When Minnesota accounting and advisory firm Copeland Buhl reached out to us, they were looking for a new website to better compete against regional and national rivals. However, they also understood that their marketing needed an overhaul. Leadership candidly admitted, “We were actually terrible at self-promotion. We had very little brand recognition in the marketplace for the size of firm we are, and we were doing almost nothing to get our name out there.”

The firm had undergone a rebranding in 2018, but it was never fully implemented. At the same time, they lacked the hands-on marketing leadership it takes to deliver an effective marketing strategy. Clearly, there was work to do. And a website was just part of the answer.

We began with research to understand their marketplace and uncover the firm’s strengths and weaknesses. We learned that their clients were extremely loyal. In fact, they almost never left. We realized that while Copeland Buhl was not substantively different from other regional accounting firms, we could give them a differentiated story to tell. And we even distilled this positioning down to a simple, compact tagline:

Your firm for life

This phrase contains a double meaning: 1) they help both business and high-net-worth clients navigate life’s financial challenges; and 2) they are committed to taking the long-term view so their clients can live the lives they always wanted.

Working with Hinge, Copeland Buhl developed a much more dependable marketing engine. Not only is their brand more credible and engaging, their marketing drives real results. They moved up 4 positions in Accounting Today’s rankings of the largest accounting firms in the Midwest, from #20 to #16. Entering the engagement, they had set a growth target of 7%. Instead, they achieved a 13% year-over-year growth rate—nearly double their expectations.

Their website performance drove greater visibility and engagement. The number of keywords that ranked in the top 10 of Google searches grew by a factor of three. SEO and other marketing activities attracted 65% more active users on the site. And when visitors got there, they had 33% more engaged sessions—meaning they were more qualified and interested in what the site had to offer.

Perhaps the ultimate validation of our partnership was Copeland Buhl’s acquisition by top-50 accounting firm Frazier & Deeter. Rather than positioning the firm as a turnaround project, our brand engagement built genuine market equity—transforming the organization into a thriving, high-value firm operating from a position of strength.