Propero Partners’ The State of Digital Marketing in Professional Services report, which surveyed 370 senior staff – of which 30% came from accounting firms, found that 51% of accountancy firms have a business twitter compared to 84% of law firms.

Despite over three quarters of accountancy firms having a Linkedin page they are still falling behind the 90% of law firms.

CCH Daily has previously spoken to small practitioners that do not have a website, with them stating that due to receiving a large workload they do not need or want to have a website which would attract more business enquiries.

As it currently stands, PwC claims the top spot, out of the Big Four, with its twitter following having 73,100 followers. Deloitte comes in second place with 53,000, followed by KPMG who has 45,000 followers and EY with 19,100.

The ICAEW currently has 38,900 twitter followers with the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) falling behind with 33,400.

James Noble, partner at Propero Partners, said: ‘As a whole, the professional services sector is active on social media, but this report highlights that accountancy firms do lag behind. By failing to engage on social media, firms are effectively lining the pockets of their competitors.

‘By failing to have even a simple website, you are immediately limiting the number of new business enquiries you’re likely to receive and look antiquated against your competitors.’

Over half of these accounting firms fail to allocate an annual marketing budget despite over 72% agreeing that firms will need to embrace digital marketing strategies in the future as they are showing to be effective.

Noble said: ‘It is curious that accountancy firms see the value of digital marketing but are not investing in it themselves to drum up new business. One of the reasons behind this might be tight margins – 19% of these respondents said they don’t receive any new enquiries month-to-month.

‘We also saw a direct correlation between the number of accountancy firms which invest in marketing and receive regular enquiries – 22% of firms which spend more than £20,000 per year on marketing benefit from more new business queries. The report also showed that accountancy firms trail behind the legal sector when it comes to investing in marketing – 39% of law firms spend £20,000 or more on marketing per year – and reap the benefits.’