Business Strategy for CPA's

Business Strategy for CPA's

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Business Strategy for CPA's episodes

  • 129 How to Spend Way Less Time on Email Every Day

    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

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    GET YOUR TIME BACK BY BEING MORE EFFECTIVE WITH EMAIL

    Do you ever get sucked into your email Inbox, wander around in there for hours, only to resurface wondering where the time went and why you went in there in the first place?

    Having a disorderly system to process your email - or worse - no system at all - can cost you hours a day of lost efficacy. Losing just ONE hour a day all year long is the equivalent of SIX and a HALF weeks of work time. 

    My guest today is Marcey Rader, a productivity expert and the President of Rader Co -  Her training company specializes in helping accountants and CPAs to get on top of their email, tasks, and their calendar.

    Today it’s all about getting your time back by learning the secrets of email processing, so that you stay out of the Inbox vortex. 

    6 Steps to get your process organized:

     

    1. Have a strategy for processing email: be intentional and thoughtful about checking it, rather than willy-nilly or “all day every day. Email strategy comes from the top down, so make sure your staff is clear about email best practices and proper etiquette.
    2. Process it like a task – do it, and be done. Don’t context switch: it leads to decision fatigue and feeling busy but not productive
    3. Know what times of day to send. Have it land when people are most likely to read it - do not send at the end of the day or at night when your reader is likely to read it. Otherwise they make worse choices. Use Delay Send (Outlook) or Send Later (Gmail) to manage send times. When you email at night, you might be interrupting your recipients’ evening or weekend.
    4. Use the OHIO Method - Only Handle It Once. See the 5 Steps for Processing email so that you can handle your email one time, rather than open-close-open-close-open-close.
    5. Turn off notifications. Your body gets used to the dopamine drip. Your default setting is designed to get you to use the product more.
    6. Create rules and filters: Emails that you don’t want to see right now have filters to go to a folder. Certain domain names or email addresses bypass the Inbox altogether.
    Use features and extensions to be more efficient: 
    • Inbox Pause – Allows you to pause new emails from landing in your Inbox
    • Boomerang – Allows you to tell emails to come back to you if it hasn’t been opened. 
    • Streak – Allows you to track email opens. It’s a powerful CRM; if you only want email tracking, then download the Chrome extension, relaunch Chrome, and select “only email tracking” when logging back in
    • Use Promotions and Updates tabs to train emails to land in the right places - Or Focus and Clutter if Outlook
    • Delay Send or Send Later – so emails land during appropriate work hours

     

    How to process email with 5 choices:
    1. Delete - the ones you don’t need
    2. Delegate - if you’re the bottleneck, send them along
    3. Archive - the emails you need to read and file away
    4. Reply - if less than 2 minutes
    5. Create a Task - move to Tasks if in Gmail or assign to task in calendar

     

    Symptoms of email addiction or lack of process:
    • If your family is on your case about it
    • If you can’t take a 15-second elevator ride without taking out your phone
    • If you’re not present when you are with people

     

    Link to the webinar that got me down to Inbox Zero and freed up my time:

    https://www.cpaacademy.org/archived_show/a0D2S00000ng1gsUAA

    Get the free gift from Marcey:

    Listeners receive the first 21 pages and all the Novice habits for Month One of Marcey's latest book, Work Well. Play More! Productive, Clutter-Free, Healthy Living - One Step at a Time. You can get that here: workwellplaymore.com/gift 

    Connect with Marcey:

    Website: https://helloraderco.com/

    ………

    Free 5-day email course - Better Pricing Strategies for CPAs

    Get here

     

    Want some help in your CPA firm, but not sure where to start?

    Schedule a free discovery call with me:

    https://calendly.com/geraldinecarter/15min

     

    Want to find out what options you might have for working together?

    More about 1:1 coaching, roadmaps, and DIY courses here:

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/coaching-options


    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

    39 min
  • 128 Selling to Serve, with James Ashford of GoProposal

    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

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    Many accountants over-service and under charge their clients. This creates a lose-lose situation, where clients don't value what the accountant does, and the accountant doesn’t isn’t charging enough to be able to provide the level of service the client actually wants.

    Not only does this undercharging result in the accountant leaving piles of cash on the table, but more importantly, the client is left wanting. 

    The thing is that it’s not a lack of expertise and information that is causing accountants to stay stuck on the hamster wheel - it’s something else. 

    Today’s guest is James Ashford.

     

    Sales misconceptions

    Many accountants carry misconceptions about sales. What are accountants missing out on when they hold false beliefs about selling, like it is and must be pushy?

     

    Adopt a sales mindset

    You need to be in a sales frame of mind - that you are always selling your ideas. It’s not simply limited to acquisition. You need to sell your clients on proper client behavior. You need to sell your staff on the direction of the company, and the culture. Sales is the most important skill, you’re selling all the time.

     

    Be clear with your clients about expectations

    Think about the skills required to get your clients to do the things you want them to do

    You need to be kind to your clients by being clear about what is expected.

    Kind and nice are not the same. By being clear about expectations, you are being kind to them because they understand what is expected of them. It’s not at all the same as being nice, which can be a falsely placed substitute for being liked. 

     

    How do you get your clients to shift from being passive to proactive?

    You’re helping your client to get one step closer to their stated goals.

    You’re helping them make the best decisions for themselves.

     

    Avoid inadvertently giving away your control out of the gates that then leads to getting walked all over and needs to be corrected, for example:

    • Meetings to overrun
    • Discounted services
    • Threw in goodies for free
    • Allows the client to control the relationship

     

    You need to set precedents at the outset to establish your role as expert and leader in the relationship.

     

    Intimidating conversations

    So often it’s the fear of rejection or disapproval that keeps accountants from moving forward. It’s not until the pain of staying still (not enough time with family, health effect, etc) exceeds the pain of the difficult conversation does the account move. 

     

    How can you make intimidating conversations come more easily, so that one does not need a health scare to discover previously unfound motivation?

    When something is a “should” you won’t do it. When it becomes a must, you will do it. 

    What had been a should, became a must in these two stories.

    “If you were to acquire your own business today, what decisions would you make today?”

     

    You’re not getting out of here alive, and you only have so many laps around the sun. 

    Time to establish what you want in your business and in your life, and build it. 

    Connect with James:

    LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesashford/

    Website: https://goproposal.com/professional-proposals/

    Book: Selling to Serve

    Free 5-day email course - Better Pricing Strategies for CPAs

    Get here

     

    Want some help in your CPA firm, but not sure where to start?

    Schedule a free discovery call with me:

    https://calendly.com/geraldinecarter/15min

     

    Want to find out what options you might have for working together?

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/coaching-options

     


    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

    35 min
  • 127 How CPAs Can Use YouTube Videos to Accelerate Growth with Hannah Smolinksi, CPA

    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

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    Today I speak with Hannah Smolinksi, CEO of Clara CFO Group, on her meteoric YouTube rise. 

    Less than 1 year ago, Hannah had less than 100 subscribers on YouTube and a few dozen on her email list. Today, she has more than 16,000 YouTube subscribers and more than 8000 people on her email list. Hannah talks with us about her success and how it has impacted her business growth. 

    What has been the impact on her business?

    • Because the lifetime value of clients is really high, there is years of value from producing videos
    • Opened up different opportunities - Hannah is now the Senior Advisor to Upside Financial, where she educates CFOs on PPP-related legislation
    • Creates truly passive income once created - like webinars that are paid afterwards

    CPAs can struggle with content marketing - it can be too shallow and doesn’t “grab”. 

    Hannah suggests listening to what people ask you the most, then responding to what people are asking. If they are asking the same question over and over again, accumulate the most common questions you get asked and then create videos from there. 

    There are a wealth of KPIs and metrics to pay attention to, but most important to watch are:

    • Total Views
    • Duration - keep it around 5 minutes

    Look at the videos that get the most views, and do more around the topics that get the most views. Hannah found that videos for Sole Proprietor videos get high viewership. 

     

    Digital Products

    There is an opportunity to do a CFO service in a 1:many model by breaking it down into something much smaller. For example, you can hone in on budgeting or cashflow, and building targeted, micro courses directed at a narrow audience.

    Hannah is building out a product ladder that includes paid webinars, advisory retainer, and more. 

    If you want to start a YouTube channel, decide to do it and: 

    • be consistent
    • learn from what other CPAs who have lots of views - what are their videos about
    • find out what people are watching

    SEO tools

    You can use these SEO tools to find out what people are searching for:

    • Tube buddy
    • VidIQ

    If you need relief on the PPP front and are bogged down with work, check out 

    Upside Financial. They have a PPP forgiveness service where the client meets with a PPP Advisor to get things done. 

     

    Here is Hannah explaining the program: https://youtu.be/_GjJojYBCtE

    If you want to get signed up for the Upside Financial referral program: https://upsidefinancial.com/referral

     

    Connect with Hannah:

    https://www.claracfo.com

    Episode mentions:

    The Traveling CPA: Around the world in 14 minutes

    Free 5-day email course - Better Pricing Strategies for CPAs

    Get here

     

    Want some help in your CPA firm, but not sure where to start?

    Schedule a free discovery call with me:

    https://calendly.com/geraldinecarter/15min

     

    Want to find out what options you might have for working together?

    More about 1:1 coaching, roadmaps, and DIY courses here:

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/coaching-options

     


    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

    32 min
  • 126 How to Implement Advisory Services with Twyla Verhelst, Leader of the Accounting Professionals Program at Freshbooks

    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆


    Twyla Verhelst is the co-founder of Eighty Twenty, an Advisory Accounting Firm. We discuss her journey of implementing Advisory Services, long before it was known as Advisory Services. We discuss the difference between what the client needs, and what the business owner needs, what questions to ask that lead to deeper insights to support Advisory Services, and how to get started simply and without overwhelm.

     

    What we cover:

    How to get started building your Advisory Services

    Rather than make assumptions about what your clients need, ask questions up front:

    1. Why did you start this business? A passion-project, or because you quit your job and you need this to feed your family?
    2. What keeps you up at night?
    3. Where is your business headed? Where do you want to see your business headed, in 6 months, 12 months, 5 years? But even now in Covid-times, how about 90 days?

     

    What patterns emerge from asking those questions of your clients?

    Cashflow cashflow cashflow. 

    While 5 and 10 year scenario planning is incredibly useful, short-term cashflow planning is the most important thing. If not done well, it makes the 5-year plan moot. 

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    What Twyla learned along the way:

    • Don’t provide metrics they see no value in
    • They may not pay you for information they don’t see value in or that matters to them
    • Present information that is digestible to them
    • How you see and understand information is not the same as how they see it
    • Understand what matters to them - and what helps them make better business decisions
    • Avoid accounting jargon and don’t be intimidating with tossing around fancy terms

     

    Twyla’s advice for those wanting to get started

    Start with one:

    • One client - don’t do it for everyone out of the gates
    • One service - don’t offer everything all at once

    Come back to :

    • what it is that you are trying to do for your client
    • what happens if you don’t tell them
    • what impact will it have if I can help them

    Connect with Twyla:

    https://www.linkedin.com/in/twylav/

     

    Other Relevant Episodes:

    053, Adding Advisory Services and the Power of Niching Down 

     

    121, Switching to Advisory Services using Profit First, with Rob Foncannon, CPA

    Software mentions:

    https://www.freshbooks.com

    Do you want your own Roadmap to Advisory Services?

    If you want to implement Advisory Services in your accounting practice, but you need something of a Roadmap so you know what path to travel, and don’t want to waste time and energy wandering in the dark,  Check out my roadmap to Advisory Services. 

    In this 30-day intensive1:1 program, we will work together hand-in-glove to get you from wanting Advisory Services, to actually Doing Advisory Services. 

    The end result is you have your first 2 advisory service clients, engagement letter signed. 

    We work together until you have that result, and you can have it inside 30 days. 

    If you’re curious, check out the Coaching Options tab on my website, SheThinksBigCoaching.com

    Free 5-day email course - Better Pricing Strategies for CPAs

    Get here

     

    Want some help in your CPA firm, but not sure where to start?

    Schedule a free discovery call with me:

    https://calendly.com/geraldinecarter/15min

     

    Want to find out what options you might have for working together?

    More about 1:1 coaching, roadmaps, and DIY courses here:

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/coaching-options


    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

    30 min
  • 125 Value and Segmented Pricing for CPAs with Pricing Expert Mark Stiving, PhD

    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆


    Most CPAs struggle with pricing - some have moved to flat-rate or subscription pricing, and some still bill by the hour.

    What they often struggle to understand is the full depth of the value they offer to their clients, and because they don’t fully understand value, they are leaving Everest Sized Mountains of Money on the table, 

    which means they have to work a lot harder to compensate for the missed opportunity. 

    Today’s guest is Mark Stiving the pricing expert behind impactpricing.com.

     

    What we cover:

    How to shift to flat-rate pricing when you have had a client whom you have billed by the hour:

    Give them Menu Pricing with 3 packages: Good, Better, Best. 

    Put last year’s average monthly bill between the Good and Better package

     

    How do you have a value conversation with your clients?

    You can’t simply ask, what is the value? Instead you must work together with your client to discover the value of your work together. You might ask...

    • If we can get you this result, what would result from that?
    • If we can move from a 7 to an 8, what would happen?
    • What’s it worth if you had that result, of ?

     

    The quantitative value takes some digging to get to, but if you ask the right questions, you can get there. 

     

    Discovering value is a two-way street:

    It’s about trying to discover how much value we are delivering to that client

    • You as a vendor have no idea how much value your customer is going to get from your product
    • The customer doesn’t know your product  and has no idea how much value they are going to get from it
    • Both of you work together to understand the value it will provide, and the client will receive.

     

    Remember:

    Before customers buy, they are buying based on perceived value. 

    After working together, they continue to buy based on actual value.

    Once we have a customer, our job is to make sure they get real value, and KNOW they got real value.

    To communicate hidden value, consider having a one-page write up

    • “Let me tell you what I did yesterday”
    • People with these problems often face these issues
    • I solved this for you
    • If you want to look more into it, here is more information 

     

    How to price by segment:

    “I charge people in this industry this amount”

    Start with what you price now, and examine your client roster to see if there is an industry that gets significan value from that service, compared to the others, and then price that segment above your basic rate. 

    Stay away from complexity!

    Keep price segmentation simple by charging businesses in a certain industry XX% more than the basic service.

    Think about where the low hanging fruit it, gain from that, and then go on to the next segment

    If a CPA has the ability to act as a Trusted Advisor, they can have an initial conversation to get the ball rolling. 

    Understanding how to do pricing well is involved, so start with industries that are not in a super-competitive market and use cost+ pricing.

     

     

    The Will I, Won’t I, or Which One? Questions:

    Will I buy, won’t I buy? – think about popcorn in a theatre. You ask yourself first, will I or won’t I buy? You are not asking “Which theatre will I buy popcorn from?”

    When people make a Will I decision, they are not as price sensitive, because options are often limited.

    Start small. Start with value-pricing for your own company, and make it work first in your own business. Then learn to have value conversations  with your clients, and then learn to coach your clients on having value conversations with their clients. 

    There’s a phenomenal opportunity for CPAs to help their clients become more profitable, you will reduce turnover, your work becomes more impactful and fulfilling, and your work becomes easier. 

     

    Connect with Mark:

    Website: https://www.impactpricing.com/

    Free 5-day email course - Better Pricing Strategies for CPAs

    Get here

     

    Want some help in your CPA firm, but not sure where to start?

    Schedule a free discovery call with me:

    https://calendly.com/geraldinecarter/15min

     

    Want to find out what options you might have for working together?

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/coaching-options


    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

    35 min
  • 124 4 Most Common Hiring Mistakes CPAs Make and What to Do Instead

    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆


    Erin Longmoon, Owner of Zephyr Recruiting shares the 4 most common hiring mistakes business owners make, and what to do instead. There is a reason that so many business owners have hiring PTSD and staff that are challenging: hiring correctly is not as easy as it looks. Erin is on a mission to eradicate toxic workplaces by helping clients find the RIGHT FIT (™) employee.

    Today Erin shares the 4 most common hiring mistakes business owners make, and what to do instead. 

     

    The 4 most common mistakes made when hiring:

    1. Hiring someone you know or someone who was referred to you by someone you know. This actually does not have to be a hiring mistake if done correctly. In fact, using your network to grow your team is a great tactic, the problem is that it often leads to having unconscious bias that this person must be a great fit if they are being endorsed by a trusted source, especially when it is someone you are close to. We are therefore no longer able to see this candidate objectively or clearly. 

    2. Hiring primarily for skills, education, and experience. You know the drill, you see that really impressive resume in your inbox and think “wow, if I can get this person on my team, we will be light years ahead of our competitors”, or “we can finally elevate our service offerings”, or some version of that. You interview the person, are totally impressed with their knowledge and expertise, and you pull out all the stops to get them, and they start with you – you scored!!! But... at some point, usually within a few months of hiring them, something is not right and BAM! It backfires! Why? Because culture fit was ignored. It is imperative, I repeat, i-m-p-e-r-a-t-i-v-e that culture fit is taken as seriously as skills, education, certifications, and experience.

    3. Not having a recruiting strategy. Think of recruiting as a project, with a beginning, middle and end, and with a measurable goal to let you know you have succeeded, (in this case, finding your BEST FIT™ employee). And just like all projects you need to identify objectives and goals, allocate resources ($ and people), create an action plan- basically you need strategy for the project to succeed. Many small business employers just identify the need to hire and jump right to posting a job and hoping it works- but hope is NOT a strategy! Recruiting is a whole industry for a reason, it takes methodology, expertise, experience, strategy, and more to be consistently successful.

    4. Not doing your full due diligence when vetting a candidate. You created a strategy, now you have to use it, consistently. Often, we end up fast-tracking a candidate because they seem great during the first interview, and you need someone NOW! So, you jump to the offer, skipping all the steps you identified in your Recruiting Strategy. This is a huge mistake because: 

      1. You could miss big red flags and critical information that can come back to bite you after you made the hire. 
      2. You could make a quick decision to not hire someone and they could end up having been your BEST FIT™, but because you did not follow your strategy, you missed out. This often happens with unconscious bias as well. 
      3. It could get you into compliance trouble. Every candidate MUST go through the same process per hiring cycle. By having a well outlined process, that is followed with each candidate, you mitigate your risk for discrimination lawsuits, and if you do get sued, it will help you defend your case, by being able to prove you have a process that every candidate goes through equally. 

    If you want the *solutions* – what to do instead, email me at Subject =  4 Mistakes Hiring PDF, and I will send you the PDF. 

    Bonus tips:

    • Anticipate 2-3 months from deciding to hire, to having the spot filled. 
    • Anticipate 4 - 6 weeks of training. 

     

    That means you will want to start thinking about the hiring process 4 - 6 months before you actually need the person to be up and running. 

    ----------------

    Connect with Erin and get “20 Questions to Determine Culture Fit”:

    Website: https://www.zephyrrecruiting.com/

    LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/longmoon/

    --------

    Free 5-day email course - Better Pricing Strategies for CPAs

    Get here

     

    Want some help in your CPA firm, but not sure where to start?

    Schedule a free discovery call with me:

    https://calendly.com/geraldinecarter/15min

     

    Want to find out what options you might have for working together?

    More about 1:1 coaching, roadmaps, and DIY courses here:

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/coaching-options

     


    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

    28 min
  • 123 Overcoming Under-earning and Rewire for Wealth with Author Barbara Huson (pka Barbara Stanny)

    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆


    Today I speak with Author Barbara Huson (previously known as Barbara Stanny) Overcoming Under-earning and her new book, Rewire for Wealth.

    Barbara Huson is the leading authority on women, wealth and power. As a bestselling author, financial therapist, teacher & wealth coach, Barbara has helped millions take charge of their finances and their lives. We discuss overcoming under-earning and how your mind must Rewire for Wealth. 

    Barbara is the author of 6 books:

    • Prince Charming Isn’t Coming: How Women Get Smart About Money
    • Secrets of Six-Figure Women: Surprising Strategies to up Your Earnings and

    Change Your Life

    • Overcoming Underearning: A Five-Step Plan to a Richer Life
    • Finding a Financial Advisor You Can Trust: A Guide for Investors and Those Who

    Want To Be

    • Breaking Through: Getting Past the Stuck Points in Your Life
    • Sacred Success: A Course in Financial Miracles
    • Her 7th book, Rewire for Wealth 

    In her new book, Rewire for Wealth, we discuss the 3 steps any woman can take at any time to rewire:

    1. Recognize - your thoughts and the lines you repeat to yourself as if they are true
    2. Reframe - how else you can think about things through different lenses
    3. Respond - what new choices you will make now that you know something different to be true

     

    We also discuss: 

    • How you can recognize whether or not you are under-earning. It’s relative to your potential and your desire to earn more
    • The element of co-dependency in the accounting profession
    • How growing your income requires changing your self-image
    • The goal of 7-figure earning women is not more profit, but greatness

    Connect with Barbara:

    www.Barbara-Huson.com

     

    Rewire for Wealth: https://www.amazon.com/Rewire-Wealth-Program-Financial-Success/dp/1260464237/ref=sr_1_1?crid=BOB4NO2P1SW1&dchild=1&keywords=rewire+for+wealth&qid=1611707302&sprefix=rewire+for+we%2Caps%2C191&sr=8-1

     

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    Upcoming Events:

    How to Deliver Rolling Forecasts to Your Clients with Laura Landmark

    Tues Feb 9th noon ET

    Email [email protected] with “Rolling Forecast” in the subject line and I will send you the calendar invite.

     

    //////////

     

    If you suspect you are under-earning and you are ready to do something about it, 

    Schedule time with Geraldine:

    https://calendly.com/geraldinecarter/15min

     

    Work with Geraldine:

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/coaching-options

     

    Download the ebook “6 Simple Steps to Double Your Revenue”

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/download-double-your-revenue


    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

    27 min
  • 122 The Pioneer of Value-Based Fees in the Consulting Profession, Alan Weiss, Ph.D.

    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆


    Today I speak with Alan Weiss, owner of Summit Consulting and author of more than 60 business books, including Value-Based Fees, Million Dollar Consulting, Fearless leadership, and more. 

     

    What we cover:

    Value-pricing requires a wholesale shift in thinking. 

    You have to do a 180 - from starting with your costs and building to some form of cost+,

    to starting with the client’s objectives, what they are coming to you to help them accomplish, determining what that is worth to them, and pricing back from there. 

    Once you can do that, then… the really the first sale is always to yourself. You need to be able to say these numbers to yourself in front of a mirror without turning red. 

    No doubt there will be a big swing in your actual prices. In many cases, my clients are charging 4 - 10 times what they would have had they set their prices based off hourly rates. You will need to get used to this shift, on the inside. 

    Other shifts in thinking include how you frame what you do.  The value to your client isn’t in the doing. The value to your client is what your doing creates. 

    Cranking out numbers isn’t it. But cranking out numbers that are scenario plans that help a client make a better informed decision that doubles her margins – that has real value. 

    Reframe all that CPA terminology. 

    Your clients don’t understand activities you perform, like:

    • monitor activity for any fixed asset/ intangible capitalization items
    • maintain fixed asset reports 
    • maintain proper accumulated depreciation records

    What does the above DO, for your clients? Keep them out of hot water? Help them save tens of thousands of dollars? Reframe, reframe, reframe. 

    There are limits to the value of compliance. 

    Become an expert in the finance and business side of things for your clients. When you look at your client’s prices, the cost of creating products and services, what the market will bear, and ensuring margins are in the right zone, suddenly the value you provide can skyrocket. 

    Consider: who else in your clients’ network of vendors they work with, can provide this level of expertise? 

    No one. 

    You are uniquely positioned to help them grow their business. 

    Behind every corporate objective is a personal objective.

    Clients want to create financial value, but there are often deeper reasons that motivate them. 

    Those might include:

    • Saving time, getting time back, going from a 50-hr work week to a 40-hr work week (get home for dinner, happy marriage!)
    • Stop wasting money to free it up to use elsewhere in the budget (look good for the boss, get promotion)
    • Stop stressing and fretting about business (my kids tell me I’m always distracted, and I feel like I’m losing them/missing their lives)

    Focus on results.

    Always think and act in your client’s best interest. Focus on outcomes and results. Consider how you will improve their condition, and how they will be better once you’re gone. When you orient your business around getting results for your clients, everything gets easier. 

    Connect with Alan:

    Website: https://www.alanweisss.com/

    Episode mentions:

    111 - Better Pricing Methodologies For CPA Firms, with Jonathan Stark

    106 - Better Pricing Strategies for Accountants: Stop Billing by the Hour, with Jonathan Stark

    081 - Time To Rethink Your Pricing Strategy?

    Free 5-day email course - Better Pricing Strategies for CPAs

    Get here

     

    Download the ebook “6 Simple Steps to Double Your Revenue”

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/download-double-your-revenue

     

    Schedule time with Geraldine:

    https://calendly.com/geraldinecarter/15min

     

    Work with Geraldine:

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/coaching-options

     


    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

    25 min
  • 121 Switching to Advisory Services using Profit First, with Rob Foncannon, CPA

    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆


    Today I speak with Rob Foncannon, owner of Foncannon Tax & Financial Services about how Profit First has impacted his business and his clients’ businesses. 

     

    Rob talks about 

    • What Profit First is and what it’s not
    • How it helps business owners become better stewards of their cash
    • The effect it has on the business owner’s profitability

     

    Misconceptions and Objections

    Some CPAs will raise objections, asking if you can’t accomplish the same thing with a spreadsheet and percentages. Rob explains that it’s more than that: intentionally moving your cash and directing it to where you want to spend it changes the mindset of the business owner and puts them in charge of their money. 

     

    Rob’s Foncannon’s Niches

    Rob focuses on chiropractors and Financial Advisors. The chiropractors because they are open-minded and accept guidance, and the Financial Advisors because they too need cash flow advice and see it as a useful tool for their clients as well. 

    If you are curious about Profit First, Rob suggests starting with the book, Profit First, and implementing it in your own business to appreciate the effect it can have. 

    Connect with Rob:

    Website: https://foncannontax.com/

    Website Mentions:

    https://profitfirstprofessionals.com/

    Get the Book:

    https://www.amazon.com/Profit-First-Transform-Cash-Eating-Money-Making-ebook/dp/B01HCGYTH4

     

    Free 5-day email course - Better Pricing Strategies for CPAs

    Get here

     

    Upcoming training: 

    Value in Pricing: How to assess it, increase it, and get your clients to see it

    Thursday, February 18th, 12pm ET  

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/free-stuff/

     

    Schedule time with Geraldine:

    https://calendly.com/geraldinecarter/15min

     

    Work with Geraldine:

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/coaching-options

     


    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

    27 min
  • 120 Cloud Accounting Technology and Software, with Blake Oliver

    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆


    Today I speak with Blake Oliver, co-host of the Cloud Accounting Podcast and Marketing Director at Jirav. 

     

    What we cover:

    Where is accounting technology going? And what are the implications that you think accountants and CPAs are not seeing?

    How should CPAs and accountants differentiate themselves?

    What advice do you have for CPAs in e-commerce, given the need for software to manage inventory and transactions?

    Discussion around owning the tech stack as a business strategy.

    What keeps CPAs from making better strategic use of technology in the accounting practices?

    You wrote somewhere that when you started back in your bookkeeping days and developing cloud accounting software, that you wanted to disrupt the business model. What is the business model specifically that you want to disrupt? And what is it you want to shift it into? 

    If you were to build your own accounting practice, around your own software stack, what do you think you'd build? And who do you think you'd have as clients?

    You have held a number of marketing positions inside software companies that provide applications for accounting related applications. What do you think CPAs need to know about marketing?

    Connect with Blake:

    Website: https://www.blakeoliver.com/

    Episode mentions:

    078 - How To Design Better Workflows In Your Business with David Cristello

    Software mentions:

    Melio

    https://www.meliopayments.com/

     

    OneNote

    https://www.onenote.com/signin?wdorigin=ondc

     

    Jirav

    https://www.jirav.com/

    Free 5-day email course - Better Pricing Strategies for CPAs

    Get here

     

    Download the ebook “6 Simple Steps to Double Your Revenue”

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/download-double-your-revenue

     

    Schedule time with Geraldine:

    https://calendly.com/geraldinecarter/15min

     

    Work with Geraldine:

    https://shethinksbigcoaching.com/coaching-options


    Announcing the *NEW* Client Success Stories podcast: 

    https://business-strategy-for-cpas-success-stories.transistor.fm/

    👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆👆

    35 min

About Business Strategy for CPA's

From the publisher's feed

Business Strategy for CPAs: work less and make more. You know how to be an accountant – it’s running your business you need help with. With guests interviews and solo episodes, you will get business…