As a business owner, you might already be considering what the next chapter in your tax or accounting firm looks like. But getting through the routine operations and reserving time to actually plan for growth and development can be tricky—especially at the end of a busy year.
What are some of the most important things to remember as you plan for the next phase of your firm’s growth?
How can you implement recommended strategies to protect your current level of business, while also opening doors for future expansion?
Are major players at your firm aligned with the steps it will take to get where you need to go?
As you look forward to 2023, we want to help ensure that your accounting firm growth is successful. To help save time, we’ve rounded up some of the tips many accounting firms apply to find sustainable growth.
4 Tips for Scaling Your Tax or Accounting Firm Next Year
Scaling CPA firms requires diligence, determination, and a dose of savvy planning. Even if your level of activity (or revenue) is where you want it to be, there’s always a next step or level. Moving forward means making important investments in the long-term outlook of your business.
Which Growth Strategies Can Help Scale My Accounting Firm?
Scaling involves a combination of factors, including resources that are related to time, people, and technology. A proper growth strategy is one that takes these resources into account and leverages them to produce a better result in the year ahead.
Check out the tips below for practical, actionable insights about what it will take to move forward and grow throughout the upcoming year.
Tip 1: Know Your Target Audience (Market Research)
Future growth depends on knowing as much as you can about your intended audience and target market. Dedicated research on who your ideal clients are and what they want to accomplish provides a path to growth that’s easier to follow.
Ask important questions about potential clients and their expectations, pain points, and financial realities.
- What does my firm specialize in? (How is that unique to competitors?)
- Who am I trying to reach through marketing, outreach, and new service offerings?
- What pain points or frustrations does my ideal client have?
- How does my service solve those specific client needs and frustrations?
Once you have valuable client or customer data, put it to practical use, and apply those findings to specific business decisions. For example, if your core client base stays with your firm because of a particular financial experience, consider how you can expand that to reach a larger group of clients in the new year.
Tip 2: Leverage Digital Platforms for Marketing Reach
One important growth mindset to accept and embrace is the idea of working smarter, not harder. Digital platforms like CoutingWorks PRO can easily eliminate some of the mundane, behind-the-scenes work in your firm. This results in having more time to think creatively about the growth objectives that really matter.
In the next year, work on expanding your marketing reach with tools and features such as:
- Automated email nurturing
- Done-for-you social media posts
- User-friendly onboarding and scheduling tools
- Simplified client portals for quick onboarding and client work
Remember, using technology to remove points of friction can allow you to expand without sacrificing the client experience. This is especially true when you use technology to deliver expertly branded marketing experiences while you spend more time on expanding your actual business processes.
Tip 3: Be Proactive in Client Acquisition
As amazing as it would be if new clients simply found your firm in recurring waves, client acquisition has to be an intentional process in your overall growth strategy. In other words, you’ve got to think about it proactively if you want to experience growth in your firm this upcoming year.
Fortunately, you can demystify the client acquisition process with elements that may already be in place. Dedicate yourself to client-forward activities and service offerings, such as:
- Optimizing your accounting firm’s primary website
- Improving your search engine optimization (SEO) results
- Advancing your content marketing options
- Nurturing new leads and prospects (with timely messages that hold value)
- Creating processes that respond to new requests quickly and professionally
When it comes to growing your firm, client acquisition is a no-brainer. It’s time to start finding high quality leads that have the potential to become valuable clients right away.
Tip 4: Become a Thought Leader in the Accounting Industry
Let’s face it—there are plenty of players in the tax and accounting niche. When firms unlock their unique place in the industry, it’s more likely that those firms stand a chance to grow and reach new tiers of success.
But how can you, as the owner of a tax or accounting firm, accomplish this in a crowded market? By becoming the voice that your prospective clients (and even other professionals) turn to. Thought leadership changes the narrative and puts you in the driver’s seat for the financial conversations that people want to have.
Transforming into a thought leader means producing unique, branded content that clients can only find at your firm or on your specific website. You might also reserve time for community-based activities that expand your reach beyond a certain location.
- Network in local business associations or community circles
- Participate in expert-led panels or discussions
- Host virtual events and invite different segments of your audience (new and existing clients)
- Take a more creative role in digital marketing opportunities
- Speak on podcasts, interviews, or other social media channels
Create Sustainable Growth at Your Accounting or CPA Firm
Sustainable growth isn’t the same as a short-term fix. Yes, you might be able to incorporate a few unique marketing trends and tactics at any given time, but are they worthwhile in the long run?
As you plan the best path to growth for your accounting practice, make sure your strategy is full of enduring tactics that have been tested over the course of time and in a variety of contexts.
- As always, you should create the foundation by understanding and defining your brand fully.
- Then, leverage specific technologies and platforms that alleviate the manual processes that hold you back.
- Finally, use this winning combination to reach new clientele with a highly curated package of products and services that solve specific frustrations in a given context.
Build Your Accounting Services with CountingWorks PRO
It’s almost the new year, and that means your growth goals are at the forefront of planning and preparation. Don’t let the busyness of the first quarter distract you from making these objectives a reality.
You can solve business challenges, grow, and scale your tax or accounting business today.
CountingWorks PRO can automate your processes and remove the stress associated with stages of new growth and development. If you already know that it’s time to adapt to modern trends and scale smarter—you’ve come to the right place. Contact us to speak with an expert.
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