Leave an impression. Show clients something new.

To attract, win and hold onto clients, you have to impress them. My thoughts could ruffle some feathers, but I really just want you to flaunt them 🐦🐤 🦆 🦃 🐓 🦉 🦅 🐥 🕊️

I have worked in marketing, and focused on accountancy business owners and their clients, for almost 7 years now, and I still think that the services we discuss are drab enough to put a volcano to sleep 😴😂 Joking.

Such helpful work, but it’s so hard to package as sellable, or special, amongst your peers. And yet so many firms succeed at it.

Accountants are gatekeepers to a client’s goals, and their 3 freedoms, but you’ve got to wade through a marsh of expertise and jargon to get there.

So how do you leave an impression? How do you create something ‘new’? 🤯

Most services only mean something to people who already PROVIDE, RECEIVE or NEED the service.

They’re not special.

They’re not a foundation for brand loyalty. They’re convenient.

Give us some romance.

Someone who’s underserviced by their current accountant, and is looking elsewhere, or being poached, is going to do the same when you miss something 🤷. No matter what 360° promises you’ve made.

We want cupid to make you look like a match made in heaven 🏹 but how are we gonna wine & dine these people…?

Let’s take a look at you… the company website… the services tab… omg that riveting dropdown. Not only is it the same as every accountant-and-their-dog’s – but most of it goes over Joe Public’s head!

Show them something NEW.

What’s good about those solutions? … Who are they for? What are the benefits?

Talk in tangible specifics.

Who do you work with?

Look through the eyes of a client 👀

In a market full of ‘accountants’, ‘FD’s’ and ‘business advisors’, all competing to service ‘your business’ and ‘your needs’… a focused theme of buzzwords can look pretty damn fresh. Even new.

Let visitors identify themselves as your perfect customer, and you as their perfect accountant.

Pick the right buzzwords to build your specialism💥

Look at yourself. You’re a business owner, as well as an accountant… that’s a superpower an employee cannot pitch. You can relate to your clients better than a professional.

Look at yourself again (yes, I’m the Old Spice guy). If you’ve come from an industry background, you’re more experienced in applying the numbers to real business.

Look at your business… now look at your clients. Focus on the work that your favourite clients depend on, and relate to… Do they use Shopify? Are there lots of start-ups? Agencies? A common sector? A common size? Let them know you specialise in their unique set of needs.

It doesn’t necessarily matter how you start to categorise/segment clients, as long as it’s focused and in their language.

Whatever you find yourself regularly doing… whoever you find yourself regularly servicing… highlight it, it speaks louder than a long list of all the possible services.

1. You’re not losing that long list, you’re just reserving it for a later conversation, or a ‘read more’ button.

Landing on your website is an initial introduction. The long list is too much information to digest, in an initial introduction. It’s not big and it’s not clever 😉 It’s vague.

What benefits do you bring?

It doesn’t have to be revolutionary to be new. It just has to feel NEW. Or BIGGER. Or BETTER.

Push the mainstream down with sass. Xero? QuickBooks? Everybody’s got that (and soon everybody will)… tell your visitors it’s basic. Then talk about the next level. Talk about what an expert with experience can harness through that compliance software. If you’re in the 1%, you’ve been on the cloud for tiiiiime. So don’t group yourself with the newbies, or those still moving over.

A firm I really like, Elevate Advice, head their services list with ‘Everything you’d expect’. It’s just badass. Numbers UK Ltd fill their blog with showcases of their successes with clients. It’s really convincing. I don’t umm and ahhh about these folks, I know they mean business. They’re on it like a car bonnet.

Sell the services on your website. Don’t list them.

‘Spotlight lets you make better business decisions.’ Big woop. Decisions such as…? Each service deserves a testimonial, or a case study, so that a visitor has something to measure their own life against. Make your forecasting pitch different.

‘We offer tax planning to our clients’. Nice one. How’s about we separate the poseurs from the performers. Everybody says ‘tax planning’ on their websites. Everybody drops the R&D bomb too. What about the other tax gap? That’s new:

Did you know that most tax reliefs are grossly underclaimed, and that there’s f#cking loads of tax reliefs out there? I bet plenty of clients & prospects don’t know. If you regularly plan ahead, and marry up clients with tax reliefs… you offer something NEW that’s better than the majority. 💪

Marketing = Sculpting your own reputation.

People are browsing your website right now. They differentiate you from your competition by reading your benefits, testimonials & prices. Their opinions are influenced by other people’s opinions.

I like music. I like talking about a band that’s unique and blowing up underground. I like telling people to check them out. It makes me feel fancy and cool, and if they like the band, they also like my opinion a bit more. The same applies here.

Your clients will develop an opinion of you. If you’re generic, their opinion will be ‘meh’ 😫 They might love the people in your business, but if those characteristics contradict the business as-a-whole, it’s not as impactful.

If you help sculpt their opinion, if you push for a specialism and an identity, there’s some substance for clients to be proud of, and to be part of.

You might feel a bit cringy at times 🤭 but trust, we’ve never ever developed without cringing along the way. It might feel like you’re ‘forcing’ it, as your identity develops, but I reckon that’s the voice of doubt speaking. The same voice that you ignored when you decided to set up your own business, in the first place 🖕

A sense of identity, outside of what’s normal, gets you looking like you have an advantage over the competition. An air of confidence. And before you know it, you might just.

Diagnostax

If you want to know how to harness the power of tax diagnostic software, to show a client something new – to win a client, onboard them or solidify a relationship – just click here.