Today's Features
MARKETING & SALES

Put Thought Leadership into Your Marketing

Businesswoman lassoing light bulb

You can’t just acquire new business. You have to retain it.

By Jody Grunden
Building the Virtual CFO Firm in the Cloud

I bet you can imagine that marketing a virtual accounting firm is different than it is for traditional brick-and-mortar accounting firms. When you’re only serving your local area, you need to focus on things like signage, local advertising, the Yellow Pages, your website, Google My Business, Yelp, Chamber of Commerce and word-of-mouth referrals. Those are all great ways to get noticed by people in your area who would benefit from the services you offer.

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When your customer base isn’t confined to a specific location, however, it changes the game a bit. You still want word-of-mouth referrals and you still need a website, but it becomes even more important to focus on search engine optimization (SEO) and thought leadership – developing your online platform, publishing articles with industry publications, speaking, etc. – to help people discover your services.
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ADVISORY & CONSULTING

Build Growth into Your CAS Blueprint

Business hand holding hot chart in crystal ball

Responding to demand is not enough. You need a plan.

By Hitendra Patil
Client Accounting Services: The Definitive Success Guide

For many firms, client accounting services begins with a single strategic question and grows into a powerful service line. Today, CAS is not just a value-add but a crucial driver of relevance, client loyalty and sustainable revenue. This growth indicates a promising future for firms willing to invest in CAS expansion.

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The 2024 AICPA/CPA.com CAS Benchmark Survey shows that CAS is no longer in its early stages. It is now progressing rapidly, with a median growth rate of 17 percent, and more than half of the firms expect to increase CAS revenue by 25 percent or more in the following year. Despite this growth, only 21 percent of firms have a formal CAS strategy in place. Without clear direction, growth efforts are scattered, leading to inconsistent client targeting, disjointed marketing and uncoordinated service delivery. As a result, capacity hits a ceiling, ideal client profiles become unclear and the value firms provide goes unrecognized outside their existing client base.
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PRO Member Exclusive

What Are Your Clients’ Children Inheriting? They Need to Be Prepared 

portrait of Randy Fox
Fox
 Randy A. Fox, CFP, AEP is the founder of Two Hawks Consulting LLC. He is a nationally known wealth strategist, philanthropic estate planner, educator and speaker.

Consider options beyond donor advised funds.

By Randy A. Fox
The Holistic Guide to Wealth Management

After interviewing several thousand high-net-worth families, The U.S. Trust Study of the Philanthropic Conversation found that one-third of respondents (31%) would switch to a new advisor if that advisor could talk to them meaningfully about philanthropy.

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Think about that for a second. One-third of affluent families would switch to a new advisor if that individual was more adept than their current advisor at helping them give their money away. It has nothing to do with investment returns, asset allocation or finding hot alternative investments. It has to do with understanding the client’s values and seeing the whole picture.
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MARKETING & SALES

Four Questions for Setting Firm Strategy

businessman turning compass labeled "strategy" like a steering wheel

Which segment will you target?

By August Aquila
MAX: Maximize Productivity, Profitability and Client Retention

We’ve discussed marketing audits. Once we have some firmwide objectives, we need to select strategies. There are many ways to accomplish something, and it is necessary to select how you are going to go about doing it.

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Let’s look at four different strategies.

  1. Cost Reduction. As new forms of technology and artificial intelligence enter the workplace, it is increasingly possible to achieve a competitive advantage by using them to reduce the cost-of-service delivery. Tax processing software is a common example that firms have used over the last 20 years. AI could help firms reduce costs in multiple areas of the firm, from tax research to improving processes.

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