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MARKETING & SALES

Three Ways to Follow Up with Prospects

Young businessman on phone with colorful world map background

This is the key to 98 percent of your sales.

By Sandi Leyva
The Complete Guide to Marketing for Tax & Accounting Firms

It seems there are hundreds of questions swirling around how to follow up with prospects.

MORE: Are You Throwing Away Profits? | Want to Close a Deal? Set a Deadline | Five Business Development Mistakes to Avoid | How to Leverage ChatGPT During This Crazy Tax Season | Eight Steps to Getting Started with AI: A Guide for Tax Professionals | You Don’t Have a Time Problem | Three Money Leaks and How to Plug Them | Eleven Ways to Serve Clients Even Better | Eight Ways to Build Busy-Season Stamina | Make Your Prospect Kit Stand Out | Six Ways to Beat the Competition | Grow Your Revenue with Three Marketing Strategies | What Can ChatGPT Do for Accounting Professionals?
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The raw truth is that very few people follow up at all. On average, only 2 percent of people buy on the first contact with a vendor.

So if you’re not following up, you’re walking away from 98 percent of your sales.
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PRO Member Exclusive

Are You Throwing Away Profits?

$50 bills in a wastebasket

Nine things to stop doing today.

By Sandi Leyva
The Complete Guide to Marketing for Tax & Accounting Firms

A critical measure for accountants – whether they bill either by the hour or a fixed price – is the amount they bill clients each month. As anxious as many accountants are to raise their revenues, their daily activity often sabotages that goal with the same common billing mistakes.

MORE: Want to Close a Deal? Set a Deadline | How Mindset Affects Your Marketing | How to Use ChatGPT to Create Images | How to Leverage ChatGPT During This Crazy Tax Season | Got FOMO When It Comes to AI and ChatGPT? You Should: Here’s What You’re Missing | Eight Steps to Getting Started with AI: A Guide for Tax Professionals | How to Weather Any Economic Storm | Leverage Your Strengths to Beat Stress | You Don’t Have a Time Problem | Are You Crossing Off Your Business Bucket List? | Three Money Leaks and How to Plug Them
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Here’s a checklist so you can compare your behavior with the list. I’ll give some tips on how to break the bad habit, and the rest will be up to you.

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MARKETING & SALES

Want to Close a Deal? Set a Deadline

hourglass on money background

Five ways to make it work.

By Sandi Leyva
The Complete Guide to Marketing for Tax & Accounting Firms

In the accounting profession, there are a ton of deadlines. Month-end, quarter-end and year-end. Payroll taxes, sales taxes and corporate taxes. And extension deadlines, filing deadlines and payment deadlines, to name just a few.

MORE: How Mindset Affects Your Marketing | Three Steps to Becoming a Millionaire | How to Use ChatGPT to Create Images | Create a Bad Website in Ten Easy Steps | Leverage Your Strengths to Beat Stress | Are You Crossing Off Your Business Bucket List? | Ten Ways to Make Your Business Irresistible | Five Ways to Target the Low-Hanging Fruit | Are Your Revenue Projections Realistic? | Six Strategies to Make More without Working More | The Art of Prompt Engineering for Accountants | Calculate Your Business Relationship Ratios
GoProCPA.comExclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

 

All of these deadlines may be a headache to business owners and accountants alike, but they are a marketer’s dream come true. How can you use deadlines to your advantage in marketing your services? And what if you are selling a service that is not in the accounting profession? Keep reading and we’ll answer these questions and provide you with five ways to woo your prospect with deadlines.
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MARKETING & SALES

How Mindset Affects Your Marketing

Smiling businesswoman

Even after years of experience, confidence may not come easy.

By Sandi Leyva
The Complete Guide to Marketing for Tax & Accounting Firms

In school, during both my undergraduate courses and my MBA classes, I took Marketing 101, or something close to that. I learned the four P’s: product, price, place and promotion. I aced the class.

MORE: Three Steps to Becoming a Millionaire | Five Business Development Mistakes to Avoid | How to Leverage ChatGPT During This Crazy Tax Season | Eight Steps to Getting Started with AI: A Guide for Tax Professionals | You Don’t Have a Time Problem | Three Money Leaks and How to Plug Them | Eleven Ways to Serve Clients Even Better | Eight Ways to Build Busy-Season Stamina | Make Your Prospect Kit Stand Out | Six Ways to Beat the Competition | Grow Your Revenue with Three Marketing Strategies | What Can ChatGPT Do for Accounting Professionals?
GoProCPA.comExclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

 

When I started my first business at age 13, I ran an ad and was able to get clients. It was no big deal. When I wanted to earn some part-time money during college doing bookkeeping (before I passed my CPA exam), I answered an ad and found clients. It was no big deal. When I started a part-time photography studio in the 1980s, I sent out press releases and direct mail and got clients. It was no big deal. I was doing all of this on the side while I had full-time jobs paying the rent and everything else.

But when I got laid off in the 1990s and needed clients in order to go out on my own and pay my own rent, something in me snapped. I was scared to death. I suddenly had no idea how to get started getting clients. I could have run an ad, but I didn’t. I could have sent out direct mail, but I didn’t.
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PRO Member Exclusive

Three Steps to Becoming a Millionaire

Dump “nonprofit” tasks and focus on the high-value ones.

By Sandi Leyva
The Complete Guide to Marketing for Tax & Accounting Firms

Let’s do the math. To earn a million dollars in a year, you have to bring in $83,333 per month. Assuming you bill hourly and work for the standard 1,000 billable hours per year, you need to charge $1,000 per hour. If you want to make $5 million in one year, you will need to charge $5,000 per hour.

MORE: Five Business Development Mistakes to Avoid | Twelve Ways Your Business Card Can Hurt You | Got FOMO When It Comes to AI and ChatGPT? You Should: Here’s What You’re Missing | How to Weather Any Economic Storm | Ten Ways to Have More Energy This Tax Season | Seven Steps to Keeping Your Clients Forever | Give to Receive, and Eight More Ways to Boost Sales | Five Things That Clients Don’t Know about Accountants | Five Ways to Wow Your Clients | How to Fight Feeling Overwhelmed | You’re Missing 60% of Your Revenue | Make the Most of CPE Conferences
GoProCPA.comExclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

 

Here’s some breaking news: You won’t get there doing tasks that are worth $10 per hour. Even if we drop a zero and aim for six figures in a year, you won’t get there doing $10-per-hour tasks either. At six figures, you’re worth $100 per hour.

The difference between poor people and rich people is simple: One values the scarcity of their time and uses every minute wisely, and the other doesn’t.
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