BUSY SEASON MANAGEMENT

Get Clients to Understand Firm Processes … or Say Goodbye

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woman in a business suit waving a red flag

With just a little advanced marketing, you can get paid year-round AND have more satisfied clients.

By Frank Stitely
The Relentless CPA

When I’m frustrated, here’s how I explain the importance to clients of letting us work our process:

“When you get your car repaired, you don’t look over the mechanic’s shoulder and tell him which wrench to use. The same principle applies to us. If you knew the best ways to prepare tax returns, you should become our competitor.”

MORE: Train Now Before It Costs You Down the Road | Keep Clients from “Balance Due” Shock | It’s OK to Say No to Clients (Even the Large Ones) | You Train Your Clients, Whether You Mean To or Not | Business Owners Face One of Three Exits | How Small Firms Can Win the Talent Wars | Do You Know Your Turnaround Time?
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Let’s be perfectly honest with each other.

There’s a reason you aren’t actively training clients to allow you to work efficiently. You’re afraid that you’ll lose clients.

I guarantee that you will.
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What’s Your Value to Your Tax Clients?

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Three questions to ask.

By Ed Mendlowitz
Tax Season Opportunity Guide

Know your value to your clients. Better, understand your business and what you really do and what you add to the client’s life.

MORE ON TAX SEASON: Are You Excited About Tax Season?
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I had a group of gastroenterologists as clients who were going to get into a business of inserting a gastric bubble into people’s stomachs. There were a number of issues to this.
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Are You Excited About Tax Season?

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woman working at two monitors

If not, take time to determine why.

By Ed Mendlowitz
Tax Season Opportunity Guide

Successful people are happy with their practices and what they do and get joy from interacting and helping clients. I know a lot of accountants who continuously complain about tax season – yet they make most of their money during the period.

MORE: Nine Tax Season Resources That Get Forgotten | Eight Ways to Charm a Client | You’re Only as Good as Your Last Screw-Up
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Do they expect someone to knock on their door with a wheelbarrow of money to hand them? If they are financially secure, why do they keep working? If they are not, then, DUH! Either do it or find something else, but stop complaining. Better yet, look at all the benefits from what you do (if you need me to tell you the benefits then find something else to do).
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Eight Ways to Build Busy-Season Stamina

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Attitude is key, but can only do so much.

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

Busy season is just around the corner. Can you feel the excitement? Or the dread?

Here are eight ways to boost your stamina and minimize burnout for those of you who are working long hours in the weeks ahead.

MORE: Five Things That Clients Don’t Know about Accountants | 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 | Five Ways to Acquire More Clients | Five Stages of Any Business | Put Your LinkedIn Profile to Work | What’s In a (Domain) Name? Plenty
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1. Understand the physical limitations of “willpower.”

According to scientists, our willpower is replenished every morning after a good night’s sleep. It’s strongest in the morning (even if you’re an evening person like me), and it wanes throughout the day. The more stress you’re under, the faster it depletes during the day, and sometimes your willpower runs out before the day does.
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Train Now Before It Costs You Down the Road

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Your time investment now could reap dividends during tax season. 

By Frank Stitely
The Relentless CPA

We’ve all heard it.

Ask if an assigned project has been completed and get the, “It’s done, but …” followed by a few reasons why said project is still – let’s be honest – incomplete.

MORE: Keep Clients from “Balance Due” Shock | Stop Clients from Performing “Favors” | Control Your Time: Avoid Ambush Meetings and Calls | Make Fewer Mistakes, Increase Revenue and Capacity | Six Ways to Create a Millennial-Friendly Firm
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Let’s examine how we got a “done but” society. A lot of this will sound like, “Back in my day, sonny …” old man nonsense, and a lot of it is.

However, I promise you a solution after my sociological exploration of 21st-century culture. You won’t need a degree in sociology to understand this.

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“Done” Only Has One Meaning

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“Done but” increases WIP and turnaround time. Profits go … well, you know.

By Frank Stitely
The Relentless CPA

In my last book, I recommended hiring younger staff. In that book, I cautioned that you might have to teach very simple tasks like breathing and using the bathroom to your newbies.

MORE: Keep Clients from “Balance Due” Shock | Stop Clients from Performing “Favors” | Who Needs Fall Tax Planning? Clients … and You | It’s Okay to Say No to Clients (Even the Large Ones) | Control Your Time: Avoid Ambush Meetings and Calls | Make Fewer Mistakes, Increase Revenue and Capacity
GoProCPA.comExclusively for PRO Members. Log in here or upgrade to PRO today.

One reader posted that she didn’t believe it was the responsibility of an admin department to teach bathroom use. She was new to this hot new writing technique called sarcasm, but she did a great job making my point that you have to teach your staff a lot of basic things.

One of those teaching tasks is the meaning of “done.”

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