Grow Your Accounting Business Online With WordPress

The digital economy has not only transformed the way business is done worldwide, it has also created a number of difficult challenges and opportunities for certified public accountants.

Challenges Professional Accountants Face Online

Now, more than ever, accounting organizations must work hard to remain competitive, obtain new clients, and keep their current business. Not only do you have to become more involved in the communities and industries you serve, you must also develop an active digital presence. This includes having a dynamic website and learning how to better promote your business online.

As well as investing dollars in offline marketing, businesses in the accounting industry are now also finding that increasingly larger amounts of their marketing budget need to be assigned towards the development and management of a website that can drive prospective clients, engage visitors, outperform the competition in search engines and help increase their marketing reach online.

This means that your website not only has to look professional, load fast, and be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of your website may change over time and sections will need to be updated often. This requires the implementation of a well-planned website and content management strategy.

One other challenge that CPAs face online, as most other professions do for that matter, is that your site has only around 30 seconds or less to give visitors the information they need or they will go away.

“Websites have evolved into central information hubs where service information is still present but enhanced with web portals, hyperlinks to state and federal sites, and a variety of free tools.”

Michael Alter, http://www.accountingweb.com/technology/accounting-software/tips-for-improving-your-website

Online Opportunities For Accountants

As well as facing a number of business and technology changes, there are also many online opportunities available to accounting businesses that can adapt to meet the demands of the online economy and who can think outside the box about marketing their business better online.

In this comprehensive guide, you will learn about opportunities to drive more traffic and improve your business results online.

As well as providing tips and information on ways to improve your accounting web presence, we also recommend that you consider using the WordPress CMS platform to power your accounting website.

For more information about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system (CMS), see these articles:

• Learn How A Poorly Designed Website Can Cost You Customers
• Learn How To Grow Your Small Business With A WordPress Blog

Ways To Improve Your Accounting Site

In this section we’ll start with the basics and show you ways to improve your website and get better results. We will look at what pages your site needs, what type of content works best for accounting and financial services sites, useful tips for improving your layout and navigation structure, etc.

If you need help with website planning, visit this page: A Comprehensive Guide To Web Site Planning For Business Owners

Essential Pages

Professional business websites need several essential pages. Let’s take a look at the pages your  need and how to structure your accounting website for best results.

Services And Products

You need to include a page that describes your services and any products that you offer.

This page will include all the products and services you offer, such as:

• Business – planning, company formation, general accounting, payroll, preparing financial statements, bookkeeping, financing, forecasting, budgeting, strategic planning, consulting services, etc.
• Taxation – preparing, planning, reviewing, auditing, advising, problem resolution
• Investment strategies
• Corporate accounting
• Wealth creation
• Superannuation/retirement plan (401k) advice
• Audit risk assessment and assurance
• Quickbooks – setup, training, tune up, and support
• Specialist services – mergers, acquisitions, information technology, secretarial, rentals, trusts, fiduciary accounting, succession planning, selling a business, asset transfers, etc.
• Lending and leasing

List all of the services you provide. Educate your visitors about the benefits of using your services and direct them to your appointment booking page.

About Us Page

This page needs to describe your business and what your business stands for, its unique approach, community activities, etc.

It’s important to list any CPA awards, certifications, recognitions, accreditations, publications, associations, etc., that can be used to promote your company and set it above other competitors.

(List all of your industry awards accreditations, recognitions, certifications, publications, associations, etc. in your About page. Screenshot source: deloitte.com)

Core Team

If you are looking for ways to sell more products online, then something you can do, is make it easier for visitors to get to know, like and trust your business better.

People need to relate to your business. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your people. This page should include a photo and a mini biography. Since most visitors won’t be that well-versed in accounting terms it should tell who they are and what their specialties are. It should also explain what those specialties mean. It should even include social buttons that will allow your site visitors to follow your team members on their social pages.

On this page, make sure to outline each employee’s qualifications, how their skills add value or contribute to the success of your team, and more importantly, how they will help add value to your clients’ business.

(Make sure to add a team profile page. Screenshot image source: deepsky.com)

If you need help how to add an easy-to-update directory of employees to WordPress using a free plugin, go here: Step-By-Step Tutorial: How To Add An Employee List Directory To Your Site

We’re Hiring

List any career opportunities available within your firm. It would include training, employee benefits, professional development, etc. You should also include stories of trainees who have established a solid career path thanks to your organization and information about career opportunities in the accounting industry.

Also include a positions available section in this page. If there are no positions currently available, consider inviting people to return periodically to the page, subscribe to your newsletter, follow your social pages, etc.

Case Studies And Testimonials

Client reviews and case studies are a great way to show potential clients what kind of solutions you will implement to help solve their problems. Adding a page with testimonials from past clients and case studies also provides prospective clients with social proof.

(Add a page with case studies and testimonials from past clients. Image sourced from: pcg-services.com)

We have written a detailed article about using client case studies and client reviews to grow your business online. For more details, go here: Discover How To Turn More Visitors Into Prospects With Sales Boosting Testimonials

Contact Us Page

Having a contact page is crucial.

It should provide:

• Name
• Physical address
• Telephone
• Fax
• Email address
• Google Map and directions
• Web address
• Contact form
• Contact name
• Social media web addresses
• Chat feature

If you operate in multiple locations you should make that clear when displaying the address and contact info.

You could also include links to an FAQ page, main pages, special offers, support area, newsletter opt-in form, blog, etc.

Add An Accounting Or Financial Services Blog Section

A blog can be a very powerful marketing tool. Blogs are built around a content management system that allows you to easily promote your business using content such as company events, product updates, training articles, informative posts, videos, media presentations, etc.

If you already have an accounting website, then consider adding a WordPress-driven blog to promote your organization.

If you don’t have a website yet, or your existing accounting site is hard to add new content to or not giving you the results you want, then WordPress can be used both as your website and business blog.

Not many businesses know this, but WordPress can become an automated traffic-generation system that can begin to drive web traffic to your website, simply by publishing regular content to your web site.

(WordPress can generate traffic automatically to your website)

Go here to learn more about this: WordPress Web Site Traffic Blueprint – Discover How To Create An Automated Traffic-Getting Machine

Legal Pages

It’s essential to ensure they have a compliant website, not just for building trust with visitors, but also to ensure that you are not breaching laws or regulations wherever you service clients.

Depending on the products and services you provide, adding the legal pages below to your accounting website will help you stay out of trouble with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers, and other potential sources of legal threats and inconveniences:

• Contact Us
• Privacy Policy
• Terms And Conditions
• Website Disclaimer
• Affiliate Agreement
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Compensation Disclosure
• DMCA Notice
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Links Policy
• Health Disclaimers
• Refund Policy
• Video/Audio Terms
• etc.

We have written a detailed article about adding legal pages to your website. Go here to learn more about this: How To Add Legal Pages To Your WordPress Site

Tips On How To Improve The Content On Your Website

In today’s globally competitive economy, content marketing has become one of the key differentiators for businesses.

You will want to provide great content with useful information and tips that will get your readers to share your web pages and come back for more information. Using content is the most effective way to educate your visitors and prospects about your business.

For example, for an accounting or financial services business, topics can include:

• How balance sheets work
• Overlooked tax deductions
• Directors’ duties and legal responsibilities
• Presenting accounts for non-profit activities
• Cashflow planning advice
• Maximizing business insurance cover
• Risk protection
• How to structure a self-managed retirement fund
• Dos and don’ts of … (e.g. purchasing insurance, claiming business expenses, etc.)

You can also create a series of educational articles that will help your your prospective clients gain a better understanding of accounting services, such as finance accounting, business accounting, business budgeting, reducing business debt, understanding accounting conventions, etc.

Remember to use specific keywords in your articles that prospective clients would search for.

We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive a comprehensive series of training emails with actionable information that will show exactly how to drive more traffic to your website or blog, save money creating useful content that will add value to your visitors and grow your business online using content marketing strategies. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also completely FREE!

Ways Of Improving Visitor Engagement And User Experience

Improving your site’s user experience (often referred to as UX) helps to keep visitors coming back and using your site. This section will show you ways you can improve visitor engagement and user experience.

Syndicate Content With RSS Feeds

An RSS feed provides lots of benefits for your accounting business.

If you provide content that adds value to others, other businesses may want to syndicate your content.

Some of the benefits of syndicating your content to other sites using RSS feeds, include:

• All of your updates are kept in one place
• Content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Feeds can be shared
• RSS feeds allow for subscribing
• An RSS feed provides a way for external links to point back to your site
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregator services
• There are various ways your readers can receive your content (e.g. subscribers can view the content on their mobile device using different applications)
• RSS is built into WordPress

There are also a number of benefits when it comes to providing information on your website from other websites, such as the fact that you don’t have to write, manage or update the content.

To find useful RSS feeds just search online for finance-related government departments or well-known industry bodies.

Below we have listed some RSS feeds you may want to add to your site:

• Taxation Policy Center: http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/press/rss.cfm
• Australian Taxation Office: https://www.ato.gov.au/RSS-news-feeds.aspx
• Canada Revenue Agency: http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/rssfeeds/
• UK HM Revenue and Customs: http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/rss/rss.htm
• South Africa Revenue Service: http://www.sars.gov.za/Pages/RSS-Feeds.aspx

(RSS feeds can help to improve your site’s UX.)

Add Checklists

Checklists and forms are a great way to increase user engagement, add value to your audience and provide something unique. Forms and checklists can give them useful instructions and resources to complete tasks. They are also great business planning tools.

Forms and checklists could address topics such as:

• How To Set Up A Business
• Rental Property Worksheet
• Non-Profit Governance Checklist
• Disclosure Checklists
• Sole Trader Tax Checklist
• Trust Tax Checklist
• Income Tax Variation Forms

Unique Tools

Providing unique tools, gadgets and applications for businesses (or links to these tools) can help increase visitor engagement and significantly add value to potential clients. Calculators, such as loan and tax calculators, are some of the most popular tools for accounting websites. Other applications could include time cards, and retirement and interest calculators.

In the next section of this guide, we will look at a number of online tools you can add to your accounting website using WordPress plugins and themes that can help to improve your seo, improve user engagement and drive more traffic to your business.

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This is the end of section 1.

To continue, click here:

• Your Accounting Website – Improving SEO, Improve User Engagement And Increase Web Traffic Generation With WordPress Plugins & Themes

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