In Part One of this guide on ways to grow your accounting business web presence, we provided in-depth information on the following areas:
- Online Challenges For The Accounting & Financial Services Profession
- Online Opportunities For Accounting Professionals
- Improving Your Website Pages
- How To Improve The Content On Your Site
In this section, we continue looking at more ways to grow your accounting services business online. Areas covered include:
- Ways Of Improving Web Traffic
- Generating More Leads & Enquiries
- WordPress Plugins And Themes For Improving SEO, Creating Better User Engagement And Generating More Web Traffic
For more information about WordPress plugins and themes, go here:
- Using WP Plugins – The Easy Way To Extend Your Website’s Capability
- WordPress For Business – An Overview Of WordPress Themes
Tips For Improving Website Traffic Using WordPress
Web traffic is a vital part of your online business growth. This section will help you improve your web traffic using WordPress.
Optimizing Your Site For Search Engines
There are so many ways WordPress can help to optimize your accounting website for search engines:
- URLs – WordPress lets you set the permalinks to create search engine-optimized URLS for your article pages (called posts).
- Tags – Specify the keywords that you want search engines to index your article pages (posts) for.
- Post Categories – Add SEO-friendly categories for archiving and organizing your content.
- Excerpts – Create descriptions for your posts that will show to search engine users.
- Images – title images with keywords for improved search results.
- Content Linking – WordPress provides a built-in feature that allows you to easily create internal links for faster indexing of pages
- Post Notification – Set up your site to automatically notify other sites and directories immediately upon publishing a new post on your site.
Improve Search Engine Optimization, Improve User Engagement And Increase Web Traffic Generation With WordPress Plugins
In addition to the built-in features of WordPress, there are dozens of plugins for WordPress that will improve your website’s SEO, increase user engagement and drive more traffic to your site.
For example, you can install the plugins below to improve your SEO:
- Yoast SEO – WordPress SEO plugin
- Google XML Sitemaps – WordPress XML sitemap plugin (lists all of your pages and posts for search engines)
- Page-List – WordPress site map plugin (for visitors)
(A plugin like Yoast SEO can improve your site’s search engine optimization)
Other things you can do to improve your accounting or financial services website’s SEO, increase user engagement and drive more web traffic to your business are to add a forum, newsletters, commenting, and social features. Here are some powerful WordPress plugins that can help (many of the plugins listed below can be downloaded at no cost):
- BuddyPress – This free WordPress plugin allows you to run your own social network on your website.
- bbPress – Run your own community forum on your site.
- E-Newsletter – This plugin lets you send email newsletters, track results and manage subscribers from your WP dashboard, without requiring third-party subscriptions.
- Disqus – use this plugin to power discussions and helps to increase engagement on your website.
- Monarch – Add powerful social sharing features to your website.
(You can add social sharing buttons to your site easily using free or inexpensive WordPress plugins)
How To Generate New Leads & Enquiries
Let’s now take a look at ways to improve your sales and generate new leads and enquiries online.
Providing An Email Newsletter
Adding a newsletter is a great way to build a subscriber list. It provides several benefits and advantages, like:
- Sends targeted traffic to your website
- Keeps your business at the forefront of your reader’s minds
- Provides updates that could save businesses time and money
- Provides you with a targeted marketing channel
- Allows you to offer special products or services to a select audience
- Provides new opportunities for improving user engagement
- Provides you with additional ways for your content to be shared online with others
A proven way to attract new subscribers to your email newsletter is to provide high value content and give users additional bonuses for free in exchange for their personal details. This can be a time-saving guide, tips for handling finances, access to tax calculators, coupons, access to subscriber-only content, contests, etc.
Contact Forms
A contact form provides an easy and simple way for readers to contact you. Readers can report issues, ask questions to specific departments, request quotes, and more.
A contact form provides several benefits including:
- Reduces spam
- Automated response
- Gives you control over what gets sent to you
- You can keep your email address private
- Can be added to any post or page
- Improves the professional look of your site
- More convenient for users
One of the most popular WordPress contact form plugins is Contact Form 7.
Contact Form 7
(Contact Form 7 WP Plugin)
Contact Form 7 allows you to insert multiple contact forms to your site, customize your forms and the mail contents, add fields, and more.
International languages, Ajax-powered submitting, CAPTCHA, and Akismet spam filtering is also supported.
Something else to consider is to add sections to your contact form so visitors can select the department they want to contact. This ensures that visitors’ requests reach the right person.
Adding Maps
Maps help your visitors and customers find you.
Adding maps (e.g. Google Maps) to your WordPress site also provides visitors with many benefits, such as:
- A map improves local SEO
- Visitors can find you more easily
- Displays location of events
(Maps help your visitors and clients find you)
Some of the more popular map plugins include:
- Google Maps
- Advanced Google Maps Plugin for WordPress
- WP Google Maps
- Comprehensive Google Map Plugin
WordPress Plugins That Can Help Improve SEO, Increase User Engagement And Increase Traffic Generation
Accounting And Financial Services Plugins For WordPress
WordPress lets you add a number of plugins to your accounting or financial services website that will immediately make available a range of practical tools for your site visitors. Here are some of these plugins:
Calculator Pro Calculators
(Calculator Pro Calculators WordPress Plugin)
This is a free collection of 400+ calculators. You can embed these into your pages, posts, or sidebars using shortcodes. Internationalization is supported.
Most of them aren’t focused specifically on accounting, but there are quite a few you can use for:
- Mortgage
- Loans
- Tax
- Credit
- And lots more
For more details, go here}:
Show Stock Quotes
(Show Stock Quotes Plugin For WordPress)
This plugin gives you a widget that shows up to 20 different stock quotes per portfolio. You can display as many portfolios as you want.
(Show Stock Quotes – Stock Portfolio)
For more details, go here}:
Custom Stock Ticker
(Custom Stock Ticker Plugin For WordPress)
This free plugin lets you add custom stock tickers to any post, page or sidebar with shortcodes.
Custom Stock ticker provides a number of customizable ticker. Choose from built-in skins or customize it yourself to match the look and feel of your website. You can also add custom stocks to specific categories.
Appearance customizations include colours, size, text, etc.
For more details, go here}:
Finance Calculator
(Finance Calculator WordPress Plugin)
This free plugin lets users calculate indicative repayments. This is a great tool for calculating auto loans, real estate loans, or any other large loan.
(Finance Calculator – WordPress Plugin – Loan Calculator)
The Finance Calculator plugin also contains an application form that sends a message to the email address you specify.
Other features of this plugin include displaying payment protection, calculating 12 to 60 months loans and creating a form that can be placed in any page or post.
For more details, go here}:
WP-Invoice
(WP-Invoice)
WP-Invoice lets WordPress blog owners send itemized invoices to their clients.
WP-Invoice integrates billing into WordPress. You can send itemized invoices. It also allows you to set up recurring billing. WP-Invoice can be expanded through both free and premium add-ons that let you manage locations, accept electronic signatures, create PDF invoices, create quotes, create single-page checkout forms, and more.
The plugin ties into WP’s user management database to keep track of your clients and their information, and integrates with payment processors like PayPal, Authorize.net, Stripe, and several others.
WP-Invoice features include adding custom payments and charges, inserting pre-defined line items and discounts, viewing invoice status and progression, easily filtering and finding invoices, showing invoice receipts and invoice history, creating email notification templates, viewing reports (collected vs uncollected invoices, 10 most valuable clients and top grossing line items), and more..
For more details, go here}:
All In One Business Management Application
(All In One Business Management Application – WordPress Plugin)
This is a complete business management system that includes accounting management, invoicing, order management, help desk with knowledgebase and ticketing management system, CRM and lots more.
(All In One Business Management Application Plugin For WordPress – Client Invoice)
All In One Business Management Application supports multiple languages, is fully customizable and provides additional tools like document management, notice board, and more.
For more details, go here}:
iBilling – Accounting And Billing Software
(iBilling – Accounting and Billing Software Plugin)
iBilling is a scalable business software that lets you manage and communicate with clients, tracks your company’s cash flow and net worth, send single-click payment reminders and payment confirmations, and lots more.
(iBilling – Accounting and Billing Software – Client Invoice)
It integrates with several online payment gateways.
For more details, go here}:
WordPress Themes
To benefit the most from using WordPress to grow your business online, we recommend choosing a theme specifically for accounting. Here is a list of some of the best WordPress themes available for accountancy businesses. With the themes listed below you can own a professional accounting website within minutes.
Accounting Pro
(Accounting Pro WordPress Theme)
Accounting Pro is an inexpensive turn-key theme built for accountants and accounting firms. It’s a responsive theme with a drag-and-drop page-builder, has several page templates, custom menu features, a content composer (which improves on the standard WordPress editor), a sidebar manager, auto-resized images, and lots more.
Accounting Pro can be customized through premium add-ons.
To learn more about this WordPress theme, go here:
Accountancy
(Accountancy Theme)
Accountancy Theme has a variety of styles and layouts to make your accounting site look and feel professional.
This fully responsive (mobile-friendly) theme includes a custom slider, a featured testimonial section, it’s lightweight, SEO friendly, and fast loading. It provides what your business needs without bloating your theme. Your purchase price includes free updates and 1 year of support.
More info:
Accounting
(Accounting – WordPress Theme)
This one includes a drag-and-drop builder that allows you to design your website any way you want. The theme also has unlimited sidebars with custom widgets, four different header types, a custom administration panel, different color schemes, a custom slider, 3 blog types, and is mobile-friendly. Accountancy looks clean and modern and is fast to load.
Go here for more info:
Kathryn
(Kathryn Theme)
This premium WordPress theme was designed specifically for accountants. It offers multiple layouts, slider, multiple sidebars, many colors, is easy to use, inexpensive, search engine optimized, and is mobile-friendly. Although it could easily suit any profession, it builds a great looking accounting theme. It includes a license for the Soliloquy slider plugin and must be purchased separately from the Genesis Framework.
Go here for more info:
Accounting WordPress Theme
(Accounting WordPress Theme – WordPress Theme)
This theme was built to enhance professionalism within the accounting industry. Every color, layout element, icon, menu item, page structure, call-to-action, etc., is specifically designed to give your accounting website a professional look. It’s a turn-key installation but you can still modify it if you want. It’s mobile-friendly and includes pages for your services, contact section with consultation requests (downloadable as CSV), testimonials section, and a blog.
For more details, go here:
WP Advocate
(WP Advocate WP Theme)
This is a corporate theme developed for professionals such as accountants and attorneys. Use the bundled images or upload your own. WP Advocate includes a custom post type adding staff profiles. It will also integrate with BeSpoke profile templates. WP Advocate is clean and fast-loading.
Visit the theme website to learn more this theme:
Divi
(Divi Theme For WordPress)
This is the most flexible theme in Elegant Themes‘ collection. Divi lets you create a unique, professional website using its page builder or beautiful and unique pre-made layouts. You can change your layout as much as you need.
Divi’s page builder transforms elements into visual building blocks, allowing anyone to understand and change the structure of their page without touching a single line of code.
(Divi – WordPress Theme – Page Builder)
It comes with 40 content modules that you can drag and drop anywhere you want. This includes bar counter, blog, circle counter, countdown timer, gallery, map, post title, shop, testimonial, text, fullwidth header, fullwidth portfolio, fullwidth slider, and more.. Divi is fully responsive and fully customizable. Theme prices start at $69 per year and includes access to over 80 sleek business themes.
More information:
The Corporation
(The Corporation)
The Corporation Theme was built specifically to create great-looking corporate sites.
The Corporation has a page-based home page design with a prominent, flashy slider. It also has a blog design. It has 6 color schemes. It also has multiple page templates that include contact pages, blog feeds, sitemaps, search page, gallery page, and more. Themes start at $69 per year and includes access to over 80 professional themes.
More information:
Adviser
(Adviser Theme)
This premium theme was designed specifically to help finance industry professionals build trust online with a clean business design. It’s perfect for those that provide services like investing advice or tax advice. It includes a recruitment page with hiring announcements and where to send applications. It also includes a lease calculator. It includes widgets and multiple shortcodes, and includes the drag-and-drop visual composer.
For more information, go here:
Tax Help
(Tax Help)
This premium theme for WordPress was built for financial organizations, tax and finance advisors, and those offering tax services. It’s designed to show your services in a professional way to help build your professional reputation. It has a range of blog styles, uses a drag-and-drop visual composer, includes a shortcode builder, the Revolution Slider, and many custom shortcodes.
For more details, go here:
Finance Business
(Finance Business – WordPress Theme)
Finance Business was specifically developed for businesses that provide any type of financial service such as tax help, consulting, insurance, corporate, finance, loans, accounting, and more. It includes a custom CMSMasters Visual Content Composer plugin, around one hundred shortcodes that let you add charts and financial content, custom drag-and-drop composer, 2 premium sliders, page options, color management, animations, and lots more.
Go here for more info:
Avada
(Avada Finance WordPress Theme)
Avada is a fully responsive and versatile multipurpose theme that lets you easily build, configure, and run any kind of website you want without touching code, including a website for an accounting or finance-related organization.
To learn more about the Avada theme for WordPress, go here: Avada
Hopefully, this guide has helped you learn how to improve your accounting or financial services business online with WordPress themes and plugins.
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