Grow Your Accounting Business Online With WordPress

The digital information age has not only revolutionized businesses globally, it has also created difficult challenges and opportunities for CPAs.

Online Challenges For Certified Public Accountants

Certified Public Accountants today must work harder than ever to remain competitive. Not only do you have to become actively involved in the communities and industries you serve, you must also develop and maintain an active web presence. This includes having a website and learning how to better promote your business online.

In addition to investing money advertising offline on newspapers, ads in industry publications and magazines, radio and tv, etc., you will probably find (if you haven’t already) that in order to compete, increasingly larger amounts of their marketing budget will need to be delegated towards developing and maintaining a website that attracts new clients, engages users, outranks the competition in search engines and social media, and gives you a wider amount of exposure online.

This means that your website not only has to look professional, your web pages have to be fast-loading, and be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of the website will change in time and many areas may need to be updated frequently. This requires the implementation of a well-developed web and content management strategy.

One other difficult challenge that CPAs face with their websites, and most businesses for that matter, is that they have only around 30 seconds to provide users what they are searching for or they will look elsewhere.

“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 Professional Accountants

As well as facing a number of significant challenges, there are also many online opportunities available to businesses in the accounting profession that are willing to evolve to meet the challenges of the online economy and think progressively when it comes to marketing their business services better online.

In this article, you will discover opportunities to increase traffic and establish online credibility for your business.

As well as providing practical tips and information on ways to improve your web presence, we also recommend that you consider using WordPress to power your accounting or financial services website.

For more information about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress Content Management System, see these articles:

• Why A Poorly Built Web Site Can Lose You Prospective Buyers And What To Do About It
• An Online Guide To Building A Successful Small Business With A WordPress Site

Ways To Improve Your Accounting Website

In this section we’ll show you how to improve your accounting website and get better results online. We will look at what pages a financial services site needs, what type of content works best for accounting and financial services websites, tips for improving your navigation structure, etc.

If you need assistance or help planning your accounting or financial services website, check out the article we have written here: The Website Planning Process: A Basic Blueprint For Business Owners

Your Website Pages

Professional business websites require a number of basic web pages. Let’s review these.

Services

You need to include a page that lists your services and products.

It will include all the services you offer, such as:

• Business accounting – planning, company structures, general accounting, payroll, financial statement compilation, book keeping, financing, forecasting, budgeting, strategic planning, consulting, etc.
• Taxation – preparation, planning, reviewing, auditing, advice, problem resolution
• Investment strategies
• Corporate finance
• 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, transfers, etc.
• Lending and leasing

List all of the services you provide. Provide your visitors with information that will educate them about the benefits of using your services and direct them to your appointment booking page.

About Us

The ‘About Us’ page should give a description of your business and what it stands for, its unique approach, community involvement, etc.

This page should include any awards, recognitions, certifications, accreditations, publications, associations, etc., that can be used to promote the company and position it above your competitors.

(List all of your business awards accreditations, recognitions, certifications, publications, associations, etc. in your About Us page. Image sourced from: deloitte.com)

Team

Are you looking for inexpensive ways to sell more products online and get people to engage more with your site? Then make it easier for your prospects to get to know, like and trust your organization better.

Prospects need to relate to your business. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your staff members. This page should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors will not tend to be very well-versed in accounting terms it should tell who they are and what their specialties are. You may also want to explain what those specialties mean. It should even include social buttons that will allow your site visitors to follow individual team members on their social networks.

On this page, don’t be afraid to humanize your team members with personal stories, hobbies, etc., but make sure to outline each staff member’s experience, why they are an asset to your team, and more importantly, how they will help add value to your clients’ business.

(Add a team profile page. Screenshot image source: deepsky.com)

For a detailed tutorial on how to add an easy-to-update list of staff or team members to WordPress using a free WP plugin, go here: Adding An Employee Directory

Job Opportunities Page

List any career opportunities available within your organization. This page could include training provided, benefits, professional development, social activities sponsored or encouraged by your organization, etc. You can also include stories of trainees who have established a solid career path thanks to your firm and information such as the job outlook and additional career opportunities in the accounting industry.

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

Testimonials & Case Studies

Customer reviews and case studies are a great way to show prospective clients what kind of financial solutions you will implement to help solve their problems. By adding a page with testimonials and case studies, you are also helping to provide potential clients with social proof.

(Add a web page with case studies and testimonials from previous clients. Screenshot image sourced from: pcg-services.com)

To learn more about using testimonials and user reviews, refer to this article: Improve Your Visitor-To-Sales Conversions With Powerful Customer Testimonials

Contact Us

Having a clean contact page is essential.

Your contact page should provide visitors with the following information about your company:

• Company Name
• Your physical location
• Phone
• Facsimile number
• Email
• Google Map and directions
• Web address
• Contact form
• Contact name
• Social media links
• Interactive chat feature

If you have different areas you want to make that clear when displaying your address and contact info.

You could also include links to commonly-asked questions, main pages, special offers, support area, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add A Blog Section

A blog can be a powerful business marketing tool. Blogs typically comprise of a content management system that is easy to use and allows you to promote your business using content like news, company updates, educational articles, opinions and discussions, promotional videos, infographics, etc.

If you already have an established website, then consider adding a WordPress-powered blog to promote your firm.

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

Something not many people know about, is that an expertly configured WordPress site can turn into an automated traffic-generation machine that can instantly begin to drive targeted visitors to your business, simply by publishing regular content to your site.

(An expertly configured WordPress site can automate your traffic generation)

If you would like to learn more here: WordPress Website Traffic Blueprint – Discover How To Drive More Website Visitors For Your Business With WordPress

Legal Info Pages

As a professional accountant, having a compliant website is vitally important, not just for building trust and credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that no laws and regulations are being contravened in whichever area or location you provide services to.

Depending on the services you provide, adding some or all of the following legal pages to your website will help keep you out of legal hot water with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers, and other potential sources of threats and legal inconveniences:

• Contact Us
• Privacy Statement
• Terms And Conditions
• Website Disclaimer
• Affiliate Agreement
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Compensation Disclosure
• DMCA Notice
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Linking Policy
• Health/Financial Disclaimers
• Refund Policy
• Video/Audio Terms
• and others

We have written a comprehensive article about adding legal pages to your site. For more info, see this article: The Importance Of Adding Legal Pages To Your Site

Tips For Improving Your Web Content

In today’s fiercely competitive global economy, having a well-planned content marketing strategy has become one of the key success factors for businesses selling similar products or providing similar services.

Providing great content with useful advice and tips will get your visitors sharing your web pages with others and coming back for more. Publishing content is a great way to inform and teach your visitors and prospective clients about your business.

For example, topics for an accounting or financial services business could cover:

• Explanations of balance sheets
• Understanding profit and loss statements
• Duties and legal responsibilities of company directors
• Presenting accounts for non-profit activities
• Cashflow planning tips
• Maximizing business insurance cover
• Protecting revenues
• Tips on structuring a self-managed retirement fund
• Do’s and don’ts of … (e.g. purchasing vs leasing, setting up payroll systems, etc.)

You can also create a series of informative articles that will help your prospective clients understand your services, such as finance accounting, tax accounting, tax planning for small business, reducing business debt, financial concepts made simple, etc.

Remember to use relevant keywords and terminology in your articles that your prospective clients will be searching for online.

We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive a comprehensive series of training emails with easy-to-digest information that will show you how to drive more traffic to your web site, save money creating useful content that will add value to your site visitors and grow your business online using content. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also 100% FREE!

Ways To Improve User Experience

Improving user experience (often referred to as UX) will help keep visitors coming back and engaging with your site. This section will show you different ways to improve your visitor engagement and user experience.

RSS Feeds

Using RSS feeds can help to improve visitor engagement and UX in several ways.

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

Some of the benefits of having other businesses syndicate your content, include:

• All of your updates are in one place
• your content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Can be shared
• RSS feeds allow users to subscribe
• An RSS feed provides a way for links to point back to your site
• RSS feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregator services
• There are a number of ways readers can receive your content (e.g. read the content on their mobile device using feed readers)
• It’s built into WordPress

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

You can find many useful RSS feeds by visiting sites of relevant government departments and respected industry bodies.

For example, here are some feeds you could add to your website:

• 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 (Really Simple Syndication) feeds can help to improve your site’s UX.)

Provide Forms

Checklists and forms are a fantastic way to help increase visitor engagement, add value to your readers and set yourself apart from the competition. Forms and checklists can provide users with step-by-step instructions and resources to complete tasks. Checklists and forms are great planning tools.

You can provide forms and checklists covering a range of subjects such as:

• How To Set Up A Business
• Negative Gearing Worksheet
• Non-Profit Governance Checklist
• Disclosure Requirements
• Company Tax Checklist
• Trust Tax Checklist
• Income Tax Variation Forms

Unique Tools

Providing unique online tools and applications for businesses is a great way to increase visitor engagement and add significant value to users. Calculators, such as loan and tax calculators, are useful tools to add to accounting websites. Others could include time cards, or retirement and interest calculators.

In the next section of this guide, we discuss a number of online tools you can use in your site using WordPress plugins and themes that improve your search engine optimization, increase user engagement and drive more visitors to your business.

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This is the end of part 1.

Click on this link to continue:

• A Practical Step-By-Step Guide On How To Build And Grow Your Accounting Or Financial Services Website – Part 2

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