In Part One of this guide on ways to grow your accounting business online, we provided many practical tips and suggestions on the following areas:
- Challenges Professional Accountants Face Online
- Opportunities For Accountants In The Digital Economy
- Essential Website Pages
- Tips On How To Improve The Content On Your Site
In this section, we discuss more ways to grow your accounting business online. Areas covered include:
- Improve Traffic Using WordPress
- Generating New Leads & Enquiries
- Improve Search Engine Optimization, Increase User Engagement And Generate More Visitors With Plugins
To learn more about WordPress plugins and themes, go here:
- Adding New Functionality To Your WP Site With Plugins
- WordPress For Newbies – An Introduction To Themes
Improving Web Traffic
Web traffic is vital to your online business growth. In this section, we discuss ways to improve SEO, increase user engagement and drive more web traffic using WordPress plugins.
Optimize Your Website For Search Engines
There are loads of ways WordPress can help to improve your accounting or financial services website’s SEO:
- URLs – configure the permalinks to create search engine-optimized web addresses for your articles and posts.
- Post Tags – WordPress lets you specify the keywords that you want search engines to index your posts for.
- Categories – Add SEO-friendly categories for your posts and products.
- Excerpts – Create descriptions for your posts that search engines will show.
- Images – title images used in your content with keywords for better search engine results.
- Internal Content Linking – WordPress provides a built-in feature that lets you easily create internal links
- Pinging – Set up your site to automatically notify other search directories as soon as a new post is published on your site.
WordPress Plugins For Improving Search Engine Optimization, Better User Engagement And Web Traffic Generation
In addition to the built-in features of WordPress, there are quite a number of WordPress plugins that improve your accounting website’s SEO, increase engagement and drive more web traffic to your website.
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 for indexing by search engines)
- WP Tree – WordPress site map plugin (for visitors)
(Use a plugin like Yoast SEO (previously known as WordPress SEO by Yoast) to improve your SEO)
Other WordPress tools you can add to improve your accounting or financial services site’s SEO, increase engagement and drive more web traffic to your website are to add a forum, newsletters, comments, and social sharing. Here are a few fantastic plugins that can help:
- BuddyPress – BuddyPress lets you set up and manage a social network on your site.
- bbPress – This plugin allows you to run a forum on your WordPress website.
- E-Newsletter – Send professional email newsletters, track results and manage subscribers from your WP dashboard, without a third party subscription.
- Disqus – Power discussions and helps to increase engagement on your website or blog.
- Monarch – Use this WordPress plugin to add powerful social sharing features and buttons on your pages and posts.
(WordPress users can easily add social features to their site using WordPress plugins)
Ways To Generate Leads & Enquiries Using WordPress
Let’s now take a look at how to improve sales and generate more leads and enquiries for your accounting or financial services business.
Adding A Newsletter
Adding a newsletter is an excellent way to build a list of subscribers. It provides several benefits including:
- Sends targeted traffic to your site
- Keeps your business at the forefront of your reader’s minds
- Keeps readers updated
- Provides you with a highly targeted marketing channel
- Allows you to provide special services or products to a select audience
- Increases interaction
- Provides other ways for your content to be shared online with new potential clients
A proven strategy for attracting subscribers to your email newsletter is to provide high value content and give users a free gift in exchange for their details. This can be a special report, checklists for handling tax, access to tax calculators, coupons, membership access to subscriber-only content, contests, etc.
Contact Forms
A contact form makes it easy and simple for readers to get in touch with you. Readers can report problems, ask questions to specific departments, request a quote, and more.
A contact form provides a number of benefits and advantages including:
- Reduces spam
- Automated response
- Giving you control over what is sent to you
- You can keep your email address private
- Can be added to any page or post
- Looks professional
- Convenience for users
A very popular WordPress contact form plugin is Contact Form 7.
Contact Form 7
(Contact Form 7)
This free plugin is easy to install and configure and lets you insert and manage multiple contact forms on your site, customize the form and the email contents, add fields, and more.
Contact Form 7 supports international languages, Ajax-powered submitting, CAPTCHA, spam filtering and so on.
Something to consider is to add sections to your contact form so prospective clients can select which topic they are contacting your company about. This ensures that contact form requests reach the right person.
Provide A Map
A map helps your visitors and customers find you.
Maps are very useful tools for several reasons:
- They help to increase local SEO
- Customers can better plan their meeting or appointments
- Shows location of events
(Maps help your visitors and customers find you)
Here are just some of the more popular plugins that let you embed, customize and display maps on your site:
- Google Maps
- Advanced Google Maps Plugin for WordPress
- WP Google Maps
- Comprehensive Google Map Plugin
Improve SEO, Increase User Engagement And Generate More Traffic Using Plugins And Themes
Accounting – WordPress Plugins
WordPress makes available a number of plugins you can add to your accounting or financial services website that will immediately make available a range of practical tools for users. Here are some of these:
Calculator Pro Calculators
(Calculator Pro Calculators Plugin)
This is a free collection of 400+ calculators. You can embed these into your posts, pages, or sidebars using shortcodes. Internationalization is supported.
Note: Most of them aren’t focused specifically on accounting, but there are a few you can use for:
- 401k
- Rate of return
- CD
- Credit
- And lots more
For more details, go here}:
Show Stock Quotes
(Show Stock Quotes)
This free plugin gives you a widget that shows up to 20 different stock quotes per portfolio. You can display as many widgets as you like.
(Show Stock Quotes WP Plugin – Stock Portfolio)
For more details, go here}:
Custom Stock Ticker
(Custom Stock Ticker)
With this plugin you can add a custom stock ticker to any sidebar, page or post with shortcodes.
Custom Stock ticker provides a number of customizable features. You can choose from built-in themes or customize these yourself. It’s easy to customize it so it matches your site. You can also add custom stocks to individual categories.
Customize the appearance by changing colors, size, speed, text, and symbols, etc.
For more details, go here}:
Finance Calculator
(Finance Calculator Plugin)
This free plugin allows your users to calculate indicative repayments. It’s great for automotive loans, property loans, or other large loans.
(Finance Calculator – Loan Calculators)
This plugin also contains an application form that sends a notification message to a specified email address.
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 – WordPress Plugin)
WP-Invoice lets WordPress blog owners send itemized invoices to their clients.
This plugin lets you integrate billing into WordPress. You can send out itemized invoices, set up recurring billing and expand functionality with free and premium add-ons that let you manage locations, accept electronic signatures, create PDF invoice versions, provide quotes, create checkout forms, and more.
The plugin ties into your WordPress user management database to keep track of your clients and their information, and integrates with payment processors like PayPal, Authorize.net, Stripe, 2Checkout, PayPal Payments Pro, and several others.
WP-Invoice features include adding custom payments and charges, adding pre-defined line items and discounts, quickly viewing invoice status and progression, filtering and finding invoices, showing invoice receipts and invoice history, creating notification e-mail templates, viewing reports (collected vs uncollected invoices, 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 Plugin For WordPress)
This complete business management solution includes accounting management, invoicing, order management, help desk with ticket management system, client relationship management and lots more.
(All In One Business Management Application WP Plugin – Client Invoicing)
The plugin supports multiple languages, is fully customizable and provides powerful tools like document management, to do app, and more.
For more details, go here}:
iBilling – Accounting And Billing Software
(iBilling – Accounting and Billing Software WP Plugin)
This is a scalable business software that lets you manage and communicate with clients, track your company’s net worth and cash flow, send single-click payment reminders and payment confirmations, and lots more.
(iBilling – Accounting and Billing Software Plugin For WordPress – Invoice)
iBilling Accounting and Billing Software allows you to get paid faster online by integrating with several payment gateways.
For more details, go here}:
Accounting And Financial Services Themes For WordPress
To get the best features and professional look for your website, it’s best to choose a theme specifically for accounting. Here is a list of some of the best WordPress themes available for accounting. These themes allow you to have a professional accounting website within minutes.
Accounting Pro
(Accounting Pro Theme For WordPress)
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, offers several page templates, a custom menu feature, a content composer (which improves on the standard WordPress editor), a sidebar manager, auto-resized images, and a whole lot more.
You can easily customize Accounting Pro by installing premium add-ons.
More info:
Accountancy
(Accountancy Theme For WordPress)
This one comes with a variety of styles and layouts to give your accounting site a professional look and feel.
This fully responsive theme includes a custom slider, a featured testimonial section, it’s lightweight, search optimized, and fast loading. Accountancy Theme provides the features you need without bloating your theme. Free updates and 1 year of support is included in your purchase.
More info:
Accounting
(Accounting WP Theme)
Accounting 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, four color schemes, a custom slider, three different blog types, and is fully responsive. Accountancy is a clean-looking, modern and fast loading theme.
More info:
Kathryn
(Kathryn Theme)
This premium WordPress theme was designed specifically for accountants. It has multiple layouts, slider, multiple sidebars, a variety of colors, is easy to use, inexpensive, SEO friendly, and is responsive (mobile-friendly). Although this theme could easily suit any profession, it builds a great looking accounting theme. It includes a license for the Soliloquy plugin and must be purchased separately from the Genesis Framework.
More info:
Accounting WordPress Theme
(Accounting WordPress Theme – WordPress Theme)
This premium theme was created to exude professionalism within the accounting industry. It features authoritative colors and layout elements designed specifically to make your accounting website look professional while not looking dull. It’s a turn-key installation but you can still modify it if you want. It’s responsive (mobile-friendly) and includes pages for your accounting services, contact details section with consultation requests (downloadable as a CSV file), testimonials section, and a blog.
For more information, go here:
WP Advocate
(WP Advocate)
This is a corporate theme developed specifically for professionals such as accountants and attorneys. You can use the theme’s bundled images or upload your own. It includes a custom post type adding employee profiles and can also integrate with BeSpoke profile templates. It’s clean and loads fast.
More info:
Divi
(Divi Theme For WordPress)
This premium theme for WordPress is one of the most flexible themes in Elegant Themes‘ entire collection. You can create a unique, professional site using the page builder or 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 edit the structure of their pages without touching a single line of code.
(Divi – Flexible Page Builder)
Divi comes with 40 content modules that you can drag and drop anywhere you want. This includes modules such as multiple layouts, a slider, you can place pricing tables, testimonials, call-to-action, and lots more. Divi is responsive and completely customizable. Themes start at $69 per year and includes access to over 80 beautifully-designed themes.
More information:
The Corporation
(The Corporation WP Theme)
This premium theme for WordPress from Elegant Themes was built specifically to create great-looking corporate websites.
The Corporation has a sleek and professional page-based home page design with a prominent slider, blog design, 6 different unique color schemes, multiple page templates that include contact pages, blog feeds, sitemaps, search page, gallery page, and more. Elegant Theme prices start at $69 per year and includes access to over 80 professional themes.
For more details, go here:
Adviser
(Adviser – WordPress Theme)
Adviser was specifically developed to help finance professionals build trust online with a clean business design. It’s ideal for those that provide services such as investing advice or tax advice. Adviser includes a recruitment page with hiring announcements and where to send applications. It also includes a lease calculator. It includes multiple shortcodes and widgets, and includes the drag-and-drop visual composer.
Go here for more information:
Tax Help
(Tax Help Theme For WordPress)
Tax Help was specifically built for financial organizations, tax and financial advisors, and those that provide tax services. This theme is designed to showcase your services professionally and help establish your business reputation. It has a range of blog styles, uses the drag-and-drop visual composer, includes a shortcode builder, the Revolution Slider, and additional custom shortcodes.
Go here for more details:
Finance Business
(Finance Business Theme)
This theme was specifically built for organizations that provide any type of financial service including consulting, tax help, finance, corporate, insurance, loans, accounting, and more. Finance Business includes a custom CMSMasters Visual Content Composer plugin. It also has around 100 shortcodes that includes charts and financial content. It also includes the custom drag-and-drop composer, two premium sliders, page options, color management features, animated elements, and a whole lot more.
More information:
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
We hope that you have found this guide on ways to improve SEO, increase user engagement and increase traffic generation using WordPress plugins useful.
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