Grow Your Accounting Business Online With WordPress

Accounting professionals today face increasing challenges.

Challenges Accounting & Financial Services Face Online

CPAs today must work harder than ever before to remain in business. Not only do they have to participate in the communities and industries their business serves, they must also maintain an active web presence. This includes having a website and learning how to better market your services online.

In addition to investing money advertising offline, businesses in the accounting industry are now also finding that they need to designate a bigger portion of their marketing budget towards developing and managing a website that attracts new leads, engages visitors, outperforms the competition in search engines and social media, and increases their reach online.

This means that your website not only has to look great, your pages have to be fast-loading, and your website layout has to be easy to navigate, but it’s also important to keep in mind that your site’s needs may change over time and sections may need to be updated frequently. This requires having a well-planned web and content management strategy.

One other problem that accounting businesses (and most professions) face online, is that they have an average of 30 seconds or less to help users find the information they are searching for 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

Opportunities For CPAs

As well as facing a number of business and technology changes, there are also plenty of online opportunities available for businesses in the accounting industry that are willing to evolve to meet the demands of the online economy and can think outside the box about improving their online business marketing skills.

This comprehensive guide will help you uncover new ways to drive more traffic and build more online credibility for your business.

As well as providing general website improvement tips, we also recommend that you consider using the WordPress Content Management System to power your accounting business website or blog.

To learn more about the benefits and advantages of using WordPress, go here:

• Learn Why A Poorly Built Website Can Cost You Prospective Buyers
• Using A WordPress Blog To Grow A Successful Small Business

Useful Tips For Improving Your Accounting Or Financial Services Website

This section explains how to improve your website and get better results online. We show you what pages you need, what type of content works best for accounting and financial services websites, tips for improving your site’s layout and navigation structure, etc.

If you need assistance or help planning your accounting or financial services website, check out the detailed step-by-step guide we have written here: The Website Planning Process Explained: A Basic Primer For Business Owners

Your Website Pages

Professional websites need a number of basic web pages. Let’s discuss these.

Products And Services Description Page

It’s essential to have a page that describes your products or services.

It will include services such as:

• Business accounting – planning, formation, accounting, payroll, financial statement compilation, book keeping, forecasting, financing, budgeting, strategic planning, consulting, 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, 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 why they should book an appointment.

Who We Are

This page should give a description of your business and explain to visitors what it stands for, its unique approach, philanthropy, etc.

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

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

Meet Our Team

Are you looking for ways to sell more products online or get visitors to interact more on your site? Then one of the things you can do, is help your prospective clients get to know your organization better.

Your business needs to be relatable. One great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your employees. This page should include a photo and a mini bio. Since most visitors are probably not 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 selected staff members on their social networks.

In this page, make sure to highlight your person’s expertise and qualifications, why they are an asset to your team, and more importantly, how they can help add value to your clients’ business.

(Add a page that introduces your team members to prospective new clients. Screenshot source: deepsky.com)

If you need help how to easily add a simple team members directory in your website using free plugins, go here: How To Add A Simple Employee List To Your WordPress Site With No Coding Skills

Work For Us

This is a listing of career opportunities available within your firm. It should include training, employee benefits, professional development, social activities promoted or encouraged by your firm, etc. You can also include information about new career opportunities in the accounting industry.

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

Case Studies

Case studies and reviews from clients are a great way to show potential clients businesses minimise tax, increase profitability, or grow strategically. Adding a web page with case studies and reviews from clients also establishes social proof.

(Add a page to your site with reviews from clients and case studies. Screenshot source: pcg-services.com)

We have written extensively about using testimonials and user reviews to grow your business online. Go here to learn more about this: Learn How To Improve Your Sales Using More Effective Testimonials

Contact Us

A contact page is essential.

Your contact page should provide:

• Business Name
• Your physical location
• Phone
• Facsimile
• Email
• Google Map
• Web address
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Links to social media profiles
• Online chat feature

If you operate out of multiple areas you will want to make that clear when showing the address and contact info.

You could also include links to an FAQ page, useful pages, special offers, helpdesk, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add An Accounting Blog Section

A blog is a very powerful marketing tool for your business. Many blogging platforms typically include a content management system that is easy to use and allows you to easily promote your business using content such as industry events, company updates, useful articles and tutorials, informative posts, how-to videos, infographics, etc.

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

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

Something few businesses know about, is that WordPress can become an automated traffic-generation machine that will begin delivering web traffic to your site, simply by publishing regular content to your website.

(WordPress can automate your traffic generation)

For more details: Website Traffic Blueprint – A Complete Guide To Getting More Website Traffic Automatically With WordPress

Legal Information Pages

It’s essential to make sure they have a website that complies will all legal requirements online, not just for establishing credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that no local, regional and federal laws or regulations are being broken wherever your business services clients.

Adding some or all of the legal pages below to your accounting website will help you stay out of legal hot water 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 Linking Policy
• Health Disclaimers
• Refund Policy
• Video/Audio Terms
• etc.

We have written a comprehensive article on adding legal pages to your website. Go here to learn more about this: Why You Need To Add Legal Pages To Your Site

How To Improve The Content On Your Website

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

You want to provide great content with useful advice and tips that will get your readers to share your content and come back for more information. Content marketing is the most effective way to educate your visitors and prospective clients about your business.

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

• Explanations of balance sheets
• Understanding profit & loss statements
• Directors’ duties and legal responsibilities
• Presenting accounts for fundraising activities
• Cashflow planning tips
• Maximizing business insurance cover
• Protecting revenues
• How to structure your self-managed retirement fund
• Do’s and don’ts of … (e.g. purchasing insurance, setting up payroll systems, etc.)

You can also create a series of educational articles that will help your prospective clients understand accounting services, such as software accounting, small business accounting, business budgeting, reducing business debt, financial concepts made simple, etc.

Remember to include keywords and terms in your articles that your 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 easy-to-digest information and practical tips that will show exactly how to drive more traffic to your site, save money creating high-quality content for 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 completely FREE!

Ways To Improve Visitor Engagement And User Experience

Improving your user experience (known 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.

Syndicate Content With RSS Feeds

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

If you provide useful information, other sites will want to syndicate your content to their visitors.

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

• All of your content updates are in one place
• your content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Feeds can be shared
• Allows for subscribing
• A feed provides links back to your content
• Your feeds can be submitted to RSS directories
• There are a number of ways readers can receive your content (e.g. view the content on their mobile device using feed readers)
• RSS is built into WordPress

There are also benefits to providing valuable 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 searching online for relevant government departments and key industry bodies.

Below we have listed some exaples of useful 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

(Use RSS feeds to improve your site’s user experience.)

Add Forms

Checklists and forms are a great way to increase visitor engagement, add value to your readers and provide something unique. Checklists and forms can give them step-by-step instructions and resources to complete a task. Checklists and forms are great planning tools.

You can provide online or downloadable checklists and forms (or links to these) covering a range of topics such as:

• How To Set Up A Company
• Rental Property Checklist
• Fundraising Activity Checklist
• Disclosure Checklists
• Sole Trader Tax Checklist
• Trust Tax Checklist
• Income Tax Variation Forms

Adding Unique Tools

Providing useful tools, gadgets and applications for businesses on your website can help increase visitor engagement and add significant value to your users. Calculators, such as loan and tax calculators, are useful tools you can add to accounting websites. Others could include time cards, and retirement and interest calculators.

In the next section, we take a look at a number of WordPress-based tools you can use in your accounting site that improve search engine optimization, improve user engagement and drive more web traffic to your business.

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This is the end of section one of this guide on ways to grow your accounting business presence online.

Click on this link to keep reading:

• Tips For Accountants – How To Improve SEO, Improve User Engagement And Increase Traffic Generation Using Plugins

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