Grow Your Accounting Business Online With WordPress

The digital economy has not only revolutionised the way business is done worldwide, it has also created increasingly difficult challenges and opportunities for the accounting and financial services sector.

Online Challenges For Accountants

CPAs today must work harder than ever to remain in business. Not only do you have to actively participate in the communities and industries you serve, you must also develop and maintain an active presence online. This includes having an effective website and searching for better ways to market your business services online.

In addition to spending dollars advertising offline, you will probably find that in order to compete, you will need to invest a larger portion of your budget to develop and maintain a website that can attract clients, engage visitors, outrank the competition in search engines and help to increase your reach online.

This means that your site not only has to look professional, your pages have to be fast-loading, and your site has to be easy to navigate, but it’s also important to keep in mind that your site’s needs will change over time and some areas may need to be updated often. This requires having a well-developed website and content management strategy in place.

Another problem that accountancy firms (and most businesses) face with their websites, is that your site has an average of 30 seconds or less to give users the information they need or they will go 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

Opportunities For The Accounting Profession In The Web Economy

As well as facing significant business and technology changes, there are also loads of online opportunities available to accounting businesses that are willing to adapt to meet the demands of the online economy and can think strategically about improving their online marketing skills.

In this article, you will learn opportunities to increase web traffic and create significant improvements in your business presence online.

As well as providing practical tips and information on cost-effective ways to improve your accounting website, we also recommend that you consider using the WordPress content management system to power your accounting website or blog.

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

• Why A Poorly Built Website Can Lose You Customers
• Using WordPress To Grow Your Business

Useful Tips For Improving Your Website

We’ll start first by covering the basics. In this section, we’ll look at ways to improve your accounting website and get better results online. We will look at what pages your website needs, what type of content works best for accounting and financial services websites, navigation structure, etc.

If you need additional information about website planning, check out the detailed guide we have written here: A Money-Saving Guide To Web Site Planning For Business Owners

Your Web Pages

Professional business websites need a number of essential web pages. Let’s discuss the pages your  need and how to set up your accounting or financial services website for best results.

Description Of services And Products

You need a page that lists your services and any products that you offer.

It will include services such as:

• Business – business planning, incorporation of companies, accounting, payroll, preparing financial statements, bookkeeping, forecasting, financing, budgeting, strategic planning, consulting services, 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, asset transfers, etc.
• Lending and leasing

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

About Us Page

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

It’s important to mention any industry awards, certifications, recognitions, accreditations, publications, associations, etc., that could be used to promote the company and set it above other competitors.

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

Meet Our Team

Are you searching for cost-effective ways to sell more products or services online or increase user interaction with your site? Then help your prospects get to know, like and trust you and your business better.

People need to relate to your business. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your team members. This page should include a photo and a brief bio. Since most visitors are probably not familiar with accounting terms your bio descriptions should tell who they are and what their specialties are. You may also want to explain what those specialties mean. It should also include social buttons that will allow your site visitors to follow your team members on their social pages.

On this page, don’t be afraid to show the human side of your team members with personal stories, hobbies, etc., but make sure to highlight your staff member’s qualifications, why they are an asset to your team, and more importantly, how they can help add value to your clients’ business.

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

If you need help how to easily create and add an easy-to-maintain simple team members directory in a WordPress site without messing with code, refer to this tutorial: How To Add A Simple Employee List To Your WordPress Site With No Coding Skills

Job Opportunities

List any career opportunities within your company. It can include training provided, employee benefits, opportunities for advancement, etc. It should include stories of graduates who have established a solid career path thanks to your company and information such as the job outlook and new career opportunities in the accounting and financial services industry.

Maintain a positions available section in your page. If there are no positions currently available, consider inviting people to return periodically to the page, subscribe to your updates list, follow you on social media, etc.

Testimonials

Case studies and client reviews are a great way to show prospective clients what it’s like to do business with your company. By adding a page with case studies and testimonials from past clients, you are also helping to are also providing social proof online.

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

We have created a comprehensive article about using testimonials and client reviews to improve your business results online. If you would like to learn more about this here: How To Improve Your Sales With Knockout Client Testimonials

Contact Us Page

A contact page is absolutely necessary.

Your contact page should include the following information about your organization:

• Name
• Physical location
• Phone
• Facsimile number
• Email
• Map
• Website address
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Links to social media profiles
• Interactive chat feature (optional feature)

If you operate from multiple areas you will want to make this clear when displaying the address and contact info.

Consider also including a few links for commonly-asked questions, main pages, special offers, support page, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add An Accounting Blog

A blog is a very powerful marketing tool. Most blogging platforms typically comprise of a content management system that is simple to use and allows you to easily promote your business by publishing timely content like company news, product updates, useful articles and tutorials, opinions and discussions, videos, infographics, etc.

If you already have an existing site, then consider adding a WordPress-driven blog to promote your firm.

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

Something not many businesses know about, is that an expertly configured WordPress site can turn your web presence into an automated traffic-generation machine that can begin driving new targeted traffic to your site, simply by adding new content on a regular basis to your website.

(WordPress can automate your traffic generation)

Go here to learn more: Web Site Traffic Blueprint – Learn How To Turn Your Website Into A Web Traffic Machine

Legal Information Pages

It’s really important for accounting and financial services organizations to have a website that complies will all legal requirements online, not just for establishing trust and credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that no laws and regulations are being broken wherever you provide services to.

Depending on the services you provide, adding the legal pages below to your site will help you stay out of legal hot water with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers, and other potential legal threats or inconveniences:

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

Go here to learn more about adding legal pages to your site: How To Add Legal Pages To Your Site

How To Improve The Content On Your Website

In today’s highly competitive digital economy, the earlier you begin to engage in the practice of content marketing, the sooner you will begin to see results and differentiate yourself from competing businesses.

Providing great content with advice and tips will get your readers to share your content with others online and come back for more information. Content marketing is the most effective way to inform and educate your visitors and prospects about your business and about using your products and services.

For example, for an accounting business, topics could cover the following:

• Explanations of balance sheets
• Overlooked tax deductions
• Directors’ duties and legal responsibilities
• Presenting accounts for fundraising activities
• Business cashflow planning
• Business insurance
• Protecting revenues
• Structuring your 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 educational articles that will help your your prospective clients gain a better understanding of accounting services, such as software accounting, business accounting, business auditing, reducing business debt, financial concepts made simple, etc.

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

We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive regular training emails with actionable information that will show exactly how to drive more traffic to your website or blog, save money creating high-quality content that will add value to your site visitors and grow your business online using content marketing. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also 100% FREE!

Improving User Experience

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

Using RSS Feeds

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds provide lots of benefits for your site.

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

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

• All of your content updates are in one place
• your content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Your feeds can be shared and picked up by other sites online
• Users can subscribe to your feed
• An RSS feed provides a way for external links to point back to your content
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
• There are several ways your readers can receive your content (e.g. 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 adding syndicated content to your website from other sites, such as the fact that you don’t have to write, manage or update the content.

You can find RSS feeds with loads of useful content by searching online for relevant government departments or industry bodies.

Here are some RSS feeds you may want to consider adding to your accounting 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 feeds can help to improve your accounting site’s user experience.)

Checklists And Forms

Adding checklists and forms to your site is a great way to increase visitor engagement, add value to your readers and set yourself apart from the competition. Checklists and forms can provide useful instructions and resources to complete necessary tasks. Forms and checklists are also great business planning tools.

Checklists and forms could include areas such as:

• How To Set Up A Business
• Negative Gearing Worksheet
• Not-For-Profit Activity Checklist
• Disclosure Requirements
• Company Tax Checklist
• Capital Gains Tax Checklist
• Income Tax Variation Forms

Unique Tools

Providing unique online tools, gadgets and applications for businesses (or links to these tools) can help increase visitor engagement and add significant value to users. Calculators, such as loan and tax calculators, are great tools you can add to accounting websites. Other tools could include time cards, or retirement and interest calculators.

In the next section of this guide, we will look at a several online tools you can add to your website using WordPress plugins that improve your search engine optimization, improve user engagement and drive more traffic to your business.

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This is the end of section 1 of this guide on ways to build your accounting business web presence.

Click here to read Part Two:

• Online Business Tips For Certified Public Accountants – WordPress Plugins For Improving Search Engine Optimization, Increasing User Engagement And Traffic Generation

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