Grow Your Accounting Business Online With WordPress

Accounting professionals today are facing many new challenges created by the online economy.

Challenges Accountants Face Online

Accounting businesses must work harder than ever to remain in business. Not only do you have to become more involved in the communities and industries you serve, you must also maintain a strong web presence. This includes having an effective website and searching for smarter ways to grow your business online.

As well as spending dollars in offline marketing, you will probably find (if you haven’t already) that in order to compete with other accounting businesses, increasingly larger amounts of their budget need to be allocated to developing and maintaining a website that attracts new prospects, engages visitors, outperforms the competition in search engines and social media, and helps increase your reach online.

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

One other challenge that CPAs face with their websites (as other professions do for that matter), is that your site has only around 30 seconds or less to give users what they are looking 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

Opportunities For Professional Accountants

As well as facing significant business and technology changes, there are also many online opportunities available to accounting companies that can adapt to meet digital demands and can think progressively in terms of marketing themselves better online.

In this guide, you will learn about ways and opportunities to attract new visitors and build more online credibility for your accounting or financial services business.

As well as providing practical tips and information on cost-effective ways to improve your accounting business online, we also place special emphasis on the benefits and advantages of using WordPress to power your accounting or financial services business website or blog.

For more information about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system (CMS), see these articles:

• Learn Why A Poorly Built Website Can Lose You Business
• Learn How To Grow Your Small Business Using WordPress

Practical Tips For Improving Your Accounting Or Financial Services Site

In this section we will start with the basics and show you how to improve your website and get better results. We show you what web pages you need, what content works best for accounting and financial services sites, ways to improve navigation structure, etc.

If you need website planning assistance, check out the detailed step-by-step guide we have written here: The Web Site Planning Process Explained: A Practical Guide For Non-Technical Business Owners

Improving Your Web Pages

Professional websites need a number of basic pages. Let’s take a look at these.

Products And Services Description Page

It’s essential to include a page that explains your products or services.

Your page should include all the products and services you offer, such as:

• Business – planning, company structures, accounting, payroll, financial statement compilation, bookkeeping, budgeting, forecasting, financing, strategic planning, consulting services, etc.
• Taxation – preparing, planning, reviewing, auditing, advice, 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, not just the ones you specialize in. Provide your visitors with information that will educate them about the benefits of using these services and why they should choose you.

About Us Page

The ‘About Us’ page needs to describe your business and explain to visitors what your business stands for, its unique approach, philanthropical activities, etc.

It’s important to also list any business awards, recognitions, accreditations, certifications, publications, associations, etc., that can be used to promote the company and position it above other competitors.

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

Staff Page

If you are looking for simple ways to grow your business online, then one of the things you can do, is make it easier for your prospects to get to know you, your team and your business better.

You want prospects to relate to your business. One great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your people. This page should include a photo and a mini biography. Since most visitors will not tend to be that well-versed in accounting terms your descriptions should tell who they are and what their specialties are. You may also want to explain what those specialties mean. This page should even include social buttons so your visitors can follow individual staff members on their social pages.

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

(Make sure to add a page that introduces your employees to prospective new clients. Image sourced from: deepsky.com)

We have created a detailed tutorial about how to easily add an easy-to-manage directory of staff or team members to your web site without coding skills here: How To Easily Create A Simple Employee List For Your WordPress Site With No Coding Skills Required

Recruitment

List any career opportunities within the firm. This page could include training, employee benefits, professional development, social aspects of working with your organization, etc. You can include information such as the job outlook and upcoming career opportunities in the accounting industry.

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

Testimonials

Reviews from clients and case studies are a great way to show potential clients them minimise tax, increase profitability, or grow strategically. By adding a page with testimonials and case studies, you will also help to provide social proof.

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

We have written a comprehensive article about using testimonials and user reviews get better results online. For more details: Achieve Better Results Online With Meaningful Testimonials

Contact Us Page

A clean contact page is essential.

It should include the following:

• Name Of Your Organization
• Your address
• Phone
• Fax number
• Contact email address
• Google Map and directions
• Web URL
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Social media URLs
• Interactive chat feature

If you operate out of several locations you want to make that clear when showing the address and contact information.

You can also include a few links for the most commonly asked questions, useful pages, special offers, support area, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add An Accounting Blog

A blog can be a powerful business marketing tool. Many blogging platforms typically include a content management system that is easy to use and allows you to easily promote your business using timely content such as news, company updates, educational information, opinions and discussions, videos, media presentations, etc.

If you already have an accounting or financial services site, then consider adding a WordPress-powered blog to promote your services.

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

Not many people know this, but an expertly configured WordPress site can turn your web presence into an automated traffic machine that can begin delivering targeted traffic to your business, simply by adding new content to your website on a consistent basis.

(WordPress can drive new traffic automatically to your site)

Go here to learn more about this: Web Traffic Blueprint – A Complete Guide To Generating More Traffic For Your Business Automatically Using WordPress

Legal Pages

It’s crucial to ensure they have a website that complies will all legal requirements online, not just for building trust with prospective clients, but also to ensure that you are not breaching laws and regulations wherever your business is located.

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

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

We have written a comprehensive article on adding legal pages to your website. For more details: What You Need To Know About Adding Legal Pages To Your Site

Ways To Improve The Content On Your Site

In today’s ultra competitive digital economy, content marketing has become one of the key business differentiators.

Providing great content with information and tips will get your visitors sharing your content with others and coming back for more information. This is a great way to inform and teach site visitors and prospective clients about your business and about using your services and products.

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

• How balance sheets work
• Understanding profit & loss statements
• Directors’ duties and legal responsibilities
• How to present accounts for fundraising activities
• Business cashflow planning advice
• Business insurance
• Risk prevention
• How to structure a self-managed retirement fund
• Things to look for when … (e.g. purchasing vs leasing, setting up payroll systems, etc.)

You can also create a series of informative articles that will help your your prospective clients understand your services, such as software accounting, small business accounting, office accounting software, reducing business debt, understanding accounting concepts, etc.

Remember to use specific keywords and terminology in your content that your prospective clients will be searching for.

We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive a comprehensive series of training emails with actionable information that will teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your web site, save money creating useful content for your visitors and grow your business online using content marketing strategies. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also completely FREE!

Improve Visitor Engagement And User Experience

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

Syndicate Content With RSS Feeds

RSS feeds provide lots of benefits for your business.

If you provide valuable content, other businesses may want to syndicate your content.

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

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

There are also benefits when it comes to adding syndicated content to your site 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 tax-related government departments and respected industry bodies.

For example, here are examples of RSS feeds containing useful information that 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

(Use RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds to improve your website’s UX.)

Checklists & Forms

Checklists and forms are a great way to help increase visitor engagement and add value to your audience. They can provide step-by-step instructions and resources to perform tasks. Checklists and forms are great planning tools.

Forms and checklists could cover areas such as:

• How To Set Up A Business
• Rental Property Worksheet
• Fundraising Governance Checklist
• Disclosure Requirements
• Individual Tax Checklist
• Capital Gains Tax Checklist
• Income Tax Variation Forms

Provide Online Tools

Providing useful tools and applications for businesses (or links to these tools) on your website is a great way to increase visitor engagement and significantly add value to potential clients. Calculators, such as loan and tax calculators, are great tools to add to accounting websites. Others could include time cards, or retirement and interest calculators.

In part 2, we discuss a number of online tools you can use in your site using WordPress plugins and themes that can help improve your search engine optimization, improve user engagement and generate more visitors to your business.

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

To view Part Two, click here:

• Your Accounting Website – WordPress Plugins That Can Help To Improve Search Engine Optimization, Increase User Engagement And Increase Web Traffic Generation

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