Grow Your Accounting Business Online With WordPress

The digital economy has not only revolutionised business globally, it has also created an increasing number of challenges and great opportunities for CPAs.

Challenges Accountants Face Online

Today, more than ever, certified public accountants must find smarter ways to remain competitive, find new clients, and retain current clients. Not only do they have to maintain an active presence in the communities and industries they serve, they must also develop an active presence online. This includes having a dynamic website and figuring out better ways to promote your business services online.

In addition to investing money in offline marketing activities like advertising on local newspapers, ads in industry publications and magazines, radio and tv spots, etc., businesses in the accounting industry are also finding that increasingly larger amounts of their marketing budget will need to be directed to develop and maintain a website that attracts new leads, engages visitors, outperforms the competition in search engines and gives them a wider marketing exposure online.

This means that your website not only has to look professional, load fast, and your site has to 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 updated frequently. This requires a sound website and content management strategy.

Another problem that CPAs face, as all other professions do for that matter, is that your site has only about thirty seconds or less to help visitors find what they need 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 Certified Public Accountants In The Digital Economy

As well as facing many challenges, there are also loads of online opportunities available to businesses in the accounting sector that are willing to adapt to meet the demands of the online economy and think progressively when it comes to marketing their business better online.

This comprehensive article will help you uncover opportunities to attract and engage new visitors and establish stronger online credibility for your accounting or financial services business.

As well as providing practical tips and information on cost-effective ways to improve your website, we also emphasize the benefits and advantages of using WordPress to power your accounting website or blog.

For more information about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system (CMS), go here:

• How A Poorly Designed Web Site Can Lose You Customers
• Learn How To Grow Your Business With WordPress

Useful Tips For Improving Your Website

This section explains ways to improve your accounting 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, layout and navigation structure, etc.

If you need specific help with website planning, check out the article we have written here: A Cost-Saving Guide To Web Site Planning For Business Owners

Basic Web Pages

Professional business websites need some essential pages. Let’s go over these.

Services Page

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

This page should include all the services you offer, such as:

• Business – business planning, company formation, accounting, payroll, preparing financial statements, book keeping, budgeting, forecasting, financing, 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, not just the ones you specialize in. Educate your visitors about what these services do and why they should book an appointment.

Who We Are

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

Remember to include any awards, recognitions, certifications, accreditations, associations, publications, etc., that can be used to promote the company and set it above the competition.

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

Your Staff

Are you searching for quicker and simpler ideas to sell more products or services online or get prospective clients to stay longer on your site? Then one of the things you can do, is help prospective clients get to know you and your business better.

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

On this page, make sure to outline your employee’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 an employee page. Image source: deepsky.com)

We have created a detailed tutorial about how to easily add an easy-to-manage simple employee directory to your web site with no coding skills required here: How To Easily Add A Simple Employee List On Your WordPress Site Without Editing Code

Work With Us

This is a listing of career opportunities available within the firm. It would include training provided, employee benefits, opportunities for advancement, social activities encouraged or sponsored by your organization, etc. You should also include stories of trainees who have risen within your firm and information about upcoming career opportunities in the accounting industry.

Include also a positions available section in your 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.

Case Studies

Case studies and reviews from clients are a great way to show potential clients what it’s like to do business with your company. Adding a web page with case studies and testimonials also helps your accounting or financial services website to establish social proof online.

(Add a page to your site with testimonials and case studies. Image source: pcg-services.com)

We have written extensively about using case studies, testimonials and reviews to grow your business online. Go here to learn more: Learn How To Improve Your Sales Conversions Using Compelling Testimonials

Contact Page

Having a functional contact page is essential.

It should include:

• Name Of Your Organization
• Address
• Phone number
• Facsimile
• Email address
• Map and directions
• Website URL
• Contact form
• Contact name
• Links to social media pages
• Chat (optional feature)

If you operate from multiple areas you will want to make that clear when displaying your address and contact information.

You could also include a few links for the most commonly asked questions, frequently-visited pages, special offers, support page, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add An Accounting Blog

A blog can be a very powerful marketing tool. Many blogging platforms typically include a content management system that allows you to easily promote your business by publishing timely content such as industry news, company updates, training articles, informative posts, how-to videos, webinars, etc.

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

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

Very few people know that an expertly configured WordPress site can turn your web presence into an automated traffic-generation machine that will help begin to drive targeted traffic to your website, simply by adding regular content to your web site.

(An expertly configured WordPress site can generate web traffic automatically to your site)

For more details: WordPress Web Site Traffic Blueprint – Discover How To Automatically Increase Your Web Visitors For Your Business

Legal Info Pages

Having a website that complies will all legal requirements online is extremely important, not just for building credibility with visitors, but also to ensure that no local, regional and federal laws or regulations are being breached wherever your business services clients.

Depending on what products and services you provide, adding the legal pages below to your accounting or financial services website 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 Page
• Privacy Policy
• Terms And Conditions Of Use
• Website Disclaimer
• Affiliate Agreement
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Compensation Disclosure
• DMCA Notice
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Links Policy
• Health Disclaimers
• Refund Policy
• Video/Audio Terms
• and others

We have written a comprehensive article about adding legal pages to your website. Go here to learn more about this: How To Add Legal Pages To Your Website

Improving Your Web Content

In today’s ultra competitive global economy, the ability to deliver valuable content at no cost has become one of the key success factors for businesses selling similar products or providing similar services.

By committing to providing great content with useful information and tips, you will get your visitors sharing your content with others online and coming back for more information. This is the most effective way to inform and teach site visitors and prospective clients about your business.

For example, topics for an accounting business can include the following:

• How balance sheets work
• Profit and loss statements
• Duties and legal responsibilities of company directors
• Presenting accounts for fundraising activities
• Cashflow planning tips
• Business insurance
• Protecting revenues
• Structuring your self-managed retirement fund
• Dos 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 readers understand your accounting services, such as finance accounting, business accounting, tax planning for small business, reducing business debt, understanding accounting conventions, etc.

Remember to use specific keywords and terms in your content that your readers 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 teach you how to drive more traffic to your website or blog, 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 completely FREE!

Ways Of Improving Visitor Experience

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

Content Syndication – RSS Feeds

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds provide plenty of benefits for your accounting business.

If you provide useful information, 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 and picked up by other sites online
• Feeds allow for subscribing
• A feed provides links back to your content
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
• There are various ways readers can receive your content (e.g. users can read the content on their mobile device using a feed reader)
• RSS is built into WordPress

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

You can find RSS feeds with useful content by searching online for finance and tax-related government departments or well-known industry bodies.

Below we have listed a few RSS feeds you may want to consider adding 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

(Add RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds to provide your visitors with a better user experience.)

Adding Checklists

Adding checklists and forms to your site is a great way to increase user engagement, add value to your visitors and provide something unique. Forms and checklists can provide users with useful step-by-step instructions and resources to get necessary tasks performed. Forms and checklists are great planning tools.

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

• How To Set Up A Company
• Rental Property Worksheet
• Fundraising Governance Checklist
• Disclosure Checklists
• Individual Tax Checklist
• Trust Tax Checklist
• Income Tax Variation Forms

Provide Unique Tools

Providing unique online tools, gadgets and applications for businesses (or links to these tools) on your website can help increase visitor engagement and significantly add value to your target audience. Calculators, such as loan and tax calculators, are useful tools to add to accounting websites. Other tools can include time cards, or retirement and interest calculators.

In the next section, we will be discussing a several WordPress-based tools you can use in your site that can help to improve search engine optimization, improve user engagement and generate more web traffic to your business.

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This is the end of part 1.

Click on this link to continue reading:

• A Practical Guide On How To Successfully Build And Grow An Accounting Or Financial Services Business Online Using WordPress – Part 2

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