Grow Your Accounting Business Online With WordPress

The digital age has not only revolutionised businesses around the world, it has also created growing challenges and great opportunities for CPAs.

Online Challenges For The Accounting & Financial Services Profession

Today, more than ever, CPAs must work hard and find smarter ways to stand out from the crowd, find new clients, and retain current business. Not only do you have to be fully involved in the communities and industries your business serves, you must also develop and maintain a strong presence online. This includes having an effective website and learning smarter ways to grow your business services online.

As well as investing money in offline marketing activities, you will probably find (if you haven’t already) that in order to compete with other web-marketing savvy accounting businesses, you will need to designate a more significant share of your budget to develop and manage a website that attracts clients, engages users, outranks the competition in search engines and social media, and helps you create wider exposure online.

This means that your site not only has to look great, your pages have to load fast, and your website layout has to be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of your website may change over time and some aspects may need to be updated frequently. This requires the implementation of a sound web and content management strategy.

One other problem that accounting businesses face, as most professions do for that matter, is that your site has an average of 30 seconds or less to give visitors 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 Accounting Businesses In The Web Economy

As well as facing many new 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 challenges of the digital economy and can think strategically about marketing themselves better online.

In this detailed guide, you will learn opportunities to attract new visitors and build more online credibility for your business.

As well as providing tips and information on cost-effective ways to improve your web presence, we also focus on the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress Content Management System to power your accounting or financial services business website.

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

• How A Poorly Constructed Web Site Can Lose You Prospective Buyers And What To Do About It
• WordPress – A Small Business Owner’s Guide

Useful Tips To Improve Your Accounting Website

In this section we will show you how to improve your accounting website and get better results online. We will look at what pages you need, what content works best for accounting and financial services sites, your layout and navigation, etc.

If you need assistance or help planning your accounting website, see this detailed guide we have written: The Web Site Planning Process Explained: A Practical Blueprint For Business Owners

Your Website Pages

Professional websites need several basic pages. Let’s take a look at the pages your  should have and how to structure your accounting or financial services website for best results.

Services And Products Description Page

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

Your page should include services such as:

• Business – planning, company formation, accounting, payroll, preparing financial statements, bookkeeping, budgeting, financing, forecasting, strategic planning, consulting services, etc.
• Taxation – preparing, planning, reviewing, auditing, advising, 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 businesses, 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 your services and why they should book an appointment.

About Us Page

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

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

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

Team

If you are searching for cost-effective ways to sell more products or services online or get people to stay longer on your site, then make it easier for visitors to get to know your business better.

You want your business to be relatable. One great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your employees or team members. This page should include a photo and a brief bio. Since most visitors are probably not 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 also include social buttons that will allow your site visitors to follow individual staff members on their social networks.

In this page, make sure to highlight your team member’s qualifications, how they add value to your team, and more importantly, how they can help add value to your clients’ business.

(Add a page that introduces your employees to prospective new clients. Image source: deepsky.com)

We have written a detailed tutorial on how to create and add an easy-to-update directory of staff or team members in your site without messing with code here: How To Create A Simple Employee List In Your WordPress Site

Work For Us

List any career opportunities within the company. This page could include type of training provided, employee benefits, opportunities for advancement, social activities promoted or sponsored by your organization, etc. It should include case studies of graduates who have worked their way up in your company and information about additional 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 this page, subscribe to your contact list, follow your social pages, etc.

Testimonials & Case Studies

Testimonials and case studies are a great way to show prospective clients what type of solutions you can implement to help them solve their problems. By adding a page with testimonials from past clients and case studies, you will also help to provide prospective clients with social proof online.

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

We have created a detailed article about using testimonials, case studies and user reviews to improve your business results online. Go here to learn more: Learn How To Achieve Better Results Online With Powerful Testimonials

Contact Us Page

A functional contact page is crucial.

Your contact page should provide visitors with some or all of the following:

• Business Name
• Your physical address
• Phone
• Fax number
• Contact email
• Map and directions
• Web address
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Social media URLs
• Online chat feature (optional)

If your business services several areas you want to make that clear when showing the address and contact information.

You can also include links to an FAQ page, main pages, special offers, support page, newsletter, blog, etc.

Blog

A blog is a powerful marketing tool for your business. Many blogging platforms typically comprise of a content management system that allows you to easily promote your business using timely content such as company announcements, product releases, educational information, opinions and discussions, videos, media presentations, etc.

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

If you don’t have a website yet, or your existing site is hard to manage or not giving you the results you want, then WordPress can serve as both your business website and business blog.

Very few people know that WordPress can turn into an automated traffic-generation machine that will help begin to drive targeted visitors to your website, simply by adding new content to your website on a consistent basis.

(WordPress can drive web traffic automatically to your website)

Learn more here: Website Traffic Blueprint – How To Automatically Increase Your Website Traffic For Your Business Using WordPress

Legal Information Pages

It’s crucial 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 local, regional and federal laws or regulations are being contravened in whatever area you service.

Adding the following legal pages to your accounting site will help keep you out of legal hot water with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers (e.g. Google), and other potential legal threats or inconveniences:

• Contact Us
• Privacy Statement
• Terms 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
• and others

We have written a detailed article about adding legal pages to your site. Go here to learn more: Adding Legal Pages To Your WordPress Site

Tips On How To Improve Your Web Content

In today’s globally competitive economy, being generous with content has become one of the key business differentiators.

You will want to provide great content with advice and tips that will get your visitors sharing your content and coming back for more. Publishing content is a great way to inform and educate site visitors and prospective clients about your business and about doing business with your company.

For example, topics for an accounting business can include:

• How balance sheets work
• Profit and loss statements
• Directors’ duties and legal responsibilities
• Presenting accounts for non-profit activities
• Cashflow planning advice
• Business insurance
• Risk protection
• Structuring your self-managed retirement fund
• Things to look for when … (e.g. purchasing vs leasing, claiming business expenses, etc.)

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

Remember to include keywords in your content that prospective clients would search for.

We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive regular training emails with easy-to-digest information that will show exactly how to drive more traffic to your website, save money creating useful content that will add value to your site 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 Experience

Improving website user experience (often referred to as UX) will help keep visitors coming back and using your site. This section will show you ways you can improve visitor engagement and user experience.

Content Syndication – RSS Feeds

An RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feed provides plenty of benefits for your business.

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

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

• All of your updates are kept in one place
• Doesn’t rely on email
• Can be shared online
• Users can subscribe to your RSS feed
• A feed provides a way for external links to point back to your content
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregator services
• There are a number of ways readers can receive your content (e.g. subscribers can read the content on their mobile device using a feed reader)
• It’s built into WordPress

There are also a number of 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.

To find RSS feeds with loads of useful content just visit sites of finance-related government departments and key industry bodies.

Below we have listed some feeds containing useful information that you may want to consider adding to your accounting 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

(RSS feeds can help to improve your accounting website’s user experience.)

Checklists & Forms

Checklists and forms are a great way to help increase user engagement, add value to your readers and set yourself apart from the competition. They can provide visitors with useful instructions and resources to perform tasks. They are also great business planning tools.

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

• How To Set Up A Business
• Negative Gearing Worksheet
• Non-Profit Governance Checklist
• Disclosure Requirements
• Company Tax Checklist
• Capital Gains Tax Checklist
• Income Tax Variation Forms

Adding Other Tools

Providing unique tools, gadgets and applications for businesses is a great way to increase visitor engagement and significantly add value to potential clients. Calculators, such as loan and tax calculators, are popular tools for accounting websites. Other tools can include time cards, and retirement and interest calculators.

In the next section of this guide, we take a look at a several WordPress plugins you can add to your accounting or financial services website that improve seo, increase user engagement and generate more traffic to your business.

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This is the end of section 1.

Click here to read the rest of this guide:

• The Complete Step-By-Step Guide To Successfully Growing An Accounting Business Online – Part 2

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