Grow Your Accounting Business Online With WordPress

The information economy has not only transformed business globally, it has also created a number of difficult challenges and opportunities for certified public accountants.

Challenges Professional Accountants Face Online

Now, more than ever, accounting firms must find smarter ways to stand out from the crowd, find new clients, and keep their current clientele. Not only do you have to participate in the communities and industries you serve, you must also develop an active digital presence. This includes having a dynamic website and figuring out smarter ways to promote your business services online.

In addition to spending money marketing offline, businesses in the accounting industry are now also finding that they need to designate a greater amount of their budget to develop and manage a website that will bring in clients, engage users, outrank the competition in search engines and social media, and help to increase their reach online.

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

One other challenge that accountancy firms face (as most businesses do for that matter), is that they have around 30 seconds to give users the information they are searching for 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 Certified Public Accountants

As well as facing many business and technology changes, there are also plenty of online opportunities available to businesses in the accounting sector that are willing to evolve to meet digital challenges and who can think strategically when it comes to improving their online marketing skills.

In this guide, you will learn opportunities to increase traffic and improve your business online.

As well as providing general website improvement tips, we also recommend that you consider using WordPress to power your accounting or financial services business website.

To learn more about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system, see the articles below:

• Discover Why A Poorly Built Web Site Can Cost You Business And What To Do About It
• Learning WordPress – A Business Owner’s Guide

Ways To Improve Your Website

We’ll start first by going over some basic stuff. In this section, we’ll look at how to improve your accounting website and get better results. We show you what web pages you need, what type of content you need, ways to improve your site’s navigation structure, etc.

If you need help with website planning, check out the guide we have written here: The Website Planning Process Explained: A Basic Blueprint For Non-Technical Business Owners

Ways To Improve Your Website Pages

All websites need some essential web pages. Let’s discuss these.

Description Of Services

You need a page that lists your services and products.

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

• Business – business planning, formation, general accounting, payroll, financial statement compilation, bookkeeping, financing, forecasting, budgeting, strategic planning, consulting, 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

Make sure to list all of the services you provide. Provide your visitors with information that will educate them about the benefits of using your services and direct them to your appointment booking page.

Who We Are

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

It should list any awards, accreditations, recognitions, certifications, associations, publications, etc., that you can use to promote the company and set it above other competitors.

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

Meet Our Team

Are you looking for inexpensive ways to grow your business online and increase user interaction with your site? Then something you can do, is help your prospects get to know, like and trust you and your organization better.

You want people 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 bio. Since most visitors are probably not that 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 individual staff members on their social networks.

In this page, don’t be afraid to humanize your people with personal stories, hobbies, etc., but make sure to outline your person’s expertise, 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 ‘meet the team’ page. Image source: deepsky.com)

To learn more about how to easily add a simple and easy-to-manage list directory of employees to your site without touching code, see this step-by-step tutorial: How To Easily Add A Simple Staff List On Your WordPress Site With No Coding Skills Required

Work For Us

This is a listing of career opportunities available within the firm. This page should include type of training provided, employee benefits, opportunities for advancement, etc. You can also include information about additional career opportunities in the accounting industry.

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

Case Studies & Testimonials

Customer reviews and case studies are a great way to show potential clients what kind of accounting solutions you are capable of implementing to help solve their problems. Adding a page with case studies and testimonials from previous clients also provides potential clients with social proof.

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

We have written extensively on using client case studies and reviews improve your business online. If you would like to learn more about this here: All You Need To Know To Achieve Better Results Online With Sales Boosting Testimonials

Contact Us

Having a clean contact page is crucial.

It should include some or all of the following:

• Business Name
• Address
• Telephone
• Fax number
• Contact email address
• Map
• Web address
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Links to social media pages
• Interactive chat

If you operate from different locations you will want to make this clear when displaying the address and contact information.

You can also include links to commonly-asked questions, main pages, special offers, support page, newsletter opt-in form, blog, etc.

Add An Accounting Or Financial Services Blog

A blog can be a very powerful marketing tool for your business. Most blogging platforms typically include a content management system that allows you to easily promote your business by publishing timely content like company announcements, product releases, training information, discussions on current topics, how-to videos, webinars, etc.

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

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

Very few people know that WordPress can turn into an automated traffic system that can begin to drive targeted visitors to your business, simply by adding content on a consistent basis to your website.

(An expertly configured WordPress site can drive new visitors automatically to your site)

For more info, see this article: Web Traffic Blueprint – A Complete Guide To Growing Your Web Traffic Automatically Using WordPress

Legal Information Pages

It’s essential to make sure they have a compliant website, not just for building trust and credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that no laws or regulations are being contravened wherever you provide services to.

Adding some or all of the legal pages below to your accounting or financial services website will help you stay out of trouble with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers (e.g. Google), and other potential sources of threats and legal inconveniences:

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

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

Tips On How To Improve Your Web Content

In today’s fiercely competitive online economy, the sooner you begin engaging in the practice of content marketing, the quicker you will begin to see results and differentiate yourself from competing businesses.

Providing great content with advice and tips will get your visitors to share your content and come back for more information. This is the most effective way to inform and educate your visitors and prospective clients about your business.

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

• How balance sheets work
• Overlooked tax deductions
• Directors’ duties and legal responsibilities
• Presenting accounts for non-profit activities
• Business cashflow planning
• Business insurance
• Protecting revenues
• Tips on structuring your self-managed retirement fund
• Things to look for when … (e.g. purchasing insurance, setting up payroll systems, etc.)

You can also create a series of informative articles that will help your your prospective clients gain a better understanding of your accounting or financial services, such as forensic accounting, small business accounting, business auditing, reducing business debt, understanding accounting conventions, etc.

Remember to use specific keywords and terms 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 easy-to-digest information that will teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your website or blog, save money creating useful 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!

Tips For Improving Visitor Experience

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

Add RSS Feeds

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

If you provide useful information, other sites may want to syndicate your content.

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

• All of your updates are in one place
• Content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Your feed can be shared
• Feeds allow users to subscribe
• A feed provides a way for external links to point back to your site
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories
• There are multiple ways readers can receive your content (e.g. subscribers can read your content on their mobile device using different applications)
• RSS is built into WordPress

There are also benefits when it comes to providing great content on your site from other sites, such as the fact that you don’t have to write, manage or update the content.

To find RSS feeds with useful content just search online for relevant government departments or industry bodies.

For example, here are some exaples of RSS feeds containing useful information that 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 feeds to improve your website’s user experience.)

Checklists & Forms

Checklists and forms are a great way to help increase visitor engagement and add value to your readers. Checklists and forms can provide visitors with useful step-by-step instructions and resources to get necessary tasks completed. They are great business planning tools.

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

• How To Set Up A Business
• Rental Property Worksheet
• Not-For-Profit Activity Checklist
• Disclosure Requirements
• Individual Tax Checklist
• Capital Gains Tax Checklist
• Income Tax Variation Forms

Adding Unique Tools

Providing unique tools and applications for businesses on your website is a great way to increase visitor engagement and significantly add value to users. Calculators, such as loan and tax calculators, are great tools to add to accounting websites. Other applications could include time cards, and retirement and interest calculators.

In the next section of this detailed article, we look at a number of WordPress plugins and themes you can use in your accounting website that can improve your search engine optimization, improve user engagement and drive more web traffic to your business.

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

To continue, click this link:

• Grow Your Accounting Website – Improve Search Engine Optimization, Increase User Engagement And Generate More Visitors With Plugins

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