Grow Your Accounting Business Online With WordPress

Accounting professionals today face increasing challenges.

Online Challenges For Certified Public Accountants

Now, more than ever, accountants must find smarter ways to stand out from the competition, obtain new clients, and retain current clientele. Not only do you have to become more involved in the communities and industries your business serves, you must also maintain an active presence online. This includes having an effective web presence and figuring out smarter ways to grow your business online.

As well as investing money in offline marketing activities, you will probably find (if you haven’t already) that in order to compete, increasingly larger amounts of their budget will need to be directed towards the development and maintenance of a website that will bring new prospective clients, engage visitors, outrank the competition in search engines and increase your marketing exposure online.

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

Another difficult challenge that accounting organizations face online (as all other professions do for that matter), is that you have an average of 30 seconds to give users the information they need or they will leave the site and 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 Accounting Businesses In The Web Economy

As well as facing many challenges, there are also loads of online opportunities available for businesses in the accounting profession that can evolve to meet the demands of the digital economy and can think strategically about marketing their business better online.

This detailed guide will help you uncover a number of ways to attract and engage new visitors and establish stronger online credibility for your business.

As well as providing general website improvement tips, 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 CMS platform, go here:

• Why A Poorly Designed Web Site Can Cost You Customers
• WordPress – The Small Business Owner’s Guide

How To Improve Your Accounting Site

We’ll start first by covering the basic information you need. In this section, we’ll look at how to improve your accounting website and get better results. We will look at what web pages you need, what content works best, navigation structure, etc.

If you need help with website planning, check out the guide we have written here: How To Plan Your Small Business Web Site: A Basic Blueprint For Business Owners

Essential Website Pages

All websites need some basic web pages. Let’s take a look at these.

Your Services And Products

It’s essential to have a page that describes your services and products.

Your page will include services such as:

• Business accounting – business planning, company formation, general accounting, payroll, financial statement compilation, book keeping, forecasting, financing, budgeting, 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

Make sure to list all of the services you provide. Educate your visitors about the benefits of using your services and direct them to your contact or appointment booking page.

Who We Are

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

This page should include any CPA awards, recognitions, accreditations, certifications, associations, publications, etc., that can be used to promote the company and position it above other competitors.

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

Team Profile

Are you looking for inexpensive ideas to sell more products or services online? Then help prospective clients get to know you and your organization better.

You want your business to be relatable. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your team. It should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors are probably not 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 also include social buttons so your site visitors can follow some of your team members on their social networks.

In this page, make sure to highlight each person’s experience, why they are an asset to your team, and more importantly, how they can help add value to your clients’ business.

(Add an employee description page. Screenshot source: deepsky.com)

To learn more about how to add an easy-to-maintain list of staff members to your website without coding skills, go here: Adding A Staff List Directory To Your Site: Step-By-Step Tutorial

Recruitment

This is a listing of career opportunities available within the company. This page could include training provided, employee benefits, opportunities for advancement, social activities promoted or encouraged by your organization, etc. You can also include information such as the job outlook and additional 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 the page, subscribe to your newsletter, follow you on social media, etc.

Case Studies

Client reviews and case studies are a great way to show prospective clients businesses minimize tax, increase profitability, or grow strategically. Adding a page with case studies and testimonials also helps your accounting site to establish social proof.

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

We have written a comprehensive article about using client case studies and reviews improve your business online. Go here to learn more about this: How To Improve Your Conversions Using Compelling Testimonials

Contact Us Page

A contact page is crucial.

It should include some or all of the following information about your firm:

• Name Of Your Organization
• Address
• Phone
• Facsimile
• Email
• Map
• Web URL
• Contact form
• Request for more information – contact details
• Social media URLs
• Interactive chat feature

If you have several locations you want to make this clear when showing your address and contact information.

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

Add A Blog

A blog is a very powerful business marketing tool. Most blogging platforms typically comprise of a content management system that allows you to promote your business by publishing timely content such as news, company updates, educational articles and tutorials, informative posts, how-to videos, infographics, etc.

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

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

Something not many businesses know about, is that an expertly configured WordPress site can turn into an automated traffic-generation machine that can help begin attracting web traffic to your site, simply by publishing content to your website on a consistent basis.

(WordPress can automate your traffic generation)

For more details: Web Site Traffic Blueprint – Learn How To Drive More Website Traffic For Your Business Using WordPress

Legal Information Pages

Having a website that complies will all legal requirements online is crucially important, not just for building trust with visitors, but also to ensure that no laws and regulations are being broken in whichever area you provide services to.

Depending on what products and services you provide, 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 legal threats and inconveniences:

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

Go here if you would like to learn more about adding legal pages to your site: Why You Need To Add Legal Pages To Your Site

Improving Your Content

In today’s globally competitive economy, the earlier you begin to publish great content on your site, the sooner you will begin to differentiate yourself from competing businesses.

You want to provide great content with useful information and tips that will get your readers to share your web pages online and come back for more. Using content is the most effective way to inform and teach site visitors and prospective clients about your business.

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

• Explanations of balance sheets
• Profit & loss statements
• Directors’ duties and legal responsibilities
• How to present accounts for non-profit activities
• Cashflow planning tips
• Business insurance
• Protecting revenues
• How to structure a self-managed retirement fund
• Dos and don’ts of … (e.g. purchasing insurance, claiming business expenses, etc.)

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

Remember to include the same keywords and terms in your content that prospective clients will be searching for.

We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive regular training emails with actionable information and practical tips that will teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your site, save money creating high-quality 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 To Improve Visitor Experience

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

Syndicate Content With RSS Feeds

RSS feeds provide many benefits for your website.

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

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
• Feeds can be shared and picked up by other sites online
• Users can subscribe to your feed
• It provides links to your site
• Your feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
• RSS provides various ways for your readers to receive your content (e.g. subscribers can read your content on their mobile device using a feed reader)
• RSS is built into WordPress

There are also benefits to adding syndicated content to your website from other websites, such as the fact that you don’t have to write, manage or update the content.

To find useful RSS feeds just visit sites of relevant government departments and well-known industry bodies.

Below we have listed some feeds you could add 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

(Add RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds to improve your accounting site’s UX.)

Checklists And Forms

Adding checklists and forms to your site is a great way to help increase visitor engagement and add value to your readers. They can provide visitors with useful step-by-step instructions and resources to perform a necessary task. Checklists and forms are great planning tools.

Checklists and forms can include areas such as:

• How To Set Up A Company
• Negative Gearing Checklist
• Not-For-Profit Activity Checklist
• Disclosure Requirements
• Company Tax Checklist
• Self Managed Super Fund Tax Checklist
• Income Tax Variation Forms

Adding Other Tools

Providing unique online tools, gadgets and applications for businesses is a great way to increase visitor engagement and add value to your target audience. Calculators, such as loan and tax calculators, are great tools you can add to accounting websites. Others could include time cards, or retirement and interest calculators.

In the next section, we take a look at a several WordPress-based tools you can use in your 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 of this guide on ways to build your accounting web presence.

Click here to continue:

• The Complete Step-By-Step Guide To Growing Your Accounting Web Presence – Part Two

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