But believe it or not, you can provide your accounting clients with an experience that makes them not only likely to stick with you but can turn them into raving fans or as I often say; walking, talking billboards of your accounting practice.

If you want to delight your clients and decrease the likelihood of them taking their business elsewhere, there are a few key things you can do:

Consider offering a Client Portal

A client portal is a great way to give your clients 24/7 access to their account information, financial statements, and other documentation. They can view their invoices, make payments, and even schedule appointments without having to pick up the phone and call you. Plus, it’s a great way to keep your clients organised and in the loop on their job status.

Be Transparent With Your Fees

No one likes surprises – especially when it comes to money. Consider offering absolute certainty with more fixed price agreements. Be upfront with your clients about your fees from the start both with compliance and diversified services like advisory. This way, they won’t be blindsided and often disappointed by an unexpected bill down the road.

Collect Feedback and Use It to Improve

Don’t be afraid to ask your clients for feedback negative or positive. This is the only way to know what you’re doing well – and where you need to improve. Consider using online client surveys, polls, and even one-on-one interviews over a coffee to get the feedback you need to make your accounting practice and the services it provides even better. This is how you’ll really understand what you improve in your firm to achieve maximum client satisfaction.

Make the Most of Client Meetings

Client meetings are your chance to shine. Make sure you’re prepared for each meeting by having all the relevant information at your fingertips, being on time, and dressing the part. And most importantly, take the time to get to know your clients on a personal level. These meetings are your opportunity to build relationships and show your clients that you care more about them.

Invest in Client Relationship Management solution

Efficiently manage your client relationships through a Client Relationship Management (CRM) system. This type of software can help you keep track of your client interactions, tasks, opportunities, actions, outcomes, projects, and the like as well as birthdays, anniversaries, and even the client’s favourite beverage and biscuit to accompany it.

Offer Value-Added Services

In addition to traditional compliance-based accounting services, you can offer diversified value-added services that will impress your clients and differentiate your practice from the competition. These services might include financial planning, estate planning, or tax planning as well as board of advice meetings and showing clients the financial impact of key business decisions before they happen. There is no better way to delight a client than to offer them something they did not expect to receive. Here is another article I wrote about value-adding.

If you are looking to move into more client-engaged business advisory (value-added) services, why not undertake a complimentary business advisory assessment? Just email me at [email protected] and we will organise a suitable time to have a chat and delight your clients.

The post Strategies for Client Satisfaction: Elevate Your Accounting Practice appeared first on Mark Holton.

The following 15-point Strategy Checklist is a practical review to plan, organise and execute a cohesive review of the strategic plan execution, to define the need for a strategic plan if one is not there. The goal is to rate your organisation out of 5 being the highest, and 1 being the lowest on your strategic performance and understanding. Any gaps present, offer the opportunity to address these issues in future planning sessions.

Why not give it a try on your firm and see how all owners and key team members view strategy?

The strategy processes

• The extent to which the whole board is involved in strategy development
• The balance between board and management input into strategic process
• Strategic planning is built into the board calendar
• The understanding of the board as a whole of company strategy
• Sufficient time and resources are devoted to strategy development

Strategy and regular board meetings

• Strategic issues get strong coverage at all board meetings
• All board papers for decision relate the item back to the agreed strategy
• KPIs are relevant to the strategy
• Regular strategy updates occur at the board meeting
• The Managing Directors report is strongly linked to strategy

Strategy Content (your understanding of)

• Our agreed mission
• Our agreed vision
• Our corporate values
• The agreed goals of the organisation
• Our core strategies

Finally on a scale of 1 to 10 and 1 is Extremely Poor and 10 is Excellent, how would you rate the board’s understanding of the strategy role? If you need help with your strategy planning, consider getting involved in my new StratAdvise program. Click here for more information.

I have always believed when assessing the need for advisory services with clients to lead off with strategy and support later with transactional analysis – not the other way around. At its core, strategic planning is the process of defining the goals of your and your client’s organisation for the immediate future and the strategies by which these goals will be achieved and resourced.

Put simply, a strategic plan is the top three or four things that the board has agreed the business has to get right in the next two or three years. In practice, it is a doorway to innovation, cultural change, and proactive strategies to manage your response to a changing environment.

Why not give it a go with select clients? The strategy assessment and subsequent discussion can lead to many more opportunities for business improvement and enhance your advisory services!

If you would like to find out about my Strategy Enabled Program, contact me to book a complimentary 45-minute complimentary assessment to find out what your firm needs to streamline for success.

The post Developing your firm’s strategy checklist appeared first on Mark Holton.

Vision

A clear and compelling vision provides direction and purpose to an organisation. It outlines the long-term goals and unifies efforts and resources toward a common objective.

Strategic Planning

Effective strategic planning encompasses setting objectives, identifying priorities, and creating a roadmap to achieve these goals. It involves analysing both the internal and external environment, recognising opportunities and threats, and devising strategies to leverage opportunities and mitigate risks.

Execution Excellence

Successfully developing and implementing strategies requires strong execution capabilities. This encompasses efficient resource allocation, establishing clear accountability, defining measurable targets, and ongoing progress monitoring. Adaptability and flexibility are essential to adjust strategies in response to changing circumstances.

Innovation and Adaptability

In today’s ever-evolving business landscape, agility and adaptability are key to staying competitive. Encouraging innovation, fostering a culture of continuous learning, and embracing change are vital components of strategic success.

Customer/Client Focus

Long-term success hinges on understanding and meeting customer needs. Business owners should invest in market research, gather customer feedback, and leverage customer insights to shape their strategies. By delivering value and nurturing strong customer relationships, organisations gain a competitive edge.

Organisational Alignment

Strategic success demands alignment throughout the organisation. This involves ensuring that all departments and teams work toward the same strategic goals, effective communication of the strategy, and the promotion of collaboration and cross-functional cooperation.

Leadership and Talent

Effective leadership plays a pivotal role in driving strategic success. Leaders must inspire and motivate their teams, provide clear direction, make tough decisions, and foster a culture of accountability and high performance. Attracting and retaining top talent with the right skills and competencies is crucial for executing strategies successfully.

Continuous Improvement

Businesses should adopt a mindset of continuous improvement to outpace the competition. This involves regular performance evaluations, learning from both successes and failures, and actively seeking opportunities for innovation and optimisation.

It’s important to note that while these pillars are significant, they are not exhaustive. Different organisations may have additional pillars or place varying emphasis on each one, depending on their unique circumstances.

If you would like to find out about my Strategy Enabled Program, contact me to book a complimentary 45-minute complimentary assessment to find out what your firm needs to streamline for success.

The post The key pillars of strategic success appeared first on Mark Holton.

Factors Impacting Business Value:

Several factors can influence your business’s value, including:

1. Owner’s Complacency: Recognising the urgency of succession planning.
2. Exit Strategy Evaluation: Comparing benefits while selecting exit options.
3. Realistic Expectations: Aligning sale prices with owner expectations.
4. Pre-Retirement Business Value Deficit: Ensuring business value is on track before retirement.

Historical Perspective

Traditionally, business owners could rely on increasing home prices to fund business growth. However, today’s entrepreneurs face higher entry costs, tougher competition, and formidable entry barriers. Consequently, ignoring succession and retirement planning might have worked for past business owners but could pose challenges for those entering the market now.

Emerging Challenges

New business owners grapple with higher acquisition costs, stiff competition, and mortgage commitments due to homeownership aspirations. This limits funding opportunities as banks hesitate to lend solely against the business.

The Challenge Ahead

• Anticipate more businesses for sale, possibly driving down prices.
• Expect fewer qualified buyers and a discerning selection process.
• In an oversupplied market, strategic planning and readiness are crucial for a successful sale.

Key Value Drivers for Business Optimisation

Smart business owners focus on value drivers to enhance their business worth:

• Reduced Proprietor Dependence
• Established Clientele and Dedicated Workforce
• Innovation and Differentiation
• Performance Benchmarking
• Efficient Systems
• Robust Succession Planning

Here’s another article I wrote recently on the staff impact on succession planning.

Optimising Business Value for Retirement Freedom

By optimising your business’s value, you secure the flexibility to choose your retirement lifestyle. Knowing your business’s targeted retirement value empowers your planning process.

The imperative for succession planning and business value optimisation is apparent. As the landscape evolves, addressing these aspects now ensures a smoother transition and more secure retirement prospects. Don’t delay – act today to secure your financial future.

If you would like to find out about my Strategy Enabled Program, contact me to book a complimentary 45-minute complimentary assessment to find out what your firm needs to streamline for success.

The post The Need for Successful Succession Planning: Can You Afford to Retire? appeared first on Mark Holton.

Last week I was lying on my back with bright lights shining in my face, watching a television display of exotic marine life above my head with a dentist prodding around with sharp instruments and a drill inside my mouth. It was hardly the time to be thinking about accounting firms and workflow issues. But that’s what I was doing that morning. I know I need a life!

Thankfully it was all over and done in 45 minutes and there was very little pain, apart from the $350 bill at the end. I handed over my credit card and paid on the spot. The paperwork was incredibly simple and the cash flow positive to the dental surgery.

There is the first lesson for accounting firms. You can get paid as you provide a service. To do that you need to create the expectation that’s what will happen, and you need the resources to ensure billing and payment happens quickly and smoothly.

It also made me think what great value biller’s dentists are. I had absolutely no desire to calculate their average hourly rate of my time during my visit there. No desire to manage WIP or consider a write off and certainly no desire to stay there longer getting drilled to get better value for money for time spent. What a great model. You get paid a flat fee even if you are quick in service delivery.

As I left, the dentist told me that he didn’t need to see me for another year, and moments later his receptionist told me she would contact me again in a year’s time and even offered to book it in then and there…which I did and entered in my calendar on my mobile device. That’s another two simple lessons – make sure your customers know what is going to happen and create the expectation that they will continue doing business with you. This is the cornerstone of exceptional client service and opens the door to offering more diversified value-added services.

Something accountants and dentists share is business models based around a substantial amount of repeat business – annual checkups for dentists and sets of accounts and tax returns as well as business advisory engagements for accountants. Where dentists and accountants typically differ in their business models is how they organise their work.

Dentists schedule their work. They have a rolling annual cycle of patients who they contact and book appointments for. Dentists take control of the process. They don’t wait for their patients to contact them – probably because they know so many people will delay their visit. So, dentists send out reminder notes and then follow-up with phone calls. They have the right staff doing the right job at the right pay rate.

By resource scheduling dentists take control of their workflow. If they get too busy, they will delay a little when they contact patients. If work is slowing down a little, they will get their team on the phone and chase people up who they haven’t seen for a while. They manage their calendars to keep a continuous smooth even flow of work.

In contrast, many accountants allow their clients to take control of the process. They let them drop their work off when they want and consequently get overloaded with work thereby extending turnaround time and struggling to meet client expectations.

Many accounting firms I speak to do not know when it would suit the client to bring in their work because they have never asked them. Some clients are habitual in that the work comes in at the same time each year and they really do not worry too much about when it is done. Others have expectations that it will be done in a certain time. Some may prefer bringing in the work later in the financial year to better match their business commitments.

Workflow scheduling is like managing a checkerboard – your only have so many spaces and some tasks take up more than one space. How do you fill up the board given your resources? Maybe it is time to survey the clients and ask the workflow scheduling question!

Dentists manage their capacity very well and schedule work based on the urgency and priority of the patient. A large amount of the dentist’s diary will be filled up with non-urgent consultations booked three to four weeks ahead. The balance of the calendar will be left open for urgent and ongoing jobs.

This is a very simple system that accounting firms can consider using. Schedule your known work in advance. Budget the size of jobs and then divide that work into July jobs, August jobs etc based on the capacity of your team. Then you need to communicate this plan to your clients. When you do this, you will also need to leave spare capacity for the urgent work that you know will come in. You don’t know which clients it is going to be, but you do know that urgent work is going to occur.

When you do this your clients will have reasonable certainty. They will know when their compliance work is going to be done. And they will know that if they have urgent work needing to be done that you can get on to it quickly. You’ll provide timely service – just like dentists.

Why not take the dental challenge and improve your firm workflow, resource scheduling and client service?

If you would like to find out about my Strategy Enabled Program, contact me to book a complimentary 45-minute complimentary assessment to find out what your firm needs to streamline for success.

The post Lessons for Accounting Firms from the Dentist appeared first on Mark Holton.

If things are going well, it’s often just simple to accept a good life, instead of striving for a great one. So, what’s going well in your firm that is helping you to remain just plain good – maybe like many of your competitors?

Do you settle for good clients when you could be out there looking for great clients? Do you settle for good staff when you could be mentoring people to become great staff? Do you settle for good financial results instead of stretching yourself to deliver great financial results for your efforts?

There are five key steps for any accounting firm that will help them get closer to greatness, so let’s cover them here;

Transitioning from Good to Great… 5 Key Steps

1. Get the right people on your team.
   If you surround yourself with smart, capable people and get out of their way, good things will happen. Train and develop the team in both technical as soft skills. Often soft skills training is overlooked or undervalued. After all we are dealing with people here!
2. Move on bad clients.
   Nobody likes being abused, under-appreciated, under-valued and so on, so why keep clients around who consistently do this to you? I call them Emotional Vampires. They consume all your time, do not appreciate what you do and bitch, moan and winge (BMW) about your price.
3. Invest some time in your best clients.
   Your best clients deserve to be spoilt, but few firms create the time or capacity to spoil them. After removing some of your bad clients, use some of the time freed-up to invest with your better clients. Meet with them and find out what is important to them both in their business and personal lives and deliver services to address these needs.
4. Add-Value to your clients’ Businesses.
   If you want to charge what you’re worth, you have to justify that by adding value to your clients. If you do not add value, why should someone pay you? One of the key growth areas in this regard is to show your clients how to build a better more profitable business with strong cashflow. Why not show them the financial impact of key business decisions before they make them? If we can effectively put money in their pocket, we are no longer considered an overhead, but a valuable partner and resource.
5. Set higher client selection criteria.
   Start by reconsidering working with clients or on projects that are going to be of low yield to your firm. Instead, let’s go hunting and see if you can engage a few bigger clients with higher standards and bigger goals that fit your ideal client criteria. If you do not have this criterion, consider developing one and pass that onto your team and hunt clients that fit this model.

Finally consider on an ongoing basis how to be great in your firm and link that to the strategic vision and process from your strategic planning process and ongoing review of goals and actions.

Take the challenge and grow and develop your firm and have more fun doing it

Practice Management Enabled is an ongoing program that ensures focus on building your practice is not lost. Get started with a 45 minute complimentary Practice Management Assessment with Mark Holton – find out how to start streamlining practice management in your firm. Contact us now to confirm a time.

The post Do You Suffer From Being Good? appeared first on Mark Holton.

You have to be success minded.
You have to feel that things are coming your way when you are out selling services; 
otherwise, you will not be able to sell anything.

Benjamin Jowett

I am often asked by practitioners; how do I sell my firm’s business advisory services to current clients and future prospects? Another common question is; how do I keep the clients engaged as we move through the years developing their business and enhancing our business advisory service offering?

There is no hard fast system or process that works every time however the following ten strategies may help:

• Know how to explain simply to clients the business advisory services your firm offers. Understand the service benefits from the client’s perspective.
• Develop your staff’s soft skills in particular basic customer service and selling and promoting skills. Give them the skills to ask the right questions, handle objections and introduce and present new ideas to clients.
• Promote services based on benefits – not features or functions. Remember the key selling acronym – FFB. You can interest a client with a feature, further support that interest with a function, however ultimately clients buy on benefits – what is in it for them!
• Use some time at staff meetings to share experiences about promoting your business advisory services to clients. These are great opportunities to learn new techniques and review performance for handling these situations.
• Have staff members role-play a client meeting where a new service is to be discussed. Role-plays build confidence and help team members prepare for objections and reactions.
• Ensure staff are thoroughly trained in all new services, as they are introduced. Keeping staff knowledge current is paramount to the successful implementation and ongoing management of business advisory service offerings.
• Develop one-page summaries of each service noting key features or technical details. Do not use these with clients, however; build knowledge and confidence by reviewing before meetings.
• Immediately address a client’s objection. An objection to a service, or its features, suggests the client has some level of interest.
• Have well-structured procedures and systems in place if a client decides to buy. Staff should know exactly what to do if a client decides to go ahead. Getting buy in and failing to deliver is not acceptable.
• Include referral targets in staff key performance indicators and monitor progress to budgets regularly. Reward those who succeed and performance manage those who need additional support.

Most importantly, bear in mind that when we refer to “selling,” it’s essentially a dialogue aimed at understanding a client’s objectives and determining the best approach to help them accomplish those goals.

Why not get the ball rolling by taking a complimentary 45 minute Business Advisory Readiness Assessment webinar with me? We will examine where your firm’s business advisory service is at the moment, where you want it in the future, how to get there and who is going to do what. Just reach out to me at [email protected] and we can organise a suitable day and time.

The post How to sell your firm’s business advisory services; the ten key strategies appeared first on Mark Holton.

Flexibility is a cornerstone of strategic planning and by frequently adapting to change, your strategy needs to be open to adjustment as you adapt to fluctuations in the market. Reassessing your strategies and being open to feedback will allow you to shift your focus based on your client’s expectations.

Setting goals both financially and strategically helps your firm by establishing concise objectives and identifying steps needed to achieve them. Focusing on the resources needed to reach these goals on a regular basis will allow you to allocate your resources effectively based on a thorough understanding of your capacity to ensure you’re able to invest in areas that will provide a clear path to achieving strategic targets.

I always start with a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) which can help your firm identify, both through internal and external stakeholders, what can be improved and where you’re shining. This can be used to inform strategic decision making and when engaged on a regular basis, this analysis will allow you to capitalise on new opportunities.

While we’re on the topic of opportunities, creating a routine for strategic planning allows businesses to identify new chances for growth and innovation. By analysing trends and client needs, your firm can identify areas where it can expand and integrate new innovative value-added services.

When I work with accounting firms and business owners to strategy plan, I generally set Smart Goals (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound) with them in the following five key pillars:

• Financial Management
• People
• Processes
• Clients
• Services

The pillars drive accountability to the plan and ongoing management of key objectives. In essence, if you get the people, processes, clients, and services goals working in sync the benefits should flow through to the financial management pillar. Alternatively, you can set the financial management drivers and link the remaining pillars into the strategy. The choice is yours.

Strategic planning isn’t all about partners making decisions. When you engage both senior management, stakeholders, and junior staff to brainstorm strategic ideas, you create a shared vision. This allows you to communicate the firm’s goals and you can foster a sense of collaborative engagement that can increase motivation and morale.

Through frequent feedback, flexibility, analysis and collaboration, your firm can reach your goals and adapt easily as industry and client demands fluctuate. The benefits of strategic planning on a regular basis will help your firm to stay agile, focused, and competitive in a rapidly changing environment.

If you would like to find out about my Strategy Enabled Program, contact me to book a complimentary 45-minute complimentary assessment to find out what your firm needs to streamline for success.

The post Strategic planning for your firm appeared first on Mark Holton.

Why not consider adopting these three business practices to refresh your routine and open new doors:

Assess Your Leadership Skills:

I passionately believe and teach accounting professionals that everyone can be considered a leader regardless of their job position. So, take a moment at the beginning of each day to remember that you are a leader, and your actions should reflect your personal values, as well as those of your firm. Empower yourself to find new opportunities to further develop your leadership skills. Maybe volunteer to take on ownership of a new project, mentor a new employee, evaluate your personal career goals, and create new paths to achieve them.

Practice an Environment of Gratitude:

Take a positive attitude, and share it with your team members. Providing genuine care for your people is one key to engage others, and as we have seen, it can directly translate into team members providing a high level of care for clients. Find new ways to appreciate the work that your peers, and leaders are contributing to the organisation. This new level of can result in a happier, more engaged workforce.

Be Curious About Your Surroundings:

Curiosity will lead you down new paths, so now is a great time to be more curious about your surroundings. Take the change in scenery as an opportunity to brainstorm and think outside of the box. Maybe think about moving your weekly meetings to other venues. Innovation stems from new stimuli. Be curious about other firms and companies. What are their business challenges and how have they solved them? You just might be surprised to discover a solution that could apply to your firm.

Finally, my five tips to open more doors:

1. Begin with gratitude. There’s an old saying “to be happy, don’t do what you like, like what you do.”
2. Surround yourself with people who are where you want to be now and in the future.
3. Go the extra mile with team members and clients.
4. Contribute professionally at conferences, events and through social media
5. Cultivate a professional standard in everything you do.

If you would like to find out about my Strategy Enabled Program, contact me to book a complimentary 45-minute complimentary assessment to find out what your firm needs to streamline for success.

The post Opening up new doors in your career appeared first on Mark Holton.

As I write this article, it’s night-time, my dog Bobby is sleeping at my feet, I have a cold glass of soft drink (maybe – maybe not) within reach, and as I look out of my window, in the darkness all seems right with the world. It’s quiet and very tranquil. I could be mistaken for thinking how perfect the world is outside.

But I will soon be shaken back to reality the minute I wake in the morning. The television will be telling me about the next natural catastrophe, another major financial institution getting into difficulty and another politician’s personal problems becoming food for the public, another war escalating somewhere, and more job losses being announced. Need I go on?

Even as accountants, when we contact a client, it is usually because we’re sending bad news or we’re reproaching them for something or other: ‘You owe $$$ in taxes’, ‘You haven’t sent in the missing information we need to complete your financial statements and tax returns’, ‘you seem to have overlooked paying our invoice…’ and so on.

How would it feel if, just for one day, you only did positive things; wrote positive letters and emails and said positive things? If you only ate healthy food, parked as far away from the office as possible, took the stairs instead of the elevator, drank water for the day, smiled for no particular reason and looked for opportunities to give genuine praise to team members at work? What do you think it would do to your frame of mind, your interactions with staff, clients and even family members?

I would suggest, that it would have a very positive impact in both directions – how you saw the world and how the world saw you. It is in your power to do exactly that. Why not try it for a day and then come back and have a read of the rest of this article.

Welcome back – how was it?

Did you feel more ‘in control’ of your day? Did it feel good to offer sincere praise to someone when you were able to catch them doing something good at the office? How was your relationship with your partner? Did people start to go out of their way to help you with your objectives that day? Did good news arrive in the mail? Did you hear from a friend or good client that you hadn’t been in touch with for a while? In short, did you have a good day?

Don’t get me wrong, I am not advocating that we should all pretend that everything is wonderful, because clearly it is not. But just imagine how your week would be if you tried to incorporate a little of this activity every day.

I compare this concept to what many great athletes employ in their everyday routine. Let’s look at professional golfers, for example.

Golf Professionals often envision themselves making the perfect swing and driving the ball into prime position on the fairway to approach the green, before their every shot. And just look at the results. It seems that they make it all so effortless! 

Behind the scenes, though, they’ve all put in their 10,000 hours, and have practiced until they have become (almost) perfect. Talented? Sure. But hard workers? Absolutely. Indeed! Just as the professional golfer thinks through their shot before, they strike the ball, you too can put some positive mental energy out there in your firm.

Tony Robbins advocates that one should ‘act as if what you desire has already happened’ and subconsciously, you’ll find a way to actually make it happen. Indeed, he teaches some really complex, but also simple material.

For example, Tony says: “In essence, if we want to direct our lives, we must take control of our consistent actions. It’s not what we do once in a while that shapes our lives, but what we do consistently.”

If you stop and analyse that quote, and seek the true meaning, what I believe he’s saying is simply this: ‘If you want to be consistently happy, you need to act consistently happy!’ and thus he is also saying ‘If you want to be consistently unhappy, you need to act consistently unhappy!’

During 2022, which were you? Just ask your staff, maybe they would say you were the second alternative for the at least some of the time! But it doesn’t have to be that way. 

What I’ve taken until now to say, is that if we can inject a little positive thinking into our day, it can make a big difference to not just ourselves, but to those around us too.

I think that the accounting industry gets a bad rap from the general public. They see us as boring, introverted, number-crunchers. I say it’s time to fight back. I say it’s time to show the world how exciting, professionally, and financially rewarding our profession can be.

Let’s start with a smile. It’s one of the most infectious things we can pass on to our clients and staff. And it’s free!

If you would like to find out about my Strategy Enabled Program, contact me to book a complimentary 45-minute complimentary assessment to find out what your firm needs to streamline for success.

The post Think Positive and it Shall Happen! appeared first on Mark Holton.