CPA - Accounting
Firm Marketing Newsletter:
The mistake of dismissing creativity in accounting
Creativity
has a bad name within the accounting industry for obvious reasons.
"Creative
accounting" brings to mind the various huge scandals of
yesteryear that took down mighty firms.
In accounting,
we want to CONFORM with the regulations and adhere to generally
accepted accounting procedures.
And although
a great accounting professional IS quite creative WITHIN the
legal and ethical boundaries of his profession — for like
it or not, tax planning and financial acumen alike ARE creativity
— we refrain from using the concept of "creativity"
in our speech.
Which is all
very well, of course. The foundation of the profession lies in
those legal rudiments and ethical principles, no doubt about
that.
But perhaps
we've taken this abhorrence of creativity a touch too far in
our business planning...
Accountancy
client-acquisition is ALL creativity
There's no
arguing the fact that the accounting industry is quite conformist
in nature. We look at each other to see what to do. We seek advice
from colleagues and various governing bodies within the accounting
industry on what's what.
Again, this
is as it should be when it comes to accounting regulations and
practices.
But it's definitely
NOT as it should be when we speak of marketing accounting services
and competition in our local area.
You should
NOT ask your colleagues what to do in competition, obvious as
it may seem to say it out loud.
For one, it's
likely they don't know.
For the other,
why would they tell YOU if they did know?
It's one thing
to share knowledge of accounting procedures and practices...
and a whole another thing to give your hard-won marketing
secrets to a competitor.
Now, obvious
as this may seem reading it when put like that, the fact remains
that most of us do not always discern the difference between
accounting procedure and marketing plans.
We tend to
confuse the two or work by the same principles in both areas.
But in marketing,
you NEED creativity.
In fact, acquiring
accounting clients is ALL about creativity.
It IS
creativity in its purest form.
You CREATE
new clients, as it were.
You CREATE
your firm by adding to its clientele, its revenue, enlarging
its network of people both externally (more clients) and internally
(more employees or outsourcing resources).
Any aversion
to creativity strikes directly at the HEART of your goal for
healthy expansion of your accounting / CPA firm.
So, the degree
to which you buy into this generalized "abhorrence of creativity"
emanating from our brethren within the accounting industry, the
tighter you tie yourself into NOT expanding your firm.
And the more
you do that, the less you can influence the attainment of your
GOAL... which translates into a sense of failure.
In other words,
you begin to feel it is not possible to acquire new accounting
clients or that there's no way to obtain BETTER clients.
Little by little,
the very idea of expansion, marketing, selling, and other such
expansion-producing activities becomes "suspect" or
"ethically questionable."
Which brings
us to present situation within the industry, really.
That's how
your colleagues chat online, that's the attitude our governing
bodies emanate from their learned forums.
Check it out
for yourself.
Browse some
accounting forums and look at what they say.
And see also
what they DON'T say.
If you can
find ANY discussion about marketing among practitioners, I bet
anything that its message is "be careful, it sounds fishy,
be sure it's ethical..."
And IF there's
advice about marketing, it will be some ineffectual mumbling
about "printing business cards" or "networking
with your bank manager..." or "using reputable methods
and providers of marketing..." (meaning using the same ineffectual
traditional means that we KNOW produce nothing but expenses)...
...but NOTHING
new, bright, creative or useful for SURE.
The end result
of which is that you'll become careful about marketing. Your
image of it becomes that it is but an expense, a costly way of
shining one's own image with nothing to show for it in terms
of results... new clients.
Little by little,
the belief in your dies, replaced by a cynical acceptance of
"realities of life."
The more you
buy into the message of hopelessness, the less you can do to
attain your goal.
You "learn
your lesson..."
...but it's
the WRONG lesson.
Those CPA firms
that do and those who don't
There are two
types of CPA firms and/or accounting practitioners when it comes
to marketing, client-acquisition, and expansion.
There are those
that DO marketing, WORK towards acquiring new clients START doing
so. They do so because they're confident in their abilities,
and want to help businesses to do better.
And there are
those who don't because of reasons of their own.
Without self-confidence,
without trusting their own services and that they can help people,
they cannot face the idea of reaching out to the market with
promotion, telemarketing or any form of communication apart from
a listing in the local Yellow Pages.
The first group
is what we are naturally when we START in public practice.
You simply
cannot start in public practice without a good dollop of self-confidence
and a definite intention of helping others.
The second
group is what we BECOME IF WE AGREE with the message of hopelessness.
We become it
merely because, when we agree that it's not good to be creative
in marketing and it's dangerous to do anything fresh and new
in client-acquisition, we essentially agree to making ourselves
SMALLER.
Nothing and
nobody in this universe remains THE SAME for any length of time.
Your firm either expands or contracts. And so it is with your
self-confidence, your sense of self-worth and your belief in
the helpfulness of your own services.
It's really
that elementary. YOUR actions define what you are — or,
to be accurate, what you FEEL you are.
And let's not
kid ourselves about this:
There are
quite a few accounting practices and CPA firms in YOUR LOCAL
AREA who would like nothing better than for you to agree that
there's no point for you to market your services...
So do NOT agree
with that.
BE creative
when it comes to marketing your CPA services.
Flow outward,
promote your services, go out of your way to recommend business
owners to use your knowhow... and you'll FEEL a lot better.
Do it with
a precise, proven set of tools and offer a service that's wanted
bo 85% of businesses and you'll also DO a lot better in terms
of obtaining RESULTS.
The good news
is that no matter how much you've agreed with the message of
hopelessness, you only have to DECIDE to go the other way and
you'll feel a lot better immediately!
If you want
to know more, why not read the article How to get an edge over
other CPA firms in your area? elsewhere on our web site.
It will show
how you can compete effectively without having to resort to ANYTHING
underhanded or unethical... only don't ask your competitors'
agreement to marketing your services!
Do well,
Best wishes,
Harry Kafka
HDK Consultants U.S.A. Inc.
PMB 211
411 Cleveland
Clearwater
FL 33755
Phone (727) 474 1206
Calls from outside USA: +1 727 474 1206
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