One of the most significant advantages of a phone call is the opportunity it provides to establish a personal connection with your client. Unlike emails or text messages, a phone call allows you to convey your enthusiasm, passion, and sincerity directly. Your tone of voice and the ability to engage in real-time conversation can go a long way in building trust.

When you send a proposal via email, you miss the chance to address any questions or concerns your client may have immediately. A phone call allows you to discuss the proposal in detail, clarify any doubts, and provide immediate response to queries.

This is not only enhances the client’s understanding but also demonstrates your commitment to their needs.

Managing your client meetings and strategy calls can be a juggling act. Coordinating schedules, sending emails back and forth, and playing phone tag can be time-consuming and frustrating.

Calendly simplifies scheduling. It sets your availability and syncs with your calendar to ensure you’re never double-booked. 👍

Conducting surveys to gather feedback from team members is an excellent way to gauge opinions, understand concerns, and collect valuable insights.

⭐ Clearly outline the goals of the survey, and determine what specific information or feedback you aim to gather from team members

⭐ Formulate clear, concise, and unbiased questions. Ensure that the questions are relevant to the survey objectives and are easy for team members to understand.

⭐ Consider whether responses should be anonymous to encourage honest feedback. Assure participants that their responses will be kept confidential to foster openness.

Conducting thorough analysis and acknowledging team feedback post-survey lays the foundation for actionable plans. Transparently communicating outcomes, and implementing changes, demonstrates the team’s valued input in decision-making processes.  

In a world where people often expect free services, giving away valuable work can be tough. While it’s noble to share your skills and resources, it does come with challenges.

Common challenges when providing free valuable services:

Perceived Value

The concept of “you get what you pay for” can lead some people to undervalue or question the quality of free services. Overcoming this perception and demonstrating the true value of your work can be a constant battle. 

Sustainability and Scalability

Free services can attract a large audience, but maintaining and scaling such services without proper funding or support can be unsustainable in the long run. This can lead to burnout or service discontinuation. 

Balancing Generosity and Self-Worth

There’s a fine line between being generous and undervaluing your own worth. Striking a balance between giving freely and valuing your contributions can be a personal and psychological challenge.

Despite the difficulties, many still offer free valuable work out of a desire to help and make a positive impact. The satisfaction of contributing to the greater good often outweighs the challenges.

Utilise phone calls to provide a personalised touch when communicating price changes to clients. This direct form of communication allows for a more empathetic and tailored approach, acknowledging the client’s concerns and fostering a stronger connection.

Have a listen to the struggles Ben Walker faced as an Accounting Firm Owner when he first started Inspire in 2013, all the way to 2022 – 9 years later.  

Here’s what he said – 

I’ve broken Inspire into 3 different stages: 

• Inspire 1.0 ($0-500k) 
• Inspire 2.0 ($500k-1.5m)
• Inspire 3.0 ($1.5m-3m) 

Inspire 1.0 ($0-500k)

• There was way too much to do
• I was wearing heaps of hats
• I wasn’t taught how to run a business at university – My dad was in business, my grandfather, but you don’t get taught that stuff. Some of them are hard lessons
• I had conflicting information from coaches or mentors
• I was pretty unclear about what to focus on for me at the time.

Inspire 2.0 ($500k-1.5m)

• I was really bogged down in delivery sales
• We were making losses as well for a lot of that
• My business partner and I are having different perspectives towards the end of our journey together in terms of vision for ourselves and our firm
• The other thing that took me a while to crack is, I was really unclear on how to grow out of a flat structure. And what I mean by that is, I had about seven or eight people reporting to me and asking me questions a lot. I was responsible for reviewing stuff and getting back to so many people, including my own clients, my life,  my wife and all that sort of stuff. So, it was a very flat structure that I struggled with.

Inspire 3.0 ($1.5m-3m) 

The thing that I’ve had to work through is sometimes not knowing what my role is. There are literally days I’d go to work and I’d have nothing to do. I would question myself, “How do I get to the next stage? What problem is going to be coming in the next day, or week, or month that I’m not seeing yet?” And also, “Where do I add the most value to the team? What are my day-to-day responsibilities?”

I’ve found out that if I’m doing things, it’s stopping someone else from learning that role as well. Let’s say marketing for instance. One of the things I’ve actively had to do is step back from speaking engagements to let those 3 future managing partners come in and take that place as well.

Many accountants excel in their technical skills, but may not possess the same level of expertise in sales.

We have learned the hard way that some of our accountants are naturally skilled in sales, while others may not be as inclined or proficient in this area. 

It has been a valuable lesson for us to understand that not everyone should be forced into the sales pathway, as it may not be a strength for all accountants.

Have a listen as Ben Walker talks about his challenges and breakthroughs as an Accounting Firm Owner 

Here’s what he said – 

Some of the feelings I’ve had throughout growing Inspire: 

• Running on a hamster wheel with work, spinning but not going anywhere
• Not enjoying work
• Mental and physical health dwindling
• Strained personal relationships with friends, family, and wife 
• Wondering whether you made a mistake starting a firm and if it’s better to work for someone else
• Feeling like a slave to your firm,  it owns you. It dictates everything
• Feeling exhausted mentally and physically 

These are the challenges I’ve had over the years. 

I’m at a point now with Inspire where I’m creating a fun, and super rewarding accounting firm that runs like clockwork. 

Stuff still breaks, and bad things happen. 

Nothing’s perfect. 

But it’s way better than looking back over the last 10 years and going, “Wow, lucky the lease isn’t a noose around my neck.”

Your terms and conditions should support the “out of scope” work. We’ve had this wrong for a while, and it’s crucial to clearly define what’s included or not in the package, as well as how we handle price increases.

So, we’ve taken note of the minimum CPI increase. We’ve even included clauses in our terms and conditions that essentially allow us to adjust their price without needing their approval by up to 10% each year. We can just inform them and simply say, “Hey, your price will be increasing from this point. If you want to cancel, let us know by that date.”

To address this, we had a lawyer create an extensive list of terms and conditions. These terms also stand alongside our CAANZ engagement letter.

Everything is automated through Practice Ignition. As a result, no client can start any work until they’ve accepted all of these terms and conditions.

Have a listen to Ben’s talk on “Training Your Team To Identify Great Clients”, here’s what he said –

The kind of clients we attract can differ based on how they come across our services.

Oftentimes, when our top-notch clients suggest someone similar to themselves, the referrals tend to be of high quality.

We also took a look at the services that our top clients prefer. It turns out they’ve chosen a mix of services from us—things like the usual tax and compliance work, additional structures, investments, and SMSFs.

During this exploration, we spotted some common themes. Relationship statuses seemed quite alike, and even the general industries they’re in shared similarities.

The whole point of this exercise is to figure out who our fantastic clients are and how we can attract more of them. Where do they hang out? Who do they interact with?

After that, it’s all about training your team to recognise your ideal client. This helps them identify who’s a great fit and who might not align perfectly with us. This is especially important if your team is just starting to handle initial inquiries at your accounting firm.