A history of my background. My father had an accounting practice in Kansas that was thriving in 1974. He had been practicing since the 1950's in fact he was certificate issue #8 when accountants first were required to be certified. My oldest brother had recently become a CPA and had opened a practice back east. I was sure, at that time, that I would also study accounting and become a CPA and someday take over my father's practice as i was the only son still living in Kansas. Having been around my dad's accounting firm since before I could remember it seemed my future was already decided.
The second semester of college I spent a few hours per day working at the firm mainly doing simple tasks,and completing simple tax returns. I think I did about 40 returns that tax season in the days before the computer changed the profession forever.It was on a fishing outing with dad (of course sometime after April 15th) that I bluntly told him I absolutely hated doing tax returns and accounting tasks and was sure it was not the business for me. Of course he was shocked and even saddened by this news and it caused some tension.
I was probably more upset than dad as I needed to decide in what direction my education would go and that is a decision that all students have to find an answer.to. I had an uncle that gave me some very logical advice.
Here is what he said: Write down the things you are good at and the things you enjoy the most and find an occupation that will make you a good living and make you happy at the same time. The first thing I wrote down was 1.You enjoy interaction with people and seem to get along well with most everybody. 2. You are comfortable conversing about sports,recent movies,family gossip, and generally any subject that wasn't too technical in nature. Sitting at a desk was not for me but rather one on one interaction with people came easy to me.
Most accountants at that time did very little marketing and what little effort they put forth was usually confined to a targeted mailing,making sure personal contacts had your business card, and of course word of mouth. Recent changes in the law allowed CPA's, Lawyers, and others, for the first time, to directly advertise their services.Lawyers jumped on the bandwagon.and. their ads were all over radio and TV.Radio,TV, and print advertising produce good results for them to this day but most of this advertising is ineffective to produce new accounting clients for obvious reasons. Number one being that a person's accountant is a lot closer to the client than most other professions. Accountants are intimately involved in the one commodity we all pay close attention to our MONEY.Because of this very personal relationship business owners are reluctant to change accountants and when they do are very cautious.
What if we just picked up some new clients the way it had been done since communications first began?
I did just that for my Dad's accounting practice and in the course of 18 months tripled his annual billings!! Read some more and bookmark this page for information on methods that have worked for me for 30 years. Get my free manual for accountants with the complete system for building a million dollar practice at Send me my free marketing manual. 100%free with valid email.
