Just as we periodically review and update our Financial Guides, we also update our calculators every quarter to ensure that you’re always getting the most up to date and accurate information out of our tools.

Our interactive financial calculators are quick guides to help your clients and readers to easily calculate multiple what-if scenarios for tax liability, retirement savings and much, much more.

We’ve just completed an update to bring the 56 interactive financial calculators in line with all 2008 tax codes. Since we’ve made these updates for you, your users are already taking advantage of your updated calculators, so there’s nothing at all for you to do.

Additionally, because you requested NASD compliance, we’ve adjusted the calculators to cap interest earned at 12%, as NASD requires. Remember, we’re always on the lookout for ways to improve your website tools and features and address your concerns and needs.

You now have even more choices of professional logos designed specifically for accounting firms. As long as you have a website with us you can use any of these 55 logos for accountants on your letterhead, business cards and, of course, your web site.

How your firm is perceived by clients and prospective clients is largely determined by your branding and marketing strategies. Branding tools like logo design, websites, business cards, and etc go a long way in creating your corporate image and setting you a part from other firms in your area.

All firm communication materials should ideally have your corporate logo on it. This gives your CPA firm more credibility and helps your clients perceive your business as a professional enterprise.

Here’s a few examples of the new logos.

This is just 6 of the 21 new logos we’ve added for you.
Take a look at our complete list of 55 logos for CPA and Accounting firms.

If you’d like to add one of these logos to your site, please call us at 800-896-4500.

In our continuing efforts to provide you with the best and most up to date content for your website, we’ve completed our quarterly review and update of every financial guide on your website.

The financial guides are written by our top accounting professionals, and are specially designed to help your clients through business, investment and life transitions. Additionally, they’re an extensive and in depth resource that will keep clients and potential clients coming back to your site again and again.

To ensure that these 3,000 pages of content and financial information are up to date, we’ve carefully examined every article and edited them to reflect all 2008 Tax Codes and Laws. There’s nothing for you to do at all, just relax knowing that your clients have access to to most current financial guides possible.

Just like your Monthly Newsletter, Tax Rates, and Tax Due Dates, your site stays on the cutting edge without you needing to lift a finger. It’s all part of our mission to continually improve your site, and make the management of your site easier.

We’ve recently made a dramatic change in the way we manage email. We’ve moved from our increasingly obsolete Hsphere email to a new, feature rich email management system.

We understand that communication is the lifeblood of your firm, and with the increasing popularity and availability of the paperless office, email has become the ultimate communication tool.

This new mail system is managed on fully redundant servers. If something goes wrong on one mail server, another backup system automatically and instantly picks up where the other left off, so your mail is always running.

Unlike our previous mail tool’s limited storage space, each new mailbox has a huge 6,500 megabytes of storage space, that’s six gigabytes! The outstanding search feature allows you to quickly find any email in seconds, much more convenient than sorting and filtering mail manually.

The included powerful anti-spam system has all of the analytical power of Google behind it, so you’ll only see the good mail that is meant for you in your inbox. All the unsolicited email will drop right into your Spam folder. Every incoming email and attachment is automatically scanned for viruses, keeping your inbox clean and free of clutter and your internal systems and critical resources safe.

Email also works well with your Mobile Devices and Outlook. A custom application for managing email through your BlackBerry is included, as is a mobile version of the full-featured webmail tool. It’s easy to set up and easier to use.

Best of all, in addition to the reliable and secure email system, you get the full Workteam Collboration Suite. You can share contact lists, Calendars, Word Documents and Excel Spreadsheets with the members of your firm. It’s all completely integrated into the email system, so with one login, you’ve got communication and a complete office suite at your fingertips.

I don’t know if you’ve ever taken the time to check out the client newsletters other CPA firms provide to their clients. I have, and I can tell you that yours is best I’ve seen.

Your monthly client newsletter has something of interest for a wide range of clients. The 3 Featured Articles help your business and individual clients successfully navigate their financial future.

The 3 Tax Tips are all approved by the IRS and gives your clients food-for-thought and insightful tax saving strategies.

The new (optional) QuickBooks Tips offer your clients great ideas on how they can become even more productive and glean insights to their financial situation. These tips position you as a true QuickBooks expert.

The 3 Financial Planning Tips are great reminders to help everyone take better care of their finances so they reach their financial goals.

Your clients also get a reminder of each of the tax filing deadlines for the month, so they don’t miss them.

Add that all up and you can see why your firm’s client newsletter is arguably the best one out there.

In the past we only included summaries of the 3 Featured Articles in the emailed version of your client newsletter. This month we’ve expanded the emailed version of your newsletter to include the titles and links to all the featured articles, tax tips, QuickBooks tips, financial planning tips and tax due dates. That way there is a greater chance that your clients find an article that catches their interest.

Your clients know that you are looking out for their best interest when you regularly provide them with helpful financial tips. And best of all it enables your firm to retain your clients even longer.

Your monthly emailed newsletter also generates new engagements by gently reminds your clients that they can turn to you for other financial services besides tax preparation.

So add your clients to your emailed newsletter. You can add them one at a time from the form on your newsletter page. Or you can email us a list of your clients’ email addresses and we’ll import them into your subscription list for you.

As part of our continuous quest to improve our services, tools and content, we’ve turned our attention to the monthly newsletter and Email Marketing System. We’ve just expanded the newsletter to include an optional new QuickBooks Tips section.

The new QuickBooks Tips section includes a number of tips and instructions to help your clients get the most out of QuickBooks and your QuickBooks services. This new section positions your firm as QuickBooks experts. So when a client or prospective client needs QuickBooks help they’ll turn to you.

Just like the monthly Featured Articles, Tax Tips, and Financial Planning Tips, this QuickBooks tips section is written by our award winning team of CPAs and MBAs to provide your clients with just enough information to pique their curiosity and entice them to come to you for the details.

As with many of our improvements, this one is completely optional and easy to integrate into your site. In fact, if you’re using our QuickBooks services section, then the additional QuickBooks Tips section is already added to your Newsletter and Email Marketing System.

Don’t Want QuickBooks Tips in Your Newsletter?

No problem. Our Email Marketing System and automated monthly newsletter update tool examines your site’s Navigation Bar before adding the QuickBooks Tips. If the QuickBooks services pages don’t appear on your site, then the QuickBooks Tips won’t be added to your newsletter.

So if you don’t want the QuickBooks Tips, please make sure your don’t have the QuickBooks Services pages on your site.

Please visit our sample newsletter to see how this new content is integrated into your site’s Newsletter page. You can find out more about our Email Marketing System and Monthly Newsletter by visiting the ‘What You Get’ tab at CPASiteSolutions.com.

If you’re using our Online Incorporation System you’ve probably recently received an email from our friends at SmallBiz.com announcing their recent server changes and updated Affiliate Site URL.

We know that this is your busy season and you’ve got better things to worry about than editing a single URL on your website, so we’ve taken care of this update for you. You can safely file that SmallBiz.com email away and leave the rest to us. In fact, if you refresh the Online Incorporation page in your web browser, you’ll see the updated URL already.

If you’re not using our Online Incorporation service, take a look at our service overview here. By making use of our private label Online Incorporation service, eliminate the frustration and time commitment involved in incorporating your clients and still amke hundreds, if not thousands of dollars annually, just from your incorporation service.

It’s simply a matter of signing up for the affiliate program at SmallBiz.com, then adding Affiliate Site URL to your SiteManager’s Add-On tools section. To get started adding this service to your site, visit our walkthrough here, or just give us a call at 800-896-4500.

We’re always on the lookout for new tools or resources that make your website even more powerful. This month we integrated an outstanding online accounting system into our suite of online solutions for accountants.

Our Online Accounting System gives you complete access to the full version of QuickBooks Pro or QuickBooks Premier from any computer connected to the Internet. Secured by the latest encryption software, protected from virus attacks and backed up daily, your online QuickBooks files are even safer than the files stored on your client’s computers.

The Online Accounting System uses Microsoft’s latest virtual computing technology to allow your firm to take advantage of off-site bookkeepers, “Stay-at-home” moms, staff members who move out of your area, and even low cost bookkeepers from India. They all have instant access to full powered QuickBooks applications with just one secure login.

Clients who split their time between multiple offices and clients who are “on-the-road” and frequently out of the office, really appreciate it when you offer this kind of service. Because they always have instant, secure access to their accounting, receivables, and payables data from any computer in the world.

You can see the Virtual Computer Online Accounting System in action by using our Online Demo. Just log in with the username user1 and the password rtdsdemo07

Visit our Online Accounting page to learn more. To get started adding this service to your website, simply fill out the form at the bottom of the page.

I’m happy to announce the newest service available to help our Gold and Platinum members deal with MS Outlook problems when they arise: Remote Assistance.

Our email servers are extremely stable and completely redundant. Email problems, if they occur, almost always have to do with a configuration error in the Outlook application.

Outlook can often be a tricky to set up correctly and seemingly unrelated changes made to your computer can have an effect on Outlook, leaving you without email.

We know how important email is to your business, that’s why we offer remote assistance to help you quickly get Outlook working. After all, you’re an accountant, not a computer technician. With remote assistance, you can leave the Outlook configuration to us.

Here’s how it works: while you’re on the phone, one of our technicians will pass you a website URL. By visiting that address, you’ll be prompted to enable screen sharing. Just click yes, and we’ll be able to view your screen and remotely borrow control of your keyboard and mouse.

You’re in complete control of the connection between the two computers, so you can temporarily suspend or quickly terminate the session at any time. You can easily watch and monitor every step of the repair as it progresses, just as if our technician was sitting there next to you.

We can even walk you through repairs or instruction involving other aspects of your CPASiteSolutions website. Is something going wrong with the automated backup? We’ll connect to your computer and walk you through it step by step.

Remote assistance couldn’t be easier. You don’t have to leave the office or wait for an IT person to arrive, and there’s nothing to install or learn how to use. With just a couple clicks, our technicians will be virtually standing over your shoulder, helping you through the repair process. For more information, visit our Remote Assistance page, or just give us a call.

As you know, we offer 160 professionally designed site styles for you to choose from for your CPASiteSolutions website. Did you also know that we can help you incorporate a custom site style built by your own web designer?

Our SiteManager tool is so flexible it allows your designer to add their site design to it. This way, you can take advantage of your custom design, our content management tool, and all the other tools, resources and content we can provide for you. By working with your own designer, you’ll have total control over your site design. You can tweak every detail to your exact specifications and even modify your site at any time.

When your designer has completed your new site style, we’ll have one of our designers show yours how to set up all the elements of your custom design, build it right into our SiteManager system and seamlessly integrate all of our features. If you don’t already have a web designer to work with, you can have us customize one of our designs to better reflect your needs, or have us build you a new design from scratch.

We want to make it as easy as possible for you to get what you need out of your website. You shouldn’t feel pressured into choosing something that you don’t totally believe is right for you. That’s why it’s our pleasure to offer you this added service feature.

Take a look over our custom design overview for more information, and let us know if we can help you, or your designer, achieve the result you deserve.