Do You Know How Much Money
Your Website is Making?

Conversion Tracking is the Key to Making Your
Marketing Dollars Pay Real Dividends

For most businesses tracking website conversions is easy.

Most retail businesses and many services can exploit tracking software like Google Analytics that can count every purchase as it occurs, so when calculating metrics like conversion rates and cost per conversion all you need to do is a little long division. Websites for CPAs, unfortunately, can’t track sales. Traffic tracking calculates sales by counting the number of visits to your “Thank You For Your Payment” page and totaling the online payments. The whole process is pretty much automatic. You can simply divide your total sales by your website expenditures and get instant feedback on your website’s ROI.

This doesn’t work with websites for CPAs. Tracking traffic is useless for calculating ROI unless the sale occurs over the web.

Selling professional services isn’t like selling retail goods. When websites for CPAs lure new clients the lead usually come in over the phone. There’s no way a website can track these types of hits so most high end professional services; doctors, lawyers, architects, etc.; need to find other solutions for calculating ROI.

I’m not saying that there’s no reason to track the traffic on these websites. Analyzing traffic patterns on your website can help you glean a lot of important information about who your visitors are, what they want, and where they’re from, but that’s a post for another day. For purposes of figuring out your conversion costs even the best websites for CPAs can’t provide accurate tracking information in regards to conversions.

The only way accounting firms and other professionals have to calculate their ROI on their websites and other marketing campaigns is to do things the old-fashioned way. Back in the old days we called it “conversion tracking”.

On it’s surface conversion tracking looks easy, but it’s actually very difficult to implement because it usually means breaking bad habits and replacing them with good ones.

I don’t need to tell you that breaking bad habits is hard. Make it clear to your staff that you expect them to to take the new procedures seriously.

Conversion tracking takes place during the sign up phase.

When you first fill out the client’s contact sheet you need to ask, flat out, where the client heard about you and why he decided to call. Add this information directly to the client contact file and record it separately in a notebook specifically for that purpose. Once you have this information determining an websites for CPAs ROI is easy.

Your staff is going to balk. Asking these questions can be awkward and it can be hard to impress on employees the importance of proper conversion tracking. Be patient, but be firm. There can be no mistake that this is now an important part of their jobs.

The vast majority of your clients won’t hesitate to answer these questions, and most of the ones that don’t will have honestly forgotten who or what referred you. A few gentle probes will usually shake something loose.

“Were you referred by a friend? A co-worker? Did you find me on the web?”

This technique has a huge advantage over the automated techniques enjoyed by online retailers. Over time the information you gather is much more useful. By taking advantage of Conversion Tracking you not only determine the effectiveness of websites for CPAs, you can determine the conversion metrics of all your marketing campaigns.

The first point of contact with potential prospects for most firms these days are professionally designed CPA websites. These sites need to establish a lasting impression of your practice.  A website markets for you behind the scenes and around the clock but it calls for persistence to manage your online content so that it’s always fresh.

You also need prospects to come across your business in the search engines. This means your website should be listed high enough that your practice is visible.

Properly managing CPA websites takes a lot of diligence, and not many accounting professionals or their staffs have the kind of spare time it takes to do the job right. One excellent method to compensate for this lack of time is to work with a student to help you with your online marketing. College students and new webmasters are always looking for opportunities to try out their web marketing skills. Some tips are below to help you work with an intern for your CPA website. They can help you with creating and managing effective online marketing strategies.

Intern Experience

It is a good idea to look for potential candidates who have existing online marketing skills. This includes both search engine optimization (SEO) and search engine marketing (SEM) experience. It isn’t an impossible task to improve your search engine results. However, it takes a lot of effort and you must be patient. You must consistently generate fresh content for your CPA website. Ask your candidates for samples of their writing. The best candidates will have articles written about accounting and the field of financial management. This way you don’t have to spend time teaching them the fundamentals of your business.

Your current clients see you as a dependable professional. It is equally important to project this to your prospects as well. Your intern does not directly work with your clients. However, their work represents you and your practice directly. You should carefully examine their work and make sure that it is of sufficient quality to represent you online.

Your intern needs only a basic set of math skills to be able to create and monitor performance metrics for your website. An understanding of spreadsheets and basic statistics is all that is needed to measure the effectiveness of the marketing programs over time.

Working with Your Team

You should work with your intern as you work with your permanent office staff. This applies even though your intern may only be a temporary employee. You want to think about how compatible they will be with your permanent staff because they will all be working together. You want to be sure there is seamless communication between the intern and your staff, so that the site content they produce can properly reflect your firm’s image.

Online Effectiveness

Because search engine programs can take several months to produce real, visible results, it is a good idea to let the intern make suggestions on SEO and SEM programs. This is especially true once they start to make valuable contributions to your CPA website. Interns can make substantial contributions to your practice’s bottom line, so it is a good idea to keep all options open.

As soon as the first marketing campaigns come to completion, you may decide to continue working with your student beyond the original scope of the project. Business School students and aspiring webmasters can continue to bring value to your practice’s online success, especially in the competitive atmosphere of CPA websites.

Getting organized, bringing in outside help, pledging to relax on a regular basis – will help every CPA get through busy season with less stress and improved productivity.

It’s common for accounting professionals to both yearn for and dread accounting busy season. Everyone enjoys the extra income that’s part of the package, which can fund their company for the rest of the year. However, plenty of CPAs ignore their accounting websites and other key marketing channels from January to April, and they allow their health to deteriorate. Even taking into account the boost in the bottom line that comes with it, all too often, busy season ruins a practice.

To get the most out of busy season and leave the stress behind, successful CPA firms follow these 5 steps:

1. They Don’t Skimp on Accounting Websites

During busy season, time is money. An hour here or there printing out documents or filing paper returns can really add up, preventing firms from reaching revenue goals.

Keeping the office simple is the name of the game, which is why well-prepared accountants use accounting websites to increase efficiency. Consider the following, all of which help firms work smarter:

• Client portal
• Online tax organizer
• Pay by credit card
• E-newsletter
• Frequently asked questions page
• Map and driving directions

2. They Tidy Their Offices and Touch Up Their Accounting Websites

Disorganization in the workplace (and at home for that matter) really adds to people’s stress. Especially in a business like accounting, piles of papers and files quickly get out of control, spilling all over the floor and teetering on the edges of crowded desks. And what happens when a client calls and the CPA can’t find their information easily? Even when they’re confident they can locate any piece of paper quickly, they’re foolish to take a chance with client data.

Accountants who prepare for busy season before the first of the year are more relaxed and more effective in their client work. These CPAs arrange files, update their accounting websites, and clean out inboxes. And they’re careful to “hibernate” any projects that can wait until after April 15th by placing them out of the way where they won’t add to the general chaos.

Once work starts coming in, it helps to spend a couple minutes at the end of every day to tidy up the office. Folks who do this report feeling empowered and well-prepared for the next day.

3. They Don’t Put Up with Trouble Clients

It’s part of the package to have some clients who just make life miserable for the whole staff. These difficult folks might take issue with every single fee, leave nasty comments on firms’ accounting websites, or just come across as highly unpleasant and antisocial.

It may be hard to do, but it’s okay to fire obnoxious clients, and smart CPAs terminate these relationships. The time accountants waste dealing with these troublemakers is better spent working with the clients who are easy and problem free.

4. They Hire Outside Help

Historically, accountants have been the biggest administrators. They answer e-mails, handle returns, manage their accounting websites, field phone and website inquiries, and other tedious tasks. Wouldn’t it save time to hand all this off to someone else?

Busy season is the perfect time to hire interns. Many interns are fresh from schooling and more than happy to get real-life office experience. Both accountants and interns benefit – and busy season can become much more manageable.

5. They Aren’t Married to the Job

During busy season, many accountants work 10, 12, 14 hours a day – or more. But not all of them. The wisest CPAs don’t allow the job to take over their lives, even when workload is at its height.

Take a page from their playbook. Instead of burning the candle at both ends, set a fixed time at the end of the day when you power down your computer and go home – no matter what. A few more hours of sleep will greatly enhance your mood and boost your efficiency.

And remember to tell your clients that you can’t work miracles. They should know that they MUST hand in their materials by a particular date or you’ll be filing for an extension on their behalf. Period.

If you’re an accountant facing busy season, remember to take time for yourself. Once a week, forget about accounting websites, tax organizers, and dissatisfied clients – and relax. Go to a film, take a bubble bath, or make a date with your pals. When you do, you – and your business – will not just survive, but thrive!

As CPAs, we serve the unique needs of governments and non-profits, individuals, and businesses from every corner of the private sector. They all turn to us to help them resolve some of their most complex, vexing, and urgent issues.

Of course, clients retain CPAs because of our experience and expertise in knowing how to save them money and grow their assets, but most CPAs also know that there’s something more that underlies all of this.

Our clients entrust us to provide solutions to some of the biggest problems they face because we offer them peace of mind. CPAs are paid to be flawlessly organized, trustworthy, and responsible in resolving client issues, and equally so in handling sensitive client information.

Why We Need Client Portals

The unique level of responsibility that comes with acting as stewards of our clients’ most sensitive information has made the use of secure, Web-based client portals an absolute necessity for all CPAs. Client portals allow a secure, streamlined, and customizable alternative to email for the transfer and storage of sensitive information, as well as an interactive platform in which to engage and collaborate with clients.

Since their introduction, client portals have been used to:

• quickly and easily transfer large files, including QuickBooks files;
• a way to receive client source documents and make completed tax returns available to clients;
• invoice clients and collect credit card payments; and
• provide a real-time environment in which to update payroll information for payroll clients.

The Question of Security

Using a password-protected client portal is tantamount to having a safety deposit box for each client’s files that only the client and his CPA have a key to. Many client portals include the same impressive 128-bit SSL encryption used by banks and other financial institutions to ensure that only authorized individuals have access.

Portals are also extremely reliable, usually offering the assurance of network uptime in excess of 99.9%.

CDs and Thumb Drives: A Real Advantage?

The transfer of traditional hard copy files to digital media has been in practice for years, and it’s a great way to reduce storage space, save cost, provide an environmentally responsible alternative to paper files, and add redundancy for backup purposes.

However, digital media of this kind has always had the same intrinsic flaws: information on hard drives, CDs, and thumb drives cannot be easily accessed or updated by individuals in different locations.

And because most email won’t allow more than 10 MB of data to be transmitted, larger files stored on CD or thumb drives have had to be sent by courier. This has meant a lot of extra expense and often unacceptable delays, not to mention the inherent security risk.

Due to these limitations, digital media has NOT been a great improvement from the archaic paper filing systems used years ago.

But with client portals, both the client and his CPA have immediate access to files anywhere in the world, as well as the ability to make real-time updates.

Client Portals Get Rave Reviews

Since most clients are familiar with Web-based systems – taking advantage of similar systems that have been in place for years to review bank statements and pay invoices –  they are quick to embrace and adapt to the use of client portals when working with their CPA.

In fact, they are so widely used now that many clients have come to expect client portals and show a strong preference for them over more archaic and less secure methods of payment, data transfer and storage, and real-time collaboration.

Find more accounting information, like details on how to become an accountant and CPA requirements, on AccountingEDU.org.

This month, we’ve added three new features to your Site Manager to make it faster and easier for you to make changes to your site.

Customizable Header Images

It’s now a snap to swap out the stock photography image on the page header to something that reflects you and your firm. Click on a page in your Site Map, and click on the header at the top of the page. A box like the one at the right will open. Select Custom Image from the Header Style drop-down and select or upload the new image.
Page Settings Tab

The new Page Settings tab, found on the far left of each page in the Site Manager, eliminates the need to back out to the Site Map to change page titles or header images.  This allows you to easily alter the page titles that appear in your navigation bar.

Upload Files Button

It’s always been easy to upload image files to include in your website. From any page within the Site Manger, just click on the More Options link at the top of your screen, and select Upload Files. Click on the Files folder on the left, and upload your file. This works with PDFs, .DOCs, and almost any other file type you can cook up.

Looking for a way to make tax season simpler? Our Tax Organizer just got its annual makeover and is ready for the 2011 tax season.

This next-generation Tax Organizer is a dynamic web application that allows your clients to organize their tax information online, saving you time when preparing their taxes. You and your clients can securely access your client’s tax information anytime from anywhere, eliminating the time and expense involved in mailing paper organizers.

As always, the fully customizable Organizer offers you a secure way to catalogue your clients’ documentation and returns from year-to-year. Encouraging your clients to use the Tax Organizer can save you both the hassle of driving around town to deliver paperwork, and saves you the hassle of having to manually enter their information into your tax software.

Interested in learning more about the Tax Organizer? Click here to watch a video.

Most CPA and accounting practices have embraced email as a reliable and safe form of communication. This is unfortunate since email isn’t really all that safe. A lot of accountants are actually using email inappropriately and putting their client’s private data at risk by posting stuff like tax returns and QuickBooks files to emails. Protect your clients. Never assume that email is a protected way to convey sensitive info. When you send an email to someone it doesn’t go straight to it’s destination. It passes through a dozen or more mail servers, and these mail servers are popular targets with hackers and malware. This arrangement makes email vulnerable to interception by what’s called a “man in the middle” attack, and there’s nothing you can do to prevent it. These third party servers are completely outside of your control and have no accountability even if they are poorly or incompetently maintained. Even well tended mail servers can play host to Trojans that will quietly forward your emails to a hacker, most likely by posting them to a website.

All it takes is one hacked server along the way to intercept your email, and you’ll never know what happened.

Some email providers offer an added layer of security by encrypting messages, but this doesn’t prevent the file from being intercepted. Encrypted files are extremely hard to open if you don’t know the key, but given time a hacker will be able to get it open. Encryption does nothing to prevent a file from being intercepted.

Don’t get me wrong, email is a very valuable tool for an accounting firm. It’s unrivaled in speed, convenience, and expense. Accountants send hundreds of emails every week and most of these these messages don’t include private files. The problem only rears up when these firms email information that’s considered confidential. If the wrong people get hold of them documents like tax returns can seriously harm a client. Because accounting firms prepare taxes they are considered financial institutions. This actually makes emailing private information a crime. The federal law governing the security of financial is called the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. This law provides stiff financial penalties for accounting firms and other financial institutions that fail to adequately protect their client’s data.

For the most part we’re talking about security here rather than privacy. Just be aware that in order to be compliant with the law you need to protect both. Privacy is about protecting your clients’ identities. It’s loosely tied to security in that it’s often considered a subset of authorization, but privacy breaches usually involve a business deliberately selling client information to a direct marketing firm or similar third party. Where privacy is about keeping the door locked, security is about the lock itself. Security is the actual online authentication and authorization protocols that networks use to protect information and the audit system used to verify the overall system’s effectiveness.

The best solution for this issue can be found in most commercially available CPA websites. Document portals are now commonplace. All of the best accounting firms make use of these systems and they are available through almost every CPA website provider.

Portals come in a variety of shapes and sizes, but they all have one thing in common. These great tools let you exchange files with clients quickly, easily, and safely. Unlike email a portal transfer encrypts the data and transfers directly from your server to the website’s. This eliminates the chance of your file passing through any third party servers and keeps the chain of information accountable and under your immediate oversight.

Don’t mistake this as a crass sales pitch. If you have a website through CPA Site Solutions than you already have access to a first rate portal system. If you don’t… well, I’m definitely not the only designer selling these features. Frankly, all the best CPA websites furnish a secure transfer system.

What I’m trying to do is recommend that you look honestly at your firms policy on emailing confidential information. If you don’t have a formal policy create one and make sure everyone at your firm knows it. If a client realizes these risks before you adapt your procedures there’s a very high probability you’ll lose them.

If you haven’t already done so stop broadcasting your clients private personal information by email right now. Get a secure portal and USE it.

Brian O'Connell, President

It feels so good to have a professional CPA website for your accounting firm. One with a modern design and loads of tools.

And what feels even better is putting your own stamp on it – personalizing it so it reflects the uniqueness of your firm.

The best way to do this is through writing new content. When you write up a unique home page, About page, or blog posts, your website visitors get a great sense of your personality, which helps them decide to do business with you.

The challenge is that it takes time to write. With a busy accounting office to run, many of our clients find this task falls to the bottom of their (impressive) to-do list.

But I think we have the solution for you: our new custom copywriting service.

When you hire us to write for your website, you get the relief that comes with striking something off your list. Further, your site becomes personalized and unique…

…and as a bonus, the custom content helps your site rise in the search results and increase conversions.

Writing for your website takes a certain set of skills.

The Challenges of Writing for the Web

Writing for the Web is its own beast. Believe it or not, people ingest information differently online than they do when reading a newspaper, brochure, or other printed material.

For one thing, people scan. Using headlines and lots of bolds help them get the gist of a page in a minute or two, without having to read the whole thing word for word.

For another, writing for the Web often involves persuasive writing techniques with a call to action at the end. You want folks to read your services page, blog post, or email marketing message – and then DO something. Your writing needs to persuade the readers why they should contact you or sign up for your newsletter – and then give a clear way to do that.

Finally, to help with your rankings in the search engines, writing for the Web needs to incorporate keywords. You need to know what keywords to target, where to place them, and how many to use. When you get this right, you can dramatically improve your placement in Google and Bing – which brings you new prospects.

Our Writers Are Trained in Online Writing

Our writers know how to write compelling copy that urges readers to take action.

They know how to increase your listings through proper keyword copywriting.

And they do it quickly, with no typos or grammatical errors.

What Can We Write for You?

There’s truly no limit to what we can write for your website – but here are some ideas:

• Welcome / Home page
• About Us page
• Service page – a page covering a particular service or one describing all of them
• Blog post
• Email marketing message

Cross “Writing” Off Your To-Do List

Now that busy season is here, you might be feeling the need to outsource some of your duties. Writing is the perfect candidate.

Focus your efforts on serving your clients – and save the writing for us. We have the experience and skills to get the job done quickly – and get more traffic and better conversions for you.

Sign up for Custom Copywriting today – or contact us with questions: 1-800-896-4500, support@cpasitesolutions.com. We’re here to help!

Are you getting applicants with no relevant experience? You might be making this mistake...

The U.S. economy is coming back. It may not feel that way, but some key indicators are showing positive trends.

One of these is job growth. In January, 70,000 new jobs were created, the majority of them by small businesses (AccountingWEB).

But when small businesses – such as accounting firms – look to hire new employees, many are making one particular mistake.

This error leads to poor-quality applicants – folks who aren’t professional, don’t have the necessary experience, and won’t be a positive representation of the firm.

What is the mistake being made by accounting firms across the country?

A poorly designed, poorly written CPA website.

Why Your Website Matters in the Hiring Process

Hiring is a two-way street. You’re looking for a great employee – and the applicant is looking for a company that will nurture and advance their career.

(At least, that’s what you want – an employee who wants to further their career. You don’t want someone who’s just looking for a paycheck.)

When researching whether to apply for a position, one of the very first steps a job seeker takes is to look up the company’s website. They want to know how professional you are, who works there, and what your firm focuses on.

This visit will give them a ton of information. If your site is professional, they will be encouraged to apply. If it’s not, well, they might decide to skip it. That means you get applications not from the most motivated and career-minded candidates – but from the second or third string of talent.

Here are the parts of your site you should perfect to attract the best candidates:

• Home page - should be clean, well written, and current
• About Us page – should list all your employees, with pictures and bios
• Services – all services should be listed and explained, with separate pages for each if needed
• Employment Page – needs to list the current job openings and provide ample details and instructions (see more below)

What an Employment Page Can Do

A well-constructed Employment Page gives the job seeker a clear idea of the open position. The page should provide a thorough description of the job, qualifications, and how and when to apply.

Having this page on your site saves money on recruiting. If you have an Employment Page with all the necessary information, you can place shorter ads in newspapers with your website address pointing people back to your site. Rather than discouraging folks from applying, it ensures only the motivated job seekers – who take the time to visit your site – will apply.

An Employment Page also allows clients and other friends of the business to keep up on your open positions, which means you get referrals to qualified people they know.

Get a Professional CPA Website with an Employment Page

When you sign up for a website with CPA Site Solutions, you get a fully loaded site with a clean, modern design and loads of relevant content. There’s simply no better way to show your professionalism – and, in turn, attract the most impressive candidates.

You also have the option to ramp up your recruiting efforts with an Employment Page, which we add for no extra charge.

Here’s an example of our Employment Opportunities page…

Hiring is more important to the growth of your firm than you may realize. Don’t make a hiring mistake. Sign up for a professional website today.

Brian O'Connell, President

We all spend hours each day surfing the Web. We use the Web for business, for social activities, and for entertainment. It’s become a way of life.

Because so many of us are online so much of the time, we’re often lulled into a false sense of security. The truth is, there are cybercriminals out there – hackers who want to gain access to our hard drives, steal our personal information, and use our computers to perpetrate their crimes.

Needless to say, tax season is not the time to suddenly find yourself a victim of identity theft, or even to face the annoyance of having your computer run slowly or unreliably because of a virus.

The good news is, there are simple measures you can take to keep yourself safe.

Probably the easiest among these is choosing the right browser.

Use Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, or IE8

I recommend using one of the three major browsers: Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, or Internet Explorer 8.

All three protect against phishing, malware, and pop-ups. Here are brief definitions of each threat:

Phishing - Phishing sites are counterfeit bank or credit card sites designed to look identical to the real ones. Their aim is to trick you into giving up your personal information, like your credit card or Social Security numbers.

Malware - Malware is short for “malicious software,” and it encompasses a variety of software or program codes – viruses, worms, trojan horses, spyware, and so on – that access your computer without your consent. Malware can be a minor annoyance – or, depending on what you stumble on, it can be downright criminal in function.

Pop-ups – Pop-up ads are advertisements that open a new window, usually a small one, and demand immediate attention. They’re generally more annoying than dangerous, but if you accidentally click on one, you could be redirected to a harmful site.

IE6 or IE7 Are Not Secure – Time to Upgrade

At this point, Internet Explorer 6 is nine years old and simply does not provide the security you need in today’s online environment. In fact, Microsoft, who owns Internet Explorer, is attempting to eradicate IE6. Internet Explorer 7 is not much better.

If you want to keep yourself safe as you surf the Web, upgrade to Internet Explorer 8, or use Chrome or Firefox. All three give you a warning screen when you’re about to click over to a suspicious site, and they scan all downloads for viruses, among many other safety features.

Upgrade Here for Free

It costs nothing and takes only a few minutes to switch browsers…

Download Google Chrome

Download Mozilla Firefox

Download Internet Explorer 8

Here’s a handy page explaining how to move your bookmarks from one browser to another.

Stay Safe This Tax Season

We’re heading into tax season, the busiest time of the year for accountants.

Why should hackers be allowed to disrupt your productivity and potentially steal your identity? Don’t take any chances. Upgrade your browser today and protect yourself against cybercrime.

And while you’re at it, sign up for a CPA website and take advantage of all its time-saving features – a secure Client Portal, a monthly Client Newsletter, a Dedicated Webmaster, Search Engine Optimization, and 100+ additional features.

You get the first 60 days free!