Give others reasons to talk about your CPA website and your firm becomes a natural part of conversation. Potential clients come from these impromptu conversations all of the time, it is a true case of social marketing. Here are three ways to keep talk about you and your firm alive.

Helpful Information. Most important, of course, is content full of helpful information that potential clients can use. Any accounting website hosted by CPA Site Solutions has plenty of content available. Including your own fresh and unique content, such as a blog, is an important part of this process.

Fun Widgets. You can add some fun elements such as the Free Debt Clock that you can see at the bottom of this blog post. You can also add a fun online poll or create a unique signature. Keep on the lookout for other fun ways to draw humor or light interest to your accounting website.

Client Spotlights

Showcasing Clients. Another way to have your website, and ultimately your firm, talked about is by showcasing your clients. A great example of this comes from the client spotlight page from Rhodes, Young, Black and Duncan.

Their firm has set up a regularly changing spotlight page and then an archive of previous client spotlights. Doing this is not only helpful for the client, but gets people within different social venues, talking about your firm.

When you can get your clients talking about you and your firm to their friends, then you are advertising. This form of advertising is in a way that is stronger and more effective than any traditional methods available.

Remember the next time you are reading a blog, including this one, you might take some time to offer helpful comments. Not only is it fun to do, but grants some search engine benefits as well.

Have a comment? Fill out the form below.

When you have an accounting website hosted by CPA Site Solutions, you have access to an easy to use Email Marketing System. As a previous post explains, there are ways to use the power behind the newsletters. Here are specific tips on using the Email Marketing System to help market your next CPA Seminar.

Create a Campaign. As detailed in the help section for the Email Marketing System, the first thing to do is create a campaign. Your new campaigns should be specific for each seminar you are running.

Email Marketing System

Attach Messages. You can then attach messages to the campaign. These messages can go to your regular subscribers letting them know about the new seminar and how to sign up.

Seminar Communication. As you start running the seminar, you can include messages specific to those who signed up. The first might welcome and thank them for signing up for the seminar.

You can then send reminder messages as you get closer to the seminar date. You might include details on what to expect and some of the logistics of how the seminar works if this is their first time attending. You can then send them a follow-up message when the seminar is over, thanking them for attending and elicit feedback via Survey Monkey.

Not everyone might be able to attend in your area. For those that can’t you can run seminars remotely if you need to using a free online presentation tool. You can help those attending follow along by using a free slide presenter to share the information.

You can use free online quizzes to help firm up what they should take away. You can either run the quiz during or after the seminar. Running the quiz during, if it is short, has the added benefit of stimulating conversation and making people feel more comfortable about asking questions.

Seminars are one of the key ways your firm can advertise your services and help bring in additional revenue for your firm.

Do you run seminars on a regular basis? Have some of your own ideas on how to run seminars smoothly? Send a comment and share with other readers your own experiences.

It isn’t enough just to have a CPA website and a blog, you need visitors and regular readers. You can get more readers by submitting your blog to blog directories and you can help your CPA website traffic by commenting upon other blogs.

Helpful Comments. When you write a blog, it is fun to get comments from readers. A good example is like the one recently from Reesa at Account Ability. Reesa had commented upon the CPA Site Solutions blog post about free online image editing.

Comments Are Always Welcome

A comment from readers can reinforce which blog posts are helpful. On the flip side, Reesa gets a link from the CPA Site Solutions site to her own which can help drive traffic to her website.

You can see an example of this if you go to the image editing blog post mentioned, scroll down to the comments, and then click on her name. When you do so you are brought to her website.

Be Specific. Your comment should add value and mention specific points in the article. If not, you risk your comment sounding generic, or something that could be added to any post. Then your comment could just get deleted as spam.

Take Notes for Specific Details

Adding Comments Box. When you add a blog for your CPA website hosted by CPA Site Solutions then you can also add a comments box. This is a great way to engage readers and, hopefully, get some helpful feedback.

Commenting on other blog posts is fun process as you engage with others online. There are search engine benefits from the activity. Just be careful of your reasons for posting.

If you are posting because you have something to say, then all is good. If you are posting just to try to get a link to your website, others can see this and you hinder, rather than help, your firm’s reputation.

If you have a CPA website hosted by CPA Site Solutions then you probably have multiple clients to manage. Keeping track of the amount of time spent with each one can be a task in and of itself. Here is a quick and easy solution that works automatically in the background so you don’t have to.

Chrometa. Although Chrometa does cost $99 it is worth the money considering the time saved doing things manually. There is a 30 day free trial that gets most hooked on how easy it is to use.

Automatic Time Tracking

All Automatic. After you download and install it, Chrometa works entirely in the background logging everything that you do and how much time you spend doing it. Although there are previous posts on a free time tracker, the problem still remains in terms of remembering to start and stop the feature.

Going Away. If you step away from your desk you can actually pause Chrometa while you are gone. If you forget then there is a box that automatically pops-up recording the amount of inactive time. You can type in exactly what you were doing, for example talking on the phone with a particular client.

Export Excel Document. You can even export a report to Excel that tells you the activity, what application you were using, and the time using it down to the second. This can give you great historical data that can be printed out if needed.

Training Videos. You can get off and running with Chrometa without doing anything but installing it on your computer. However if you really want to get the most out of what it holds then you might consider the free online training video.

When your CPA firm gets busy, keeping track of how much time you spend on each client can get tricky. Every minute you don’t have to spend logging your actions, you can spend on work that directly generates revenue for your company.

Have a comment? Fill out the form below.

When you have an accounting website hosted by CPA Site Solutions, you have access to 55 logos for your firm. These logos are modified with your firm’s name, re-sized, and placed on your website all for free. For those times when you don’t find exactly what you are looking for, and don’t want to do it yourself, you can try ready made logos from 99 Designs.

Finding A Logo. If you don’t have a logo for your CPA website already, finding one can be quite a process. You can shorten this by getting ready made logos that have a particular style without the cost.

Ready Made Logos for $99

Ready Made Logos. The ready made logos from 99 Designs are much like the logos available to any CPA website hosted by CPA Site Solutions. Ready made means that you find one you like, your business name is placed in, and you have a new logo.

Making It Your Own. The only part about having a ready made logo is that another company can have the same logo as you. The benefit though is that the cost of the logo from 99 Designs is only $99.

There is an option to get exclusive rights to a logo for only $100 more. This means that you won’t find another company with that same logo and so can call it your own.

Free Ready Made Logos

If you are just starting out your CPA firm, or have never had a logo and are unsure about what to do for one, you may find ready made logos work for you. If not, there are some options to get exclusive rights.

Need to change your logo? Send an email to support@cpasitesolutions.com or call 800-896-4500.

There is a lot of information on what you get with each service level when you look at pricing for a CPA website hosted by CPA Site Solutions. When you consider the amount of time saved through the two hours of updates at the Gold or Platinum level then it becomes a much easier choice. Here are some reasons for new or existing clients to consider the Gold level.

Two Hours of Updates. There are often questions regarding exactly what is meant by two hours of updates for your CPA website per month. There is a previous post on two hours of updates that helps clarify what that means.

Busy Tax Professionals. Certainly your time as a CPA or other tax professional is worth more than $10 an hour. Yet you only pay $20 more to go from the Silver to the Gold level. Plus you not only get two hours of updates but also access to many more ready-to-go website designs.

Have CPA Site Solutions Add Pages For You

Easy To Do. Although it is true that the Site Manager is easy to use, there are many other tasks that call for your attention. When you are not used to using a free online photo editor to resize photos for the web for instance, then that can be time consuming.

When you hand off that task to CPA Site Solutions you can get that done without so much worry and more time to focus on your own clients. Plus at the Gold level you also get access to a great application that allows for automatic backup of critical files.

This application is available not only to you but your clients as well. You can even sell the critical backup file solution to your clients for a minimal fee.

Flexibility. When you have a CPA website with CPA Site Solutions you are under no contracts and pay on a monthly basis. You can use this flexibility to your advantage.

Lets say you know that you are only going to be using the two hours of updates and not any of the other features. You also know you are going to be very busy for the next couple of months but still want to update your CPA web site.

You can move to the Gold level for a couple of months. You can then email CPA Site Solutions with photos and content with directions on where to place them. Usually twenty-four hours later the task is complete.

Think you want to switch to the Gold level? You can email support@cpasitesolutions.com or call 800-896-4500 with your request.

If you have a website hosted with CPA Site Solutions at the Gold or Platinum level then you have access to a great critical file backup feature. Although there is a great previous post and help section on how the file backup feature works to back up files, what about recovery? Here are some quick reasons to use the feature and how to easily recovery files.

Your Firm, Your Clients, Your Business. All of these elements rely upon consistent use of data over time. Your firm has a legal and business obligation to make sure that data is kept safe. Your clients, and therefore your firm and business, rely on you to make informed choices on how that data is maintained on a daily basis.

Automatically Off-Site. One of the best choices you can make is to have your data in another location than your main business. This is traditionally called Off-Site Backup and has been done in the past with tapes. The beauty of current technology is that you can do the same Off-Site Backup with less hassle and much faster recovery time.

Critical File Backup

If you take a look at disasters like Katrina, it becomes obvious that having data backed up at your office isn’t going to help if everything is under water. Being able to communicate effectively with your clients during a disaster and still have access to all your data, is key to keeping business alive.

Recovery. One of the key elements to backing up data is testing to make sure it is available when you need it. Not only that but how easy and fast is it to get the files back in place?

The FileVault application keeps all of your critical files backed up to where you specify. You can create a backup folder within your My Documents area to put the files. Then when you need them you just login to that folder and download making it a fast and easy recovery solution.

Critical Files Versus Whole Computer. Although the FileVault application does a great job of backing up critical files if you need to back up more you should consider using Mozy. If you just need a little more space you can always purchase more for the Vault at $9.95 a month for two gigs of extra storage.

Have a question regarding the Vault or want to increase storage? Send an email to support@cpasitesolutions.com or call 800-896-4500 with your question or request.

If you have a website hosted with CPA Site Solutions and have email via the Workteam Collaboration Suite, then you should be aware of some changes with Internet Explorer 6 and Google. Google plans to discontinue support for Internet Explorer 6.

Shared Calendars is One Feature Offered by the Workteam Collaboration Suite

IE 6 Not Supported. Google plans to discontinue support for Internet Explorer 6 starting March 2010. According to an email sent out to those who use Google Applications, “over the course of 2010, we will be phasing out support for Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 as well as other older browsers that are not supported by their own manufacturers. We plan to begin phasing out support of these older browsers on the Google Docs suite and the Google Sites editor on March 1, 2010.”

Since the Workteam Collaboration Suite is powered by Google Apps then the proposed change potentially affects those who use it. If you are of the 10% of those who still use IE 6 then you might consider some alternatives.

Switch to Firefox. In a previous post there is mention of many reasons to switch to Firefox. The decline of IE 6 can now be added to the list of reasons to switch.

Update Internet Explorer. It is free to just upgrade to IE 7 or just jump to IE 8 (option available within the same link). If you are like the other roughly 36% of users who like Internet Explorer then this is probably your best option.

Use Chrome. Google’s browser is called Chrome and, although only launched in September of 2008, already has over 10% of the browser share of users. It is faster than many of the other browsers and is easy to use. If you are interested in new frontiers this might be your option.

Use Safari. Safari is the default browser for those people who use a Mac. Even so if you own a PC you can use it as well.

Use Opera. You can also download Opera for free. Although only 2.2% of people use it, it is still an alternative to IE 6.

Although support for IE 6 is declining, there are alternatives. If you use the Workteam Collaboration Suite provided with any website hosted by CPA Site Solutions, then you want to be sure to choose one of the alternatives above.

Have a comment? Fill out the form below.

In a previous posting there was an offer for 10% off a February Jennings Seminar. As promised CPA Site Solutions is offering 10% off a Jennings Seminar for March. This time the topic is Lunch with Bob, The BIG 1040 Push, is scheduled for March 16th and is worth 1 hour of CPE credit!

10% off Jennings Seminar in March through CPA Site Solutions

Limited seating! The seating is limited so you will want to sign up early for this event. Be sure to test your system to make sure that you meet all of the system requirements.

1 CPE credit hour! This is a great way to get 1 hour of CPE credit. If you attend this event and answer 75% of the polling questions at the conclusion then you will get 1 credit hour for this event. There are no prerequisites for this seminar.

To get your 10% discount: Be sure to use the code marcpasite during the checkout process to get the 10% discount. Regular price $49. CPAsitesolutions.com customer price: $44.10

Event Description. “The big 1040 push – dealing with the big balance due returns and problem clients.”

Jennings Seminars was founded by Bob Jennings CPA, CFP, CITP, a national and World renowned speaker. Jennings has published articles in such magazines as The Journal of Accountancy and The Practical Accountant along with authoring several accounting and technology seminar manuals.

If you can’t make this event look for another posting in March for a similar offer for a April seminar. Click here to take advantage of 10% off Jennings seminar in March.

Every website with CPA Site Solutions comes with a free Tax Organizer. There is a previous post that details about how you can generate a PDF of the Tax Organizer to be used offline. The Online Tax Organizer has been recently improved making it faster and easier to use.

Save and Finish Changes for Later

Save and Finish Later. Although the Tax Organizer had an automatic save feature, there is now a button at the bottom of every page. Clients can now click on the Save and Finish Later button at anytime in the process.

Timeout. The Tax Organizer has a time out feature. This is designed to bump any user out after a long period of inactivity.

Although previously there were times when the Organizer would time out prematurely, that issue has been fixed. The current timeout is after approximately twenty minutes of inactivity. To avoid data loss, clients should save and close before they have to walk away from their computer.

Better, Faster, Stronger. It may not be the Six Million Dollar Man, but the Tax Organizer is faster then the previous version. This means that both you and your clients save time when using it.

Adding Client Access. Make sure you have either modified the default access rights or changed a specific user to include the Tax Organizer. This step assures that when they client logs into the portal they will see the Tax Organizer icon and have access to the Tax Organizer.

Add and Publish the 2009 Tax Organizer

Adding 2009 Tax Organizer. If you are unfamiliar with how the Tax Organizer works you can get help. You can add the 2009 Tax Organizer by logging in, choosing Manage Organizers and then clicking on Add 2009 Organizer near the bottom of the Subscriber Center.

Draft Versus Published. When the 2009 Organizer is added it is in draft mode by default. None of your clients see the Tax Organizer until it is published.

Before you publish the 2009 Tax Organizer you can edit the questions or add some of your own. Once you are satisfied then you can publish and all clients will then have access.

An important note to this is that once you publish the Tax Organizer you cannot edit it. It is good to make sure of your changes and then hit publish. If need be you can add another 2009 Tax Organizer and make a new draft with the changes in place that you need. This isn’t as efficient and should therefore be avoided.

The Online Tax Organizer is just one of many features included with any website hosted by CPA Site Solutions. Send us a comment on any of these by filling out the form below.