How Can Self-Employed Accountants Build A Strong Client Base?
Training as an accountant opens up a lot of opportunities. There are plenty of big accounting firms you could work for, or you could look for an in-house position with a business. Alternatively, you might decide that you want to be self-employed and source your own accounting work. This is a great option if you want to be your own boss and have full control over your work.
However, when you work for yourself, it’s down to you to find your own clients and make sure that you have a constant flow of work coming in. This cannot be easy, especially when you start, but you can take a few simple steps to get more clients.
Define Your Niche
If you advertise yourself as a general accountant, you’re not really showing people how you can benefit them. Instead, you must find a specific niche and focus on targeting those customers. For example, do you want general bookkeeping work, or will you focus on helping private individuals with their tax affairs? Maybe you want to help small businesses manage their money? You might even decide to focus on a particular type of business. Whatever you decide to do, the first step should be defining your area of work and drawing up a list of ways to help those clients.
Invest In The Right Tools 
Offering a great service to your clients is the best way to build a good reputation and generate more work through recommendations. So, if you are going to get anywhere, you need to invest in the best accounting practice software to improve your service. This will make life easier for you and allow you to provide a more comprehensive, efficient accounting service for your clients. People won’t be impressed if you are still using basic spreadsheets to manage their books, so make sure that you always have the most up-to-date tools.
Understand The Limitations Of Social Media
Social media is not the best marketing tool for accountants, but it does have its uses. You’ll be disappointed if you think that you can make a few posts and get loads of clients because it won’t happen like that. However, if you target small businesses, platforms like Facebook and Twitter are perfect for finding new start-ups. Just be aware that many of them will not become successful enough to offer you regular work. LinkedIn is also a good platform for building professional relationships and networking with business owners.
When using social media, keep in mind that it’s not going to get you lots of new clients overnight, and you need to employ other strategies simultaneously.
Build a Strong Client Base: Build An SEO Friendly Website
Creating a professional website is key to finding new clients, and SEO is the most important thing. If people are looking for an accountant, they will often start with a Google search. Focus on making your site SEO-friendly and pay particular attention to local SEO. Once you appear higher in the search rankings, you will get more clients through your website.
The key thing to remember is that building a client base takes time. So, employ these strategies and stick with them until things gradually start to pick up. Once you have a few regular clients, you are well on your way to building a stable business.
