Your clients come to you as an accountant with a range of financial queries, looking to you to guide them through some of the biggest decisions concerning their business. With business advisory services stepping to the forefront of the industry, accountants across Australia need to be engaging their clients to analyse their financial landscape. Whether your clients are looking to expand their business, come to you about issues within their cashflow, identify trends and how they can use those to forecast their financial outlook, or seek advice about tax - your expertise can make the difference.
Encouraging your clients to analyse their finances is an exceptional and vital practice which can also allow you to improve your own workflow and offer stellar customer service. It’s a surefire way to get a complete picture of their future while allowing them to maintain control of their goals. It can set your accounting firm apart by fostering a teamwork approach designed for collaboration and trust. Here’s how you can help your clients embrace this approach and elevate your firm’s services to a new level.
The first port of call should be identifying which clients would be receptive to collaborating and which are in need of your advice. Once you’ve chosen the clients that are ideal candidates, be sure to reach out for an informal chat. Whether your client is local or from afar, having a face to face meeting either virtually or in-person shows your interest and creates an air of comfortability to allow a client to open up about sensitive financial concerns.
This first step also allows you to build rapport, cementing professional relationships and improving loyalty. If you’ve been working on improving your soft skills, this is an opportune moment to exercise those skills and put them into practice for both you and your client.
A client’s future can be an enigma to them. Working within their business day to day can take centre stage, leaving their future as a secondary concern. It’s your job to get your client to see the big picture and how mapping their financial forecast would be most beneficial to them. You could ask questions such as:
You may have a client who has been working within their field for the last 40 years and is looking to arrange succession plans or retirement. Most clients aren’t fully aware as to how to move to the next step or even begin the process of ‘letting go’ of their own work. This is where you come in. You can advise them about the next steps or put them in touch with a specialist within your sphere who can draw up plans for them.
Getting your client excited about what lies ahead is an integral step to ensure your services move beyond compliance based work. If you are looking to move to an advisory model, you can outsource your compliance work to a trusted company, leaving more time spent focusing on business advisory services and your client’s financial wellbeing.
By using financial reports, data analysis, cashflow planning, and business advisory services - you can make a true difference in your client’s professional success. The best place to start is to gather data about your client using predictive analysis methods to foresee trends and sore spots that could use some work. Financial reports using this data allows you to present your findings in a succinct manner that lays out the framework of your client’s business and provides you with solutions that are both achievable and actionable.
From there, you can work with your client to plan out their cashflow and guide them to input methods designed to maximise profit and improve their financial forecast. You will be able to see from your analysis where they could be tightening their budget and which investments would benefit them in the long run. If your client is looking to expand upon their services, your advice will prove to be essential in making decisions backed by tangible research and will allow you to partner them with the appropriate resources.
Your work doesn’t end once the analysis is done. Following up with your clients shows interest, integrity and innovation. It’s important to check in with your clients once their financial analysis has wrapped and be consistent. It’s integral to offer continual check ins to see how your advice has improved their business. Your client may have new ideas about their future that they would like to engage your services for or they might need some extra work completed to iron out a past issue. Your interest in the success of their business can mean more work for your firm.
By establishing a strong professional relationship with your client, you can be their go-to accountant for all financial queries. This presents opportunities for ongoing services that you can offer as their business grows and they seek fresh advice. Following up with your clients shows that you care about their achievements and are there to guide them throughout the entire journey.
