This list was designed for CPA’s to help clients with Software & Technology
Selecting the wrong software can be devastating to a business. Help your clients navigate the world of business software and you’ll not only gain their loyalty but you can also help them reduce costs and increase profits to grow with your firm as their trusted advisor. Don’t let a competing CPA firm get to them first.
Clients are buying technology every day without your assistance. And you get nothing for it. Spend a little time understanding their needs and we will offer you seminars, webinars, training and lunch and learns to invite your clients to as well as learn yourselves. Leverage the Cloud: The cloud is a major topic today. Smaller clients don’t have full-time IT resources nor the infrastructure needed to take advantage of new technologies. Help them identify ways to move their business to the cloud so they can reduce not only technology costs but also their ongoing administrative costs with the added bonus that cloud technologies make it easier for you to help them with their financials.
Help clients with recruitment, retention, benefits, and payroll and you’ll build client loyalty while identifying new revenue opportunities with existing clients. Help them find software that will handle the current Health Care Law and any new ones that may be enacted. Support M&A: Many firms offer merger and acquisition services but few recognize the value technology has in this process. An acquiring company wants a clear picture of the health of the organization they’re considering buying. Technology can make this much easier with the right reports and data. Further, a company looking to grow through merger and acquisition needs a solid technology platform to facilitate this growth as it brings new entities into the fold. In fact, one of the main reasons companies change technology platform is due to a recent acquisition or divestiture so make sure you are ready to capitalize on this major capital investment opportunity.
A company with healthy accounts receivable will qualify for lower interest rates and will have a much higher borrowing potential. Identify clients that are struggling with accounts receivable, have high days sales outstanding, are factoring receivables to alleviate short-term cash flow issues, or companies with excessive bad debt write-offs. Help them implement technologies like Anytime Collect to get paid faster and easier with automated customer communications and online bill payment options.
Most companies struggle to manage purchases effectively. Help them evaluate systems for purchase order requisitions with built-in approval workflows and refer inventory-centric clients to ERP experts who can help them maximize purchases for raw materials.
One of the best ways to help clients grow is to show them how to increase leads and win a more business by partnering with technology providers to increase website traffic through keyword search engine optimization or by implementing customer relationship management (CRM) and marketing automation applications to get better insights into the sales process with automation around email communications and drip or nurture marketing campaigns.
You already know that compliance with accounting and tax laws is vital to clients’ success. But there are so many other ways that clients struggle with compliance. Help clients identify consulting firms to implement quality compliance initiatives; help them identify they right human resources and benefits applications to comply with healthcare mandates; and help them utilize sales tax applications to simplify the sales tax compliance process with modern-day systems like Avalara.
Larger firms have a technology practice to assist clients as they grow. Smaller firms most often do not. If you’re a larger firm you must create this value internally or by partnering to offer competitive services. Smaller firms absolutely must partner with technology firms or they will inevitably lose out to larger firms who offer considerably more value with extended technology services.
Small businesses don’t plan and those that do plan – do it poorly. Most CPA firms don’t realize that there is technology available to help them create budgets for clients so they can manage costs and streamline cash flow so they aren’t blindsided with large expenses that prevent them from growing their businesses. Budgeting is one of the most effective ways firms can add value to clients and it’s a billable service providing significant bang to your own bottom line.
CPAs know the value of financial reporting but you probably don’t realize the tremendous revenue opportunity available if you had reporting tools in place that you could use with every client to improve reporting and access to information regardless of their business application or industry. Products like Solver BI360 are available to CPA firms to create not only financial reports for clients but also to create sales analysis reports, inventory reports, dashboards, alerts, and month-end or year-end reports that can be delivered automatically to clients.
Truly there are countless ways to add value to clients by simply listening to their challenges and consulting with an experience technology provider. But the key is to identify the right technology provider. The CPA firm must pick a technology provider that sees every aspect of their client’s diverse businesses – from infrastructure to ERP and across industry segments and geographies. e2b teknologies is that technology partner. With decades of experience, in-house consulting and custom development resources, and hundreds of applications available – e2b works with CPAs to solve client problems so they can grow their businesses adding significant value to the client relationship with revenue opportunities to grow the firm.
