Ephemeral content was first created as a concept in 2011, so it’s relatively new. Examples of ephemeral content include Stories, available on Facebook and Instagram (and being tested in TikTok).

Ephemeral content is almost always made up of videos, very short ones. These videos can be created from a series of graphics or an actual video clip.

The advantages of using ephemeral content in your marketing strategy is that it gets top billing on all of the platforms. Stories are listed above the feeds, at the top of your screen. This generates high engagement as well as an immediate response from the viewer.

One of the most powerful emotional aspects of ephemeral content is the fear of missing out (FOMO).

Instagram Stories

One of the best examples of ephemeral content is Instagram Stories. Instagram users can post video clips that disappear after 24 hours. They appear at the top of the feed in little circles. When viewed, they appear for a few seconds.

As of July 2021, 500 million people use Instagram Stories daily. After seeing a product brand in Stories, 58 percent say they’ve become more interested in it and half say it has led to a purchase.

With Instagram Stories, you can make your content pop by adding stickers, applying filters, and using other engagement tools provided. The types of content that are good for stories include announcements, highlights, questions, countdowns, and links. Think about anything that might make a good headline, and you have a story idea.

If you want your story content to last longer than 24 hours, you can always create it as an Instagram reel, which is a longer video, up to one minute, and doesn’t disappear like a story does.

It might sound counter-intuitive to spend time and money on content that disappears, but the big benefit of creating stories is they expand your reach so that more people become aware of your service. Try stories to add ephemeral content to your toolbox of marketing strategies.

1. Paid social media ads that are delivered in the newsfeed so that they look like any other post. These will be marked “Sponsored” or “Promoted.”
2. Articles included in a magazine or newspaper. These will be labeled “Sponsored Content.” You might also have seen them called advertorials or special advertising sections. In the case of the latter, several companies might go in together to create content on a particular topic.
3. Promoted search results. These are paid search ads, which take many forms these days. You might see them listed as a regular listing labeled sponsored, promoted within a Google Map, or listed in a carousel of products, to name a few.
4. Recommendation blocks or widgets. These are headlined with “You might also like” or similar wording and are often used in store search results for upsell purposes.
5. Promoted listings. Ecommerce sites such as Amazon will use these. I’ll enter in a book author’s name I am searching for and other author’s books labeled promoted will appear in my search results.
6. Product placement, where you see a Coke can or Audi car in a movie, is a special form of native advertising.

Native advertising is incredibly common in the finance and tax profession. It has many benefits. One, the click-through rate is much higher than, say, a banner ad, because the reader feels like it should be there and it’s not as much of an interruption as a regular ad is. Second, we often need to educate our clients, and native advertising usually has a heavy educational content component to it.

In 2012, H&R Block hired The Onion (a satirical news site) to post a sponsored article with the title of “Woman Going to Take Quick Break After Filling Out Name, Address on Tax Forms.” This is a prime example of native advertising.

Almost all of the major news outlets benefit from native advertisers. CNN is especially full of paid and sponsored content; all you need to do is scroll the home page to see dozens of examples.

Native advertising can take the form of a social media post, an article, a video, or just about any content medium. Consumers look at native ads 53 percent more than display ads, according to Outbrain, and here are some more statistics when it comes to monetizing native advertising.

https://www.outbrain.com/blog/21-native-advertising-statistics-for-2021/

At ThriveFuel, our top expertise is advertising, and lot of native advertising is what we offer. Feel free to reach out if you’d like to add native advertising to your marketing strategy.

The flywheel concept is not only far more relevant to today’s consumers; it’s exactly what the accounting and tax profession should be using in business development.

In the old funnel model, marketing and sales functions were complete once the sale was made. The funnel didn’t take into account client retention, client referrals, or customer service, which many firms struggle with.

The flywheel idea puts the client at the center. Today’s consumer is constantly researching and continually skeptical. They are evaluating you and your services before and after their purchase. They are evaluating their experience with you to determine if they want to be your advocate or not.

The flywheel implies a rotating, or spinning, process, where individuals enter the circle at various points depending on whether they are strangers to you, prospects, customers, or promoters. Your goal varies, from attracting to engaging to delighting, depending on where they are in the process.

Your relationship with your clients is key, and it’s constantly evolving. The key to business development growth for accounting firms is to focus not only on lead generation, but to create a continual experience for the client that exceeds their expectations.

How fast your flywheel spins depends upon your strategies. HubSpot says the key is to reduce friction at the points you want to grow. You do that by focusing on customer needs and making it easy for them to learn about what you offer.

In the Attraction phase this can mean developing great content that describes your value and your offerings. Content can be pushed out through many different marketing channels, such as paid ads, SEO, social media, and more. It’s about earning people’s attention, not forcing it.

In the Engagement phase, you are starting and developing the relationship, so you want to make it easy to interact with you. This may include lead nurturing, marketing automation, an initial consult, and/or lots and lots of educational and support videos.

In the Delight phase, you’re helping the client reach their goals. This is where advisory work beyond compliance can make such a difference. From a marketing standpoint, this means exceptional customer service, encouraging clients to leave online reviews, and/or customer loyalty and referral programs.

As HubSpot’s blog says, “the biggest threat to your company’s growth isn’t your competitors. It’s a bad customer experience.” And while I realize staffing is our number one block to growth in the tax and accounting profession right now, this gives us an opportunity to improve in two areas of our business: automation and customer service.

When a client can seamlessly get their needs met through smooth automation of as many client touchpoints as possible, it improves the experience and increases client retention and referrals. Similarly, when employees are trained in customer service – and for most of us, it’s a learned skill, not a natural skill – then client retention and referrals increase, too.

Take a look at the flywheel versus the funnel to determine how you can propel growth in your firm.  And, if you’d like to do further reading, here is a link the original Flywheel article from HubSpot.

https://www.hubspot.com/flywheel

Large companies will have their marketing teams create thick documents that stakeholders can follow when creating marketing materials to represent the company. Small businesses can benefit from creating an abbreviated version of a guide. Going through the process is extremely beneficial for an entrepreneur who needs clarity on how they want to be represented from a marketing standpoint as well as what they want their company to stand for.

Components of a Branding Guide

The first part of a branding guide is your logo. Your logo designer should have presented you with a logo kit once you approved the design. The logo kit includes several files of the logo in different file types and should include the original artwork. It should also include the numeric codes of the colors used and the font style name and where it was purchased.

The logo kit should also include several variations of your logo, such as a grayscale version (black and white), and a reverse version (where the colors are reversed to work on a dark background).

Your branding guide should make note of the logo files, the color codes, and the typography used in your logo. Additionally, you may want to create guidelines for how it can be used. A common example is how much spacing you want to require around the logo when it is displayed.

Some branding guides will describe styles for images to be used in marketing. For example, if you want all of your Instagram graphics to have a purple border 5 pixels thick, then you should include that in your guide. Another example is your letterhead; a copy should be included, and the template should be consistently used across your business.

The elements described above make up your brand identity. Your brand guide should also include other brand strategy elements. These can include:

• Mission, vision, and values statements
• Your personal story about why you started your business
• A description of your ideal client. In marketing, this is called a persona
• Messaging, which can include tag lines as well as descriptions of tone of voice and other details
• Your positioning in the marketplace; how you would like clients to perceive you
• Research on competitors and how they are positioned

You don’t have to have all of these elements to create a brand guide, but as you can see, completing these items is a great exercise to help you gain clarity about your brand. It also helps you to create a common look and feel across all of your marketing materials, which further strengthens and solidifies your brand.

If you’d like to find out more about creating a brand guide, feel free to contact us anytime.

That’s where we need to get creative. Here’s a list of ideas you can use to graphically illustrate your posts on social media, your Google business profile, and your blog.

• Photographs you have taken of
  • Your workspace, with and without people in it, inside and exterior shots
  • Your employees
  • You at an accounting convention or networking meeting
  • You running a work errand
  • You taking CPE
  • You volunteering
  • You sitting in on a board meeting
  • You taking a tour of a local business
  • You holding a certificate you just earned
  • You doing a hobby
  • Your team members doing any of the above
  • You with a client, with permission of course
  • Landmarks of your local city
  • Your favorite places

• Stock photographs

These are photographs you purchase from a stock photography company. Here, you can get photos of tax forms, calculators, people in meetings and at workplaces, and thousands of other ideas. Use a keyword to search for the perfect photo. Stock photos cost anywhere from $5 to hundreds per photo.

• Screen shots

Capture screen shots on your PC or phone to use in posts. These are often screen shots of software, but can also be slides.

• Graphics

You can create your own graphics to include a photo and text headline, or really anything you want. Use an app like Canva or describe what you want and hire us to create it for you.

You probably already have a logo and product graphics, so be sure to use them. And don’t forget Excel graphs and charts. You can copy and paste these to illustrate your posts.

• Memes and GIFs

Many people will use memes and gifs to reply to someone. These are used to convey emotion and humor.

• Infographics

Infographics communicate statistics in a graphical format.  We can help you design one; just send us the statistics you want to include, and we’ll provide you with a quote.

• Drawings

These are original, hand- or computer-drawn graphics. They can include anime or cartoon drawings as well.

Selection Tips

To select or create the best graphic, here are a few final tips.

• Your selection should generate or tap into the right emotion when it’s viewed.
• If people are in your photos, match demographics with your ideal client.
• While we may think about calculators and tax forms, people connect with people, so don’t overuse pictures of accounting props without people in them.
• People want to see themselves reflected in your graphics, so choose wisely.

The more you use graphics in your social media posts, the more your posts will stand out and be noticed. And with the right illustration, your message will be seen.

I wrote a blog post about the benefits of filing an extension. While you might initially think this is only tax-related, it is also accounting-related because it provides more time for clean-up work.

Here’s a sample of the blog:

https://websample1.com/the-benefits-of-filing-for-an-automatic-extension-of-time-to-file-your-income-tax-return/

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to add this blog to your website, please reply YES.

If you don’t want it, no reply is needed.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi and Jason

Don’ts

First, the don’ts. Here are some email addresses to immediately stop using in front of clients:

• Emails ending in aol.com (or prodigy.com). Why? Because you look like a tech dinosaur, just like the AOL (or Prodigy) brand. The last thing you want to do in this day and age is telegraph (pun intended) that you’re 20 years behind in your technology expertise.
• Emails ending in yahoo.com or hotmail.com (includes msn.com and live.com). Yahoo, MSN, and Hotmail are not much better. There was a HUGE security breach a few years back as well as the fact that Yahoo’s brand is dated and more personal than business. Hotmail just sounds cheap and dated.
• Emails provided by your internet service. These end in verizon.net, att.net, comcast.net, and others. While not awful, you end up providing marketing exposure for the telecoms instead of your own brand.

The email deliverability of the above emails is very questionable. It’s very likely you won’t receive perfectly good email, including from prospects who want to purchase your services. And if you use one of these emails and wonder why you don’t get leads, it might just be your email deliverability failure.

Not the Best, But Not the Worst

• Emails ending in Outlook.com. This one’s not horrible, but not great either. It promotes the Microsoft brand instead of yours.
• Emails ending in gmail.com. Of all the free emails, if you have to use a free email, I recommend this one. The deliverability is better than the ones above.
• Emails with private domains but that you don’t own. This includes the cpa.com emails. You miss out on marketing your own brand and instead market your CPA, which is not awful, but not ideal.

Dos

The best email for you to use is your own domain email. If you have more than one domain, use the one that matches your website. Here at ThriveFuel, we use @thrivefuel.com and most of the emails contain our first names.

Use cloud email as your email application, such as Office 365 or GSuite. Avoid using info@ because of spam. Instead, I like these names for a support email:

• Support@
• Service@
• Hello@
• CustomerCare@
• Solutions@
• ContactUs@
• GetAnswers@
• Office@

When you use your own domain for your email, you promote your business and website with every email you send.  Who wouldn’t want that?

Your own domain email also eliminates any question about your technology expertise because at the very least, it shows you’re smart enough to set up your own email (or hire someone to do it). And you can control deliverability and security through technology.

So don’t miss out on a perfectly good marketing opportunity: Using your domain email when communicating with clients will enhance your brand, increase your website traffic, and have you looking far more professional and polished.

First, go to https://search.google.com/search-console/about and login using the Google account you want to be able to access Search Console under. Enter the URL of your website in the space provided.  The first time you do this, Google will ask you to validate the website, and you can do that in a number of ways. We can also help you with that if you need to update your domain records or post a file to your site.

Once validated, you will start to have a wealth of information about who accesses your site.  My favorite part is the Performance menu. Click it on the left, then scroll until you see the tabs Queries, Pages, Countries, etc.

Under Queries, you can actually see the keywords that web visitors used to find your site as well as the volume of visitors during a particular time period. This is useful to see if visitors are coming for the right reasons. You may think of additional content you can develop that contains these keywords to entice even more traffic to your site. You can also use the keywords as ideas for when you run paid search ads.

Under Pages, you can see which web pages are visited the most. You may want to focus on developing these pages to increase conversion, especially if you are getting a lot of traffic but no calls, emails, or appointments. This means your call to action needs to be stronger.

Under Countries, you can see how much of the traffic is US or Canada-based. And under Devices, you can see how many of the visits are made on a smartphone versus a desktop.

Back on the left menu, you can find a section on Index, which catalogs information about pages that Google has indexed for visitors. The Coverage section has a list of errors, which basically includes pages that were not able to be indexed for one reason or another.

Under the Experience section, Google will give the site a score based on some metrics it considers important, including the Core Web Vitals that we’ve written about before.

Farther down the left menu, my second favorite part, Links, provides valuable information. It shows any of your web pages that have been “mentioned” by other sites, thereby linking to your site. Gaining external links, or link building, as it’s called, is very important for ranking higher in search results; In Google’s eyes, it’s like a referral – another site recommending your page. Links are all about popularity (just like high school).

Locate your Home page under Top Linked Sites (External) and click to see the detail. Under “Top sites linking to this page,” you’ll see exactly who is “recommending” your site.  Click on the box with an arrow next to any of these referring sites to go directly to the referring web page that lists your site. By seeing who is already linking to your site, you can map out a strategy to gain more links.

Google Search Console is a useful tool for those who want to dig more into their web traffic.

I wrote a blog post about the processing delays at the IRS so you can more easily communicate client expectations for this tax season.

Here’s a sample of the blog:

https://websample1.com/processing-delays-and-backlogs-at-the-irs/

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to add this blog to your website, please reply YES.

If you don’t want it, no reply is needed.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi and Jason

The metaverse is gaining steam, so it makes sense to find out more about it and figure out when it’s going to start affecting our world. The definition of metaverse is essentially a connected web of immersive social experiences using 3D technology, including virtual reality (VR), augmented reality and artificial intelligence, to participate in virtual worlds.

The goal of the metaverse is social connection in virtual worlds, but don’t be fooled: there will be a heavy commercial focus as companies and brands figure out how to monetize this new thing. Typically, players don an avatar, which is a representation of a person, to enter the virtual world. Players or participants use a headset and gaming equipment that are enabled for virtual or augmented reality.

To be clear, the metaverse doesn’t exist in whole yet, but there are some pieces out there that have been developed. One of the oldest is Second Life which was launched in 2003 and allows players to enter a virtual world. Games such as Fortnite allow multiple players into their virtual world where you have challenges to conquer, and the CEO of Epic Games has a very metaverse-like vision in mind for his company. Facebook’s – or I’m sorry, Meta’s – first attempt toward the metaverse is Horizon Worlds, launched December 9, 2021. But right now, it’s just a game that uses a Meta Platform and the Oculus Quest VR system.

The metaverse should enable people to do pretty much anything you can do in real life. Currency is especially key to the development of the metaverse. Picture people buying virtual accessories (which already happens on numerous kids’ phone apps), virtual pets like unicorns, virtual real estate (check out Decentraland), and more with game-like currency or virtual currency or both.

One vendor that’s farther along than Facebook/Meta is Roblox. It’s an online game-development platform with more than 164 million users (as of August 2020) and 1.3 developers (as of October 2021). Roblox has its own virtual currency, Robux, which can be purchased by real cash.  Developers can earn money from the worlds they develop through participant engagement, participant purchases, and sponsorships.

And here’s where the marketing comes in. Sponsorships and advertising will likely seep their way into these virtual worlds. The platform providers and developers of the Metaverse will be like the platforms and influencers of social media. Luxury brands, sports brands, and celebrities are already taking notice.

There’s also the enterprise metaverse, where the metaverse concept is applied to work. Check out Virbela to see one example of how that’s unfolding; its customer base already includes forward-thinking companies and top universities.

It should be fascinating from a business standpoint to watch how these platforms will begin to knit together or not, which vendors gain traction on their platforms, which developers become superstars in their virtual worlds, which currencies become the most valuable, and what monetization models work the best. From an accounting and tax standpoint, you know there will be additional rules and laws come out of regulatory bodies that we’ll need to absorb and apply to clients playing and working in the metaverse space.

If you’d like to start learning more about the metaverse and its possibilities, here are four suggestions:

• Become a gamer, or at least try out one of the VR/AR games available
• Explore one or more of the vendors mentioned above
• Learn more about virtual currency including cryptocurrencies, NFTs, blockchain, and that world, because it will play a part in the metaverse as well.
• Take them on as clients – that is, the individuals and business who are developing and monetizing the metaverse. It could be a fascinating niche for forward-thinking professionals.

I’ve written this quarter’s lead magnet on accounting software with an emphasis on add-on software.

Here’s a sample of the blog:

https://websample1.com/a-quick-guide-to-understanding-accounting-software/

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to add this lead magnet to the Guides section of your Resource web page, please reply YES.

If you don’t want it, no reply is needed.

It will also be designed into a PDF that you can access via your members account.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi and Jason

Don’ts

First, some don’ts:

• Never use a photo with a drink in your hand or shot from inside a bar or at a party
• Avoid photos where the lighting is too dark
• Avoid photos where you have to clip someone out of the picture and their shoulder still shows (unless you have a really good Photoshop person)
• Ladies, avoid low-cut tops (well, I guess men should too)
• Avoid clothes that are too formal (like cocktail attire) or too casual or show too much skin
• Avoid red-eye photos where the flash is not optimal
• Avoid photos of you in a group unless it’s your work team
• Avoid selfies where parts of your face are out of proportion

And the most important don’t: Don’t worry about how people might judge your looks. It’s not about your looks as much as it is about how approachable you look.  So, try not to look intimidating!

Dos

The two most important aspects of a great photo are lighting and eye contact.  Let’s explore these in details.

Lighting

A professional photographer will tell you that photographic lighting is an art form. Certainly, you’ve seen many striking pieces of photography where light played a tremendous role.

While you don’t have to get artsy with your business photos (and probably shouldn’t), lighting is still key. Your face needs to be lit so we can see details. You can use natural light from a window, purchase a light kit, or best of all, go to a professional photographer to get your portrait made.

If you do it yourself, light your face from the side and front to provide more dimension. You can get a light kit on Amazon or at your local photography store.  I have two soft boxes (Westcott Photo Basics 411 uLite and 20-Inch Soft Box) on stands (Westcott 750 Photo Basics 6.5-Foot Light Stand), and they work great for Zoom calls as well.  A reflector is nice, too. Put it right in front of you horizontally, and watch your wrinkles disappear.

Eye Contact

We need to see your eyes in the photo, and that’s why lighting is so important. It’s best if you look straight at the camera.

If you hate getting your photo taken or you are anxious during a photo shoot, that will come across in your pictures. Practice looking in the mirror and making faces at yourself. Find a way to psyche yourself up, and remember all of the people you can help with your skills as you go through the shoot.

Smile

Your smile should be a genuine Duchenne smile. This is when you smile with your eyes. Instead of thinking of saying “Cheese!” think of something you are really happy about in your life. If you go to a professional photographer, they can help you relax. A big trick of mine was to tell the subject I’m testing the lighting, then take a bunch of shots. These were typically the best since the subject didn’t think they counted.

What to Wear

Wear business clothes or business casual. You may want to stay away from all white clothes, all black clothes, or weird clothing patterns that will date the photograph. White and black clothing can absorb the light differently and appear washed out with no detail.  Greens can play funny tricks with the camera too; it’s the hardest color to photograph accurately.

If you need to, get a haircut and/or hair color treatment a week before the shoot so that it has a chance to grow out naturally for a few days and won’t look so severe.

If you wear glasses and want to wear them in the photo, take the lenses out or adjust the lighting so glass glare is not an issue.

Staging the Scene

For headshots, a neutral or canvas background is best. A professional photographer will likely have a hair light or backlight to separate the outline of your head from the background so the picture is more dimensional and less flat.

You may also want to have a photo of you at your desk, which then may include shelves or a credenza in the background.  If this is the case, be sure to stage the background the way you want. Be hyper-aware of what shows up right around your head in the photo; you don’t want to appear like you have horns.

If you’re shooting your team, keep it simple. All of the backgrounds should match, and it’s easier if there is a neutral background so that the focus is on the person and not what’s behind them.

The Shoot

Shoot dozens of photos (hundreds if you’re doing it yourself). It can take a lot of photos before you get the perfect one. Even professionals don’t get it in the first try.

Try these tips for a great first impression with potential clients.  Then, send us your shiny new headshot, and we’ll get it posted on your About page.

For those of you with tax clients who received Child Tax Credit advance payments, the IRS plans to send a letter out on Jan 19 with details. We’ve written up a blog post to notify clients to give you a copy of this letter which will help you reconcile the advance CTC payments.

Here’s a sample of the blog:

https://websample1.com/irs-letter-about-advanced-child-tax-credits/

Action Requested

We are providing you with 3 choices:

1. If you’d like our team to add this blog NOW to your website, please reply YES.

2. If you’d like our team to SCHEDULE this blog to drop on your website on January 17, 2022, please reply “Schedule January 17, 2022.” You can also suggest a different drop date.

3. If you don’t want it, no reply is needed.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi and Jason

Year-end is a perfect time of year to reflect on which marketing methods or channels returned the highest investment and the highest quality of new clients. On the flip side, it’s a good time to identify the losers as well.  Pruning the losers out of your 2022 budget and investing more in the winning channels and campaigns will make for a great start to the new year.

Here are some steps to consider for your 2022 marketing:

1. Finalize your marketing metrics for 2021.

Do you best to determine your return on investment for each campaign or marketing channel you used in 2021.  What paid off?  What didn’t?  From there you can make smart decisions for your 2022 plans instead of simply winging it.

2. Decide on your growth goals for 2022.

Where do you want your business to be on December 31, 2022?  Revenue levels?  Number of clients?  Quality of clients? What type of work do you enjoy doing best?  Is there a new service line you want to roll out (or get rid of)? Are you ready to start winding down, or do you want to ramp up to sell in a few years?

Perhaps you want to build new marketing and sales skills through training.  Or maybe you’ve been itching to roll out a new marketing app or add a new social platform to your mix.

List it all out, and make your goals SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.

3. Update or refresh your current marketing materials.

Have you hired new staff during 2021? Earned a new certificate?  Received more testimonials?  If so, your website, social accounts, ads, newsletters, lead magnets, and other marketing materials may need a quick update, or even a complete makeover.  Let us know how we can help with this.

4. Create a marketing plan for 2022.

This can be as complex or as simple as you’d like. How will you achieve the goals you set for yourself in 2022?  List what steps you need to take in marketing to achieve your 2022 dreams.

5. Try some new things.

Do you want to experiment with new marketing channels in 2022? There are so many hot ones:  geo-fencing, text marketing, bots, and more. If any of these pique your interest, then add them to your plan.

6. Implement!

Get started!  You may even want to get started before New Year’s Day. Make sure that for 2022, marketing is a priority so that you will have an excellent chance of achieving your goals. It’s easy to get busy and procrastinate, especially if you feel marketing is uncomfortable for you.  Just don’t do it!  Make sure your goals are always top of mind, and push through any discomfort so you can have your best year ever.

We recommend adding a new link to your Resources page in the Tax column/section below the Taxpayer Bill of Rights. The Taxpayer Advocate service designed a roadmap that looks like a subway station map.

You can see how the link will look here:

https://websample1.com/resources/

And this is what the link will link to:

https://www.taxpayeradvocate.irs.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/TAS_Roadmap_32x32_v22_HQ.pdf

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to add this link to your Resources page, please reply YES.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi and Jason

Chances are, social media marketing is nothing new to you—at least, it shouldn’t be. Today, social media marketing ranks number three among the top marketing channels that both accounting and tax professionals use to attract new clients (2020 CPA Trendlines/Accountant’s Accelerator New Clients Survey).

Do you fall into this category? Are you currently using social media to gain new clients? You may be wondering why social media marketing works so well for some and not so well for others. This is just one question that will be addressed in our webinar on Thursday, December 16^th.

Additionally, this is an opportunity for you to learn how to make social media work for you. After all, you’re missing out on quality clients and new revenue if you’ve given up on this marketing method. Not only will this webinar give you a refresh of social media marketing essentials, but it will also teach you some advanced secrets to optimize your returns on investments and reach the revenue level you desire for 2022—and beyond! If that’s enough incentive for you, you’ll also receive one free CPE.

After successfully completing the webinar, you will be able to accomplish the following:

• Name the top social media platforms to maintain a presence on
• List three things you need to focus on with social media marketing
• Describe the difference between organic and paid social
• And so much more!

Speakers include Jason Holmes and Sandi Leyva. Jason is a serial entrepreneur and Founder and CEO of ThriveFuel, a marketing agency that specializes in targeted digital advertising, promotion, and conversion techniques across all technologies. Sandi, CPA, CMA, MBA, is the Founder of Accountant’s Accelerator and has helped thousands of accounting professionals earn more, work less, and serve their clients better through her innovative marketing, training, and coaching services.

If you are a CPA, EA, accountant, bookkeeper, tax professional, or someone who just wants to learn more about social media marketing, then this webinar is for you! Oh, yeah, don’t forget: it’s complimentary!

For more details and to register for this webinar, click here. Space is limited, so don’t delay.

A whitelist is a list of email addresses that you can create. Placing an email address on a whitelist tells the computer that you want to receive emails from those email addresses.  Think of the whitelist as being the opposite of a blacklist where people are being excluded.  Whitelisting an email address gives it a “green light” on your computer or smartphone.

The instructions for whitelisting an email address vary depending on the type of email software you’re using.  We’ve listed the most common email software below.

Apple iPhone

In your email program, select the email that is from the email address you want to whitelist. Click on the person’s name. You’ll get a new screen that gives you a choice to Create New Contact. Click that, then click Done. The contact is now added to your Address Book.

Gmail or G-Suite

There are two steps you can take to whitelist an email address in Gmail. One way is to click on an existing email and click the drop down arrow next to the Reply button on the right side of the email body. You’ll see the choice “Add ___ to Contacts list.” Choosing this will add the person and email address to your Contacts and Gmail typically delivers those emails to your inbox.

If that doesn’t work, you can also go into Settings by clicking the gear icon at the top right and selecting Settings from the drop-down menu. Choose the Filters and Blocked Addresses tab. Click on Create a New Filter.

Enter the email address in the From field and click the link at the bottom right labeled “Create filter with this search.”

Check the box next to “Never send it to Spam.” You also have the option to Star the message, mark it as important, move it to another folder, and more. Click the Create Filter button.

Outlook

There are many versions of Outlook, and the instructions are similar in all versions. Locate the email message and select it. From the menu, locate the Junk icon and click the arrow to the right. The drop down menu will include “Never Block Sender;” select it. You can also choose “Never Block Sender’s Domain.”

A similar way to whitelist an email address is to select the email message and right click. Mouse over the Junk option in the drop down and click “Never Block Sender” or “Never Block Sender’s Domain.”

Other Email Apps

If you don’t use the three most common solutions above, you can find other instructions for Android, Yahoo!, AOL, and others on this page: https://help.aweber.com/hc/en-us/articles/204029246

We have a new video on how to hire a bookkeeper. Please keep in mind we use the word bookkeeping because that’s what most small business owners call it. You could offer anything from bookkeeping to CFO level services and this video will still work for you. This will be on a new page that we’ll link to your existing Resources page.

You can see the video sample here:

https://websample1.com/how-to-hire-a-bookkeeper/

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to customize, add this video to your YouTube and make a new web page for it, please reply YES.

We will need access to your YouTube account, so if your credentials have changed, please forward them to us.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi and Jason

We’ve made a new page for you with the new 2022 tax tables/rates that were announced via IRS Revenue Procedure 2021-45 on November 10,2021. This page will link to your existing Resources page.

Platinum and Diamond members can also see the graphic in the Infographics section of their accounts at https://members.acceleratorwebsites.com.

You can see the page sample here:

https://websample1.com/tax-rates-2022/

Action Requested

If you’d like us to add this page to your website, please reply YES.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi and Jason

We have a new video on when it’s the right time to change bookkeeping services. This will be on a new page that we’ll link to your existing Resources page.

You can see the video sample here:

https://websample1.com/small-business-resources/

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to customize, add this video to your YouTube and make a new web page for it, please reply YES.

We will need access to your YouTube account, so if your credentials have changed, please forward them to us.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi and Jason

What CRMs Do

It’s amazing what CRMs can do these days. As client contact points have grown the last few decades beyond phone and fax, so have CRMs’ capabilities to unify client messaging.  At the core level, all CRMs typically allow you to store customer and prospect contact data, such as name, address, company name, titles, and so forth. Most of them allow you to create custom fields so that you can store things like type of entity, marriage or filing status, and what accounting software they use.

Here’s where it starts to get fun. Most CRMs used to simply have a place for you to store meeting notes about the client. Record things like spouse’s name so you can remember to ask about them on the next phone call.  Today’s CRMs go one step further by integrating appointment scheduling automation so that a client can book, pay for, get a Zoom link, and show up for a meeting with you, all without you having to do any of the clerical part.

In some cases, you can also email clients directly from a CRM so that the communication is recorded right in the app.  Most CRMs allow you to group clients so you can email several clients at once messages containing deadline notices or newsletters.

A few CRMs are now integrating voice mail and SMS – smartphone texting – into their features so that when you get a message, it goes straight into the client record. With some CRMs, you get a phone number for texting that you can use so that you don’t have to use your personal cell phone number with clients.

Most CRMs also include a task management feature where you can create and assign sales type tasks to sales reps or simply yourself.

Integrated CRMs have multiple marketing apps built in to expand their functionality.  Examples include e-commerce functions with order forms, shopping carts, and online store features; marketing automation so you can automate client service communication delivery, marketing messages, and sales funnels; and other add-ons, such as accounting system integration, social media integration, affiliate sales tracking, reporting and metrics, and more.

What CRMs Don’t Do

CRMs’ adoption has been slow in the accounting profession, and I believe there are several reasons. One is that CRMs don’t do everything we need them to do when interacting with a client.

Most CRMs do not have a client portal or document-sharing portal; in most cases, this is connected to your tax software and not your marketing software. While CRMs have basic task features, most do not have an integrated workflow process as complex as what we need; you can only find that in project management software or practice management software, of which most do not meet our needs either.  And CRMs do not track time or do our billing for us (except for the ones with e-commerce).

Nevertheless, CRMs are incredibly useful for sales, marketing, and communications and are vastly underutilized in our profession.  We have to think about the cost of losing track of even one client and how much revenue loss that could be. When we think that way, we can justify CRMs even if we only have about 50-100 leads per year. When we can integrate CRMs with other client-facing apps that meet the more operational aspects of our firms, then we’re in business.

If you’re interested in implementing a CRM for your business, we offer ThriveFuel360. Find out more here: https://thrivefuel360.com/.

As time goes on, your list will get larger, and many contacts with email addresses you have collected years ago may stop interacting with you. As your list grows, you may be charged more to maintain that size of list. And, as people stop opening your emails, it can affect the deliverability of ALL of you email.

These are the reasons why you should periodically clean your email list.

How to Clean an Email List

The first step in cleaning up an email list is to remove or correct any contact records that have email addresses that hard-bounced or were returned. Hard bounces will never be delivered correctly.  Sometimes, you can see an obvious spelling error and correct the record so that the email can go through next time. In other cases, it’s best to simply delete the record with the hard-bounced email address.

Your list can also experience soft bounces, It’s OK to keep these on the list.  A soft bounce means the email was unable to be delivered temporarily but that the email does exist.  This can happen when a server is down for a few minutes but comes back up.

After cleaning up hard bounces, the next thing to look at is open rate.  If a contact has not opened your emails in a long time, it might be best to delete them so you don’t continue to pay for them. The length of time of inactivity varies based on the age and size of your list as well as the cost to maintain it. Some people say to remove contacts who haven’t opened any email in six months, but I usually like to go longer, such as one year.  The larger the list, the more frequently it should be cleaned.

Your email software may do some of this list maintenance for you.  Get to know what it does so that you’ll know what you need to put into place to keep your list fresh.

Once you’ve pruned your list, it’s time to build it back up.  You can do that in a variety of ways, through lead magnets, landing pages, special offers, surveys, quizzes, ads, and many other lead generation techniques.  You’ll find that when your list is newer, your open rate and deliverability will go up, and that’s a good thing for your business.

We have a new resource guide on life events: 43 Life Events That May Affect Your Taxes and Accounting. It’s a monster that will help with SEO and serve as the quarterly lead magnet. In a few weeks, a PDF version that you can use will be added to your Accelerator Toolbox account.

You can see the sample here:

https://websample1.com/43-life-events-that-may-affect-your-taxes-and-accounting/

Action Requested

Please read it over carefully to make sure you agree with its accuracy.

If you’d like our team to add this page to your website, please reply YES. It will go in the Resource section.

As always, if you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to add.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi and Jason

The alluring part of a quiz from a magazine is that you can’t really fail. Plus, many of them can give some insight into our personalities or traits, even if it’s made up.  How can you use quizzes in your business to attract clients?  Here are some ideas to do just that.

Content Ideas

Think about the types of clients you have and a varying characteristic of each one. Many of these ideas can make good quizzes.  For example:

• Tax clients have varying risk levels. You can make up a quiz to determine how much risk your client is willing to take. A sample question might be “I would rather go through an audit than give up $1 in taxes to the IRS.” Answers would be “definitely agree, somewhat agree, somewhat disagree, definitely disagree.”
• Accounting clients come in varying levels of messiness. You could create a quiz to determine how organized your client is.
• Financial planners can have a heyday with quizzes, asking all sort of questions about the types of investments client might be comfortable with as well as savings goals.

The Quiz Framework

The first step to creating a quiz is to decide what you want it to measure.  Continuing with our tax example, let’s say we are measuring client risk level when it comes to taxes.  Your quiz outcomes might be:

• Very risky – not afraid of an audit every year as well as court cases
• Somewhat risky – I want every deduction including gray areas
• Somewhat safe – I want every deduction but don’t go in any gray area
• Very safe – I want every deduction but don’t go in any gray area and no red flags

The next step is to write the questions and answers. All of your questions and answers need to be ones that evaluate risk tolerance. Each answer set should have four choices that correspond with the outcomes above.

Next, assign weights so that the scores fall into the correct ranges for the outcomes. For example, each answer could be scored 1, 2, 3, or 4.  The weight of 4 should be assigned to the “very risky” answers. With 10 questions and a range of scores from 10-40, a score of 34-40 would place the participant in the “very risky” outcome, 26-33 in somewhat risky, 17-25 in somewhat safe, and 10-16 in very safe.

Now you have your quiz, the questions, the answers, the weights of each answer for your scoring key, and the outcomes for the participants.

It’s time to automate.

Automating Your Quiz

Many apps and WordPress plug-ins can provide a way to automate your quiz.  We’ve used Class Marker and Progress Ally to develop our quizzes, but you can use something as easy as SurveyMonkey.

It’s a good idea to ask people to opt-in to your quiz, so you can send them a series of follow-up emails for marketing purposes.

The Best Quizzes

The best quizzes connect the prospect with pain points related to how much they need your services. Or they can help to educate the prospect about what you do. In that way, it can become a natural lead in to talking about your services.

In the case of tax risk tolerance, it can help to show the client that it’s their decision and they have some flexibility when it comes to how you can serve them in a customized fashion to meet their specific needs.

Try quizzes to attract new prospects as well as to have a bit of fun with your marketing.

We have a new service page for those of you wanting to expand or better promote your advisory services: “Business Consulting Solutions.”

You can see the sample here:

https://websample18.com/business-consulting-solutions/

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to add this page to your website, please reply YES.

As always, if you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to add.

And, if your menu is getting a little too wieldy, we can offer suggestions on how to re-organize it. Just reach out and let us know your thoughts.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi and Jason

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Contact Sandi Leyva 408-550-4325 or Sandi@AccountantsAccelerator.com

September 20, 2021 – Carlsbad, CA – Accelerator Websites, a division of Sandra L. Leyva, Inc., has been acquired by ThriveFuel, LLC, a full-service marketing agency providing business development services with a focus on ROI.

Accelerator Websites’ Founder Sandi Leyva noted, “This acquisition will add ThriveFuel’s outstanding track record in ad management, media buys, CRM solutions, and integrated direct marketing using text and other outreach solutions to Accelerator Websites’ existing strong offerings in websites, SEO, and content, while leveraging its strengths and deep knowledge of the tax and accounting profession.”

Accelerator Websites will continue to run under the Accelerator Digital Media brand, offering comprehensive, done-for-you website packages as well as client newsletters, social media management, and now much more.  The entire Accelerator Websites staff will now be part of ThriveFuel and serve the Accelerator Digital Media division.  Learn more here: https://acceleratorwebsites.com/

ThriveFuel is a full-service digital advertising agency specializing in targeted digital campaigns, responsive website design and optimization, industry leading search engine strategies and social media plans for a variety of clients. The agency handles all forms of advertising and marketing, including branding, creative design, video production, outdoor, online, TV, radio, and print media planning and buying. Learn more at https://thrivefuel.com/.

If so, you are not alone. But if you are also an entrepreneur or partner, you are probably sabotaging your marketing investment, and you have a higher chance of your business failing (or suffering from low revenue).

What can you do?  Is there a way to attract clients and stay shy or private?

The answer is maybe. In any case, a mind shift needs to happen.

You might be surprised to hear that I am extremely introverted (a nicer way to say I am shy). And I am fairly private, but only with certain things.  Yet I have hundreds of thousands of followers and thousands of customers.

So here are some random thoughts about how I handle and cope with “putting myself out there.”

1. I hate being a best-kept secret.

Many of you are “best-kept secrets.”  This does no one any good. What’s worse is people who are a bit more extroverted will end up helping your clients even if they are not as good as you.  And that should make you mad enough to get a little braver.

2. I hate it every time I have to push the SEND button to send that email to thousands of people.

Yes, it scares me every time I send an email to masses of people.  I’ve learned many things from having many followers; namely, you can’t please everyone. And if you are pleasing all of your clients, you are either too cheap, vastly underutilized, or not marketing hard enough. In all cases, you are definitely leaving money on the table.

You haven’t really become an entrepreneur if you haven’t received negative criticism.

3. Am I selfish?

I could make a case for me being selfish when I DON’T put myself out there, because then I am hiding my skills from people who could really use my help. I don’t want to be selfish. I want to help as many people as I can. So therefore, I need to be putting myself out there.

4. I can control what I keep private.

I choose to keep my religion and politics private.  That way, no one can judge me for those things.  I’m fine if you want to use those in your own marketing; just know in some cases, it will limit your clientele.

5. It’s not bragging if it’s a fact.

You should be proud of your experience, education, certifications, and memberships.  Put those out there to build your credibility.

Better yet, get others (like us and your clients) to brag for you.

6. I used to be afraid of asking for testimonials.

I have a feeling that many accounting professionals are somewhat afraid of their clients (or maybe simply people in general – it’s more common than you might think). It could be the lack of control over what they think or when they will pay you. Otherwise, why are so many of you reluctant to ask for testimonials?

Please do ask your clients for testimonials, and display them prominently. You might be afraid of their words, but most of them will think you walk on water. Even if they don’t, you will be able to take care of any issues that arise so you can correct the problem and keep the client happy.  Plus, you might get valuable feedback that will allow you to become even better at what you do.

7. Get your ego out of the way.

There are a lot of ways to do this, but for me, what works best is to put myself in the shoes of my clients. When I focus on others, I don’t focus on myself.  That gets me out of the way of myself!

After all, there are 7 billion of us. It’s not like the world is going to suddenly start looking at you.

8. But what if I get too many leads?

A LOT of you use this for an excuse!  If you get too many leads, you can pick and choose your clientele.  I can’t think of a better world.  The top movie stars like it; why wouldn’t you?

You can also share them with your peers and friends. You can even sell them and keep a finder’s fee.

But really, when I hear this excuse, I think there must be something else that they are afraid of.

9. So what are you really afraid of?

Only you will know for sure. It could be success itself. One powerful exercise is to ask yourself what’s the worst that will happen if your fear comes true. Keep asking the question until you drill down to get to the root of the fear.

Only when you can get past the fear of putting yourself out there will you be able to become successful at marketing so you can earn the level of revenue you desire.

We have a new small business resource page called “25 Questions to Ask When Hiring an Accountant.” This content is very good for SEO. You can see the sample here:

http://websample2.com/25-questions-to-ask-when-hiring-an-accountant/

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to add this page to your website, please reply YES. We will put it on your blog and on your Resources page under Small Business Resources.

As always, if you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to add. With this item, you may want to add answers to educate your prospects ahead of the sales cycle.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

Here are my thoughts as well as what’s possible with domain names, especially as they relate to search engine optimization at the macro level.

Don’t Overdo It

If available, you will definitely want to get a couple of domain names just so no one else gets them:

• Your company name or something similar
• Your own name
• Any trademark or brand names you own the rights to

The best top level domain to get is .com if your company is a business. Get .ca if you are in Canada.  Get .org only if you have a nonprofit. Get .net only if you are an internet service provider. Get .cpa if you are able to afford it. I haven’t really seen any benefits to the .cpa top level domains as of this writing, but they are still very new.

GoDaddy and other domain registrars will try to upsell you on getting all of the top level domains — .net, .org, .edu, .gov, .biz, etc.  Just don’t fall for it.  It is not necessary and a waste of money.

Respect Your Elder Domain Names

Age is the most important factor with domain names. Try not to switch domains simply because you thought of something cute to rename your business.  You will lose valuable “SEO juice” if you throw out an old domain name and replace it with a new one unless you work with someone like us who knows how to help you “inherit” the juice of the old domain during the transition.

Here’s the Key

You can only optimize one domain name per website. Period. So, if you think there will be an SEO benefit to getting five domains and pointing them to the same site, you would be wrong.

The alternative is having multiple websites – one for each domain with different content and design — which can be costly unless there is a good reason.

How More Than One Domain Name Works

Let’s say you have two domain names, yourcompany.com and yourname.com, but you only want to maintain one website.

There are two ways to get additional domains to point to the same website: forwarding and alias.  With forwarding, all you have to do is go into your domain registrar account and point your additional domain to the primary one.  You can do this yourself without your webmaster’s help as long as the domain is in your control.  However, there may be limitations with using email or other applications at this domain if that is desired.

A second way to point your additional domain to your website is to set up an alias.  In this case, your webmaster needs to get involved by setting up an alias or a “www=www” in the control panel section of the website hosting account. Then, the DNS (Domain Name System) record needs to be changed in the domain registrar account to point to the server hosting the website. The last step is to make sure the site shows secure via the SSL certificate.

Resources

Here are a few more articles that I wrote on domains:

• https://acceleratorwebsites.com/domain-tips/
• https://acceleratorwebsites.com/improving-your-site-rankings-with-domain-and-other-factors/
• https://acceleratorwebsites.com/the-new-dot-cpa-domain-extension/

If you have questions about domain names, feel free to reach out.

When you complete a social media profile page, you’ll notice that some have the limit of being able to include only one link.  The question becomes, what link is best to add?  Should you link to your website? Your LinkedIn profile? A free report you offer? Or something else?

With link in bio tools, you don’t have to choose.  A link in bio tool is a web or mobile application that allows you to expand on the limits of social media profile pages – most famously, Instagram. An example is https://linktr.ee . Inside linktr.ee, you can add and label multiple links.  Then just add the linktr.ee link to your Instagram profile, and voila, all of your links are displayed.

Here’s what my linktr.ee looks like, and you can see for yourself at https://linktr.ee/sandileyva.

Linktr.ee is not the only app you can use to create these micro landing pages.  Here are some alternatives.

• ContactinBio
• Everlinks
• Shor.by
• Tap.bio
• Manylink
• Link.bio by Later (https://later.com/linkinbio )
• And so many more

Most of these are free with potential upgrades to more features.

What links should you list on your link in bio tool?  Here are some ideas:

• Your website home page (of course!)
• Key website subpages, such as your contact info or About page
• Landing pages with offers
• Free report opt-in pages
• Newsletter sign-up pages
• Social accounts, including
  • LinkedIn profile
  • LinkedIn Company page
  • Facebook business page
  • Twitter profile
  • Instagram profile
  • Clubhouse profile
  • TikTok profile
  • Pinterest account
• Google My Business listing

A link in bio tool is not just for Instagram use.  You can add it to your email signature file to replace multiple links so that it looks less cluttered. It can even go on your letterhead, other social accounts, and all of your marketing materials.

Add a link in bio tool to your marketing arsenal, and when you do, send us your customized URL so we can add it to your website.

You can find both types of businesses on the Internet today: those who freely list their prices front and center and those who don’t, meaning an interested party will have to reach out and inquire.

There are pros and cons to each option, and we want to explore those options a bit further.

Yes, Add Prices to Your Website

One of the main reasons to display prices of your services and/or products on your website is to potentially avoid low-quality leads and price shoppers. Specifically, if you have done everything to customize, personalize, and de-commoditize your site, then adding prices to your website may be the best solution for separating serious clients from ones that won’t help your business.

There are a couple of different ways to list your prices. For example, you could put out a statement as vague as, “Our packages start at $500 per month.” You could also be extremely detailed, listing the different prices of each package, as well as every single service included in the package. Then, the potential buyer would see exactly what he or she is getting for the price they’re paying.

Other benefits of listing your prices on your website include trust and branding.

Many customers refuse to do business with a company that doesn’t list its prices online. Customers can see this as a way of the business trying to be sneaky or misleading. By adding your prices, you can immediately create a foundation of trust, as well as attract the “right” type of customer—the customer who can afford your services.

Finally, pricing can often be seen as an effective marketing technique and may help set your brand apart from other company’s brands. Specifically, your fees tell potential customers where you see yourself among competitors in the industry and which target market you want to serve.

No, Don’t Add Prices to Your Website

To counter what’s stated above, some companies believe that the best way to build value and trust with a potential customer is by not listing prices of services and/or products on their site. This way, the customer has to make contact with you—either by phone or face-to-face—and in doing so, can understand why your price is what it is and what they are getting for that price. In short, you build a connection, and hopefully, that connection results in a lifetime customer.

In the situation that you offer customized services and/or products, you might also offer customized pricing, which would make it impossible to list your prices. Additionally, you may not want your competitors to learn how much you charge for your products and/or services, as it could cause them to lower their prices in hopes of poaching your customers.

Finally, you may be hesitant to list your prices because you are unsure of your worth or value. However, only you—the business owner—can determine the price of what you have to offer. Consider your skills, experience, time, and the service/product itself. What’s it all worth? Don’t feel guilty about the prices you establish. And, whatever you do, don’t lowball yourself.

There are alternatives to listing your prices on your website, though, including a button that states “call for an estimate,” or “get a quote,” leading them to a form they can fill out which you can then respond to.

Adding Prices to Your Website: The Choice Is Yours

As you can see, there are pros and cons to adding prices to your website. In the end, the choice is yours. However, we recommend doing a test.

You can do a test by adding new content (with prices or without prices) and measuring the amount and quality of leads you get during the time that particular content is up. Then, change the content and see if you get different results. Stick with the content that gives you the results that you like best.

Remember, you can’t assume that just because another company has their prices listed that that method is working for them. It’s easier said than done, but try not to worry about what your competitors are doing; find out what works best for you and your business, and then do that!

We upgrade our server hardware every two years or so, and we just completed the migration to a new, faster West Coast server for all clients on the Western half of the U.S. Yesterday, I bought a new, faster server for the East Coast and we’ll be starting the migration of websites for clients on the Eastern side of the U.S. The process could take a couple of months.

It’s all good news to you, because Google likes speed.

Individual site moves will be done before you can blink and there should be no measurable downtime. Unfortunately, we cannot tell you the exact timing of each site or it would take us forever.

Action Requested

If you are not making your own updates to your site –and– we have access to your domain account, you do not need to do anything.

1. If you’re making your own extensive website changes, please reach out so we can coordinate. I know this is not the case for 99% of you.

2. If we don’t have the current password to your domain account or you have 2FA turned on, we’ll need to coordinate so we can access your domain account. Let us know the best time to connect to get this done.

3. I n the highly unlikely case that you have hard-coded your website IP address into a program, app, or something else, please let us know. Your website IP will change.

If you have any questions, please reach out.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

Testimonials are important for any business, as they support your credibility, experience, and professionalism. Further, they strengthen your reputation by proving that you can be trusted to provide quality service. Remember, clients generally trust each other more than they trust any sort of marketing technique you put into place. That makes testimonials work like referrals do. And we all know how important referrals are.

In short, a good testimonial can help your business grow by attracting more clients. To assist you in collecting more testimonials for your business, we’ve put together a list of tips on how to properly and professionally ask for a testimonial from a satisfied client.

1. Don’t Be Afraid to Ask

I was petrified to ask for a testimonial when I first started my business. I just didn’t like asking people to do things for me. Finally, I realized that I just had to do it. I had a coaching client who felt the same way. When she finally did it at my insistence, she cried at how loving all the testimonials were.  It turned out her clients fawned over her. It made her feel really good – and also a bit foolish for worrying so much and not asking sooner.

2. Ask Right Away

When asking for a testimonial, it’s best to ask sooner rather than later. You want the client to relay their experience with you and your service while it’s still fresh in their mind. Once you’ve provided your service to the client, ask if they would be interested in sharing their experience with others via a testimonial. Make this automatic – a part of your regular process.

3. Make the Process Easy

If providing a testimonial isn’t easy for the client, they won’t want to do it. The process should be quick and easy, taking no longer than a few minutes. There are different ways to go about obtaining a testimonial (i.e. providing links on your website to your Google My Business, Find-a-ProAdvisor, or Facebook review area, asking for a free-form email back, etc.); just ensure that the method you choose is manageable for the client, as well as conducive for your business needs.

4. Convey the Importance of a Good Testimonial

Share with the client how important a testimonial can be for you and your business. If you inform the client that word-of-mouth is a great tool to keep your business going or afloat, they may be inclined to assist you. You don’t have to share too many details, but simply state that testimonials are good for business and that you’d greatly appreciate it if they’d take the time to provide one.

5. Help Clients Who Don’t Know How to Start

Clients are funny: some are embarrassed about their writing, and others don’t know what to say other than “good job.” Prompt them by asking questions when you send out the testimonial request:

• How were we to work with?
• Did we solve your problems?
• Did you save money or time with our services?
• Have you increased your financial knowledge while working with us?
• Was there a staff member that went out of their way for you?
• Did we respond quickly to your questions?
• How do we compare to other people you have hired for the same service?

Don’t include all of these; just choose a few that you like to get your client started.

Some clients are so embarrassed about their writing that they may be willing to give a testimonial if you write it for them. When that happens, I ask for a couple of adjectives from them. Once they give those, you can word a few sentences objectively that they can review and approve.  Embarrassment is avoided, and you get your review.   

6. Don’t Demand or Beg

Never demand or beg for a testimonial. You don’t want to come off as pushy or needy. Clients don’t want to feel forced or inconvenienced. That is not the way to get a testimonial, and it is definitely not the way to get a good testimonial.

However, people are busy, and sometimes a reminder doesn’t hurt. Email is a good way to ask, and after you’ve asked once, send a gentle reminder a few weeks later, but stop after that.

We recommend you send a general email to your client base once or twice a year. Just before Thanksgiving is the best time of year to ask.

7. Respond to the Review

Within a few days of your client posting a new review, be sure to respond to it by thanking the reviewer. In Google My Business, this can be done in the review section by clicking reply and writing and posting your response. This shows the world that you are paying attention.

If someone leaves a bad review, don’t do anything immediately. Walk away, think about it, then come back and deal with it in a professional manner. Here’s more on how to respond to a bad review:  https://acceleratorwebsites.com/what-to-do-when-you-get-a-bad-review-online/

8. Be Polite and Respectful—No Matter What

Perhaps the most important tip when asking for a testimonial from a client is to be polite and respectful—no matter what. In any case, always thank them ahead of time, and after the fact. A client will always remember that you were polite and professional.

As you already know, more than ever before, it is necessary to provide the best service you possibly can to clients. In doing so, word will travel—with or without testimonials—that you are competent, professional, and offer great service.

We have a new quarterly lead magnet on internal control titled 88 Ways to Safeguard Your Business. You can see the sample here:

https://websample1.com/88-ways-to-safeguard-your-business/

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to add this to your website, please reply YES. We will put it on your blog and on your Resources page under Guides.

As always, if you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to add.

The pretty stylized PDF version will be available in your Accelerator Toolbox account in a few days.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

We have a new service page for those of you who help clients with sales tax compliance. You can see the sample here:

https://websample1.com/sales–and-use-tax/

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to add this to your website, please reply YES

As always, if you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to add.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

1. COVID notices and re-opening.

It might be time in your state to update or remove any COVID notices that remain on your website.  If this is the case, please send us exact instructions on how you’d like to update that information.  Some of it can be added to your resource page if it is still useful; just let us know.

2. After-tax marketing focus.

If you’ve had us focus on tax client acquisition via your site’s title tags, you may want to ask us to change your focus now through December to acquiring monthly accounting clients.

First, find the content of your title tags, which displays when you mouse over the tab of your website page in your browser software. You can see what your title tags contain currently.  It will normally start with your city and state. Then it might say tax preparation or bookkeeping. If it says tax preparation or anything similar, let us know if you want to change it and what services you want us to focus on.  We know you hate the word bookkeeping, but that’s what works best. We can also use CPA firm, accounting firm, or accounting services.

If the cities listed are not the ones you think you can get the most clients from, let us know which ones are better for us to list.  We recommend cities with at least 50,000 population (20,000 in the northeast) and if your city is huge, we recommend you think about suburbs.  We can get you higher that way (big fish, small pond).

We’re happy to switch these back and forth any time, so stay in touch with us and help us help you have a better result.

3. Hours and holidays.

If your hours are posted on your contact page/footer or if we handle your Google My Business listing, please send any corrections to your office hours.  Also let us know which days you will be closed for holidays for the rest of 2021 and we’ll get them marked in GMB.

4. Other web updates.

Please send us any updates such as staff changes, new photos, and client testimonials so we can keep your site fresh.  Also, if you have any new corporate info such as policy updates, mission statement, or diversity statement, etc., please forward those for posting.

5. New marketing channels.

If you’d like to expand your marketing with us, there are two ways to do so: consider a website upgrade to the next package level, or consider an additional channel, such as adding social media or a newsletter to your existing digital footprint.

If you find that any of these areas above need updating, just send your instructions to support@accountantsaccelerator.com and we’ll get on it right away.

As always, we appreciate your business.  Please let us know how we can better help you with your marketing.

1. Steady content

The meat and potatoes of social media must include maintaining a steady presence with good quality content. We do this by posting pre-written tips, facts, and news about our services at least three times a week.

These posts can include things like:

• Tips related to your services
• News about your services, including deadlines and requirements
• Facts about you, your staff, the location you serve, your office hours, your mission, and any other information related to your business
• Offers, including new services and promotions, which should be kept to about 25 percent or less of total posts.
• Curated content, such as sharing an article that was informative and related to your services or relevant to your clients’ interests

2. Engagement

It’s essential to connect and interact with others on social media. This is a very personal part of social media that should not be automated. It can be delegated to someone that you trust and that knows your voice. Otherwise, it’s something you should do yourself.

I spend 15-30 minutes each day going through my social feeds so that I can comment, like, and share other people’s posts. Many of them ask questions I can answer. A lot of them are work-related, and I can show my expertise.  Some questions may not have anything to do with work, and that’s not the point. You can show your personality when you answer those types of posts.

For anyone who responds to anything I post, I like their post and follow them.  This is important. I also follow back anyone who follows me.  The only exception is if their site is R-rated. I do unfollow people to keep my feed positive and clean.

In the beginning, to build my followers, I followed everyone who mentioned accounting or tax in their bio at a rate of about 50 a week. I don’t do this anymore.

I can also periodically post my own questions in hopes that people respond to me.  Don’t overdo this; you will look like you are trying too hard.

If you’re worried about time, set a timer before you start, and stop when it goes off so you can get back to work on time.

3. What to avoid

Be smart about your comments on topics where people are polarized, have strong feelings, or are private: politics, religion, sex are the classics.

Also, I don’t run ads.  It’s better to keep it organic.

4. Monitor metrics

Tweetsmap tells me how many followers and unfollowers I received each week.  If in any one week, I have more unfollowers than followers, I go back to see what I did that might have created that result so I can learn from it.

Growth will be steady but very slow. I usually only get about 10-20 new followers a week, and your mileage will vary.  You can boost this by following more people; it will happen when they follow you back.

That’s it.  Steady is the key, along with valuable content and a small amount of engagement.  A little goes a long way.

We have a new blog post for you to help you spin the positive when it comes to filing extensions:

You can see the sample here:

https://websample1.com/why-filing-an-extension-for-your-taxes-is-a-good-thing/

Action Requested

If you’d like our team to add this to your blog, please reply YES

As always, if you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to add.

Thank you for your continued support, and hang in there; you’re almost done with the hard part of 2021.

Sandi

We have three new Xero pages for those of you who work with Xero:

You can see the samples here:

Xero Accounting Software: https://websample1.com/xero–accounting-software/

(replaces old Xero Cloud Accounting page)

Xero Marketplace Add-ons: https://websample1.com/xero–marketplace-add-ons/

Xero Partners, Certified Advisors, and Training:

https://websample1.com/xero–partners-certified-advisors-and-training/

These can either go under their own menu label, Xero, or under Accounting Software, where we can put both QuickBooks and Xero product pages.

Action Requested

Your reply is going to be a little more complex than YES this time. Please read carefully.

First, if you do not want these pages, there is nothing to do.

If you want all three pages, reply ALL THREE, or tell us which ones you want by name.

Tell us where you want them:

• Under a separate menu item named Xero, Xero Products, or Xero Accounting Software, depending on room
• Under QuickBooks Products; rename to Accounting Software and put the pages on the bottom of the drop-down
• Under QuickBooks Products; rename to Accounting Software and put the pages on the top of the drop-down (you focus more on Xero than you do QuickBooks)
• Something else: spell it out for us, please

We will look on your website to see if you are a Partner or Certified, but if these are not up-to-date, then there are 2 more items.

• If you are a Xero Partner, let us know whether you are Bronze, Silver, Gold, or Platinum. We will add the graphic and a sentence to all three pages.

• If you are a Xero Certified Advisor, let us know and we will do the same as above.

As always, if you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to add.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

We are now able to add a Search widget to your blog page. You can see a sample right here; it’s the first item in the right column on this page:

https://websample9.com/blog/

Action Requested

If you want this search feature added to your blog, please reply back YES.

If you don’t want any update, no action is necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

Here are some more infographics for you to use in your social media. (If we are doing your social media, we’ll automatically post these.)

-Tax Process

-Sales Workflow in QuickBooks

-Vendor Workflow in QuickBooks

You can find all of these in your Toolbox account.

https://acceleratortoolbox.com/

Action Requested

If you want any of these added to your website, let us know which one(s) you want and what page you want it on (or if you want it as a stand alone blog page).

If you don’t want any update, no action is necessary.

If you want to use these graphics on your own, log into your Toolbox and grab them for yourself.

We Take Requests

Please send us your ideas for Infographics. My team enjoys doing these!

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

No one knows the exact algorithm that Google uses to rank web pages in search results. Experts say there are over 200 ranking factors to consider. Google’s May 2021 update will focus on “page experience,” which includes three metrics called Core Vitals as well as four additional page experience signals.

This is all about providing a better mobile experience for the user. Here’s what all that means in detail.

Core Vitals 

The three metrics Google will be weighting more heavily in search results are Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), First Input Delay (FID), and Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS). These are all related to the speed of your website – how fast it loads for the user.

LCP looks at the largest graphic on any page and measures how long it takes to fully load. Google wants this speed to be 2.5 seconds or less. Things like videos, sliders, and large background graphics may need to be made more efficient.

First Input Delay is something Google created. It measures the time it takes the browser to respond to the first user interaction on that page. Google wants this measurement to be less than 100ms. FID can only be measured in real time. We will be using Total Blocking Time to check this metric. It is slowed by excessive use of JavaScript and custom CSS.

CLS is how much shifting has to occur as the web page is displayed in your browser. Shifting happens when size parameters of graphics are not included in the code. The browser has to move things around once something fully loads if it didn’t know how big it was going to be in the first place.

Other Page Experience Signals

In addition to the Core Vitals, Google mentions four signals that will be part of the May 2021 roll-out:  mobile-friendly, safe browsing, HTTPS, and no intrusive interstitials.

All of our sites are mobile-friendly. We have been offering mobile-friendly or responsive sites for at least four years now. However, Google will be getting pickier with this update. One example is button size and the white space around it. Buttons must be at least 44 x 44 pixels with at least 15-20 pixels of white space around them. This is to allow for “fat thumbs” on the smartphone when clicking buttons.

Safe browsing means Google will prevent pages with malware, harmful downloads, uncommon downloads, or that are deceptive from ranking. Unless you have questionable third-party apps installed, this should not affect your site’s ranking.

HTTPS-security is another thing we have been offering for many years. All of our sites are secure.

Interstitials are popups, including ads, opt-in boxes, chat features, and other items that may cover up content on your page. Pages with intrusive interstitials will be penalized.

What We’re Doing

Google has a new report in its Search Console webmaster tool called Core Vitals that can tell us which URLs need attention. In most cases, however, it will display Not Enough Data.

We are currently auditing Diamond, Platinum, and Pro package websites for Core Vital metrics using CatchPoint’s WebPageTest. Most of the newer sites are just fine; however, your site could require changes if your site:

• Is not using one of our themes
• Has not been redesigned in a while
• Has a slider on the home page
• Has a video on the home page
• Has a large background graphic on the home page

We will be able to do a lot behind the scenes to fix these metrics. In some cases, all we need to do is replace a graphic with a compressed graphic. With the older sliders, we will replace those with a single compressed graphic. In other cases, we may need to redesign your home page.  In extreme cases, we may need to replace your theme or redesign your site. There is no extra charge for any of these changes for Diamond, Platinum, or Pro sites.

We will start working on these Monday, April 19, 2021 and should be complete over the next few weeks with Diamond and Platinum packages.  We will start on the Pro packages after that. Premium and Starter packages do not include advanced SEO. (I’ve copied Starter and Premium subscribers to alert you to this change in case search ranking has become important to you.)

If we have to make a substantial change to the look of your home page, we will reach out and let you know.

Your Action Items

In most cases, you won’t have to do anything; your site metrics are “green” across the board and you have a healthy report card with Google already.

In a few cases, we will reach out to you if we need to “perform major surgery” on your site to get the metrics under control. So please wait to hear from us. And I’m sorry in advance that we may have to bother you before the May 17 (June 15 for some) tax deadline.

If you have third-party items on your site, such as chatbots, chat windows, popups other than exit intent, and anything that is not standard from our foundational sites, it could affect page experience and ranking. You do not need to worry about things like appointment buttons, login buttons, or payment buttons. View your site on your smartphone and decide if these third-party add-ons are getting in the way or slowing things down. If they are, they need to be removed.  Just send us a request and we’ll get it done.

If your website or marketing goals have changed over the years, some of you on Starter, Premium, or Pro packages may want to upgrade to Diamond or Platinum so you can receive more attention or higher ROI from your website results. Currently, 45% of our client base is on Platinum or Diamond packages.

If you want to read the announcement from Google directly, here is the page: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2020/11/timing-for-page-experience

As always, feel free to grab a time on my calendar for any reason. https://go.oncehub.com/SandiLeyva

On January 9, 2021, Texas attorney Rod Ponton appeared before the 394^th Judicial District Court via a Zoom call with old Dell software that showed him as an adorable furry white kitten with big, sad eyes due to a stuck filter.  Judge Roy Ferguson released the video and issued a Zoom Tip about filters.  Within three hours, the video had 1.6 million views and by the end of the day, it had been watched 16 million times and counting. ICYMI, you can find it on YouTube as the Kitten Zoom Filter Mishap video.

The El Paso Times, the BBC, USA Today, Washington Post, and New York Times all ran articles on the event, and USA Today and the BBC ran follow-up articles the day after.

The same day, The US ambassador to Vietnam, Daniel Kritenbrink, released a rap song ahead of the Lunar New Year to celebrate the country’s Tet festival.  While the viral aspect of the kitten incident was totally unplanned, this rap song was. Watch it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-N5HQtiOMc

Why Do Things Go Viral?

People most often share information that is unusual, funny, or delightful. If the item triggers an emotional response, a person is likely to share it.  The more people who have the same emotional response will continue to share, triggering a viral cascade.  One reason the Kitten Zoom Filter Mishap was shared so quickly is that it possessed all three characteristics, not to mention its depth of hilarity.  I couldn’t stop laughing for two days (and I have a very narrow sense of humor).

The most shared type of content is news. People who post breaking news first will often be in a position to have their post shared. Other types that are shared include humor and opinion pieces.

Is Going Viral Desirable?

Going viral does not necessarily equate to making money or acquiring clients. At worst, it can be a fleeting 15 minutes of fame. At best, it can be a goldmine.

To go viral on purpose requires a carefully crafted ad campaign with a heavily-staffed back office to handle the potential volume. Think about an original angle of your work and how you can tie it to client needs; this will be the seed for your viral campaign.

A secondary way to monetize a viral moment is through ad revenue from the video views. This requires careful setup in advance of the viral event.

The best way to monetize a viral event is to be ready.  If you are appearing on TV or in front of a large crowd, you can have a website with an email opt-in set up ahead of time to build a list. On January 20, 2021, a picture of Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders wearing handmade mittens at the inauguration become a meme that went viral for a week. He put the image on promotional items such as t-shirts, sweaters, and stickers that he offered for sale. Within eight days, he raised $1.8 million for Vermont charities.

If you’d like to explore viral opportunities for your marketing, please reach out any time.

GA is the complimentary platform that Google uses to help website owners track information about the people who visit their sites. Previously, GA tracking for websites was separate from tracking for apps (which was done in Firebase).  In GA4, tracking is now combined, so if a company owns a website and an app, they can see both on one account.

User tracking is enhanced in GA4 as well.  Previously, tracking was pretty much limited to device ID.  However, if a person visited a website on their laptop and later viewed it on their phone, Google could not tell it was the same person. With GA4, it can. It allows Google to track activities of users across platforms and to better identify users with AI and machine learning.

Here’s the take-away in a nutshell:

1. We recommend you set up GA4. (GA4 will be the default if you are setting up a new account.
2. Your old GA (Universal Analytics, or UA), will still continue to function, and you want to keep it, because your history data does NOT populate over to GA4.
3. The GA4 account will show history from the day the code is added to your website. It will NOT retro.  (same was true for old GA).
4. If you own an app, you need to follow Firebase conversion instructions instead of these.

Here are the steps to make this conversion:

1. Once you’re in GA, select Admin on the left menu.
2. In the middle column, choose GA4 Set up Assistant.
3. Click Get Started.
4. Click Create Property
5. In the column under Property, click your property name to view the drop down and select the property with GA4 in the title.
6. Click Data Streams
7. Click anywhere on your data stream row to popup the details.
8. Copy Measurement ID and send it to us in an email.

We will add the code to your website once we receive it from you.

Here is a guide from Google:  https://services.google.com/fh/files/misc/4_steps_get_started_new_analytics.pdf

In the summer, we’ll provide further training on GA4. As a reminder, you can find Google Analytics here:  https://analytics.google.com

Bonus Blog Page: Tax Deadline Extended for SOME but NOT ALL Tax Returns and Payments

We have a bonus blog post for you on the tax deadline extension.

You can see a sample here:

https://websample1.com/tax-deadline-extended-for-some-but-not-all-tax-returns-and-payments/

Action Requested

If you want this page added to your blog, please let us know.

If you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to post.

If you don’t want any update, no action is necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

The Best Images to Use

Your own original photographs and drawings are the best to use, as long as they are professional-looking.  You can also use photographs that you have hired to be made for you, as in professional headshots and portraits. Some ideas include:

• Photographs of your entire team
• Photographs of your office building
• Photographs of your team at work
• Headshot, portrait, and lifestyle photographs that have been professionally done
• Well-lit candids of you at a business event or of you speaking
• Drawings or caricatures of your headshots or pictures of you and your team
• Photographs of landmarks in your city (these can also be purchased through a stock photography agency)
• Drawings of processes that you have created yourself
• Infographics that you have created or hired to build

With most of these photographs, you own them so you do not have to make any disclosures with regard to copyright.  One exception is if a photo was shot by a friend or co-worker, technically it is their copyright so they may want a byline.

Badges and Membership Logos

If you have earned a certification, you typically have the right to proudly display the badge that represents your certificate.  The same thing can be true for memberships. Some organizations will create a special Members badge that you can add to your website. And payment-related companies such as credit card companies allow use of decals they provide.

These can typically be used without issues as long as you follow any guidelines for use.  Items that fall into this category include:

• Badges for professional certifications
• Badges for software certifications, resellers, affiliates, and partnerships
• Memberships in organizations you pay dues for
• Accreditations you pay for, as in Better Business Bureau or a technology seal of approval
• Sites with services you use that allow you to market your connection, such as Thumbtack, Angie’s List, and UpWork
• MasterCard, Visa, Discover, American Express, shopping cart, PCI compliance, and other payment-related decals

Stock Photography

If you don’t have the perfect graphic, you can purchase them from stock agencies.  These companies offer not just photographs and illustrations, but video clips and audio clips too.

Prices vary from company to company.  Sometimes, you can get a monthly subscription which allows a certain number of downloads. You can also pay individually per graphic.  Good quality stock graphics are roughly $10 per graphic per use.  Beware of free stock photography; it usually requires a copyright disclosure or an advertising link, and that can make your site – and your company — look cheap. The stock agencies we use include:

• Adobe, our preferred go-to, at https://stock.adobe.com.
• Dreamstime
• Storyblocks

We use stock graphics for page illustrations that show small to mid-sized business scenes involving people. While we have our share of tax forms, calculators and charts, we prefer using people shots for a better client connection. Other ways we use stock graphics include a guarantee badge and local landmark photography.

You typically don’t have to display the graphic’s copyright when you purchase it.  Stay away from a graphic labeled editorial, as its uses are limited.

I’ve found that stock photography sites that have an excellent search feature are worth paying more for; plus, they usually have the highest quality graphics as well. A LOT of time can be taken up searching for the perfect image.

Free Images

If you absolutely don’t have a budget for graphics, we recommend you don’t use them.  But if you insist, there are free graphics available.  You must honor the copyright of the artists that supply these graphics by following the site’s instructions.

Some graphics have a creative commons copyright.  This is a special type of copyright where artists donate/share their work to the public and the public can use it.  Some artists appreciate a byline.  Again, follow the instructions on the site where you got the graphics so you’ll be in legal compliance with their requirements.

Never

Google image search can be a treasure trove of graphics files. Never use an image you get this way because it is someone else’s copyright.

Using Graphics Wisely

Graphics definitely enhance your site visually when you use them correctly and wisely.

New Services Page: International Tax Services

We have a new services page for those of you who do international tax.

You can see a sample here:

https://websample1.com/international-tax-services/

Action Requested

If you want this page added to your Services menu, please let us know.

If you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to post.

If you don’t want any update, no action is necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

Bonus Blog Page: Tax Changes for Businesses from the American Rescue Plan Act 2021

We have a bonus blog post for you on the tax effects of the new ARPA 2021 for Businesses (last week, we had the article for individuals)

You can see a sample here:

https://websample1.com/tax-changes-affecting-businesses-from-the-american-rescue-plan-act/

Action Requested

If you want this page added to your blog, please let us know.

If you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to post.

If you don’t want any update, no action is necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

We have been building out some infographics for you to use in your social media. (If we are doing your social media, we’ll automatically post these.)

We can also add the tax tables graphics to your tax tables resources page. Here is a sample with a LIGHT background:

And here is a sample with a DARK background:

We also did the parts of a balance sheet.

You can get all of these in your toolbox locker. Log in to your account. click your Web package under My Items and look for the Infographics tab.

Action Requested

If you want the Tax Tables graphics added to your resource page, let us know which one you want. If you don’t have the 2021 Tax Tables page, we will add it.

If you don’t want any update, no action is necessary.

If you want to use these graphics on your own, log into your Toolbox and grab them for yourself.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

Second, there’s no video. Meaning there’s no pressure to make videos, be on camera, put your makeup on, or be self-conscious about how you look.  I LOVE this part.

So what is it?  Clubhouse is an audio-only platform where you can start a room based on a topic and others can join the room and conversation. You can bring people up to the “stage” who have raised their hand.

Think of it this way: Clubhouse is like hundreds of live radio stations, or perhaps hundreds of interactive live podcasts. The platform hosts both personal and business conversations, so there is a lot of noise to wade through, but that’s true of every social app.

While in a room, everyone can see everyone else’s avatar. Clicking on other people’s avatars is encouraged and brings up a bio and direct links to the person’s Twitter and Instagram accounts.  Unlike Twitter, you have lots of space on Clubhouse to build an extensive bio, and this is primarily how other people in the room can get to know you, along with hearing what you have to say.

Why Clubhouse?

Clubhouse is ideal for news announcements, interviews, coaching Q&A, and even classes and lectures. The big difference from live stages is that there are usually multiple people on stage – think 30-50 sometimes – and it’s best to host a room with several other people at a time to bring in multiple areas of expertise and points of view.

The Future of Clubhouse

I do think this one is going somewhere. The founders are hands-on, well-grounded, and enthusiastic. The platform is addictive and has its own vocabulary and culture. The growth is record-breaking.

One thing that could possibly cause Clubhouse to falter is that post-pandemic behavior on the platform may change as people get more options back in their lives. Another thing that could crush the app is if the founders sell too early to one of the bigger platforms.

Interestingly but not surprisingly, Twitter has already partially rolled out Twitter Spaces, and other platforms are busy building competing features.

About Clubhouse

Clubhouse was launched in March 2020. In December 2020, there were 600,000 members. In January 2021, membership jumped to 6 million. As of February 21, 2021, Paul Davison (co-founder) reported 10 million members.

At this time, the app is valued at around $1 billion.

Getting into Clubhouse

If you want into Clubhouse, you must have a mobile phone number, either an iPhone or iPad, and an invitation from a current member. Clubhouse is expected to incorporate Androids into the experience mid-summer 2021.

If or when you get on Clubhouse, make sure to look me up: @sandileyva.

Bonus Blog Page: Tax Changes for Individuals from the American Rescue Plan Act 2021

We have a bonus blog post for you on the tax effects of the new ARPA 2021 for individuals (early next week, we’ll have another article on businesses)

You can see a sample here:

https://websample1.com/tax-changes-affecting-individuals-from-the-american-rescue-plan-act-of-2021/

Action Requested

If you want this page added to your blog, please let us know.

If you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to post.

If you don’t want any update, no action is necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

Whenever you request to view a web page that no longer exists (or the URL is spelled wrong), the server will send you to a catch-all page for that website called the 404 page.

The 404 page is named after the “Page Not Found” error that you get when there is no page that matches the URL you entered.  It’s literally a file or page named 404.  You can go to any website and enter https://domain.com/404 and see what it looks like.

These 404 pages are another marketing opportunity, or at the very least, a chance to show some personality.  For the sites we build for clients, we change the message to something related to math or accounting to make it slightly fun for the visitor.

Our most common 404 page says, “This doesn’t add up,” and displays a calculator as shown here:

Here are some other examples of 404 messages we’ve customized for client sites:

There’s even more opportunity to add a link to where you might want the visitor to go to. And a few extremely crafty internet marketers offer a product for sale on the 404 page.  A happy medium might be to ask visitors to sign up for your newsletter.

A second thing you can do to monetize your 404 page is to view the history of activity that led to the visitor getting to the 404 page in the first place.  After all, it is an error, and in some cases, needs to be fixed.  For example, if you deleted or renamed a page that people expect to still be active, then you may want to recreate the page and set up a forward to the next most relevant page available.

One thing we always do for new clients with previously existing sites is to add “redirect pages” under any old page names that are not listed on the new site.  That way, when visitors land on the old page (in the new site), they are immediately directed to the new replacement page instead of the 404 page.

The 404 page is not the most profitable part of your website, but it’s fun to know about and is an area to work on for the web owner that has done everything else to make their site pay off.

Bonus Blog Page: Does Your Business Qualify for the Employee Retention Credit?

We have a bonus blog post for you on the employee retention credit.

You can see a sample here:

https://websample1.com/does-your-business-qualify-for-the-employee-retention-credit/

Action Requested

If you want this page added to your blog, please let us know.

If you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to post.

If you don’t want any update, no action is necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

1. Add your website address to these places, and be sure to use the https:// version of the URL.
  a. Signature block in your email.
  b. LinkedIn profile.
  c. LinkedIn company page.
  d. Facebook business page.
  e. Twitter account.
  f. Instagram account.
  g. YouTube account.
  h. Any other social media account where you have a profile.
  i. Any email marketing app you use to send a newsletter.
  j. Your Intuit Find-a-ProAdvisor listing.
  k. Membership sites where you have a profile.
  l. Your Google My Business listing.
  m. Your Bing listing.
  n. Your Yelp listing.
  o. Any other directory listing you’re in.
  p. Any other place online where you or your business is listed. Google your name and/or
   business name to see what comes up and where your opportunities are.

2. Use a domain email address instead of gmail, etc. For example, use sandi@yourdomain.com instead of yourdomain@gmail.com . Each time you send an email, you market your domain and not Google’s.

3. If you have printed business cards and letterhead, add your website address to them. Also add it to any other printed client-facing materials such as brochures, flyers, one-sheets, prospect kits, folders, and invoices. In this case, leave off the https:// and www format-wise. Keep it short and simple: yourdomain.com.

4. Add as many credibility-builders and customizations as you can to your site.
  a. Privacy policy.
  b. Terms of service.
  c. Refund policy.
  d. Testimonials / client reviews.
  e. Case studies.
  f. Certification badges.
  g. Membership logos.
  h. Client login for your portal.
  i. Customized bio on About page for owners and employees.
  j. Photos of you and your staff.
  k. Support section with how-to videos or blog posts.
  l. Blog with the most recent page no less than one month old.
  m. Organizers / client intake forms.

While this won’t directly help traffic, it will help you make the most out of traffic you do get so that you don’t need to attract thousands of visitors before someone calls you. We call this increasing conversion.

5. Mention your website when you’re networking or marketing or in conversation with just about anyone.

6. If your website is new or newly revised, send an email and/or a postcard to everyone you know to announce your new site launch.

7. Make sure your title tags are set to the type of service and client that you want more of. This is something you would work with us on.

8. If it’s been a while since we have built your site, ask us to do an SEO refresh and we’ll go through your site and look for more opportunities to improve your SEO.

9. Periodically review your SEMrush dashboard. This is for Pro and up packages.

10. Avoid changing your domain name. Older domain names that have been online consistently for years will get more traffic than just about anything else we can do.

11. Renew your domain name for five or more years in advance. Google sees that as going-concern bonus points.

12. If you have a new domain name, be patient. It can take up to a year to start seeing results. But do make sure SEO has been done from the very beginning on your site.

13. Create original content and send it to us to update your site with. It’s great for thought leadership, client education, and SEO, all at once.

14. Add videos to your site to get an instant SEO pickup. Our Diamond package can help if you’re not already on it.

15. On your social media accounts, promote your newest blog posts. Include your website address in social posts any time you can to drive traffic back to your site.

16. Submit original articles you write to news sites that your clients read. Become a guest blogger or columnist and request a link back to your site when they publish your work.

17. Understand that no one knows exactly how the Google ranking algorithm works. Google is also constantly changing it. A few times a year, Google makes major updates. The two most important keys to ranking higher are great content and referral links from other sites.

18. Know that Google is not the only game in town. Microsoft’s search engine is Bing. YouTube is the second largest search engine. On mobile devices, search results are different again. And finally, we continue to speculate as to whether voice search will take off this year.

We have another new lead magnet for you. As promised these will arrive roughly quarterly.

The report, “30 Reasons Why It’s Better to Have Professional Help with Your QuickBooks® Software,” is available to help you boost SEO as well as attract more QuickBooks and accounting clients.

You can see the report here:

https://websample1.com/30-reasons-to-get-pro-help-with-accounting-software/

Your action item: Let us know if you want this report. We will add it as a blog page and as a link on your resource page. 

If you have ideas for future topics, please send them our way.

We appreciate your business!

To your success,

Sandi

We have a bonus blog page ready for you on PPP.

You can see a sample here:

https://websample1.com/ppp-january-2021-update/

Action Requested

If you want this page added to your blog, please reply back YES.

If you want an edited version, scrape the text into a Word doc, make your changes, and send it to us to post.

If you don’t want any update, no action is necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

We have 3 bonus blog pages ready for you, with more to come, to help you educate your clients on the new law signed on Sunday.

You can see the samples here:

1. PPP expense deductibility issue solved: https://websample1.com/deductibility-of-ppp-related-expenses/

2. Stimulus Checks: https://websample1.com/a-new-round-of-stimulus-checks/

We will update this one if the Senate happens to act on it.

3. PPP Round 2: https://websample1.com/the-economic-aid-to-hard-hit-small-businesses-nonprofits-and-venues-act/

Action Requested

If you want all 3 added to your blog, please reply back YES.

If you want some but not all, reply back with the # or titles of the ones you want posted.

If you don’t want any update, no action is necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

Please be open-minded when you read my response if you think this way. I do respect that many of you want to keep your business small and comfortable. You can keep your business whatever size you want, even if your marketing generates more calls than you can handle.

First of all, it’s entirely unlikely that this is going to be an issue. Most of the people who think this way are solo entrepreneurs building a first website or new marketers. They may not realize there are 400 million active websites. It’s not easy to get your website noticed, especially if it’s new or a new domain name. Luckily, it’s not impossible either. We defy the odds every day at Accelerator Websites.

They may also not realize there are 1.2 million tax preparers and 1.4 million accountants in the U.S. You’re just not going to get flooded with calls.

Even if you do, that’s a good thing. You can be pickier about who you take on.  If you do have more prospect volume than you want, you can make them jump through some hoops, such as completing a form on your website before you set up a meeting with them. They’re even more likely to do business with you when they have a little “skin in the game,” such as time invested completing a form.

You can also refer prospects that are not a good fit to other businesses and get some very good pay-it-forward karma for your business. Just be sure to have those referral sources in place.

Don’t let this thinking hold you back from implementing marketing so that you can reach the revenue goals you’ve set out for yourself. It’s easy to think small, hold yourself back, and be your business’s own worst enemy.

It might initially feel a bit uncomfortable to be putting yourself out there like that. I felt like that when I stepped up my game from being stuck for years. I cringed every time I hit the button to send tens of thousands of emails out.  But the result was that I got to help more people when I played a little bigger. I got to reach my revenue goals too.

I’m hoping that you want to share your gift of numbers and tax law with as many people as possible. The world really needs you.

If you’ve been worried about implementing marketing in the past, consider throwing out that thinking for 2021, so you can attract the quality clients you really want to work with in the new year.

Happy New Year to all of you.

Business owners that understand how valuable an email list is will often be eager to grow the list’s size, so that they can market to more people. As marketing is a numbers game, this is a smart approach.

Growing a list requires discipline. With each new client acquired, there should be a process to add the person to the list. But many business owners want to go farther and add prospects to their list as well. This is best done by adding an opt-in form on your website.

An opt-in form asks the visitor for name and email address. The form needs to describe what the visitor is going to get if they sign up. These days, a simple “Sign up for my newsletter” message is not effective at all, especially for an accounting newsletter.

The sign-up needs to be far more enticing, and that’s where a lead magnet comes in.  It’s a report, guide, or other valuable piece of content that the visitor wants. A couple of lead magnets we’re providing for our web clients with the Platinum package and up include:

• 105 Ways to Speed Up Cash Flow in Your Small Business
• The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Starting a Business in 12 Easy Steps
• 12-Step Guide on Hiring and Paying Employees
• 21 Ways to Get Help for Your IRS Tax Problem and Get Your IRS Debt Resolved, Reduced, or Forgiven

Visitors are usually willing to give up a few pieces of their private information as long as they receive value in exchange. By providing one of these reports to people who complete the opt-in form, you are building your email list.

A lead magnet is not something you can whip out overnight. It requires thought about what the ideal prospect wants most. It requires organization and professional research and writing. And it requires a beautiful graphic layout.

While it’s ideal to write and create your own original lead magnet, it’s also expensive for small businesses to justify the cost. That’s why we offer the above lead magnets for sale so it’s more affordable.  You can find out more here: https://acceleratorwebsites.com/lead-magnet/

Whether you purchase one from us or create your own, we encourage you to build your customer and prospect list over time so your business can benefit from the most valuable asset you won’t find on any balance sheet.

We’ve written a new webpage for you called “Send Us Your Referrals.”

You can see the sample here:

https://websample1.com/send-us-your-referrals/

Action Requested

If you want this added to your site, please reply back YES.

Please note we will add this under your About menu as a new drop down.

If not, no action is necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

A marketing campaign is a multi-pronged approach to reaching a marketing goal that you’ve set for your business. It’s one of the biggest differences between how small accounting firms market and how larger firms approach their marketing.  Small firms tend to solve marketing by using a very generic message such as “Hire me now.” They also market by investing in one or two marketing channels at a time such as a website, social media, or Google Ads.

It’s important to have these foundational marketing pieces in place, but an even better approach is to have them playing like an orchestra instead of as solo pieces. A campaign unifies the channels by setting a specific goal and concentrating a consistent message to be sent across all of the channels.

Let’s say you want to do more tax projection appointments in December. You can create a campaign to get the message out across all of your channels. Your to-do list for the marketing campaign might look like this:

1. Create a web page for tax projection appointments.
2. Write and send an email notifying all current clients of the benefits of this service.
3. Write and post social media content to direct traffic to the tax projection web page.
4. Create a video on tax projections to post on YouTube.
5. Add a line to your email signature file to mention tax projections.
6. Create a Facebook Story about it.
7. Add this service to your Google My Business listing.
8. Hold a free webinar and give a presentation on tax projections, then upsell it at the end.
9. Send a postcard to key clients announcing the tax projection service.
10. Run Google Ads or LinkedIn Ads to promote tax projections.

See how you have a much better chance at success when you push your message out through a campaign instead of just using one channel at a time?

So, how can you leverage marketing campaigns in your small business? Well, first you need a very specific goal. It can’t be “Hire me;” that’s too generic. Next, decide on your message. Then, choose which channels to use to get the message out.  Build a launch calendar and get your team to work developing the content you need for your campaign.

For best results, you’ll probably want to have multiple campaigns in any one year. You might do one to launch a new service, another to welcome clients from a merger/acquisition, and one more to boost a seasonal slow time.

The two big stumbling blocks for small businesses are having a campaign budget and selecting a specific goal. Once you can change your mindset to see how powerful your results can be using campaigns, you’ll probably never go back to a solo marketing approach.

Are you getting a lot of questions about taxes and the election? If so, we have a bonus blog page ready for you.

You can see the sample here:

https://websample1.com/new-president-and-federal-taxes/

Action Requested

If you want this added to your blog, please reply back YES.

If not, no action is necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

BERT

BERT is now rolled out to almost every English search query. BERT helps Google deliver better search results to searchers with deeper queries by better understanding language and context.

I first wrote about BERT about a year ago; you can read more about what BERT is here.
https://acceleratorwebsites.com/bert-a-major-google-search-algorithm-update/

Spelling

Ten percent of all search terms are misspelled, and Google has gotten better at discovering and suggesting the correct spelling.

Page Sections

Seven percent of worldwide queries will be improved as Google is now able to drill down into web page content to discover relevant page sections.

This should be good for your rankings, and I would encourage you to produce more content on financial literacy, accounting apps, and tax topics to capture the attention of people who are researching these categories. Think about a particular problem you solve all the time for clients, and write it up.  It’s bound to get you more impressions.

Subtopics

When a searcher types in a broad or general phrase, Google is now more able to show them relevant subtopics so that the search results page shows a wider variety of solutions to fuel their research.

Pandemic Safety

Diamond and Platinum client saw our email on how to update their Google-My-Business profile for the six new safety options: mask required, staff required to do temperature checks, etc.  You can see these options in the attributes section of the business profile.

Maps

Google wants people to be able to get around more safely.  It has improved its busyness feature so you can see how busy a place is before you decide to go.  And with Live View, you can simply point to a place as you are walking in the neighborhood to see whether it’s open and other features about the shop.

Video Moments

Google can show you a relevant scene in a video based on your request.  This rollout is ongoing.

Statistics

Through the Data Commons Project, Google has consolidated government data to bring you more accurate statistical results when you search.

Hum to Search

Can’t remember the name of a song? Say “What’s this song and hum, whistle, or sing it to your smartphone’s Google app and it will suggest titles.

The new 2021 tax rates came out yesterday and we have a page ready for you.

You can see the sample here:

https://websample1.com/tax-rates-2021/

Action Requested

If you want this added to your Resources page, please reply back YES.

If you have any older Tax Rates pages (2018, 2019) and you want to delete it/them, reply back YES and DELETE 2019. We’ll delete the year you tell us and everything before.

If you don’t have a resources page, we’ll add it for you if you reply yes.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

We have a new procedure and a new requirement when you make changes to your own website without going through our firm.

1. New Procedure: After you have completed any changes to your site, we will need to clear your firewall cache in order for the change to “take.”

And

2. New Requirement: We politely, respectfully, and strongly require that you NEVER change your WordPress password and NEVER add new WordPress users without our permission. The penalty for non-compliance is we will delete your site immediately. Yep, it’s that serious.

Here’s the New Process

For Web Premium packages and up, we really, really prefer your send all website changes to us. After all, there’s no extra charge, and we can usually get them done in 1-2 days (unless it’s a redesign, then it can be up to a week).

If you prefer to do them yourself, no worries. Once you’re done, send an email to us with the URL of the page you made the change on and let us know to clear the cache or that you made a change We should be able to turn these requests around same business day in 90 percent of the cases.

I know it’s a new hassle, but the benefits of the firewall outweigh this minor inconvenience.

Here’s the Why

Our new firewall provides for added safety for your website in a year where attacks have exploded.

It’s essential that your site loads fast so that you will rank higher in search. One feature of the firewall is performance, and caching is something that speeds your site up.

Each time we make a change to your site, we clear the cache via a performance plug-in, WP Rocket. Now we also have to clear the cache via the firewall. Having both increases the speed of your site (we tested this) but can also make your site do weird things if the cache is not cleared.

Since speed and safety are both important, this is what we need to do to get the job done.

Regarding the password change requirement, we had a client change their WordPress password to something like admin2020 and sure enough they experienced a severe ph!sh1ng attack. So please help us keep your site safe by honoring our new requirement. Let’s all be super-smart and serious about having strong passwords everywhere.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

We’re excited about getting your Google-My-Business listing in tip-top shape and we need a bit of information from you to make it even more awesome. There are four parts to our request:

1. Holidays

Please send us the exact dates your office will be closed during the next few months. We’ll update your listing so Google won’t mark you closed when you are open. If you’re closing early on any “eve,” let us know your hours and we’ll update that as well.

Feel free to send us your full 2021 calendar too if you already have it. And if we don’t have your hours, please send them so we can get that updated.

2. Photos

We automatically add your custom photos from your website. If you have additional photos you’d like us to use on your GMB listing, please reply and attach them.

3. Attributes

We’d like to update the Attributes section of your listing. The choices vary a bit by account, so not all options are available for all accounts. Here are the most common choices:

• Black Owned
• Veteran Led
• Women Led
• Wheelchair Accessible Elevator
• Wheelchair Accessible Entrance
• Wheelchair Accessible Restroom
• LGBT Friendly
• Restroom
• Online Appointments
• Onsite services
• Appointment required
• Mask required
• Staff get temperature checks
• Staff required to disinfect surfaces before visits
• Staff wear masks
• Temperature check required

These can be displayed in Google search results along with your website URL and description.

Please let us know which ones you want us to checkmark for your listing. We understand that while you may qualify for some of these, you may not want them to be highlighted for your business. If this is the case, don’t include that one in the ones you want us to check. We can’t control which ones get highlighted.

4. Reviews

You know I can’t miss an opportunity to bug you about getting more reviews, right!? The more GMB reviews you can get your clients to leave, the better.

We should have a link on your testimonial page for clients to leave a review on your GMB. If you don’t have that or it doesn’t directly go to your reviews, let us know and we’ll update the page/link.

So we just need 3 things: your holidays, your photos (optional), and your attributes. Just reply back to this email so we can make your GMB listing rock.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

Facebook Stories are very short videos that you can create and post. When you post them, they are at the top of your feed along with any other stories your Facebook friends have posted in the last 24 hours.

They can be as long as 20 seconds, which is longer than Instagram and Snapchat. While they disappear after 24 hours, they remain on Facebook Insights for 28 days.

To create one, click the plus sign at the top right of your screen. Today (I say today because if you’re reading this 2 months from now, it will probably look different.), you have the choice of a photo story or a text story.

Choose text story and in the left box type in something like “Happy Wednesday!” Select the font style and background that you want from the left menu options and then click the Share Your Story button.  You’ve just created your first story!

To post a Story from your Business page, you need to use the Facebook mobile app. It won’t work from the PC.  Facebook stories have been around since 2017 but I still don’t see too many accountants using them.

Here are some ideas for Facebook Stories:

• Make a story about an upcoming deadline: “Tomorrow is the deadline to get your paperwork to me if you don’t want to file an extension.”
• Make an announcement: “I just completed my QuickBooks Online Certification.”
• Make a marketing story: “Need help with your taxes? Call us.”
• Show off a testimonial: “ABC Firm was great! –XYZ Customer”

Just about anything you can do in a post, you can also do in a story.  The key is to be very, very brief.  It can’t be too complicated.

And don’t worry too much about the video aspect.  A lot of people simply upload a graphic and add text to it.  Think your logo, team headshots, certifications, your office, and other photos like that.

Once you’ve mastered the basics of Stories, play around with the bells and whistles.  There are a lot of them: stickers, filters, audience settings, privacy setting, and more.

The key to Stories is to keep doing them. Since they have such a short shelf life, it’s a good idea to create a content calendar just for stories.  Try to do at least one a week, if not more.

For incredible visibility in Facebook, try your hand at Stories.  They are easier than you think.

For this quarter’s lead magnet, we thought we’d create a checklist. We’ve written a long-copy list, A 39-Item Tax and Accounting Year-End Checklist for Your Small Business, that you can use as a blog page on your website to attract prospects and boost your SEO.

You can see the sample here:

https://websample1.com/a-39-item-tax-and-accounting-year-end-checklist-for-your-small-business/

Action Requested

If you want this added to your blog, please reply back YES.

Feel free to edit it and send it back for us to post as well. With 25% edits, you can make it original to the search engines, which is a good thing.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

We’ve hired a security company to provide an extra layer of protection for your website. This feature includes 24/7 monitoring, scanning for malware every 12 hours, and a firewall to help cut down on attacks.

We’ve made some additional changes you should know about.

CPanel

We’ve changed all cPanel passwords. If you need to get into your cPanel, please email us with your request and why you need in there. We will only give out the passwords on a need-to-know basis.

We may also be changing WordPress passwords in the next few weeks. Again, this will be provided on a need-to-know basis. Please do NOT change it on your own.

Blog Comments

Your WordPress website blog has a feature for people to leave comments. This feature will be turned off on all current and future posts. A few of your sites have valid comments; we have not deleted those.

Firewall

About 60% of sites are behind a firewall; thank you for all of your prompt help with this. If you receive additional emails from me about your domain access, please respond immediately.

Malware Removal

While there is no extra charge for this new feature (and it’s a HUGE value) we reserve the right to charge a $150 cleanup fee if your site is compromised in the future. This is unlikely if you are behind the firewall.

Thanks for understanding that this is simply another one of the changes we must embrace in today’s times. You have all been amazing about this, and I appreciate it.

List Size

The most important metric (that no one ever talks about) is the size of your list, i.e. how many email addresses you have permission to email.  A small list is not necessarily a bad thing as long as it’s incredibly responsive.

Here’s what matters when it comes to list responsiveness:

• The fresher the list, the better. This means that a person who signed up for your list a week ago is better than someone who signed up 10 years ago.
• A list of current clients will be the most responsive list.
• Where you acquired the emails determines list quality.
  • If they are purchased, they are of zero value and can actually hurt your domain reputation. Never buy a list unless you know what you are doing.
  • If the leads are from a discount or free offer like an Amazon or Groupon source, they may be of lower value than if they were acquired via a partnership or professional relationship.
• Email addresses that are free like Gmail and Yahoo are of less value than an email with a more custom domain.
• Emails that are “out of style” like AOL indicate a subscriber who is not very tech-savvy and might require more customer service.

Your list quality and size will impact all of the email metrics.

Open Rate

Unfortunately, not everyone that you send an email to will read it. Good email marketing software can detect whether an email has been opened or not. This metric is called the open rate.

The open rate is not foolproof like an email receipt, but it’s a good comparative measure for you to see which emails were opened the most. A good subject line, a timely topic, and a clean list are some of the keys to a higher open rate.

What is a good open rate?  For accounting newsletters and a fairly cold list, the open rate can be 15 percent or lower. For a stronger business newsletter with wider topics than accounting and a current client list, the open rate can be higher than 30 percent.  The industry average is 22 percent. The last time I measured our BizBoost newsletter, it was 30 percent.

Click-Through Rate

If your email has a link to a website, you can measure who clicked it. This is called the click-through rate. This metric varies widely by industry and by type of email.  On average, it’s 5 percent. Emails that are related to customer transactions have the highest click-through rates, at roughly 9 percent.

If you’re running a campaign, a very cool thing to do is to measure your entire funnel, starting with your click-through rate.  If you’re sending readers to a specific web page, then your open rate should correlate with your Google Analytics page visits for that page. If there was a purchase offer, opt-in, appointment setting request, or other measurable customer action on the page, you can measure your conversion at each step:

1. How many emails did you send
2. How many opened it
3. How many clicked to visit the page
4. How many took the page action
5. How many did you convert to clients

Bounce Rate

One last measure is bounce rate.  If the email is undeliverable, it will bounce. This happens when an email is misspelled, discontinued by the user, or has its email server down. You can have several kinds of bounces – temporary and permanent are two kinds.

It’s essential to clean your email list periodically of bad emails to reduce the bounce rate. A high bounce rate impacts the deliverability of all of your emails and can get you blacklisted from using the email software.

If you have email marketing software, you can go to the reports or analytics section and view these metrics for your own business.

We’re installing a firewall to afford a higher level of protection against the increasing malware attacks to our clients’ websites. We need access to your domain account to set this up, but DO NOT REPLY VIA EMAIL until you’ve read this entire email.

If you’re in a hurry, use this link to send us in a word doc:

https://sandismithleyva.sharefile.com/r-r7cccf8b8b884e60b

• your name,
• website domain address,
• domain account (like GoDaddy),
• username and
• password.

If you have 2-factor authentication, please be by your phone or email to get us the code.

Secure upload link:

https://sandismithleyva.sharefile.com/r-r7cccf8b8b884e60b

If your site went live in the last few months and you haven’t changed your password, we might not need your information. Your firewall has already been installed if we could get into your account.

Background

We have been playing Whack-a-Mole with hackers on about 10 of our sites for about a week now and, after 20 years of being able to easily handle these things internally, I guess those days are gone like so many other things in 2020.

I have hired a security company at my (great) expense and this wonderful benefit will be an ongoing feature of your package at no extra charge to you. They are on the job now and will clean up the hacker damage over the next few days.

Once it’s clean, they will submit the sites that were marked with Google warnings to Google through Search Console. I am told it will take about 3 days for Google to review the site and remove the warning.

I apologize for the downtime but this is the best way forward.

Email

If you use Google email, you may be at risk for further blocks. If your website URL is in your signature file and you email another Google GSuite user, I believe this is where the blocking occurs. I use Google GSuite, so don’t email me unless you understand the risk. This is Google’s security response and completely out of our hands.

Details

About 10 of our sites mostly on our West coast servers have been hit with code infusion malware via WordPress. These are phishing attacks. Please be cautious when accessing your site. Do not attempt to access your site unless you have anti-virus AND browsing protection.

These hacks can come in via vulnerabilities in forms, plugins, and themes. We will have a new way for you to access cpanel and I suspect we will require IP address whitelisting going forward. We are also in the process of turning off blog comments on all of your sites.

You may not be able to tell if your site has been hit. Some sites have been flagged by Google Chrome and you will see a red screen in this case. Edge and Firefox will present fewer warnings.

I’ve been through several hacks and handled them personally. They happen about once every 5 years. After the fire is out I will attempt to find out what caused this and let you know, although most of the time we never find out.

Please know we take many precautions to avoid this type of issue – strong passwords, up-to-date systems software, and tight security within our own company staff and procedures. But we cannot control many, many other variables that can lead to the weak link.

Going forward, as mentioned in the opening paragraph, we have real-time monitoring (already working) and a firewall specific to malware prevention, even though it’s not part of the current package.

Please know we’re on top of it and please be patient with us.

If you need to call me urgently, feel free, but please know that time on the phone will hold up the installation of all of the firewalls. So if it can wait, I and your fellow clients will appreciate it.

While we spot-checked many sites, it’s a good idea to view a couple of pages on your website just to be sure everything is OK.

We appreciate your business.

If you have any custom programming on your website, please inform your developer that we will be upgrading MariaDB and MySQL. They can email me directly with their requirements. There should be no downtime experienced.

We’ll be checking all of our client sites throughout this process.

We’ve also limited access to the programming side of our servers to users in the United States and Canada. If you have a developer located outside of the U.S. that needs access to cpanel or another function please contact us and specify their IP address and the functions they need access to and we will whitelist them. Your website is still visible worldwide to all countries that have internet access.

We’ll send an email when we are complete with these server upgrades.

We have a new Services web page on Forensic Accounting. You can view it here:

http://websample1.com/forensic-accounting-services/

If you offer this service and want the page posted to your website, please REPLY back and say Yes.

We appreciate your business and hope you are staying safe and healthy! And a preliminary congrats on achieving another big tax deadline today.

Once you get it set up, this tool will track the number of visits to your web pages.  It can tell you things like:

• How many people visited your web page in a certain time period
• How long they stayed on a page
• How many pages they visited per session
• Whether they’ve visited your site before or are new
• If they visited a previous website before yours and which one it was
• What country the visitor is located in

The tool cannot tell you the individual name, phone, email or any other private information about the person who visited your site.  However, you can get aggregate data, such as gender and age if you have demographics turned on.

Here are a couple of very simple exercises in GA that you can do to learn more about your traffic.

What is your most visited page?

In Analytics, go to Behavior > Site Content > All Pages.  Adjust the date range near the top right side of the screen to display whatever range of time you want to view.  Scroll past the chart to the bottom of the page to see the list of pages.

Your home page will be represented as a forward slash (/).  If it is listed first, it is your most popular page. If you are running ads or lead magnets, your landing pages may get the top traffic.  Your “About Us” page will likely be right up there too.

The first column shows the pageviews – this is how many times your page was displayed. The third column, time on page, is interesting too.

Where is the traffic coming from?

Go to Acquisition > All Traffic > Channels. This tells you where the traffic is coming from.

• Organic search is where people click on your site from a search they did in Google.
• Direct is where they typed in your domain name because they knew it or clicked from a source that Google couldn’t determine (such as an email you sent out).
• Referral is where they clicked on a link to your site from another site, for example, a membership site or a directory listing.
• Social is when the traffic comes from social media.
• Paid Search is when traffic comes from you running Google Ads.

Clicking into any of these gives the relevant detail.  Organic provides the search terms people used to find you, although most of these are missing. Direct provides the pages. Referral tells you what site they came from before landing on yours.

What percentage of people are visiting my site using mobile?

Go to Audience > Mobile > Overview. The report lists desktop, mobile, and tablet and gives a percentage of each.

You can also discover the average age and gender of your visitors by going to Audience > Demographics > Overview.

Take action on the information you learn by adjusting your content to the audience you want to reach, improving the pages you want to get more visitors to, and working with your webmaster on new ideas for your site.

1. Instagram add-on.

Instagram posting is not currently included in the Social Media Starter package for cost reasons, but we realize Instagram is an important channel, and some of you don’t want to go up to Pro to get it.

We are offering a $25/month add-on for those of you who are current Social Starter subscribers and want us to add Instagram posting to your Social Starter services. Just email us your consent and your IG user ID and password to get started.

NOTE: If we are already posting to your Instagram and you are on an old Social Starter or Digital package, nothing will change for you. We will continue posting to your Instagram at the same rates you signed up for originally.

2. Social Platinum – our newest level of service.

We’ve added a $299/month social media package for those of you who want a higher level of engagement along with your content posts.

The added benefits of Platinum over Pro include:

• More engagement: send us your client list and we’ll create lists inside Twitter and Facebook where we’ll follow, like, comment, and retweet as you. You can also periodically send us lists you have access to, such as Chamber memberships, BNI groups, and more.
• We’ll be joining groups based on your guidelines as well as suggesting twitter chats you can attend when time permits.
• A quick monthly check-in where we share ideas and content to increase engagement
• 2 more posts per week
• Extra channels like Pinterest

I’m only going to take about half a dozen clients at this price, then I’ll go up to $349/month on any new clients after that. Email us if you want to upgrade; you can see our new Platinum package here:

https://acceleratorwebsites.com/pricing/social-media-package-pricing/

3. Social Media Starter price increase only on new subscriptions.

The price for Social Media Starter is now $119 per month, but only for new subscriptions. We try hard not to go up on existing client subscriptions. If you’re locked in at the $99/month, your monthly charge will stay the same.

We very much appreciate your continued business.

The AICPA and CPA.com have control over the purchase and distribution of the .cpa extension in domain names. They have just opened the application process. The bottom line is I recommend you get this if your budget permits.

https://register.domains.cpa/apply-now/

Normally, I don’t recommend changing a domain name (as many of you might know!), especially if your domain is over 5 years old. However, because you HAVE to have a registered CPA firm to get this extension, I have to think that Google will consider this a credibility booster under their EAT (Expertise, Authority, and Trust) criteria.

The price is $225 per year. If you can fit this in your budget, I recommend getting a .CPA domain for your firm. If for no other reason, get it to avoid your competitors getting it.

How to choose your .cpa domain name

Choose a name with three things in mind:

1. What’s closest to your legal firm name? If you have a trademark, consider it as well.

2. What’s closest to your current domain name? (this is secondary)

3. Don’t repeat cpa. If cpa is part of your domain name now, leave it off since it will be in the extension. In other words, get sll.cpa, not sllcpa.cpa.

If you get one

When you are awarded the domain (which will be in November it looks like), please send me your domain login credentials and I will set up an alias that will point your .cpa domain to your existing domain. PLEASE DON’T SEND ME YOUR LOGIN UNTIL THE DOMAIN HAS BEEN APPROVED.

There is no cost for us to set up aliases.

Then set up a time on my calendar so we can discuss converting your current site to your .cpa domain. https://go.oncehub.com/SandiLeyva

Here’s the application link again: https://register.domains.cpa/apply-now/

We have a new video to go on the Service page labeled Owing the IRS Money. You can view it here:

http://websample4.com/owing-the-irs-money/

If you want it posted to your YouTube channel and website, please REPLY back and say Yes.

If you don’t have that page, we’ll add it.

We appreciate your business and hope you are staying safe and healthy!

To your success,

Sandi

A good but somewhat elusive goal of marketers is to be able to win the position zero ranking for their sites.

You may have seen the box of information – also called a featured snippet – that displays a paragraph of text, a list of answers, or a table.  Here is an example where we have gotten one of our articles to rank in Position Zero:

You may be able to see it live if you enter “Awards for Accounting Professionals.”  It then links to this article:  https://accountantsaccelerator.com/44-awards-you-can-win-as-an-accounting-professional/

Position Zero is great to get when it is connected to the services or products you offer.  It can give your brand more visibility and it can generate many, many leads.  So how do you get to position zero yourself?

It’s pretty easy, but it does take a bit of work.  You already know that great content is the key to ranking well in SEO, and Position Zero is no exception.  A 2,000-word article that answers a key question in a list or steps is ideal for targeting Position Zero opportunities.  The topic should be sage, accurate advice that lasts and won’t go out of vogue tomorrow.  Cover the topic thoroughly, showing both your breadth and depth of knowledge.  Include background to help further explain and clarify your topic. And format your article in a way that makes it easy for robots to pick out your key points and place them into the snippet format.

Google results pages have shown remarkable variety over the years. There are many more places to rank depending on the search term:

• The Google Map Pack
• People Also Ask page, where questions are featured and your answer might get listed
• On the right as a Google My Business listing or Google panel
• In a Video box featuring videos on the topic
• Recipes
• Lifestyles ideas
• Shopping boxes
• See more places
• Images
• Top Stories
• Top Sights
• Searches related to
• And so many more

Next time you search for something, study the format of the search results page to look for opportunities in your own business.

Whenever you can get your site to rank in multiple places on the search results page, it’s a good thing.  If you’re ready to do the work, you can get more search real estate by creating content that Google would love to show its searchers.

Now that many face-to-face marketing channels have been cut off, we encourage you to consider reevaluating your marketing budget for your digital spend well before next busy season starts. If you’re happy with the volume of leads you’re getting currently, then I’m thrilled for you, and you don’t really need to read the rest of this email. For those who want more leads from their digital presence, please keep reading.

Options for expanding your digital presence

In a survey we conducted with CPA Trendlines last year, both websites and social media were in the top five ways to find new clients. In the last few years, social has really blossomed and we’re seeing more and more clients becoming successful in their engagement and acquisition of new clients, especially on Facebook.

In addition, email marketing is one of the highest ROI marketing channels for those of you who have a client list. It’s a great way to stay in touch with clients when you can no longer visit them on a regular basis. And you can keep them informed of deadlines in an efficient, systematic way.

Last but not least, videos can make a real difference in your website search ranking. A recent study showed that having a video on a page elevates its ranking by 20%.

We suggest four action items for you to think about:

1. If you don’t already have social media with us, consider adding it or upgrading it.

Whether you do it yourself or choose one of our packages here https://acceleratorwebsites.com/pricing/social-media-package-pricing/, please add it to your marketing plan, especially during these Covid days. Your competitors are already there.

And just a heads up – the Social Media Starter package price will be going up for new clients only on September 1, 2020. If you already have this package, your monthly fee will not increase. I just did a cost analysis of that service and we’re actually below cost on it, so you’re getting an amazing deal.

2. If you have a good list of clients and prospects, consider adding newsletter services if you don’t already have it.

Our official newsletter services are here: https://acceleratornewsletters.com/. However, what’s not advertised anywhere is that clients with Web Pro packages and up can get our Done-for-You Newsletter package at a reduced price starting at $75 per month (for less than 500 contacts and includes Constant Contact Email software).

3. Add video (for accounting websites only not already on Video or Diamond Package).

Our team has really been hustling to provide you with relevant videos based on the issues your clients are going through now. We now have these stock videos available:

• Controller Services
• Bookkeeping Services
• Payroll Services
• Services for QuickBooks
• Tax Preparation and Planning
• Tax Resolution
• Advisory Services
• Resilience and Business Continuity – helping shuttered businesses survive
• Cash Flow Services
• Tax Audit Support
• Tax Resolution for Non-filers
• Tax Resolution for Late Payroll Taxes

You can get them in three ways:

• With the Diamond web package
• By choosing a monthly video subscription here: https://acceleratorvideos.com/.
• By purchasing them individually here: https://acceleratorvideos.com/accounting-videos/.

If you don’t have time to do them yourself, this is a great alternative.

4. Consider upgrading your web package to the next level if it’s relevant for you.

If you’re on Diamond, you’re already getting the highest level of service we have, so nothing to do here for you. But if you’re on Starter, Premium, Pro, or Platinum, you might want to consider going to the next level, especially if you want more leads.

Schedule Time with Me If You’d Like to Discuss Your Goals and Options

All clients are always welcome to schedule time with me to discuss your digital marketing goals and priorities. There is never a cost for this while you are a current client. https://go.oncehub.com/SandiLeyva

We very much want to help you reach your digital marketing goals during this challenging time, so please let us know how we can help.

We have a new web page on audit and assurance services. We know this won’t apply to a lot of you, but wanted to offer it for those of you who do assurance work.

You can see the sample here:

http://websample1.com/audit-and-assurance/

Once a visitor has visited your website, you can show that person ads about your company when they visit other websites besides your own. For example, let’s say Jim visits a couple pages of your website, might be interested, but then leaves and doesn’t do anything else.  Later he visits the ESPN website. When he does, he can see an ad about your company that you can run through Google Ads.  Or maybe later, he visits Facebook.  Facebook can show him your ad.

There are many benefits to running remarketing campaigns in Google and Facebook.  For one, the person has already seen your ad once. With remarketing, you’re simply keeping your brand top of mind. For another, it’s one of the more cost-effective forms of advertising.

Getting Started

To get started with remarketing, the learning curve is a bit daunting. First you need a Google Ads account. Next you need to install a pixel – a piece of code – on your website. This builds the audience that will see your ads.  You can qualify your pixels based on specific page views or your entire site.  Your site needs to have enough traffic so that the pixel can build an audience over time.  Generally, visits older than 60 days or so roll off the audience build.

Next you need to build graphics in the correct sizes to accommodate all of the shapes available in the display network.  The display network is the list of websites your ad will show up on; there are literally millions of sites in the display network. You’ll want to set goals for your campaign and create landing pages specific to the ads you’ll be running.  You’re now ready to write your ad and set the parameters of your ad in Google Ads.

Monitor your results by discovering how new clients found you and whether remarketing played a part. Get better at your remarketing ROI by making sure you run the ad at the right frequency and that you exclude current clients who have already purchased. These are common beginner mistakes with remarketing.

The Display Network

The display network is very different from the search network. Once you’re past the learning curve, you’ll find remarketing to be a key tool in the advanced marketer’s toolkit.

We have several new videos available in your AcceleratorToolbox.com account. Topics include:

• Tax resolution
• Advisory services
• Business resilience
• Cash flow help
• IRS audit assistance
• Nonfilers
• Payroll tax resolution

If you haven’t logged into your account for a while, please do so and take advantage of all of these new videos.

If your subscription is Premium, we have either posted your new videos to your website or we will be emailing you the link to use to access the recordings.

If you need help with anything, please email us anytime.

We have a new video on payroll taxes as they relate to tax resolution for those of you that offer that service.

You can see the sample here:

http://websample4.com/behind-on-payroll-taxes/

But what should you write?  Sometimes it’s hard to figure out what to write about, so here’s a list of many of the ways content can take shape.  Hopefully it will trigger your creative juices so you’ll have an idea of what to write about.

Questions

1. Answer one or more questions in a FAQ

What are some questions that your clients ask you the most frequently? Each one of these could make a short post, or you can combine the answers into a Frequently Asked Questions – FAQ – article.

2. Ask questions in a survey

A survey is a great way to find out more about your clients. Do you wonder how many employees they have? What about how financially literate they would rate themselves?  All of their answers will give you insight into what makes them tick and how to serve them better.

You can create a satisfaction survey for clients to find out how to improve your customer service. If you have an idea for a new service, you can find out what their interest level might be.

3. Write a quiz

A quiz is a little bit different than a survey, although it is asking questions. When clients take a quiz, they expect to be graded. You’ve seen them in magazines. “Which Disney Leading Lady Are You?” (Teen Vogue, 2010)

Quizzes are popular and tend to go viral easily. You can make up a funny quiz like “Does your eye color predict your financial smarts?” or “What type of saver are you?” where the answers are tied to animals or colors or something.

4. Ask a question via a poll.

A poll usually consists of one question that is timely and tied to current events. While it alone does not generate much content, the answers do. You can also write your opinion of why the answers are what they are.  You can also include a poll question that is open-ended where people can write in their answers.  That will generate a great deal of content for you, and you can later write an article quoting your favorite answers.

Other people’s content

5. Curate an article

If you don’t have much to say yourself, you can always borrow from others.  (I don’t mean steal their copyright.) Simply browse newsletters you subscribe to or the news, and save some articles that you’d like to share. Then write an article that is full of links to the articles you like.

You can also do theme-based curation, where you select a topic and find your top five or so favorite links, and make an article out of that.

6. Use a quote

Using short motivational quotes has been popular in the past, and is still frequently used in social media. Everyone loves a quick reminder of positivity during their normal day.

To find some quotes, simply Google “inspirational quotes on ___” and insert your topic, such as leadership, money, business, tax, or accounting.  Be sure to attribute your quote to the person who said it.

7. Share your testimonials

If clients have sent you reviews of your services or products, use them as content on your website or in social media.  This builds credibility and lets future client see what you’re like to work with.

Company information

8. Summarize your company

Writing an overview about your company is helpful for readers so they can find out more about you.  Include a summary of what you do, who you serve, number of employees, when you started, and where your offices are located.

Consider also including statements on your mission, vision, and values.

9. Make a company announcement

When you hire a new employee, open a new location, add a new service or product, change your hours or policies, or have other corporate news, write it up.

10. Profile an employee

Feature an employee so that your customers can get to know your team better.  This personalizes your business as well.

11. Celebrate a press mention

If your business was mentioned in the press, that’s certainly worth writing up.  You can have a press page on your website or a social media post that links to the press mention.

12. Recount your company history

Let people know the history of your company, especially if you have a long history over multiple generations.

13. Recap an event

Has your company held an event?  Write up a summary of the event and include lots of pictures.

14. Display your policies

While not the most exciting choice on this list, it is essential to post company policies such as privacy, legal, cookies, returns, warranties, shipping, and other company notices.

Product or service information

15. Demonstrate your service or product

Videos are the perfect medium for showcasing your products via a demonstration.  Letting clients know how your product works greatly increases sales.

16. Share a case study

Do you have a story about how a current customer has benefited from your product or service?  Write it up!

17. Write up a backstory

Is there a story behind how your product or service came about?  If so, consumers love stories about your brand; you can make a deeper connection when you share these types of stories.

18. Outline the news

News impacting small business finances in 2020 has been huge. Help your clients figure out how it impacts them related to your services. This includes new laws, IRS announcements, accounting changes, SBA guidance, relief programs, loan options, new CDC and OSHA requirements, and so much more this year.

19. Address an objection

Are there reasons why customers do not buy your product? If so, address it head-on.

Thought leadership

20. Tell us your opinion

This type of content helps you to show your expertise related to the products or services that you offer.  An example for someone who offers tax preparation services might include an article on how a particular tax law can be interpreted.  In accounting, it might include a discussion of the latest features or reports in an accounting software package and how a client can use them.

21. Share a tip

One of the simplest content pieces to write, just list several tips you have for customers that are related to your products and services.

22. Provide a recommendation

Do you recommend a particular software package, tax position, internal control action, or accounting report?  Write about it.

23. Publish a guide or guidelines

If you have recommended steps or guidelines for customers to follow related to your product or service, write them up.  An example might be which forms to use, steps to start a business, what deadlines to pay attention to, what to do when hiring a new employee, or what Chart of Accounts system to follow.

General

24. Create a how-to piece

Many people search for how-to articles, so writing up how to do something related to your service or product can earn you lots of traffic.

25. Make a list or checklist

People love lists.  This article is a list.  You don’t have to have 100 items on your list; just a few will be fine.  Make lists of how to save money, tax deductions, or QuickBooks features.  Checklists are great too, such as year-end checklist, tax preparation checklists, and more.

26. Document an example

Create an educational piece that includes an example.  Examples help to clarify the learning that you’re trying to get across.

27. Make a video

For any of the above-listed items, you can create and post a video that highlights your content.  Transcribe it and you have an article. Convert it to audio and you have a podcast.

28. Write a social post

If you have something to say that’s short and sweet, it will make a perfect post.  And if not, you can always write a teaser with a link to longer content.

29. Compile a slideshow

Lists as well as many of the other ideas above can make a great piece of content in slideshow format.

30. Write an article

We’ve saved the simplest and most common for last.  Most of the above ideas can be formatted into an article that can be posted on your blog.

Hopefully, this list will give you dozens of ideas about what to write about and how to format your content.

Once you have a content piece written, edited, and finalized, send it to us and let us know where you want it posted on your site.  If you prefer not to write your own content, we can do it for you. Articles range from $150 to $300 per page, and long content can be created from $750 to $1,500.  We can also do series, videos, and much more, so let us know what you’re thinking and we’ll get you a quote.

We have a new web page on innocent spouse for those of you that offer that service. One of your fellow tax professionals helped me a great deal with this page and has been generous enough to allow me to share it with you.

You can see the sample here:

http://websample1.com/when-your-spouse-owes-the-irs/

We produced a new video on IRS nonfilers for those of you that offer that service.

You can see the sample here:

http://websample4.com/filing-prior-year-returns/

Action Requested

If you want this added to your IRS Nonfiler Services page, please reply back YES.

If you don’t have that page, we will add it for you.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

We produced a new video on IRS Audit representation for those of you that offer that service.

You can see the sample here:

http://websample4.com/help-with-your-irs-audit/

We wrote a new services page for those of you helping your clients with PPP loan forgiveness.

You can see the sample here:

http://websample1.com/ppp-loan-forgiveness-assistance/

As a site owner, you’ll want to influence the search quality raters so that if your site is scored, it will score high. One of the ways to do that is to pay attention to EAT.

EAT is an acronym that stands for Expertise, Authority, and Trust. It’s a key factor for raters in evaluating your site.  There are several ways you can influence your site’s EAT.

Some of the quality raters will be asking these questions about your site when they consider how to rate it.

• Why should a reader spend time on your site compared to your competitors?
• Do you have expertise related to the content of your site?
• How can you demonstrate your expertise?
• Why should you and your content be trusted?
• Is the site’s author an authority in their field?
• Do others quote or cite your content?
• Who else trusts your site (enough to link to it or share it)? What is their authority level?

Basically, you want to make sure Google can find all of the credibility-builders that we have been teaching for the last 20 years.

Implementing EAT

Your bio is a key place to list accomplishments such as degrees, credentials, awards, publications, speeches, and press mentions.  Your contact page should include all of your contact information so that you can easily be reached and you don’t look like you are a fly-by-night company or hiding something.

Encourage people to share the contents of your site on social media. When your site is shared, it means to Google that others feel strongly enough about your content that they want others to see it, boosting your authority.

Encourage people to mention you or your site. This boosts third-party mentions, and you can add a press page listing all of your press mentions.

When someone else mentions your site or writes about you or your company, we call this earned media in marketing.  The more positive earned media you can get, the more your EAT will be positive.  Raters are encouraged to perform “reputation research” which is to look for these mentions when evaluating a site.

Another huge area to encourage is client reviews. Clients that have written reviews for you via Google My Business, Facebook, or other platforms help you earn additional credibility.

One of the most overlooked areas where you can make a huge difference in your rankings is to have a section on your website for customer service. Software companies do it regularly, with knowledge bases, support videos, and multiple ways to contact their support department including chat. As accounting firms, there is a lot we can do to build a support section for our clients:

• Post organizers online
• Have materials available for download
• Create and post short videos on how to perform simple tasks, such as
  • Logging into their accounting software
  • Logging into their client portal
  • Uploading and downloading documents
  • Logging into their payroll system and entering time
  • Checking on their tax refund
  • Updating their credit card
  • Paying their bill

Other credibility builders that will boost EAT include posting privacy policies, terms of service, refund policies, and any guarantees or warranties that come with your work product.

A few EAT and SEO experts say adding popular or well-known authors to your site can help boost your EAT.

Remember writing term papers in college and including all those scientific references? If you are writing about things like tax law, including a reference and link to the actual law will show Google that your content is well-researched and cited properly. Originality is rewarded as well.

It goes without saying that accuracy and being current are also good ideas.

Ultimately, when Google ranks your site on the search engine results page, it’s looking to show the pages that answer the searcher’s question in the best way.

EAT is covered in Google’s Guidelines for Search Quality Raters, which are here: https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/guidelines.raterhub.com/en//searchqualityevaluatorguidelines.pdf

For this quarter’s lead magnet, we tackled tax resolution. We’ve written a long-copy report, 21 Ways to Get Help for Your IRS Tax Problem and Get Your IRS Debt Reduced or Forgiven, that you can use as a blog page on your website to attract prospects and boost your SEO.

You can see the sample here:

http://websample1.com/21-ways-to-get-help-for-your-irs-tax-problem-and-get-your-irs-debt-resolved-reduced-or-forgiven/

Action Requested

Feel free to edit it and send it back for us to post as well. With 25% edits, you can make it original to the search engines, which is a good thing.

We have more new content to come, including something on PPP, but wanted to get this out now.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

We have changed our Terms of Service https://acceleratorwebsites.com/terms-service/ in two places, regarding Intuit trademarks and web forms, and both topics may require action on your part.

Use of Intuit Trademarks

Intuit continues to crack down on offenders that violate their ProAdvisor agreements regarding use of Intuit Trademarks.

We have completed a review of all client sites and made some corrections to protect both you and us. A few things we need your help on:

1. Please review all of your posted certifications that are on your site and listed in your bio. If your certifications are NOT CURRENT, you MUST take them down. Please email us back and let us know what to take down. We will do this at no charge for all packages.

It is your ONGOING responsibility to keep this current and compliant with your agreement with Intuit.

2. Please check over your site for your use of trademarks and be sure you are in compliance with Intuit’s and our terms. We cannot give legal advice at any time, so do not ask us to interpret their terms.

It is our past experience that Intuit’s legal team will go after blatant violators and shut down their digital assets, including their website, in any way they can.

Use of Forms on Your Website (Premium Packages and Up)

Many of you have asked us to add forms to your website. We have come up with a solution we think you’ll like: Google Forms.

We will be happy to add a Google Form to your site, but we will no longer be supporting any other type of form. If you want to add any other type of form to your site, you will need to do it yourself.

To add a Google Form to your site:

1. You will be required to make the form yourself. It’s very easy. Just log into your Google account, select Drive, and start creating your new form (New, More, Forms).

2. Once you’re done, click Send, <>, and copy the embed <> code.

3. Email us the embed <> code, and we’ll attached it to your contact page.

4. You can test the form any time you want, independent of us, which gives you total control. Form completions are logged right in the Google Forms document. You can have the form email you when it’s filled out by making sure you are one of the collaborators (vertical 3 dots, Add collaborators) and choosing Get email notifications for new responses (click Responses tab, vertical 3 dots).

Thank you for your continued support.

Sandi

Out of 12 responses, a disproportionate number of accountants rated their satisfaction just below average, at 5.25 on a scale from 1 to 11 where 6 is the median point.

We asked why participants chose that rating and they said many things. Here’s a summary of the most frequent answers:

• I’m not doing any marketing.
• I’m not comfortable marketing.
• I’ve tried and failed and lost time and money.
• I’m too busy.
• I’ll get started any day now.
• I’m not getting the right clients.
• I’m happy and blessed with good clients.
• I’m turning clients away.
• It’s easy to get clients.

Filtered data showed us the larger and/or older the firm, the more satisfaction participants have with their marketing efforts.

I teased the data apart to show how many people rated themselves at each point.  While the mode is 5, you can see how the distribution skews to the dissatisfied side.  The next most frequent answer was 7, followed by a three-way tie at 1, 3, and 6.

We asked why participants chose that number. While some accountants were satisfied, others were not growing as fast as they’d like due to a number of reasons – discomfort, time, staff, and poor results.

Certainly, the more changes there are in a particular year with accounting rules and tax laws, the less time accountants are going to spend boosting their marketing skills.

Another thing that holds accountants back is that most tend to be technicians first, before they are CEOs. Not all accountants have the CEO-level skills to build all functions of their businesses.

One more factor might be that accountants by character, tend to be introverted. While you can still be introverted and be very successful at marketing, you may also tend to procrastinate or avoid altogether some marketing methods that could work well to grow the firm.

Marketing is one of those topics where there is a mix of mindset and money beliefs to master before one can become effective or even embrace the topic. Only then will the training sink in and start working so that one can prosper and help more clients. And high performers who can master change and multiple skills quickly will prosper.

One of the most important things you need to do in your marketing is to have everything in your name and not the marketers’ name.  Here’s how to do that and why it’s hard sometimes.

It’s easy to tell a marketer that you’ve just hired to go ahead and “handle everything” as they set up services for you.  It saves you time and avoids you having to go through a number of learning curves. But that’s a very bad idea. At some point, you may want to part from that marketer. When you do, that’s when it can get awkward if essential digital assets are in the marketer’s name and the marketer has low or misguided business principles.

Over the years, I’ve seen everything. One client faced a bankrupt hosting company that registered his company’s domain name. It took him six months and a legal battle to get the domain back.

Another client had his Google for Business account set up under a marketer’s email and did not have primary access to it.  The marketer refused to put the Google listing in the business owner’s name.

Many of our clients have had their domains registered by or transferred to webmasters who take control of the domain. We’ve had a few clients have to pay to get their domains back. We’ve had to fill out legal paperwork for others.  There’s a way to avoid these hassles altogether.

Just because you don’t know how is not a good excuse to delegate these important tasks.  Take the time to get through the learning curve so you can do these steps yourself.  Or if you do delegate, make sure you have the passwords to the accounts at all times and total control over the email addresses that are used for account setup.

Here is a list of things I can think of that need to be in your name or your business’s name, and not anyone else’s.  Use this as a checklist to review your own business’s assets and take steps to get these in your name now if they aren’t already.

1. Your domain name.

You should have full and total access to the registrar account where your domain name is set up.  There is only one exception: private registration, where it’s in the registrar’s name.  We don’t recommend this, but some people choose it when they purchase.  If it’s not in your name, start the steps to get it transferred into your name.

How can you tell what name it’s in?  Go to the registrar account, log in, and check the contact records.

2. Your Facebook page.

You should be listed as Owner on your Facebook page.  Go to your business page in Facebook, click Settings, locate Page Roles on the left menu, and look to see how you are listed in the Page Roles section.  You should be listed as Owner and/or Admin with full rights.

3. All other social platforms.

Be sure you own the email address that was used to setup any other social media platforms for you.  These include Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and Instagram.

4. Google My Business listing.

Claim or set up your Google My Business listing using an email you have access to.  Never let a vendor set it up for you.  Instead, you can grant vendors Editor or Manager access to your page, and you have control over when to revoke it.

5. Your web site.

If you’ve hired someone to do a custom website for you and made a large payment to own the full copyright, then everything – the hosting, the website software, the plugins, the graphic licenses – should be in your name.  Most people are avoiding the large upfront fee by “leasing” their website. In that case, you don’t own the copyright so it will likely be in the vendor’s name.

6. Your ad accounts.

Your Google, Facebook, and other ads should be in your name.  However, Google Partners are able to take over the management of the account, and that should be granted to a vendor that you trust.

7. All marketing software: CRMs, email marketing, shopping carts, and dashboard apps.

All of your marketing software should be set up using your email.  In most cases, you’ll have multiple users and you should be the primary one.  In other cases, Certified Partners may have control over your account if they are paying for the billing. You should still have the login credentials in all of these situations.

We hope that helps you keep your marketing assets safe and in your control.

We have a new services web page on cash flow forecasting, which in my (Sandi’s) opinion should be your number one top tool to help your small business clients.

And for Diamonds only, we also have a new video available.

You can view the page and the video here:

http://websample4.com/cash-flow-forecast/

We’ll add this to the top of your Services menu list. If you don’t want it at the top, let me know how you want us to position it when you reply.

We appreciate your business and hope you stay safe and healthy!

To your success,

Sandi

It used to be that there was a checkbox that said something like “Hide this address.” That checkbox is no longer on the profile. There’s still a place for address, but if you work from home, nothing should be listed in the address box.

It is against Google policy to list a personal mail box as your address, so do NOT use that for your address; it will get your profile suspended.

When you enter no address in the Business Location area, this will display:

There is really no other choice now.

What’s especially important to complete is the Service Areas section just below it, especially if you work at home. You are allowed to list multiple cities. You are not allowed to list the entire state, even if that’s your service area. You are also not allowed to list the United States, even if that’s your service area.

After speaking with a couple of Google employees on this, my conclusion is they really don’t have a good way to support virtual businesses using Google My Business listings. GMB was first designed for businesses with shops where customers walked in and were served.

Someone having a virtual business like a lot of us doesn’t really fit. Yet, Google My Business is still very important for lead generation and SEO rankings. One GMB thought leader told me it’s against Google terms of service to have a virtual office listed on GMB. Here is partial copy from Google’s policy page as to what businesses are eligible.

Eligible businesses

In order to qualify for a Google My Business listing, a business must make in-person contact with customers during its stated hours.

I am still recommending you maintain your Google My Business listing, because I have seen Google be lenient in this interpretation.  I think the reason for that is that they realize it’s a bit contradictory to penalize forward-thinking businesses that are saving the planet just because they happen to not have a physical office. On the other hand, I can see their need to protect their searchers from fly-by-night startups.

I want you to be prepared if Google suspends your listing.  That means having clients post reviews to other online profiles, such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and QuickBooks ProAdvisor listings, not just Google.

If you have a Platinum or Diamond website package with us, we maintain your Google Business listing for you. But only if you’ve claimed it for yourself and granted Manager access to us.  Here are two videos on how to do that:

https://acceleratorwebsites.com/how-to-claim-your-google-my-business-listing/

https://acceleratorwebsites.com/how-to-share-your-google-my-business-listing-with-us/

If you have any questions for us about your Google My Business listing, feel free to reach out any time.

We have a new video on business continuity. You can view it here:

http://websample4.com/building-resilience-into-your-small-business/

We’ll add this to your blog page on Building Resilience in Your Small Business. If you don’t have that page, we’ll add it.

We appreciate your business and hope you stay safe and healthy!

To your success,

Sandi

We have an article for you on the increased risks due to scams, hackers, and fraud with refund checks, fake COVID-19 cures, and more. You can view it here:

http://websample1.com/34-ways-to-get-money-fast-in-your-small-business/

As always, you’re welcome to edit it and send us a revised article for posting as well.

This is probably the last of the special content we’ll be producing unless something big breaks related to small business or taxes.

We appreciate your business and hope you stay safe and healthy!

To your success,

Sandi

We have an article for you on the increased risks due to scams, hackers, and fraud with refund checks, fake COVID-19 cures, and more. You can view it here:

http://websample1.com/scams-fraud-and-hackers-in-the-time-of-coronavirus/

As always, you’re welcome to edit it and send us a revised article for posting as well.

We appreciate your business and hope you stay safe and healthy!

To your success,

Sandi

We have an article for you on the new SBA EIDL and PPP Loan details that we believe many of your clients are asking about. You can view it here:

http://websample1.com/the-paycheck-protection-program-ppp-loan-and-the-economic-injury-disaster-eidl-loan/

As always, you’re welcome to edit it and send us a revised article for posting as well.

We plan to write a few more bonus articles, so please expect a couple more of these emails as we get them ready for you.

We appreciate your business and hope you stay safe and healthy!

To your success,

Sandi