How to Empower and Differentiate Your Accounting Practice in Canada

From the perspective of many individual and corporate clients, more often than not, there aren’t that many competency differences between accountants. When it comes to filing tax forms or providing tax advice, for most clients a lot of it's the same.

However, there is a way to stand out from the crowd and empower your accounting practice in Canada.

Critical to empowering your accounting practice is the ability to bring in new, high-quality,  well-paying clients on a consistent basis. Take a moment and think about how you’re getting your new high-quality clients today. Are they referrals from satisfied current clients? What about referrals from other professionals? Moreover, why should people be choosing you and your firm over all your competitors?

If your practice is growing organically you're likely doing so slowly and incrementally – a referral here and there. For accountants, and most any professional for that matter, the need to be recognized as an expert in their field, coupled with a sophisticated referral generation strategy, is required to create a steady stream of new high-quality well-paying clients.

While you may very well be an expert in your field, who knows this to be the case? Most accountants fall into the category referred to as "Hidden Talents." They’re adept professionals that few people are aware of. If this is your situation, the key to energizing your practice – to dramatically boost your firm’s revenues and your personal income – is to become a "thought leader." Even if you’re professionally well established and well known, by becoming a thought leader you can still boost your ability to generate considerable new and higher-quality business.

Becoming a thought leader is the process of being a recognized industry expert combined with the ability to seriously monetize this positioning. Here, monetization means creating a sales funnel full of highly desirable prospects very strongly predisposed to become your clients and quite willing to pay the prices you set. Because the prospects come to you strongly endorsed by other professionals or from your current clients, it’s likely that your ability to convert them into clients is very high.

Many accounting firms, of all sizes, try to become thought leaders. They might publish reports, write articles, produce webinars and have their partners speak at conferences. While some of these firms are successful, by a truly effective definition of thought leadership, which includes monetization, the vast majority of accountants and accounting firms are not thought leaders. They’re going through the motions and producing content without the strategic planning and related actions that tightly connect high quality intellectual capital to a constant flow of high-caliber, profitable new business.

By becoming a thought leader, which for the greater majority of accounting firms is the optimal business development methodology, you can seriously empower your practice. You can create a pipeline of decidedly attractive new business that will not only greatly increase revenues, but also significantly add to your personal wealth as well.

Related reading: What Accountants Need to Know About Health Spending Accounts

Becoming an expert in Health Spending Accounts is an effective tactic in both differentiating your practice and positioning yourself as a thought leader. Learn more about Olympia's Health Spending Account guide specifically created for accountants and discover how to maximize your clients' savings with this effective tax planning tool.