innovation

who, me a consultant?

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young man facing image of himselfit’s time to look at yourself in a new light.

by jody padar
the radical cpa

i love andersen consulting, now accenture. i especially love the story that when andersen consulting first started, the consul­tants who worked for the firm were not accountants. they hired mostly liberal arts majors – creative thinkers who were exception­al at communicating and innovating, but not so great with the numbers. the executives at andersen taught the consultants accounting and, well, how to be an actual consultant.

more on radicalism: target prospects for best fit | how spiritual value affects pricing | radical pricing fixes cash flow problems | each social channel has a language | 5 radical ways to be social and strategic | six competitive advantages for the radical cpa | 5 radical transparencies; are you ready? | why start being radical now? | the roots of ‘radical’ cpas

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i hope this motivates today’s firms. this younger generation of accountants has more than 150 hours of accounting, but they are less well rounded than previous generations. this is a problem.

we can no longer complain to the aicpa as to when they made that 150-hour rule, why they created more necessity for young accountants to learn more useless financial knowledge that’s constantly changing as opposed to having them develop better writing and analytical skills. that’s most important in today’s workforce.

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target prospects for best fit

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young businesswoman speaking with clientfocus on what they need, not what you want to sell.

by jody padar
the radical cpa

when you look at your practice from a sales and a marketing perspective, make sure you have enough leads coming in your door because you have to be okay if someone doesn’t like your fixed price. as accountants, we accept way too much bad work just because it’s there under the guise of the firm needs to “pay its bills.”

more on radicalism: how spiritual value affects pricing | radical pricing fixes cash flow problems | keep scope creep and seep from hurting bottom line | a radical close look at value pricing | each social channel has a language | get ready for radical transparency | six competitive advantages for the radical cpa | being radical is all about your customer

goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

as your firm matures you have to get rid of your yucky customers because your yucky customers will bring you down. they bring down your firm and your team will get frustrated. bad custom­ers are culture killers. part of running a good firm is clearing out the bad customers.

look at those a, b, c and d list customers, and get rid of the d and maybe some c customers so that you have more capacity to serve the good ones. if they’re not the right fit for your firm, you have to be okay with that. just know, there’s another one going to come along soon. as ron baker says, “you can never price the wrong customer.”

delivering what you promise read more →

how spiritual value affects pricing

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padar_valuepricingbonus checklist: 34 sources of client value.

by jody padar

what we miss the most when we don’t value price is the intan­gible value, that spiritual value.

more on radicalism: radical pricing fixes cash flow problems | keep scope creep and seep from hurting bottom line | the radical approach to bundling services | get ready for radical transparency | 5 radical ways to be social and strategic | 10 radical steps into the cloud | six competitive advantages for the radical cpa | 5 radical transparencies; are you ready? | being radical starts with being the change | going radical: the 4 tenets of a ‘new firm’ | the first 3 questions i should have asked before starting my own practice

goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

if it’s lacking in your firm, ask yourself these nine questions:

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radical pricing fixes cash flow problems

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you’re in the money, year round.

boomby jody padar
the radical cpa

the best part about value pricing and fixed pricing is cash flow.

from a customer perspective, customers like knowing what they’re going to pay up front. they like having a monthly payment over an annual fee. they will buy the payment over the car.

more on radicalism: keep scope creep and seep from hurting bottom line | the radical approach to bundling services | the radical approach to pricing | a radical close look at value pricing | let’s get radical about content | each social channel has a language | how social media transforms firms to their core | 10 radical steps into the cloud | six competitive advantages for the radical cpa | the market is moving toward the radicals | 5 radical transparencies; are you ready? | going radical: the 4 tenets of a ‘new firm’ | the first 3 questions i should have asked before starting my own practice

for instance, $6,000 is hard for them to think about but you if tell them $500 a month, that’s instantly more affordable. it’s psychology. customers know the costs and expectations up front.

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keep scope creep and seep from hurting bottom line

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bonus: a new breed of engagement letter.

by jody padar
the radical cpa

scope creep generally takes the form of new services being added once the project has started. typically, these are not properly reviewed and the team is expected to deliver them with the same resources and in the same time as the original scope.

the opposite of scope creep is scope seep. this is when the accountant or team volunteers to do extra work and take on extra requirements and issues. now of course the customer will never turn down “free help” and when this is done over and over, the customers quickly assume all of their issues they vaguely speak to you about are included in the price.

more on radicalism: the radical approach to bundling services | the radical approach to pricing | a radical close look at value pricing | get radical about pricing | six competitive advantages for the radical cpa | the market is moving toward the radicals | 5 radical transparencies; are you ready?

goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

because we’re afraid or not used to confronting uncomfortable subjects (ahem, pricing), too often we let them change a part of our project management. we really need to get solid on what a change request is and make sure that when change requests are implemented, that the required pricing comes with it.

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the 5 most common marketing blunders accountants make

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how many are you making?

by hitendra patil

proactive marketing is as rare as a marketing plan or a marketing budget at many firms. getting new clients is one of the top 5 challenges for firms of all sizes. accountants seem to be not doing enough of the right things.

more on the entrepreneurial accountant:  linkedin adds messaging. finally!  |   re-learning the lingo of the accounting business  |  how the “1099 economy” will transform accounting  |  what cpa firms could learn from google’s alphabet  |  summer reading list: five great books for the five lives of a busy accountant  |  four signs the uberization of accounting has already begun  |  management guru chester elton on success  |  savvy cpas focus on the constants  |  more

1. not doing enough to get found by prospects

it is estimated there are about 660,000 cpas in the u.s., 80% of which are believed to be in the corporate world. that leaves 132,000 cpas in practice. and there about 53,000 linkedin profiles that include the word “cpa” in the profile headline. in other words, 1 out of 2 cpas is either not on linkedin or don’t use the profile headline to reflect that they are cpas.

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the radical approach to bundling services

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package your knowledge, and don’t forget client personality.

by jody padar
the radical cpa

how do you take that tax planning, that small business exper­tise or whatever insight it is that you own and package it so it’s similar to a product? that’s what the next generation of firms has figured out how to do.

i started doing this pre-cloud. i had to figure out a way to keep my customers engaged with me all year without doing book­keeping because i didn’t want to do bookkeeping. i productized my year-round tax services.

more getting radical: the radical approach to pricing | a radical close look at value pricing | get radical about pricing | let’s get radical about content | each social channel has a language | get ready for radical transparency | 5 radical ways to be social and strategic | how i got started being social | how social media transforms firms to their core | six competitive advantages for the radical cpa | radical tenet #1: embrace the cloud | radical customers are on their way | 5 radical transparencies; are you ready? | 4 questions radical firms must face | being radical is all about your customer | being radical starts with being the change | why start being radical now? | going radical: the 4 tenets of a ‘new firm’ | why should cpas be radical? | the roots of ‘radical’ cpas

goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

i also took every piece of work i could take outside of tax season and separated it from the tax return. we do the work outside of tax season and charge for it as a separately stated item. today, so many firms are still doing accounting cleanup work that can be done outside of tax season in tax season and they’re not charging for it separately. i’ve heard firm leaders say, “oh, that’s part of doing a tax return.” no, it’s not. getting accurate books before you do a tax return should be priced and completed outside of tax season. it shouldn’t clog up your firm in march.

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the radical approach to pricing

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calculator in shopping cartbonus checklist: the 3 prices you need to set.

by jody padar
the radical cpa

you should know your relative costs and assumptions to value. when i say, “know your cost,” you’re not going to know every freaking minute that it takes to do something. but you should know approximately what the accounting file is like.

when you’re thinking about pricing your cleanup work with either a cloud-based product or let’s say you’re not even in the cloud, you should have already done a diag­nostic on that quickbooks file or whatever accounting software the prospect is using.

more on radicalism: a radical close look at value pricing | let’s get radical about content | each social channel has a language | get ready for radical transparency | 5 radical ways to be social and strategic | how social media transforms firms to their core | 10 radical steps into the cloud | six competitive advantages for the radical cpa | radical customers are on their way | the market is moving toward the radicals | 5 radical transparencies; are you ready? | being radical is all about your customer | being radical starts with being the change | why should cpas be radical? | the roots of ‘radical’ cpas

you also should analyze the five traits of their financial personality:

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re-learning the lingo of the accounting business

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new tech solutions require new thinking.

by hitendra patil
pransform inc.

it’s tough enough to keep up with the new technical developments in taxes and accounting, but practitioners are also grappling with a whole new vocabulary in technology.

if you’re not speaking the new lingo, you risk losing the millennials you work with and mystifying some of your clients and prospects.

for instance: in the distant past, you “bought” a “software license,” “received” a cd and then “installed” the software on your “desktop.” but now, you go to the “cloud” to “activate” your “subscriptions” to the “software as a service.”

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a radical close look at value pricing

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pen ready to fill in blank timesheetbonus checklists: 5 reasons not to manage employees by timesheet and 4 factors of fixed pricing.

join the survey; get the results:
pricing strategies and billing rates

by jody padar
the radical cpa

ron baker and ed kless of the verasage institute are the hands-down experts on value pricing. they do a phenomenal job of explaining how it works and why you shouldn’t track time. i’ve done it for the last eight years and i absolutely love it. i would never go back to time and billing. my quality of life has changed dramatically because of it. what it’s done for the culture of my firm can’t be measured. it’s an intangible. i started doing it because i figured out that there had to be a better way to sell my services. i didn’t want to sell myself by the hour and i found out that it worked without reading all the economic theories. so i continued.

more on radicalism: get radical about pricing | make radical connections | let’s get radical about content | each social channel has a language | get ready for radical transparency | 5 radical ways to be social and strategic | how i got started being social | how social media transforms firms to their core | six competitive advantages for the radical cpa | radical tenet #1: embrace the cloud | radical customers are on their way | 5 radical transparencies; are you ready? | 4 questions radical firms must face | being radical starts with being the change | why start being radical now? | going radical: the 4 tenets of a ‘new firm’ | the roots of ‘radical’ cpas | the first 3 questions i should have asked before starting my own practice

goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

the technology is only getting faster and better. eight years ago my payroll only took two minutes using paycycle. i had to ask myself: how could i make money on it? i believe that the pricing model finally is going to change. ron baker was the early adopter and started this 20 years ago. i believe the technology has now caught up. if firms don’t change our pricing model, we’re either going to have 25,000 customers or we’re not going to make any money if we continue to charge by time.

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get radical about pricing

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two happy businessmen looking at digital tablet at desk in officeforget about measuring by time.

by jody padar
the radical cpa

“forget about pricing and think about what people buy.”

customers are not buying our time. they may be buying our expertise. but they’re really buying a solution to their problem. famed management consultant peter drucker says, “a customer never buys a product by definition, the customer buys a satisfac­tion. satisfaction of a want, he buys value.” he’s buying a good feeling.

more on radicalism: make radical connections | let’s get radical about content | each social channel has a language | get ready for radical transparency | 5 radical ways to be social and strategic | how social media transforms firms to their core | 10 radical steps into the cloud | six competitive advantages for the radical cpa | radical customers are on their way | 5 radical transparencies; are you ready? | 4 questions radical firms must face | being radical is all about your customer | going radical: the 4 tenets of a ‘new firm’ | why should cpas be radical?

when lipstick leaves the manufacturer, it’s a solution. when it crosses the counter in a department store, it’s hope. from this perspective, how do we make our services into products or solutions? that’s essentially what you are doing with bundling and packages. you are productizing a service. read more →

make radical connections

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you don’t define your brand, your customers do. by jody padar the radical cpa social media is great for connecting with clients and prospects, but it also makes it easier to get published in the real media and that will … continued

let’s get radical about content

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content is king and context is queen.

by jody padar
the radical cpa

most professionals speak and/or tweet above their audience. they don’t realize whom they’re talking to.

more on radicalism: each social channel has a language | get ready for radical transparency | 5 radical ways to be social and strategic | how i got started being social | how social media transforms firms to their core | six competitive advantages for the radical cpa | radical customers are on their way | 5 radical transparencies; are you ready? | 4 questions radical firms must face | being radical is all about your customer | being radical starts with being the change | the roots of ‘radical’ cpas | the first 3 questions i should have asked before starting my own practice

goprocpa.comexclusively for pro members. log in here or 2022世界杯足球排名 today.

when you’re producing content, it has to be driven at the consumer level, not at the other professional level.

most cpas talk above their customers. some companies get it right. read more →