Marketing for accountants: how to get more clients

Seven steps, roughly in order of cost. The first five are close to free.

1. 1Pick a niche: an industry, a client type or a service you want more of.
2. 2Ask every happy client for a referral and a Google review.
3. 3Build referral relationships with attorneys, bankers, financial advisers and bookkeepers.
4. 4Make sure your credentials show up where clients check them, such as the IRS preparer directory and CPAverify.
5. 5Complete your Google Business Profile and give your website a page for each service.
6. 6Add paid search or directory listings for the services with the clearest demand.
7. 7Answer every prospect call and inquiry fast, especially from January to April.

Step seven is where many practices leak. A prospect who calls in March and gets voicemail calls the next firm on the list.

Usually yes. A niche makes your marketing easier to write, your referrals easier to explain, and your fees easier to justify.

• Industry niches: restaurants, construction, medical and dental practices, real estate investors, nonprofits.
• Client-type niches: freelancers and creators, small business owners, households with complex returns.
• Service niches: bookkeeping and payroll, tax resolution, fractional CFO work, business formation.

You don't have to turn other work away. The niche is what you lead with on your website, in your Google profile and in referral conversations. Our guide to how to price accounting services covers setting fees once you've chosen.

Ask, make it easy, and build relationships with the professionals your ideal clients already use. If any fee changes hands, the AICPA code requires you to disclose it to the client (AICPA).

• Ask clients for introductions at the moments they're happiest: a refund, a clean year-end, a problem solved.
• Give referral partners a one-line description of who you help, so they know when to think of you.
• Refer work back. Attorneys, bankers and financial advisers remember who sends them clients.
• Thank every referrer, and tell them when the referral became a client.

Under the AICPA's Commissions and Referral Fees Rule, a member who accepts a referral fee for recommending a CPA's services, or pays one to get a client, must disclose that to the client. Commissions are barred entirely for clients where the firm performs audits, reviews and certain other attest work (AICPA Code 1.520.001).

Both say the same core thing: no false, misleading or deceptive advertising. The AICPA rule applies to members in public practice, and Circular 230 applies to anyone who practices before the IRS.

• AICPA 1.600.001: a member in public practice must not seek clients by advertising or solicitation that is false, misleading or deceptive, and must not use coercion, overreaching or harassing conduct. Promotions are misleading if they create unjustified expectations of favorable results, imply an ability to influence a court or regulator, or quote fees the member knows are likely to rise substantially without saying so.
• Circular 230, 31 CFR 10.30: practitioners must not use false, fraudulent, coercive, misleading or deceptive statements in any public communication or private solicitation on an IRS matter. Enrolled agents may not use the term "certified" or imply an employer or employee relationship with the IRS.
• Fees under Circular 230: you may publish fixed fees for routine services, hourly rates, fee ranges and your initial consultation fee, but you can't charge more than a published rate for at least 30 calendar days after you last published it (31 CFR 10.30).
• Records under Circular 230: for direct mail and e-commerce communications, keep a copy and a list of who received it for at least 36 months (31 CFR 10.30).

Circular 230 also says a practitioner may not keep contacting a prospective client who has said they don't want to be solicited. Your state board of accountancy may add rules of its own.

Through the IRS's directory of tax return preparers and through CPAverify, so make sure both show you correctly. The IRS tells taxpayers to use its Directory of Federal Tax Return Preparers with Credentials and Select Qualifications to find credentialed preparers in their area (IRS).

• The IRS directory lists preparers with an active PTIN who are CPAs, enrolled agents, attorneys, enrolled retirement plan agents, enrolled actuaries or Annual Filing Season Program participants (IRS).
• Your directory entry comes from your PTIN account, so update your details there if they're wrong (IRS).
• CPAverify, run by the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy, lets the public search CPA licenses (NASBA).
• Link to your listings from your website, so a cautious prospect can check you in one click.

Explain who you help, what you do and how to start, and make it easy to contact you. Google says services you list may be highlighted when local customers search for them (Google Business Profile Help).

• A page for each main service, written for the client with the problem.
• Your niche, stated plainly on the home page.
• Fee information you're happy to publish, such as a starting price or a consultation fee.
• Credentials, with links to the IRS directory or CPAverify.
• Every service listed on your Google Business Profile, with accurate hours, including extended tax season hours.
• A Google review link in your engagement-close email. Get it from your Business Profile under Read reviews, then Get more reviews (Google Business Profile Help).
• No incentives for reviews: Google removes incentivized reviews (Google), and the FTC rule bars incentives conditioned on a review's sentiment (16 CFR Part 465).

Paid search for specific services with clear demand usually works better than broad brand advertising. Test one channel at a time and measure calls and signed clients, not clicks.

They decide whether to book a consultation, usually on the first call. In tax season, a prospect who can't get through calls the next firm.

• Answer in the firm's name.
• Take the caller's name, phone number, email and whether they're an individual or a business.
• Ask which service they need and any deadline, such as a notice from the IRS or a filing date.
• Give the fee information you've approved, such as your consultation fee.
• Book the consultation, or give a callback time.
• Never give tax advice on the intake call; that's for the accountant.

Calls peak exactly when your team is busiest. Overflow and after-hours cover means the prospect gets booked instead of sent to voicemail. Our guide to after-hours answering services covers the options.

Ringzel is an AI receptionist for accountants that answers every call 24/7 from $99 a month, so tax season prospects reach someone even when every accountant is busy.

It answers in your firm's name, takes the caller's details and the service they need, and passes them on. It is set up never to give tax advice. On Professional and Premium, it can book consultations into your calendar and transfer calls to the right person.

Plans are $99, $179 or $299 a month, with a 14-day free trial and no card to start.