Client retention is a major concern for many firms. A survey from Accounting Today found that acquiring and retaining clients was the biggest concern for 36% of accounting firms. Providing clients with an exceptional experience can go a long way in improving client retention. But how do you achieve that?
Let’s look at some simple and effective ways to provide clients with an extraordinary experience.
1. Use Multiple Touchpoints
One of the biggest gripes clients have with accounting firms is that it often is difficult to get a hold of someone. Your team is busy, but a slow response rate can be a big turn-off for clients.
Failing to return a call or respond to an email in a timely manner may push many clients to leave.
One way to give clients the attention they deserve is to use multiple touchpoints. Touchpoints can include:
- Phone
- Video chat
- In-person meetings
- Presentations
Outsourcing lower-value work will also free up time for your team to focus on delivering high-value service to clients.
2. Create Policies for Client Interactions
Providing an exceptional client experience goes beyond simply being nice to clients when they walk through the door or call on the phone. To ensure you provide a consistent, positive experience, set policies for customer interactions.
For example:
- Instead of waiting to get back to a client until you have all the answers, respond with, “Let me ask and find out.”
- Greet clients as they walk through the door.
- Set policies around how quickly client emails should be responded to
- Use the customer’s name often
- Always own up to your mistakes
Taking a client-centric approach will help create an exceptional experience that clients will remember.
3. Personalize the Client Experience
One way to surprise and delight your clients is to deliver a personalized experience. Paying attention to the little things will make clients feel valued.
Providing a personalized experience may mean:
- Scheduling video calls to let clients know they are a priority
- Sending emails or texts wishing them a happy birthday
- Asking about their recent vacation
- Sending a thoughtful gift for referring a client
To deliver a truly personalized experience, you need to know your clients. This means training your team to take notes about client interactions and make it a priority to develop relationships with clients.
4. Become a One-Stop Shop for Clients
Becoming a one-stop-shop for your clients will make your firm their go-to contact for their financial needs. Offering additional valuable and relevant services will save your clients time.
They already trust your firm and will appreciate not having to vet out other professionals to meet their needs.
For example, adding advisory and financial planning services can complement the services you already offer and provide additional value for your clients.
There is a good chance that your clients already need these services and would be happy to have your firm handle them.
You do not necessarily need to offer these services through an in-house team either. You can partner with other firms that already provide these services. They will handle the logistics while your firm maintains its relationship with the client. It is a win-win for all parties.
If you are not sure which services would be beneficial for your clients, you can ask for feedback from them or search through client communication to find problems they have that need solving.
Providing clients with an exceptional experience can go a long way in improving client retention
5. Use Technology to Enhance the Customer Experience
Technology can improve the experience for all parties involved by streamlining annoyances. Let me use a common pain point of document sharing to provide an example. Document sharing can be a frustrating aspect of the process for both clients and your team.
For example, your firm can improve the customer experience by:
- Using a document collection platform or app. Clients can upload documents anytime that’s convenient for them, and your team can easily follow up with requests for missing documents.
- Making use of E-sign technology to make document signing a breeze. E-sign software eliminates the need for clients to print documents, sign them, scan them and upload them to email.
- Using automated reminders to let clients know about deadlines and document requirements.
- Safely storing important client documents so that there’s no need to continually request them.
Along with improving the customer experience, technology also will save your firm time that your team can spend focused on more important tasks.
6. The Client Experience Should be a Top Priority
Your firm invests a great deal of time and resources into acquiring new clients. Delivering an exceptional client experience will help improve retention so that investment delivers a return multiple times over. Use these simple tips to ensure your clients feel valued by your firm.
John Graziano, CPA, PFS, CFP®, and FFP Wealth Management are not only servicing the financial planning needs of his growing list of clients, but he is actively mentoring and offering advice to more than 80 CPAs firms around the country, who wish to transition their business to include Financial Services for their clients. He has written several articles and held seminars on the subject. John has appeared on Fox Business and was mentioned in Business Week, Investment News, Newsweek, Senior Market Advisor and other local publications. If you have questions about expanding your accounting firm’s services, you can contact John at johngraziano@ffpinc.com.
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