Automation is a great way to save time, increase profit, improve client experience, and keep on top of your workload. In fact, you could save around 6 or more hours per week by automating more elements of your business.
So, if you’re an accountant—or an accountant considering automation—you might be wondering what kinds of automation will make the most impact on your workday.
We’ve got 6 hacks that’ll help you automate your accounting process and make more time for what matters: clients!
What are some of the reasons to look into automating your accounting practice? Here are just a few:
1. Save time. Automation saves time by eliminating repetitive tasks, which means you can get back to doing what you love: running your business!
2. Improve client experience. Automated systems make it easy for clients to submit their data and have it automatically processed. This means less time spent on customer service and more time for you to focus on improving your product offering.
3. Keep on top of workloads. Automated systems help ensure that all tasks are completed on time so that your business always runs smoothly—even during busy seasons or when things get a little crazy in the office!
4. Keep up with industry standards and regulations. Automation helps keep you up to date with changes in industry standards and regulations so that you don’t run into any issues with compliance down the road (and risk losing clients).
5. Improve customer service by reducing wait times and increasing efficiency for everyone involved (including customers!). Automation makes it possible for clients to submit their data quickly and easily—and then receive an immediate response from your team.
How can I automate my accounting practice?
Now we know Why we should automate our services, next let’s look at how accounting firms can do this. It’s important to recognise which elements of your business you can automate, depending on the size of your company and your plans for the future. Investing in products for automation can be beneficial, however, you have to consider if these investments are going to increase your profit.
There are actually tons of ways to hack the automation systems that can help you keep your business running smoothly and efficiently—and even save you some money in the process.
Here are six automaton hacks for accountants:
Email reminders
Email reminders are a great way to remind yourself when something needs to get done, or even just check off tasks as they’re completed. You won’t have to worry about forgetting important dates or appointments anymore! All it takes is setting up an email address in Google Calendar and adding tasks that need remembering. It’s easy peasy lemon squeezy!
Automate onboarding
Why should you spend hours manually entering data into your accounting software when there’s an easier way? Automated onboarding makes for an easier process for both clients and you. Don’t get us wrong, some aspects that will have to be done manually and are nice to be done a bit more personably, but most elements can be done automatically.
Reoccurring meetings
You should be scheduling weekly, bi-weekly and monthly meetings with your team to discuss what has been going on with each client, any new clients and anything else that needs to be addressed. You can also set monthly meetings for your clients so that you’re guaranteed to speak with them, and you’re always kept up to date with their business. If you’re heading through a busy season, consider setting meetings more often with clients as you’ll most likely need more information from them. You can easily automate this by setting a reminder in your calendar and then inviting everyone who needs to be involved.
Schedule Marketing
Marketing is key for any business in order to grow and maintain a healthy customer base. A great way to do this is by using tools like Hootsuite which allow you to schedule tweets for specific times so that they go out at the right time for maximum exposure. You can read more about simplifying your marketing process for your accounting firm here.
Invest in a Practice Management Software
There are many benefits to investing in this software including flexible working, helping efficiency, and improved communication. This software can help you to run your practice with more ease, and help if your practice is now remote or hybrid. Again, investing in this software is beneficial, but you must evaluate if the benefit will be worth the cost. Again, this depends on your financial situation and the size of your practice. There are many different benefits and different kinds of software that could be suitable for your business so it might be worth looking into this before making a decision.
Update with newsletters
Having your team send out newsletters on a regular basis reminding clients of upcoming deadlines or special events happening soon can help you to stay organised and on top of things, as well as build stronger relationships with clients. Take some time at the start of each month, three months, or even year to set those reminders and save yourself from stress at the last moment. It’s a small task that’ll pay off in the long run.
Co-source to save time
If you’re looking into automating your accounting firm, chances are you’re looking for one primary solution: to save time. Totus Finance can help you with that. Our co-sourcing method allows you to stay in control, whilst saving time on finding staff members for your accounting practice. We specialise in finding bookkeeping and payroll staff for you- all you have to do is provide us with your requirements. Our Talent Acquisition Specialists will take it from there, finding the best options for you. No longer will you have to struggle to look for talented team members, the options will be therefore you. Not to mention the added benefits such as not having to worry about staffing issues such as illness. You can find out more about Totus Finance here.
