BizActions

1. Costs Less: Producing and sending accountant newsletters the BizActions way costs much less than sending direct mail or buying advertising, both of which often have a low return on investment. Custom email newsletters require no postage or printing costs, so these targeted email newsletters are easier on the budget. And they save time by cutting out the hours spent dealing with the printers, and by avoiding mail delays. Once you choose your template, sending your company’s accountant newsletter is a breeze.

2. Directly Targets Your Clients: CPA email newsletters let your firm communicate directly with clients, getting your message out just the way you want it. Custom email newsletters help set your business apart from the competition. For many customers, the follow-up provided by email marketing newsletters encourages them to stay with you, builds stronger relationships and prompts them to make referrals.

3. Shortens Sales Cycles: Studies show people need to be exposed to a product or service on average seven times before they decide to buy. A BizActions CPA newsletter provides repeat exposure on a regular schedule of your choice. Effective email management campaigns allow you to keep current and prospective clients up to date with the most relevant information they need weekly, monthly and seasonally. That shortens the sales cycle by helping clients selects the services they need more promptly.

4. Generates Business Leads: A BizActions CPA marketing email newsletter lets readers easily send copies to friends and colleagues, helping drum up new business through client referrals. Moreover, simply putting a link on your Web site will encourage visitors to sign up for the newsletter and help you generate more business.

5. Increases Chances of Being Read: Studies show that email marketing newsletters are more likely to be read than paper versions. On top of that, effective email management, along with other BizActions services, such as the online tax guide, widget, dashboard and email radar, will let your clients see how your use of new and innovative technologies can help them stay on top of their financial and tax planning needs.
 

Many customers using our service want to use the BizActions system to get new business and cross sell to their existing clients.  However more often than not, clients with that goal do not have a staff member that is comfortable making phone calls to follow up on read activity.  If you are sending a business email communication to try and get new business, perhaps you could try a passive approach instead. 

There are several tools in the BizActions system to help.  Email Radar allows the ability to send email blasts to individuals within your database, and with email radar you can create specified groups based on click activity.  If you do not want to call recipients who have clicked on an item, you can simply create a group of individuals who have clicked on specific business newsletter content.  Then instead of calling those individuals, send them a follow up email with additional information pertaining to the topic they have clicked on.  Additionally on each newsletter there is a comments and survey feature built in to the articles, and those survey responses are captured in the system.  It is helpful to review those survey responses on a regular basis and respond if a reader takes the time to fill it out. This is a great chance to be able to send a thank you or follow up email to open up a line of communication with the reader.  Finally don't forget the importance of reviewing each client's click activity to have information to discuss when you next meet with them.  You never know what cross selling opportunities will pop out at you.  For instance if are a CPA and you see your client clicking on email newsletter articles that are about estate planning, or retirement planning, and you are not yet providing them those services, it's a great opportunity to discuss how you can help them in those areas.

The majority of you reading this blog, will spend one-hundred seconds, and then move on. Time is precious, and when delivering ideas, or possibly creating your next blog or B2B email newsletter article, please keep this in mind. Make sure you entice the reader quickly, and give them a reason to continue reading.  A blog or an effective custom e-mail newsletter should be, clear, precise, and easy to read. As an e-mail marketing professional, make sure you convey your point, but don't overwhelm the reader by communicating everything all at once.

A blog or professional email communication of any kind should have a personal touch to it, and should convey the personality of the blogger or writer. Simply copying and pasting from websites or other sources, is not a good way to show the “true you”. For instance, your writing style should have a personality, and over time, readers should be able to easily identify your blog or newsletter article, almost like a brand logo. Perhaps you don't have the time or capacity to write, you can always outsource newsletter creation to a company that handles this for you, or content providers may be able to assist you with content management. B2B Newsletters are also a great way to convey corporate communication, or conduct business customer surveys to find out more information about the type of newsletter content your readers would find informative, and helpful. 
 

As we approach the end of this blog, I hope you read it in its entirety, and didn’t stroll away, unless of course, it was to publish your accountant, employee benefits, financial planning, human resource, payroll, or law firm B2B e-mail newsletter. The next time you're creating an e-mail newsletter, keep it targeted,  keep it short!

• CPA Email Marketing Newsletters
• Chartered Accountant Newsletters
• Financial Planning Newsletters
• Employee Benefits Newsletters
• Human Resources Newsletters
• Law Firm Newsletters
• B2B Newsletters
  
  To learn more about how e-newsletters can help your organization maintain client /customer relations,and generate additional business from prospects and referral sources see www.BizActions.com. There you will find tools tips and techniques that will help you appreciate the power of e-newsletters by branding firm to the marketplace.

Typical accountant email newsletters prove that we are living in times of information overload.

We know that you can deliver timely and meaningful information on Financial Services, Human Resources, tax issues and accounting, but how do you keep your readers coming back.

One way is to personalize you CPA Email Newsletter by letting your readers know something about your firm, your employees and yes, your clients.

Some of the most successful CPA Email Newsletters with the most “clicked-on” articles have nothing to do with the Stimulus Package, New Tax Regs or 401K’s.

An article featuring the son of a secretary who just graduated West Point drew scores of comments from their readers. Another CPA firm wrote about the managing partner preparing egg omelets on a Sunday during tax season for all the firms’ employees. He said that for months, when he ran into friends and clients, it was the first thing they mentioned.

A Chartered Accountant Newsletter features a different client each month. The clients love it because it gives them exposure that they would not ordinarily receive and the firm’s prospects read about the type of clients that the firm services.

If you can inject the “human element” into your firm’s email newsletter, your clients, prospect and referral sources will look forward to receiving your newsletter and will become loyal and long term readers.

1. Database – First and foremost, it is difficult to run an effective email marketing campaign without a healthy database.  However, be sure to think in terms of quality, not just quantity. It is much more effective to have a solid database of good contacts that might be less in number, as opposed to an extremely large database consisting of mostly people who don’t know you, bad email addresses and purchased lists.  Create a strategy for capturing every single email address for all of your clients.


2. Design – With a New Year under way, this is the perfect time to think about redoing your email newsletter design. Be sure to have a graphics person help with this as opposed to just someone on your team with limited graphics experience.  As an example, BizActions fees for designing a brand new masthead for someone are minimal compared to the immeasurable value a professional design can lend to your firm’s appearance and credibility.  It is probably worth it to pay the extra money for something that positively and professionally reflects your firm’s image.


3. Message – Think about a strategy for the messages you would like to send this year and who you would like to target with those messages.  Also, make sure you are sending the most applicable content to the right people in your database.  You want to make sure your contacts view you as a firm that knows their clients needs and interests.  BizActions offers something called Master Accounts, where you can actually build separate newsletters for different segments in your database and your contacts can benefit from receiving information that makes sense for them.

Almost no one thought it would really happen, but Congress let the federal estate tax die for 2010. Lots of people are confused about what the repeal means. It's no wonder ... the current situation is a huge mess. Even worse, some large estates could face delays and unintended consequences.

Most people assumed Congress would step in last year and continue the $3.5 million federal estate tax exemption and 45 percent maximum estate tax rate that were in effect in 2009.

But lawmakers were tied up with health care reform and partisan politics so the year ended without an agreement.

Most tax professionals still believe Congress will resurrect the federal estate tax sometime in 2010 and that the effective date of the new rules (whatever they turn out to be) will be sometime in 2010. Some experts believe that making the new rules retroactive to January 1, 2010 would be unconstitutional. 

Imagine the uproar if Congress waits several months to retroactively impose an estate tax on wealthy people who died early in the year. The issue is likely to wind up in court, which will lead to delays and additional burdens for heirs.

No matter what happens in 2010, the estate tax is scheduled to come back in 2011 with a $1 million federal estate tax exemption and a 55 percent top estate tax rate. If Congress doesn’t pass additional legislation and that actually happens, countless more estates will pay the death tax. These days, you don’t have to be rolling in dough to have more than $1 million in cash and securities, real estate, insurance, trusts, annuities, business interests and other assets.

The repeal of the estate tax leaves us in uncharted waters. For the past 93 years, the United States has relied on the estate tax as a source of funding (before that, there were various other taxes imposed on estates during times of national emergencies).

What will happen now? No one knows for sure but one thing is certain: Estate planning will be challenging. Documents may have to be changed now and revised again before too long. Clients will need to meet with their estate planning attorneys, CPAs and financial advisers to ensure their documents are up to date and their wishes are carried out.

Anyone with more than $1 million in assets should consider how to minimize a potential estate tax liability.

No matter what happens, estate planning advisers must stay in touch with their high-net-worth clients over the next few years to keep them informed of the latest changes. BizActions is the perfect vehicle to accomplish that type of communication. Our newsletters will cover the laws as they are passed or phased in. With our service, you can have that information sent to clients ASAP. Plus, your firm’s professionals have the option to write your own articles and announcements to speak directly to your clients.

We provide financial planning newsletters, accountant newsletters, law firm newsletters, employee benefits newsletters and more.

When it comes to estate planning uncertainty, your clients have lots of questions. Your firm has one smart answer: BizActions.

Email Radar is not the only tool the BizActions Platform provides for you to segment your member database. You can also use the Report Rollups to organize your POCs in almost any imaginable way and look at that data broken down.

For example, let's John and Jane deal primariliy with customers who receive employee benefits newsletters, while Brad and Sue handle all the law firm email marketing. They've already been assigned their respective members of the database.

Now we can start defining our Rollup Levels. Create an Employee Benefits Newsletters Department and assign John and Jane to it. Similarly, create a Law Firm Email Marketing Department and assign the appropriate POCs to that.

But you can take it further than that, as you can have up to 5 levels of Rollups defined. Maybe your Firm has multiple locations and sends regional versions your Employee Benefits Newsletters. Add in another Rollup Level for Locations and assign your departments to the appropriate locations. Now you're all set.

Take a look at your reports. Your top level report now breaks down your numbers by location, and clicking into a location you'll see your numbers broken down by department. Click into a department, and view your numbers broken down by individual POC.

Rollup Reports are highly customizable and provide great insight into both your employees and your members.

No More Excuses

What is your excuse for not implementing an electronic newsletter for 2010?  Do you struggle with not having enough resources like a marketing director or coordinator to execute your marketing strategy or an electronic newsletter?

Using an outside email marketing professional, BizActions can help you to move forward in the New Year.  BizActions offers marketing services for 2010, so that you no longer have an excuse.  Services include:

• Customization of current BizActions e-Newsletters with newsletter content management and adding articles of firm’s choice, personalization of articles using Partner’s pictures and personal messages.

• Work with web master in making enhancements to existing web site. Maintain appropriate linkage between CPA firm web site and BizActions system.

• Launch e-mail radar for current business news flashes and tax alerts.

• Manage BizActions Data Base of your firm’s subscribers.

o    Scrub existing data base

o    Review/compare current billing data base system of clients with

o    BizActions data base

o    Update/eliminate bad e-mails

o    Provide on-going maintenance of data base once scrubbed

o    Grow firm subscriber data base by adding new clients, prospects, referral  sources, via new business forms or mailing campaign

o    Team members – regularly add firm associates to system 

• Set up personal e-mail from Partner to subscriber prior to receiving first BizActions e-Newsletter. (Good PR technique)

• Send personal acknowledgment to anyone who requests being added to system via web site.

• Provide individual messages from Partners to Client base as requested.

• Monitor and review all responses after each launch (out-of-office, general questions, change of addresses, problems with opening e-mails) and forward pertinent info to Partner when appropriate.    

• Review and analyze BizActions reporting system after each publication…….number of opens, read rates, highest areas of readership interest, possible leads.

• Do annual review with each Partner of their subscribers (or as often as Partner requests) for updating their subscriber data base and discussing lead generation.

• Keep CPA firm apprised of any enhancements to BizActions system that would benefit them.

No more excuses in 2010, let BizActions marketing services help you to set up, manage and implement your electronic newsletter.  Consider taking your e-newsletter results to the next step by cross-selling and harvesting those warm leads with business development emails, or by using our tool to conduct business customer surveys.