How to find new clients for your accounting firm

Building a new accounting practice takes a lot of hard work, and driving client growth is essential to your success. Having a smart, proactive strategy in place is the best way to find new clients and replace lost ones.

This guide will explore how to find new clients for your accounting firms by using tactics like:

• Attending meetups
• Joining a freelancing website
• Speaking at events
• Practising your elevator pitch
• Updating your website
• Joining a Facebook group
• Partnering with a software provider 

Attending meetups is an excellent way to meet new people that might need your accounting services.

Meetup.com is a website and app that you can use to join groups for your own industry and go to meetups where potential clients hang out. Try to place yourself in your prospective client’s shoes and search for a group or event that might interest them.

However, your goal when attending these meetups should not be just to sell but to make real connections and have good conversations. Ask about attendees’ industry and show an interest in what they do. Build a connection first, then hand them a business card and tell them to keep you in mind if they know anyone who needs an accountant.

Making a memorable impression first will increase your chances of the person thinking of you when they need the services you offer.

Signing up to a freelancing website can be an excellent way to find new clients, and most allow you to register as a freelancer or a business.

These sites will help you connect with prospective clients looking for accounting services. If you’re new to accounting, try to emphasise this will benefit prospects. Maybe you’re very adaptable and charge much lower rates than other accountants on the site?

Small businesses might not be able to afford a Big Shot accountant, meaning your reasonable rates will attract them to your services instead. However, it goes without saying that your service should still be of the highest standard you can offer. 

As you build up your reputation, gaining more experience and positive reviews, you can find more clients and increase your prices. Make sure you stay in touch with clients you work with and see if they need any more tasks done down the line.

Another excellent way to make yourself known in the accounting industry and showcase your expertise to prospective clients is to speak at public events, both online and in person. 

Make sure your talks provide value to the audience and wrap up by letting them know that you’re taking on new clients. 

Start small and work your way up. Large conferences often host local events leading up to the main event. These smaller events will likely take on less experienced speakers to fill their slots. Then, as you build a reputation as a thought leader, you can start applying for speaking engagements at larger conferences.

Even though you’re not a salesperson, it’s still good to have an elevator pitch ready, so you can promote your business effectively when an opportunity arises. If you can’t clearly communicate your value proposition, you’ll struggle to convince clients to work with you.

An elevator pitch is essentially a summary of your services and why they’ll bring value to a prospective client. Having an elevator pitch memorised means you can be a salesperson for your practice whenever you need to, and increase your chances of getting more clients. 

Creating and maintaining a professional website is the perfect way to demonstrate to clients that you mean business. Systems like WordPress, Wix, or Squarespace enable you to design your website for free or at a reasonable price.

Make sure your website looks clean and professional, is easy to navigate, and clearly lists who you are and what you do. You also want to make it easy for prospects to contact you by adding a link to your contact details on the home page. The easier you make it to find your details, the more likely a user is to use them.

You’ll also want to make sure your website is optimised for SEO (search engine optimisation) and includes keywords that users are likely to search for. Unsure of how SEO works? Learn more about SEO in this guide.

Facebook has lots of different groups you can join to find new clients. Joining a Facebook group in your own industry can be an excellent way to get leads from other members. For example, someone might post that they have a client or two to give away. 

However, the best groups to join to find clients are ones that operate in adjacent industries where your clients hang out. As an accountant, you can join these groups and create a post asking if anyone needs free accounting or bookkeeping advice. Pitch in when you can to expand your network and attract new clients. 

Software companies want to partner with businesses that can promote and implement their solution. Partnering with these providers will also give you access to modern and efficient accounting software that can give you the competitive edge you need to attract clients.

For example, Countingup’s free accounting software allows accountants to connect directly to their clients’ business current accounts and gain instant access to their transaction data. 

The Countingup business current account and accounting app automatically matches invoices to payments and automates time-consuming bookkeeping admin, saving hours of time when it comes to tax returns. 

Countingup also lets you view clients’ profit and loss, balance sheet and trial balance reports. The accounting software is built specifically to help you manage your self-employed and sole trader clients. 

Our software is MTD-compatible and full of features for accountants to review and manage client accounts efficiently, with direct access to their real-time organised data. Find out more here.