Why Now’s the Perfect Time to Shift Gears

In the face of recession the natural tendency is to lay low, to duck and cover.  It’s likely that your competitors are doing that already, which is why this is the best time for you to shift gears and take advantage of the economic downslide.  Here are six things you can to move ahead during the recession:

1. Take advantage of down time

Remember all those times that you bemoaned your crowded schedule and lack of free time?  And remember all those things you had to place on the backburner because you lacked the time to attend to them?  Take advantage of downtime by doing those things you may not have had time for before: networking, de-cluttering your office, researching industry trends, reorganizing your files, following-up with prospective clients, etc.

2. Hire good talent

Now’s the perfect time to hire good talent for less.  The recession has left lots of talented individuals without jobs and without appealing positions to which they can apply.  You will be able to select from a qualified pool of applicants and bolster your staff in order to prepare your business for number three!

3. Prepare your business for an influx of new clients

Think positively and prepare your business for what might result in an influx of new clients for you.  As you market more aggressively (see six below), build your staff, and take advantage of downtime, you’ll find that your client roster will begin to grow.  So use this time to prepare yourself by ensuring that you have the resources necessary and processes in place that will enable you to manage all that business more efficiently.

4. Cut expenses

Of course it’s a good idea!  Take a look at your budget and see if there’s anything you can cut.  While an accounting practice doesn’t have much overhead, you may consider ways you can streamline your workflow, accomplishing more in less time.  Your objective should be to increase billable hours while cutting unnecessary expenses.

5. Diversify your services

The best way to take advantage of this recession is by making it more appealing to prospective clients.  Have you considered adding QuickBooks services to your menu?  Or perhaps you could learn how to prepare a small business’s tax returns as well as manage their books?  You’ll definitely gain an edge over the competition when you are able to provide full financial services for your clients who will be more than happy to take all their financial needs to just one firm.

6. Practice aggressive marketing techniques

Chances are your competitors are currently trying to maintain their rosters rather than grow them.  Big accounting firms are focusing on their A-list clients rather than their smaller ones who are no longer worth the time or energy to maintain.  Your aggressive marketing techniques will enable you to acquire many of those small business accounts that have been overlooked or forgotten.

Not only that, but when you market like there’s no tomorrow, you inspire more confidence in current clients who see your efforts as evidence that your business is thriving despite the recession.

Universal Can Help You Market More Effectively

UAC has been helping professional like you gain the skills necessary to succeed as small business accountants.  With over 25 years experience, we not only know the skills required to succeed but the strategies you need in order to market your skills more effectively.

It’s no secret that accountants are not marketing experts.  In fact, some accountants even get a little nervous when talking about promoting their services.  With UAC’s Universal Practice Builder (UPB) Program you will have everything you need to grow your business and your bottom line.

Here’s a sampling of what you will gain from enrolling in this amazing program:

• A guarantee of $30,000 in new annualized billings in only 12 months
• 12 marketing strategies that you can implement immediately
• A process which can produce 15 to 25 qualified leads per month
• 3 months of coaching via telephone and Internet
• Training on a computerized database tracking program
• A presentation DVD to show potential clients

While your competitors hunker down for a long recession, you need to take advantage of this time to grow your business and become the premier accounting firm in your area.  And when you enroll now you will receive QuickBooks Made Profitable (QBMP) for FREE, a program designed to help you use your QuickBooks expertise to enhance your services and attract even more clients!  You’ll be trained in the following:

• A proven system in using QuickBooks to attract larger numbers of potential clients
• Representing yourself as a QuickBooks expert
• Leveraging your time
• Meeting potential clients
• Offering clients services that will help them reduce taxes, increase profits and put money in the bank

Only ostriches hide their heads in the sand.  Don’t duck and cover simply because the economy is struggling.  You can take advantage of the recession and have a stronger business as a result.  Order this package today and begin a journey to a brighter financial future for you and your business.

Discover How Cracking a Book May Increase Your Bank Account

Steven Covey’s seventh habit for highly successful people is better known as “sharpening the saw” and refers to a number of ways in which you can renew yourself to become a better professional. In Japan they call this “kaizen,” a term that refers to the constant improvement of oneself.

Even the most dedicated accountant can get a little burned out working day in and day out for their practice. In order to rejuvenate and rededicate yourself, you must look for ways to sharpen the saw. In Steven Covey’s example, he explains that the long-term use of a saw, let’s say nine to five every weekday, can dull the edges, making it more difficult to be productive. In order to sharpen the saw you must sit back and take out your whetstone, attending to your craft without necessarily performing your craft.

The Value of Reading

Reading is a great way to sharpen the saw. It exposes you to countless new ideas and enables you to become a better, more thoughtful professional. In fact, the more books you read the sharper your saw becomes and the better you perform your accounting functions. And not only that, but the better business owner you’ll be.

In one job I held employees were required to spend 30 minutes a day reading the latest news on our discipline in order to be informed of current and even cutting-edge techniques. Not only did it keep me abreast of current events, but it helped me learn new approaches that I could incorporate into my day-to-day work activities. I became more efficient and more informed as I performed my duties. It also enabled me to sound intelligent when talking to peers about my profession.

We suggest that you try to do the same. Schedule 20 to 30 minutes a day, during which you will search books and magazines that will enable you to become a better financial professional. Perform searches on Amazon, ask colleagues and peers for recommendations, and research the literature getting the most buzz. The more you read the longer your reading list will become. Don’t get discouraged; just start at the top and work your way down.

Our Recommendation

The best books for you may be those focusing on running a successful small business of your own. Not only will it help you better manage your practice, but it will also help you consult your clients in doing the same.

Allen Bostrom, president and CEO of Universal Accounting Center has written a book designed to help any and every small business become more profitable, and it’s called In the Black: Nine Principles to Make Your Business More Profitable.

Allen’s father, Alf, made a living turning small businesses around. In fact, he was called the Turnaround King. For a small percentage of a business’s future profits, Alf would their business around, often yanking them from the brink of bankruptcy. In doing so, Alf learned many key principles about ensuring a business’s success. He passed those on to his son, Allen, who also has extensive experience helping small businesses thrive. Using his father’s principles and those he developed himself, Allen wrote In the Black.

In the Black presents 9 practical principles that you can begin applying to your practice, or your clients’ businesses, immediately. It’s a quick read that will enable you to see how, exactly, you can increase a business’s profitability. And as an accountant, you can use this information to enhance your practice, becoming your clients’ Profit Expert.

If you would like to enhance your business, and your bank account, by reading books that will sharpen your saw, start here. Order In the Black today and have 9 principles, at-the-ready, that you can use to enhance your accounting practice. This small investment will make a big impact on your future.

You and Your Clients: True Business Partners

When you think of the term “business partnership,” you might imagine scenes of men and women in suits sitting around a boardroom table, signing papers and shaking hands. But that’s only one way a business partnership can be formed.

There are actually many types of partnerships in the business world, and one of the most important is the kind you build with the clients you work with every month.

You and Your Client Make a Team

Clients rely on the service you provide to do their own jobs effectively and accomplish their goals. You, in turn, rely on your clients to keep your practice strong with their loyalty. And isn’t mutual reliance what great partnerships are all about?

Any business relationship a client has with your company is a relationship with you. As their company grows, so might yours. So build strong partnerships with your clients by getting “down to business” and providing top-drawer service every day.

Make Your Clients More Profitable and They Will Do the Same For You

The Professional Bookkeeper program teaches you how to make your client companies improve their bottom line. By helping your clients get spending under control, paying their bills on time, and simply put, spending less than they make, you become the single most valuable person safeguarding the financial future of the company. When you supply decision-makers with clear, actionable financial information about their business, you ensure that you will keep that client for years.

At least as important is that when clients benefit from your great service, they talk. They will tell their business associates about their turnaround and your part in it. Word of your abilities will spread. When you service a client that has increased the profitability of their business, it becomes a very easy thing to ask for referrals. The great work that you will do will prove to be the best marketing that you do.

How To Increase Your Client Base In An Easy, Natural Way

Module 4 of the Professional Bookkeeper program, “Building a Successful Accounting Service”, teaches you how to sell your services in a low-pressure way and get clients quickly. Since each client that you service will give you an average of $300/month for the 6-8 hours that it takes to service them, getting a few extra clients makes all of the difference whether you are servicing clients full-time or part-time.

Learn How to Build a Successful Accounting Service With the Professional Bookkeeper Program

What’s Your Target?

Knowing What Your Clients Really Want

The Bay Street Group is a firm that provides accounting and tax professionals with expertise in marketing, management, and strategy. In 2007 they performed a survey intent on finding out what clients really want from financial specialists. They received feedback from 1,799 accountants, financial advisors and CPAs from all sectors of the profession. 45% surveyed work in an office with 1-10 individuals.

The survey uncovered a gap between what financial professionals think their clients want and what their clients actually say they want. For example, 77% of accountants surveyed said they think that the majority (if not all) of their clients would recommend their services, while only 55% of their clients would actually do that.

What Clients Really Want

82% of clients surveyed said they might change accountants or firms if they got a good referral. You don’t want to be that accountant that looses a client because you weren’t aware of their real needs. The survey found that when clients choose an accountant or firm they are most interested in good service and attentiveness, the quality and reputation of the firm, and the accuracy of their work.

Good service and attentiveness. Clients want to feel valued, and that occurs when you practice good customer service. This can be achieved by treating each customer with respect, keeping all your promises, responding immediately to complaints, practicing good communication, and going above and beyond the call of duty. When you attend to your clients’ needs, they will know that you value their patronage. One accountant explained that they are most effective when they “worr[y] more about satisfying existing clients than obtaining new ones.” Another explained, “We can ask them how we are doing and what we can be doing better. Being proactive is the best approach to keeping strong client relationships.”

Quality and reputation of the accountant and/or firm. Remember that 82% of clients surveyed said they would switch accountants if they got a solid referral. Word-of-mouth marketing is still the most effective, simply because people trust the recommendations of friends and family. And the only way you can benefit from that type of marketing is when you develop a solid reputation. You’ll notice that these three characteristics are closely related; in providing attentiveness, good service and accurate work, you build a firm reputation that will get you countless referrals.

Accuracy of work. Good accountants recognize that their reputation depends on the accuracy of their work. It’s all about numbers, and when the numbers are incorrect, your reputation, and your clients’ business, are at risk. Your job is to help your clients enjoy profitability, and if your work is inaccurate, that can never be accomplished.

Miscellaneous. 40% or more of clients surveyed said they’re also interested in the following: affordability of services (67%), proactive advice and consultation (63%), specific understanding of their industry (56%), specific understanding of business (51%), problem-solving ability (44%), and personal chemistry (42%).

Reevaluate what you think your clients need, because you may be wrong. This survey indicates a significant gap in what clients need and what clients are actually getting. It’s important to do what you can to retain you current client base; remember, it’s 10 times more costly to attract a new client than it is to retain an existing one. So look at what you can do to improve service for your customers, because you’d rather be the one getting more business because of referrals than be the one loosing business because of them.
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Accounting and Bookkeeping Information

Whether you work for small businesses or high level corporations, it’s important to know exactly what your clients want so you can successfully cater your services to their needs. And regardless of business size, all your clients want top-notch treatment. In fact, ensuring they receive that treatment will nearly guarantee your ability to continually retain them as clients. Michael Platt is a management and marketing consultant who has worked with accounting firms for over 20 years. In an article entitled “What CEOs Want from Their CPA Firm: A Perspective from Accounting,” Platt discusses 10 things CEOs are looking for from their accountants, information he received from a panel discussion with a handful of what he likes to call “A-Level Clients.” Here’s what they had to say:

1. Practice Basic Business Etiquette
From answering the phone to returning emails, clients expect everyone in your firm to practice basic business etiquette. Often this requires you to hold training sessions that inform employees of your expectations and business policies.

2. Customize Your Approach
Not every client expects the same treatment. Some like regular interaction with a representative from your firm. Others just want a monthly update. In order to customize your approach you must first know your clients’ preferences. That requires focused and attentive communication with each and every person for which you work.

3. Be Proactive
Some accountants have the misconception that they work in a vacuum, crunching numbers and regurgitating data for their clients. That should not be the case. Accountants can change the course of a business by providing crucial information on what might be done to improve a business’s profitability. Clients want a Profit Expert. That can only occur when accountants are proactive.

4. Work as a Team
Everyone on your staff should work as a team. That means you should introduce your clients to all your employees so each client appreciates their roles and responsibilities and how they might be able to assist them.

5. Add Value
Clients expect your prices to be competitive and your services valuable. But unless you explain just how valuable they are, they may never know. These high-level CEOs told Platt that they expect their accountants to articulate their value, to understand how their services enhance their clients’ businesses and to take the time to explain it to them. In that you must know and believe that you and your services are valuable. Practice an elevator speech that will communicate just that.

While these CEOs may not be of the same caliber as your clients, they do offer valuable advice on ensuring that your firm adequately fulfills each of your client’s needs. Take care to cater your services so they address their concerns and respond to their unique issues.

Return next week when we’ll discuss the final 5 things CEOs are looking for in their accountants:

6. Recognize How Valuable Your Client’s Time Is
7. Understand Your Client’s Business
8. Streamline Your Communications
9. Share Additional Services
10.Make Their Lives Easier

Reference
Platt, Michael T. “What CEOs Want from Their CPA Firm: A Perspective from Accounting.” RainToday.com

Wouldn’t you like to know what your clients really expect from you? A panel of CEOs told Michael Platt, a management and marketing consultant who works with accounting firms, what they’re looking for in a financial professional. In an article entitled “What CEOs Want from Their CPA Firm: A Perspective from Accounting,” Platt discusses 10 things CEOs want from their accountants, information he received from this panel discussion with this handful of what he calls “A-Level Clients.” Last week we discussed the following five of 10 things these CEOs expect from their accountants:

1. Practice Basic Business Etiquette
2. Customize Your Approach
3. Be Proactive
4. Work as a Tea.
5. Add Value

This week we will share the final five qualities these CEO are looking for:

6. Recognize How Valuable Your Client’s Time Is
This says it all. Your clients recognize that time is money which means every minute you seem to waste appears to them as currency going down the drain. And more than that, thoughtlessly wasting a client’s time is disrespectful and may ultimately chase away your clientele.

7. Understand Your Client and Their Business
Sometimes it’s profitable to specialize in a particular business type: car dealerships, retail stores, restaurants, or hotels. When you do so you become familiar with their language, concerns, and unique needs. While you don’t necessarily have to specialize in order to understand, doing a little research in order to become familiar with your clients’ businesses will go a long way. In doing so you’ll earn loyalty, and perhaps, lifelong clients.

8. Streamline Your Communications
Don’t overwhelm your client with excessive emails and phone calls. They have work to do, and just because you can obsess over their financial data all day long doesn’t mean they want to. Make your correspondence clear and concise. And when working with your staff, ensure that you coordinate your communication efforts so clients do not receive duplicate and redundant information.

9. Share Additional Services
Like most people, your clients are looking for ways to make their lives easier. If you offer complimentary services - like tax preparation, QuickBooks consulting, or business assessments - it behooves you and your client to tell them about it. Don’t be shy. You offer valuable services that can enhance your clients’ businesses. The more you can do for them, the more indispensable you become.

10. Make Their Lives Easier
It’s important for you to be proactive, to anticipate your clients’ needs before they do. This is what elevates you from a common accountant to a valued profit expert. You provide your clients with the information they need to make wise business choices that improve their profitability.

Whether your client rooster is full of CEOs or mom and pop shops, applying these 10 tips like the 10 commandments of accounting will make you a highly favored financial professional. In no time at all you’ll find your elevated standard for customer service enables you to leap ahead of the competition.

Reference
Platt, Michael T. “What CEOs Want from Their CPA Firm: A Perspective from Accounting.” RainToday.com

Maintaining top service quality during the busy holiday season can be challenging. The holidays are among the most stressful times of the year because people travel, shop, and have family and business obligations all crunched into a two-week, very intense period with a lot of expectations and heightened emotions. Everyone’s in a hurry and expects prompt, courteous service despite the fact that there may be 10 or 15 other people demanding the same service at the same time from you.

There are steps you can take to minimize stress and keep clients happy and coming back:

* Be especially empathetic. Demonstrate genuine concern for clients’ problems. Use such statements as ‘I understand why you feel that way, ‘I see your point of view,’ and ‘I hear what you’re saying.’

* Go the extra mile. Little things mean a lot. Clients will really appreciate any effort you make to go the extra mile. For example: Give clients small gifts as tokens of your appreciation for their business, or mail them a nice
Christmas card.

* Underpromise and overdeliver. During the holidays, clients may make more demands than usual. By offering clients options and alternatives, you let them know what you can do for them, not just what you can’t.

The Running Your Own Bookkeeping Service portion of this site gives additional tips on the day-to-day operations of your Accounting and Bookkeeping business.
Learn How To More Effectively Run an Accounting and Bookkeeping service

Stay In Touch

To keep existing clients, they need to know that you are there for them. Keeping the lines of communication open with them is absolutely essential to keeping clients happy.

Objectives of communication with clients which email can facilitate include:

• Two-way communication of information needed to accomplish the tasks your clients are paying you for.
• Show your clients you are always there for them when they need you. Demonstrate that not only do your services cost less than if a client had hired their own bookkeeper, but that you are just as available.
• Show your clients that you are on their mind and that their success is important to you.

Your goals in communication with clients facilitate one of two goals. You want to keep the clients you have and find additional paying clients.

Advantages to Email Over Other Ways to Communicate

Email Is Time-Efficient

Phone calls and personal meetings rob you of time. Phone calls often result in spending large amounts of time socializing with clients. While you need to maintain a good rapport with your clients, they will appreciate you staying focused on the things they are paying you for. Their time is precious too.

Personal meetings are probably the worst wasters of time, since you not only have the time spent in the meeting itself, but the commute to and from a client’s place of business.

You can leverage from one email to another. You may find that you get the same questions by many of your clients. Look in your email client’s Sent box and see what you said last time. This will save you time and it ensures that you give consistent, well-researched answers, while keeping research time to a minimum.

You Get Time to Think

When you are face-to-face with a client or on a phone conversation with them, you often do not have the opportunity to take a few minutes to mull over the best answer. You won’t get time to research your answer if you need more information. While you can always tell a client that you will find out, if you use this tactic too often, you run the risk of your clients feeling like you don’t know what you are doing.

With email, you can take your time composing just the right response. If you are in doubt about how it may be received, you can always bounce the email off a friend to see how you can better phrase things.

Email Is Inexpensive

While postal mail costs money for envelopes and postage, if you already have Internet access (and if you don’t, you should), it costs you nothing besides your time.

Rules For Effective Emails

Communicating with clients through e-mail need not be a challenge. The best way to compose effective e-mail messages is to set up a basic format to follow.

Start by handling each of these areas:

The Subject Line

Write clear, specific, and concise subject lines. For example, rather than writing, “We have something we want to tell you about your profit & loss,” which is vague and wordy, write, “Your financials are done!”

Main Body of the Message

The first paragraph should restate the client’s question (if you are writing a reply to a client’s e-mail message).

The Closing

In the closing paragraph, thank the client again, and offer further assistance.

Be Polite

Because there’s no face-to-face contact in an e-mail communication, people tend to be more casual, outspoken, or even rude than they would be in person, or even on the phone. But good netiquette requires the utmost courtesy at all times.

Because a large percentage of communication is non-verbal, it is more easy to be misunderstood when you are not speaking directly to a client. Things like voice inflections and body language are often cues as to a client’s reaction to your statements. With an email, you never know the mood of the client when they read your correspondence, so you must be extra careful in your wordings and how they could be taken.

Formatting

Avoid using capital letters (except to punctuate names or the beginnings of sentences). In e-mail, capitalizing all the letters in a word is tantamount to shouting.

Accounting/Tax Terminology

Minimize accounting jargon. Avoid using financial acronyms and buzzwords unless you are e-mailing a true expert or long time client. Many clients will not understand this terminology, and may end up misunderstanding the message as a result.

Solve Issues the First Time

Resolve issues on the first contact. First-time resolution is just as important with e-mail as it is with traditional telephone interactions. It saves everyone time if you completely fulfill clients’ requests or resolve their problems in the first response.

Attachments

Use attachments only when necessary. E-mail attachments require readers to download the files, which can be annoying (or impossible if a client doesn’t have the appropriate software to open it with). Certain types of attachments may be blocked either by the email client (Outlook, Outlook Express, Thunderbird, etc.) or by the recipient’s internet service provider. Some kinds of files may contain viruses or other ill effects, so they may simply not arrive at their destination.

As silly as it sounds, it is very common to refer to an attachment in the body of an email, and then forget to attach the file you refer to. If you are going to attach a file to an email, it is a good idea to attach the file before composing the letter. Once you begin writing the email message, you can easily get involved in the message and simply forget to attach the file. This, of course, looks very unprofessional and is easily avoidable.

Proofread!

It’s critical to proofread e-mail messages before hitting the “send” button. Also, read sentences for clarity and accuracy, and look for any wording that could be misinterpreted. If your email client doesn’t have a spell checker, you probably want to consider using one that does. Few things look more unprofessional than misspelled words or other typos. If your email client does not support spell checking, consider composing your emails in your word processor and spell-checking with it. Then just copy and paste the text of the email into your email client before sending.

Know When Not To Use Email

When clients write with complex questions or several questions, it may save time if you reply by phone.

If a client expresses a preference to use another method of communication, respect their wishes, even if it takes more time or effort. Keeping existing clients pleased with your work usually takes less time and effort than finding new clients if they become dissatisfied.

Email: Just One Aspect of Running Your Accounting Service

Most accounting courses focus on teaching you the basics: debits and credits, general ledger, and so on. One thing they will never teach you is how to run an accounting service, much less how to make it profitable. That’s what we do, and why Universal Accounting training is so different. Sure, you’ll get the basics, but you will also learn how to find clients and how to sell your services for the highest possible hourly rate. If you want an accounting job making $10 per hour, go to a university for training. If you want to learn how to make $30 to $60 per hour, set your own flexible hours, and be your own boss, you owe it to yourself to click the link below and learn more. Hundreds of our graduates started down the road to personal and financial freedom with that same little mouse click.

Learn Why an Accounting Service Will Best Achieve Your Financial Goals

Changes in technology are occurring daily — changes that will make your life easier, and make you a more valuable resource to your client. Today’s clients are more demanding and sophisticated than yesterday’s were. Stay up to date on their ever-changing expectations by taking these steps:

* Be a voracious reader. Read everything you can about your client’s industry, new service techniques, and changes in the marketplace.

* Become ‘techno-savvy’. Spend part of your budget to stay ahead of the technological curve.

* Monitor technological trends. If you don’t receive customer surveys on an ongoing basis, find out what you have to do to get on the routing list.

* Talk to your clients. What’s the best way to find out what your clients want? Ask them. Keep on asking them.

It’s that simple.

Our newsletters will always work to keep you up-to-date on the latest in accounting technology and client relations.

The Software Questions and Comments section of the Forum gives advise on software and other technology questions.
Click HERE to Visit the Technical Section of the Forum

Tax Simplification: “Not Gonna Happen”

A recent student asked me how to respond to a well-meaning relative who felt that accounting was a dying occupation because of tax simplification. I’m often asked if a simpler tax code, meaning flat-tax or federal sales tax, would eliminate the need for accountants. Those who ask this question obviously don’t understand what an accountant does.

First of all, I don’t think such a tax bill could ever pass. Too many special interest organizations with powerful lobbying groups will lose too much to let any such bill pass without a fight.

• Religious organizations will argue that their funding from contributions will dry up.
• National homeowners’ associations will argue (and rightfully so) that homes will drop in value as mortgage interest will no longer be deductible.
• Medical organizations will buy TV ads telling stories about people with debilitating diseases and high medical bills going to ‘tax prison’ because they lost their medical deduction.

And, those are just the obvious problems.

Plus, most tax simplification plans will tax the poor heavier and the wealthy lighter than they do now. That’s a hot-potato that neither political party will support.

No, the public will never let such a thing happen.

Even if we were to assume that such a tax program will be adopted, accountants will remain in high demand. Certainly simpler tax laws may eliminate tax preparers. But most tax preparers aren’t accountants.

The primary and most beneficial roles accountants perform are in the area of management controls, and cash management. A company stands to gain much more through staying on top of these areas than saving on lower taxes. Let’s face it, companies don’t go out of business because they are paying too much in taxes, but they will if they have poor controls, or poor cash management.

Big businesses certainly understand this. A large company I once worked for had four thousand accountants. Less than 1% of these accountants worked in the tax department. In other words, 99% of the accountants with this company were working on providing management with crucial information regarding profitability, while monitoring the company’s financial position. This company understood that income taxes are a necessary evil that require some attention, but the potential for business improvement is much greater in other areas.

So, do we ignore taxes? Certainly not! Taxes must be completed, and done correctly according to law. Besides, a good tax preparer may save a tax payer hundreds of dollars, if not thousands in taxes — sometimes many times the cost to have the taxes prepared.

Tax preparation will always be needed. And, my guess is that it will become even more complicated before becoming any easier.

Regardless of the tax law, however, accountants will always be a critical part of the business world.

Also, see the article entitled “Why are Businesses Begging for Your Services?” This is “must reading” for every freelance accountant.