Think about the last time you noticed a business had stellar customer service. What was it about the service that stood out? Chances are, there was some element of personalization: a product, a shopping experience, or even a friendly greeting that seemed meant just for you.

Personalization can grow business revenue up to 15% in many industries. Accounting is no exception: clients entrust accounting professionals with some of their most sensitive financial information, which creates an ideal opportunity to deliver personalized service. Yet often, accountants struggle to find time to get to know their clients.

So how can accountants deliver more personalized client experiences? Here are three strategies your firm can start with.

1. Centralize client data for better service

As data-driven businesses deliver increasingly personalized experiences, people are growing to expect personalization from all the products and services they use. 

In wealth management, for example, people are starting to expect financial advice that’s much more attuned to their unique financial circumstances rather than just an overview of generic investment opportunities.

While larger companies need to rely on sophisticated data management processes, small accounting firms have an advantage: on average, they’re only working with between 50 and 200 clients rather than thousands, meaning they can develop closer relationships with each client.

At the same time, you’ll still need some best practices for managing client data in order to track each client’s unique circumstances from year to year.

That’s where centralized client data comes in. With ProCharted, you can keep all client information in one place – so notes, billing, work items, and organizational info give you a complete picture when it’s time to return to their file, regardless of which accountant is assigned to their next project.

2. Segment clients to scale outbound communications

Creating automated emails is a great way to market your firm’s services, but clients from different industries will likely have different business needs, deadlines, and new regulations to consider.

Segment your clients to organize them into smaller groups to deliver more personalized communications at scale. This can help you market your services back to existing clients, or market new services with upsells. 

Thomson reuters reports that progressive firms are moving from seasonal tax services to year-round services. However, that also means it’s important to reach out to different client segments when they may need new services.

For example, you could use emails to:

• Update corporate clients on new ESG regulations as they come out to prepare for audits, or remind them about other services you offer such as payroll.
• Remind individual tax clients about upcoming filing dates, or send emails to help improve their financial literacy year-round.
• Create a list of leads who you haven’t worked with yet and market your services to them.

In ProCharted, you can add notes or additional details to their profile to track what segment each client belongs to.

3. Find your niche to improve personalization over time

If you’re like most accounting firms, you probably started out by offering general services to maximize your reach – but over time, it’s a good idea to gravitate towards a niche.

Often, that means focusing on a particular service, a particular industry, or both to improve the quality of your services for a subset of customers. An accounting firm focused on law clients, for example, will have much more in-depth industry knowledge than a generalist firm.

Segmentation can help with this, too. In ProCharted, client data is connected to billing data so you can easily track income by client. This can help give you a better sense of which clients tend to have a larger lifetime value to find out which industries and client types get the most value from your services.

A few final tips on personalization for accounting firms

Personalized service starts with understanding who your clients are. In your client notes, you might want to track things like:

• Significant life or business events that affect their financial picture over time. When you reach out to them again, this enables you to proactively ask about updates.
• Financial plans they’ve communicated to you, even if you haven’t started working with them on their goals yet. This will help clients feel like you’re truly listening when they share information with you.
• Personal details that can help your team improve their affability, regardless of which team member reaches out next.

Keeping the whole team in the loop is also crucial to delivering personalized service. If one team member has all the details on a client, their absence risks disrupting your client relationships. When your whole team is in the loop, you’ll be able to create standards for personalization to deliver the same great service every time.

Ready to start delivering more personalized client service? Get started with a 30-day free trial of ProCharted today.