Navigating a freelance accountancy career can be overwhelming, especially when you lack an important criterion of freelance career – having effective marketing skills. Take any freelance business or job or service, the only thing it thrives on is continuous, full-proof marketing strategy. So, if you are a freelance accountant or planning to work as an independent accounting consultant, then we have compiled few essential tips that will accelerate your professional journey.
If you didn’t know, most small to medium-sized businesses depend on external consultants for their accounting and bookkeeping work, such as doing their finances, recommending financial tools and filing their taxes. Even private individuals make use of contract accountants to manage their money. Everyone has money, obviously and with the almost unlimited supply of clients, it is important that you define your skills and market them properly to attract more prospects.
It does not matter what level you operate at, our said tips will help you market your skills as a freelance accountant at different facets of your career.
If you want to assess your skills and your capabilities, then do it from a point of view of a hiring manager. We think most of us forget to define our capabilities when it comes to skills. But it is very important that you judge from a third person’s POV to understand what you can do.
Companies that cannot afford resources, infrastructure and skills required for bookkeeping and accountancy generally fall under the category of small to medium-sized businesses (SMEs) or start-ups. These companies typically don’t (or cannot) invest in big financial firms. So, your main focus should be on such companies as this is a great and thriving market to tap. What you should do is make yourself visible to these firms, who are younger and smaller, and then offer services and solutions that fulfill their business accountancy gap. You can start by scheduling free assessments of their financial statements and then provide customized financial solutions.
By doing this, you will also give them a chance to evaluate your competency and how it can benefit their business. Always remember (careerlancer stresses on this) that you are not here to sell your skills but you are here to give effective solutions via your skills. So, that should be your focal point.
Moving on…
A freelance community is a place (online or offline) where you get to network with other freelancers, formally as well as informally. Networking will not only help you improve your knowledge in this field but it will also open doors for job opportunities. Upwork is one such popular freelance networking site. The site lets you to build a solid profile, market your skills and find potential employers. You can also join closed group communities or other job events in and around your location.
It’s not necessary that you have to communicate and socialise with only fellow freelance accountants. In fact you can also get in touch with other freelancers with different job profiles. This is because their clients may at some point require accountants and vice versa, your clients may seek for other professional services like digital marketing, designing etc. too.
One of the valuable and most recommended resources to market your skills as a freelance accountant is social media platforms. You can access hundreds of thousands of customers in matter of few minutes through these platforms. The only criterion iskeeping yourself active in all of these accounts and stay connected as much as possible:
LinkedIn is a business social media site. Create an account and update your profile. Don’t be disheartened at the very beginning itself. A LinkedIn account creation can be tricky and needs intelligence. So, make sure you read blogs and assess other account holders before setting up yours. Your focus should be on demonstrating your skills and what those skills can offer, in a distinguishing way. Your profile introduction should entail everything about you and your services.
It will take some time to understand the ins and outs of LinkedIn but being continuously active will make you an expert quickly.
A professional Facebook Page can boost your freelance business in several ways. Facebook is the oldest and most popular social networking community and obviously you will have friends there. Create a good Facebook page, post relevant information about your job and skills and share the page with your FB followers. Ask them to follow your page and add people for more information.
To make it even more authentic, include testimonials from satisfied clients, keep your page professional and updated and make it look useful for people searching for accounting work. Use hashtags where necessary and share information (blogs, articles, videos) relevant to your job. Don’t post anything personal.
Build a website that demonstrates your skills. You can host your own site or else hire a digital marketing firm to do the work. Your website should outline your business profile, the services you offer, sample work, testimonials, a blog page and a contact page.
Start writing blogs and post them on your website. Yes, you don’t have to be a Shakespeare with excellent vocabulary or grammar to write blogs. Blogs written by youare meant to show to your clients how well you understand your job and how you can varyingly utilise your skills to address business related issues.
Share your blogs on your Facebook and LinkedIn pages as well. And make sure your Facebook page has your website mentioned.
Your CV should be distinctive to that of a full-time professional. Make your CV a case study where you talk about your technical skills with suitable experience. You should mention about your Top clients and how you helped them with your accounting skills (of course in few lines). Also ensure that your CV doesn’t cross 2 pages.
This should be the finalaction-planonly when your freelance career takes off really high. You could explore the career further by considering the idea of growing your individual freelance business in to consultancy firm. You can probably recruit small team with newer freelancers and formalize a brand around you.
Don’t stop with these, continue to educate yourself with additional bookkeeping and accountancy courses to stay abreast of others. We will come with another interesting freelancing skill in our next post. However, if you can add up to our list of marketing skills, please comment it below.