“From September 2009 to September 2011 my CPA Firm business nearly doubled.” David Scheumann
I collected social media success stories while writing the book “Success Using Social Media.”
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@scheumannCPA scheumanncpa.com linkedin.com/in/scheumanncpa |
From September 2009 to September 2011 my CPA Firm business nearly doubled.
Twitter and Facebook alone brought in 35-40% of this new business. I met lots of great people through Twitter. Some absolutely great clients who are now good friends. These connections then referred me to lots of new business, tax clients and PT-CFO clients.
The funny thing is I resisted social media like the plague for a couple of years. Thought it was just stupid. And of course, generally speaking, my profession does not like change and the thoughts within my profession are that social media is stupid.
One day I was talking to a friend who is a car salesman. He was telling me about how his sales are up…but workload was down. He was making connections via social media and as friends of friends (and/or tweeps) would be looking to buy a car, people would recommend him. So, 1) people were coming to the car dealer and specifically asking for him, or scheduling appointments with him, 2) he was finding out exactly what people wanted before they got there and had numerous cars lined up and ready and 3) he sold a few cars virtually, except for signing the final papers and delivery. Often he never met the customer IRL.
So, I decided to give it a whirl. BUT, I was only going to use it for business! I would tweet out tax tips, topics, reminders, etc. That was it.
Well, I had some followers and had some folks reply from time to time about the tweets. But no real business growth. Then my more social side kicked in and I started to actually interact with people. Folks started asking about services. A few folks asked me to do guest blog posts and speak at lunches/dinners. As you can imagine, that is when I started to see business growth. So I really started to embrace it and continued to see even more growth in my business.
Now, back to my profession not liking social media. I was at a continuing education event a year or so ago. I was sitting with a group at lunch and the topic of business development came up. A few of the guys were complaining that they have done ads in phonebooks, ads in local magazines, direct mail, discounts to new customers, etc, etc with little to no business growth. So, I spoke up and openly admitting to not only having Twitter/Facebook accounts, but that I actually use them.
Before I could explain what it had done for my business, I was told just how stupid it was. Now I know what it would be like to don a UNC sweatshirt and walk through the Duke campus.
The guy sitting next to me (one of the main complainers) just started ripping on me and Facebook. “I would NEVER accept a client looking for a CPA on Facebook! NEVER! I don’t have time for that crap. I don’t care if someone is getting dinner at xyz restaurant. Blah. Blah. Blah.”
Once they were all done chastising me, I reminded them how they were all complaining about not seeing results from all of their marketing efforts. I asked them how much had they spent on the Yellow Pages ad, the direct mail pieces – both in production and mailing the post cards. I then explained how I had seen real results that I can link directly to social media. I explained to the guy “that would never accept a client looking for a CPA on Facebook” that I bill several of these clients that he would “never accept” more than he spent on his entire direct mail campaign.
Before I excused myself from the table, I had one more comment….Oh, by the way – IT IS FREE!!
I am so glad that I have decided to get engaged on social media. Building relationships that open doors to business for my CPA Firm.