Payroll
The Fastest-Growing Firms Go Beyond Accounting
Small businesses have struggled to adapt to the many complex government regulations and heightened expectations surrounding employee benefits. They’re turning to their accountants for support in this area, and the fastest growing firms are leveraging ...
Oct. 24, 2016
In a recent survey of accountants across the country, Gusto, an all-in-one platform for HR, payroll, and benefits, found that 88% of the fastest-growing accounting firms enjoy helping clients with non-accounting services.
Benefits stood out as one of the biggest areas of opportunity for forward-thinking accountants to explore. According to Gusto’s research, 85% of accountants say they are asked by clients for benefits advice, yet only 52% feel confident doing so.
Small businesses have struggled to adapt to the many complex government regulations and heightened expectations surrounding employee benefits. They’re turning to their accountants for support in this area, and the fastest growing firms are leveraging software that enables them to be help clients with benefits, HR and other areas outside of traditional bookkeeping and taxes.
“I’ve long advised accountants to step into a trusted advisor role. Now with Gusto’s fully integrated payroll, benefits, HR and 401(k) offering, accountants have an easy, trusted technology solution they can leverage to do just that,” said Doug Sleeter, founder of The Sleeter Group. “I’ve used Gusto for my own clients, and am thrilled with Gusto’s new tools that allow accountants to provide even more value-added services.”
Gusto has attracted over 3,000 high-growth accounting firms like HPC and Bench to their Partner Program. The company also recently redesigned the program to better enable accountants to build stronger client relationships and become trusted advisors. Gusto now serves 40,000 small business customers nationwide.
“Gusto has changed the way I run my practice,” said Joanne Ort, owner of ORT CPA. “I save over 400 hours a year – that’s 50 full days! I can use that time on CFO-type services, which is really where my time is better spent.”
As a top-rated app on Intuit’s QuickBooks marketplace and the #1 Xero add-on, Gusto centralizes payroll, HR, health benefits, workers’ compensation, and 401(k) in one place. By using Gusto, accountants and clients alike are able to avoid manual data entry and the errors that result, helping them stay compliant.
“We know accountants are doing more than ever for their clients. We’ve built our partner program to make it easier for accountants to help their clients in complex areas, from health benefits to 401(k) to payroll,” said Lexi Reese, Chief Customer Experience Officer of Gusto. “We’re thrilled to see our partner program grow to over 3,000 accountants, and we look forward to forging many more relationships with CPAs.”