How to Help Your Clients Sleep Better at Night

Focus on the Growth Potential of Your Clients

It’s time to stop measuring success by how many tax returns you have completed, and start measuring against the growth your clients have had since working with you. Advisory services is more about helping solve financial problems that keep clients up at night, rather than checking the amount of money in their bank accounts. The introduction into advisory services with each client is essential to understanding their concerns, as well as showcasing your expertise. Sit down with your clients and ask them: What keeps you up at night? What are your biggest financial stressors? What contributes most to these stressors? Investigating their concerns further will allow that relationship to grow far beyond just tax returns. Your clients’ will gain more trust and come to you for advice more regularly. 

After you’ve started to work on a solution with your client, to provide the best advisory services and help them succeed you also need to ask yourself: Is the new meeting cadence mutually beneficial? Do they feel like they can ask more questions and have them answered? Are your clients getting more out of advisory services to help them succeed in the long run? By offering advisory services and exploring these key questions, you are letting your clients know you are there to offer expert recommendations, help them overcome financial concerns, and grow and succeed in their aspirations.. 

Create Long Term Goals

With advisory services, you and your clients have more time to focus on setting long-term goals rather than focusing on the next tax return. This helps you stay in-tune with your clients wants and needs, and allows you to get a better understanding of what they want or need out of this partnership. Do they want to franchise their business? Are they focused on paying for their kids’ college education without taking out loans? Do they want to retire with a summer house? Getting a better understanding of what they are working toward will allow you to offer more tailored recommendations, and meeting regularly will help you keep them on track. Advising on long term goals can help clients achieve all of their aspirations, and more. 

Check Your Progress

It’s important to continue to check your progress throughout the year, as you continue to work with clients At least once or twice a year, explore whether your clients have made good progress, and how your advisory services have contributed. Did they accomplish what they wanted to? Have they invested based on your recommendations and succeeded in it? Have they grown throughout your partnership with them? Working through these answers will not only help your clients feel successful, but it will also foster their trust in your services. 

Keeps Them Prepared for Anything

With the constant ability to ask for advice and have goal setting meetings, clients will be better equipped to handle anything thrown at them. A pandemic? Financial crisis? Unforeseen tragedies? With the plan you put in place to help them succeed, they are as prepared as they could be. Start having conversations with your clients about advisory services and the benefits of keeping close tabs on their ongoing financials and goals. By asking what they would do in each situation, and planning to improve those baseline outcomes, you can help your clients be ready before the crisis strikes. 

Your clients will have a better night’s sleep when they know you are as invested in their financial health and success as they are. By offering advisory services, you will build better relationships with your clients and be able to relish in their success as well.

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Jasen Stine is tax and accounting education leader at Intuit. Jim Buffington is advisory services leader for Intuit Accountants.