Transcription
People like to say how AI is coming for accounting firms, and that may be true, but not in the way that you would think. It'll come for our lowest paying clients. It'll change how we staff our firms, even how we build our internal systems.
So, in this video, I'm breaking down the most important things to prioritize in your firm in 2025 based on hundreds of conversations with real firm owners so you can skip the guesswork and build a firm that will thrive regardless of what happens with AI. I'm going to cover five important points, and the first two, like, they will immediately add to your bottom line. Genuinely, 5 minutes from now, you're going to see a path to a more profitable firm.
Okay. My name is Jason. I last ran a 40-person accounting firm. Now I help accountants around the world run killer firms. We're jumping straight into the AI boogeyman discussion because, as I mentioned, AI will change the accounting profession, but not in the way that most people think. Firms today, we should absolutely be leaning hard into AI. In fact, I would argue today's AI-first firms are already pulling ahead of those firms who are still stuck on issues we frankly should have resolved by now. How to train the team up on AI, how to navigate security concerns.
But arguably the biggest way AI could reshape our profession in the short term is productized solutions. The company serving the bottom of the market getting much more powerful with AI, which is what makes it imperative for traditional firms to get serious about moving upmarket. Because in an aggressive AI timeline, AI comes for the bottom of the market first. Let's look at bookkeeping for an example, and say I serve a range of clients who pay me anywhere from $500 to $1,000 per month. Right now, that's probably all right because most productized solutions start around $300 bucks. But when these productized solutions lean into AI, and you better believe they're already doing this, it's bound to have one of two effects. Productized solutions will either charge more because they can serve more complex clients, or will have a deflationary effect on everyone else's prices. So these productized services, their prices, it may end up starting at $500 a month instead of $300, or these services will actually get a lot better so that on simple engagements, it'll become harder for me to justify the prices I once did.
Now, that may be hard to believe. I probably lean to the former timeline more than I do the latter. But importantly, the right thing to do today for either one of those timelines is the same. It's to move upmarket to serve clients that those productized services can't serve well. And getting upmarket at all starts with better pricing. Because the only way to guarantee you aren't upmarket above what productized solutions are selling is to look just like them and charge the same prices. So much of how clients value something simply comes from what they pay for it. And as simplistic as this sounds, the way that you will guarantee someone doesn't value what you do over what productized solutions do is if you charge the same thing. Now, obviously, there's 100 levers to pull to make that more premium service worthwhile or not. But the most common trap is we get paralyzed, afraid to ever charge more, and we never find that premium client as a result. Cheap prices attract cheap clients. And when a premium client sees rock-bottom pricing, they're going to assume rock-bottom delivery.
So, where do we start? How can we begin to more effectively capture a client's willingness to pay? I can tell you how I struggled with this, and you can, you can see if it resonates. I always had clients complaining about price. There was never a day when there wasn't a cheapskate in our midst. And even when I would give these people discounts, they would still complain. As a result, whenever I considered increasing prices, my mind immediately went to these people. I thought about how they would be beside themselves and make me feel as though they were being hard done by. I would fixate on the people unwilling to pay more, not recognizing that I also had clients who would happily pay more. My C-level clients were stopping me from optimizing my firm to attract more A and B clients. Sound familiar? Ever been there? Get a, get a little tummy tingle there.
Here's the thing: every client has a different willingness to pay. And the easiest way to capture that willingness is to introduce three-tier proposals. This looks like offering clients the bronze, silver, or gold package. But even within this framework, 80% of firms still get this wrong because the core opportunity is to let your cheapskates self-select, and the folks happy to pay more pay more. It is truly an immediate boost in revenue. And equally important, your clients just decided for you who the cheapskates are and who they aren't, which may actually be the same thing as who's still on the client list in two years and who isn't. This self-selection actually becomes a guide for who you want to work with in the future.
But the, the trap here, and this is what most people get wrong, is to do more on the silver or the gold plan when what you really want to do is better. So, for example, let's say the gold tier costs 3x the bronze tier. Most firms will feel pressure then to do three times the work of the bronze. Don't do that. That's more. That's not better. An airline, for example, will charge three to sixx as much for first and business class seats, but only spend one and a half to 2x on, like, delivering the service for those people that they do the plebs, the normies. So, if your bronze level service is the minimum, uh, filing the tax return, closing the books each month, then silver doesn't have to look like comprehensive tax planning or closing the books by the fifth of the month. It's, uh, closing the books while wearing a fancy hat or being more responsive. You can do comprehensive tax planning, but there's also a bronze version of that versus a gold version that for you is much, much more profitable. I'll put a whole bunch of ideas on screen here for how you can make something feel premium. This will probably seem really silly to you, especially as most accountants are very practical people who don't spend on things that may feel trivial. But the fact is people pay for exclusivity, for the fast track, for the premium offering, especially entrepreneurs who, who want to feel like they're a cut above the rest, right? All we're doing here is we are letting people pay more if they want to.
And these first two items that we've covered, charging more to escape the bottom of the market and capturing willingness to pay. Don't think, "Oh, Janice, Janice, we should do this in year-end renewals." Don't do that. That's a trap. Consider, is there actually a version of this that we could, we could do now that we could do by the end of the month? Because these changes, like, they add money to the bottom line as soon as you do them.
Okay, these next two are the biggest operational blockers to most firms, and nailing this will genuinely shave years off of your journey. Next, we need to talk about investing in your peer network. I am not a network guy. In fact, the only accountants who I tell to go to local networking events are those who want to work with realtors. But my firm-running journey took a huge turn in 2018 when I went to my first accounting conference. And I sat down at breakfast the first day with a table of three other firm owners. And over the next 45 minutes, realized that every question I had ever had about how to run a better firm was better answered by my peers who are doing the same thing than any thought leader or or software company. And I, I get the irony of that as I say this. But all the answers you're looking for, someone else out there, they've already tried the things you're thinking about doing. And rather than guessing what you should do next, the goal should be to go out and find the person who's already done it that can give you the shortcut. I'm so bullish on this. In fact, like, the moment I realized this in my career was the biggest turning point.
We've talked on the podcast about a, a structured approach to how you build this peer network. I'll give you the short version here. These are the eight types of peer relationships firm owners need to develop. A tactical peer group. Not just one person, but a diversity of perspectives on the day-to-day stuff from people who run firms just like you. A group for each of your core tools: my practice management system, the tax software. The day that I was able to stop relying on what salespeople told me about software and instead could rely on real people at real firms, people actively using those tools. Uh, that was, let's just say we, we started using software a little bit better. Next one, friends who are a step ahead. The people who help you visualize what you're trying to become. And actually equally important, friends who are a step behind. This is immensely fulfilling. Being able to help others in the profession who are currently where you were a few years ago. Here's one people don't think about much. Friends who can hand down clients. The bigger fish, who are cutting clients that you'd be happy to have. And if they had a solid referral partner in you, they would send you loads of work for the same reason that you need this. Friends you can hand clients down to because those clients you've been hanging on to too long, it's much easier to pass them off when you have the right home for them. Here's a biggie, a connection within your specialization, that is the type of client that you're trying to serve. Last, a couple friends for personal support because running a firm, man, like, it's a lot. These have been the most important relationships that I've developed, and I'm so bullish on the value of your peer network that it's actually kind of what I've devoted my life to now. I run a peer networking community for small firms that tries to give you a bunch of shortcuts to build these relationships. It's called Realize. I'll link it down in the pinned comment. What a shill. Look at this guy.
Okay, last two points. How to reinvent your hiring funnel since this is the number one blocker for most firms finding the right team members. Now, we'll talk about how to systematize the stuff you do. So, most of us, we are, uh, severely blocked on hiring. We're perpetually looking for that, that senior who's a unicorn. And if we could just find that next person, man, we'd be off to the races until we need the next one, or, or somebody leaves, or we're blocked on change management, and you want to hold your team accountable, but, uh, you, you can't because you have no leverage, and if they leave, you'd be absolutely hosed. I have, uh, yeah, I've been there. I have an entire closet full of those t-shirts. They've got all the leverage because you don't have a sustainable way to find new staff.
A few things I challenge you on here. First, consider what makes your firm a great place to work. And if it isn't something you can put on a careers page or that you can describe in 15 seconds or less, then you haven't nailed the pitch yet. It's not enough to be an accounting firm. And just like it's very hard to build a, a firm that's great for any type of client, it's near impossible to create a juicy proposition that will appeal to every potential hire. Because this, this whole, like, just being a great place to work, we're nicer than everybody else. You'll see once you come work for us. Even if that is completely true, nobody knows that until they start working with you. So they'll only agree to start work with you based on the info that they can gather externally. And, and this is like, uh, so many other things in entrepreneurship where when you're stuck, and I spent probably 10 years stuck on hiring, to get unstuck requires breaking some assumption that we hold today. That might be having the courage to be opinionated for the first time. Not being afraid to say who you're great for and who you're not great for. And maybe having to eat the cost of a recruiter for the first time. I don't like paying that ransom any more than you do. But consider the cost of not finding the right person. There's a reason that recruiters exist.
Or I'll actually tell you the biggest thing that I did here. You look seriously at offshore hiring. Oh, here we go. Okay. The last four accountants that I hired, they were in the Philippines, and they were fantastic. True story. Uh, zero chance I would ever go four for four with onshore hires. Maybe I just got lucky. But it completely changed how we approached staffing in our firm. And this was an 80-year-old tax firm. You better believe we went into that with all the fears and ignorance you would expect. What about security? What about disclosures? But what opened my mind was I had a couple friends who ran killer firms. I looked up to them and eventually learned they did a ton of offshore hiring. And so the assumptions that I had up to that point, there was no way to, like, resolve them with what I was seeing in the real world. And it forced me to change my perspective and, and it opened us up. We just started learning, opened our minds. And I'd encourage you to do the same thing because patriotism, patriotism is great, but it's not a business strategy. And if there's somebody on the other side of the planet that will do that work at half the cost, you got to have a really strong answer in 2025 to not offshore hire.
Last, we're going to talk about systems. So, so important. But first, if you need a partner that'll make offshore hiring really easy for you, what team? That's the Jason Daily House fan. [Music] Okay, consider this video sponsor. [Music] It's TeamUp. Except for TeamUp, they make it easy. Easy, easy, easy, easy, easy squeezy. Listen, okay, we partner with TeamUp because they'll help you directly hire really talented accountants in the Philippines. I know a bunch of firms who have happily used TeamUp and now continue to return to TeamUp each time they need to make a hire. It's why I'm happy to promote what they do. And unlike most offshore staffing groups, you're not paying a mailman each month. You just hire people and you pay those people directly, no different to the rest of your team. We're the best. Give TeamUp a call and we'll do the rest. Great accountant. We'll find them for you. Watch more of Jason's videos. That's what you'll do. [Music] You guys, you're very kind. Like I said, I know a lot of firms who are very happy with TeamUp, and they actually just released a free salary guide that's really good. We'll answer like all the questions you could potentially have about doing this, and I'll link that down in the video description.
Okay, last point, and everything you just heard is, is honestly kind of table stakes compared to this, is that most firms still haven't systematized, and so we're operating at like half the output that we could be simply because we don't have repeatable processes. Well, every client is different, and that is true, but building systems is about taking the 80% or 50% or even 20% of that type of engagement that's the same every time and putting it on rails. Let me tell you what I did in my firm, and this is a true story. Step one is to get all your peeps into a room and put on a board all the different things that you do for people. And it is going to be a mess, a big hot mess. But the good news is this is, this is the worst that it will ever be. So you put all that up on a board and you look to see what they have in common. And those common threads are what you begin to build your systems around. Maybe that's simply how you gather info. We take a bite-sized part of the entire process and we put that on rails. We deskill it in the process. This means we're, we're saving the time of your most scarce resource, your big-brained technical people. We start small, we get some wins, pull some admin folks into things that were once technical parts of the process, and then we keep going.
And a funny thing happens as soon as you have a system, even if it's a big old sloppy one where clients are still doing things differently, a funny thing happens is once your teams agreed upon the basic framework for those systems, for the first time, your engagements start trending toward being more similar than they are different because the natural state of your engagements is they will grow more different over time. That is just like a force of professional services nature because, uh, your client Mike doesn't want to have to make the simple hire contributions, and Janice made the mistake of picking up those tax forms in person last year. Your engagements on their own, they will get more different over time until you have a system. Even if it's just a loosey-goosey one, now your team has a language to propose to the client, "Hey, let's actually do this instead." The next time the conversation of doing something off the wall comes up, they're like, "Yeah, no, we've actually got a preferred way to do this. Let's, let's go down this path." And your client's usually like, "Fine." But until that exists, your team doesn't have anything to tell them. And once you have that, the engagements, they start getting more similar for the first time. And you can start systematizing things just a little bit more. I've actually got a whole detailed process of how your firm can do this. It's literally the most liked video that I've ever made. I spent an entire week on a free template that'll make this way easier for you to do. The same process I followed in my firm. And I'm going to show you how to do that right up here. Here it is.