Marketing By Numbers

Every now and then I invite another small business owner to share their personal marketing experiences, tips and tricks. Today’s guest blogger is Jeri Wilson, owner of Hawkeye Business Services. I came across Jeri on Twitter where she was offering her Followers a commission for referrals. I love seeing small business owners using Twitter to sell…not blatantly…not every tweet…but a little offer amongst some tips and updates is a good thing. Jeri does just that…although at the time of writing, I think she’d twitted just one too many Ping.fm tunes! Ah well, trap for young players!

If you’re a Bookkeeper or Accountant this is a must read. If you’re stuck for some ideas to get more customers it’s also worth the next five minutes of your life. To anyone who says Bean Counters aren’t creative…Jeri just proved you wrong. Check this…

“You must believe in a product completely before you can start to market it. If you are passionate, confident and knowledgeable about your product, understand how it has benefited you and be able to explain clearly how it will benefit others, then you will be on the right track to successfully market your product. The key to the success is showing people the real you. Don’t try and change yourself to be something else, people won’t believe in you if you don’t believe in yourself.

I work in an industry that is based solely on trust and the most successful marketing tool is word of mouth from happy customers. As a bookkeeper, the quality of my work, my professionalism, simplicity and ability to handle client affairs with complete confidentiality is what makes happy clients. One of the most useful tools for a bookkeeper is being able to simply describe to clients how bookkeeping works and what the information means to them and their business.

The bookkeeping industry is flooded with undertrained bookkeepers that do not provide quality service for the price they are being paid. With an average bookkeeper, in some cases the client would have been better off saving their money than having a bookkeeper because the bookkeeper had no idea at all. The most difficult hurdle that I currently face relates to the potential client not knowing whether I am a good bookkeeper or an average one until they give me go.

For new clients, I provide a free initial consultation to review their current bookkeeping system and advise any improvements that need to be made for their bookkeeping system to provide them with the relevant information and meet their expectations. The clients can then either:

1.    Take my free advice and use their own resources to improve their system
2.    Use us to train their staff how to implement and manage the bookkeeping system
3.    Use us to review what they are doing periodically to ensure they are on the right track
4.    Use us to complete some or all of their bookkeeping tasks

In order to get the clients initially, I offer commissions (from 2.5% to 10%) to family, friends and colleagues who refer new clients to Hawkeye Business Services. Imagine earning up to $5 per hour for every hour someone else works on your friend’s bookkeeping. It benefits everybody: the client, the referrer, the bookkeeper and Hawkeye Business Services.

I am also very passionate about helping other people who have to do bookkeeping (whether they are professional bookkeepers or not) to be able to understand what they are doing when recording their transactions and be confident that the figures they are producing accurately reflect how their business is performing. That is why I am developing a Bookkeeping Training Network for people who want to learn and be confident in their bookkeeping skills, as well as a Bookkeeper’s Start-up Kit for those who want to move into bookkeeping professionally.”

Thanks a gazillion Jeri…So readers…Which of Jer’s ideas are you going to try?

2 Responses to “Marketing By Numbers”

1. Melissa Says:
   May 13th, 2009 at 2:52 am

   Great read! I love the commission idea for family & friends & may give it a try myself. I can’t wait to check out the Bookkeeping Training Network Jeri. Keep up the good work!

   Melissa

2. Kirsty Wilson Says:
   May 16th, 2009 at 9:42 pm

   I remember seeing Jeri’s tweets regarding the commission offer. I hope it has worked for her. There is nothing wrong with letting others know what you do. Jeri is a great connector & always interacts well…so when she gives her services a plug, it’s what we would expect. A great read Tim.
   Cheers
   Kirsty Wilson
   kirsty_wilson

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