EP346: Jeff Jacobs - How To Build Trust With Your Bookkeeping Clients

02/14/23 • 35 min

“If you’re going to work with someone and they’re going to give you access to their client base, they’re really going to have to trust you.” -Jeff Jacobs

Trust is fundamental to any relationship and yet so many of us struggle to build long-lasting and trusting relationships. Expectation plays a key role in how trust is formed. When someone lets us down or fails to deliver on a promise, it shakes our faith in them.

But more deeply, it shakes our faith in ourselves. After all, we put our faith and trust in that person or organization to deliver. When they don’t, we question our ability to make the right decisions going forward. This becomes a never-ending cycle of self-doubt and inconsistent trust-building activity.

Jeff Jacobs, Director of Development at Wilkins Miller LLC, is this episode’s featured guest. His approach is a personal one that focuses on the team rather than the individual as the key to success. Building caring and trusting relationships with employees and clients, not just to leverage them later, but to learn how he might best help them reach their dreams.

If you are struggling to build trust, consider how much of your intention is on what you want to get out of a client rather than on how you can improve their lives. When clients don’t feel valued, they are less likely to trust you to manage more of their needs. When was the last time you checked in on a client just to see how they are feeling or to ask them what you could be doing better?

During this interview, you'll learn...

The value of trust in long-lasting connections
How to create strong business relationships
The importance of keeping people in the loop

Click here to find out more about Jeff.

Connect with him on LinkedIn.

Time Stamps

02:09 - Jeff talks about his career journey 08:52 - Why building trust matters 10:50 - Creating centers of influence 13:54 - Overcoming the obstacles of industry 16:02 - Find the way that works for you 20:29 - Keeping people in the loop 22:06 - Delivering a quality offering 24:22 - Building strong business relationships 33:28 - How to get in touch with Jeff

This episode is brought to you by our good friends at Pure Bookkeeping!

If you want to grow your bookkeeping business, get back your time, be more efficient and have confidence that your work is best practice, you need proven systems, processes and standard operating procedures.

That’s what Pure Bookkeeping offers. To find out more, visit PureBookkeeping.com TODAY!

“If you’re going to work with someone and they’re going to give you access to their client base, they’re really going to have to trust you.” -Jeff Jacobs

During this interview, you'll learn...

The value of trust in long-lasting connections
How to create strong business relationships
The importance of keeping people in the loop

Click here to find out more about Jeff.

Connect with him on LinkedIn.

Time Stamps

This episode is brought to you by our good friends at Pure Bookkeeping!

That’s what Pure Bookkeeping offers. To find out more, visit PureBookkeeping.com TODAY!

Previous Episode

EP345: Amy Anderson - How To Find Your Ideal Marketing Style

“You really need to identify your target audience. If you don’t know what market you’re in and who your ideal client is then how can you even begin marketing?” -Amy Anderson

Marketing ourselves isn’t easy and in the bookkeeping industry especially, where we tend to be more introverted, it can be hard to build an exciting and outgoing profile. Fortunately, marketing ourselves doesn’t have to be all or nothing. There is room for us to find ways of doing it that play to our strengths.

It's easy to get discouraged when you spent a lot of time on a marketing strategy that had few returns. This doesn’t mean you are a failure. It just means you need to try something else. Perhaps that is hiring someone to help you market your bookkeeping business or to find passive and slow marketing tools that can be working for you in the background.

Amy Anderson, co-founder of Wild Coffee Marketing, is this episode's featured guest. She has spent 25 years helping businesses market themselves to the right kind of clients. Her expertise and holistic marketing approach have helped countless businesses find the right clients, build consistent and engaging profiles and feel more at home in their niches.

If you are struggling with marketing, unsure about what to do next or how to grow your bookkeeping business beyond the "I must take every client I can get" mindset, this is the episode for you!

During this interview, you'll learn...

The value of finding the best methods for the type of person you are
How to manage referrals to find your ideal clients
The importance of leveling up your client list

To find out more about Amy, click here .

Connect with her on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Time Stamps

01:50 - Amy talks about her career journey 04:21 - Navigating the hurdles of business 06:21 - The common marketing mistakes 07:18 - Defining who you are & what you offer 10:53 - Mastering referrals & finding the ideal client 13:36 - Levelling up your client list to avoid bad clients 16:28 - Finding the best marketing method for you 24:08 - Accepting the need to adapt 27:04 - Balancing your professional & personal life This episode is brought to you by our good friends at Pure Workflow! It’s a simple, easy-to-use workflow practice management solution which will help you manage your clients, deadlines, workflow and team with ease. The BEST PART? It's specifically made FOR BOOKKEEPERS! For more information, visit PureWorkflow.com!

Next Episode

EP347: Melissa Morris - Project Management: How To Create Your Ideal Workflow

You don’t know what you didn’t know. And everything that’s living in your head, we’ve got to get it out of there! -Melissa Morris

It is often easy to feel like no one can do what we can do and yet, we rely on hastily written to-do lists or checklists quickly passed off to our employees. If things in your bookkeeping business aren’t running smoothly, it is unlikely to be because of employees being underqualified and intentionally doing things wrong. It is far more likely that we haven’t explained to them or trained them in how things need to be done.

Getting everything out of your head and down on paper in a way that is understandable takes a skill set a lot of us haven’t trained for. There is no shame in hiring someone to help you translate the workflow systems as they exist in your head into a document that anyone could follow and achieve the same results as you.

Melissa Morris, owner of Agency Authority (a project management and operations consultancy), is this episode’s featured guest. She has spent her career using a wealth of knowledge and experience to help businesses maximize their teams, increase productivity and grow their profits.

If you are feeling overwhelmed and burnout, haphazardly chasing apps in the hope they can fix your issues, or getting too hands-on, micromanaging employees, then this is the episode to help you get the right help to get the gold in your head onto paper so that your business can not only run effectively and efficiently but be easily scalable to new heights!

During this interview, you'll learn...

The value of effective & efficient workflows
The key components of a successful project
The importance of finding your zone of genius

To find out more about Melissa, click here.

Connect with her on LinkedIn.

Click this link to book a time to chat with her.

Time Stamps

01:50 - Melissa talks about her career journey 03:48 - Finding our zone of genius 05:08 - Overcoming the obstacles of business 08:09 - Preventing overwhelm & burnout 11:27 - Effective & efficient workflow 16:20 - The key components of a successful project 18:40 - Melissa talks about the power of transformation 21:27 - Learning from our struggles 24:21 - Making the big mistakes work for you 29:58 - Getting connected with Melissa

This episode is brought to you by our good friends at Pure Workflow! It’s a simple, easy-to-use workflow practice management solution which will help you manage your clients, deadlines, workflow and team with ease. The BEST PART? It's specifically made FOR BOOKKEEPERS! For more information, visit PureWorkflow.com!