Latest / The Accounting Leads Now Podcast / From Compliance to Advisory: Amanda C Watts’ Guide to Transforming Your Accounting Career

Transcript

From Compliance to Advisory: Amanda C Watts’ Guide to Transforming Your Accounting Career · The Accounting Leads Now Podcast

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to CFO Chronicles the secrets behind success, the go-to podcast for fractional CFOs and accounting firm owners who want to attract more high-paying clients and increase their revenue.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: Hosted by James Donovan from Nine Two Media, this podcast dives into marketing strategies specifically designed for lead generation and client acquisition.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: In each episode, you'll hear from industry leaders sharing their success stories, and Thank you so much for joining us today, amanda.
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: I'm really looking forward to our conversation.
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: We're joined by Amanda Watts from Business Advisory Academy.
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: Amanda, for those who aren't familiar with your work, do you mind giving yourself a quick introduction?
• 1:03
  Speaker 3: Yeah, of course, no problem at all.
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: So my name is Amanda C Watts and I think we might do some conversation around marketing today, so I'll explain what the C is later on.
• 1:14
  Speaker 3: But yeah, amanda C Watts and I work with accountants and bookkeepers and CFOs to help them move from a compliance-based accounting firm to adding in either an advisory offer or literally going I don't want to do compliance anymore and becoming purely business advisors.
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: So there's a few options on how I help my clients, but one of the things that is absolutely fundamentally key is that I show them how to have the confidence and the clarity on what business advisory actually is and enable them to go and create their own business advisory offering.
• 1:50
  Speaker 3: So that's what we work on is really helping them get the clarity and the confidence and being able to deliver that advisory offering.
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: Is that where the C comes in?
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: Confidence and clarity?
• 1:59
  Speaker 3: It's not that, although people have said to me that does C stand for clarity and it's not.
• 2:04
  Speaker 3: Actually it stands for Claire, which is my middle name.
• 2:07
  Speaker 3: But I'll give you the marketing lesson right now.
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: So when I first got married so Watts is my married name when I first got married and you googled Amanda Watts, two people came up.
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: One was a serial killer in Australia and the other one was a serial killer in Australia and the other one was a woman who was selling golden tickets to get into heaven and she was selling them for a fortune in America.
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: So, like Amanda Watts hasn't got a great reputation, so I had to find a way that people could introduce me so that when someone Googled me, it was Amanda C Watts which is my middle name.
• 2:42
  Speaker 3: And actually that has worked many times for my clients, because sometimes their name might be famous and when you're trying to show up on Google and be found on LinkedIn or be found on Facebook, you're up against these famous people.
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: So if you use your middle initial, it enables you to then stand out.
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: What it does mean is I am a bit of a diva, because if I'm not introduced as Amanda C Watts, I'm like uh-uh, no, no, no, you have to put that C in there, like you did.
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: James, you just called me.
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: No, it's absolutely fine, because now we've actually shared the reason behind it and we've helped people with it, so it's not a problem.
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: But it's about the only time you'll find me as a bit of a diva.
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: It's like no, you've got my name wrong, it's amanda c watts.
• 3:24
  Speaker 3: So yeah, there you go.
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: Amanda c watts, thank you so much for joining us.
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: That's awesome.
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: That's an awesome um marketing strategy, so that you are standing out, especially on the searches, because it can be so hard to be found when other people are sharing your name.
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: And yeah, I'm sure you don't want to be referred to as the serial killer or the individual you know.
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: Golden tickets to heaven.
• 3:46
  Speaker 3: So I know, right, I want a better reputation than that.
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: So, yeah, it just means that when someone Googles me, I show up for what I want to show up and that's like a lesson that all of your listeners today can get is, when they Google themselves, how are they showing up, or are they even showing up, and what do they need to do to make that happen?
• 4:04
  Speaker 3: How are they showing up, or are they even showing up, and what do they need to do to make that happen?
• 4:06
  Speaker 3: Because we will always Google someone.
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: I Googled you, james, before I came on your podcast.
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: I was like who is this guy?
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: So I go to Google, I go to your website and I go to LinkedIn.
• 4:14
  Speaker 3: They're the three places I go and have a nose and that's what everyone does.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: Even if they have a referral, they still Google you.
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that's.
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: That's great, Great advice.
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: So, Amanda, I would love to hear a little bit about how you got into this space.
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: What were you doing prior to starting Business Advisor Academy?
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah, really great question.
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: So I am not an accounting profession when I would say back in 2016.
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: But my dad is a tax technician and he used to work for HMRC, which is the government here in the UK.
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: I say that quietly because that's a bad person to work for, a bad company to work for.
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: He also then moved from HMRC to one of the big four accounting firms and in the 90s here in the UK we had terrible economy and he got made redundant.
• 5:11
  Speaker 3: And when he got made redundant he decided to run his own tax firm and bought into a franchise.
• 5:18
  Speaker 3: Now, sadly, this franchise said to him hey, buy my franchise, spend all your redundancy money on this franchise and you will have a successful business.
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: What actually happened was he struggled to get clients.
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: He had huge outgoings, the clients who bought from him bought on price and he ended up having to close the franchise because he was really good at tax but really bad at marketing.
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: So then he decided to become a consultant and get better clients but less of them.
• 5:49
  Speaker 3: Not try and run this massive firm with 1000s of tax clients, which was a nightmare and just worked with a few key clients.
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: He even got like a part time consultancy job in another accounting firm as well as having his own higher value clients, which was amazing, right.
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: So in 2016, he said to me oh I'm going to retire, amanda, and at the time I worked with startup businesses and coaches and consultants.
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: And he said you're really good at helping people get great clients.
• 6:18
  Speaker 3: Why don't you work with the accounting firm?
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: And I love accounting firms and I laughed.
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: I was like Dad, like I wouldn't say that an accountant would want to work with me.
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: I'm not an accountant.
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: And he said give it a go.
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: So I've always been very kind of do as I'm told by my father.
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: At the time I was like 40 years old, right, but I always do as I'm told.
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: And Dad said do it.
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: So I went forth and got a few clients and realized that me, with my strategy mindset, coupled with the very data driven mindset of an accountant it's an amazing experience, absolutely amazing.
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: So I've now had over 1000 accounting clients where I've worked with them and I've probably influenced 10s of 1000s of accountants and bookkeepers around the world and I'm so happy and I'm so lucky and I get to change people's lives, and they get to change people's lives and we have this massive ripple effect and it's great.
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's awesome.
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: I love that.
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: You mentioned the ripple effects.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: I speak about that with our team.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: I speak about that with our clients as well, and it's more than just that first person you're to and you know, maybe one strategy implemented, what's going to happen after that and, like you said, the ripple effect and your client's business and their family and then the families that are, you know, connected to that family and etc.
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: And etc.
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: So that's awesome.
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: Exactly, and one of the things that I really see is that when people start a business like generally, I'm not talking about accountants and bookkeepers when someone starts a business, they do it probably because they either want to make a difference in the world, or they want to make some money for their family, or they want more freedom.
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: Right, one in five businesses gone in the first few months.
• 8:01
  Speaker 3: Right Then, like four out of five businesses gone within five years.
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: The world can be changed, the economy can be changed, if we can have less businesses go out of business, and the number one pivotal company to help these businesses are accountants and bookkeepers, because they understand the numbers.
• 8:21
  Speaker 3: And one of the things I talk a lot about is business coaches are stealing your clients for the advisors.
• 8:26
  Speaker 3: So the accountants and bookkeepers that want to be advisors and business coaches are still ensuring that we're having loads of businesses go under.
• 8:35
  Speaker 3: So we need to step up as financial with our financial acumen and actually rescue these businesses.
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: And that's the ripple effect, because we change people's lives, we change people's businesses and we also then change the economy, and that then lifts the entire world up and then we can make our way to Mars, and then we're just changing everything right, so, but that's a whole nother conversation.
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: But yeah, it's accountants and bookkeepers who want to offer higher value services are absolutely pivotal in whether or not the American economy, the British economy, any economy around the world thrives.
• 9:09
  Speaker 3: That's it.
• 9:09
  Speaker 3: They're absolutely pivotal with it.
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: That's so cool, Amita.
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: What would you say is one of the biggest myths about transitioning from compliance to advisory?
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: um, fear, I don't know if it's a myth.
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: Fear is like a really big problem and the fear is I'm not going to have all of the answers.
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: So I suppose to answer your question now I've like talked it through, not thought it through is the biggest myth is that they have to have all the answers.
• 9:38
  Speaker 3: As a business advisor, and if I say you came to me james and hey, amanda, can you coach me?
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: I would really like some help.
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: I want to grow my business and I told you what to do all the time, you wouldn't listen to a word.
• 9:52
  Speaker 3: I said you would say in your brain you'd say I don't have the time, I don't feel like doing that.
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: That's outside my comfort zone.
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: I'm not going to do that and you don't look old enough to have children.
• 10:03
  Speaker 3: But for those who have children, if you say to someone and say to your child you have to do this, they're not going to do it right.
• 10:11
  Speaker 3: So the biggest myth, I think, is that accountants are told that they have to be business advisors and they take it literally, when someone says you need to advise, that they have to advise, but that actually isn't true.
• 10:24
  Speaker 3: What you have to do as a business advisor is lead mentor, ask questions, help people get clarity and just kind of support your client.
• 10:36
  Speaker 3: And the other day I was on a call with my clients and they asked me.
• 10:40
  Speaker 3: One of the women asked me for an answer and I said you're not asking me for an answer, I think you're just asking me for permission.
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: I give you permission.
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: And she went, oh, wow, okay, great, so I can just do it.
• 10:52
  Speaker 3: And I'm like, yeah, you've got my permission to do it.
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: And she's like that's the best advice I've ever had.
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: I was like I haven't given you advice, I've given you permission, right?
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: So as a business advisor, the biggest myth is that you have to give advice.
• 11:04
  Speaker 3: The biggest myth is that you have to give advice.
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: That's the worst thing you can do.
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: The best thing you can do is get really good at asking questions and helping your clients get clarity themselves on what they need to do, because if you tell someone what to do, they're not going to do it.
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: If they decide to do it themselves, they're more likely to do it.
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: So you got to get really good at asking questions.
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: That's so cool, that's so impactful.
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: What are your thoughts on being very vulnerable and admitting when you don't have the answer?
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: Because I feel like a lot of business owners or individuals in maybe an elevated space where they're coaching or they're consulting or advising, they feel like they always have to have an answer and they might just come up with one for the sake of well, this is the position I'm in.
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: But what are your thoughts on when someone says, hey, look, I don't know, but let's talk it through or let me go try to find the answer somewhere else, because I think a lot of people might think that'll damage their reputation and then they're not, you know, looked at as the expert anymore and they're not, you know, looked at as the expert anymore and they're not needed.
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you see, I love that question Because I think you've almost answered the question in the question that you've given me, in as much as if someone doesn't know the answer and they make it up or they have a best guess and it's not correct, you are going to get egg on your face, you're going to lose the credibility, you're going to lose trust.
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: It's going to be a disaster.
• 13:15
  Speaker 3: However, if you say to someone actually I don't know the answer to that, but I have got an acquaintance, he is an IFA, for example, right, an advisor who can help you with that.
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: I'm going to go and speak to him and I'll either bring you back the answer or I'm going to intro you, you to him, because he can help you with that specific problem, probably better than I can.
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: And another great way for advisors to thrive is to have their little black book of really good people that know all the answers.
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: So I love working with my own mentors.
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: That can go oh, let me introduce you to Bob.
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: He can help you with that problem.
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: Oh, let me introduce you to Claire, he can help you with that problem.
• 13:53
  Speaker 3: Ooh, let me introduce you to Claire, she can help you with that problem and having all these different people that I can get introduced to sometimes.
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: That in itself is priceless.
• 14:00
  Speaker 3: So own the fact, because if you fudge it and you make something up and you have best guess and it's wrong, then you're going to lose trust with your clients and you're not going to be that trusted advisor, you're going to be that liar advisor and you'll lose them as a client.
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, the saying of it.
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: You know you can lose trust.
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: It takes forever to build trust, but you can lose it in a second.
• 14:23
  Speaker 3: It sounds like exactly what you're covering, yeah absolutely In seconds, and I think that that works in any relationship and we need to look at the advisory practice that we bring to our work, as it is a relationship and, whether or not it's a relationship with your children, you fib to your children or your children fib to you, you get upset about it.
• 14:44
  Speaker 3: The same with your partner, your husband or your wife, if you know.
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: The moment they tell a fib or a lie and we find out, we're like, oh, oh, actually I don't know how I feel about you anymore, so just own it up, like, own it like my kiddies.
• 14:58
  Speaker 3: I can just say to them what have you done?
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: And they'll go, oh, mom, and I'll be like, okay, that's fine, that's absolutely fine, rather than you're fibbing to me, that's not fine, okay, does that make sense?
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: it.
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, for those who who are moving from advice or compliance to advisory or or they're thinking about it what is generally like the first couple of steps you would recommend to someone who wants to start that path?
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: So advisory, I think, is overused.
• 15:32
  Speaker 3: The word is overused, which is really ironic as it's the name of my business, the Business Advisor Academy.
• 15:37
  Speaker 3: However, what I would say is, instead of taking the first step into being an advisor, look at who is a good client you've currently got and how.
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: If you were to sit in a room with them for an hour, how could you help them in a way that is more than just being compliant?
• 15:58
  Speaker 3: Is it sitting with them and helping them get clear on their goals?
• 16:02
  Speaker 3: Is it sitting with them and helping them through something?
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: Maybe they need to raise some money and they need to apply for a loan, or they don't know if they need a loan, or they do need a loan.
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: Just sit and help someone with something that isn't to do with compliance and build your confidence, because it's confidence that sells and it's confidence that will enable you to have the strength to ask the difficult questions.
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: So the only way you're going to get confidence is through capability, and the only way you're going to get capability is through courage to actually take action.
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: That's so good.
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: That's so good, amanda.
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: Let's flip the script a little bit to the marketing side of things.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: Okay, how do you ensure you're getting enough people on your calendar to know about your business, to sell your services?
• 16:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 16:57
  Speaker 3: So I think I'm really lucky.
• 16:57
  Speaker 3: And the reason why I'm lucky is because I started marketing to accountants in 2015.
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: And in 2015, it was really easy to build an email database.
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: You would put out there and go, hey, come to my webinar.
• 17:08
  Speaker 3: Or hey, would you like a copy of my ebook?
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: And every accountant would go, yes, please, amanda.
• 17:12
  Speaker 3: So I built a really nice database of accountants, which means that every time I want to make a sale, I send an email out to my database.
• 17:20
  Speaker 3: If accountants are at the beginning of their journey, getting an email address from someone is, a more difficult and, b, even when you have that email address, getting someone to take notice of you is more difficult.
• 17:33
  Speaker 3: So it's kind of like what would I do now versus what I did that enables me to have a nice life.
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: Now I would say so whenever I want to make a sale, I and I'm not going to I'm going to exclude how I get calls in my diary, which is mostly through my email database.
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: Whenever I want to make a sale and I wake up and I'm like you know what?
• 17:53
  Speaker 3: I haven't got a good week ahead of me I will literally reach out to people.
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: So I talk about the fact that every single day, you should be building your audience, you should be starting conversations.
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: So say you're a potential client for me.
• 18:07
  Speaker 3: James, I would reach out to you on LinkedIn.
• 18:09
  Speaker 3: I'd be like, hey, just want to introduce myself.
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: You've been a LinkedIn connection, but we've never spoken before.
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: This is what I do.
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: Do you know anyone that might be interested?
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: And if I send 20, 30 of those every single day for five days, I'll get a client.
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: It's as simple as that.
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: But you've got to do it from a place of not trying to sell, but a place of hey, I genuinely want to build a relationship and sadly, sending messages like that have become very generic and not from a place of I want to build a relationship.
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: So, yeah, just be authentic and start conversations.
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: And one of the things that I'm doing with my clients now is scrap online, which I know is so counterintuitive.
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: But scrap online.
• 18:51
  Speaker 3: Go and have a conversation with someone, networking face to face, and get them as a client.
• 18:57
  Speaker 3: Maybe it's time to go back to BNI.
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: Maybe it's time to go networking again, because people want to deal with people and everything that we've gone through online If you look at your Instagram, if you look at your Facebook.
• 19:10
  Speaker 3: Every other thing, every scroll that you do, it's got an advert in it.
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: Someone's advertising to you, I'm advertising to you, I run Facebook ads Right, so I'm in your Facebook timeline.
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: Best way to get a client is to have conversations with people.
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I 100 percent agree.
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: It's really like you said.
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: It's just have conversations every day with more of the right people.
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: It's boring, there's nothing cool, there's nothing flashy about it.
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: It's the boring stuff that works and it's just being consistent, doing the boring stuff.
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and you I think even yourself talk about how you help firms generate and keep more revenue with zero ad spend.
• 19:49
  Speaker 3: Like you're all about relationships.
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: I assume I've not seen inside your program, but I'm assuming you're about relationships yeah, so we yeah, I probably need to tweak that a little bit because we we have expanded and we do work with paid ads now with our clients for some of them, some of the programs, but, like, our core offer is still very much just reach out to people on linkedin.
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: Who's your target audience?
• 20:14
  Speaker 3: let's build your network, everything you're speaking about because the planting those seeds and watering them day after day after day, you're going to and let's look at the math right, if you need 20 clients, and if you have 20 clients paying you two grand a month, then you're going to be making about $450,000 a year, right?
• 20:34
  Speaker 3: So to get 20 clients means that over the space of a year, you probably need to speak with 60 people, which means that you need one sales call a week.
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: So to get one sales call a week, how many people do you need to talk to?
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: Probably five.
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: So you need to have five conversations to get to 20 clients, which is nearly half a million bucks a year.
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: It's simple math, right?
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: Sorry, I just get, I get.
• 20:56
  Speaker 3: I have people come to me and like I need help with marketing.
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: It's like no, you need help with conversations, that's it.
• 21:01
  Speaker 3: You need to learn how to have conversations with people.
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: If someone wants 1000 clients, then they need help with marketing because they need to run a machine.
• 21:10
  Speaker 3: But you don't need a machine, you need conversations if you want 20 clients.
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's also not going to happen in the first week or in the first month, I mean you can have an amazing, an amazing month, but you're probably going to burn out and pull all the hair out of your head, but it's just.
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: It's going back to being consistent, right?
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: Have those conversations.
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah, practice what it is you're doing why did this conversation not go as well?
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: And then tweak that process.
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: And it's yeah, it's a.
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: It is a very simple process.
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and I would say never do marketing without understanding what your offer is and who your ideal client is.
• 21:42
  Speaker 3: Otherwise it's a waste of time.
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: So people are like, oh, I need help getting clients.
• 21:48
  Speaker 3: No, you need an offer and you need to know who your ideal client is.
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: That's what you need.
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: first, do you help your clients create their offer?
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: That's what I do mostly.
• 21:55
  Speaker 3: So I find and I know that that's probably the opposite of what you do.
• 21:59
  Speaker 3: So I want to be careful what I say, so I don't actually obsolete you.
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: But I find that if someone has a really good offer, their confidence goes through the roof with having conversations and marketing is almost a no brainer for them, because if they're really secure on what it is that they do and how they transform their clients lives, then they're happy to go out and go hey, look at me, because they are so excited about what they can do for their clients.
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: So what we do in the academy is we're like who's a good client for you?
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: It doesn't have to be an industry niche.
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: It can be like maybe you help people exit, maybe you help people with tax strategies.
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: It's like who's a good client for you?
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: What is the transformational offer that you're going to give them?
• 22:37
  Speaker 3: So we create a modeled offer.
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: So we show them how to take their clients from where they are now to where they want to be over a three-year timeline.
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: We teach them how to have conversations, all the soft skills that you need how to ask questions, how to read someone, how to look at whether someone's engaged or stressed or worn out or all these different things.
• 22:56
  Speaker 3: And then we go take it to market and they're so excited about what they've created over the past month or two that they just go oh yeah, everyone, look at what I've got, and they'd like have the conversations and it just magically happens.
• 23:09
  Speaker 3: It's so good, it's so good.
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: That's incredible, it's, it's so true.
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: I mean, when you have the confidence, you don't feel like you're you're selling and battling uphill Because, at least for me, anyways, anyways, the times where I feel like wow, I'm on a hot streak, like I can, I can sell to anyone, it's because we have the results that are backing it up.
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: And it's just, I believe wholeheartedly, you need to do this.
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: This makes 100 sense for your business.
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: And if you don't do it, that's okay, because the next person I speak to is going to realize it's for them, versus trying to convince yourself.
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: I think they need this and I think my product's good.
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: If your product's good, it really will sell itself.
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: But you have to have the conversation.
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: People are just going to show up at your door with their credit card.
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: That's exactly right.
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: And for me, I, when I have my sales calls with people, I show them inside my product because I am so proud of it.
• 24:02
  Speaker 3: If you're having a conversation with someone and they go oh, these are the things we can do for you and I'll let you in the portal after, that's kind of warning flags for me.
• 24:11
  Speaker 3: I'm so proud of what I do, I'll show you everything.
• 24:14
  Speaker 3: I'll show you all my worksheets.
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: I'll show you absolutely everything because I know it's blimmin awesome and anyone who looks inside of it.
• 24:20
  Speaker 3: They're like, oh my gosh, I want to do business advisory with you.
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: But if you can't do that with your services, if you're an accountant or bookkeeper that are like, oh my God, I don't know how to describe this, I don't know what to say.
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: You know I, oh, I do advisory.
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: It's 500 pound a month or $500 a month or whatever.
• 24:36
  Speaker 3: That's not going to work.
• 24:37
  Speaker 3: Get so excited to share your offer.
• 24:40
  Speaker 3: Show people everything, give it all away, because people don't pay for information, they pay for implementation.
• 24:46
  Speaker 3: So just give everything away, like we're doing now.
• 24:49
  Speaker 3: James, you know we're giving everything away because you can do what you like with this information, but you're not going to implement it Like you can take it all in.
• 24:57
  Speaker 3: I've got a podcast myself and I give everything as a solo, solo podcast, not an interview one, but I tell you step by step how to do everything.
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: You're not going to do it without my help, but I give it away, yeah, so yeah, 100 it's the same reason.
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: People are still hiring personal trainers or hiring chefs, whatever it is.
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: All that information is available online.
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: There's videos on youtube how to do all of it yeah, absolutely.
• 25:21
  Speaker 3: They do it by themselves.
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and here's another thing is I on YouTube how to do all of it?
• 25:23
  Speaker 3: yeah, absolutely do it by themselves.
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and here's another thing is, I can learn how to build a house if I want to, or I can pay a million bucks and have someone build it for me.
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: I'm going to be paying the million bucks and have someone build it for me.
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: I could probably build it myself, but it won't be as good and I'm not going to have someone behind me telling me where to lay the bricks and all that kind of thing.
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: So, yeah, 100%, james.
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: So tell me a little bit about your process going into into sales conversations.
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: I'm sure there's a ton of value you can share for everyone listening, because you do have a lot of confidence in your offer and I'm curious, like how do you approach sales calls with new prospects?
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: how do you approach sales calls with new prospects?
• 26:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so, first of all, when someone books a call into my diary, I like to see that they have listened to my podcast, come to a webinar or been connected to me on LinkedIn.
• 26:14
  Speaker 3: If I can't tell where they've come from, I can pretty much guarantee that they will be possibly buying on price.
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: Okay, they're like I've got this problem, I'm going to book a call.
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: The first thing they're going to do is go oh, I'm not sure if that's expensive or I'm not sure if I trust you enough, or something like that.
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: So when someone gets into a sales, they book a sales call in with me.
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: They probably have already got to know, like and trust me a little bit.
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: Okay, then they book in a call and this is a really great sales process and I highly recommend you do it too, james.
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: If you don't do it already, I send them a video and in that video I say hey, this is what I do, this is my program.
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: Have a look inside of it.
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: And this is the price.
• 26:54
  Speaker 3: If you think that it's too expensive or you can't afford it right now, then cancel the call.
• 27:00
  Speaker 3: It then means that every single call I get on.
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: They know exactly what they're going to buy, they know how much it costs and they know me.
• 27:07
  Speaker 3: So the conversation is really a 20 minute call where it's like, hey, nice to meet you.
• 27:11
  Speaker 3: Oh, nice to meet you too.
• 27:13
  Speaker 3: I feel like I've known you forever, amanda.
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: Oh, that's nice.
• 27:15
  Speaker 3: Thank you very much.
• 27:16
  Speaker 3: Should we get you signed up?
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: Okay, then great, and it's done.
• 27:19
  Speaker 3: So when people book in a call with me, they know everything before they actually have that call with me.
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: And it's so easy.
• 27:25
  Speaker 3: It's such an easy conversation and it's lovely.
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: It's really lovely, that's awesome.
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: We're not.
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: We're not sending out a video directly, like what you're speaking about.
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: We send out a lot of, you know, testimonials, results, etc.
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: We're kind of on the front end.
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: I really like what you're saying and we'll implement that, but we put our price directly in our ad on Facebook.
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: So it's the very first thing somebody sees, and we've kind of taken it a step further from, like, the cheeky point of view.
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: And it's literally the price with a huge elephant in a room.
• 27:56
  Speaker 3: Yeah right.
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: They come into our nurture sequence.
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: It's the same thing.
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: So the elephant in the room, literally right there on the screen, this is the price, um, and if you know, a lot of people will say they haven't seen it.
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: So I think, yeah, probably adding in a video would be more helpful, but I I'm I've never been one for building up, and here's all the bells and whistles and then revealing the curtain and here's the price, because as soon as that is mentioned, everything you said has been lost and they're only focused on the price and it just ruins the flow of what you're doing yeah, and I I don't have sales calls.
• 28:29
  Speaker 3: so what I do I do have calls, but I don't call them.
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: Sales calls, um is someone will come on the call and I'll go.
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: So what questions have you got for me?
• 28:35
  Speaker 3: And it's great because they can literally they know the price, they know what the program is, they, they, if they've got any questions, they can be like hey, what do you do with this?
• 28:44
  Speaker 3: And I go great, let me show you a little bit more into it.
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: And then I'll ask them a couple of questions after all their questions have been answered.
• 28:51
  Speaker 3: So I actually flip it on its head because they're not going to, they're not going to want to talk to me if they've got questions.
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: So if they can get their questions out of the way, I can then qualify them after they've got all the info.
• 29:04
  Speaker 3: I'm not going to ever sell anyone into my program.
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: It's awesome.
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: It's either a right fit or a wrong fit.
• 29:06
  Speaker 3: So I flip it on its head.
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: This is everything you're going to get.
• 29:10
  Speaker 3: And then I'll ask them a couple of questions and I'll say right, do you trust me?
• 29:14
  Speaker 3: They say yes.
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: I say do you trust yourself to do the work?
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: They say yes and I go great, would you like to join our program?
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: And they go yes, please.
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: And I go great.
• 29:21
  Speaker 3: And then it's amazing yeah.
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: Awesome.
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: It's a simple process when you're just having a conversation.
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: Totally and trying not to be pushy and go hey, buy my stuff, like it's not about that.
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, very cool.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: Amanda, how can people get in touch with you, find out more about you, for those listening to this call who do want to reach out, more about you.
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: For those listening to this call who do want to reach out, yeah, so if you are an accountant or a bookkeeper and you're either in practice and you're working for somebody else, you want to make the leap and you want better clients, then you can reach out to me.
• 29:53
  Speaker 3: If you are running a multi million pound accountancy firm and you want to have a really good advisory offering, then again, reach out to me, because that's what it's all about, and the best place to reach out to me is either on LinkedIn or go to my website, business Advisor Academy, or pop over to my podcast, which is businessadvisorpodcastcom, so kind of or Google me, amanda C Watts, if you remember that from the beginning, google me, I'll come up on there as well.
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: But, yeah, just reach out, send me a message, say that you've heard me on the podcast with james and I'd be very happy to uh, have a conversation, because that's what it's all about, isn't it?
• 30:28
  Speaker 3: Building relationships perfect.
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: I'll make sure all those links are in the the description of the episode, uh, and really encourage everyone to reach out and have a conversation with you.
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: I think there'd be a tremendous value for anyone to reach out.
• 30:40
  Speaker 3: Thanks, james, appreciate it and thanks so much for having me today.
• 30:41
  Speaker 3: It's been awesome.
• 30:42
  Speaker 3: And thanks so much for having me today.
• 30:43
  Speaker 3: It's been awesome.
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much for coming on the show.
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to CFO Chronicles the secrets behind success.
• 30:53
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• 30:58
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• 31:03
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• 31:12
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