Client relations

Adding the right combination of new capabilities will make you more valuable to clients and more scalable as a business. Follow this advice in today’s new advisory landscape.

Artificial intelligence is on a fast track to peak-hype status.

Did you ever think about your value to your clients and what they are paying you for?

Simple steps to spending all day with your favorite, most profitable clients—who happily refer you to their peers.

“Tis the season for fee increases” is a song I hum every year in late December. This has always been a good time for me to review the year and fee structure with clients.

Today, at many smaller firms, client service partners generate, on average, about 1,500 to 1,600 billable hours per annum.

I had a meeting recently with an accountant and was led into his office while he was on the phone. I overheard him telling a client that he wouldn’t be able to get his work done as promised because his humongous client needed something done right away, and “you know how that is!”

I have found that clients, while they completely trust us for everything in their business, professional and financial lives, do not trust us when we price our services.

Thanks to technology, we see clients less, but speak and interact with them more, maintaining and strengthening the relationship.

Or do you just want to carp about the one that got away?

How would your firm's culture change if your best clients were always in the room?

A month ago I wrote that I “gave away consulting and coaching” services. However, that is not the whole story and because of the calls I got, here is some more of what I did and do.

It is significantly more expensive to attract a new client to an accounting firm than to invest in client retention.

Clients buy something they need or solutions to problems, not hours. Here is a situation that has actually occurred in a client’s legal matter.

What's the best way to evaluate the performance of your firm's employees?

As a follow-up to last week’s column on determining what to charge, this column will explain a way to determine your hourly rate should you decide to bill using that method.

Art Kuesel on how communication and trust will make a professional indispensable to a client.

How does one properly handle the various ways a death affects each co-worker, client and the firm itself?

Accounting professionals have the potential to become their clients' most trusted advisors. Here's how to achieve that trust.

There are two types of accountants—those who do their work with blinders and those with wide-open eyes. Both can do competent jobs for their clients, but the ones with the wide-open eyes grow and can do far better work for their clients.