I've lost count of the amount of times I've heard a small firm accountancy owner talk about struggling to onboard clients effectively and efficiently. This isn't a "nice problem to have"... Unfortunately when you are growing rapidly you can easily start to over trade and rarely have the time to onboard new clients. Sounds silly, but is often the case! This is why its important to get your new client onboarding process systemised, automated as much as possible and just working. This article explores how to get your new client onboarding process right.
Why is new client on boarding process so important to get right?
Any new client is using their first few interactions with you as a gauge of whether they made the right choice in transferring their business to you. Get the onboarding right and it sets the tone of your relationship for the rest of your working relationship. Great new client onboarding is also a prime way to get new clients to quickly recommend you to others. Get it wrong and your new hard won client could be off sooner rather than later.
Their trust
At this time their entire trust in you is based on promises that you, and possibly some of your other clients have made. Trust is built up by (over) delivering on promises you make. Some of those promises can be made, and delivered on, before the first 'work' is done. It's all in the series of things you do with them over the first weeks.
What’s a new client onboarding process?
Onboarding is how you welcome new clients into your firm. It’s the time when they are most unsure about you, and you can influence the way you’ll work with them for years. Get it wrong, and you're likely to reduce the profit you make from them, before doing any chargeable work!
You’ll be addressing their questions and concerns, ensuring they understand the services available to them, getting them set up on all your systems (as well as all the regulatory stuff).
Most small firms know the regulatory stuff. Some manage it well and in others it is a bit hit and miss. In many places it takes longer than it should, doesn’t make clients feel really special and rarely gets them trained up to help you.
Key parts in the onboarding process.
- What are your client’s needs? These should mainly come from the sales meetings you had with them, and most are probably in the offer letter. But have all your notes made it into your CRM, so your whole team will be aware (and you won’t forget?). What are their preferences for small (and irrelevant things), perhaps including biscuits?
- Team briefing: Is all the information going to your team, including the aspirational stuff that is still in your head? Things like they have 3 other companies and we want to get them too, or they are really worried about timeliness as they had to pay fines to HMRC last year.
- What’s in the information flow? You have, no doubt, got a checklist to ensure the main legal documents are returned. But, who chases it up and when? Do you have a process to flag up outstanding ones, and what parts of it are automated (emails and task reminders can happen automatically and save a lot of time). Some firms not only send emails, but also have one or two relevant staff call them to introduce themselves. It’s a good time to brief them on how you manage their year-end work, how you’ll chase them up and make sure you have a superfast turnaround time on their work.
- Making them feel really special? In your sales meetings you probably explained the onboarding process. What expectations did you leave them with, and are you exceeding them? If you are only just about meeting their expectations at this stage, you’re setting up a problem client. Are there simple little things that could help you exceed expectations now? From a ‘welcome pack’ (done differently, rather than a simple list of all the staff names), up to a small gift, or handwritten welcome card (personalised with a team/ office/ motivational photo on the front).
- When does your boarding process end? One firm deal with everything promptly, but still consider them new until they've had their first annual returns. In that way they get special hand-holding until their confidence in you is based on results.
Click here to download our best practice onboarding process to almost virtually eliminate manual data entry by you or the client.
Managing the onboarding process.
Having somebody, not you, who knows where every client is in the process; coordinates the response from your firm, chases the client and flags up problems sounds obvious – but many firms just tell a member of staff to do that. There’s no delegation, follow up, or discussion in weekly meetings. If your coordinator went off sick, where’s the data kept, is it electronic, (or at least available) and managed seamlessly?
One of the best ways to manage your onboarding process and workflow is to map it out on paper. Click here to download our best practice onboarding process to almost virtually eliminate manual data entry by you or the client.
How do you manage your onboarding process and how will you keep improving it?