What Clients Want

Source: CPA Trendlines

The following includes excerpts, reproduced with permission, of a blog entry by Rick Telberg.

The Great Recession is shifting client desires and expectations in some interesting and counter-intuitive ways, according to readings from a new Bay Street Group/CPA Trendlines survey.

More than any other requirement, clients are increasingly demanding from their CPA firms a deeper and more profound understanding of the client's own business.

The number of client companies citing a “specific understanding of my business” as “important” in “choosing a new CPA firm” vaulted 26 percent from 2009, to 55 percent of respondents in 2011. More than ever, clients expect their CPAs to be experts and specialists. The need for “understanding” is growing faster than any other measure.

By comparison, “price, fees, costs or ‘affordability'” has barely budged. To be sure, price remains important, with 68 percent of clients saying so. But in terms of trends, pricing sensitivity hasn't really changed.

Clients seem to be saying that price is not as much of an issue as long as their CPA firm is performing up to par in other, more critical, ways.

And the most critical of ways is in the “level of service and attentiveness,” which is rising 16 percent in importance, mentioned now by 80 percent of clients.

The third-fastest-rising criterion for choosing a CPA firm is the opportunity to “work with the best people in the firm,” up 14 percent in the last two years, and cited by 21 percent of clients. Clearly, clients are becoming more and more impatient with working with a CPA firm's rookies or newbies.

Still, the “quality and accuracy of the work” remains a top measure, with 73 percent of clients demanding it. But it's a given, table stakes. The measure has barely budged in two years.

For the complete article, read “Survey Results: Tough Times Reshape Client Expectations.”

From CPA Trendlines, http://cpatrendlines.com, August 10, 2011.