I just finished rereading Seth Godin’s classic book "
As a CPA, you’re the linchpin of your client’s financial life. No one knows more about your client than you do. That’s why CPAs have long been considered their clients’ most trusted advisor. The relationship goes even further, though. You’re an expert connector. You’re not necessarily the one solving a client’s financial challenge or problem; you’re the one who connects your client to the expert problem solver. You’re the one who makes sure things are getting done correctly on your client’s behalf.
Don’t let anyone try to tell you that you’re not providing significant value as a connector. It’s very important, and you should be compensated accordingly.
Metcalfe’s Law
Godin refers often to Metcalfe's Law, which states that the value of a network grows exponentially with each new node that joins the network. A node can be a computer, or it can be a person.
Think about it this way. As a CPA, you have a working knowledge about a wide variety of financial subjects. You may not be the expert in each area, but you can run point for your clients and speak intelligently to the go-to mortgage broker in your network, the go-to financial advisor, the go-to cost segregation specialist, the go-to M&A transaction attorney, and other specialists in your network whom you’ve assigned to solve difficult challenges for your client. Your clients don’t have the time or expertise to manage all these experts (i.e., nodes) in your network. Who else is better qualified to manage them than you are?
Again, don’t underestimate the value you’re providing here.
Anyone can do a client’s taxes these days. But when clients are telling you about all their complex issues, challenges and entanglements, they’re trusting you with that information and they’re seeking your expert counsel. Again, they don’t expect you to solve each one of their financial challenges directly. But they trust you know someone very good who can.
I know what you’re thinking: “It’s not my job to supervise all of these people.” Guess what? It is your job as the expert connector and most trusted advisor for your clients.
Just as there are plenty of other people (and machines) who can do your client’s taxes, there are plenty of well-connected people with deep Rolodexes who are happy to refer your clients to advisors within their network. The problem is, those referrers don’t know your client’s financial situation as well as you do. They have no way of knowing if a referral in their network is going to be a good fit for your client. You do!
Build your network, not tax returns
As a CPA, you should be spending more and more of your time vetting potential experts to add to your network. You should have a great insurance person in your network, a great investment advisor, a great estate planning attorney and a great banker. I’m not saying you need three or four contacts for each specialty; you just need one go-to person for each category that you trust implicitly.
As with a social network or computer network, the stronger and wider your connections, the more your value increases as a CPA. As you become more of an expert for your clients, you get better at moving the right pieces into position to solve your clients’ financial puzzles. Machines can’t do that. You can.
Here’s where it gets even better for CPAs. As you refer more and more business to your connections, they will start referring more and more business back to you. Every specialist needs a great CPA to whom they can refer their clients with confidence. Your referral network will become a very natural and powerful virtuous circle.
That’s the future of our profession — it’s not about becoming a better tax preparer. If you’re not comfortable becoming a connector and would rather just stay in your lane, that’s OK. I suggest you become a top expert in a very narrow specialty (i.e., business valuation or cost segregation) so you can be one of the “connections” that a well-rounded connector relies on to solve the problems their clients are having.
By the same token, if more and more clients start asking for a certain specialty (say, cost segregation) and you don’t have a go-to person in your network, start building relationships with cost segregation professionals and add the best one to your network.
As Seth Godin says, “Your network is real if there are people you would go out of your way for and they would go out of their way for you.” Why not be one of those people for your clients?
