Day two of three, of the Taking Your Firm Virtual Summit, hosted by Nayo Carter-Gray, was filled with expert speakers on a variety of subjects from Cryptocurrency to Email to Pricing.
LuSundra Everett, EA, NTPI, Principal Owner of Everett Tax Solutions opened with New Money: The Basics of Cryptocurrency. She defined the “Crypto terms to know” like Air Drop, Basis, Blockchain, Exchange, Fiat, Hard Fork, HODL, Initial Coin Offering, Mining, Non-Fungible Tokens, and Wallet. Everett discussed how it started and how it’s currently going. She emphasized how as a tax professional, you have to let your clients know “cryptocurrency is not something to play with.” She highlighted taxable and non-taxable events and questions to ask your clients about their history and use of cryptocurrency. If they need to report cryptocurrency, they need a Form 8949. Lastly, she touched on accepting crypto payments and reconciliation software.
Next, Jason Staats, Firm Owner and Creator, presented Building a Bot to Increase Your Bottom Line. Jeremy Wells, EA the Owner of JWellsCFO gave us Communicating Value, then it was time for the Mid-Summit Check-in and Lunch and Learn: Discover Freshbooks.
Madeline Pratt, Founder and CEO of Fearless Foundry, expounded on Pricing Your Primary Service. She told us her key to a prosperous money mindset is not about making enough money to get by, but about making enough to give back. Pratt discussed money manifesting and asked us to envision our number for 2021 and pushed us to select a number that made us a little bit uncomfortable. Her next point was not devaluing our work, because it’s a disservice to ourselves and to others. She emphasized the fight for pay equality and equity and how underrepresented groups like women and people of color often devalue their work because they empathize with clients and that we can’t do that and expect to hit that goal number. There are ways to give deals, or “free samples” to attract new clients, but it has to be free with a purpose, like to create prospects or for beta testing. Pratt closed with the thought that pricing becomes problematic when the client is out of alignment with your value or values, or your work doesn’t align with your audience. Value is a dynamic concept, and you should consider your audience, their pain points, your region, and the market price.
Arman Sayed, Email Specialist for InboxDone presented Avoiding Email Overwhelm and brought attention to how often we are reactive with our email instead of in control of it. You have to remember, “Email is not your job” so optimize your inbox. Free your time and increase your productivity instead of getting bogged down in email all day. Start with reflecting on your use of email and ask yourself how much time you are spending in your inbox? Do your emails align with your goals? And what actions can be taken to give you clarity in your inbox? To achieve this, you must eliminate non-essential emails, create rules and shortcuts (like automations or templates), and retrain your mind and your recipient expectations for reactive emailing.
Jamie E. O’Kane CPA, CTC, Tax Strategist and Podcast Host of Abundant Beans Tax & Accounting presented Setting Virtual Boundaries and Dave Cooper, Owner of Dave Cooper CPA, LLC closed the day with Reclaiming My Time. The second day of the Taking Your Firm Virtual Summit was an insightful and awesome experience. We have one more day of the summit, stay tuned for Day Three!
