Marketing

The AICPA 2008 Succession Survey, as you would expect, has a great deal of information about the current state of succession at multi-owner firms and recommended best practices for those firms. What will come as a surprise to some is there is an equivalent amount of information, observation of trends, and recommended best practices for the sole practitioner.

Since most observers consider the tax prep market to be in a maturing mode, it’s important for software makers to offer their products for tryouts, early renewals and promotional pricing during the season when their customers have the time to experiment.And that time, of course, is now.

Accounting firm Weaver and Tidwell has introduced a financial services niche practice aimed at investment companies, including hedge funds and private equity firms.

The seven deadly sins of career management were delineated by Kathleen Grace, founder of Grace Consulting Services, a professional services firm specializing in executive assessment, executive coaching and strategic succession planning, at the recent Forum for Women in Accounting, presented by The Advisory Board and Crosley + Company.

Deloitte plans to invest approximately $300 million to create a learning and leadership development center in Westlake, Texas.

BNA has appointed Lisa Fitzpatrick as director of marketing for the company's tax and accounting product line.

REMINDER: Time to submit an entry for Practical Accountant’s Practice Innovation Award is running out. For application information, see the June issue of Practical Accountant. I don’t know about you, but I am getting tired of surveys. Especially those that promise you that filling it out will only take “a couple of minutes.” The last one that I filled out was for a major hotel chain conducted by a very, well-known company that conducts surveys nationwide.

The American Institute of CPAs has formed an online Succession Planning Resource Center to help small and midsized firms deal with questions of how their firm should be managed in the future.

Seventy-six percent of the 120 firms in attendance at the Forum for Women in Accounting, a three-day confab in its second year, have a strategic plan in place.

A group of eight midsized CPA firms has banded together to offer cross-border tax services in an effort to compete with larger firms.

It takes solid strategies and steps to grow a niche business, and Gale Crosley, president of Crosley + Co., shared some of her strategies with approximately 100 participants during a pre-conference session at the Forum for Women in Accounting here.

Let’s face it: The next 15 years are going to be hard for small firms to compete and survive. The external environment and demographic facts speak clearly:* 8,000 Baby Boomers are retiring each day.

BKD said it is combining forces with the Hanke Group, allowing the Springfield, Mo.-based accounting firm to expand to Hanke's San Antonio and south Texas markets.

The Small Business Administration has created an online tax savings resource center to help small businesses understand the benefits of the economic stimulus package.

The Association of Accounting Marketing presented awards to 45 accounting firms and marketers at its annual conference.

The AICPA Private Companies Practice Section (PCPS) did a remarkable job with its 2007 Top MAP Issues survey, and it was done without even changing the question that is asked each year or who was asked. It was done simply by taking a knife and cutting up the answers. The annual survey asks various practitioners in public practice: What are your top five MAP concerns?

Sage Software has launched a program to put its Peachtree accounting program in more family-owned businesses by giving away free copies and support.

I am constantly amazed and intrigued by what is being done via the Internet. In Practical Accountant, we report on how creative some firms are incorporating the Internet into their operations and going way beyond the proverbial virtual firm brochure. My guess is that creativity is stimulated by how others are using the Internet.

CPA firm Marcum & Kliegman is expanding from New York to New Jersey by merging with RosenfarbWinters, a specialist in forensic accounting.

The American Institute of CPAs' Private Companies Practice Section and the Texas Society of CPAs have begun their fifth annual survey of management policies at small and midsized CPA firms.