What Premium Brands Understand About Value That Most Accounting Firms Don’t

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Hi and welcome back to another episode of the Growthminded Accountant podcast.

Today we're going to talk about luxury brands.

Yes, believe it or not, on the growthminded accountant, we're getting into luxury brands and how this can apply to tax and accounting firms.

So, brands like Rolex, Ferrari, Apple, uh Ryan Sirant now in the real estate industry.

Uh and we're what we're going to do is teach you as a tax accounting firm what they're doing and how that applies to your own growth.

So, now before you think uh Rebekah specifically, you could say hello in a second.

We have completely lost our minds and turned this into a luxury brand podcast. uh stay with me a little bit.

Okay, so because I believe one of the biggest mistakes tax and accounting firms make is assuming that premium pricing comes from being technically better.

And as you all are realizing it doesn't and now if you see all these new uh you know influencers in our space talking about oh what is wrong with cast pricing and what you know all the challenges are happening.

Oh I'll tell you what's wrong. you have not positioned your brand as a premium brand yet and yet you're going out there and selling premium services.

Okay. So, every year I, you know, we talk, Rebekah obviously talks daily.

Uh, we just did a big survey with our own client base and we talk with firms that uh are frustrated because they're losing opportunities to competitors charging two or three times more than they are.

And it's like, you know, the reaction is, you know, they aren't better accountants than me.

They're not a better CPA, a better EA.

They're definitely not smarter.

Uh, their tax returns aren't necessarily more accurate.

Right?

But often they are right.

The difference usually is not their expertise.

And that's what we're going to talk about today.

The difference is perception.

The difference is positioning.

The difference is trust.

And more importantly, the difference is becoming visibility.

Okay?

And that's really important here in the the AI age.

And we'll go through this one isn't going to be all into AI as a kind of a general topic, but this is somewhat in a response to what AI has done to the market.

So, we're going to talk about some consumer changes as well.

Uh, the brands we're talking about today have mastered uh these concepts to be the obvious choice, right?

And the reality is that the same principles um that they are implementing are becoming more important than ever for accountants as AI continues to commod commoditize basic compliance work.

You got to realize your clients have access now they think to the same exact knowledge you have through chat GBT cla etc.

Right?

So they're all thinking oh I'm as smart as my accountant now but the reality is they're obviously not and AI tools are often uh incorrect.

So to help us unpack this I'm joined by our chief visibility officer Rebekah Barton.

Uh welcome back Rebekah if you can say hello.

Yes.

Hello.

As much as I wish this was a shopping podcast because that would be fun.

This is more of a human psychology podcast and I'm very excited.

This is one of my favorite topics.

Yeah.

And then one of the brands we're talking about and let's just see Hermes.

Did I say that right?

Hermes.

Hermes.

Hermes.

All right.

Well, we did throw in one fashion like high-end um brand because I know that Rebekah would be all into that one.

So, yeah.

My daughter was laughing at my my wife and daughter are laughing.

I still can't pronounce it, but that's fine.

That means I don't buy that and I don't shop there.

Uh so let's start here.

I think the biggest misconception many accountants have is believing clients hire them because of their technical expertise.

Uh and I want to go over kind of why is that flawed thinking?

Rebekah, if you can kind of just let's start here as the base and then we'll start moving through some of the directions and strategies that you can use.

Yes.

So, we're going to start with something called information asymmetry, which is a very fancy way of saying that one party or one person in a situation knows more than the other party.

Accounting is a great example.

Um, so you know tax law, you know tax regulations, you know the tax code.

Your client doesn't, at least not in the way that you do.

Um, you understand planning opportunities, you understand how to help them prepare throughout the year.

Your client doesn't.

That's why they need you.

They don't know what to do month over month to make things work best for them in April, right?

You understand compliance risk.

They don't.

So, because of the imbalance, it's hard for the client themselves to evaluate your expertise because they don't necessarily have the baseline to do this.

So, it's hard for for a client or a lay person to look at two accountants and figure out which of them is actually better um because they don't know the information themselves.

The same thing goes for attorneys, for doctors, for financial advisors, kind of any professional who has deep expertise in a specific area.

So rather than evaluating them based on their expertise, they evaluate them based on trust signals.

Uh these are things like reviews, referrals, the quality of the website, the positioning, the branding that you've given yourself, even the aesthetics, the consistency of your posts, the social proof that you have.

All of these things come together to help people develop confidence in one brand over another.

And that's very different than evaluating you based on your expertise.

It's based on evaluating you on the perception of your brand based on what you're putting out there into the world.

So, I think that's where we're going to start.

Set that baseline, that cornerstone for the rest of this podcast.

Yeah.

And I think this um ties in you you mentioned before you know how you evaluate a doctor for example perhaps how you evaluate a tax attorney.

Uh I have a couple examples of my own life. minutesSo you know was it five years ago we were talking about you know restructuring our own entity and you know I asked for some referrals from my you know Morgan Stanley uh representative my adviser there.

I I asked for some local attorneys to uh find a QSBS stock tax attorney, right?

Uh and believe it or not, it was interesting the way I went through the process.

This was a very important decision for me.

And there was a lot of people that had the expertise, but who actually was the best at this?

Who could I trust would do this correctly?

This isn't an area that I wouldn't want to make a mistake with.

Same with choosing a doctor perhaps for a lifethreatening type of deal. you're you're buying confidence in the expertise that you read and that's a very different thing, right?

So, it's a big distinction I think people need to think about.

So, you know, when I went and actually received a couple referrals, it was interesting what I found online, and this is before ChatJBT was able to recommend people, which it's doing now.

But what I found online in my Google searches, was the exact same name that two of my other friends, one in private equity, one at Morgan Stanley up in the Bay Area, they recommended the same person.

And guess what?

When I started researching them, everything I saw about them just validated that was the right choice.

So I was evaluating trust, right?

And trust is often built long before a consultation ever happens.

By the time I actually reached out and engaged this QPS tax attorney, it was their marketing.

It was the power of these referrals.

It was the power of their reputation that separated that individual from the services that they providing.

Right?

So many people could do QSPS stock uh advising and and treatments and how to do it and how to set it up.

But the marketing is where the trust creation was.

It happened, right?

That was part of the funnel.

By the time I reached out, I'm like, "Oh, I have found the right person." So trust creation starts before somebody ever becomes a client.

I think that's the biggest misconception I see in the tax and accounting space.

I I can't tell you how often and I my head usually spins as Rebekah knows.

Well, I don't need marketing.

It's like, well, no wonder you're floundering.

You're complaining that you're losing clients.

You're complaining they won't pay you enough.

You're complaining you don't make enough money because you do not have a premium brand.

You have not established, you know, trust.

And let's start with a a brand like Rolex.

Um, and this is totally off topic, but I somehow stumbled upon a a watch um, reclaimer.

What would you call it?

Someone someone who basically can take an old Rolex and bring it back to life.

And what was completely remarkable, he did uh, basically a a Rolex watch that survived the Palisades fire and he brought it back to life, but you could see what it looked like.

Um, but the reality is just even his presentation, you know, it's just a watch.

A Rolex tells time, right?

But so does a $50 watch, it tells time.

Yet one costs exponentially more.

So what exactly, Rebekah, and then when I saw everything that was inside the Rolex and how this guy brought it back to life and all the parts and the I mean it was insane.

It was incredible what's inside this watch.

But what exactly is Rolex selling?

What are they really selling?

Rolex is selling the accumulated value of trust in a brand.

And we call that brand equity.

So basically it is the value that a brand has created in itself over decades.

Um in Rolex's case many many years.

You look at brands like MercedesBenz they're very good at this.

Um old legacy brands uh brands like Ralph Lauren very very good at kind of establishing themselves as a premium brand especially when it comes to Americana things like that.

So when people see a Rolex or any of these other brands I just mentioned, they instantly associate it with quality, reliability, precision, success, and then heritage, which for these kinds of legacy brands is really, really critical.

And what's interesting is that consumers often assume that these brands are high quality before they ever experience the product.

The vast majority of Americans don't own a Rolex.

Um, but yet they would probably say if they were asked, "What is the best watch brand?" And it would probably be Rolex or Tag Huer.

Um because they are the brands that are visible.

Um Leu mentioned visibility.

Um Tag Huer sponsors lots of sporting events, lots of PGA events, lots of horse racing events, things like that where you have a lot of money.

You have a lot of people spending a lot of money to be at or attend these events.

And that is projected on TV across the United States.

So people see these brands, they know these brands, they see them in high authority, high-end situations and therefore that builds trust and it builds it builds a sense of community as well.

People want to be part of these communities.

When a brand has high brand equity, it makes it very easy for them to get new customers because people want to be part of the lifestyle that they perceive that this brand provides.

So it's kind of real quick and I'll just kind of tie this in.

So what are what are some of the trust building systems that a tax and accounting firm could utilize to start establishing the same you're not trying to necessarily become a luxury brand but you know what that's where education comes in your newsletter reviews things like that.

So explain that real quick.

Yeah.

So consistent educational content is going to be key here.

People typically don't trust brands that just come across as salesy, right?

That doesn't really that doesn't resonate with most people.

They want things that are valuable.

So, educational content is super valuable and it helps to build trust in you as a tax professional before people ever actually talk to you.

If they're seeing reals, if they're seeing blog posts, if they're seeing segmented newsletters that apply to where they are in life, that can all be really great for building trust and building value right off the bat.

Client testimonials are huge.

Letting people kind of put themselves in the shoes of individuals you've already helped. minutesSaying, "Hey, this actually works.

This person helped me.

They know what they're doing.

There is a baseline here for what they can do for you." Speaking opportunities, that's really big, whether it's on podcast or in person.

That can help establish you as an authority and get your face out there and even more importantly, allow you to build more of a personal relationship with people, even if you haven't met them yet. people connect to you if you're on camera or if you're in front of them at a convention or a conference.

They're going to feel like they're developing a relationship with you just based on what you're telling them.

Um, community involvement is big here.

Obviously, thought leadership can play into a lot of these different things that we've already talked about.

And then strategic partnerships with other local businesses.

So maybe partnering with a financial advisor or an estate planner or things of that nature who can kind of funnel highquality leads to you and they can tell their clients, hey look, I really trust this person and that can help build that rapport before you ever meet people as well.

Yeah.

I mean, so the goal here again is to create confidence before that actual consultation meeting, right?

That first meeting.

So, what you'll find is the strongest firms, you're not you're not selling trust, you're demonstrating trust through your marketing communication.

Okay?

Um, and what we're finding is the firms, uh, you know, if you're spending time trying to convince prospects, uh, your marketing isn't working, if that makes sense.

So, when a prospect reaches out, they're already convinced.

The prospect has already read your blogs, perhaps.

Maybe they saw a social media post.

Maybe they started following you on social media.

Then they looked up your reviews.

They watched maybe a video that you created.

They listened to one of your podcasts.

Uh the consultation becomes a fit conversation.

At that point, they're kind of like, "Okay, which which, you know, uh advisory service should I be?

You know, which one is right for me?" So, it's not necessarily a trust conversation at this point.

Uh and that's a completely different business model when you think about it.

And most accountants are not doing that.

So, I'm going to continue our walk through the luxury brands.

Uh, this is one I've watched the movie Ferrari.

Um, and Ferrari may be one of the most misunderstood business models in the world, but I think there's a lot to it.

I didn't even understand um how you actually uh are allowed to buy a Ferrari.

You know, there's a whole process about that.

So, let's talk about Ferrari and how that can teach positioning.

Yeah.

So, one of the foundational ideas of all marketing across brands is that value comes from differentiation.

You can't be like everyone else and establish value, which I think really ties into tax and accounting and ties into a lot of the things we've talked about on the podcast lately, is that you don't want to be lumped in with everybody else.

You want to stand out.

You want to differentiate yourself.

Ferrari does an exceptional job of this.

They're not trying to be the car for everyone.

They're not trying to be the car for Joe Schmo who lives down the street from you.

They are trying to be the best car for a specific class of buyer.

When you try to appeal to every person, you're going to become generic.

When you become generic, you become comparable.

When you become comparable, you compete on price alone.

That's a trap.

It's a trap for accounting firms.

It's a trap for car brands.

It's a car trap for clothing retailers.

It's a trap for anyone in any kind of industry where you need to establish trust in order to to connect with the right clients for you.

So with accounting firms for example, if your website says something like we serve individuals and businesses, we offer tax and accounting services.

That's not helpful because every one of your competitors is saying the same thing, not just in your city, but in your state, in your nation.

Um, so Ferrari doesn't do that.

They describe identity, not the fact that they provide transportation, but they describe who they are and also who their clients are, who their ideal client is in all of their marketing.

Accounting firms can and should do exactly the same thing.

For example, we help construction company owners build wealth.

We help dental practices increase profitability.

We help highincome families reduce tax surprises.

Those are statements that the right audience is going to connect with.

So you have to remember that specificity creates relevance.

Relevance creates authority and authority in turn creates trust.

And what you want is all of these things.

Specificity, relevance, and trust with the right audience.

It doesn't matter if you appeal to everyone.

What matters is that you appeal to the right people.

Yeah.

No, 100%.

And and this is kind of the basis for my cookie cutter is dead, narrative wins campaigns.

Um you know, most firms are describing services.

They're not describing their ideal client and what that ideal client wants as far as their outcome.

Um and that is a huge difference.

Uh all right.

So we're going to what uh the brand that Rebekah cares about and we're going to tay in the luxury for a moment.

I'm going to try it again.

Hermes.

Hermes.

Hermes.

I give up.

I don't care.

So Hermes is not marketing to me.

I can't even pronounce the name.

I could care less what they're selling.

So that's the good thing.

But the reality is they're not selling to me just like Brandy Melville isn't selling to me, right?

So what they do though is they use scarcity to increase value.

Um they make their products difficult to get.

They have you have to, you know, there's a limited edition and then they rotate that through.

I've watched a bunch of studies on them.

I can't pronounce their name, but I've studied the brand quite a bit.

But Rebekah, let's talk about scarcity and how that is such a powerful behavioral um kind of strategy.

Absolutely.

So, they do it very well.

Um, everybody wants a Birkin and hardly anybody can get one.

Obviously, there are resale market things like that, but what Aramz does exceptionally is that they make you want their product simply because you can't have it.

Scarcity is hugely popular and hugely important in behavioral economics.

Humans automatically assign high value to things that are perceived as limited.

It's why almost every brand has limited edition things or limited runs or limited time or a limited number of this particular item, right?

Um special things.

Even at like Bath & Body Works, you'll see special edition collections come in and people flock, you know, and that's for soap.

So, it's just anything that is perceived as limited tends to draw a crowd and tends to be something people want.

We call it scarcity bi scarcity bias.

If something is abundant, it feels common.

It doesn't feel like it's that critical to go out and own it because it's going to be there, right?

And everybody can get it.

Laundry detergent, for example, something like that that's just everywhere.

Um, but if something is scarce or appears scarce, it feels very valuable.

So, the majority of accounting firms kind of accidentally communicate that their services are abundant.

We'll take anyone.

We're here to serve everyone.

We, you know, deal with individuals and businesses and nonprofits.

That doesn't make it feel like you're providing an exclusive offering.

So, it doesn't make anyone urgently want to contact you because they're like, "Well, they're here." Um, and then they'll just maybe move on to the next person who feels more scarce or like they're providing a more exclusive service.

So premium firms communicate selectivity.

They don't communicate arrogance but selectivity.

So for instance, they might have ideal client profiles on their websites.

They might have an application process to see if new prospects align with what they're actually looking for.

They might have capacity limits.

We're only taking on X new clients this year.

They might have weight lists during particularly busy seasons like tax filing season.

So all of these things communicate scarcity in the same way that having to spend $50,000 at Hermes before you can get a Birkin apply to that same situation.

Um because that's basically how it works there.

You have to spend X amount of dollars before you can get on the wait list to then get a Birkin.

So it's the same principle.

If you create scarcity and exclusivity, you're going to have people beating your door down basically because suddenly they're going to want to work with you.

So, it's a really great way to increase your value without actually doing a lot.

This is a pretty easy thing to position.

With a few minor tweaks to your messaging and your website, you can really start positioning your your self not as a commodity, but as an exclusive provider of high-v value services.

Yeah.

I mean, this is why there's certain retail um stores that have lines outside and you have to wait until you're allowed in to go spend your $5,000 on a purse, right?

Uh this is why Taylor Swift was so uh successful through the last tour and then Olivia Rodrigo just did the exact same thing.

Scarcity.

Ax card holders.

You can buy tickets first, you know, and then it does backfire as you can see with the World Cup when they overplayed their hand.

So you got to be a little intentional about what you're doing, who you're serving.

And obviously the World Cup um lost who their end client was, right?

They went so luxury that they actually lost out.

They still have tickets to sell here in LA for the next upcoming match.

So that you got to be careful here.

But one of the fastest ways to increase value is to stop trying to be everything to everyone.

The goal isn't necessarily fewer clients.

The goal is better fit clients.

And I want your marketing to communicate who is your ideal client profile.

What do they look like?

What are the services that I feel are most beneficial for my client that I'm the best in class?

Those are the things I want to highlight in my marketing material.

Um, all right.

So, we've gone from some really established long brands.

I'm going to now talk about a disrupting brand.

I've talked about this person before, this brand before, but they continue to expand.

They're growing like crazy, and they are what I would consider um a younger demographic kind of marketing style.

So, it's more of a digital marketing person.

That's Ryan Sirant and Siran's brand in the real estate industry.

They're blowing up.

They're expanding everywhere. and kind of get an idea of exactly what Sirant sells.

It's not necessarily expertise just like accountants.

It's uh more of an exposure effect, right?

And there's a a social side to this because so kind of explain his approach and how that brand has become so successful and this is a very good modern uh example of what to do.

Yes.

Yeah, this is great.

So, Sir and his team leverage something that in psychology and in behavioral marketing is called the mere exposure effect.

The idea is that the more often people encounter something, the more they tend to trust it.

So, it's literally mere exposure to something makes you want it, makes you trust it, makes you feel like you know it.

Um, I think news anchors are kind of a great example here.

People who watch the same news show every single night.

Those people are literally coming into their living room.

Or you look at game show hosts like Pat Sjack, Vanna White, people who families have minuteswatched for generations come into their living room nightly.

There is this sense of trust and familiarity and that's basically the same principle here.

So that would be the mere exposure effect.

So with Siran in particular, they do it online, right?

They're using social media, they're using video, they're using storytelling, they're using their captions, they're using education, and they do it very consistently daily, multiple times a day.

They're in their stories.

They're on Tik Tok.

They're on Instagram.

They're on LinkedIn.

They have a large footprint, which is also really important.

I talk a lot on this podcast and with our clients individually about the importance of building a web footprint, not just having a website.

And that's something that Sirhant's team does really well.

They are everywhere.

No matter where you follow them, you're going to be getting content.

They're very consistent and very intentional crossplatform.

And this means that by the time someone actually contacts him to assist with their real estate needs or someone on his team, they feel like they know him. minutesThey already feel like they have a very, very deep trust in this individual because they see him all the time.

The accounting field is moving in this direction.

Visibility is becoming a serious competitive advantage.

But it means that you have to be intentional about putting out content and about putting out content in multiple locations.

So explain a little bit.

I mean cuz you're saying you're just kind of giving that they trust him.

It's not him anymore.

It's all of his staff.

It's Siran as a brand now.

He represents it.

But the way they have effectively done this, and I think this is why it applies to tax and accounting firms, you know, we we want you to start thinking like a media company, you know, and you don't need millions of followers.

You need very focused targeted followers, right?

And because trust starts before discovery and that's what Siran is doing.

They're making you feel they're approachable, they're fun, they're people I'd like to hang out with, right?

Um, so you're not even thinking about the transaction.

Am I getting the best deal?

Are they finding me the best property?

You're just thinking, you know, hey, I would like to work with this person or this firm.

Okay?

So, the consultation is isn't where trust begins anymore.

It's just where it gets confirmed.

By the time you've reached out, they've already effectively done their job and kind of connected with you.

Um, all right.

So Rebekah, since we went to digital, we went new, we're going to go back to I would call this this is not a super old brand, but at one point this was the premium brand.

Whether or not we want to argue that Apple has fallen on kind of a rocky times right now, they're still one of the best cash flow companies in the world.

They are selling phones.

They created multiple categories.

Okay.

And what's the lesson here?

What can we learn from what Apple did?

What is their greatest strength, so to speak?

Yeah, I love Apple.

I'm a big Steve Jobs fan, so this is a fun one for me.

But Apple's greatest strength has historically been, and again, we don't have to argue about their current positioning necessarily, but cognitive fluency.

What that means is that things that feel easier feel safer.

Things that feel safer, feel more valuable, and more important.

Apple has removed friction in a way that very few other brands actually have.

Everything they do feels extremely intentional.

It's very simple.

It's very predictable.

It's very clear.

I have been in Apple stores all over the country, all over the world, and they provide exactly the same experience no matter where I am.

Uh Starbucks also does this really well with the consistency across locations globally.

But Apple is really the standard, right?

You go into an Apple store, you know what to expect.

There's going to be a Genius Bar.

There's going to be people in colored t-shirts to help you.

They're going to know exactly what you need.

They're going to provide you with options. and everything is done in a way that basically anyone can do.

So it's very clear and very simple.

Um AI tools are creating this same expectation in the modern world across industries.

So people open their chat GPT or they go to Gemini and they immediately receive an answer.

They don't have to do anything.

There's no manual.

There's no onboarding.

There's nothing hard about it.

They just type in a query and they're given an answer that is most of the time correct.

So that experience is retraining how consumers function even if they don't realize it.

Consumer psychology has changed dramatically even just in the past couple of years.

Uh people expect immediate explanations.

They expect immediate support.

And whether the answer is perfect isn't even the point.

The easier something feels, the more people trust it.

That expectation for instant gratification has been established through AI and through all of these platforms.

Apple again does a really great job of this and accounting firms can also apply this.

So you can ask yourself questions things like is our website clear?

Is it easy to make an appointment?

Is onboarding simple?

Um is our communication simple?

Is our document sharing simple?

Is the client portal intuitive and easy to access?

Those are things that you can kind of audit yourself on in 30 minutes. um go to your own website and pretend that you're seeing it for the first time and you'll probably identify some things that you could correct.

And they might not be hard things to correct, but every little detail matters when it comes to removing friction.

And the more friction you remove, the more clarity you create.

And the more clarity you create, the more confidence people have in you.

Yeah, I think most firms underestimate how much value is hidden inside client experience.

Uh it's interesting as we're going through all these brands, you know, we're as you know, Rebekah, we're working on a little bit of a rebrand, but basically we are accounting works is the client experience platform for modern forward future tax accounting firms.

So I'm just giving an example of how we have positioned ourselves and kind of similar strategies here where you know we're not a practice management software.

We're not a website product for sure.

We're all about the client experience, but we're not for everybody.

We're for the modern forward thinker.

We're for the firms that believe in AI, that believe they want to have better client experiences because there's value in return for that, right?

That means higher paying clients.

That means more referrals, better retention, right?

So, I'm going to put this back to the tax and accounting firm.

Two firms can deliver identical tax advice.

Um, the one with the better experience often wins here.

So, you got to stop discounting.

You know, you everyone always thinks about what happens in the back end.

How does my team work?

Very rarely do they sit back, which is the most important part of everything you're doing is your client relationships.

So with disruptive technology like AI right now, you putting your moat around that client relationship is the most important thing you can protect.

Okay.

And what is it?

I'm going to go in kind of, you know, what AI and we we can't go through a podcast now without talking about AI, but how does AI tie this all together?

So, you know, uh many accountants think AI will actually destroy pricing power, but Rebekah, what minutesare they missing?

Um, and how can they apply that to their own practice?

Yeah.

So, a lot of accountants and people in other industries, this isn't just accountant specific, but within the accountant industry, people are misunderstanding what's actually happening.

AI isn't just changing taxation and accounting.

It's changing clients, like we just said.

So, every time a client opens Chat GPT or Gemini or Siri or Claude, they're being trained to expect immediate answers, personalized explanations, 24-hour availability.

You wake up at 2 in the morning with a burning question in your mind, you can get an answer.

Um, there is literally no friction.

There is there is no barrier to getting the information you need at any time.

And whether the answers are right or wrong has kind of become secondary.

Um, I saw something the other day that said, "Chat GPT is currently telling the dumbest person, you know, that they're absolutely right." And it made me laugh a little bit because it is kind of true.

But when it comes to a psychological standpoint, clients are bringing all of these expectations of personal personal explanations, personal um kind of like being told that everything they believe is correct or has a solution or finding something that works for them.

People want that to come into every area of their life and with every professional relationship they have, including with their accountant.

So that's why branding matters, why visibility matters, why the client experience matters, because you have to start building the same kind of trust that people have in an AI system that isn't even necessarily right. your advice is going to be right, you know, and you're gonna provide the answers that people actually need.

But you have to take some of these ideas of a frictionless process and providing personal customized information, custom tax plans, custom newsletters that pertain to specific segments of your audience.

All of those things are going to help build trust.

So, economists have long observed that as any financial product becomes commoditized or any product becomes commoditized, differentiation shifts elsewhere.

And I think you could argue that's happened a little bit with Apple um currently with iPhones kind of being everywhere, things like that.

But they're still great at what they do.

But as information becomes abundant, judgment also becomes more valuable.

So as expertise becomes easier for people to access whether it's through AI or through you know the internet in general relationships are becoming more valuable.

So AI isn't going to replace you or take your job.

What it's going to do is bring into sharp light how important it is to have these personal relationships with your clients and provide high quality advisory experiences that meet their needs where they are as a modern consumer.

So, the firms that thrive aren't necessarily going to be the smartest firms.

They could be, but they're really going to be the firms that clients trust the most.

Information is now abundant.

People have it everywhere.

They have it very literally at their fingertips 24/7, 365.

But judgment is what's becoming scarce and that's what you provide.

Well, you can say that for sure.

And I'll give two real good examples of how this applies in other spaces that I think it just kind of reinforces um what I'm talking about.

You know, from a dental visit and I read that I should be doing this this and that and you know the poor dental hygienist has to explain that or college counselors right now.

Well, Chad GBT said I don't need to worry about this. and the humans the judgment is the scarcity part and it's a battle in every vertical and it's a if you don't think this is a battle in your own vertical yet I I assume most do most have experienced it already they've had people that said well Chad GBT said to do this and that and you're sitting back annoyed but you have to explain but if you had proactively reinforced your trust and your goto your firm for the judgment then I think you're going to start winning so I think this is a really important observation.

Most accountants think AI is a technology problem.

Um, and I think what it's doing is creating an expectation problem.

So, the client who gets an instant answer from Chad CBT on that 2 a.m.

Saturday night doesn't suddenly stop needing professional advice.

Um, but they do start expecting faster communication.

I think uh uh proactive advice uh proactive guidance versus reactive.

I think that's the whole commodity reset that's happening.

More personalized experiences, what Rebekah had mentioned.

And more importantly, better follow-up.

Accountants are renown for their poor follow-up, right?

I mean, the onestar reviews that we see on clients, it's not because you're not good at what you do.

You just don't respond or you don't set expectations for that response.

AI and technology can supercharge you.

You can be a superhuman.

Um, you can have responses written for you.

You can just look at them and say, "Yeah, that's right." Boom. you do not have to have some of these kind of bumps in the road that are there currently uh in the future.

So look for a smoother client journey.

Um I would say firms that recognize this shift are going to have a huge advantage and the shift has already happened.

I said this last week I I feel like people are like oh well when it changes no the change has happened.

Um, but my feelings are AI is not replacing relationships.

And you're already seeing so much push back to AI.

You know, whether that be in college graduation speeches and people booing when someone the speaker is talking about AI or the anti-data center movement.

People value human relationships, right?

Um, and it actually raises the bar for them though.

Okay.

So, the future belongs to firms that combine expertise with this visibility. expertise with trust.

Expertise again with client experience.

So the winners will not be the cheapest firms.

This is not a race to the bottom if you do this right.

They'll be the firms clients can't imagine replacing.

So let's go through this real quick.

Uh and let's just go through the brands that we talked about today.

And I'm not even going to say I'm just going to say the the purse brand.

All right.

So Rolex, Rebekah, what is it?

Trust Ferrari positioning.

All right.

Hermes so close.

Scarcity.

Ryan Sirand or Sirand visibility.

Um Apple I think is a big one.

Simplicity.

Yeah.

And so what is then the word for the AI era?

What do you need as a tax and accounting firm?

Differentiation.

Um you you need to be different.

You have to set yourself apart.

I love it.

So, we're going to close this one up.

And if the takeaway that I would like, there's a few of them.

I think there's been some good kind of real world explanations here, but premium pricing is not a pricing strategy.

It's the outcome once you've built trust.

Okay?

That is the outcome of positioning.

That is the outcome of being visible online, being uh and SEO is kind of dead.

Traditional search is dead.

So visibility now happens inside chat GBT inside Gemini.

Okay.

Um the outcome of specialization.

Why is your brand why is your firm being talked about or recommended?

Right.

The outcome of delivering experiences people remember that they trust uh that they then feel good enough to refer others to.

Okay.

So most accountants think they're competing against other accountants.

Um I would argue 100% they're not.

They're competing against expectations and these are expectations established by the brands we talked about by Amazon for example.

Now you know the expectations I get everything in hours or days at the latest, right?

Expectations created by Apple for simplicity.

Uh expectations created by Netflix for example for uh entertainment and ondemand entertainment and a huge library.

Right?

So these are things that now are in the consumers.

Right?

So the expectations now are being morphed and even changed by AI especially in the knowledgebased profession.

So the firms that reduce uncertainty the fastest I believe are the winners. the firms that thrive over the next decade won't necessarily be the firms with the most credentials on the wall or the commas, right?

You know, we've had seen clients with 10 commas.

I'm like, I don't even know what those designations are.

Um, but they'll be the firms that become the obvious choice, the firms that build trust before they're needed, predictive, proactive, right?

Not reactionary.

The firms tell a better story.

This is so important. having your narrative dialed in, having a personality.

Um, you know, it is so easy to differentiate in our space that I mean, that's why we're doing so well.

We that's why we have hundreds and hundreds of people doing our our future ready firm assessments.

We we give you a blueprint because we teach you how to tell a better story and we look at your brand and say, "Okay, this is where you are today.

This is where you can be and that's how you now can create a better client experience." So, the firms that stop selling tax returns like hot dogs, right, and start delivering certainty and outcome, um, they're going to be winning.

And that's because now information is becoming abundant, right?

There's knowledge quote unquote everywhere.

There's information, misinformation, bad information everywhere, but there isn't uh trust isn't everywhere.

Okay?

So, as I mentioned, if you're interested in evaluating your own firm positioning, we usually don't do much selling on this podcast.

Uh, but we are doing, and we've done hundreds of them in the last month, uh, our future ready firm blueprints.

If you go to countingworkspro.com, there's a blue bar or just hit the button that says start my assessment and my staff, our humans will go in and actually fill out just spends three minutes fill out the questionnaire, give us some general idea of where you are, where you want to be, what you're doing today, and we'll come back with you with a road map that is just absolutely awesome.

And we'll give you a sample narrative, a sample brand story of what your firm can sound like.

So, we want to continue helping tax and accounting firms thrive in this AI era.

I hope this has been a solid uh topic.

I think it really helps just from a a visualization of what you should be doing and why this matters.

Sometimes people, you know, they're not versed in marketing.

They don't understand what positioning is.

And I think that just having a little more clarity will really be helpful.

So, again, thanks for being a listener to the Growthminded Accountant podcast.

Until next time, that is a wrap for Rebekah and I.

And we'll hope you uh again, graduation time is happening.

Some have already gone through it.

Summer is about to start.

A big swell out here in Southern California.

So, lots of fun.

I feel like summer is here.

So again, thank you for being a listener and we'll see you next Sync to video time

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