CPA and accounting firms · Professional services
Sell the work you want in May, because nobody is listening in March.
Most US firms do not have a lead problem. They have more work than staff, and a client list where the bottom third pays the least and calls the most. Every May a partner says that this year the pruning will finally happen.
Scope, fee, reporting and term are agreed in writing after we have read your brief and spoken to you.
In one paragraph
Marketing for a CPA firm is rarely a hunt for more returns. It is about becoming the obvious choice inside one niche, pricing the work properly, and filling next January with advisory and monthly accounting instead of another hundred 1040s. GullySales does that work as your outside marketing team, from the niche page to the proposal nobody chased.
So the marketing is aimed the other way. The point is to become the firm that dental practices, or craft breweries, or trucking companies call first, and then to reprice or release everything else. None of that can be done in March, when nobody in the building will open an email that is not a K-1.
Last updated 5 Oct 2026. Rules for this trade differ by state and professional body, and they change. We describe restrictions in general terms, so check the current position with your own council or adviser before you publish anything.
How buyers decide
How CPA and accounting firms are chosen.
A business owner leaves their CPA for one of three reasons. The return went on extension for the second year running, nobody answered in August, or the business outgrew a preparer still working out of a spreadsheet. When they start looking they ask their attorney, their banker or their wealth adviser first, which is why those three relationships matter more than any advertisement.
Then they open the website, and this is where most firms lose. A page listing tax, audit and consulting tells a restaurant group owner nothing at all. A page about tip credits, payroll across four locations and the 1099 mess that comes with delivery apps tells them you have seen their exact problem before. Niche beats size here, and it beats a nicer logo every time.
The discovery call and the proposal settle the rest. Owners want a price before they want a partner, and the firm that sends a fixed-fee proposal in two days beats the one promising an hourly estimate next week. US firms are allowed to advertise, within the AICPA rules against misleading claims and whatever your state board adds, so the real limit is accuracy and taste rather than permission.
The problem
What usually goes wrong for CPA and accounting firms.
What owners tell us on the first call, in their words.
“We have more work than staff and the wrong work fills the calendar”
Three hundred small individual returns take the same January as the twelve clients who pay for everything, and nobody will say so out loud.
“The website has not been touched since 2015”
It says tax, audit and consulting, and a prospect cannot tell whether we have ever handled a business like theirs.
“Every May we say we will release the bottom fifty clients”
The list gets written, the letters never go out, and in January all fifty send their documents again.
“One banker sends most of our new work”
The owner is two years from retiring, nobody has met whoever replaces them, and there is no second source standing behind them.
“Prospects call in March when nobody can answer”
The enquiries arrive in the eight weeks we have the least capacity, and between May and August they barely arrive at all.
“Advisory is on the menu and nobody buys it”
We put CFO services on the website two years ago and sold it once, to a client who asked for it before we mentioned it.
What we do
What we do for CPA and accounting firms.
Everything included for CPA and accounting firms, and the result each part is there to produce.
A website built around one niche, not a service list
Pages written for the industry you want more of, naming the returns, credits and deadlines specific to it, with the general service list demoted to where it belongs.
Result: A contractor or a dentist can tell in ten seconds that you work with their kind of business.
A discovery call to fixed-fee proposal routine
A short qualifying call, a scope worked out against your own pricing, and a proposal in a tool such as Ignition that goes out within two working days.
Result: Prospects get a number while they are still comparing, not a week later.
A referral programme with attorneys, bankers and advisers
A named list of the professionals whose clients need you, a reason for each to make the introduction, and a record of what was sent both ways.
Result: New work stops depending on one banker who is about to retire.
An off-season content calendar
Articles, talks and emails planned for May through August, drafted from short conversations with the partner who actually knows the subject.
Result: The firm publishes in the months it has the time to.
Client tiering and the repricing letter
The client list sorted by revenue, effort and fit, with the letter and the conversation script for raising fees or handing a client on.
Result: The pruning that gets discussed every May actually happens.
Google Business Profile and a review routine
The profile completed and kept current, with a review ask timed to a filed return or a resolved notice, written so no client detail is disclosed.
Result: A prospect searching your firm's name finds recent proof from real clients.
An onboarding sequence for new clients
The engagement letter, the document request and the first ninety days mapped out, so a new client is not silent until their organiser arrives.
Result: Clients start the relationship believing they picked the right firm.
Report against the baseline
Enquiries by source, proposals sent and accepted, revenue per client and advisory retainers added, reported against the baseline recorded before work began.
Result: Partners can see whether the client mix is really changing.
How the result is measured
- Proposals sent and proposals accepted
- Revenue per client, by tier
- New clients by niche and referral source
- Clients repriced or released each year
- Advisory retainers added against returns filed
- Enquiry response time, in and out of busy season
Recorded as a baseline before work starts, so every later report has an honest comparison.
Every service, written for CPA and accounting firms
Each has its own page: what it involves for CPA and accounting firms, what you get, and what it is measured on.
- SEORank for the industry you want, not for accountant near me.
- PPC adsBuying clicks in March fills the season you already cannot staff.
- Lead generationSend the fixed fee in two days, before the owner asks the next firm.
- Digital marketingRun the marketing year backwards from January, not forwards from now.
- Reputation managementYou cannot answer a bad review by saying what really happened.
- Local SEOBe found in your metro without becoming the cheap return office.
- Branding and identityA firm named after three retired partners tells a buyer nothing.
- Social media marketingOne channel matters, and the attorneys and bankers are already on it.
- Content marketingWrite in June what you want prospects reading in January.
- Email marketingThe client list is the asset, and most firms only mail it an organiser.
- Buyer personasWrite down who hires a CPA firm, and why each of them would leave their current one.
- CRMKeep prospects, referrers and engagement renewals in one place the partners will open.
- Follow-up systemsFollow up on every proposal and referral so a quiet prospect is not a lost one.
- WebsitesBuild a CPA firm website around the clients you want, not the services you list.
Worth a page and a campaign of their own
Monthly client accounting and advisory retainers · Business tax returns and year-round planning · Individual returns for business owners · Audit, review and compilation engagements · Non-profit and employee benefit plan audits · R&D credit and incentive work · State and local tax and nexus reviews · Entity structuring and owner compensation · Fractional CFO engagements · IRS notice and collections resolution · QuickBooks and Xero clean-up projects
Priority campaigns
Campaigns for what CPA and accounting firms most want to sell.
Each one planned around when your buyers decide, and measured against the baseline.
Off-season niche campaign
A concentrated push from May to August into one industry, using its association meetings, its publications and the problems only that industry has.
Result: By January the firm is known to the buyers it actually wants.
Extension season clean-up
Outreach in the weeks before the September and October deadlines to owners whose current preparer has gone quiet, which is when their patience runs out.
Result: You reach frustrated owners at the exact moment they are ready to move.
Year-end tax planning campaign
A November push to business clients and prospects about decisions that have to be made before 31 December, with a paid planning meeting as the offer.
Result: Planning revenue arrives in a quarter that is usually quiet.
Repricing and tiering campaign
A staged programme of fee letters and conversations for the bottom tier, with a referral path to a firm that wants smaller returns.
Result: Capacity opens up without anybody being left stranded.
Advisory upsell to existing tax clients
A campaign to the business clients already filing with you, offering monthly accounting or a CFO engagement framed around what their return already shows.
Result: Advisory sells to people who already trust you rather than to strangers.
Busy season intake triage
A short qualifying form and reply routine for January to April, separating the prospects worth a partner's time from the ones who found you on price.
Result: The season stops burying the enquiries you would actually want.
Beyond search
Where we reach buyers of CPA and accounting firms, beyond Google.
Search matters, but it is rarely the only way this industry's buyers find a supplier.
Attorneys in estate, business and M&A work
These are the introductions that produce the largest engagements, and they come from being the accountant an attorney trusts in a room.
Bankers and commercial lenders
A lender needs financials they can rely on, so the relationship is built on turnaround and clarity rather than on lunch.
Wealth advisers and insurance agents
They share your best clients and refer both ways once someone makes the arrangement explicit instead of leaving it to goodwill.
Business brokers and M&A advisers
Every sale needs quality of earnings work and a clean set of books, and brokers keep a short list of firms that deliver on time.
Industry associations inside your niche
Speaking at the association your niche belongs to reaches a room of owners who all have the same problem you solve.
QuickBooks and Xero advisor directories
Small business owners search these directories to find a local firm, and most listings are half filled in and never updated.
Who it is for
This is written for these CPA and accounting firms.
- Sole practitioners and two-partner firms
- Multi-partner regional firms
- Tax-only practices
- Client accounting and advisory service teams
- Audit and assurance practices doing non-profit and benefit plan work
- Niche firms serving a single industry
- Bookkeeping firms adding tax work
- Firms preparing for succession or a sale
- New firms in their first two years
Not for
It is not the right fit if.
- You want a guaranteed Google ranking or a guaranteed number of leads. Nobody honest can promise either.
- You need enquiries by next week and have nobody to answer them.
- You want posts and reach reported, not enquiries and orders.
How it works
From your first message to the first report.
No open-ended retainer. Every step gives you something in writing.
First
Your brief
You tell us what you need in a few short steps: your business, what you want, where enquiries come from and how they are handled.
After the brief
A conversation and a written scope
We read it, then talk with whoever handles your enquiries. If you want our help, the scope, the fee and the reporting come in writing, and nothing starts before you have read them.
Before work starts
Baseline recorded
The numbers this work is meant to move, such as enquiries, quotations, orders, visits or renewals, written down so every later report has an honest comparison.
After the baseline
The first fix goes live
The fix we agreed to start with is put in place and measured against the baseline, whether that is a reply, a follow-up, a page, a listing or the handover between marketing and sales.
As agreed
Report against the baseline
What moved, what did not, and what changes next, in plain words. How often you get it is set in writing before work starts.
At renewal
Renew on the numbers
The term ends and you decide whether to continue from the results. The length is agreed in writing before anything starts.
How the work runs for CPA and accounting firms
- 1
Assess
We look at where clients came from, revenue per client, proposals sent against proposals accepted, and what happens between May and August.
- 2
Decide what you want more of
One or two niches and a service mix chosen against capacity and price, with a written note of the work the firm will stop taking.
- 3
Rebuild the front door
Niche pages, the profile, the partner bios and the proof, written so a prospect can recognise their own business on the page.
- 4
Fix the proposal
A qualifying call, a scope template and a fixed-fee proposal that goes out in two days, with a follow-up on every one that goes quiet.
- 5
Market when you can answer
The campaign runs May to August, year-end planning goes out in November, and January to April is triage rather than promotion.
Why us
Why owners pick GullySales over an agency.
Marketing and sales, as one job
Most agencies stop at the enquiry. We also fix what happens after it: the reply, the follow-up, the quote and the CRM.
The person on the first call does the work
No account managers in between. You are never handed to someone you have not met.
A baseline before anything starts
Your numbers are written down on day one, so every later report compares against something honest.
The fee in writing, split three ways
Our time, your media spend and production on separate lines. You always see what goes to us.
No guarantees we cannot keep
The term is agreed in writing and never a default twelve months. We never promise a ranking or a lead count, because nobody controls those.
Hours that fit your day, agreed up front
Which hours we overlap with yours is settled before any work starts, so you know when a reply is coming and when it is not.
#257, 3rd floor, Sri Nanjundeshwara Complex, Nagarbhavi 8th Block, Outer Ring Road. How we work.
Engagement options
Ways to work with us.
Pick the size of commitment that fits. Every option starts with your brief and a conversation.
Option 1
The conversation on its own
A call after you send your brief. It says honestly whether you need outside help, and many fixes are ones your own team can make.
Option 2
One fix, scoped
Start with the fix that matters most, such as reply time or follow-up. The fee is in writing before anything starts.
Option 3
An ongoing programme
We run the work, report against the baseline, and you renew on the numbers. The term and the reporting are agreed in writing first.
Option 4
Guidance for your own team or agency
We plan, brief and check the work of your in-house team or current agency, instead of replacing them.
Your brief
Tell us what you need, and we will read it before we call.
Eight short steps about your business, what you want and who decides. Most questions are a tap, and you can skip any you would rather answer on the call.
FAQ
Questions CPA and accounting firms ask before they call.
Not here? More answers, or ask on WhatsApp.
Are we allowed to advertise this way?
Do you do bookkeeping or tax preparation too?
Should we pick a niche?
When should a firm actually market?
We cannot take on more clients. Why market at all?
Can we ask clients for reviews and name them?
What does this cost?
How long is the contract?
How soon will we see results?
Who will actually do the work?
Part of Professional services. See the other industries in the sector.
Your next practical step
Tell us what you are trying to grow, and we will read it before we call.
Eight short steps, mostly taps. Skip anything you would rather answer on the call.