Looking to grow your small firm? Start with these three steps.

There’s no shortage of good ideas for growing your business. But you can’t pursue them all—especially at a small firm, where a hundred other hot priorities are competing for the top of your agenda every day. Instead, you need to focus on the ideas that are easiest to implement and are likely to have the biggest impact

That’s why we put this list together, with a heavy focus on smart, effective, easy-to-use technologies such as generative AI (GenAI) and website tools such as the .cpa web domain. These aren’t long-fuse ideas—you could put many to work in a matter of days (or less). Here’s where to start.

GenAI is ready (really!). Make it work for you.

A funny thing happened in the middle of all the over-the-top hype about AI: It became practical, useful and business-ready. You’d never guess it, but a lot of small firms are already putting AI to work in small, powerful ways that are having a big impact in terms of their efficiency and effectiveness. Especially GenAI, which is used to create new content, from emails and social media posts to videos, images and more.

Here are some ways you can put this powerful, surprisingly easy-to-use technology to work for your firm today:

• Make it your marketing assistant: Generate content to support your website, marketing tools, social media presence, and emails for both clients and prospects.
• Give AI the grunt work: Use AI capabilities built into the software products your firms and clients already use to take on repetitive, highly manual tasks to drive more efficiency—and make life easier for your clients and employees along the way.

To get the most out of GenAI, start with our toolkit. While free tools like ChatGPT are great for experimenting, it’s important to use paid versions when working with sensitive client or firm data to keep everything secure and private.

Use technology to scale up your business

Growth requires the ability to do more—to bring on more clients, reach out to more prospective new clients, and deliver more services for existing clients. Without staffing up, the only way to accomplish these goals is with a big assist from technology. Fortunately, the technologies available to small businesses are up to the job. Small firms are taking a technology- first approach to deliver wins in three key areas:

• Building a strong digital brand whether using platforms like YouTube to build community and brand recognition online or tools like the .cpa web domain to stand out from the competition.
• Unlocking new levels of efficiency by documenting all processes and workflows, standardizing wherever possible, and using AI and other tools to take on lower-value tasks.
• Creating lifelong client relationships by using technology to simplify how you communicate and collaborate with clients.

Focus on brand building

Is your firm’s brand overdue for a refresh? Branding tends to get stuck a few notches down on the to-do list but is critically important for growing your firm and keeping existing clients.

Your website is one of the most visible expressions of your brand. And with the .cpa domain, you have lots of options for improving your brand, much more easily than in the past. For example, you can:

• Change your firm’s name or make your existing URL shorter.
• Add new domains to build out your brand strategy—a geographically-specific name or industry-focused name, for example.
• Create a professional starter site in minutes. This is free to domain holders.
• Or you can work with a trusted provider like CPA Site Solutions for a fully customized website, designed specifically for CPA firms and ready in 30 days or less.

Domain names that have long been out of reach at traditional .com addresses are now available at the .cpa address, which is only available to licensed CPAs and CPA firms.

See which of your preferred website URLs are available by visiting domains.cpa. And if they’re still available, you can begin the short registration process immediately.

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step

Growing your small firm is a journey, and there’s no better time to take your first steps to growth. Between the wealth of advanced, commercially available technologies designed to help your firm grow and all the resources available from CPA.com, including the .cpa domain, it’s easy to get started.

For more insights on how to grow your firm using a .cpa domain, visit our resources page. Securing the perfect URL for your firm is a great way to jump-start your path to growth.

About the author:

Chris Cromer is a tech expert focused on the support and operation of CPA.com’s products and services and leads product management of the .cpa top-level domain. He has a broad range of knowledge in all IT disciplines and leads projects related to internet security, dev/ops, cloud infrastructure, and IT audit and compliance.