The Importance of Effective Email Communication for Bookkeepers

Effective email communication is a powerful tool to free up your time, but also empower your clients to do things as they now have a note or instructions to follow. Sound interesting?

Why Effective Email Communication is IMPORTANT for Bookkeepers:

Over the years we have been spoiled with the ability to use email as a form of communication. Every day millions of emails are sent from bookkeepers to clients from a desktop, laptop or mobile for free. I think we can all believe that an email is a valuable tool, that sometimes we don’t use enough to streamline our bookkeeping businesses.

In today’s modern age of technology, emails can be scheduled, drafted, postponed and monitored by using different email applications and services. As a bookkeeper utilising these tools for effective email communication are instrumental in running a successful business for a variety of different reasons:

Immediacy

By communicating with your clients through email we can quickly disseminate information and provide fast response times for our clients. It not only allows for quicker problem-solving but creates a more streamlined process for small business owners who are often working multiple roles within the business.

Record Keeping

By keeping the bulk of your client communication in email form you will easily be able to search for past conversations in a matter of minutes to check or confirm something. This ‘virtual paper trail’ provides a more efficient way of using a ‘file folder’ rather than depending on both your and your client’s memories.

Low Cost

Thankfully, email is one of the more inexpensive ways you can communicate with your clients. Instead of paying for expensive phone plans and spending hours on the phone each week, you can easily transition the bulk of your communication with the client to email making mass communication 100% easier and more time-effective.

Marketing

By using email, you can efficiently and effectively spread important information to your clients about your services, changes in regulations, stimulus packages and more to your clients. This kind of information-based email can save you time and reduce the number of times your clients call you all asking the same question.

3 Effective Email Communication Tips for Bookkeepers:

1. Use Powerful Subject Lines:

In one day a business owner can receive over 100 emails (on a good day) and let’s be honest; usually, half of those get read properly. Your clients are busy running their businesses so to ensure that your email, which is important for them to read, gets read promptly you need to ensure your email attracts them as soon as possible.

This is done by creating a powerful Email Subject that will entice them to open the email. If you’re emailing them about Job Keeper or Stimulus information, ensure they know that you are trying to help them get funds for their business. Subject lines such as ‘Let’s get your employees back to work without costing you’ or ‘Want to improve your cash flow?’ are emails that will 100% make your clients open your email right now.

If your email is about lodging BAS on time write a subject line like ‘Avoid Late Fees’ or ‘Let’s Lodge Your BAS and Save You Money’. By using exciting and action-driven subject lines your client is more likely to open your emails right away because you’re talking about things that 100% intrigue their interest; cash flow and saving money. Effective email communication gets your message out clearly and concisely.

2. Create a Clear Message:

For many business owners, Bookkeeping is part of the great unknown of running a business. When sending emails, you need to make sure that you are using terminology your clients will understand while providing them clear and concise formatting that is easy to read while they are busy running their businesses. By being direct and informative, your clients will be more responsive to your emails in a timelier manner because they can easily understand what you are asking from them.

3. Be Empathetic and Understanding

Day in and day out The Savvy Bookkeeper works with fellow bookkeepers who continually say that their clients are frustrating to work with and don’t give them the respect they deserve. While this does, unfortunately, happen within our industry, what you need to remember is that many business owners don’t understand the time, effort and knowledge that it takes being a bookkeeper.
The best way to improve your working relationship with your clients is to remember that their #1 priority is not their bookkeeping; it’s running their business.

They hire you so that your #1 priority can be their bookkeeping. As we all know business owners are busy, often working outside the 9 to 5 stereotypical workday, so the more understanding and empathy you show them you will receive right back.

Make sure that your emails are polite and start with a ‘How are you?’ or ‘Hope your day is going well’ and finish with ‘Thank you for your time’ Or ‘Have a wonderful day’. By offering these simple words of support you will be surprised in the response you will receive by just reminding them, that you too are a business owner doing your job to support them.

You can even use something like Grammarly to help you with spelling and grammar, to help you get across your point accurately.

Check List to Ask Yourself Before Sending:

Before sending your emails make sure that you review the email content and format first (preferably in Desktop and Mobile) to ensure that your clients will easily be able to understand the message you are trying to convey. Here are a few tips that we suggest you should be checking:

1. Can you easily tell what the purpose of this email is?
2. Am I using the right writing ‘tone’ for my client?
3. Have I used correct grammar and punctuation?
4. Is the email easy to read?
5. Have I highlighted the important information?
6. Have I provided easy Call-To-Actions to my clients will understand?

In the end, the more systemized you make your email communication with your clients the more streamlined your bookkeeping processes will be saving your valuable time and money. Ultimately, isn’t that every Savvy Bookkeeper’s goal?

To learn more about this topic, make sure you tune into The Bookkeepers’ Voice Podcast Episode #65 – Essential Email Communication for Bookkeepers get all the insider tips on maximizing your email communication.

That is our take on effective email communication. Over to you…

Thank you for reading our post. We hope it has been useful for you and given you many actionable tips. By skillfully using email, you will save yourself hours (days?) of time on the phone, often saying the same thing over and again. And it will all be on record, and your client (and you) can refer back to what was written, without having to ask again.

Sound good to you?

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