Minimum Viable Marketing That Works for fCFOs

Speaker A: I find that accountants, and this is a wonderful quality, are very humble people. Like, listen, I'm not all that great. I just saved somebody £100,000 in tax. And you're like, that is phenomenal. Like the accountants I talked to who helped save the farm, you know, they didn't lose the farm, they didn't lose the business, they did sell the business, but they got a good return on it. Like, this is life changing stuff and the accountants will just mention it casually. So I think finding a way to take those stories that feel just like a daily thing for you, and recognizing that if you've had the chance to change somebody's life, even in a small way, you've got to tell people about it.

Speaker B: Welcome back to the new F Word

Speaker C: podcast where we talk finances in business. I'm your host, Colin Hewitt, founder and CEO at Float. We're so glad to be back for season three, and this season we've got some great guests that are going to bring a ton of value. We'll be diving further into how fractional CFOs add value, what financial clarity actually looks like, and what systems and apps are leading the way. New guests, sharper conversations.

Speaker B: Let's get into it.

Speaker C: Hello and um, welcome to the new F Word podcast. Today we're talking with Karen Rayburn, founder of the profitable firm, the creative agency that's been transforming how, uh, accounting firms approach marketing for over a decade. Karen's built a reputation for helping accounts and finance leaders tap into their creativity and connect authentically with clients they genuinely want to work with. She's the author of two books on these subjects and has recently made the move to live on the Isle of M Mull in Scotland. In this episode, we dig into the specific marketing challenges facing modern firms and fractional CFOs. From defining, uh, a clear audience to crafting compelling client stories. Karen shares practical insights on how finance professionals can evol of their marketing, uh, as their services change, especially when transitioning from compliance work to advisory or fractional rules. We talk about the common hesitations many firms have about marketing and explore a refreshing take on why tighter niching in your target audience leads to better client relationships. If you've been thinking about how to differentiate your accounting or CFO services in a crowded market, this conversation provides both strategic direction and actionable next steps. We also talk about what Karen's learned about finding balance and living on an island.

Speaker B: So let's get into it. Hey Karen, it's great to have you on the podcast.

Speaker A: Thanks for having me.

Speaker B: Good to see You, I think, despite your accent, um, you're actually living a little bit closer to me than people might think. So do you want to tell us a bit about, um. I know you were in central Scotland and you moved recently. Do you want to tell us a little bit about that?

Speaker A: Yeah. So I, uh, as most people figure out from my accent, I grew up in America, but I've lived half my life there and then the other half here in Scotland and worked for an accountancy firm and then marketing for accountants. But, um, I lived in central Scotland for a good 20 years or so, but I kept coming to this island that I live on. It's a island, uh, off the west coast of Scotland. Um, and I just came for holidays and visits and break and creative space. And it was my happy place and the place where everything just. I got room to breathe and to think. Like, things are so rushed, and I think now more than ever, so I would use that as my chance to get away. And I always separated it from my work and my normal life. And then I remember I started thinking that I would love to get a house here. And originally the idea was to get a house and have two houses. And then after Covid, I was like, why not just live where you love? And I have a remote company. So I decided to test it. And I came to the island and spent a week and just hired out a flat and worked and then went and, you know, did nice things in the evenings and weekend, and it was amazing. And I'm like, I think this could work. Like, I. I brought the best of both together. And we could talk about it later in the podcast, but I don't really believe in balance. I don't think that actually happens. I think things go up and down. But I did feel something there, like a mixture, a combination, where I'm like, oh, there's the work side and the, uh, you know, enjoying my life side and creative space side and rest and all of those good things. So I moved here, and I've lived here for six months. And you, in order to get here, you fly into Glasgow, and then you take a train, and then you take a ferry, and then you drive, and there's a, uh, there's a journey involved, and there are things that take longer or harder, or if the local shop is out of vegetables, you have no vegetables. But it's very resilient people and a very beautiful, restful place that doesn't allow you to rush. No matter how hard you try. The island will slow you down. And I love that. So that's where I live. And um, that's why I love about it.

Speaker B: That's great. Have you seen the movie the Outrun? I just saw that recently. The Outrun with Shorsha Ronan.

Speaker A: No, I have not.

Speaker B: I think she goes. I think she. I think it's Orkney she goes to live on. And it's kind of slow. Captures it really, really well. Great, great film. Um, actually, yeah. Um, but I think it looks like she has a harder time slowing down than. Than it sounds like you have.

Speaker A: So I, Yeah, I think I've been working at slowing down for so long that I'm receiving it with gratitude. Although, I mean, I'm not gonna lie, the other day there was some roadworks. And most times if you're on the mainland and you get some roadworks and you're stopped for 10 minutes or 20 minutes, this was literally a 45 minute drive around, uh, on the edge of the coast, up and down single track roads versus 10 minutes on a fairly easy road. And I was a little tempted to be like, oh, I have to be there at this time. And then I just went. I literally live in one of the most beautiful places in the world. We saw little lambs and the sea sparkling in the sun and we just went. We will either get there in time or we won't. And meanwhile we're having a nice journey and it's good. So as I said, it's. Every day is a reminder to just slow down a bit.

Speaker B: I love that. Uh, yeah, absolutely. I think it's so tempting to sort of feel like I'll take a break when I'm done with the business or, you know, and I think I've come to the point where I've just realized, yeah, that's never gonna happen. You know, like that, that sense of I have to start it now, you know, like, this is amazing right now. This is amazing. Uh, and like you say like when you're in those traffic lights, just being like what, like an opportunity for a pause, you know, rather than feeling like I have to get. Because that's just, you know, those moments, like if. Yeah, those are the moments where you can see what you're really. What's really going on.

Speaker A: Yeah, well, and, and looking for the gift, the opportunity, the something that you might not have gotten otherwise. And um, you know, yesterday. This was yesterday and it was very, very full day and I had lots of things on, but my nephew's here visiting and we had planned to go to this beach and sauna and swim in the sea. And I knew that that was important and I was prioritizing that for all the right reasons. But my head was getting a bit like, I have so many things to do and work and documents to send clients and just holding that both of those realities that I need to honor the things I promise my clients. And I need to have time with family and in the sea and rest. And so we're driving and I'm tempted to think, oh, my goodness, like, this is taking so much time. And we got to the sea, in the sauna, and there was a whole pod of dolphins that was just swimming with us in the sea. And I'm like, I would have missed that whole amazing. And I'm, you know, like, you get different things at different times, but it just caused me to go. You never know what the pod of dolphins is going to be. And if you're obsessed with this is, it has to be like this and it has to work like this and it has to take this amount of time. I think you can miss the dolphins.

Speaker B: Wow. We've gone, like, we've gone straight into it, straight into the depths.

Speaker A: Real stuff.

Speaker B: Colin, let's not talk about marketing or anything.

Speaker A: Like, let's just go, oh, this all applies to marketing. Don't you worry.

Speaker B: Why don't we take a step back? So you're. The fact that you've been able to move to, um, the island, you've got a remote business. Tell us a bit about how that got started and what, what you do.

Speaker A: Yeah, so I set up, uh, the profitable firm, we call it PF in 2012, because at the time I saw so many people advising accountants to what they needed to do in marketing. And then the account is going, okay, I agree with you. I will, I'll get a brand, I'll get a new website, I'll send emails, I'll, you know, run webinars or whatever it was at the time, but they didn't know how. And they, they had like, multiple providers. You know, they had to talk to the branding agency and get the whole brand done. And then they had to go and find a website person, do the whole thing again. And then once they were done with that, they were like, well, what do we do? We hire somebody to do the emails. So the, the whole thing was kind of fraught with confusion. And I'm a, uh, qualified accountant myself and a marketer, so I thought, hey, maybe I could help accountants to bridge these two things together and connect the strategy and the brand and the website and the emails and the blogs and the events and everything together. And that's what I did. So this agency, so we've been going 13 years, gone through a few, you know, as you do in business, you've gone through a few iterations. But we are still a marketing agency that helps accountants to understand and enjoy marketing. That's the first thing. If you don't understand it, it's not going to go well. And if you don't enjoy it, it's not going to go well. If you look at marketing as a grudge buy and a thing that you have to tick off, it's not going to be the most connected to humanity. And people buy from people. People buy based on emotion, especially accountancy services. My gosh. Like the accountants I talk to and their clients who are, you know, crying or celebrating or trying to move house or trying to start a new business or whatever it is they're trying to do, there's so much emotion in that. And I look at so many accountancy firm websites or marketing, that's so bland. And so, you know, hi, we're accountants, we do accountant y things, we're really friendly, talk to us. And the poor person is going are like, how do I compare this to the other seven accountants that I'm looking at? So of course they do it often by word of mouth or referral, but they're still looking at those marketing materials. So anyway, we help accountants understand enjoy marketing so that they get to work with clients they love and that their marketing attracts to them the clients they love working with. And that has pretty much always been true. But now more than ever, the attracting of clients you love is critical. Everything is going at such speed. AI is changing the marketing industry, the creative agency industry, the accountancy industry in many positive ways. But it's also throwing us into a bit of a tailspin, all of us, me included. And the accountants that are coming to us are no longer like, hey, I need a good brand and website and maybe a little content. They're like, I need leads and I need them fast and I need good ones. And that's tough. Cause I've always said the good things don't come fast. But if you have the right foundations, you can move quicker. So we help the accountants with the minimum viable marketing and then we get them to the results and then move from there to help them work with those clients they love.

Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, it's one of those professions, isn't it? I can't see that has just, you know, I guess, evolved and typically like so many, like people who go into business as a practice. It's, it's not necessarily seen as like we're going at this with this, with, this is our business and this is how we're gonna scale it and grow it and market it and position it. It's, it's a, it's a service that people provide and I think more people are starting to get that. Uh, like people certainly people entering. You're seeing a lot more younger, like media savvy people coming into the space. But you know, I remember, you know, when you said 2012, I can remember being at a zero con in London where you were speaking. Uh, actually you must have just started because it must have been our first zero con as well. So we, we started our businesses like this at kind uh, of the same time. But you obviously like what got you, like how did you recognize this is the niche? Like were you, did you come from accountancy background or did you get a client and decide, like this is an area that I think I'm going to niche into?

Speaker A: Yeah. So I studied accountancy at university and I sort of fell, that's a whole long story, but I sort of fell into it because all my other kind of business related courses at uni were, they just didn't challenge me and the accountancy one did. And I, uh, really liked the way that if this is right and this is right and it balances out, then it works. And there's, there's like, there's patterns to it, there's rhythms to it and you know when you're right and you know when you're wrong with accounts. But I think I also, I know that I also had this creative mindset and those just being able to bring that together and say, I'm somebody who understands accounting. I've worked as an accountant, I've worked as an auditor, I've worked in an accountancy firm. And also I have worked in marketing and do marketing myself. And I understand the struggle. So I embody those two qualities that I believe every accountant embodies. They are an accountant and they are a creative person because they're a human. Every human is creative. But they're also a marketer because they have to be. And some accountants are a marketer because they want to be. But everybody, every business owner is a marketer because you have to be. So the question is, how does the accountant become a good marketer? And that's what I became obsessed with, you know, once I started pf and turns out there's a lot of accountants

Speaker B: who resonate with that, yeah, yeah, I'm sure. I mean there must also be firms where you've gone into where somebody's kind of like, I'm not interested. This is just gimmicky. Like get somebody to do the marketing as a, like it's a sort of thing we have to do. So how do you, how do you choose? Do you choose your clients? Do you find like, what's the ideal? Is there a sort of point, you know, aha, moment that a firm's got to where they're like, no, we need to prioritize, this is our top thing. Or uh, we're not going to survive. Like, is there, does that exist in the market?

Speaker A: Yeah, 100%. And we, we work really hard at living out by example what we tell the accountants to do. And chapter one of my book session one of the, you know, kind of marketer coaching group is audience first. You've got to know your audience. You have to be crystal clear who those people are. Could be an industry niche, could be a type of human person. I don't, I don't care. Your audience doesn't care which one you pick, but they care how specific you are. So if you are specific about the kind of audience you work with, then they will know whether you are for them or not. So we live that out by saying we work with ambitious accountants who want to or are, ah, willing to understand and enjoy marketing. So that kind of person you describe, it's like, listen, this all feels very salesy. I just need to get some marketing done. I don't have a big budget. Can you just make it happen? They don't make it very far past our discovery process because, you know, we have a discovery form that asks loads of questions and well, I won't, I won't give the spoiler away, but there are some questions in there that give us a good indicator of the type of person, the way that they think, the mindset they take. And if they're just like, I found you on Google, I'm looking for the cheapest website I can find in so many words. And you're just like, listen, you know, this is the approach we take. We're very strategic. We write all the content. We believe that strategy, content, design and development all work together. We're reassuringly expensive. We are definitely not the cheapest. And if you want a cheap website, please, by all means, off you go. I hope it goes well. It probably won't, but you know, do that. Or if you're a startup, we are not the people for you if you're a startup who just needs a quick website to have something, but we can help you with the direction your website needs to go, the approach you need to take, the kind of audience you're trying to reach, we can help anyone with that. I work with some very small firms that have one person, and we have a monthly momentum call, and they write their own content, put their own website together, get a client to help them, no problem. I'm a big fan of DIY collaborative marketing, but it's, um, always the mindset. It's the mindset of, I'm willing to learn, I'm willing to try, I'm willing to experiment, I'm willing to involve my team. Those are the people that we're best placed to serve, because then you can actually have a little fun with it. And I believe marketing ought to be fun. Has to. It has to be fun, or else it's as dry as any other stuff that's being generated by everybody else. And then it doesn't stand out, and then it doesn't bring you the clients you love. So it doesn't work.

Speaker B: Yeah. And that's a scary barrier to push through, isn't it? Like, I think there's a. I mean, I feel like I've gone through this myself. Like, I had an agency, like, uh, before Float, we were. We would make websites and do branding. But I didn't really feel like I really ever understood marketing, you know, that it was more about the technical side of, like, getting a website that looks good, bringing a copywriter, photography, you know, brand together. But it wasn't really rooted in, like, how do we. How do we say something unique, how to work through a framework. And I think when we started Float, I thought again, like, marketing just goes out and gets the leads. Like, the real work is done in building the product. I think that, you know, there's a. There's analogies there with accountancy where they. People I can see, imagine people feel like, you know, marketing something that the intern does and, you know, I'm not doing anything creative, fun. We're going to be. We're credible, responsible, you know, how do you. But I imagine, like, the best, like, breakthroughs are when people sort of get over themselves and start to, like you say, have fun with it, really find that gap, find that point of differentiation. Like, how have you. Have you seen people kind of move through that journey and like, do you have any stories that are.

Speaker A: Yeah, so many stories. So many stories. And it's great. I love that I have so many stories. I've gotten to the point now where somebody will tell me about, you know, an accountancy firm that is fairly stereotypical or dry. And I'm like, oh, I sort of forgot that there's still people who don't really care about marketing, don't want to stand out, just ticking away. Maybe they are the cheapest because that's not who we work with. We work with the ones who are open minded and experimental and interested in connecting the message of the marketing to the real experience that people have. So, I mean, a very recent example is a client I'm working with this week. So the first month, um, or so of working with an accountancy firm, we go through the foundational strategy. So what is it that you want to actually get out of this marketing? Why are we having this conversation at all? What's your brand? What are the gaps in your brand? Maybe your name is great, but your colors are wrong. Maybe your colors are great, but your brand voice isn't defined. Then the website, what are the gaps in your website? Do you have a clear client journey? Do you have a clear call to action? Like, side note, if your call to action is book, uh, a call with us today, like that's so far removed from the initial stage that somebody's on. Like at least have some kind of learning or uh, resource thing or test or small thing that somebody can do before they book a call. So we look for the gaps in the website and the brand and then the asset gaps. So that means do you have resources, education things for awareness, scorecards, videos, training courses, an event? You don't have to have all of those, but you gotta have at least one asset. And I mean an actual asset, not a generic guide that you've generated from ChatGPT and slapped your logo on. That's not an asset, that's just a bunch of words. And I have no trouble with AI and ChatGPT. Love it, use it all the time. But I don't believe it's best for generating original marketing content without phenomenal prompts, brand voice, solid foundations, all that. Anyway, we work on all of those things and it takes a month or two. And there's a firm we're working with now who literally asked me this week, what do you think about us trying this? Or what about this blog post? Or what if we did this kind of post on um, LinkedIn? Or do we need to wait until we've updated our brand and updated our website? And I said the short version is whatever you're thinking of as long as you Think it will be helpful for your ideal client? Do it. No question. Do it. I don't care what it is. I don't care if it's a LinkedIn post or a video you record or a, uh, team meeting you want to hold or I don't care what it is, because you just have to try it. And the worst that happens is that it fails and it doesn't really seem to do anything. And you go, okay, what did I learn from that? And then you try again. But if you wait and you wait and you wait and you wait, six months go by, and then you're like, we're ready for the perfect marketing now. But you haven't even been talking to your clients, and you don't even know what the perfect marketing is. So I was telling them that the conversations they can have with their clients, the LinkedIn posts they can put up, the blogs they can write, will just get them a little closer to that ideal client. So by the time their brand and website are beautiful and shiny and fully reflective of who they are as a firm, then we can bring the two together and say, you've been talking to all your prospects about this, and they're all resonating with it. Let's put it in a PDF guide. Let's create a scorecard app. Let's, you know, create some videos or run an event. Now, we know that it's got a bigger chance of success, but the longer you wait for things to be perfect, the longer you miss out on the opportunity to talk to real humans about what actually matters to them.

Speaker B: Totally. I mean, it kind of blows my mind now. And, you know, we. One of the things we, you know, float we are doing a lot of is talking to our customers. So, you know, all the time it's like, get, like, we want to launch this new feature. Let's get 10 new customers. We've got an advisory panel. You know, we've. We've got, um, we're doing a lot of it. And in my agency, we never spoke to our customers about what their experience is of. Of us, you know, and. And I just think if there was one thing that, I mean, we've moved accountancy firms a few times in, in our, you know, 12 years. And I, uh, just think if they just come and asked us, you know, hey, what could we have done better? Like, now that you're leaving us, is there anything that, you know, what would have helped you to stay or how's it going?

Speaker A: You know, like, I tell people, like, if you're going to talk to your clients really, like think therapist questions. You know when you go to your therapist and they ask you this mind blowing question like, how are you? Or how's that working for you? Or tell me more and you're going, oh my gosh, my mind is blown. This is incredible. It's so deep because all they're doing is listening to you and drawing out from what's in your mind. And I think there's so many, I know there's so many accountants who are obsessed with like, we need to do client surveys, we need to send out emails, we need to do all this when actually what you need to do, either in the first five minutes or the last five minutes of every call you have, ideally both. You ask a very simple question like, how are things for you personally? And then they go, well, honestly, I was really stressed about this or I was troubled about that. And you don't go, oh gosh, that's tough. Anyway, let's look at your numbers. You connect that. Like, I had a client the other day that we were, we had a deadline to deliver, uh, a website page for an event that he had and I sent him a message, we chased him, we sent project management things, tools, emails, messages. And finally on like Friday afternoon, I said, I just want to let you know that we need these three things by end of the weekend or 9am Monday morning or else we will not be able to deliver this in time. And he said, oh, thank you so much, I'll get on that right now. And he did. By the end of Friday, he had done all of the things we were waiting on to enable us to finish the website and the page and the form and the stuff for the event. And he sent us a message a couple days later and said, I just want to really thank you because I had the worst week. And he had some personal things that were going on that was absolutely awful. And he said, but this thing was important and you helped me to see what the critical thing was and filter through all the stuff. Because, you know, we're not perfect at PF either. We've got Slack, we got Monday.com, we got emails. And I know what it's like as a business owner to be like, what do you need from me? I just did it to my book editor. I was like, I don't understand what you're asking for. And she's like, if you scroll up to the third message I sent you before, but she was very gracious, just like, there it is. And I'm like, Ah, uh, yes, I forgot all about that. Thank you so much. I will do it. So I think there's just. This is so much even more relevant now with all this AI and speed and tools and tech, the ability to connect with humans and say, how are you really as a person? And if they're not ready or don't want to talk about it, fine. Or if everything's great, fine. They can talk about what they're excited about, what's motivating you. But just that moment to be like, if there was anything that we could give you as an accountancy firm that would make your experience better, what would it be? I guarantee you 90% of the clients you ask will say, I don't really know. That's a good question. Let me think about it. And when they do that, don't let them get away. Don't be like, okay, we'll talk to you later. Say, yeah, sure, think about it. But while you're thinking about it, what about this? And just ask more questions because it's there. They want to tell you things, same as you said, like they're little things. Usually they're not huge. You know, we didn't get this email or this member of your team emailed us six times back and forth. That was a little frustrating. But it's not frustrating enough for me to fill in a survey and tell you that you're horrible or leave. But if that builds up, then it's not a good relationship.

Speaker B: Yeah. And I think, you know, this is maybe controversial because, you know, we, we felt when we started, you know, and back in that 0con 2005, I'm sure Xero were saying, you know, the move is moving away from compliancy and into advisory. You know, I'm sure they were saying that, that talking about that transition and we thought, fantastic. Because, you know, Cash Flow is a, is an advisory service. It's not a, it's not a compliance, um, service. And yet probably, you know, all the way through, until a couple of years ago we would have said, you know, it still hasn't really happened on the mass scale like that. Most people, most accountants, uh, are sticking with the bread and butter of compliance, which is fine. But what we were picking up from businesses when we spoke to them was actually we, There's a gap now because businesses don't, they need more than that. They need somebody to come alongside and go, how's it going? How are your numbers? Are you getting what you need? So this is where we think the kind of role of the Fractional FD is kind of coming in. And that's not to say that accountancy firms can't provide that. I think it's a great opportunity. But you know, people are coming in and going, well, I can do that. And that's what we had to do, you know, and it was only when we did that we were like, oh, this is like how we can get our numbers in a place of like having a month end process. Like our accountants didn't tell us that, ah, you know, like all the things that we needed to do to build, we can actually do a lot with our bookkeeper. But just having somebody sit there and go, we're going to get you management accounts at the end of the month, we're going to give you a cash flow forecast for the year. We're going to give you a 13 week, you know, I will review it monthly with you. That kind of stuff is, is really the opportunity that I think a lot of fractional CFOs, um, are picking up on. And it's just so, yeah, I think it's a really interesting time to be in this space.

Speaker A: It is. And uh, uh, like, I mean I've been in this space for probably 20 years, but I feel like every new iteration is a fascinating one and this one is no exception because of the opportunities. There's always these opportunities, if you see them that way. And this firm I was telling you about, the ones who were saying, oh, do we wait? Do we wait until everything's set? And I'm like, no, be experimental. Try stuff. I said, what's interesting is, uh, I just had a meeting with them recently and I said, what's interesting is you are already trying stuff. Because you told me last week that the last prospect you had come in, you looked at everything they gave you and what they were doing and you said, do you know what? I think we're too expensive for you. I think that from what you've said about what you're willing to spend and what you're expecting and the kind of service that we give, I don't think it's a fit. And they said, this person went, well, what's too expensive? I could, I could, you know, I want you guys to work with me. And they said, well, it's going to be this. And they're like, okay. And they went, man, look at what happens when you go in with confidence and say, listen, there's no harm if we're too expensive for you. It's not a fit, or you don't see the Value, it's no hard feelings. We wish you well. And sometimes they say that and the person goes away. But they said it was remarkable that that one little shift of mindset for them was, oh, if we take on this client at that smaller amount of fee, it will cause the whole problems of the reason we're having this marketing conversation in the first place. And we don't want to perpetuate that. So we will stop that in its tracks. And they will either say no and we'll wish them well, or they'll say yes and we will charge appropriately. And they said they had a client who was. They would have in the old days charged 230amonth, and they increased it to 450amonth to be accurate. And the client said yes. And the same thing with a, A, uh, tax project. Somebody was starting a new venture. And they said, normally we would have been obsessed with this new venture, but we said, well, hold on. What all services do you need from us? And this tax project is separate. And then they got higher fees from that. The point is, people will pay higher fees when they get a result that they maybe didn't know was possible. So this whole concept of, I thought accountants were just like that. I thought that they just contacted me once a year. I thought that I would get a bill with three days notice to pay 50 grand. I thought it sucks, but that's the way it goes. So their whole approach is like, that is not what you have to expect from an accountant. Did you know that? And I've had that happen as well. I talked to somebody who, I think he does woodworking. And I said, you know, I work with all these different accountants. You've just got a 30 grand tax bill. I can find you an accountant who can help you with that. But I can also find you an accountant who can help make sure that that never happens again. That is like, that it comes with, you know, three days notice. Not that you don't get a 30 grand tax bill. You might get 100 grand tax bill and be excited about it because your revenues are so high. And I said, plus, I could find you an accountant that you really like and that you'd enjoy having a beer with. And he's like, do those people exist? I'm, uh, like, they do. And I know loads of them. So just circling back to the, the buyer's perspective that I don't believe they know what they need, but they know what's wrong and they know what's frustrating and they know what's driving the mental and if they can come in and, and the accountant or the FD or the VCFO can be like, did you know that this was possible? Did you know that we can manage all of your numbers? You don't have to worry about any of those. But these three numbers, these, you know, KPIs, if you want to call them that. But whatever these numbers you need to be obsessed with. And if you are not obsessed with those, you are going to get into the same trouble. Any business owner can understand that. And they're sitting there feeling shame and guilt and blame for themselves that they're not understanding their accounts. And a good accountant says, you don't have to understand all that. That's what I'm here for. But you gotta fault track these numbers obsessively and when they go up or down massively, talk to me about it. And then like you said, it's that human relationship so that you're not having this super formal meeting with your accountant, you're just going, colin, listen, this happened. Is that cool? Is that good? Is that bad? What do I do? And then you have that help.

Speaker B: And I think, I mean, just to sort of move it into. How would, how this would apply for somebody who's moved into that fractional CFO business? I mean, presumably this is, all of this applies, you know, somebody sides, right? I'm making the leap. Um, I've been a CFO and I want to move to having, you know, less or do four days a week and have, you know, four or five clients. Uh, and, you know, what, what are they, what would the steps be that you would that again, they should go through? Because, you know, I can see people going, oh, am I going to have to post every day on LinkedIn? Am I, how am I going to get clients? Am I going to, you know, what happens if I lose a client? How am I, you know, if somebody. What's that I charge? Like what, what are the kind of things that you would start from, from that point of view?

Speaker A: Yeah, it's a really great question. I would say there's, there's one big question to ask right at the beginning, which, it's okay if you don't know the answer to this yet, but at some point, pretty quickly, within the next six to 12 months, you're going to need to know, is this a personal brand? Is this Colin the B cfo, or, you know, Karen the CFO consultant, or is this potentially a scalable business? Is this the CFO company? No offense, if that's somebody's actual Business name. But, you know, XYZ company, is it going to be scalable or is it going to be just you? Because that is going to change how you do your marketing. Now if you don't know, like genuine, you're like, I don't know. Right now it is just me. It could be scalable later. I don't even have time or energy to think about that. I just want to get the four or five clients, then treat it like a personal brand. Which means that it's about your name, your experience, your case studies and stories make your marketing very human. You know, just tells whatever format, we will get to that. But whether it's LinkedIn or blog posts or videos or whatever, it's about telling the stories of success and failure. You know, I worked with a client who this was a big fail, then we did this and then they had success. People love to hear those stories. And if you have that in your mind, it's going to ease the burden a bit. Because if you know for, for sure that this is going to be a scalable thing, you're going to bring in others. There's maybe two of you. I, uh, was talking to some people recently who are in exactly that situation you described, but they're two of them and they each have their own personal brand, their own website, their own services. But they're offering this VCFO thing together, combined. And I said, well, minimum viable marketing, just each of you create a page on your websites and do it separately. And if it goes super well, we can worry about bringing it together and giving it a name and all of this. But that's another easy mistake to make, is be like, okay, there's two of us, we need to give it a name. We need to get a branding agency in. And, um, we need to build a website, which you may do, but if you haven't proven the concept, you might just be spending a whole bunch of money on something that doesn't work or isn't what people need. So once you've answered that question, then it's the, you know, 12 elements from the Accountant Marketer. So it's the book I wrote for accountants or anyone financially doing marketing. And chapter one, number one, who is your audience if you don't know that everything else in marketing is going to be harder for you and for your potential buyer. And the specifics of this audience need to be sharp. So the more vague you are, the harder it is for them to find you. The harder it is for them to decide to work with you, the less they're willing to spend, and the less likely they get in touch at all. The more specific and clear and sharp that you are, the more they can say, oh, I think that that is me. They work with me. And therefore they lean in. And it doesn't take all these extra brain calories for them to be like, is this. Is this. Like, do we work together? How does this work? They just go. They work with. You know, I've always used this example that if they say they work with female owners of creative agencies that have been going for more than 10 years and, you know, past the million pound barrier or whatever those things are, and who happened to live on a remote Scottish island and, you know, have brown hair, whatever, I mean, the more specific you are, the better. But if somebody said that, I'd be like, wow, that's almost spooky. And I actually had somebody say that to me. They sent me a LinkedIn message and said, I feel like your book is almost spooky. I sat down to read it and I felt like you and I had been at the pub and I had unburdened my whole soul to you, and. And then you wrote a book about it. And I was. I love getting messages like that, because that's why I wrote the book to say, if you just follow these 12 things in order, starting with your audience, you will be a little clearer. And that's all I'm trying to help you with in the first stage, is to be a little clearer and then more and more clear. Because the more clear you are, the more clear they can be about whether they want to work with you. So audience first, then the issues that they have, then the way that you approach things, and it goes from there.

Speaker B: Yeah, and it's funny because, you know, honestly, at float, you know, we. That's not where we started. We started with thinking that we were the, like, you know, my. I was the customer, um, from my previous business, and I thought everybody else would be like me. And I think that's a big sort of lesson you have to often learn is, like, not everybody else is like you. And, you know, and it's shocking. Um, so the audience question was actually something that kept coming back to bite us. And, you know, people would say, marketing teams would come to us, or agencies would come to say, well, just tell us who your audience is. So we would go, well, it's small businesses, accounting firms, virtual FDs, uh, you know, like, and. And just realizing now that that felt like it was quite specific to us at the time, you know, um, well, what size of the business? Oh, they're between 500 and, you know, 10 million. Okay. So we're very specific. Um, and, um, you know, I, uh, think, I imagine for a lot of people, like, what, what's an example of. If you're like, you say, um, people don't. They're not willing to spend enough time on that audience because they, it's, it feels like they're narrowing in or they're commit, you know, they're, they're going to be like, well, I would work, I said this, but I would work with these other people. And um, but it is, it's really hard to grow a business like that because if you, you know, you start having three very different clients, they're not connecting to the same people, they're giving very different testimonials. They're, um, they, you're solving different problems for them. So, yeah, it's kind of like, whereas when you, when you really focus in and go, we are going to solve for, you know, female agencies that are over 10 years old, they live in remote islands. That's like a really, you know, that's a much better, um, definition. But it takes a long time, I think, to, to get there. Um, yeah, it does.

Speaker A: It does. That's a, That's a really good point. And I don't want anyone to be under the illusion again, that they have to hold off on any marketing until they are crystal clear. It's the same concept as, um, the brand and the website and those foundational things. You can make some progress towards it and then get, and you will get more and more clarity. You and I have both done this. I exclusively served accountants since day one at pf, but we have gotten much more clear about the type of accountant that we are best placed to serve. And also even just writing the book, the accountant marketer has allowed me to help more accountants without directly working with them, um, one to one. So if they are very small or startup or solo and don't have any budget at all, or very, very small, I'm, um, like, listen, go buy the book. Go buy the book, read it. You can join a coaching group if you've got that level of investment and I can guide you through that. But at the end of the day, if all you do is read it and get helped, wonderful. I'm so pleased. And then we have other people who, you know, are running a larger firm and larger being even just two or three partners, 50, 100 team members, and they are also helped by it. So you are going to progress with your audience in the same way that you're going to progress with your business. Your business is just going to keep changing based on you, your team, the client needs, the world at large AI all of these things. So the key is to be as specific as it is possible for you to be. I, uh, would encourage you to be a little more specific than you feel comfortable. Bing. Get yourself just a tiny bit uncomfortable where you worry a little that you're sending people away. When that worry comes in, I believe that's an indicator that you're headed the right direction. Because your marketing is supposed to send some people away. That is its job. Good marketing divides and if it is not dividing, it is too broad. So how can you divide further? Because I believe there's enough business for everybody. There's so much business. I have a friend on the island who does photography and videography for island based businesses. That's all he does and he does it really well and lots of these businesses use him and I am sure that he could be a massive success working with businesses all over the uk. But that's not uh, what he does because he lives on the island and wants to have this restful way of life and he wants to support these small businesses in a way that fits with them. So maybe yours isn't that specific, but get as specific as you can. And the key to that is to look for patterns. So if you don't have an industry niche like first, if you do lean into that because that's an easier, faster way. But if you do not, if you're like genuinely, we have a brewery, we have a coffee shop, we have an E commerce business and I've got a consultant and a coach. I don't see any patterns. If you don't see patterns of industry, look for patterns of personality and humanity. Are these ambitious people? Are these people who are very family orientated, do they all have dogs? I don't. You know, like, is there anything that you see in common that you can lean into either about their business or them as a human or them as a business owner or anything? And there will be. And when you find that, lean into that. So for example, one of the firms we're working with realized that the theme we struggle, I'm not going to lie, we struggled with this a bit. We wrestled with the whole audience thing for that reason. And we finally said their ideal audience is somebody who's really ambitious, a little bit worried that the other businesses like them are doing better than them. The imposter syndrome. And they've had a bad experience with another accountant. That's what holds them in common. We will probably get much more specific, but that's what we've got right now. So all of the marketing is going to be driven towards that. Do you feel like this, have you had this happen? Do you think this is what an accountant is? Because guess what, we've got news for you. It can be different. And what was really fascinating was that when we were talking about this, they said that the clients they got from an event or an in person connection never queried the fee. And I said, well, what kinds of things are you talking to people about in an event? And they said, well, most of the time it's well, my account at this and that. And they say that's not okay. That's not good accountant behavior. It ought to be like this. And the person went, oh, what? I didn't know this. So now we're taking that thing that they say naturally at events and putting it into their marketing so that they can attract people without having to be an event. Does that make sense?

Speaker B: Yeah, it makes so much sense. And I think, I think, you know, again, it's so easy to, when things are kind of taking along nicely to kind of think, well, we'll just get the marketing people to kind of boost it a little bit, you know, like bring them in and do a few more posts or uh, up the ad budget or that kind of thing. And actually uh, it really is. If you're not clear on the audience, I would say that it is so worthwhile. The senior people, like if it's, you know, if you're a firm or if you're. Even if it's just you, you know, sitting down and going, I am going away for a week and I'm not, I'm going to work with somebody to help me get this message straight. Because until I'm clear on what we're doing, and the only other thing I would add to that is be willing to get it wrong as well. Like we, we, we went through this where we were like, we've got to, we're just going to go for it. And uh, we had an in between website that's different to the one we have up now. But you know, it was pretty, it went pretty wacky. You know, we were, we were targeting agencies at the time. Um, we thought we're going to be creative, we're going to be like personality led. It was quite sort of cartoony and um, people loved it. You know, people did like it but it was too small. That was when we realized, like, this is. We're not. We're still not reaching enough to. Doesn't feel quite right. But I think in hindsight, I'm glad we did it, because we were willing to. You have to be. If you're not willing to make a mistake and go, well, we tried it and didn't work, then, you know, you move on to the next one and, like, see it as an experiment. Don't see it as, like, people are going to. We're going to be shamed. People will never use this, like, again. Because, you know, you. You just can. You just keep evolving and keep changing. And I think that's been something we've maybe done too slowly, uh, in the past. And then, you know, maybe you flip to the other side and you go quickly. And it's actually like, um, okay, now we need to pedal back. But you might get it wrong. And that's okay. Would probably be the thing I would add.

Speaker A: That's always what I tell accountants with marketing. That is the difference with accounting. You remember I said when I was at uni, I was like, ooh, these accounting classes, it matches. There's rhythms, there's patterns. It makes sense. When it comes to marketing, you've got to throw that out of the window. Which feels really weird because you're marketing something that makes sense by using a process that doesn't really make a whole lot of sense to you or anybody else. And the point is to play with it and experiment with it for exactly what you just said. I mean, I was reading an article about the very recent, um, Jaguar ad that just failed massively, massively. Because they did this whole advert that had no cars in it. There were no cars. And they're like, copy nothing. Be original. And everyone's like, what are you H and M? Are you like, what? I don't understand. There's a bunch of colors and people dancing about. And so there's a balance of being bold and different, but actually saying, this is who we are and this is what we do. And we had an accountancy firm that said, well, we do so much more than accounting. Shall we just say that we're professional services? And I said, absolutely the hell not. Do not do that. Because the more vague you get, what does professional services even mean? Nothing. At least if you say you're accountants, you have an opportunity to be a better accountant and to show what a better accountant looks like. So make sure you stick to the core roots of what it is you actually do. I mean, I deal with this in marketing all the time. A lot of accountants have had a bad experience with marketers, marketing agencies, website developers, consultants, authors, speakers, all of the things that I am and my company is. But the way to do that is to say, I'm really sorry that you had to go through that. That's tough and that sucks. And I wish it wasn't the case. But what kinds of things did you learn from it? And that tells me if they're, you know, willing to be optimists and experimental and learn and move forward and how can we make sure that doesn't happen again for you? And that, I think, is what the accountants and the CFOs and the FDs, that's the key. What frustrates the life out of you? That is one of the questions we tell people to ask their clients. And if you don't know, go ask them. A lot of you have, you can DM or message or WhatsApp your client and be like, hey, I just, I'm doing some like, marketing prep and I'm just curious what frustrates the life out of you? I guarantee you, you will get some phenomenal answers and that will tell you how to craft your marketing. Because of everybody, I mean, you can say what frustrates the life out of you about accounting specifically, or you can just say in your business that's going to give you some gold dust to be like, okay, we address this. And then your potential buyer goes, that frustrates the life out of me. How did they know? And then they lean in rather than being confused.

Speaker B: Yeah, no, absolutely. And there's just so much opportunity then to try and innovate in that and go. People don't like unexpected bills. So we're going to offer like a monthly fee or we're going to commit, give a commitment that will always give you up a payment plan on anything. And we'll give you upfront advice if there's going to be something. And there's just so much, uh, innovation you can do to try and become the ideal based on what people don't want. So, yeah, I love what you're saying. And, um, I think the 12 part framework that you talk about in the book is fantastic. I know you've got a new book coming out, is that right? Tell us a bit about that.

Speaker A: Yeah, so the second book is on the mindset of creativity. So the first one is here's the structure, here's the plan. And I actually almost wrote it. Not by accident, but it wasn't the first book I intended to write, I wanted to write something very creative and open and story led. And I ended up writing the Accountant Marketer, because I wrote down all the things that I kept saying over and over to accountants, and Suddenly I had 60,000 words in a Google Doc. But now that I've written that and published it and say, this is the structure and the approach. I actually like how it's worked out that the second book is. And now you need to think about your mindset. You are a creative person. Every human is creative. So the concept is, accountants, you are creative. You're a creative person. And when you lean into that creativity, it transforms your marketing, your business, even your life. Because instead of going, oh, I'm not creative, I'm just an accountant. I just do the numbers. I'm the. And you minimize yourself. Instead, you open it up and go, I have creative ideas. Because creativity is essentially problem solving and curiosity. You've got those. Every business owner, entrepreneur has those in some percentage because that's why you start your business. So when you lean into problem solving and curiosity with yourself, with your marketing, with your team, with your clients, with your services, then your marketing is better because you're like, huh, huh. Here's a problem that all of these clients have. How might we solve that? How might we address that in the first month of them being a client? And how might we tell people about that before they become a client? And that's the marketing side. So the book is crafted around helping you to realize that you are a creative person or if you do already know that, how to lean into it more so you get, you get better results from your marketing and a better business and life too.

Speaker B: That sounds great. And I think, you know, most of the accountants and financial people I've spoken to. Yeah, like, there, there is always something behind, you know, there's that kind of like people say, oh, you're going to an accounting event or that sounds a bit dull. And it's actually the opposite, isn't it? It's always, like, fun. And there's a lot of, like, there's a lot under the surface, like behind the. The numbers waiting to come out. And yeah, I love that, that everybody's creative. And, and how do you use that to. To generate something that you're proud of at the end of, um, your time? It's not just we kept people out of jail or, you know, it's actually, you know, we help transform these businesses. I know we're kind of approaching time. Have you got five more minutes? Because I wanted to ask you about balance. Um, we talked a bit about that right at the beginning and you said, um, you've got some interesting views on that. Tell me a bit about that.

Speaker A: Well, I have struggled with this concept of work life balance or just balance in general for a long time. And for a while I was like, oh, I believe more in like a work life blend. And it's not really about balance and all this. But I read something recently that caused me to be like, do you know what? I don't really believe in balance in that way. Because balance sets an imperfect expectation that we will have a life that just floats. It will just balance perfectly. A little ball sitting on top of a post and it just sits there and it's not going to be moved by the wind or the rain and nobody's going to knock it off and a dog isn't going to come by and it's just going to sit there balanced perfectly. That will not happen. Every single day, every week. There is something throwing you off balance. And the point is not for the thing to be balanced. It's for things to sit where they need to sit. And when they fall off, you put them back up or you go, do you know what? I'm glad that fell off. I don't want that there anymore. But I mean, my whole week was thrown off last week cause I had dental surgery. It was not pleasant. I did not enjoy it. It was a good thing that I needed to have done. But I had this super optimistic, like, oh, uh, I'm gonna be back at it in three days. And I was not. I was imbalanced physically, mentally, emotionally. And, uh, I did a little better job. Not a perfect job, still working on it myself, but a little better job of going, oh, huh, that balance went off a little more than I expected. So I'm just going to adjust. I'm going to ask some of my very kind clients to shift the call so that I can give them my best energy. And of course they did. And they've all been there too. And instead of going, I'm expecting my life to just float along balanced. I'm going, okay, something is going to knock it off and how am I going to respond to that and what am I going to do with that and how will I be a at, uh, peace and at rest sort of person? You can call it balance if you want to, but, uh, for me it's just having a sense of calm within myself when things are unbalanced. Because there's always something either work or personal or mental or emotional or physical or financial or family or relational or whatever that is off balance. And if we go, yeah, that's how it goes. Sometimes one thing's out of balance, sometimes 7 are. Sometimes the whole of life feels unbalanced and that is okay because that is how life works. And when you accept that, then it releases some of the pressure of stressing out about why is my tooth not healed in three days? And you're like beyond. Because it's a human body. These things take time. It's frickin surgery. Surgery is a heavy thing. Take your antibiotics, take your ibuprofen and go to bed or do, uh, you know, drink some more liquids, like do the thing that you need to do and maybe stop stressing so much about restoring balance and just recognize what's in or out of balance and accept it and see what you can do about it if anything. And if you cannot, just go, hey, it's a little imbalanced right now, okay? And I know I make that sound all very calm and I'm not, you know, uh, I don't believe I'm somebody who has this figured out, but that is a big part of why I moved to this island. Because I, last year before I moved, I was probably the most imbalanced I've ever been in my entire life, in my business, personally, mentally, emotionally, every way. And I was not a happy person. I had people constantly being like, oh, you have such a great agency and everything's going so great for you. And I distinctly remember thinking, if you had any idea what I am going through and the fact that I was just crying right before I jumped on this call and pulled myself together as you do, if you had any idea, you would not be praising me. But I don't have time to explain all of this and I'm still trying to figure it out. So I made a lot of changes in my life to get to a place where I could accept the imbalance better and still working on it. But for me, being physically in a place where no matter how hard you try to drive fast, there will be a sheep or a lamb or a highland cow or some water or roadworks or something that will slow you down and go, okay, that is fine, I'm going to receive that and move through life as opposed to like we were saying at the beginning, blasting through it to try to get somewhere little bit more of enjoying the journey.

Speaker B: Mhm. Yeah, that's great. I mean, I think kudos to you for like you say, when you recognize that things are not where you want them to be, then to. To try, like, to change something up. And, you know, it's, uh. I think that's a big, you know, obviously, you know, one of my sort of big lessons is like, things will. Things will pass. You know, things will, like, whatever you're going through, like, it's going to change. And I think. But it's also like, yeah, why not change something as well and try and see how that goes.

Speaker A: Sometimes it's a small thing that you change, and sometimes it's a massive one. And I do want to say, for anyone listening who's thinking, well, that sounds all very well, but I cannot even see what I need to change. Uh, like, I was there too. And the toughest thing for me was making a massive. I made three or four massive changes in my personal life and my business all at the same time. And I won't say they felt wrong. They didn't feel wrong. But I was sad, I was angry, I was exhausted, I was frustrated. It wasn't like I made the change and went, ah, uh, everything is smooth now. Now things got loads better a month later, two months later, four months later. And I remember going, I. I was pretty sure that that's what would happen, but I had to believe it and hold onto it. So just, uh, just an encouragement to those who are thinking. That sounds all very well. Sometimes you have to make the hard decision and you feel crap about it. That doesn't mean it was the wrong decision. It just means that sometimes change, especially big change, feels awful for a little bit because you disappoint people or they feel disappointed. Maybe you haven't disappointed, you have made a decision. They feel disappointed, they feel angry, they don't like the change. They don't want you to move to a different place or whatever things happen. But you hold onto the thing that will, you believe will get you to a place where you can receive the imbalances of life a little better and that will be worth it.

Speaker B: Karen, that's beautiful. And a great way to wrap things up. I think it sounds like you need to sort of start a little hermitage on Mullen. Like, we'll come and visit and sit. Sit under your tutelage while little retreats.

Speaker A: Yes. One or two at a time.

Speaker B: Yeah. You know, maybe in like 20 years when you've got, like, gray, uh, hair and you become like this, uh, this wizard.

Speaker A: Yes. Yes, exactly.

Speaker B: We're going to come. We're going to come looking.

Speaker A: That's exactly what we need.

Speaker B: But like, yeah, great. To catch up. And um, thanks for coming on. And if people want to get in touch with you, where should they look?

Speaker A: Probably the simplest, fastest way to get in touch with me personally is my LinkedIn Karen Rayburn R E Y B U R N online and I will respond to all real human DMs. If you're coming on to sell me something, I'll remove the connection. And then for PF, if you go to werpf.com, there's a discovery form that you can fill in if you're interested in working with the agency.

Speaker B: Thanks for tuning in to another episode of the New F Word. I hope you enjoyed it. Remember, expert financial advice shouldn't be limited to those with just big budgets. You can access the same level of advice for a fraction of the costs thanks to this fractional revolution. I believe that every growing business needs

Speaker C: to know how much a game changer this can be.

Speaker B: So if you love the episode, please consider subscribing to the show. It'll help us keep doing what we're passionate about. And feel free to share this episode with others who might find it useful. Finally, we'd love to hear your thoughts.

Speaker C: Feel free to connect with us on LinkedIn.

Speaker B: See you in the next one.