Mastering Virtual Bookkeeping: How to Run Your Business and Never Meet Your Clients

Do you find yourself wondering how difficult it would be to setup a virtual bookkeeping business to really expand your client pool?

Let’s face it, some areas are more financially depressed than others and being able to do bookkeeping virtually is a great solution to help you really build your business.

Your first step will obviously be to setup a website for your bookkeeping business.  You’ll need to have a page that lists your services, one that describes your experience and an optional page that lists your rates.  Personally, I prefer to state my hourly rates up front because I think it helps to deter “tire kickers” and discourage them from wasting my time if they’re not prepared to pay my rates.

If you’re not very website savvy, an easy alternative is to setup a Wordpress blog.  You can use their “pages” feature instead of their “posting” feature so your site will be very much like a typical website.  WordPress has thousands of templates that you can choose from to make your website unique.  It also has many plug-ins such as site maps to make your website more functional and search engine friendly.

You’ll also need web hosting for your website.  I recommend using Hostgator as they are very reliable and inexpensive to use.  I’ve hosted my own websites on them for a couple of years now and have never had any downtime that I’m aware of.

Once you have your website setup, you’ll have to get some traffic so potential clients can find you.  There are many ways you can do that.  Here’s a list of a few:

Write articles and submit them to article directories and a link back to you website
Join forums in markets that you’d like to do bookkeeping in (such as internet marketers, home businesses, work at home moms, etc.)
Post ads on Craigslist.org describing your bookkeeping services

You can also join virtual assistant forums to learn more ways that you can market your virtual online bookkeeping business.

Virtual bookkeeping can be done a few different ways.  Some bookkeepers login to their client’s computers directly from their own and access the client’s accounting software that way.  Other bookkeepers prefer to do the bookkeeping on their own computer and store the data there.

Either way, your client will have to send you the actual paperwork so that you can process and enter it in the accounting system.  Clients can email, fax, courier or mail this information to you.

Speaking of faxes, you will need a fax machine.  However, I highly recommend using an online faxing service over putting in a separate phone line for your fax.  An online fax service such as eFax is only about $15 per month compared to 4 – 5 times that amount for a separate phone line (note they have a 30 day free trial for even more savings).

Even though many times you won’t be meeting your clients in person, you will still need to speak to them on the phone when necessary.  For that reason many virtual bookkeepers find that online communication services such as Skype are invaluable in being able to talk to their clients worldwide without incurring huge phone bills.

So if you’re looking for ways to expand your current bookkeeping business, I highly recommend you look into virtual bookkeeping as a great way to cast a wider net in potential bookkeeping clients.

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