Accounting firm marketing strategies for firms that sell tax planning

The best marketing plan for a firm that sells planning runs on the IRS calendar. Collect planning candidates from January to April, book meetings from May to early September, run year-end planning from October to December, and pick one type of business owner to aim all of it at.

Prep demand turns up every February on its own. Planning has no deadline pushing owners toward you, so your marketing has to create the moment. This guide gives you the month-by-month plan, the four things your website must say, the advertising rules that apply to CPAs and EAs, and the numbers to track.

Why planning needs its own marketing

Prep sells itself once a year. Planning sells in any month, and only when an owner sees a reason to act.

So the job is to give a specific owner a specific reason to meet you this month, then make the meeting easy to book.

There is no shortage of owners. The SBA's Office of Advocacy counts 34,752,434 small businesses in the United States (SBA Office of Advocacy, FAQ 2024). In fiscal year 2025 the IRS received 6,154,614 S corporation returns and 5,215,815 partnership returns (IRS Data Book, Table 1-2). Your marketing job is to reach the small slice of those owners who fit your firm.

Pick one owner type first

Firms that market to "small businesses" sound like every other firm. Pick one owner type and write everything for them.

Choose on four things:

1. Entity. S corporation owners have planning questions built in. The IRS requires an S corporation to pay a shareholder-employee reasonable compensation before non-wage distributions (IRS, S corporation compensation). Every owner taking distributions has a salary question worth a meeting.
2. Industry. Pick one where you already have clients. Your examples will be real and your fee will be easier to defend.
3. Revenue band. Set a floor where planning clearly pays for itself.
4. State. Where you are licensed and where your state rules give you something to talk about.

You can add a second owner type next year. Starting with three spreads your marketing too thin to be remembered.

Your website: the four things an owner looks for

A business owner who lands on your site from an ad, a referral or a search wants four answers fast.

1. Who you serve. Name the owner type in the first line, for example "We plan taxes for S corporation owners in construction."
2. What planning includes. List the deliverables. A written plan, a mid-year review, a year-end meeting, estimated payment updates. Owners buy what they can picture.
3. How you price. A fixed fee or a range. Circular 230 allows practitioners to publish fixed fees for specific routine services, hourly rates, a range of fees for particular services, and the fee for an initial consultation. You may charge no more than the published rates for at least 30 calendar days after the last date they were published (31 CFR 10.30(b)).
4. How to book. One button to a short form or a calendar. Don't make an owner email you and wait for a reply.

A 12-month marketing calendar

January to April: the April crunch

You have no time to market, so don't try. Use prep work to build next season's planning list.

• Tag every return where planning would have saved real money. Rising Schedule C profit, an S corporation owner with a low salary and big distributions, a partnership with a new partner.
• Note the owners who asked "why is my bill so high?"
• April 15 is the deadline for most returns and the first estimated payment (IRS estimated tax FAQ). Send nothing about planning until after it.

May to August: the gap after busy season

This is your main booking window. The phone goes flat for prep, and owners still have most of the year left to change their numbers.

• First week of May: email your tagged list. Offer a fixed-fee planning review with two dates.
• June 15: second estimated payment. Contact owners whose payments look too high or too low.
• June and July: run one webinar or small workshop for your chosen owner type, if you have a list to invite.
• All summer: turn on any outside source, such as ads or a marketing firm that books meetings, so new owners arrive while you have time to meet them.

September to October: extension season

• September 15: third estimated payment. One more reason to call.
• October 15: the extension deadline for individual returns (IRS, get an extension). Finish extensions, then switch fully to year-end planning.
• Send a year-end planning offer to everyone you met in summer who didn't sign.

November to December: year-end planning

• Run year-end meetings for planning clients and late signers.
• Ask happy clients for one referral, right after you show them what the plan saved.
• Write down which owner type signed best this year. Next year's marketing starts from that answer.

A topic for this year's year-end letters

For tax years beginning after 2025, the IRS describes a new minimum deduction for active qualified business income, tied to material participation in the business (IRS, qualified business income deduction). New rules give owners a reason to meet. Check the details against the IRS page and your own reading before you put a number in front of a client.

Channels compared for planning work

For a side-by-side look at buying leads, appointments or qualified meetings, compare what each one hands you and what it costs before you pay.

If you have meeting capacity from May to August, see whether your firm fits our criteria.

See if your firm is a fit

Content that brings owners in

Write for the owner type you picked. Three formats suit planning firms:

• State rule explainers. Only publish state content with real, sourced state facts. A page that swaps the state name and repeats the same text helps nobody. Google's spam policies list pages aimed at specific regions or cities that funnel users to one page as doorway abuse (Google Search spam policies).
• Entity choice pages. S corporation or LLC taxed as a partnership, salary versus distributions, when to revisit an election.
• Year-end checklists. One page, dated, for your owner type.

Every piece should end with one next step: book a planning review.

Rules on advertising for CPAs and EAs

For IRS matters, your marketing is covered by Treasury Circular 230 section 10.30 (31 CFR 10.30). Key points in plain words:

• Don't use, or take part in using, any ad or private solicitation with a false, fraudulent, coercive, misleading or deceptive statement or claim (10.30(a)(1)).
• Uninvited written or oral solicitations that break federal or state law, or another rule that applies to you, are not allowed. Any lawful solicitation, whether you make it or someone makes it for you, must clearly say it is a solicitation and, if applicable, name the source of the information used to choose the recipient (10.30(a)(2)).
• If a prospect has made it known they don't want to be solicited, stop trying to contact them (10.30(c)).
• For direct mail and what the rule calls "e-commerce communications", keep a copy of the actual message and a list or description of who received it for at least 36 months from the last time it was sent or used (10.30(c)).
• Fee statements that involve extra costs must say whether the client pays those costs.
• Enrolled agents may not describe their designation as "certified" or imply an employer and employee relationship with the IRS. "Enrolled to practice before the Internal Revenue Service" is one wording the rule accepts (10.30(a)(1)).
• Don't assist, or accept help from, anyone you know gets clients in a way this section forbids (10.30(d)).

Before you tag returns or email prep clients about planning, check section 7216. A prep client list kept without consent may not be used to solicit any service other than tax return preparation (26 CFR 301.7216-2(n)), and using return information to solicit other services generally needs each client's signed consent first (26 CFR 301.7216-3). Ask your adviser whether your planning offer needs that consent.

The IRS notes that all states regulate advertising and solicitation by attorneys and CPAs (IRS, practitioner FAQ, Q15). Check the rules for every state you market in. This summary is general information and is not legal advice.

What to measure

Track five numbers each month, by source:

1. Meetings booked
2. Meetings held
3. Planning clients signed
4. Average first-year planning fee
5. Total cost of the source, including your team's hours

Worked example (example numbers only, use your own): In July a firm books 14 meetings from its email list and 8 from ads. 12 and 5 are held. 4 and 1 sign. The email list produced four of the five clients. If the ads also cost more per signed client, next May the firm emails earlier and trims the ad budget. Without the split by source, the firm would see 5 new clients and have to guess where they came from.

What our marketing has taught us

We run marketing that fills tax firms' calendars with planning meetings, and the lessons that carry across every channel are about what happens before a meeting is booked.

• Agree in writing who counts before any marketing starts: owner and decision maker, entity type, a revenue or profit floor, wants proactive planning, a state you serve, new to your firm.
• Speak with each owner briefly before the meeting is booked. A short check keeps free-advice tire-kickers off your calendar.
• Cap meetings at a pace your team can handle.
• Report booked, held and rebooked every week, so a bad week shows up while you can still fix it.

A qualified meeting is one where a business owner we've qualified books onto your calendar and shows up.

When to bring in outside help

Bring in help when you have meeting capacity and no time to fill it. If your planning person has open hours from May to August and your marketing keeps slipping behind client work, that is the sign. Ask any provider what a meeting counts as before you pay, and read how we book qualified meetings.

Questions firm owners ask

What marketing strategies work best for accounting firms that sell tax planning? Pick one owner type, build a planning list from prep work during the April crunch, book meetings from May to early September, and run year-end planning from October to December. Email your own clients first, then add one outside source.

When should an accounting firm market tax planning? From May to early September for booking meetings, with follow-ups around the June 15 and September 15 estimated payment dates and a year-end push after October 15.

Can CPAs and EAs advertise their fees? Circular 230 section 10.30 allows practitioners to publish fixed fees for specific routine services, hourly rates, fee ranges for particular services and the fee for an initial consultation, and to charge no more than the published rates for at least 30 calendar days after the last date they were published. State boards may add their own rules.

What should an accounting firm's website say about tax planning? Who you serve, what planning includes, how you price it, and one clear way to book.

See if your firm is a fit

20 qualified tax planning meetings in 90 days, guaranteed.

Our team contacts and qualifies them so you don't waste time on the wrong leads, then books them on your calendar.

If you have fewer than 20 qualified meetings after 90 days, we keep booking with no further monthly fee until you reach 20.

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Related: How to get more tax planning clients · Tax planning revenue calculator · About Financial Sales Insider

Johnny Logan, Founder, Financial Sales Insider. General information for tax firm owners. Not tax or legal advice.

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