Where are you standing two days into the challenge?

If you’re behind, then no worries. Even if you have zero intention of touching any of this until after Independence Day, that’s cool, too. That’s the beauty of these short, simple tasks, you can get caught up on five days worth in about an hour. They’ll be even shorter today and tomorrow, because I realize nobody really wants to be working during a holiday. But it’s also the perfect time to be doing these sort of tasks, because it mentally reinforces the importance of the marketing habit (hmmm, The Marketing Habit might make a good book title!).

In fact, I’m the same way. So before anybody accuses of me of “phoning it in” the next couple days, let me just admit it straight up. 🙂

Day 3 Challenge

This is going to sound a LOT like Day 1. I mean, a lot like Day 1.

But instead of LinkedIn, head on over to Google Maps and search for “tax preparers”. Pick the five non-franchise preparers that are closest to you, go to their websites, and find an email address or a Contact Us form. Write or call them and introduce yourself, and let them know you’re looking to network.

Time: 10 minutes

Happy Sunday!

Oh, did you think there were days off during the 30-day challenge?

Nay, nay, as we say. If you want the pay, you gotta play every day. So let’s do more lead harvesting via referral marketing.

(See what I did there? It’s the weekend, it’s ok to have a little fun.)

Before we get to today’s challenge task, a quick reminder about the next two upcoming CPE webinars:

July 6: Another presentation of the sweeping overview of tax resolution. This will be a rebroadcast of last week’s presentation, but still counts as CE/CPE. Free. Click here to register.

July 7: Inside the IRM™: Financial Analysis Handbook, Part 1. Only $10. Click here to register.

Day 2 Challenge

Birds of a feather flock together.

You and I are weird birds. We chose to build our professional careers around taxes. By most measures, that’s a strange topic to get excited about. But, we do. And since nobody else around us wants to talk about the IRS, we have to go out of our way to find other tax geeks like ourselves.

Most areas have a local professional organization for tax and accounting professionals. As in, a local-only organization. It may be at the city, county, or state level, but it’s not associated with or affiliated in any way with a national organization. Here in my bend in the creek, it’s a group called Washington State Tax Consultants (WSTC), and they have county-level chapters in the more populous parts of the state. It’s only $90 a year, and is primarily a CPE provider.

Your challenge today is to go find your local organization and join.

Now, I don’t know what yours is called, or where they’re based, or what they do, or if they’re any good or not, so don’t email me asking if … Continue reading

If you’ve heard me present the most recent version of my Tax Resolution Marketing 101 talk, then you may have noticed the addition of a very important slide. That slides covers the top three marketing strategies you should be using to dominate your local tax resolution market. Namely, those three strategies are:

1. Referrals from other service professionals.
2. Local authority positioning.
3. Tax lien marketing.

If you missed the most recent presentation of that material, you can watch the replay here.

During the next 30 days, we will revisit these three themes in particular via the daily challenge tasks. Also, I will be putting together some bonus resources for Premium members to help with the challenge tasks. I will place those all on one page for convenience, located here (if you’re not a Premium member yet, click here for info).

Day 1 Challenge Task

At the core of being able to receive referrals from other service professionals is, well, getting to know other service professionals. Real estate agents, mortgage brokers, bank loan officers, bankruptcy attorneys, divorce attorneys, estate attorneys, financial planners, insurance agents, even other tax professionals, are all potential referral sources for 1040 tax debt resolution work.

Your challenge today is an easy one, and it should take you all of 10 minutes or less. What I want you to do is pick one specific type of service professional, and reach out to at least 5 of them on LinkedIn. Send them a connection request with a personalized message saying that you’re looking to network and would like to connect.

Even better, invite them to lunch. Remember the old saying? “Never eat lunch alone.” Plenty of sales and marketing gurus would expand that to breakfast, brunch, lunch, high tea, dinner, and supper, meeting with a different potential referral source at each meal. As long … Continue reading