JWA

Business Development Manager

Personal Narrative

Trouble with referral partners

Had an interesting conversation with my CRO.... he likely didn't like my perspective because the company is hurting but thought I would seek perspective from the war room.

I work in the R&D tax credit realm. We consult, advise and then help clients who qualify do what's needed to receive their credits.

Originally I was hired to target CPAs (which feels a bit like herding cats) as they had proven to be good partners at times and useful in getting our tax work done for the client.

In my experience working with some major payroll companies and now here is that if you plan to engage a CPA, don't bother them too much in tax season.

Crazy amounts of OT, lots of stress and chances are they are not worried about you and what ever you offer if it doesn't make year end work easier.

When he asks, "whats the next step with that partner" he hates hearing back "They agreed to meet early next month..."

In my experience with the my company, the feel is that leadership believes we should be on top of mind and extracting referrals with in 30 days or less or else we warn them that we are to cancel the rev share agreement...

There is potential that they could make decent money by partnering with us but in general.... our referral fee paid out is extra on top to them where as for my company, those leads are our life blood. We need the deal haha so strong arming a CPA and hoping to get a referral from them mid tax season seems nuts....

Maybe I got it all wrong, I am curious how others have successfully navigated referral partnerships where you need their referrals and do not always have a referral for them.

🔎 Prospecting

👑 Sales Strategy

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12 comments

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bonez

Politicker

4

Account Executive

Reciprocity is bigger than short term monetary gains. I work with referral partners and they use me because I take care of their clients and have shown I can. They will always pass me more than I will to them and by becoming trusted enough to handle their clients they keep referring me. At the end of the day your pipeline is your own and the referrals are a nice benefit.
Right now I wouldn't be bothering CPAs - who I can partner with too - and I'd leave them be. If you harass them now you also tell them you don't know their business which would make me very leery of sending you business in the future. Tact goes far.

Pachacuti

Politicker

4

They call me Daddy, Sales Daddy

I have two CPA friends I ride with and till after April 15 they are unavailable.

However instead of saying “they will meet with us in a month, I’d say “ we have a meeting set for April 20th” or something like that. That way your boss thinks you’re on top of it and he doesn’t feel let down. And when April 20th comes and you don’t have the meeting - you just say he pushed it out a week due to illness, or something like that. It’s lame and weak, but it’s the game you have to play.

jefe

Arsonist

3

🍁

Thinking you'll get ANY attention during tax season is insane.

Play the game, and play it this way.

JWA

Personal Narrative

1

Business Development Manager

Right, the CRO does not have industry experience selling to CPAs. I figured I wasn't off by much but still.

oldcloser

Arsonist

2

💀

Flawed model. Your partners have no skin in the game if they’re not charged for the partnership. You’re a side hustle for them. Come tax time? You don’t exist. Your org has to charge for the privilege (and fantasy) of future riches. If they’re invested, you have the right to call them any time and offer to help them turn ROI on their partnership fee. Even still- this time of year? Nahhh

JWA

Personal Narrative

1

Business Development Manager

@oldcloser the only thought where we add value is some partners who are not CPAs and have logical offerings, IE
Software developers whose customers can use us to help off set costs of the development...
Payroll companies/Reps who sign individual RAs and can make some nice referral bonuses with us, if they send some decent projects.

But no matter what, we are not their primary mode of business.

oldcloser

Arsonist

1

💀

Not until you've paid out enough anyway.

Justatitle

Big Shot

2

Account Executive

This is all about leverage and in your company’s case you have none, if your CRO can’t see that that’s a problem

JWA

Personal Narrative

1

Business Development Manager

I agree 100 percent. He doesnt like that we cant get stuff immediately but I don't know how to tell him the game is about being top of mind.

Yes, we will pay them out when we get paid but....still... We are just a option for them not a focus.

Phillip_J_Fry

Opinionated

2

Director of Revenue

It sounds like leadership isn't interested in understanding the customer's priorities. I'm no accountant, but even I know that Q1 is a nightmare for tax folks and trying to cold call them to setup partner meetings is a waste of time.

It's important to remember, a customer never cares about you, your company, or your product. They care about their own challenges. If you can cater to those, ease some of those concerns with your product, then they'll take a call. But, if you're calling me during crunch time where my hair is on fire to talk about how I should also be selling your product to my clients, I'll tell you where you can shove your product.

I would like to know why CPA's are the target here. Unless the referral kickback is going directly into their pocket, why would they care? To me, I would imagine execs would be more interested in how you're generating revenue for their org. Paint a picture of other accounting firms (their competition) and how they're bringing in more revenue for their org and providing better experience and services for their clients.

JWA

Personal Narrative

0

Business Development Manager

We have had good referrals from CPAs in the past.
When CPAs work with us, its favorable because its simple to get the needed documentation compared to not tax referring partners.

they don't want to do the work but don't want their clients to leave to firms who will do it.

CPAs can only charge a flat rate and thus usually don't do a deep dive on the credit. We charge more but usually get the clients more with a deeper dive.

Since we can pay them for the referral based on our percentages, if they are money-motivated they will make more money from us doing the work over their flat fees...

So CPA can charge say 5k to do it for them...lots of work that gets missed but some okay baseline work. We charge 20% of the credit and pay out 10% of our fees.

Example: I had a potential client who would have paid us around 130k-150k since his credit was very sizeable.
Instead of the CPA getting just 5k, they would get 13-15k and remove the liability from them doing the work.

Most CPAs do not want that though(they pay out), concern over conflict of interest. The "if something goes wrong, how will this come back to us" mentality/concern. Many are happy to make introductions... when it comes up.... which is the pain. We do have an offer instead of paying the CPA to take those fees and pass it on to the client. Still about the same to them at the end of the day.

JWA

Personal Narrative

0

Business Development Manager

I find more success in non-tax firm-minded partnerships either cause the payout matters or because they can twist their offer to make it appear competitive.

That said, we are not their focus. To expect someone's time just for the referrals with no guarantee of payout (since they have to qualify). They have a full-time focus so I don't blame or pressure any one into trying to meet...

But maybe that's where I need to improve?

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