Today's Technology for Tomorrow's Firm.
Issue link: https://cpapracticeadvisor.epubxp.com/i/76159
Reviews For Your Firm WEBSITE BUILDERS AFSB Accounting and Financial Site Builder ture and Flash www.afsb.net BEST FIT Firms adding their own content to a template- based solution at a low cost. STRENGTHS r With a basic monthly subscription fee of $29.99 and a 20% discount if paid annually ($288/year, effectively $24/month), AFSB is the least expen- sive web builder among the products reviewed aſter the discount. r Over 120 templates and thousands of variations available, including spe- cialized templates for both CPAs and EAs. r New templating system uses CSS technology, a billboard homepage fea- ging engines. r AFSB's "Website Wizard" guides the user through creating a website step by step. r Users can easily add an events calendar, a PayPal link to accept payments securely, Google Maps showing the company location, and social media widgets and unlimited pages of their own con- tent. r AFSB Sites include arti- cles, monthly cl ient newsleters, and financial calculators. r Te system allows firms to integrate logins for prog r ams such a s accounting and payroll, on-line e-filing tools, archiving tools or blog- BuildYourFirm.comBuild Your Firm BEST FIT Build Your Firm is a good fit for firms that want to outsource both the design and writen content in the process of building a completely customized website, especially those highlighting a particular specialization or industry niche. STRENGTHS r Recent ly increased number of e-mail news- leter articles and they are released twice a month (1st and 15th of each month), as opposed to most vendors that release them once a month. r E-mail marketing system can be tailored to seg- mented li s ts of an accounting firm's client base. r Client Center provides one easy login box for many different services. r Experience helping firms design a website around an industry niche. r Branded WordPress blog integration (additional fees apply) POTENTIAL LIMITATIONS r Firms that want complete cont rol for making changes themselves are given access, but func- tionality is limited to minor changes such as text edits. Build Your Firm prefers that change requests go through the firm's account manager. r Integrated portal has limited functionality. However, firms can go with Build Your Firm's partner Sharefile if the integrated portal does not meet their needs. 26 August 2012 t www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com In 2003, Build Your Firm got into the website development business because workshop atendees asked its man- agement to develop web- sites with search engine optimization built into the initial design along with pay-per-click advertising, which accounting web builders were not pro- viding at that time. Each website that Build Your Firm develops is unique and designed around an accountant's practice. Factors such as a firm's geographic marketing area, type of accounting firm (bookkeeping, EA, varying sizes of CPA firms), and accounting software are taken into consideration. Build Your Firm assigns a website designer to an accounting firm's website project who writes 95% of the website content. With this approach, the accounting firm is only responsible for writing bios and reviewing the content before the site goes live. Build Your Firm offers a Client Center so that accounting firm clients can go to one area of the website to log in to various SaaS applications such as a web portal, bill.com, or QuickBooks Online. Te Cl ient Center wa s designed with a vendor neutral approach to meet the needs of accounting firms using a variety of applications. One of the new services offered this year is the integration of WordPress blogs into a website. Build Your Firm will design and set up the popular blog- ging soſtware, mirroring the website branding with the firm's existing website. SUMMARY & PRICING Because Build Your Firm takes responsibility for the website development process and does not push it to the firm like some other template-based providers, it is best suited for firms that want the vendor to complete both the customized website design and content. Te recurring monthly fee for the starter package is $49.99 per month. Te premier plan at $83.33 per month adds features Read the full review of this product exclusively online at www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com/10738429 including search engine optimization, file transfer and the client center. Niche websites are also $83.33 per month and have a setup fee that typi- cally averages from $1,000 to $1,500 depending on the extent of the custom- ization requested and complexity of the content to be writen. QuickBooks hosting and WordPress blogs incur additional fees. Tere is no annual com- mitment and Build Your Firm offers a free trial period of 60 days. r A free tool is included for creating online forms. POTENTIAL LIMITATIONS r Templates and pages are pre-populated with con- tent that is fairly basic as is, but can be edited and customized to each firm's needs using a website wizard. r Although the software allows for an unlimited number of additional pages, the content man- agement is not searchable, potentially making it difficult to manage a very large number of addi- tional pages. Introduced in July 1999, AFSB Accounting and Financial Site Builder is now in its 13th year with a mission, per its website, "to offer websites that are affordable, designed just for tax and accounting business, and easy to manage. changes on a website for its customers at $100 per hour ($25 minimum). " AFSB is part of Tenenz, Inc., which has served tax and accounting firms for more than 40 years. AFSB has an excellent WYSIWYG text editor for changing page content with toolbars similar to Microsoſt Word. Advanced users can add html code to any page. Although the amount of help in AFSB's Support Center is some- what limited, users can e-mail technical support with questions. AFSB also provides a service to make SUMMARY & PRICING AFSB reports that it has a satisfied customer base and a high retention rate because of four factors: its low cost, sites are created and available for editing seconds after sign-up, AFSB does not self-pro- mote in the footer of its customers' websites, and firms can easily add their own services. AFSB's basic monthly subscription fee is $29.99 and a 20% discount is offered if paid annually ($288/year, effectively $24/month). Tere are no setup fees or constricting contracts. For an optional one-time $30 fee, AFSB provides search engine optimization and registra- tion services. If requested, AFSB modifies templates or creates custom site designs for a fee that ranges from $100 to $250. Currently, AFSB is offering a 60-day Free Trial. Read the full review of this product exclusively online at www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com/10738428