We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Katey Maddux. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Katey below.
Katey , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear your thoughts about making remote work effective.
My work consists of doing accounting for small businesses, often from overseas. In my experience, being successful in remote work is all about building trust: Your clients have to trust you in order to want to work with you. Once I have gained their trust, the next biggest factors responsible for my success have been proper systems and setting expectations with clients. I started my remote company back in 2016, long before Covid, and before remote work was even ‘normal’. When I started, I didn’t know a single person doing remote accounting work while overseas, and although I had an accounting coach, no one was teaching me how to run a company while traveling. I knew I needed to level up my expertise if I wanted to grow the business, so I started attending industry conferences to learn what other people were doing in my field. Now, six years later, if I had to boil everything I learned down to the one thing that changed my business, it would be standardization. I started by taking the one thing that was the most uncomfortable and standardizing it. For me, that was client onboarding and pricing. Once I was able to standardize the onboarding of a new client, and how I was going to price the work, my processes improved, my stress level came down, and my sales increased. In accounting, onboarding a new client involves the discovery (assessment of their current problems), the proposal (plan to solve them), and the pricing packages. Additionally, proper onboarding involves teaching the client company culture and setting expectations. I have found that clients are usually pretty flexible and understanding if you teach them your culture and set the right expectations from the beginning. For example, I’ve taught my clients that random phone calls are not the best way to reach me, because I’m usually concentrating or on the phone. However, I have given them a link to my calendar, so that they can book time with me any time that they need something. Additionally, I’ve taught them that we use a system called Liscio to send files and DMs back and forth, so they know that rather than texting or emailing me, they should DM me in Liscio if they would like an answer quickly. Setting expectations also involves giving the client timelines. They don’t mind if their assessment takes a week if I tell them it will take a week. They’re annoyed if they assume it will happen tomorrow and it takes a week. So, it is important to over-communicate and be clear on what they should expect of your company. In addition, setting expectations helps build trust which, as stated above, is extra important when you’re running a remote business.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers
My story is an unusual one! I grew up in West Bloomfield, Michigan, in a family of accountants and entrepreneurs, though I never imagined that I would be either– let alone both. And although my first job was working for my mom’s accounting firm, and my second for the family CPA, I had zero interest in going into accounting as a career. At 18, I moved to Texas and then graduated from Baylor University with a degree in Fashion Merchandising and a minor in business. I then studied Italian and fashion photography at Florence University of the Arts in Florence, Italy. Later, I moved to NYC to work in the fashion industry, then back to Texas, where I became one of the youngest assistant buyers at a corporate retailer, managing a $3.5 million women’s apparel business. At 25, I became TEFL certified and moved to South Korea to work as an English teacher. At 32, I graduated from a Ministry School in California and started a women’s ministry. I have traveled to 50 countries, lived in four, and have had years of schooling and different life experiences, and while little of it was related to accounting, all of it has contributed to where I’m at in life and the success of my company. So, you’re probably wondering, how did I get into accounting? After contracting a life-threatening case of Dengue fever in a rural village while living in Vietnam, I was forced to move back to the states, and went to live with my parents as I was nursed back to health. My mom, President of Account Ability Accounting & Consulting Service Inc., offered to train me in bookkeeping if I first got QuickBooks certified, so that I could work from home, in accounting, while in recovery. She gave me one client and hours and hours of training. Fast forward six years, and that first bookkeeping client is still around, and I have a thriving accounting and consulting firm with clients all over the country and even a few overseas. My team and I serve clients in the retail, consulting, property management, interior design, and creative spaces. In addition to ongoing monthly and quarterly bookkeeping services, we offer consulting and hourly training to those who want to learn QuickBooks, need a professional eye on the work they’ve done themselves, or would like us to train their team. We have a few international clients who have US-based businesses but are unfamiliar with US bookkeeping and accounting practices, so we offer consulting on that as well. What sets us apart is our ability to merge standardization with customization. Some clients want to do the work themselves while others want to be completely hands-off. Some want to fix the past and others only the future. We can price and package for either. Many people have the idea that bookkeeping is out of their budget, but with quarterly and consulting packages, we’re able to make it affordable for small businesses without compromising quality of work or attention to detail. For clients who have never been in QuickBooks before, we offer set-up packages, so their books are set up correctly from the beginning. Then, if their budget doesn’t allow them to have us do the ongoing work, we set up a specific number of hours a month for consulting. Either we do the work with them, or we set up a training call, then they do the ‘simple’ parts on their own, and bring us in for a quarterly review to fix anything that was done incorrectly and to run the reports. This works really well for our creative clients whose income may be seasonal, sporadic, or fluctuating. For retail clients, who typically purchase monthly packages, our systems and our industry expertise are what sets us apart. Whether they use Amazon, Shopify, Square, Paypal, Venmo, etc., we have systems and processes for all of it. They can be hands-off when it comes to the books and focus on buying, merchandising, etc, — what they do best. I am most proud of our ability to translate what seems difficult and complex into language that any business owner can understand. When they understand their books, our clients can make the best decisions for themselves and their businesses.
What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?
Learning to speak my clients’ language and understand industry-specific needs. Many people find accounting to be confusing and frustrating, especially if they’re a creative and their brain doesn’t work like a spreadsheet (as mine does). They don’t know how to efficiently get the data they want, or they don’t have the time or energy to figure it out. One of the most common comments I get from new clients, especially creatives, is ‘wow, I was so worried this was going to be scary and confusing but you really broke it down in a way that I can understand it’. While I started doing bookkeeping and consulting primarily in the property management and retail sectors, I have a growing base of creative small business owner clients, including dance studios, photographers, florists, and consultants/freelancers. There was a need in their market that wasn’t being met: Many were too small to need monthly bookkeeping, but they needed to have eyes on their numbers and understand their finances more than just at tax time, so I created packages just for them. This kept their books current at a price that was affordable to them. This has really been a ‘sweet spot’ in the creative entrepreneur space, and through client referrals, word-of-mouth advertising, and social media, my reputation has grown within that market specifically.
How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?
In 2020, when the rest of the world was dealing with Covid, my family was walking through cancer, and I personally was struggling with a debilitating sickness that kept me in bed for weeks on end. I needed to be able to make money without taking on more clients or more stress. In 2018, I had started teaching classes for CPA Academy (www.CPAAcademy.org) to other CPAs and accountants on the skills necessary to leave their 9-5 and successfully run a remote company. So, when my health was suffering and my working hours sporadic, teaching online classes was a perfect way to supplement my income. I started to brainstorm and create content on other topics within the umbrella of remote work, like ‘remote work and client relations’ and ‘how to be productive while working from home’ in order to have a broader sales offering. My classes were so well received that brands and accounting tech companies began approaching me to teach classes for them. And because I had prepared the content already, when they approached me, I had presentations ready. I think it’s important as entrepreneurs to think outside the box and to allow your company to flow in sync with what’s happening in your life at the time. It’s hard to take on new clients when you’re sick because you can’t give them the time or energy you normally would. I could build presentations and create content at any hour of the day, and then present it online from my home office. It also built my reputation within the accounting world, and now I get hired to speak at accounting conferences. It’s not just being known by your clients that can boost your top line, but also being known in your industry. Think of creative ways to use your skills. Even if it’s been done before, no one does it like you! And that’s your superpower.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://maquickbooks.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kateymaddux/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Millennialaccountingservices/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kateymaddux/
- Other: https://www.cpaacademy.org/instructors/Katey-Maddux https://www.instagram.com/millennialaccounting/
Image Credits
My photos