Conquering Workflows & Systems For Bookkeepers & Accountants | with Alyssa Lang (Workflow Queen)

Building a Seamless Onboarding System for Your Clients

• Alyssa Lang • Season 1 • Episode 93

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In this solo episode, Alyssa Lang dives into the critical aspects of client onboarding for bookkeepers and accountants, ensuring efficiency and client satisfaction. Alyssa walks you through the process of mapping out the onboarding journey, utilizing automation tools, and setting timelines that distinguish onboarding from sales or cleanup, setting your practice on a path to success with streamlined systems!

In this episode you’ll hear:

  • How to map out an efficient onboarding process
  • How to separate your sales process, onboarding and clean up process for best success
  • Why proper onboarding is crucial for cultivating positive client relationships and retention
  • How automation tools can enhance the onboarding experience
  • Who can handle onboarding tasks within your firm

Resources mentioned in this episode:

💻 Breakthrough for Bookkeepers & Accountants

🎙️ Growing Your Firm Podcast Interview: Workflow Queen’s Must-Have Tools & Tactics for Growing Your Firm

⚙️ Miro

⚙️ Dubsado

⚙️ Asana

💻 All our programs and courses at Workflow Queen

⚙️ Notion

💻 Kickoff with Asana for Bookkeepers & Accountants

💻 The Motherload of Email & Form Swipe File

⚙️ Content Snare

💻 Effortless Client Requests for Bookkeepers & Accountants

☎️ Book a 15 minute consult call to discuss what program is the right fit for you and your firm

Thanks for listening. If this episode inspired you in some way, take a screenshot of you listening on your device and post it to your Instagram stories and tag me, @workflowqueen

For more information about the Conquering Workflows & Systems for Bookkeepers & Accountants Podcast or interest in our programs or mentoring visit our resources below:

Visit our website: workflowqueen.com

Check out our courses: workflowqueen.com/courses

Follow the Blog: workflowqueen.com/blog

Connect on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/alyssa-lang-wq

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Let me ask you something. Are you confident in your client onboarding process or does it feel like a little bit of a mess every single time a client signs on if you're juggling endless emails, missing documents, or just feeling overwhelmed every time someone says yes to working with you, then today's episode is for you today. We're diving into why onboarding is one of the most critical pieces for client retention. And how it actually sets the tone for your client relationship. I'm going to walk you through the exact steps to create a flawless onboarding system, the tools you can use to automate and streamline the process and how to decide how fast your clients should be onboarded. Plus, I'll share a success story from one of my breakthrough students, Jennifer, who went from turning away clients to confidently onboarding new ones, thanks to the strategies we implemented together. And if that wasn't enough, I'll show you how this process ties into tools like Asana contents there, and systems we teach inside a breakthrough. So if you're ready to create an onboarding process that saves you time and presses your clients and sets. sets. you up for a long-term success, then stick around. Did you know that a well-executed onboarding process can actually make or break your client relationships onboarding isn't just about collecting documents or checking off a list. It's your first opportunity to truly deliver an amazing experience that sets the tone for the entire working relationship with your client. And today's episode, I'm walking you through why onboarding is critical for client retention, the exact steps to create a flawless system, the tools to automate it, and even how to decide how fast to onboard new clients. Plus I'll share some strategies and resources that we use at my firm to make onboarding smooth, scalable. And stress-free, let's go ahead and dive in. So before I dive into all the juicy strategies and all the details for today's episode, I did want to share a bit of a story to help you guys understand and connect to. What it's like to actually implement a really solid onboarding system. So inside of my breakthrough program, we have a student. Her name is Jennifer and Jennifer actually reached out to me directly and booked a paid one-on-one call. So this is actually something that inside a breakthrough. Our students do have access to book one-on-one individual paid calls with me. Um, to help them build out things, to support them. It's actually the only place anybody can get me to build anything out anymore. And it's only available for our breakthrough students. And so Jennifer reached out and was like, Hey, like, this is my problem. I have a really successful tax firm. I have a really successful bookkeeping firm as well, but we want to scale and grow the bookkeeping side a little bit more than we currently have. But unfortunately every single time I try to onboard. Unfortunately, it just flops and we can not take on new bookkeeping clients because of it. And she was just like, uh, something has to change because. The people are knocking at her door. She just cannot service them. And if she can not set that tone from the very beginning, she knows that she's going to essentially feel like chaos within her team. And she's going to feel really overwhelmed. So we got on a couple of paid one-on-one calls together inside of breakthrough. And during that call, We mapped out her whole entire onboarding process. We built it out from scratch. I went ahead and supported her with creating the templates, the details, the mapping, things out, the building it in Asana and just setting up everything that we possibly could. We even set up her content, snare onboarding requests. We did everything together and it was just so cool and so awesome. One. It was so cool To just chat with a student who's super receptive. To change and just my suggestions and things that we need to do. And the implementation that needs to happen, we did this all like three calls and these calls are like 30 minutes that they pay for inside of breakthrough. And it was just so awesome to just see this come to life. And so we actually nailed it down, I think like last month. And she actually just recently reached out to me and was like sharing with me the success of the onboarding and what it's like now that she was able to open up the flood gates for her bookkeeping clients. So I just want you to know that if you're someone who is not documented their onboarding process, hasn't given at the time of day and just feeling a little bit overwhelmed by it, just know that there is a solution. A lot of the times it just comes with support or just leaning on someone who knows how to implement these. Things and what to do. So in today's episode, I'm going to be sharing a lot of those little things that those golden nuggets that I gave Jennifer, as we built out her onboarding system. So why does onboarding actually matter for client retention? So this helps you guys to build trust and confidence from day one with your clients. So if you are setting the tone from the very beginning, during your onboarding, that your chaos, you know, you're scrambling around to, to get emails out to them, or you're not gathering the right documentation and information. You're already setting a tone with the client that that's how the relationship's going to be moving forward. So you want to make sure that they feel like they made the right move from the very beginning, in my opinion, it's one of the most important steps. Within retaining your clients is the onboarding and the experience that you actually give them. It helps to reduce the frustration for both you and your client and the team. And so this is really important as well, because. The last thing that you want is during the onboarding experience for your clients. To feel overwhelmed or feel stressed out or feel like you're just like nagging at them. And I know that there are things that we actually need from our clients, but there are ways to do this without making them feel frustrated. a lot of the times, the reasons why the clients feel really frustrated or even you or your team is because there's a lack of processes. There's a lack of documentation you're trying to recreate and reinvent the wheel every single time. It also helps you to ensure clients feel valued and supported during this process. Which makes them stay for, with you for long-term. So, like I said, the more you set the tone at the very beginning, during your onboarding to truly impress your clients the longer that they're going to stay with working with you. So you might be asking yourself, how do we actually build that trust from day one? How do we really create an onboarding experience that really reduces that frustration from our clients? And maybe even helps them feel valued and supported? Well, that's what today's episode is going to be. So I'm going to be talking through four different steps Of what you can implement within your firm to make a smooth and seamless onboarding system and process for your clients. So step number one guys, before I dive into the nitty-gritty, I'm just going to high-level cover the steps that we're going to cover. Step one is mapping out your onboarding process. Step two is standardizing and delegating those tasks. Step three. Is it using automation tools to save you time? And then this last step, step four is determining your onboarding timeline. So I'm going to go in that order. So I recommend that you grab a piece of paper. If you're driving, just come back to this later, there's going to be a lot of action items. Plus you can go to workflow queen.com backslash podcast, to look at our blog. That's associated here with this episode. So if you want to refer to any notes, you can go to our podcast for this specific episode as it goes live. So step one was mapping out your onboarding process. So this is something a lot of people, I feel like. I avoid and it's because it's not something that's normal to be taught in the industry. So essentially process mapping is the ability for you to kind of look at your process. So let's just call it onboarding for this specific episode, that one process from a high level overview, instead of trying to get stuck in the nitty gritty and all the details. So how many of you have started to try to document a process? Maybe it's your onboarding and you try to get it nailed down. And every time you keep customizing it, it's this whole thing. But the reason why you keep getting stuck is because you keep going to the nitty gritty details of your onboarding rather than looking at it from a high-level perspective. So. So it's kind of like the saying, like you can't see the forest. through the trees. And it's because when you're looking at the forest, while you're walking through the forest, you can't see high level where you're going, same goes for like a process map. So when we're looking at a process map, we want to be able to look at from a high level of overview, our whole entire onboarding, without looking at the step-by-step for just this one little task within our onboarding, maybe that task is setting up their Google drive, for the new client or whatever. Like if you get stuck in those little details, you're never going to see high level what steps you have to actually implement high level. For your onboarding process. So process mapping is honestly one of my absolute favorite efficiency tools. Instead of breakthrough my group coaching program, we actually have a module called world-class systems. In that module. We have a sub module called efficiency tools in the efficiency tools, sub module. We teach our students the process mapping process, like. looking at all of your different processes within your firm and doing the process mapping, we teach them how to document SOP is, which are the nitty gritty little details. As they start to process map, we teach them how to make sure that you have rules and guidelines around the ways that team members need to be documenting stuff, stuff like that. So process mapping is not new to me. And it's something that I absolutely love teaching. One of my favorite tools for process mapping is called Myro. And I will link it below this episode for you guys. I did a interview on the growing your firm podcast. Quite some time ago, actually, I think it won. It was almost like two years ago. Now I'll link it below in the show notes, but the episode is called workflow. Queens must have tools and tactics for growing your firm. On that podcast episode, I talk a lot about process mapping and it was just such a cool conversation because I think a lot of people in the industry just don't know what that is. And so my recommendation is, as you start looking at your onboarding process, don't look at it from just the nitty-gritty details. I whined to look at it high level. And so for me, what this looks like sometimes I do this virtually now through Myro, but if you need. To just map things out first. what I do is I find an empty wall in my house and I actually take sticky notes and I literally write on a sticky note, just the high level steps of the onboarding, and I stick them across the wall in the order in which they happen. So the first step of onboarding is. As soon as someone signs and pays that contract inside of dub Sato, the first step initiates for onboarding. That's how we know it initiates is when someone signs a contract, then our onboarding starts. And so my recommendation is take quick little sticky notes. We actually do the same concept at our in-person retreats as well. And people freaking love it. So sticky notes are like just a high level that it's called a process map. if you need a visual, just Google process maps, I'm sure that like someone's got like some sort of an image. Like I said, if you're in breakthrough, we do have resources. We teach you how to do this in. and we've got you on this, but anyways, so process mapping helps you to see things high level. And so when you're starting to map this out on a high level perspective, you don't get stuck in like the step-by-step of every single little thing. for me, what we're doing in my firm right now is that we are revamping a lot of our onboarding. So I'm working with my operations assistant Mackenzie, and she's just awesome. And so we use Myro to collaborate on our team virtually to build out this process map. And what we're doing is we're brain dumping, all the steps that it takes in order for us to onboard. And it doesn't mean like the nitty gritty details. We're talking like the high level steps, like create the Google drive folder, create a slack channel for the client. Things like, downloading the contracts and information., but it's not going to tell someone how to actually download something or how to set up the actual Google drive. So there's a difference between process mapping and actually documenting your true process. And your SOP is. So one of the big things I'm going to recommend for you guys is to create a list of all the tasks. That you actually perform in onboarding. So one thing that I really want to make super clear that I see this mistake a lot in the industry is a lot of people are taking your sales process, your onboarding process and your cleanup process. And you're pretty much putting it into all into one process. Those are three different processes. Your sales process is anything that you're doing in order to obtain your client. So going from prospect to actual clients signing on to work with you. So I would recommend not having. You know, send the contract to the client. wait for them to sign and pay and confirm that they've actually paid stuff like that. I would not include that in your onboarding because that's your sales process. They have not yet become your client. So the moment that they become your client, you have to determine what is that trigger for you? So, for example, for me, we know that a client is our client when they have signed. Their first contract plus played their first invoice inside of dub Sato. once that happens. We now know that as soon as that client does that they are now officially a client and now we can onboard them. The other mistake, I said at the very beginning of this part, where I was talking about the mistakes. Is people also meshing their onboarding with our cleanup. I see this often where people are like in the onboarding process, trying to already gather like all the like statements that documentation and the details about, invoices or, payment disputes or all this stuff about the cleanup. When you're onboarding and your cleanup are two totally separate things. And the reason I say this, and the reason why a lot of people struggle with delegation on this type of topic on onboarding is because most people think that you need a bookkeeper and account manager in order to actually onboard a client when that's actually not true, you can get away with onboarding with using an assistant or using someone that's more admin. and it's because it's very technical, not necessarily something that's like, they need to know how to do bookkeeping because once they get into the cleanup process, that's where a team member who does our cleanups, like. Our cleanup specialist or our account managers will step in and then ask the client for any details they need in order to actually do the bookkeeping. So my recommendation is if like you are meshing the three together to please separate them out because it'll make your life so much easier and make it easier to delegate. So speaking of delegation, that's going to be step two here, which is standardizing and delegating your tasks. In regards to your onboarding. So like I mentioned before, the people who can do the onboarding in my firm, Or my operations associates are admins. It does not need to be a bookkeeper. It does not need to be an account manager. It also doesn't even need to be me. And I think a lot of people are like mind blown by this, especially when they come into breakthrough. They're like, wait, I'm confused, Alyssa, like the person who's onboarding a client needs to know X, Y, Z, about the industry. No, they absolutely don't. They just need guidance. They need information. Really your goal is from start to finish. The expectation of our onboarding is to take a client from just being a client that we have zero access for, and potentially bringing them on to make sure that we have everything we need to get started working with them. So onboarding into our project management system. Onboarding into our slack. And it doesn't mean that the client's going to be added to our slack. It just means that like, we need to get our systems up and running so that we can onboard them that so our team could communicate. About the client in the future, as we do cleanups and all the other things for the client. This means that by the end of our onboarding, that they are fully set up in all the different parts of our system that we need them to be set up in. So that then we can actually move into the cleanups, phase of the actual project. So for me, because of this. It does not require some like crazy high-level paid team member. That needs to know and understand the industry. Does it mean that you can't do that? Obviously you could do whatever makes the most sense for you. However, for us, it is an admin or an operations associate that actually runs our onboarding for us. So I recommend that you actually use templates in your project management system to actually ensure that you don't miss any steps when you're actually doing your onboarding. So for example, we use Asana in our firm and I'll link all this kind of stuff below. I keep dropping a bunch of tech for you guys, but I'll link this below in the show notes. And for us, we use Asana. And so Asana is what helps us to stay on top of all of our different tasks, all the different things that we need to delegate. We can easily assign our team. Into each of the tasks that they need to perform for the onboarding inside of Asana, we actually have like pre-built templates that are already pre-assigned to our team members. And the due dates already pre-assigned that when the onboarding kicks off, it automatically has everybody assigned. So then we don't have to go in there every single time and reassign them, which has been really cool. If you're using another system like keeper or maybe Xenax, or maybe click up, it doesn't matter where you're doing this. You just need something that keeps you and your team on track of all the tasks that you need to perform. In order to do the onboarding. So if you're struggling with this guys, and you're just really ready to make a really seamless onboarding system. And you're struggling with the tasks of what you need to put inside of this project. Then you can check out kickoff with Asana for bookkeepers and accountants. It's one of my signature programs. Actually the first one I ever created here at workflow queen that actually gives you my exact templates that I use within my firm to actually stay on top of the client work and all the tasks. And it's not just for the client work guys, it's actually to run your whole entire firm. And so if you want to check that out, you can go to workflow queen.com backslash courses, and you can just click on the one that says kick off with Asana. And learn more and I'll drop that link below in the show notes as well. So another thing that we do for standardizing and delegating these tasks and make life easy is, we document a lot of information or details that are going to be needed. And we do this with a notion. And so a lot of people are confused as why I use notion in Asana. because some people are like notion candy project management candidate. Yes. Is it good? No, I don't think it does a really good job of task management inside of notion. but what we do use notion for is information that is where we're documenting details and info. That whoever is executing, the onboarding might need in order to make sure that it is up to par up to standard. So, for example, one of the big trip-ups most people experience in their onboarding. Is a lot of the times. You're like, oh my gosh. Well, I need to get a tax return from the client. And how is this team member going to know if that's the right tax return? Well, a lot of the times you could just tell them. Maybe you can see a screenshot of previous clients. Correct. tax forms or whatever it is that you actually need to gather from the client. So we use notion to showcase that. So in Nosha we have like an onboarding. Like checklists that essentially says it's not like a task list. That's different. The checklist is like, you need this resource from the client, which is a tax return. If the client is an LLC taxes and escort, then you're going to need an 1120 S if a client is schedule C, then we technically don't need the return. So it gives details. So this is where the information is. So Asana. Doesn't do the best job of like showcasing information. So that's where we use notion to share with the team, like, okay. When in this part of the process, this is the script that you use during the onboarding call with the client. So we do an onboarding call with our clients that's required. And in that onboarding call, literally our admin team member, when they get on the call with them actually goes through a script that's written out in notion. And that's why we use notion because it gives us information. So it's the guiding compass for that team member. Who's onboarding. My other recommendation for when you're standardizing and delegating these tasks is to use any sort of templated emails, resources, anything that you could possibly template that you can use over and over against that way in your onboarding. You're not repeating. And trying to remember what you said in the last email, the last time that you onboarded, maybe it's been two months since you've onboarded and you don't remember what you said. And so for us, we actually use templated emails and resources, and they're usually linked within our Sana tasks. So when the team member is at that point, They can easily just copy paste that email and send it off to the client. we do have some resources for that as well. If you guys are interested in checking it out. We have, a mini program it's called the mother load of email forms. and if you go to workflow, queen.com backslash courses. You'll see it there, you just click on it. It's called the mother load of email and forms. If you don't see it, there just email our team@supportatworkflowqueen.com. But this little mini resource gives you all the emails that actually send within my firm and all the forms that we use as well. for our onboarding, anything like that. That you could use maybe in Google forms, or if you want to add it to your emails, whatever makes the most sense for you. So we've templated all of our emails to make our life super easy. My recommendation is to assign tasks to all the team members for your onboarding based off their roles. And who's should be doing that part of the onboarding process. Like I said, most people get tripped up on trying to mesh the sales process with the onboarding, with the cleanup. So my recommendation is to split those three high-level process map out your onboarding specifically. And I want you to start creating some templates, some tasks easily delegate it. Like I mentioned, I did this with, Jennifer H over in breakthrough during our one-on-one session together, we actually built that out with her. So like I process mapped with her the whole entire onboarding process that was unique to her firm. Cause a lot of people always tell me like, Alyssa, just give me like your exact onboarding, like the whole entire process map. I'm like the way I do things in my firm is going to be wildly different than your firm. And so I like to customize it per person and teach you the concepts and the theories of how to actually process, map your specific. Processes for within your firm. So step number three of these key points for today is use automation tools to actually save you time. So automation really helps you with all those repetitive tasks to really improve the efficiency and reduce the errors. So for example, Whenever we're onboarding a new client, as soon as they sign and pay the first invoice within DUP Sato, that is our trigger point to know that onboarding needs to be initiated. When that happens, we have automations that are automatically firing in the background. We are using things like Zapier plus we're using things like, the current softwares that we use usually have automations built into their systems. We are trying to use and leverage as much automation as possible. So that way we don't have to do a lot of stuff. So for example, in our onboarding zap. We essentially have steps like creating the slack channel for that client. So we don't bring our clients into slack. However, we do communicate amongst our team within slack. It's also linked that below for you guys. Slack is like one of my favorite resources, by the way, this is super random and such a random side note. I'm actually really curious if you're listening to this episode at near wondering. How we use slack within my firm. And you would love for me to create like a mini course. On how to use slack and how to implement it, how to communicate, what channels to create, how we use it. So on and so forth. Please let me know by going to support@workflowqueen.com and emailing me and our team and letting me know that you are interested in that, or come on Instagram at workflow queen. If I get enough of you guys listening to this episode, letting me know that you really want to see my slack setup, then I'm happy to break this out. As of right now, my slack set up. The whole entire structure is actually built into our breakthrough program. So in breakthrough, we do have a bonus module. That's all about slack that teaches them how to use it. And then also the channels I use and all the other details that they need in order to implement it within their firm. But if it's something that you want me to break out separately so that you can like purchase that. And not have to purchase all the breakthrough, let me know. And I'm more than happy to create that resource for you guys. So. Anyways, it's a super side note in the automation. We have things like, creates tags inside of clock of. Five for us., so that way, when we're time tracking, the client's already set up in there for us. So we don't have to like go manually create that it sets up all the Google drive folders for the clients. That way we don't have to manually do that. It like literally does so much for us and even sets up the contents, their requests, that we ended up setting, sending to the client for the onboarding so that we can collect all the documents in the information that we need. Automation will change the game. However, the thing I tell people all the time is everybody's trying to automate things without first understanding your high level process. So this is where process mapping was. The first thing that I talked about is because if you can see high level, your full process, you can then see which of those steps can actually be automated and then get into the nitty gritty details. And so this is what I do as well as I process map that I go back and look at what can be actually automated. And don't be afraid to actually use the current softwares that you use to see if they have capabilities to actually do some automations within their system as well. So for example, we use content snare and I'll link that below. For you guys, if you want to check it out. So content snare is what we use in order to onboard our clients with a request. So we don't necessarily onboard decline in there. What we do is like all of the questions that we have for them about, you know, What did they start their business like upload your tax returns, things like, do you have a payroll system? Please add us to your bank or whatever that might look like. We have all these things that we need to collect from a client and get access to and questions, to be answered. And we use contents there in order to do that. The reason we love content centers, because within content snare, they actually include email automation. So we actually have like what they call a schedule. For onboarding and we created this it's custom to our firm. And essentially when we send an onboarding request to a client, we can attach like an onboarding schedule. That includes a bunch of emails that essentially follow up. automatically with your client to say, Hey, you haven't filled out your onboarding and it gives them a due date and everything. They could comment back and forth. We can reject fields, we can approve fields. It's super freaking cool. If you're interested in content, Sarah and learning how to use it. Fun fact, this month, I am coming out with effortless client requests, which is a lovely program. I'm co-creating with one of my besties in the industry and also a coach here at breakthrough. Her name is Brooke Swan and I'll drop the link below. If you guys want to join the waitlist, maybe by the time. You're listening to this it'll be live, but essentially it's how we use contents there. We're going to give you every single request we use in our firm. Plus all the emails. There's literally 31 emails guys. I just had to create this last week. All the different schedules to all the email automations, we were giving you everything and I'm super excited about it. So I'll get you guys that link below the episode. If you guys want to join, or you can go to workflow, queen.com, backslash content snare. And with that, you can join the wait list. And I'm super excited for that. Like I said, I want you guys to choose tools and things that can help you automate and save time. And like I said, a lot of reasons why people don't automate their onboarding is because you're too busy making it custom every single time, which we're going to talk about here in just a second. So step four of today's episode is to determine your onboarding timeline. So I see this a lot where people will overextend their timeline and a lot of the reasons why they do that. Is because, like I said before, A lot of people are taking their sales process, onboarding process and their cleanup process and putting it all into one. And so therefore you think that it needs to take four to six weeks or six to eight weeks or however long it's going to take to clean up. So for us, we clearly define with our clients that our onboarding takes two weeks. Yes. I said two weeks, our onboarding is only two weeks. We actually can get it down in one week. We get our onboarding done so quickly. One because we're automated. A lot of it's automated too. We have a team that's going to be able to execute it. I'm not waiting on a cleanup specialist or some sort of a bookkeeper to do the onboarding. We have a team that could just get it done. Not only that, but like if I were to do it myself, I could still onboard the client within less than two weeks. And so my recommendation is to set a timeline. It's also really awesome. When you're in the sales process with the client and you make it very clear to them that, okay, as soon as you sign and pay, we're super excited to like support you. It's going to take you two weeks to onboard with our team. After those two weeks, that is dependent on you. If you do not get us the information that we need by the end of the two weeks, your timeline and project will be pushed back and you'll be put not as priority anymore. And it will go to the next person who is actually on top of it. So we let them know that, but we usually don't have any problems with our clients. Plus we do an onboarding call, which is super supportive. So I like to give a timeline to the client so they know what to expect as they start to work with us. Plus in the onboarding, as soon as someone signs a contract, it's also restating that how long the timeframe. Of how long it's going to take to onboard. And so I really, really want you guys to decide on your ideal onboarding timeframe and outline the milestones for completion. Uh, to make sure that they're on track. Like I said, that's to your project management system, what's being automated. Are you process mapping? Are you getting support? If it's just you doing onboarding that's okay. But you need to be able to have all these things in place in order to make sure that your onboarding is super, super smooth. So before we end off this episode today, I do want to talk about some common things that are going to come up for most people listening to this episode, as you're thinking about onboarding, you might be feeling overwhelmed because I talked about so much different tech. There's so many moving parts and pieces when it comes to building out your actual onboarding. And I know that it can be intimidating and overwhelming and not so smooth. And here's a couple of things I know that you guys are probably thinking. Number one, I don't have time to build on an onboarding system. I understand, and I totally get this. It does take time to build these things out guys, but once you nail it down, you don't have to build it again. you have to stop and make time so that you can save time. This is the perfect time of the year. A lot of people are like slowing down enjoying holidays and doing all these things. Granted, I don't have kids. And so for me, and I really don't intend to have any like ever in my life. And for me, obviously, like I don't have to go Christmas shopping and doing all these different things. I totally understand that. However, I do know a lot of moms and parents at dads out there who during this time of the year are slowing down and relaxing and chilling out the business. And a lot of people don't realize that December is one of the most. Incredible times of the year, while everybody's expecting everyone to slow down for you to actually ramp things up and work on your systems. So right now is a good time to start looking at your onboarding to get ready for 2025. We're about to hit cleanup season people. This is when people are going to come to us and like beg us to clean up everything. If you don't have a good onboarding system in place, you are going to regret it. So another thing that you might say is I don't have the team to help me with it. That's okay. People, you don't have to have a team in order to onboard, however, it will make your life easy. Sure. However, there's also automations and tools and resources. Before I had a team. I just had my project management system, which was Asana. I had my onboarding project within there. The one I said that we provide templates for that inside of kickoff, with Asana, I literally had all those things set up. I had automation set up that like if someone were to onboard, it was really easy for me to do it solo as well. However, as I've grown and scaled, I do now have an operations associate that takes care of that. So I just want to be really clear that you can be successful with this without needing to hire a bunch of people. The last objection that you might be coming up with is my clients prefer a custom experience during onboarding. I get this guys. My number one favorite process in my firm Is a client experience overall. I like to make sure that our clients are super happy. I do the same here at workflow queen. I want our students to have the best experience working with workflow queen. All of those things. However, you can still create a, what feels like a custom experience that will impress your clients without actually having to customize it. We have so many different touch points within our onboarding that make the client feel like it's live and that it's custom. And that it's tailored to them. We don't have to sacrifice that by creating automation and creating these different things, we just have touch points within the emails, the way we communicate. Whatever that actually looks like. So before we finalize everything in this episode, because I want to do a quick little recap of what we learned that way to give you a checklist of things that you need to implement in order to create a seamless onboarding system. So I do want to drop some shameless plugs here about some resources that we offer to help you guys the onboarding. There's absolutely no pressure to move forward with any of them. But I just like to offer these for anybody who is looking for a solution. So kickoff the sauna, like I mentioned earlier, we do provide you guys how to use Asana, how to set it up. It's a project management system. We teach you how to delegate your tasks, all the different templates that you need for all the different high-level processes within your firm, not just from the client work, but also running the whole entire business. We've had thousands of students. In this program since I created it back in 2020, and it's just continued to grow and people love this program. It's the same, Asana setup that I use at my firm. And then the other program, as well as breakthrough, I've talked about this several different times. And break your, like I said, Jennifer was able to book one-on-one calls with me, which is actually only available inside a breakthrough and they're paid 30 minute calls. which are not a part of the program, but it's something that we offer for anybody who wants help building certain things out within breakthrough. However, if you want to do everything solo, A lot of our students have also built out their onboarding process with the resources in breakthrough. Where we help you guys step-by-step document it, outsource it to your team, hiring the right people in order to help you with onboarding so on and so forth. If you're curious about breakthrough, you can just go to workflow, queen.com, backslash courses and select the breakthrough program. If you scroll a little bit midway through the sales page, you can actually book a 15 minute consult call with me. If you want to talk through, if breakthroughs are right fit for you, because it's really meant for scaling firms also drop the link for the consult call below this episode as well. If you want to get on a call and chat about it, the last thing is our effortless. Effortless client requests and there is a current waitlist for this. This is our content snare program with both me and Brooke Swan. We're at, we're giving you guys all the requests that we use in our firm from our w nine requests, onboarding requests, our month end year end request, stuff like that. We're going to give you everything, all the emails that we use at our fully automated in a way to automate all that stuff. So a couple of key points that I wanted to come back to that we talked about here on today's episode is why onboarding matters for client retention steps to create a flawless onboarding system. Tools to automate onboarding like content snare, Asana. Zapier, stuff like that and how to set a timeline for onboarding effectively for your clients. I'm so excited and I hope you got a lot of golden nuggets from today's episode. There's so much that goes into onboarding. And if you need any support, you can reach out to us and we're happy to support you guys in whatever capacity. And don't miss out on this week's episode, we're doing a bonus episode on Thursday, which I'm super excited about.'cause I'm joined by one of my besties, Brooke Swan, and also one of our coaches at breakthrough. And we're going to be talking about how we used to request things from our clients in the past and how we do it now and what impact that's made for our firm. I can't wait to see you guys on next week's episode.