The Tax Advisory Plan: Pricing, Team Structure, and Why It's Not on Our Website

Marcus and Rachel break down their Tax Advisory Plan (TAP), the $500/month individual tax offering built for high-income clients, referrals, and business owners exiting their companies. They cover pricing, onboarding fees, the "team of three" structure, and why they deliberately cap new TAP clients at 10 per year and keep the service off their website.

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• (00:00) - Welcome to Who's Really the Boss Podcast
• (01:02) - Why Create TAP
• (02:24) - Lessons From AIM
• (04:28) - TAP Pitch and Inclusions
• (05:50) - Pricing and Add Ons
• (08:44) - Who TAP Is For
• (10:01) - Off Ramp Client Story
• (15:13) - Onboarding Fees Explained
• (21:31) - Team of Three Handoff
• (26:46) - Role Breakdown and Workflow
• (34:28) - Capacity Goals for TAP
• (36:07) - Jerry Case Study
• (46:59) - Kickoff and Early Wins
• (52:16) - Wrap Up and Secret Menu

Creators and Guests

Host

Marcus Dillon, CPA

Host

Rachel Dillon

What is Who's Really the BOSS??

"Who's Really the BOSS?" highlights the joys and challenges of running a CPA firm with your spouse or family. From hiring and terminating to improving capacity, cash flow, and culture, our conversations cover leadership, operations, and current accounting industry challenges. Our mission is to strengthen families and accounting firms by helping listeners avoid the mistakes we have made, so they can lead and live happily ever after.

Attention: This is a machine-generated transcript. As such, there may be spelling, grammar, and accuracy errors throughout. Thank you for your understanding!

Rachel Dillon: This is Who's really the boss. A podcast for accounting firm leaders who want to grow with intention and lead with purpose. I'm Rachel Dolan, and along with my husband, Marcus Dillon, we share real stories from our accounting firm, Practical Firm growth strategies, and the tools you need to lead your clients, your team, and your life well.

Rachel Dillon: Welcome back to another episode [00:00:30] of Who's Really the Boss podcast.

Marcus Dillon: Hey, thanks for having me back.

Rachel Dillon: We are recording here in the summer of 2026. And on the previous episode, we talked about clients year to date, how many new clients we've brought in, but also the increase in PTO that our team has been able to take. And also with that, that's important or interesting because client service is still just as good, if not better than [00:01:00] it was in prior months, prior years. And so we mentioned that not only do we have our CAS services, client accounting and advisory services that are monthly for small business owners, we also developed a tax advisory plan, a tax offering for individuals, because we often had referrals either from referral partners in our kind of professional network or from [00:01:30] current clients that are great clients that wanted to refer somebody over. And we didn't really have a plan for them to go into. We stopped accepting annual only tax clients back in 2018, I can't remember. It's been a long time since we've accepted a annual only individual or business tax client. And so I would love to share with everyone. What is a tax advisory plan? [00:02:00] What does it cost? Who is it for? How do we service them all the all the details? Um, just in case there are other people in our boat where they stopped accepting the annual work. But that means that they're turning away a lot of potential revenue because they don't necessarily have a way to serve them on a consistent basis, like the monthly business.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. Um, I think we can also share like we had, uh, a very similar program [00:02:30] before our most recent version. Uh, we called that aim, uh, advice with the intent to minimize, um, taxes. So AI M and we still have a few of those AIM clients around, but it was a monthly recurring tax program as well on that. We, what we learned in that is there was a lot of, there were a lot of people that were open to it paying monthly. They more saw it as like taking their [00:03:00] annual and dividing it by 12 and having access to the team. We priced that way too low in the beginning, and so we had some, I think, ehm, clients right at 100 to $150 a month. So about a 1200 to $1800 tax return, which is great in some circles. But when we looked up, what we were doing is we were creating a whole, a whole new 1040 practice, uh, of, of people that we had been previously telling [00:03:30] no to, that we weren't serving. And then all of a sudden we felt really bad about these referrals that were coming in through referral partners, financial advisors, just good mutual clients that were sending over people.

Marcus Dillon: So we kind of, we did this first as, hey, like it's a way to appease some of these referrals that are coming in. But now the the pricing, the actual model, the services, the touch points add [00:04:00] a lot more value than that previous AIM program. That was at about 100 to $150 a month. So all that to say, please learn from what's going well for us and please learn from what didn't go as well for us. Um, because that was definitely, if you want to build a 1040 practice, all you have to do really is raise your hand these days and people, people will come. Uh, it appears so, but that was our experience on the first one. So let's talk a little bit [00:04:30] about like what tap is today. And if you get a referral, because tap is actually a really good place where people can live long term or it's a good on ramp, it's a good off ramp as well as how we use it for some of our business clients. So just give us the pitch. What is tap?

Rachel Dillon: Okay, Tap is stands for Tax Advisory Plan. It includes the tax return. So preparation and filing. It also [00:05:00] includes two tax projections per year. We do those mid-year. So let's say beginning of June and end of October. So mid-year and year end. And what we're doing in those tax projections we actually calculate a tax projection. Our client controllers record commentary of just walking the client through their screen of their tax projection. And then clients are invited to book a meeting to talk about it. Not every client books that meeting, but they're definitely [00:05:30] invited to. So if we're adding these things up, we have tax return preparation. We have two tax projection calculations and then two meetings to talk about tax planning at that same time with those projections. So that's what's included. Also what's included. They're paying us on a monthly basis. So the cost of the tax advisory plan is $500 per month. That does [00:06:00] include those services I just listed. And it also includes if an opportunity comes up throughout the year or if their golf buddy or fishing buddy says, hey, I'm going to do this Augusta rule on my house, you should look into this and do it too, or I'm going to insert whatever may be real or not real tax strategy. They can call their team and say, hey, does this apply to me? How do I take advantage [00:06:30] of this? Um, so they have, they have access to the team to send an email or a phone call or question throughout the year that typically, um, just experience wise that we typically don't have someone calling us on a monthly or weekly basis with new opportunities that are in our tax advisory plan. It's more your traditional annual tax client. But instead of googling or using ChatGPT or just going [00:07:00] off their friends advice, they will call the team first before making big financial decisions. Get their input, and then move forward. So tax advisory plan, really most basic simplified level is the tax return to tax projections and then invites to do tax planning meetings at those same times of the tax projection calculation.

Marcus Dillon: And I think a few points of clarification. Um that tax returns their [00:07:30] 1040. So is their individual which everybody needs right. Uh $500 is the base we review the, um, you know, whenever you do intake of that prospect, we review their prior year tax return. They share that you obviously know why they're calling, what's going on a little bit in their life. Uh, we're also seeing people that have maybe some, some trust returns that come along with. So that also adds to the cost. Um, and then, you know, we'll see people that maybe they [00:08:00] have an investment or a, uh, a real estate entity where it's not a full blown business, but we can add on the maintenance of that QBO accounting. And we do that at anywhere from 250 to $500 a month, depending on how, um, how much activity there is, obviously. Uh, it's not a full on CAS client. We would do quarterly financials instead of monthly, but they do have a team that's managing that [00:08:30] and kind of keeping it up to date so that whenever it comes to tax projection time, we can get our hands around most all of the income that they have coming in. So we can factor that into the tax projection.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah. So, uh, tax advisory plan is best for, uh, maybe someone who is just a high income earner with a lot of investments. Maybe they have investments in entities where they receive k-1's or maybe [00:09:00] just, um, just a lot of investments. Some people have started, we'll call it a side hustle. It is not their main source of income, but they have something on the side that has income and expenses, uh, maybe a schedule C or schedule E entity. And then, um, also people different stage of life. So a lot of times it is a high income earner or someone with a high net worth because they need and have potentially [00:09:30] more planning opportunities where that really is the value of the tax advisory plan. It's not the value of you're going to do my tax return every year. The value really does come with calculating that tax projection and having those planning meetings and having a team that knows your goals long term and short term, and what you're trying to achieve so that they can help advise on what the opportunities are and whether or not you should take advantage of them [00:10:00] in that tax year. Um, the other is, like you mentioned, as far as an offboarding would be our monthly CAS clients who have sold businesses, they have been working with a team for on a monthly basis, talking to them maybe, maybe monthly, as far as emails and things or on a quarterly basis. And now all of a sudden it just shuts off. But they still have income. They may still have an entity that needs to wind down and file a [00:10:30] final. So having a home and a service for them, and not just saying we can't do anything or we're only going to talk to you once a year at tax time, This helps both sides.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. And that's a really good example. Um you know, a story of ours is we have, uh, it was one of our first CAS clients. Uh, we worked with him and his business. I over probably ten years, it felt like, um, so he was within the team of three. He exited his business. We helped [00:11:00] him achieve that last year. And, you know, as part of that, we were doing so many things not only for his business, but for him personally, like flowing through the, the business and just the benefit of being a business owner. So whenever he sold and no longer owned 100% of the business, uh, he wanted to continue to work with our team, uh, very similar to how the business used to work. And, um, so he, as part of his engagement, um, with the new owner of [00:11:30] the business, he is consulting and helping identify new companies for acquisition. He's traveling, he's, um, having to submit monthly invoices to the parent company. He's a 1099, not a W-2. So obviously he has an entity that that flows through that money comes in. We have him set up on. We don't have someone on payroll yet, but we are working toward that as he gets more revenue in. Um, but that's just one of those like he is, he's [00:12:00] got this side hustle now, right? Um, so that's where we started with him. Um, very quickly it was like, can y'all do my invoicing? Uh, I don't, you know, I don't want to do that. I don't want to submit invoices. Um, he's, he was a business owner for 30 plus years.

Marcus Dillon: Right? He doesn't want to go back to doing HR and AP. And so we, we put him into this model. We added on the, uh, you know, the QBO quarterly touch point, just because of the lack of volume and just not much activity. And [00:12:30] we built something out where it made sense for him. Now one step further. You know, three months later, he's like, I don't know what I'm spending money on. Um, you know, it's I have all this money from the sale of my business. I've got all these investment accounts. I don't know where everything is. Uh, I can pull up different accounts and look at balances, but I would like to see it all in one place. I would also like to track how much I'm spending, because [00:13:00] obviously, similar scenario with a lot of business owners that sell their business. He's building a house on land. He bought a lake house, he bought a boat, he's looking at some other purchases. And he's just like, I, I don't know how, how things are going. I feel like I'm spending a lot of money and it's like, well, you're spending money, but like, let's get it all together. Let's figure out how much you are spending. So he actually moved into a CAS model. You know, he [00:13:30] so he went from CAS down to tap and now he's back at Cass. But for his family group, because we now have to track his family finances like we would a business, and we're doing some other things. So that was in that story. It was an off ramp, and then it was an on ramp essentially to another Cass engagement.

Marcus Dillon: So just be open to this. Like you can celebrate when a client sells their business and exits. And, you know, for us, it was we, we kind of got sad when a client got [00:14:00] approached for, you know, the sale of their business or even, uh, successfully exited their business because we, we would think that we're losing a client and the client's like trying to figure out how they can still work with us. So this tap model, we, we mainly introduced it and leaned into it for these situations because we know that client really well, we know them inside and out. And it's a way to offer to them how they can continue to work for us. Not everybody has taken [00:14:30] us up on it. And so I think that's the other thing to point out is if you've got a client that's on a monthly engagement and then all of a sudden like, how do you address, you know, they sold the business, who's doing the tax returns? Who's doing your personal. Something like this has been handy. And whenever somebody says, that's great, but I just don't I don't want to spend $6,000 a year for my personal tax situation and all the advice that goes along with it. That's okay. Here are some recommendations and referral partners [00:15:00] that will serve you in the way that you want to be served moving forward. So this has been a really helpful product to, you know, take off the shelf and to be able to serve clients with.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah. So like our CAS model, we also charge an onboarding for tap. So this one is a little bit different. It is not the 7500 that we charge for a monthly CAS engagement. It's not the same amount of work that goes [00:15:30] into onboarding a tax advisory plan client. Some things that are similar are we still do a kickoff call with the client to introduce them to their team of three. And so team of three is how we serve our clients. And we also use a team approach to serve our tax clients in the tax advisory plan. Um, and so I think that that's worth talking through what that looks like. It's not the same roles as the team of three for monthly [00:16:00] CAS clients. There are different responsibilities that are needed. But I think that that's worth talking through. And then let's also share the starting and what's included in the onboarding fee and how we kind of talk through that.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. And you're the best person to lead this because you have these conversations every day. Um, so how this works, like if you're a owner or leader in a firm and you get pulled into these conversations and speaking from my experience, like [00:16:30] I can blow stuff up on the team. Like I can accept work that doesn't fit what we're really trying to do. And I create more problems than are truly necessary because I just want to serve people. I want to help people. I want to help them get through. But sometimes the best referral is the way to serve them. And so the way that it's allowed me to kind of redirect and make sure that people are being served really well, and then also protect the team is to redirect this conversation [00:17:00] to somebody like you that is knowledgeable and is the gatekeeper and can protect that team. So that's, that's honestly what I would do in this situation. So, um, let's, let's have that conversation, I guess, if you will.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah. So when I talk to a new prospect and this is not the prospect that has, we'll say downgraded, they've just moved to a different plan. They've sold their business. They've moved to a different plan. Typically we wouldn't charge that person an onboarding fee for [00:17:30] tax advisory plan. They're going to continue in a monthly package. We have access to all of their tax. Previous. We've been doing tax projections for them, uh, when they were a monthly client. So those typically do not pay an onboarding fee when they will say downgrade or transition to tap. Clients who are brand new to our firm do pay an onboarding fee. Typically, that onboarding fee starts at 750 per month. The 750 per month [00:18:00] is really to review their prior their either current year or prior year tax return, the most recently filed tax return. And to have that first kick off call with their team of three. Because most of the time, a taxpayer who is coming to us for tax advice has immediate questions there. Sometimes they come at tax time and they just need someone to prepare a tax return and somehow get convinced into the whole planning [00:18:30] and advisory piece.

Rachel Dillon: But most of the time it's because they already have the questions. So during that kick off call, we have the people who can actually answer those questions for them. So of course there is a charge for that. So typically starts at 750 if we need to prepare anything new, if we need to prepare new tax returns as part of onboarding, if we need to amend tax returns as part of onboarding, we either price it out [00:19:00] and include it as the onboarding fee, or we let them know. We need to assess what needs to be amended, and we'll let you know a price that will be separate. So it doesn't just automatically include any current work that needs to be done. That onboarding fee really is for us to assess what they have, make sure it's optimized and correct. And for the kick off call, because that kick off call, they are going to get advice and [00:19:30] strategy, most likely assuming they have a question during that time.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah, I like it because you're able to obviously someone's calling in with a pain point. As practitioners, we typically lean towards their pain point is the lack of compliance. And that's not always the case. Like they're the lack of compliance on their side is probably the least thing that they care about. But it's the thing that we end up like [00:20:00] caring about or leading with because we know exactly how to do it. And so it's comfortable to us. But, you know, having these, having the space for the actual planning, the advice, the conversations to actually build relationship and address why they're coming in. Um, so many of these calls are, I would assume so many of these calls to you aren't. I just need to get a tax return done. It is some other life event. It is like a bigger question that maybe ChatGPT or [00:20:30] Claude couldn't answer. And they actually do need professional advice. And they've, you know, they've taken discernment upon themselves and said, I actually need to go outside of my laptop to, to get this done. So I think it achieves a few different things because if, if we really love the puzzle of compliance, that's what we gravitate to and that's what we jump to. And that's typically not what a client wants in the very beginning of that relationship. They do want to build rapport. They do want those initial questions answered so much like in [00:21:00] a CAS engagement, when we do onboarding in a CAS engagement, that CFO is there to block and tackle for the controller and the CSM so they can get the client up on the wheel of service. But that CFO is also helping answer questions, ask questions about their goals. Think about like how we're going to build out different things like budget or cash flow, like what's really necessary, like what's priority for that client. So we can go address priority. And those same conversations happen [00:21:30] with Tap clients. And why don't you tell us a little bit about the makeup of the team that's in that tap engagement and who's in those meetings?

Rachel Dillon: Yeah. So as soon as we get an engagement letter signed, I will send a welcome email to the new client that introduces their team of three. So this again is for our tax advisory plan. These are individual tax clients that we serve throughout the year and that are on a monthly recurring service [00:22:00] agreement. Uh, we're taking money from them every single month. Uh, and so I'll send the email to introduce them internally. I meet with that team of three. That team of three is comprised of our tax administrator who currently is Deidre, our tax Controller and our Director of Tax and Financial Planning. So right now our team, real name's Deidre Cordell and Aaron, uh, make up that team of three that serves our tax advisory clients. And [00:22:30] we meet together as soon as it's, uh, the new client is welcomed, we meet internally so that I can help share all of the information. We have notes, we have transcripts of those meetings and things saved, but still, I just let them know the things that we've collected. The they can ask me questions and I say, yeah, no, we don't have that. We're going to need to ask the client. Um, and then we schedule a kickoff call. [00:23:00]

Rachel Dillon: It's a 30 minute virtual call with that team of three, the tax administrator, the tax controller, and the director of tax and financial planning. Um, and the client, uh, so I'm there so that I can help, make sure that expectations are clear, that what I've told the client during the sales process matches what the service team is telling the client, and what the client has told me matches what he's now saying during this [00:23:30] call. So it's a very nice handoff and it's an introduction of you're not going to come to me, even though we may have been talking for 1 to 6 weeks. Um, and all the things, all the communication was directed to me. It is a very nice handoff to this is your new team. This is their role and this is why there's so much better at answering these tax questions than I am. And so, um, yeah, that's the, that's the team that will be [00:24:00] in that meeting and serving that client. Uh, we can talk through exactly what the tax administrator and the tax controller and the director of tax and financial planning. I think it's important to share what those responsibilities are for each role.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. No. That's good. Um, you kind of mentioned people's by name, right? So much like the client CFO's kind of, you know, supporting leading the tax director is doing that [00:24:30] in this pod, uh, or this team. Uh, Cordell, who was mentioned as the tax controller. We have other tax controllers, but those tax controllers aren't accepting new clients like Cordell. Is cordell's newer to the team? He's just got more capacity. Um, and then Deidra, right as the administrative team member that's there, uh, we also have, um, in the past and in the future, uh, we currently don't have, uh, we've had other tax assistants, uh, [00:25:00] where that's been a team member that has just been in the background there helping, uh, prepare and pull tax documents together. And so even even that person, they may have set in on the internal call, they may join the external call depending on their availability, but they're also a part of that, that Tap team, because they may do some of the preparation. Deidre actually does some of the preparation for tax. She'll [00:25:30] get it into prep and ultimately find its way into ultra tax. But but yeah, like those are the team members that make it make up.

Marcus Dillon: Um, and much like on the cash side, what we've tried to avoid doing is we've tried to avoid the service team having conversations around payment or price. Uh, we really just want the service team to, to provide the best service possible to our clients. And if there is a pricing conversation or an administrative, [00:26:00] hey, I need to update things or like, can we look at something different that also goes back to you to lead that conversation because you're the best person for it. You remain there to protect the team, very similar to the situation, whereas you're there to protect the team. On maybe prospects that aren't a fit and you can have that conversation better than anybody. Um, and so that's, that's also a little bit of the flow of actual service versus, um, pricing [00:26:30] and engagement. Um, and people may do it different, like this is just the way that we've seen, uh, it work best for us. So, but yeah, I would love to, to continue to talk about, you know, just that tap team and like what that actually looks like.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah. So tax administrator is actually shared across the whole firm and does administrative responsibilities. She actually owns canopy management and setup. [00:27:00] So she is setting up every new client, whether they are a tax only, uh, meaning tax advisory plan or a CAS, because every client that we serve, we're going to do at least one tax return for them. We're at least doing the business where we at least doing the individual. And so she has been our best person to manage the setup of new clients. She also requests any documents that are needed. So through Kanopy. It's just this solution [00:27:30] that we currently use. But she requests maybe she requests prior year tax returns for additional entities that they didn't share at some point. Um, all kinds of different things that might be needed. Uh, she will request during tax time. She sends out engagement letters. She requests tax documents. So she is in a lot of communication with those clients specifically. Um, but actually in a lot of communication with all of our clients, [00:28:00] the tax controller does some preparation and a lot of review. So depending on what our tax assistance or our tax administrator can prepare, um, what we have technology available to prepare. He really comes in as a review function, but also can prepare returns when needed. And then our director of tax and financial planning is again just a higher level review function [00:28:30] for tax returns that need it. And then support to the team as they have questions and then especially education.

Rachel Dillon: So he really owns all tax updates and any education that our team may need to keep them uh, compliant and sharp and up to date on what's happening. He really owns that process. So those three together work really nicely. It's helpful to have them all on [00:29:00] that first call with the client. So when they do get an email or a notification and they're like, who is this person? Um, they don't respond back to me asking either who that is or sending me the information because they didn't recognize that name. They get to know each person and what they're doing. I will say a lot of times people think like in the team of three, that there's a hierarchy and maybe that the director of tax or the client CFO really owns or quarterbacks the relationship. [00:29:30] But what I will say is that it's typically those controllers that are owning that relationship. Now again, with communication, our csms on the CAS side and our tax administrator, they're in a lot of contact with the client. So really, it's not one person doing the communication of what needs to happen. It really is a team approach, which is nice because then it's not a surprise or out of the ordinary when they [00:30:00] receive a message or a notification from someone other than you, myself, or one member of their team. It's really a shared relationship between all.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah, I would say if you're doing a good job and, um, hopefully we're doing a good job. Like, um, the clients are speaking more to the administrative and the client service manager team and the client controller team. So it's that bottom [00:30:30] up approach, like the clients are really being served at that foundational level. Versus waiting for a call back from the top of the pyramid, right? Like if that's how you think about structure and all that fun stuff. Um, because the foundational is just, it's, it's, that's where the base of the actual production of the work is being done and the client's needs are being met. So I would, I would assume that Deidre, um, has the most interaction, [00:31:00] you know, across multiple communication forms, um, with our clients. And that's a great thing, right? Like she's got the availability for it. She's got the personality and the skill set for it. She's pleasant to talk to, pleasant to meet with, uh, accommodating. And so I would just, you know, I would, I would put that out there because that was not always the case. Uh, we did, we did not always have that positioning. [00:31:30] And we actually started that positioning. We actually hired, um, she was a CPA. Um, and we actually worked her through different roles on the team. Uh, but she was a CPA that wasn't the strongest at technical work. Um, it was bouncing a lot like personally.

Marcus Dillon: And so, um, and I'm not, I'm not the strongest at technical work and I'm a CPA. So that's not saying anything negative about her. It's just that wasn't her skill set. That wasn't how she was uniquely wired, but she was great on [00:32:00] the phone. She was great with people and she would help expedite. She would help track different things down and help clients get their needs met, regardless if she was the one that was going to be meeting those needs or somebody else on the team. So she was this role of expediter. And then, you know, she she had another child and decided to stay home. So that role somewhat shifted over to Deidre. Um, and then it just kind of became a role of its own with tax administrator, the one that she [00:32:30] leads now. Um, so she's really, you know, I think she's the one that's taking point on a lot of this. And she is the one that a lot of clients are introduced to and will continue the conversation throughout. She's also the same one that will send out, um, engagement letters and organizers, you know, at tax time. She's also the one that will send out their tax return. So it's just, it's helpful if Deidre ever retires. We're just going to have to keep her email address actively going and just share it between multiple people. [00:33:00]

Rachel Dillon: Yeah, yeah. It is, um, very interesting because she really does become their point of contact. Since she does send out the completed tax return, she does accept the 8879. She does it is the notifications coming from Deidra that their tax return has been filed. Um, and so those are all ways that she is helping to support the whole entire team, in addition to some preparation when she has capacity to do so. So we [00:33:30] are very fortunate with her. Um, what else do you want to share about tax advisory plan?

Marcus Dillon: Well, let's talk about let's talk about Jerry. So like, um, I think with this tax advisory plan being an option, like we talked about, like with an existing client moving it off the shelf, a great client comes in through a referral source as an option. But here recently, like you celebrated on the last podcast that we had two new tap engagements, one $800 a month, one at [00:34:00] $500 a month. I feel like there's another 1 or 2 in there, but maybe, maybe Jerry came in after maybe this most recent one came in after we pulled that data. And much like we set goals of 15 new clients, which we've met, you know, more than halfway through the year on tap. Tell us about how we set goals there, because it's different than the goals that we set on the cash side.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah. So instead of [00:34:30] instead of setting a goal of how many new clients we would like to onboard and accept in the year, we actually set a maximum amount of tax advisory clients that we will accept. And the reason for that really is capacity. So because these are still individual tax returns that have Deadlines and due dates. We do not want to overload a team. We don't necessarily want to hire a seasonal team. [00:35:00] And so we our main goal is still to keep consistent workload throughout the year for our team. And so our goals for tax advisory plan are different in that we will only allow ten new clients per year. So we have a maximum cutoff. So once we get to ten we don't accept any new. This year I believe we really are at two. We had one client that signed right before the first of the year, and so we onboarded them during 2026, [00:35:30] but they actually signed in 2025. So I think that that is our other one. But I would like to talk through our most recent client and just talk through where they came from, what they paid, and then even through their kickoff call of what they were asking and what it looks like as follow up on the other side, because I'm sure I would be interested to know, do people really go for a $750 onboarding fee or more, where [00:36:00] they're really paying for like a 30 minute phone call? Like, do they find value in that? So let's talk about this most recent.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. It's funny, like, um, we talked about our website. It was, um, optimized for search, right. But, um, so these leads come in and, um, you know, sometimes they're spam, sometimes they're legit and they actually book time on your calendar, sometimes the spam books time on your calendar. But, um, so this lead came in and, um, you know, it's really interesting. Sometimes clients [00:36:30] will fill out the leads and ask questions and I'm like, that's stupid because you don't know who your team is. Like we're failing you on that side. But this was a.

Rachel Dillon: Good reminder to us.

Marcus Dillon: Right? Yeah, exactly.

Rachel Dillon: A reminder to us, like we need to reach out to this person somehow they've gotten lost of who, who they're supposed to be, who's taking care of them?

Marcus Dillon: We know dance like, yeah, a legacy annual client that I'm like, what are you doing? So. Um, but this name came in, I'm like, I know that name. He [00:37:00] used to be a client. And so, uh, he hadn't been a client since 2017 or 2018, right around that time frame. And, uh, he used to have a business, um, very, very typical in West Houston, you would have, uh, engineers that work in the oil and gas industry. And then, uh, when they retire, some of them go back and consult with different companies. And that's what he set up. He was a geoscientist. Um, and he set up an [00:37:30] entity, paid himself payroll was getting to 99 in various, uh, engineering firms. And he, I guess, retired again and wound that down and no longer needed either the tax or any of the payroll services that we were assisting with. And then as 1040 as well, just got super simple and he was able to do it. So we all forwarded him as a client, um, you know, left him at a really good place and just said, hey, like that was about the time we were shifting our focus more to [00:38:00] MRR too. So, um, we probably would have said, hey, here's a couple of referrals, uh, if you can't do it yourself.

Marcus Dillon: And, but I remember 2017 was also hurricane Harvey. And, uh, we, we tried to help as many people in the Houston area as we could navigate things. And, um, I remember him because for those of you that don't know, like I've grown up around cars, I've been around cars a long time, I've owned different cars. And he had a Porsche 911, a nine, [00:38:30] six four, which is a 90s, um, car, um, which are now highly sought after. Uh, they're actually either restored or they're turned into, um, retro fit kind of cars that go for hundreds of thousands of dollars. But he had this 964 and in his garage in Katy, and it flooded as part of Harvey. And he was so torn up about it. I just remember like, we connected on it a variety of different ways. Obviously being [00:39:00] around cars and now owning a few different, you know, nine elevens. Um, so I remember the name. I remember helping him, you know, just remember his car in the story. And then he comes back, you know, and he's like, in, in the email that he sent through the website, it was, um, hey, my brother in law passed away in California and I've got questions on a trust and all this stuff.

Marcus Dillon: And I think as soon as I saw that both those emails, both both of the emails come to the emails come to both you and me, [00:39:30] um, and other people that we want to designate that they go to, uh, that would be on a future sales team. But I saw it and I was like, oh, we gotta refer this guy. Like, you know, I know who he is. He's going to like, we need to refer him to somebody that is in California that can answer his questions on a California trust return. But I think he booked time with you. And then even the day that I saw on your calendar that you were meeting with, and I'm like, why are you still meeting with him? That's just an email to say like, hey, just refer, just [00:40:00] refer him to anybody else. Like just going in. I just came in assuming, right? Like that, he just needed this one thing and you actually took the call. You were such a better person than I would be and actually like, saw it all the way through. So tell us about that first call with that former client and what that actually like, how the conversation went from there.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah. So fun fact we have automation set up through the website. When a form is filled out, it automatically [00:40:30] emails the prospect, uh, an email that says, would you like to book a meeting? That's what they're agreeing to really when they hit submit is that they want to book a meeting. And so No, I don't pay attention. I see them, but I don't take action on those emails because there are additional automations. If they don't book after that, first email goes out with my calendar link. And so I, I see them, but I don't take any action because we have automation [00:41:00] for that. And this one probably came in either on a weekend or at night. And so I, I didn't do anything with it. And I saw that he had booked with me. And so I'm like, okay, it's taken care of. I'm not going to waste my time sending an email because I don't mind when I have a meeting on my calendar. And it doesn't take up the full 30 minute time slot that was scheduled. If it's a quick phone call and we're off within five minutes, I'm okay with that. Um, if someone [00:41:30] doesn't show up, I can't say that I get real sad about that either. So just know when they book on my calendar, spam or not, I kind of let that hold and then it gives me a breather. But this one actually did show up. We started talking and really in the first two minutes he let me know.

Rachel Dillon: I already have a California attorney and I have a California CPA contact to handle the things for my brother in law. What I really need you guys for is the income that we're going to receive [00:42:00] from this inheritance, from this estate. And so he's like, we've already received and started kind of going through the details. There was inheritance from the mother in law. There is inheritance from this in different forms. So there are properties, there are investment properties, there are IRAs and different retirement. And so there's a lot of moving pieces in addition to life changes that are happening for them as well. A wife [00:42:30] retiring, um, both approaching 73, they still have a few years, but both approaching that coming up and had questions about RMDs. And so there was a lot of information that we kind of went through. But what I will say that what stood out and why he came back and didn't go straight to email and like email us, actually went to the website to see our probably, are we still in business? Are we accepting new clients? Um, was that, uh, [00:43:00] Hurricane Harvey help that you provided with? And then his initial reason for reaching out to become a client so many years ago was that he had received an IRS notice for penalties and interest for not filing something either on time or just not filing it, not realizing maybe with the business that he set up. Um, since it was like the side consulting and not realizing that he needed to file something and you were able to write a letter or make a phone call and get those penalties, [00:43:30] uh, abated.

Rachel Dillon: And so he remembered those two things. And I will tell you within the first five minutes because he was self-prepared tax return and it's an annual tax return. I let him know the cost of $500 per month and just said going from self prepared to $6,000 a year is a big jump. Do you want to continue the conversation? And so we he's like, of course, let me talk through [00:44:00] some more things. And then by the end of the call, he just said, we're going to use you guys. Just send me whatever, whatever we need. You guys have helped me so much in the past. And so before we even had a chance to look at his prior year tax returns, he was already making himself a client. We still requested, um, his most recent tax return. And then any information that I could just get from the two of them regarding the inheritance and how the California would be addressed. Because [00:44:30] if we're going to address it, it's going to be more than $500 a month. If someone else is going to address it, then we were good with the $500 a month once we had a chance to look at that tax return. So that's kind of what that looked like. Um, just from the, the initial conversation piece.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. No, and that's and, you know, I think you had the call with, um, the team. So you had, you had a great call with them. Uh, you sent him the engagement letter for [00:45:00] $500, right?

Rachel Dillon: He uploaded really quickly. He, I sent him the link to canopy to upload his priory return. He uploaded the same day. You happen to be able to look at it the same day? Probably because you were still under the impression of we're not doing this for this guy. Um, he's he's he's not going to want to pay. And so I went ahead and did the engagement letter, sent the link and he completed that the next day. So this whole sales process was like 48 hours, 72 hours total. Um, [00:45:30] and then we, you know, had a new Tap client.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. I mean, I looked at the 1040 and it was it was not even a ten. It was like a 1040 SR. Right. Which is like for senior citizens, right? So it's like the easy version of a 1040. I'm like, oh, crap. Like, can we justify $6,000 in value to somebody that's self prepared? And like, is so simple, but it's also like the context of the conversation that you had. Like, they're not going to be simple moving [00:46:00] forward, right? Like they're going to complicate life and there's going to be moves that they make with RMDs and charitable qualified distributions and donor advised funds and inheritances and trusts and all this stuff. So yeah, like having that context, it's a different story. Um, versus if you just go off of the 1040 and base your pricing on that. So you presented you, you, you had just the one call with him, and then you sent the engagement letter for $500, $750 onboarding. [00:46:30] And then we were, I think it was like Saturday and like, you know, email comes in and I'm like, well, you got a new tap client, you know, and you're like, really? And it's like you said, it was a 48 hour turnaround. And then so that was over the weekend. I think. What did it look like the next few days as you met with the team? Even explain to the team, like, why is this guy a client? And then having that conversation with the whole team and Jerry later in the week?

Rachel Dillon: Yeah. So Monday [00:47:00] morning sent the welcome email and introduced his team of three. So Deidra as tax administrator, Cordell's client or tax controller, and Aaron as director of tax and financial planning and then gave him some times. So I'm able to see all of our calendars. I gave him some times that were available to have the kickoff call. And then also we use teams and so let the team know, hey, I found this open time for us to have our. We call it an SOS meeting. [00:47:30] That stands for Sales on Board Service. So that's our internal meeting. So scheduled that for Tuesday morning. And then he accepted his kick off call for Wednesday morning. So we were able to go through this actually. And it's really because of the responsiveness of the client. Um, but able to get to that kick off call really quickly to where during our internal SOS call, Aaron and Cordell had a lot of questions for me that I did not have answers to [00:48:00] related to the money that would be coming in and what they would do with it. Even the question of like, when will they be 70.5 since one of them turned 70 this year? And so questions like that, that we just started documenting from that meeting of these are all things we're going to ask. And then during the kickoff call, they were able to share some of the things.

Rachel Dillon: So one thing that was uncovered, they have more money saved up than [00:48:30] they will spend in their lifetimes. And so one of the questions that was asked was, what are your intentions for the excess? Is it charitable giving outside of your family? Is it for your family? Do you plan to increase your spending and have some fun and buy some things that aren't typically what you have now? Um, and their answer was yes. Uh, just so, just so we all know what they're intending to do with that. Um, but Aaron and Kordell then [00:49:00] could start, they start asking good questions and the follow up from that meeting, because not all questions got answered at that time. They had to gather some information. They're going to request their year to date income. Uh, this family is actually meeting with their financial planners next week. And so they'll gather up all of their income and expenses year to date. We'll do a tax Projection. And then on the other side of that, they'll be invited to get the answers to [00:49:30] or some ideas for a lot of the questions and opportunities that we explored during that kickoff call. So there's 750 really covered their kickoff call, their midyear projection, because we haven't had any income from them yet. And then kind of some resolutions or some answers to things that they asked during the kickoff call.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. And yeah, they'll, um, you know, their first year, they'll spend 6750 with us, you know, just assuming the $500 a month. Um, the, [00:50:00] the other thing, you know, tap or aim was really positioned to reduce our 1040 as well, like our 1040 base. So the way that we thought about it is if we had a $6,000 a year, 1040 family, um, that could replace ten, $600, 1040 uh, with ten touch points, you know, just you multiply that times ten and that's not what everybody wants. But we just wanted at that time to reduce, uh, family relationships, contacts with team [00:50:30] and everything like that. And so I think this is a perfect example. Um, if we still had $600, ten 40s, we would probably really assess like, hey, who can we get rid of because we just celebrated this new client coming in the door. That's what we've done in the past. If we still had the makeup of clients, that's what we would do today. Just because it just goes along with discernment. Like we could serve so many additional people. But you know, with connections like Jerry coming [00:51:00] in and building a relationship, building rapport, him now, transferring that rapport over to other team members with Deidra Cordell and Aaron. Um, you know, and also, you know, if he wants advice on how to spend his money, I'm still here. I can help him spend his money because I think he mentioned a Ferrari, uh, on, on the call. And I'm like, I like, probably wouldn't buy anything Italian unless you just want to allocate a lot of money to maintenance. Um, but you know, let's go, let's go shop for a 911 again. That's, that's always fun. So, um, but [00:51:30] yeah, like those are, those are the clients that you want to do life with or that I want to do life with and that just, you know, it gives you a lot of joy to, to make sure that your team's serving them well throughout the year.

Rachel Dillon: Yeah. Our team loves this, uh, style of serving this service line. They really get to know these clients when they interact with them and have conversations. Um, it's, it's more than just, here's what you, oh, here's what you can do to save and get off the call. And so they actually feel, [00:52:00] you know, some enjoyment, some connection, build a relationship with these people. And it gives a lot of meaning to the work that they're doing.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah. And meaningful work is, you know, one of our, uh, values at DBA. So it definitely leans into that so well, really good. Uh, breakdown of the Tapp model. Anything else to share before we sign off?

Rachel Dillon: I think that's it. I think that was a good overview. As always, happy to answer questions of how did we arrive [00:52:30] at this? How did we decide on pricing? What does it look like? Who's doing what during onboarding? Happy to talk through any of that. You can schedule a meeting with me through the website or email me, Rachel at collective dot cpa.

Marcus Dillon: Yeah, one more thing before we go. Tap is not on our website.

Rachel Dillon: Tap is not on our website. And again, that is intentional because of our goals surrounding that of we don't want more than ten. [00:53:00] If we put an individual tax offering, everyone is going to think it's for them. Um, and it's just not. Maybe if we put the price out there, it would scare some people away or let them know that it's not in the best fit, But I, I don't, I don't want to have all my calendar filled up with the wrong fit prospects. I need room on my calendar for right fit prospects. So we have intentionally because that is not what we're trying to grow. We don't put it on our website. [00:53:30] We do offer it. We're just not trying to grow that. So on our website are the things that we are intentionally trying to grow within the business. Um, even though we may do something on a secret menu off the website.

Marcus Dillon: People love secret menus.

Rachel Dillon: Yes.

Marcus Dillon: All right. Well, thanks so much for leading the conversation and we'll see you on the next.

Rachel Dillon: Thanks for listening to this episode. If you enjoyed the conversation and want to learn more, be sure to visit collective dot CPA. You [00:54:00] can schedule a meeting directly with me, Rachel, by clicking on the Contact Us page. Be sure to subscribe, like, and share so you don't miss any future episodes. We look forward to connecting with you soon.