The Unstoppable Accountant - Grow your Accounting Firm

Expanding Your Accounting Firm Internationally: Building Global Teams and Trust Through Technology

• Arun Mehra

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What if you could seamlessly expand your accounting firm internationally and tap into a global talent pool? In this episode, we unlock the secrets of doing just that. I share my own experiences with Indian accountants and how I built Samera Global into a powerhouse supporting UK and US firms. We break down the essential elements that contribute to a successful firm: building a robust team, leveraging cutting-edge technology, and fostering deep-rooted trust. With an ageing demographic of accountants in the UK and US, paired with advancements in technology like cloud accounting and AI, the opportunity for offshoring has never been greater.

Creating a world-class team is critical, and we don't hold back on the details. Listen as we underscore the importance of hiring experienced professionals with stellar communication skills and unwavering ambition. A positive work culture, competitive salaries, and a flexible environment are just the beginning. We also explore how involving your team in meaningful societal contributions can elevate your firm's ethos. Plus, discover how technological integration, including AI, can play a pivotal role in training and upskilling your team to boost efficiency and innovation.

Trust is the cornerstone of acquiring international clients, and we offer a multi-faceted strategy to build it. From crafting a high-value weekly newsletter to producing engaging podcasts, free growth courses, and insightful blog articles, we provide a toolkit to connect with your audience and establish credibility. Don't miss our tips on navigating cultural fits, understanding regional regulations, and the transformative role of AI in the accounting profession. Tune in to hear answers to audience questions, real-world insights, and actionable advice that could redefine your accounting firm’s reach and impact.

Speaker 1:

Hello, welcome everybody. This is Arun Mehra here and lovely to see you today. I hope you can see me today. Welcome to this webinar which I'm hosting. And it's all come about because of how I've been working with kind of Indian accountants in my team and then, when I started off my offshoring journey a few years back on my own, I keep getting inquiries and people asking me how can I get international clients? So today's webinar is all about really just touching on the subject of how to get new, to get international clients for your firm, how to kind of build that trust and really kind of help you build that firm. So let me crack on. Let me start with what I'm going to talk about and then hopefully I can give you some ideas and thoughts and get you thinking. More importantly, to get you thinking about what you want to achieve and what you want to do to build an international firm for Indian CA. So let me get my slides going. So that's the title how to get international clients who are offshoring and outsourcing Indian CA firm. Now you can see there's a picture of me that's with me. Earlier in the year with some of my team, we were down in Goa, so we had a great time in Goa, had a lot of fun, great memories, and I'm heading back to India in July actually to see the team again, so it's going to be great fun. And this is again some of the team outside our offices in Delhi again, great, great people, wonderful team. It's been a real kind of wonderful experience thus far dealing with my team in India. So but before we talk about how you can get clients, let me kind of run through a little bit about who I am, my experience, what I do, all these types of things. So my name is Aaron and I'm a FCA, which means I'm a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.

Speaker 1:

Here in the UK I'm the owner and CEO of Samara and the owner and CEO of Samara Global. Now Samara is a UK accounting firm and we've been running that for many years. It focuses on the healthcare sector dentists, doctors, pharmacies, that type of thing and then a few years back I started off Samara Global. Now Samara Global is our offshoring business and that started off as supporting my Samara business through offshoring and now it's grown to a point there where we're actually helping other clients, other accounting firms here in the UK and the US with their kind of offshoring needs. I also own something called the Neem Tree Dental Group, which is a dental practice group here with my wife Smita, who's a dentist Many years back now, as you can see by my gray hair, I'm a trained chartered accountant with PwC here in London.

Speaker 1:

I worked in investment banking for a number of years as an ex-VP of Bank of America, but I've realised I had my calling to be a business owner and that's what I did, started over 20 years ago. I started off Samara and we've grown from there now. So that's a little bit of a background. And this was actually at my birthday, my 50th birthday, which was last year. So I'm 51 now at the moment and still going strong and still very excited about the future.

Speaker 1:

A little bit more about myself my interests getting harder as I get older, but I try to keep fit, try to run. I enjoy skiing. I love cooking, eating and obviously good Indian food. I love traveling. My family are very, very important to me. I have a son who's 19. I have a daughter who's 15, almost 16. Obviously, my wife's meter and I enjoy my business. I love working in my business.

Speaker 1:

I enjoy doing what I do, so today's really come about me sharing my experiences and my thoughts, um, and really kind of getting to help others with what they're trying to achieve. So let's crack on. I'm only going to talk for about half an hour in total today. Um, it's just a real introduction to get you thinking more than anything else, because I think quite often or not, um, people don't actually think about what they need to do, what they need to achieve. So if you look at a firm of an accounting firm, whether it's a UK firm or even an Indian firm, a CA firm, you have to look at kind of three things that I think are really important one is the team, the other is the technology you're using and the third is the trust. And all of these, in my mind, are really really important for a firm of today, but also a firm of tomorrow.

Speaker 1:

So let me cover each of those things shortly, but before I do that, if you look at the offshoring opportunity, there is an opportunity, okay, and I know many firms have been doing it for well, not many. Some firms have been doing it for many years, but other firms are trying to break through into this space. And why? What's happening? Well, let me explain it a little bit more with me here sitting in the UK. I'm here just in London. It's cold, it's wet, it's dreary and I know most of the people watching this video today are probably in India, where it's very, very hot, extremely hot, I believe at the moment. This video today are probably in India, where it's very, very hot, the extremely hot, I believe at the moment. Um and but here in the UK certainly, and I know in the US, there are a real lack of accountants. You cannot find accountants to hire. More and more people are retiring unless accountants or people studying accountancy are entering the profession. So it's an it's an aging demographic. So in the UK, the vast majority of the people are probably over 50, whereas I know in India the vast majority of people are under 35, I believe. So big demographic difference.

Speaker 1:

In addition, there's been rapid changes and improvements in technology over the last 10 years, with cloud accounting, and obviously AI is emerging as well. Over the last 10 years with cloud accounting, and obviously AI is emerging as well. Now, in my view and this is my personal view I strongly believe that India will become the accounting and finance back office, but also middle office and even front office, over the next decade. Now, why do I say that? If you look at a lot of the accounting firms here in the UK the large ones in particular, the PWCs, the Ernst Youngs they already have large kind of operational centres in India. Now, as costs rise here, as there's a declining number of staff here in the UK, a lot of those kind of middle to kind of front office roles will shift to India, because there's resource, smart people, clever people, plenty of people to do these roles.

Speaker 1:

And with the involvement in technology, people will question well, why do we need people in the UK to do it, which are, firstly, there aren't people and secondly, it's more expensive, when we can get really good people in India at a more kind of cost effective, at a more kind of cost-effective, in a more cost-effective manner? But there's a big but here and there is an ocean of offshoring players. Now, as I said earlier, I get in calls or emails or messages literally daily, okay, from all sorts of people, um, and in the offshoring space some large organizations, some small organisations, some new organisations, but there's literally thousands. Okay, but more interestingly, there are many countries and many players that are now in the offshoring space. We know India, okay, it's what we're talking about predominantly today. But of course we have the Philippines, south Africa, sri Lanka, mexico, bangladesh, pakistan you name it the list is endless. And certainly India isn't the cheapest anymore. I can tell you that now for a fact. I know places like Bangladesh are significantly cheaper.

Speaker 1:

But the question I raise here is competing on price are raised to the bottom, and I'll address that point in a moment. But I think you've got to be very careful about thinking about being the cheapest, okay, and this is where I'll lead into how you've got to think about how you're going to present yourself, how you're going to present your organization, how you're going to present your business to international potential clients. So let me explain a little bit here what I'm talking about here. What I believe is that you need to seek out a competitive advantage. Now, this is a Harvard business model from Porter.

Speaker 1:

I think Porter's Michael Porter wrote this model or created this model, and the competitive advantage is really two things that you can do. You can either lower your cost OK or you can differentiate yourself, make you stand out in some way. Now, as he says here, it's impossible. It's possible to compete on low cost and be differentiated at the same time. But companies that try to be all things to all customers can wind up getting stuck in the middle, a strategic mistake that michael porter calls the kiss of death. And this is what I'm seeing, I think, with many offshoring firms.

Speaker 1:

Um, people are lowering prices, saying we can do it for ten dollars an hour, eight dollars an hour, seven dollars an hour, six dollars or whatever. Where does it end? Okay, so there's a point, and and that's just in India, then I'm sure people in Pakistan or Bangladesh or a another place will be cheaper one dollar an hour and that's kind of not good. And you have to start thinking well, am I really going to compete on price? Because price is not the thing to compete on if you're going to be able to seek out a competitive advantage. So how can you seek out a competitive advantage? Well, in my, my mind, you have to differentiate yourself, and certainly driving up praise prices is one way to increase profitability, to command a premium price.

Speaker 1:

A company must deliver distinctive value and that's the word to customers, and that's where you have to get across, that's where you have to differentiate. What is the value you're presenting to your customers? What are they? What do your customers want. If your customers just basing you on cost, that's all they're presenting to your customers, what do your customers want? If your customer's just basing you on cost, that's all they're going to have a look at. But if you can add value in a different way, that's how they're going to really see the difference in you.

Speaker 1:

So cost leadership, I think it's important to think about. Driving down costs is ultimately another way to increase profitability. But to compete on costs, companies must balance price with acceptable quality, and that's where it goes wrong. I see a lot and this is what experience I had I used prior to setting up my own firm many years back. I used some other offshoring and outsourcing firms and they were competing on cost, but cost was not good. Cost was good but the quality was bad, and that had a massive impact on the delivery, which ultimately led us to think you know what? I've had enough of this. I'm not going to work with that company anymore. I'm going to do it myself, and that's what we did, and that was the impetus to start up Samara Global. So bottom line what I'm trying to get across here is focus on value, not price. Ok, if you focus on value, that's how you're going to stand out.

Speaker 1:

So you remember I talked about this earlier Team, technology and trust. Well, you've got to start looking at all of these aspects. So what are these aspects? What are you going to focus on? How are you going to do it? How are you going to focus on the team? What are you going to do on the technology? What are you going to do on the trust? Trust so I'm going to run through each of these individually and explain some of the things that we're doing. Okay, to help you get some ideas.

Speaker 1:

So, building a team now I've written here build a world-class team and focus on the culture you're trying to create. So when you hire people, you want to hire people who are experienced in their roles. They can train and skill. Ultimately, you train and skill the team up in the right roles. You provide X. They have excellent communication skills. You have positive. They have a positive driven attitude. You offer a flexible work culture. You pay them above market rates. You develop the team. There that you develop the team. They are the foundation of the future and you build a culture where it's not just about money. It's about doing something much more important make them feel much more part of something.

Speaker 1:

So let me kind of share um something with you. Hold on, um, I'm just going to share a page on our website, if I can just find it. Bear with me a second. I'm just going to share a page on our website, if I can just find it. Bear with me a second. I think, hold on, technology ever works. Never works how you want it to. But bear with me a second. I'm just going to add. I'm just going to add, so hopefully I can share this screen with you, okay, so I think this you can see it. So if you look, is that working? Sorry, just technically never works how you want it to. Okay, so you can see here. This is our careers page on our website, and what you can see here is you've got some details about who we are and what we do, and I'll come to that in a minute. But there's a little video about here when we went to Goa. But we're always seeking out people for our team. So if you're looking for an opportunity yourself, do inquire. We are hiring currently. But more importantly, here we've got some videos here about um.

Speaker 1:

One of the team members is discussing how our culture at samara. This is a video or youtube webinar what we talk about, but some of the things we also offer our team. Okay, um, what do we offer? Obviously, competitive salaries, health care policies, appraisals, team outings, annual trips. Watch the video if you get a chance at the later date of our go a trip. Um, obviously, weekends off. I talk to my team weekly um, on all of the team engaging. Um, we have regular team building exercises. We train, train them.

Speaker 1:

What I'm trying to get across here is that the culture is so, so important and if you get that right, that is the first foundation of your firm. Okay, it's so, so important here. If I go to here, I've talked about careers team. The other thing I want to share here is what we also do, are very much involved in, is kind of doing good in the in in society. Okay, so the team want the team don't just want to be accountants okay, the team don't just want to get their pay salary, they want to be actually seeing that they're doing something different, making a difference. Making a difference. That's the thing. So you can see how you can go to our website and check out our values, our missions, but you can see here, um, this is one of the causes that we're working for at the moment um working with an NGO called the rhythm of life. Okay, um, which is based in Delhi, works in the slums with children and we sponsor the school there. Um, we provide teachers, we provide equipment, all these types of things, okay, and again, you can have a look at this type of stuff.

Speaker 1:

But what I'm trying to get across here is the tip. The team is so much more than just someone sitting in the, in the in a office, doing um bookkeeping or preparing a tax return. The team is about the culture, what you're trying to get and getting the best out of your team, and everyone has dreams and aspirations. Obviously, everyone wants to get a good salary, everyone wants to fulfill their basic needs okay, or shelter, food, of safety. But the team also want these other things. Where you can, they're having, they're making a difference, okay, to society, they're doing something positive. So this is what we're doing in our context is um helping firms or helping helping certain charities, um with with this type of stuff. So I just thought I'd kind of give you an idea of what we're doing here.

Speaker 1:

Let's go back to this slide. Then technology is the other area that we focus on Train your team and all the required technology. So our technology, our team will have, obviously all have their own laptops. We provide, which are good equipment. We help them train them on using the equipment. We invest in secure infrastructure. We train our team in all the required technology and then, obviously now with AI changing, we help them embrace the changes in AI and then we'll ultimately give them the skills that they need okay, for growing and developing their skill set. So some ideas of what we do. Obviously, all our team are aware of touch tools, as Xero, quickbooks, sage, that type of thing. They all use that. They all use that. We also help them and train them on some of the apps that are linked to them, such as Dext or HubDoc or Spotlight, those type of things that are there all the apps that are linked to various of these bookkeeping packages.

Speaker 1:

In addition, we're doing AI training with our team. We're rolling out Microsoft AI pilot, microsoft co-pilot, and I'm confident that AI will change the role of accountants. Technology will take a lot of the work away. So therefore, you have to start thinking what skill set have my team got so that they're developed enough to actually do more work using AI? And that's a really big thing that I'm kind of thinking about at the moment and how I can develop my team to get better AI skills. So, to get better AI skills, they can do more work skills, because if they get better ai skills, they can do more, more work.

Speaker 1:

And then I suppose, if I move on to the last bit, last part, part of this is I've talked about the team, I've talked briefly about the technology. It's about the trust, okay, and what we are seeing in this world. And I sit, I sit here in the uk, um, and I receive emails and direct DMs and messages literally every day, okay, from people from different parts of the world, including India, saying, oh, we can offer accountancy or offshoring services, we can do bookkeeping, we can do payroll, we can do all this type of stuff, and that's just spam OK, and spam is spam, and no one wants spam OK. In addition, no one really wants cold calls OK, and that isn't really working either. So, remember, accountancy is all about based around trust and and that's I think people forget that because accountancy is a trust-based business, it's relationship-driven. So accountants aren't selling a product or a widget like headphones or a pen or something like that. They're not selling that, okay, they're selling a relationship and ultimately a service.

Speaker 1:

So it's a big mistake when many firms spam. Okay, with emails and spam calls and spam DMs. Okay, and I just strongly, strongly suggest please stop it. Okay, so people rarely buy from spam unless you're the cheapest. But if you're the cheapest, you're probably not getting the client that you want. Okay, because if they're trying to get the cheapest deal, then they're probably going to be the biggest headache as well.

Speaker 1:

So you need to build trust, okay, and how do you build trust? That's the that, and to me, that's that's actually the hardest thing. That's at the core of getting international clients. Ok, getting quality clients, whether they're international or Indian, but getting quality clients is how do you build that trust? So I've put a whole range of ideas and I'll go through each of these in a minute. Ok, but content OK.

Speaker 1:

Now we live in a world of there's so much stuff that we can do. We can, and I say content, content, content, content, content, content, and the key is to create useful content and information which will ultimately help you showcase you know what you are talking about and information which will ultimately help you showcase you know what you are talking about. You can talk technical aspects, culture, innovation, new business. Your team trips away, whatever it may be okay, but I would strongly suggest strongly suggest, um, that you um kind of really really um, focus on generating and producing quality content, not AI generated content, but quality content. So how do we do it?

Speaker 1:

So let me go back to a few things. First one is the newsletter. I've got written there, so let me go to the newsletter. We've got resources, so we create a newsletter every week. We write about business tips for accounting firms, that type of thing. Write it, okay, we share it. Now our newsletter start, our newsletter list started at zero. Now it's grown and it's grown significantly and it keeps growing and we'll be adding that. So, if you haven't already, make sure you sign up to the newsletter. It's totally free, um, and you can see it, okay, I'd strongly suggest you just um, sign up, okay, um.

Speaker 1:

Then the next thing I've talked about here is what else we've got in here. We've got other content, other things that we provide. We do a podcast, okay, so, again, if you haven't listened to the podcast, sign up to the podcast. If you haven't already, I'd strongly suggest you do that. Um, what other resources we have. I'm trying to remember now. Um, we have, we have, have, have, we have a free growth course. Okay, it's a course that we've created, um, that you can sign up to and read and watch. Um, there's a whole load of stuff on here. Again, I would strongly suggest you check it out, okay, but it's tons of information on there. But we provide.

Speaker 1:

What we're trying to do is provide value to our clients, help them understand what they can do. Okay, so sign up to this course. Okay, um, watch it at your own time. Um, how else are we doing it? We are doing, um, what else we do? I'm trying to remember now. We've got so many things here. Oh, yeah, that's right, we've got my linkedin, so you got my profile. I'm actually showing you here now live, but you can see, you got my linkedin profile. I focus on this add information there all the time. I have a company linkedin profile as well. Um, I also have.

Speaker 1:

We have a blog where we've written plenty of articles. Okay, on accounting, offshoring, ai, you name it. We've written loads of articles here. Again, adding value, adding ideas, giving people knowledge. Okay, and that's the bottom line. Okay, because, if you can provide them knowledge, provide them expertise, provide them their know, okay, this guy knows about this type of stuff. At some point they will reach out to you. Now it might not be as quickly as you want it to be, but they'll reach out to you, and that's the bottom line.

Speaker 1:

I think what I'm trying to get across here is it's so, so important to get that kind of kind of thing across. We also have a youtube channel, um, I'll try and share that with you here. Yeah, can you see that we have a youtube channel? I'm trying to remember how to get there. So we have have a youtube channel with loads of videos and everything that we're talking about offshoring. Now, as you can see, there's a lot here, a lot here, a lot of ideas, a lot of things, and it's not me only. I have a team that helped me do this, okay, and they play a vital part in helping me achieve this, okay. So what I'm trying to highlight here is let me just remove this, okay. So what I'm trying to highlight here is let me just remove this, um. So I've just shown you a kind of a spread of different things that we do, okay, um, we also do live webinars. We go to um exhibition shows here in the uk, across the globe, in the us.

Speaker 1:

So what I'm trying to get across here is content, content, content, content, because you build trust by putting out your knowledge. Okay, now, some people will agree, some people will disagree, that doesn't matter, okay. But some people will want to know how do you, how do you, how can I trust these people? If they can trust you, they will then start thinking okay, maybe I will use this firm for my offshoring or they'll consider you so, and that's how I would strongly suggest you think about growing your client base.

Speaker 1:

Now, another strategy and I'm not going to talk about that today is that and now, this takes patience. Sorry, this content strategy, it's all. This type of thing takes patience, it takes time, it, it takes effort and it's not easy. Okay, but another strategy you could do is say well, I want to buy a firm. Okay, I'm going to buy a uk firm, I'm going to buy a us firm, and I know some indian cas that have actually done that. Okay, and I've done it very successfully, but successfully because that's enabled them to buy a firm and then literally reduce the cost base in this US or UK firm and then all the work's done in India. That's another idea, okay, so it just gives you a flavor of stuff.

Speaker 1:

So you might be now think I'm just as I said, I was only going to talk for half an hour today. We're already coming up to the end. But you might wonder why am I sharing my business ideas? Okay, well, I personally think the market for offshoring is still in its infancy. Okay, it's still early days, even though it's been around a number of years. I think now the momentum is there in the marketplace and it's vast and I honestly think there's massive opportunity here.

Speaker 1:

Okay, but what I've just highlighted today to build, to get, to build the right culture in your team, to ensure the technology you've got and training the team in that technology is the right technology takes time, and building that trust, the content, everything you create takes time, it builds, it takes. And to build that trust doesn't happen overnight, it doesn't happen by you spamming in me or someone else an email coming come to me, come to me, come to me, I can do it cheaper, cheaper. That won't work, doesn't wash. So, in my mind, those who are willing to step up, evolve, try, fail and try again will be the winners of the future. That's my genuine, genuine kind of viewpoint. Okay, so I strongly suggest you think and see that through um and, I think, the firm of tomorrow.

Speaker 1:

I think the basic principles remain the same trust, trust, trust is at the heart of it, whether you're working in india with indian clients or whether you're working with overseas client, overseas clients, trust is at the heart of it. But how we manage and develop our firms has changed fundamentally and, in my mind, underpinning a successful one has to be quality people. Okay, not just quality team members, but also attracting quality clients. And anyone can get a client if you're so cheap, but that brings lots of headaches. So it's having quality team members with quality clients that brings lots of headaches. So it's having quality team members with quality clients and, in my mind, being global is a key for a successful accounting firm of tomorrow.

Speaker 1:

There's a need here in the West, in the UK, in the US, for good accounting staff. There's a wealth of talent and people sitting in India and we need to match those two together. And how do you do that? You only do that through building trust. Okay, and trust, how do you build trust? By putting out good content, by sharing information, by sharing knowledge and, as I said, I'm sharing my simple knowledge here today and experience, because I think and I personally feel there's so much opportunity out there in the marketplace, in the marketplace, and I'm happy to share my thoughts and ideas to you. So I'm just coming up to the end now. Um, one thing I'm doing and I'm going to build on what I've spoken about today. I'm doing a course, okay, um, called marketing strategies to gain high quality international clients for your offshoring and outsourcing Indian firm.

Speaker 1:

It's on Saturday, the 8th of June, at 11am IST, and I'm going to go into much deeper on all that content stuff I talked about. So my LinkedIn, my YouTube, my blog posts, my articles, my newsletter, all of that type of stuff, how we do it, what we do it and how we're going to do it. The price is 5,000 rupees. Okay, I'll put the link through now here. I'll share that link with you if I can find it, and the link is here. Hopefully that'll get through. There's a, there's a code. If you book with this code, when you're on the booking page, you'll get paid just 4 000 rupees as opposed to 5 000 rupees. Okay, so I, if you're, if you're serious about getting international clients and getting international clients, this is a great first step to to consider um strongly advise you to do that now.

Speaker 1:

Last slide is as the thank you. This is another picture of me and my team, or some of my team, in goa, um, I'm sure that, um, they hopefully that you might have some thoughts. You might have some questions. There have been a couple of questions that have come through um. One of the questions was does samara provide freelance or remote work? Yes, um, we do. Um. No, no, sorry, we don't. We don't provide freelance or remote where we, we have a team and if you're looking for an opportunity, if you go to our careers page, you can apply for a job there, um, and then one of my team will reach out to you to to check your cv and have a chat with you. Um, our team, some team are remote, some team are in office in delhi, so we have team all over india, um, but there are opportunities available currently as we speak.

Speaker 1:

In addition, addition, I have, if you want, the PowerPoint, I will share this PowerPoint. That's not a problem. I'll send this on the email. That's out there. I've got you on the list. I'll be sharing that after this.

Speaker 1:

Now, if anyone's got any questions, please do fire away. I'm sure I can hopefully provide some answers if anyone has any questions before we wrap this up. Any questions at this stage? Okay, I don't think there are, just to make sure that I haven't missed anything, but I just want to say thank. You are just to make sure that I haven't missed anything, but I just want to say thank you if you have any questions.

Speaker 1:

I think there is a time delay, I believe, actually, so I'll wait for this as we talk. I think you want to. Also, if you want to check out my UK website, I think you'll want to see that as well, for this is at my UK firm. You'll get a better idea of what we do as well here for our UK clients. And yeah, I think that's it today. Thank you so much. I hope you've enjoyed it. I hope you've got a taste of what I'm talking about here, and if you want to know more about how to build that trust, how to get those clients, I would strongly suggest you attend the event on the 8th of June. Thank you very much.

Speaker 1:

I think Hold on a minute. I think I have some messages now. Any messages? No, we don't have any messages. Okay, great, I will leave you to it. Thank you so much. Have a lovely day, and if we can help in any way, please reach out to us. Oh no, here we are. Sorry, the questions. There's a bit of a delay on getting the questions through, so I've just got them here now. So great, thank you.

Speaker 1:

So one question is what do you think about the US and UK and the culture fit for Indians? So thank you, maya, for that question. I think the US and UK opportunities they're significant, they're massive, ok, and there is a cultural difference, ok, but you can overcome those cultures by understanding people. Therefore, by putting out content, by putting out who you, you are, putting out what you believe in, makes a massive difference, okay, and good people will always find good people. Um, and I think it's so important to kind of understand that, and that's that's what I'm saying.

Speaker 1:

In the uk, certainly in the uk and I think maybe less than the us, but still in the us, people don't like to be spammed, okay, um, they want to build trust, they don't want to buy from an accounting firm. It's just selling, selling, saying they want to understand. Okay, how can you help me? How do I understand? And is there, is there value to what you're providing then? Then we've got another question um, do we have other than uk clients? Do I have any other uk? But yeah, I have you at uk, we have us clients, okay, um, so that covers that we're probably going to canadian or australian clients soon.

Speaker 1:

Another question is where do you learn the new technology? Like zero and all well, you just got to go to their websites. Okay, if you look on youtube, you'll find videos to do it. Zero offer, I think, a free course where you can get zero qualified. So that's important.

Speaker 1:

Another question is shall I add any convincing sort of content as marketing, apart from educational, general content? Well, I think you should, when educational and general content is very important, but I think convincing who you are get people to understand who you are. So they'll understand, they do they trust you, do they like you, do they um, kind of know, know who the personality is? People buy from people. At the end of the day, they don't buy just from a robot, they buy from who you are, what you stand for. Um, what else we've got here? I'm just seeing what else is there. Should I add any other questions are do we have, do we have to country specific when looking? No, you don't have to be country specific, but ideally, if you're looking for an opportunity, I'd say build your knowledge. Say, if you want to be uk, you focus on uk, you understand the uk laws, uk taxes. Or if it's us, you look at the us stuff. And so we have people who now have done uk ACCA or people who are doing US CPA qualifications. In that respect and there's a great point here made at the end Don't you think how AI is changing?

Speaker 1:

Everything is going to be less opportunities in accounting roles worldwide and, considering this, how can one venture their firm with the perspective of the future? Well, you're totally right in that point. I think AI is changing things now, remember. But you still need people. Okay, now, let's say a bookkeeper does five jobs today. Um, in the future, bookkeeper with ai might be able to do 25 jobs. Okay, so you'll still need good people to do that now. Potentially that person will be sitting here in the UK or potentially that person can be sitting in India. Now, if that team member in India is trained well in AI and there's still a lower cost for UK or US firm, they're going to probably go with the US, with the smart people are focusing on ai in enhancing accountancy profession, enhancing the legal profession?

Speaker 1:

Um, that's what I would do and train yourself up so you know these things, you understand these things okay. So, great question, great point. But I think ai is really, really important to embrace um in our firm. What we're doing? We're training the team to use AI. We're using more apps that are AI related. So, slowly but surely, people are familiarizing and sometimes we don't even realize AI is in the background, but AI is doing a lot of the things already in software like Xero or QuickBooks as well. What all profiles you provide in accounting? I'm not too sure what that question means, but, uh, um, yeah, I think we've wrapped up today. I think there's been plenty of questions. Um, as I said, I'll be sending out an email on the next day or so with the recording of this plus, um, the slides I believe people want, and if anyone wants to attend the course on the 8th of june, please do. Okay, thank you very much. Okay, I hope you enjoyed it and have a wonderful day ahead. Thanks bye.