Investing.
For your bookkeeping business to be successful, you'll need to invest money into products, programs, systems and tools to ensure your operation has all the resources it needs to deliver great service to your clients.
This reality is one our guest, Peter Broberg of Monitor Bookkeeping Services based in Perth, Australia, accepted and has never looked back.
During this interview, you'll learn...
The value of buying a proven and pre-made system that allows you to focus on your business instead of reinventing the wheel
Why exploring fixed pricing can be a game-changer and who you should research to implement it properly
The importance of always looking for ways to automate your enterprise to increase its efficiency and productivity
To learn more about Peter, visit here.
To access the pricing videos regarding left-hand digits and the power of 9 that were mentioned in this episode, the links are below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34t9hlee3Y0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niE-ZCZPmic
To email Peter, send your note to peter@monitorbookkeeping.com.au.
Michael Palmer: 00:59 Welcome back to another episode of The Successful Bookkeeper podcast. I'm your host, Michael Palmer, and today's show is going to be a great one. Our guest is on the line all the way from Perth, Australia, where he runs Monitor Bookkeeping Services, which provides bookkeeping and payroll services to small and medium enterprises. He also has been in the finance sector for over 20 years and has significant knowledge in corporate accounting and we're really happy to have him on the show today. Peter Broberg, welcome to the podcast.
Peter Broberg: 01:29 Thank you, Michael. Thank you very much. It's a really lovely introduction.
MP: 01:33 Yeah, well it's great to have you here and all you're, you're about as far away from me as humanly possible unless you're leaving planet earth.
PB: 01:42 Uh, that's probably a better word.
MP: 01:44 It's pretty close, isn't it? All the way around the world. And I've been over to Perth a couple of times. It's a beautiful area of the world and I recommend anyone that's dreaming of going to Australia. You must put Perth onto your bucket list because there is just so much to see there and it's just a beautiful part of the world.
PB: 02:01 That's, it certainly is Michael. Yes. I love him very much. After moving from the eastern states back in 2010, uh, spending most of my life over there and, uh, now over here with my family.
MP: 02:13 Yeah, it's, it's a nice place to be. And you've built yourself a very nice business over there as well. So Peter, perhaps let's start off by sharing your background and how you came to be running monitor bookkeeping services.
PB: 02:28 Certainly thank you. Thank you, Michael. Yes. Um, my background is in financial management and I was, uh, worked for a utility company looking after the finances for probably about a 30 to $40 million business. Um, did that for probably about 10 years and then, um, decided I needed to make a change and um, moved into and worked for a point of a sales software company called in touch technology. And um, that's the area that I found that I really, really enjoyed doing. And it also, I made that part of that business as I'm, this, it worked out that that's probably the niche that I need to be in as the point of sod area in the retail and hospitality area. Hmm. So when I moved over to Perth, that particular company, they decided to sell it and I'm sold it over to the, to the Kiwis over in New Zealand.
PB: 03:21 And, um, I needed to make a change in my career. And that's when I decided to start up my bookkeeping business and started the process in 2013 when I was looking around for, um, at that stage I was looking for a franchise and it actually did a fair bit of due diligence in, um, my particular franchise model and just didn't quite sit right with me. And then I all of a sudden fell upon the pure bookkeeping system and I'm met. Yes, yes. And I met up with them because I had a lovely lady and a gentleman called Debbie Robertson protocol and in Perth. They were over here doing one of the right shows that they do every year. And um, I suppose the rest is history. I decided to purchase a license for the pure bookkeeping a there and then on that day and um, haven't looked back.
MP: 04:12 Wow. So you've taken Pure Bookkeeping and, and grow and basically grow in your business right from, from the get-go, using the methodology.
PB: 04:22 Yes. Well when I, yes, when I was looking for a system, um, or looking for something to help me grow my bookkeeping business, the pure book, a consistent ticked kit ticked all the boxes because it had certain add the sales and marketing model module and it had the highchair module, which is what I really needed to help me to grow as well as all of the systems. So I didn't want to reinvent the wheel that somebody has already done all the work for me. So why not buy a Pure Bookkeeping system that's got just about everything that I need, probably has everything that I need.
PB: 04:55 You know, that's an interesting concept of building versus buying and I was working in the software industry and that was, that was the tagline. Don't build buy because the building is often more expensive, takes more time, and rarely gets you to the end destination that you've envisioned. Whereas when you buy, buy something that's prebuilt, then you know, all the bugs have been worked out of it. It, it's just a methodology. It's a mindset really of being able to go and say, well, what's working in the marketplace? And then going with what's working and put all your energy and time into execution and implementation versus the invention and, and, and building of it.
MP: 05:37 Hmm. Absolutely. I mean, I'm at the point of a sale software company that I worked for, they were thinking about implementing a finance module within their point of sales system that did exactly what zero will QuickBooks online can do or [inaudible] and all those programs over. And then I said to them, why would you want to invent the wheel? Why would you want to do that when someone has already done it and you, it's just going to take so much effort and so much time to be able to get to the final piece of the puddle right at the end to get, get that implemented.
PB: 06:07 Yeah. And did they decide to, to build or did they go and buy? I'm not that. I didn't decide to build that. I decided to do just
PB: 06:14 what everybody else is doing and developing an IPI into the software that's already been built.
MP: 06:20 Beautiful.
PB: 06:21 Because not everybody, you know, the common sense is there, but not everybody applies it. So it was curious to see what way they went.
MP: 06:35 Well that's great and it's so amazing to have you on the podcast because you're all the way in Australia. We've got licensees all over the world and so, so interesting to hear your perspective. And I think whilst the bookkeeping and some of the accounting principles would be slightly different, the concept of growing your business and being, having a successful bookkeeping business, the challenges that you face and the moves that you need to make are very, very similar to where ever you are in the world. So let's get into a little bit about how your journey's looked a and start off with what were some of the challenges you faced when growing your business?
PB: 07:16 The challenge was I'm at the stage when I started the process, I was actually working. So I had a full-time job and I had to try and start the process and finding the time to do it. Then I was actually, um, I was actually onboarding new clients at the same time as well. So I was sort of at a position where I couldn't really progress any further because I couldn't take on any more clients because I otherwise I'd be working all weekend and all week and not have any time for myself and my family. So I sort of had to slow down. But it wasn't, it was at the time when, um, I was, um, more or less told that know your 10 year up with the software companies, um, is finished and that your job won't be there anymore after a certain period of time.
PB: 08:02 So that's when things ramped up and that's when things needed to be done in the business for me to ensure that I had the same cash flow moving forward after leaving that company. So, so there was a lot of, lot of searching, a lot of, um, finding what I needed to do now because I already had the Pure Bookkeeping, I knew that I needed to do sales and marketing, so I needed to get out there and need to get people finding me. And so that, yeah, that process was really great having the templates that Debbie is in the system and all the cattle side of the context as well. So website had to be done. Yeah, you ordered your social media marketing, um, obviously SEO which comes with it as well also needed to be done. So it's the cost associated with it as well. It was also in, in an impediment at the beginning as well.
MP: 08:52 Mm. Yeah. There's a big, big n relative rather big investment, uh, both time and, and dollars.
PB: 09:00 Indeed. Indeed. But, um, I was, um, lucky enough I was reviewing some information on the firm of the future series from intuit and there were systems in there that the intuit recommended as probably the programs for the future. And so I started looking at those programs and probably three or four of those, maybe five of those programs I'm now using in my business and from that particular, yeah.
MP: 09:28 Yeah. What are those?
PB: 09:29 So cloud pricing by Mark Wickersham, which is the quoting and pricing tool for prospective clients. Um, I think it's been mentioned a few times in a couple of your podcasts. Michael,
MP: 09:39 We did. We have Mark on as well. Yep.
PB: 09:42 And you've had Mac on as well. So you thought, I've been talking with Mark a lot over the last couple, last 12 months. Um, I think he was in a pickup. I had some success in this cloud pricing and winning some clients. Mark actually approached me in September last year to do Beta testing of his latest version, the new version two of the software. So let's fan a few months. I'm testing it for him and I'm happy to say that he also accepted me as a power affiliate for the program as well, so people can contact me and I can sell the software fund aided to, I'm an assist and a system a is a support of IB here in Australia and yeah. And anywhere else where anybody wants to run, we get support for the new version.
MP: 10:22 Beautiful. Beautiful. So Mark's been, and I definitely want to get into your price and methodology and some thoughts around that, but what were some of the other systems that you, you stumbled upon or discovered and implemented?
PB: 10:37 Yep. Certainly, Yan practice ignition was, um, one of the ones that I, I certainly needed, which was to automate the onboarding of clients and sending out proposals, um, igniting all of the invoicing into the, into zero. We're into QuickBooks online. Then also carbon as well. And cause I'd started, I sorta started at carbon right at the beginning I had a carb and before I had practice ignition, but on you the product ride met for carbon, we're going to be integrating with practice ignition at some stage and signed with cloud pricing as well, integrating with practice ignition. So having the flow, the systems flow right through to the end to invoicing the customer, managing the client, managing all their tasks. And that's the sort of, uh, that's what I was looking for. And um, I'm proud to say that seems to be working very, very well for the business at the moment.
MP: 11:34 Beautiful. Well, you know, Karbon and its Karbon HQ, that is correct. Right? Is that a that's correct, yeah. Karbon HQ. We hearing a lot about it all over the place.
PB: 11:47 Yeah. So I tried a few other programs, but I just found Karbon to be the PLA. The platform seems to be what I wanted for my business and yeah. And that's attached to their own.
MP: 11:59 Yeah, absolutely. There are lots of different options today and there'll be lots more in the future and it comes, but it comes down to what I get from you is just your, your desire to have a really streamlined system that all speaks to each other and you know, from top to tail it's, it's, it's working together.
PB: 12:19 Correct. Correct. And, and, and that flows on to the systems that you need to look for for your client as well. So when you're looking at the add ons for, you know, with some other client might have zero or QuickBooks online and what other add ons do you need? So looking at the add on, mark applies to, to implement streamlined and the businesses as well for their processes as well, which is I really, really enjoy doing.
MP: 12:41 Yes. And I think there are lots of those apps out there. I think that's the conversation in uni before we, we started the episode this morning and we talked about niching and you're, you're looking into that for yourself while there's a lot of apps out there, it's, that's one of the advantages of, of having a narrow market that you're working with is that you can actually really get clear as to what software and apps and tools will be essential for working in that industry.
PB: 13:12 That's correct. And that's the why, why that the industry is moving at the moment. Troll industries, all the younger generation are the ones that are coming into the market now and the older generation is moving out and so the younger generation is going to be wanting cloud-based programs, add ons just and to assist and help them with their businesses.
MP: 13:35 Yeah, absolutely.
MP: 13:42 And so with, with the sales and market, I want to just jump back a bit into your, your comment about that growing you needed to get out and, and start implementing the sales and marketing aspect of your business. What did you find worked the best for you?
PB: 13:59 I found the website to be more effective for me because more pretty climbed straight away. When I, when I went to my website, I went live, I started getting inquiries from the website, but I was probably at the right time of the year. The company that I used to obviously do the marketing, but your social SEO work also helped as well. But I mean there are many different forms of marketing and at that particular time I am at, I didn't actually go do any networking at all. I, I was hesitant to do it, but yeah, last year in April last year I decided to join BNI. Beautiful and been is where if I was looking at a way of, most of my clients have come from the last 12 months, probably about 50% of the come from BNI and then the rest has come from my website.
MP: 14:53 Excellent. Well that's, that's great to hear on both fronts. I'm curious about your BNI story. What was that like for you? A lot of people have, you know, we talk a lot about networking and one of the ones that I recommend to everyone is BNI. I think it's the world's greatest, you know, business networking organization. And we've had Ivan Meisner who created it on the podcast. So we're, we're really big believers of it, but I think there's a lot of misunderstanding and it'd be great to get your take on it in that people think, oh, you know, I'm going to do this step and I just, I show up and I'm going to get business. What is, what is the journey been like for you?
PB: 15:37 Yeah, well I had that same opinion at the right at the beginning that I was, I thought that I was actually going to get business. And um, they do tell you right at the beginning that it could take you nine months before you actually get your first referral. And I thought I was sitting there for probably about five months and I hadn't had a referral and I thought, well, maybe I've done the wrong thing and I should probably quit. But all of a sudden, yeah, the, they all started coming in. And admittedly bookkeepers in those networking groups tend to get the clients of the members in that group as well. And so, yes, I do have a few of the members in my chapter that I'm our clients, but you know, they are now, they now know what I do and now that referral was starting to go outside the chapter.
MP: 16:21 Beautiful. I think that's a natural progression, right? Because you know, people need to know you and understand and believe in, trust you. And then once they got that, then it becomes easy to refer that business.
PB: 16:36 Absolutely. And the same thing guys, when you're sitting there with a prospect, do you need to relay your, what you do to that client and vice versa, the client to you to see whether you both are, are a match to each other?
MP: 16:47 Hmm. I think it's a, it's great and I'm glad that you mentioned that it's, it's not an instant thing, but it's like we've talked often on the podcast about just the concept of planting a seed. Um, you know, a farmer doesn't go and put a, uh, a seed of corn in the ground and expect tomorrow there'll be corn stocks, you know, bouncing out of the ground air. There is a determined predictable amount of time and there's also a requirement of certain criteria, environmental conditions, watering sunlight, all these different things that need to be applied if they're not, if you miss one piece, you know, it's not going to have the outcome that you may want to have. So that's what I love about all of these philosophies that we talk about around the sales and marketing grow your business system and the process is that there's a formula.
MP: 17:41 It's been figured out, it's been done. It's like this is what it's going to take. These are the things you need to do. And if you do them, the likelihood is you're going to get this outcome and to think otherwise, any other way it'd be just craziness because that's, you know, hundreds and hundreds of people are doing this and this is the way that it goes. And for you, the seed took five months to sort of work it out. And then all of a sudden this plant pops out and, and there's fruit to bear. And as well you've also bared fruit for the other members in that group as well. They're planting seeds, you helping nurture their plants. And that's what, that's what I think is beautiful about the culture of BNI is its givers gain. It's people coming together to mutually help each other.
PB: 18:24 Exactly. I mean, I've looked at other networking groups and they're just being, and so far better than any on any of the ones that I've been to. I just find that it's just this, the structure of it as well and the commitment that you need to make to it and just brilliant.
MP: 18:40 Yeah, it's a serious group and it's serious about doing business and every group has people in it and therefore no two groups are alike. And so, you know, it's, it's about finding a group that works and it's great. And, and you know, you wanna date a few groups before you, you get committed to one particular group. And that's what we recommend is go out there and find what, what feels right for, for yourself. And, but do it because it's really, really powerful. If you're serious about getting growth in your business, find a BNI and if there's no BNI chapter close to you, start one. You know.
PB: 19:16 Exactly. Exactly. Yes man. I travel for half an hour every day to get to my BNI chapter. So it's uh, it was a, an opportunity I couldn't, I could not miss being when someone said that I need a bookkeeper and I said I'm there. I went, went there and I signed up there and then on the spot. So it was, it's just a, a book, capers position doesn't come up very often in the chapter. That's right. It's just the ones that tend to go very, very quickly. So when yeah, you still, the only way you really can get into is a probably if they're all full is to start up a new chapter.
MP: 19:49 That's right. Which has its own journey to go along.
MP: 20:00 So Peter, some interesting stuff and lovely to hear about your success with BNI. You would just jump into the conversation around the pricing model that you use, the cloud pricing, and you've done a presentation to all of our pure bookkeeping licensees on your work here. And I'd love to dig into too a little bit of that. Absolutely. So how did you, you, you've just, you've discovered it from intuit, the firm of the future, and you started along that journey. What was, what was it like getting started with that methodology?
PB: 20:36 So, well, my, when I first started is when things started to happen in the industry with value pricing and fixed pricing that, you know, it was still the hourly pricing and I needed to, um, you know, if I was to start up my business, I needed to need to get into that area and start doing fixed, fixed pricing. So that's why I caught stumbled across cloud pricing and had a look at that and reviewed on, I was in every one of Mack's videos just to get an understanding of cloud pricing. And I recommend anybody, uh, he's listening to this podcast to actually have a listen to some of Mark's, um, videos because they're, they're just amazing. I mean, I haven't actually physically spoken to the person. I haven't, uh, to mark. I've just watched these videos and it seems like I'd know him really, really well now.
MP: 21:27 That's awesome.
PB: 21:28 Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And you know, working out, which is the best, um, packages of pricing and how I'm going to create that pricing. You know, I must've made, I have taken a lot of marks, um, stuff on board and changed to the bit so to obviously suit Australia and I'm having the money every, every quote that I do now on its fixed pricing. I've only had a couple of clients that are on hourly pricing, but that will be going onto the fixed pricing very, very shortly. But all the new clients that have come on board in the last two weeks, which has been about five, they've all signed up on the value that I've given them at that particular meeting and relying the value that you give into them and then the price, they seem to don't want to haggle on the price. Right. Beautiful things. Lockout seems like I've got the pricing right.
MP: 22:16 Beautiful. You wanted to have some success around this and this was the, the avenue taken in. You've customized it for the Australia market and for and for yourself and what would you, what would you say it that you love about it?
PB: 22:31 It's actually presenting the quoting, the pricing in front of the prospect. So yes, there were some, some occasions where you have to go away and do some sort of scoping of the project, but sometimes you can actually do it in front of them. A couple of nights ago, I did one at a client's, a prospect's pies and did it in front of them and, and they loved it to be able to see what price and the prices in the three different categories and what's included in each one and yen. Nine Times out of 10 most of the time they're picking the middle package and at the middle packages, the one that most people tend to focus too and, and it's all around price psychology. Everybody knows about, you know, the power of nine and the barrel seven the 70s way they tend to focus on which is right in the middle.
MP: 23:20 Interesting. So share a little bit more about the power of nine in the power of seven.
PB: 23:26 Yeah. Well Max, the video, he's videos explains it really, really well, but it's, people tend to look at either the first digits or the last digits and it depends on if you're going to value a prospect and you'd give somebody says $405 and the psych of $6
PB: 23:46 you provide the, present them with $399 that's more appealing to a prospect or somebody. Yeah. Mentally inside the psychology around it. And they tend to purchase that three 99 and you'll actually get more purchases for that three 99 than you would with the 405.
MP: 24:05 Beautiful. So we'll, we'll, if you can shoot over the link to that particular video, I would love to share that in the show notes because I think that's interesting, um, for, for, for everyone the listener to, to listen to that and when watch and learn about it because it's remarkable how much can go into pricing your services and uh, and the more we know about this, I think the more we're able to go into the market powerfully.
PB: 24:34 And there's a lot of work to get to that area. The don't get me wrong, you can't just grab the program and just hope it's gonna work out of the box. So you still have to do that leg work on getting to those prices.
MP: 24:45 Absolutely. And I think that's that that should be a disclaimer on the box, on every single program out there. Right. It's like this is not instant and it's not magic. It will require work, but if you do the work, the magic will happen. And that's, you know, unfortunately it's the non salesy way to talk about anything, but it's the real way to talk about it. Um, so I love that you mentioned that, but I think a real great place to start sounds like a video like that. It's interesting and we'll be a good leader into learning more about what you've been doing with, with Mark's work and, and we also have an episode that we'll link to that people can, can learn more about it there as well. Now you, you also mentioned that earlier on that you searched out and became a Pure Bookkeeping licensee. How has that helped your business?
PB: 25:36 Oh, I mean, it's, everything that I do in my business is around the pure bookkeeping system, just about everything. There are a few things that I probably haven't implemented yet and I do need to do that. And then that's part of my plan for the next 12 months. But your mind focus on everything you do for a client is, uh, you know, that you've got all of the templates there for you to use to do the tasks that you need to do. Like in Australia we've currently done into the financial year, um, finalization of the finances for the end of the financial year. So, and there are templates within each of the programs that we use over here. So, and I'm not sure in Canada what and what programs you use there, but, um, and, and Debbie's been doing a lot of work in getting all of those templates all changed because the software changes over time. And so you have to change as well. So the templates I've got in the program called carbon and they and, and everything is all synchronized and it rebates and, and, and so I don't miss things. And having the systems in place helps, helps that immensely.
MP: 26:39 Beautiful. And I love that you've brought all of these other pieces of technology together to help you streamline your business.
PB: 26:46 Absolutely. Yup. Yeah, I wouldn't be without them.
MP: 26:51 Beautiful. So I, I'd like to just open it up for any other tips or suggestions that you can share that would help bookkeepers around the world like yourself grow their business.
PB: 27:03 It looked, let's just do some research, take some time to review the things that you want to do for your business. Um, it took me probably two years to get to the area that I needed to get to with the programs that I needed to run my business. Um, and obviously with the Pure Bookkeeping system, that is the tool that I do. I'm glad that I, I'm actually using, glad I stumbled across it. I won't tell you how I stumbled across it, but that's for another podcast.
MP: 27:31 Okay.
PB: 27:32 Oh, slime. But it was, it just, yeah, it just popped up in my, in a Google search one day. And, um, it was just amazing that, uh, I was actually, it's the power of the Internet where you actually have it knows what you're looking for and all of a sudden something pops up that you were thinking about or you were googling at some stage and all to do with, um, the Google and Facebook and all those programs.
MP: 27:58 It's amazing. It's, it starts to almost feel like it knows us better than we know ourselves.
PB: 28:05 Exactly. Which can be creepy at times as well. But, uh, that, that, that is, that is the modern day that we live in with technology. It's, it's uh, and brilliant.
MP: 28:20 That's certainly is. Yeah. Brilliant. Well, listen, Peter, this has been great. It's a, it's so refreshing to hear your story and your commitment and passion for your business and as well the commitment and passion for building and utilizing all of the latest and greatest technology that's out there behalf of the entire successful bookkeeping community. We wish you well and we thank you for your time
PB: 28:40 Thank you for the invite.
MP: 28:43 Absolutely, very much. Absolutely. Now, Peter, if people want to get in touch with you, connect with you, what's the best way to do that?
PB: 28:50 You can hop onto my website and have a look at that, which is, um, Monitorbookkeeping.com.au or, um, email Peter@monitorbookkeeping.com.au
MP: 29:01 Beautiful. And we'll have those links in the show notes as well. So thank you again for being on the podcast.
PB: 29:07 No worries, Michael. Thank you.
MP: 29:09 That wraps another episode of The Successful Bookkeeper podcast. To learn more about today's guests and to get access to all sorts of valuable free business-building resources, you can go to Thesuccessfulbookkeeper.com. Until next time, goodbye.