A Lesson from Stuart Anderson

Years ago as a resident of the Grand Canyon State (Arizona) I remember seeing a commercial touting a restaurant chain called Stuart Anderson’s Black Angus – a mid-priced concept specializing in yes, steak and also seafood.

The grizzled founder himself, Stuart Anderson, appeared in the 30-second spot, which like many similar promotions for restaurants, highlighted the restaurant’s signature plates and ended with him promising that “we’ll do the dishes.”

I thought about it for a while and then it struck me that every sit-down restaurant does the dishes, but the fact he promised that standard service, undoubtedly made an impression on the viewer. He (and I’m sure the creative agency behind the spot) made dishwashing a point of differentiation between his operation and others. At that period in time, chain restaurants proliferated throughout Arizona as well as much of the Southwest so the battle for “share of stomach” was fierce.

The same goes for CPA firms.

Differentiation is critical not only for growth but client retention as well.  For example, if Firm A offers tax and audit, and Firm B offers tax, audit and financial planning, that expanded service offering might just, be the tipping point to attract a new client.

Not too long ago, a study came out showing that the more services a CPA firm offers a client, the retention of that client increases exponentially. If a firm provides five services to one client, it would make it that much harder for that client to go elsewhere, as opposed if they just provided a 1040.

And you don’t need me to tell you that there is no entity less loyal in this profession than a 1040 client, especially those on the low end.

Establishing a point of differentiation may just be a matter of adding one service line – either from scratch or bringing aboard someone experienced in that area. The aforementioned financial planning for example is a natural segue of a tax practice.

The same goes for cost segregation if you have a large roster of construction clients or other rapidly growing lines of forensics and litigation support.

So after the filing season and the obligatory one week vacation for many, maybe it’s time for owners and partners to sit down and take a holistic view of where you are with your client offerings and plan accordingly for the future.

Because there’s little doubt your competitors will be doing just that. 

Although I’d be a bit skeptical if they advertised dishwashing services as well.