Accounting Firms RINA and GROCO Use Social Networking
October 9, 2009
The accounting world’s green eyeshade crowd seems like an unlikely sector to embrace social networking for marketing and recruiting.
And those accountants pushing their firms onto Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter will tell you it’s no easy task. After all, the industry, with all its rules and regulations, can be a major buzzkill.
But RINA Accountancy Corp., based in Walnut Creek, is using social networking to attract both recruits and clients.
“This is how the younger generation is communicating,” said Denise Clay, RINA’s marketing manager, who worked with Marketing and Business Development Director Pamela Raumer over the past year or so to kick off RINA’s social networking initiative involving FaceBook, LinkedIn, and Twitter in addition to debuting a blog.
Tim Tikalsky, a tax and consulting stockholder at RINA, was initially skeptical — until a prospective client he wanted to reach out to contacted him via LinkedIn. He’s now one of the firm’s most prolific bloggers and users of social media within the firm.
RINA officials say it’s too early to judge the success of its blogging efforts, which go well beyond a discussion of debits, credits and accruals.
Tikalsky, for example, incorporates his passion for country music and songwriting as a jumping off point to discuss accounting issues. He starts a recent blog post relating the tale of singer David Allan Coe, who claimed Steve Goodman’s song “You Never Even Call Me By My Name” was not the best country-western song because it didn’t mention Momma, trucks, trains, prison or getting drunk. Like a good country-western song, Tikalsky says, a solid business plan must have certain key elements or it just doesn’t qualify.
RINA is not alone when it comes to accountants embracing social networking. Fremont-based Greenstein, Rogoff, Olsen and Co. — known as GROCO — recently added “tweet,” “tag” and “post” to its partners’ vocabulary.
“Social media has become a large part of the younger generation,” said Alan Olsen, GROCO managing partner. “In order to reach them, you have to travel down the right channel.”
The firm’s blog, the “GROCO Tax Ninja Blog,” focuses on helping individuals stay up to date on tax strategies and battling the IRS over tax problems.