050 Should You Speak At An Accounting Conference?

Hey, just got off the pj. The private jet took the limo down to the hotel for AICPA Engage. It is conference season, so come on in. We're going to talk about what speaking at accounting conferences looks like. And is it something that you should do? There's benefits to doing it. Kind of just talking chop about, like what behind the scenes of accounting conferences looks like. I'm actually fascinated by event running. It terrifies me. Maybe someday I'll do it. There may be reasons for you to do, like, what's, what's your own, like, little, Little accounting firm con. What would that look like? Come on in, let's talk about it. I was joking about the pj. Welcome to the special Las Vegas edition of Jason Dal. Okay, so accounting conferences. I am a big fan. If you didn't already know that the main thing about like all of this speaking's like, whatever. The main thing about accounting conferences is there's so many smart people at conferences who are investing in themselves that when you walk into a room, like, I'm a firm believer as somebody, someone who speaks at conferences, that when you sit down in a room and listen to somebody speak at a conference, you have more to gain from all the people in the room than you do the person that's up front speaking. Like a lot of smart people do talks. And you can definitely take value from that. But the real value is when everybody does the little shuffle out of the, out of the room that they're in when they go over and they realize, oh, we get a little. We get some. We got some little 2:30pm snacks over here. Hi, my name's Steve. As you look at each other across the little. What is a little. Little toasty bread things called, you know, I'm talking about. That's the good stuff. That's where like the gold happens. And it's one thing to like go to a local continuing education thing or like some local society or something like that and see other professionals there. I'm telling you, this is totally different because people, it is a collection of the people for whom they're like, oh, like, missing a week of work, not a week. Missing some days of work. That is worth it to me. I'm going to plop down a big sum of money. And when they get there, it's like, I got to learn. I got a network. Like, there are stakes involved. And so like, this is the highest stakes in person sort of thing that I do. So everybody that's there, they're like, okay, I need to actually get Something out of this. I'm motivated to be here. Let's do it. Unless you're Laurelin Wilson, then you just get a cabana and you hang out there the whole time. So, speaking aside, man, conferences are great. I've met so many cool people at conferences. It's also like we're meeting more and more people online these days too. And when you take that online relationship to the in person level, you know what I'm talking about, that is a big threshold to get over. And then you're just like a whole new, whole new level of buddy at that point, which completely transforms your communications with those people online too. It's like, you know, having a virtual team and then doing an on site together or something like that. And you're like, wow. Like, you come away from that and you just work with those people in fundamentally different ways. Same thing around, like the relationships you build with other pros, which for me, having friends that do this stuff was like the biggest thing for me that helped me to get over isolation and this not being a really lonely job, especially as we're working from home and like, you know, your family and all the people around you in your life, like, they'll do their best to understand, but the end of the day, like, they don't really know or understand what we do quite like peers do who do what we do. So like, I just, there's so much value in these conferences to me. But I'm doing a bunch of speaking this year, so I just figured I'd share some thoughts on like, how these things come together. I've talked in the past about how, you know the business of accounting conferences. And so most, most accounting conferences these days, you're going to be plopping down a good sum of money just to get a ticket. And there's also like a sponsored element. So there's all sorts of things in a conference that are sponsored, from the emails you get on the days coming up to the conference to all the signage at the conference, to the WiFi network, to the little like water fountain. Like most conferences these days, like, everything is getting monetized, which, whatever, you know, I don't, I don't have a, I don't have a hugely strong opinion either way on that stuff. I do think you have to be tactful and not like cramming down people's throats. They don't want to write a big check for something only to then be advertised to the whole time that they're there. Right. Like, and that's, that's reasonable. And then talks oftentimes like talks have sponsor presence. And I didn't know that in the early days in my young, rosy cheeked, naive kind of initial conference experiences. Most of the time if there's somebody on stage that works with a vendor, in my experience, the vast majority of the time they're on that stage as part of a sponsorship package. Again, like, I wouldn't go as far as to say that's wrong necessarily. There's a lot of really smart people that work for our software vendors. But sometimes it's, I feel like it's not as transparent as maybe it ought to be if you don't have that understanding. If you think about other situations, like if you're reading an article on Forbes or something like that and it's, you know, by somebody that paid to be there, there's rules around those disclosures. Heck, if I have a, if I have a paid promotion in a YouTube video, I have to disclose that and like I have to check a box in YouTube that like makes a little pop up thing come up so the viewer knows that's an ad. But with conferences it can be a little bit sneaky, especially when like a person isn't necessarily talking about their product. And again like there's a lot of smart people that work for product companies and these are not all like bad talks. But I've also sat through a lot of talks where I came away dazzled by a tool and then only after the fact realized, oh like that they'd actually just paid a lot of money to dazzle me with that tool. Now not all talks at these events are sponsored talks. Some are just like, you know, me and Chad Davis are doing a talk in Automations. I'm doing a talk about video with Laurelin Wilson and Nicole Davis. Like none of those have any sponsor types at all. So you're going to get a mixed bag of like different types of stuff. So most of these conferences are making their money like through sponsorships and like the, the companies that will come set up shop and like the expo hall and what people are paying to get in the door, the expo hall type stuff. Like I love it cause I'm a total tech dork. So all of the, not all, a lot of the companies that you know in the space that are very active online and all that, they'll all have presences at these events. It's a really cool opportunity to meet some of the senior people behind these tools. Cause they're all coming out and hanging out and like meeting users and talking shop and before you know it, like, you've made all of these friendships that just for me, like, helped me to feel like I was more connected to, to the, like, the firm I was running and the software I was using and stuff like that. Like, I know the people behind most of the software that I was using, which was kind of cool. So it's a super fun community thing. Like, and for me, like, isolation was always a big issue. Maybe that's why I love it a lot. This episode is sponsored in part by dark horse CPAs. Hey, remember last week's Dark Horse ad read? Some of you were concerned with good reason. Listen, I was kidding about the whole shtick with dark horse CPAs abandoning computers. Maybe sarcasm isn't your forte. Dark Horse actually strives to be the opposite of everything mentioned in that ad. But sometimes it's just helpful to let people know what it is you don't do to help them frame what. What it is you actually do. Did you write that down? That's a nice tidbit. That's a good bit of advice. So here's what Dark Horse is not. They're not a franchise. They're not a technology suite that you plug into at arm's length. They're not a bench of outsourced accounting labor for your firm. Dark Horse is a platform cpa. And if you don't know now you know. Instead of spending your time building the wheel for your firm, you could join a firm who's created and constantly evolving the wheel. You don't have to make your own wheel cave accountant. Instead of spending your time in the areas that aren't driving value for your clients and revenue for your firm, you just join a firm that's gonna help you do all that stuff right? So you don't have to. I'm just saying you could become a Dark Horse cpa. Think about it. Hey, if you thinking about having to reinvent the wheel yourself, if you're thinking about going out on your own, but you don't want to have to fiddle with like all the admin and all the, all the, all the just having to, you know, do all that stuff yourself, Check out these peeps. Darkhorse cpa. Check out the link in the. In the show notes. This episode is sponsored in part by Client Hub. Hey, this week on Tales from the Hub. Yeah, we're doing more of these. Hey, remember last week when Super Smart Accounting Firm, which is totally a real accounting firm, captured all of their workflow processes in Client Hub? How are your SOPs looking right now, huh? That's right. Look in the mirror. Now, partners don't have to stress when staff members take a vacation this summer, knowing someone else can pick up the client work without missing a beat. Because all those SOPs, all that documentation, it is, it is squeaky. It's all where it needs to be. Unlike in your firm, right? Oh, boy. Talking to myself. Speaking of the partners, they've been hearing the staff raving about Client Hub, the water cooler, the break room discord, whatever the digital equivalent of this is. So they decided to get in on the fun. The partners, that is. Now the partners start their day with the Jobs Dashboard and Client Hub. It's an easy to use view of all the projects with filters to drill down into just the ones they're interested in, like their own projects. Tax, project, accounting, what do you want? Whatever you want to look at. They get a view into everyone in the firm and what work they're doing for clients. And they can just look into Client Hub whenever they want to see where the latest, where the stuff's sitting, you know, where it's. What, what, what are, what are, what, what's everybody doing? Peace of mind delivered courtesy of Client Hub. That's it for this week's tales from the Hub. Check out Client Hub at clienthood clienthub app, or just use the link in the show notes. That's probably easier than figuring out what I just said. But how do they decide who's gonna talk? Who gets up on the old big stage? So first, like, you have sponsors that will come in and take some slots, and those talks will not necessarily be exclusively sponsored spots. Sometimes there will be one person on a panel or several speakers, but generally sometime before the conference, usually quite a while before the conference, they're going to have some sort of panel that is like, what are the types of talks we want to have this year and who are the people that we think would be a good fit? Sometimes that stuff happens way before, like up to a year before when that conference happens. The upside to that speaker availability is going to be much better. The downside to that is, man, sometimes stuff changes. Like if you think about like this year, what all has changed in the last 12 months. And so like, I won't pick on, not picking on, engage this conference at all. But like, like think of how much AI stuff has changed even in the last six months. If you're going to go out, you know, very far ahead and how you set up those talks. That is the potential downside is some of that stuff maybe you're less relevant or maybe there's like something big that you know should have had a bigger presence at a conference. That's kind of what you have to balance. The problem is all these people who are speaking are all like important people running businesses and like busy people. And so if you push that too late, you're going to have all these conflicts and people won't be able to come speak. So upsides and downsides to both. Some conferences push it shockingly late. Like shockingly late. I always kind of like assumed that like big companies. And I'm not, this isn't the aicpa. I'm. This is an AICPA event, but this is. I'm not talking about the aicpa. There are a lot of like really big companies who you just assume kind of by their size and the fact that in their marketing and all that it looks put together. You just assume that everything's like on rails and all. There's all these milestones everybody's hitting and it's all well organized. But if you've done this stuff much like, you just know like what a, what a big, ugly, sweaty, like hard thing events are and like trying to land a hundred different aircraft at the same time. And some more than others, like super down to the wire and kind of seat of the pants. So upsides and downsides to like scheduling and booking all that stuff super early. Honestly, as you're hearing this, think about like, I'm actually kind of interested in, I don't know, people talk to me about like putting on my own sort of event and what would that look like? And it's so scary to me. It feels like I've talked with Randy Crabtree about this, who runs Unique cpa. They're having their bridging the Gap conference in the fall and I'm going to emcee and that's going to be it at in Chicago. If you're in the area, totally come check that one out. But this is the first year in person conference for them and that just sounds terrifying to me. You're telling me I'm just going to burn all of this money on this thing and, and just trust that people and sponsors are all gonna turn up and pay to be there and that will somehow pencil out. Like that is terrifying to me. But it's why I'm thinking hard about doing it because I don't know anything about live events and like, this is just how I learn. That being said, that feels like a high stakes way to learn if like people are taking time and money to come do this thing. I don't want them to get there and it suck. And me be like, well, at least I learned. So, like, that's kind of the thing that I'm stuck between. But there's a lot of smaller versions of this that are a lot easier, too. Like local events, virtual events, things that are a little easier to organize and are fantastic lead magnets for, like, a firm or for, like, kind of your approach to, you know, trying to get into a niche or something like that. So, like, it's even worth thinking, like, is there a crossover here with how you attract clients and how you find your next thing? Conferences, they'll have a team of people that will, like, reach out and kind of coordinate with the different speakers to kind of gauge their interest. Some will reach out with a very explicit, this is the thing that we want you to talk about. Others will reach out and be like, hey, we just want you to be here and talk. You tell us what you want to talk about. Or maybe, like, here's kind of the general theme that we're going for. Is there a talk you'd be excited about doing kind of within that domain? The more flexibility you have there, I think the more fun it is to do, But I also think the better the talks are ultimately. Like, you can get a really talented person, and if they come in and you just say, hey, come talk about this thing, it's like, are they really, like, giving you something that they're, like, you know, the best in the world at? Like, that's what I want to see at conferences is, like, people who are super prolific at a specific thing talking about that thing that they're prolific at. And if you prescribe to them what that talk should be, I think it kind of misses some of that. So different conferences do that different ways. Money, money, money. Money is super across the board. So some conferences will give you a speaking fee and, you know, cover some expenses. Some just roll all that up into one number and just say, here's the number. I actually prefer that because then it's like, if you want to be the. A hole that wants to fly first class or something like that, then it's like there's all this. These, like, rules around, like, well, how much is too much for flight, how much too much for a hotel? And it just seems like a pain to me. But people pay, like, wildly different amounts from, let's see, from as little as I'm thinking to all the conversations I've had this year, as little as like a few hundred dollars all in for everything to, for me, like conversations I've had this year, like upwards of ten grand or so for a speaking engagement, depending on like, are they going to position this as like a cool bigger like keynote sort of thing, like kind of one of the cornerstone talks? Or is it just like one of the talks or just are you on a panel? So there's a huge spectrum there. One of the problems is really like, there's like no transparency into that stuff. And I've, I would, I don't know, it's very easy for me to say being on the outside of this, but I think transparency and all of that and like actually publishing that information would be helpful. And every conference has like different classes of talks and like you turn up at like QuickBooks Connect and they're going to have a few like mega celebrity talks, like Serena Williams, Simon Sinek, stuff like that they had last year. And that's a, that's another thing. Like, that's another class of thing. Like, whatever. I know they're paying big bucks for that, but for like the people running accounting sessions and for the people running panels, I think there ought to be a greater level of transparency in the deals that they're making with people there. I think that's usually beneficial. But again, easy for me to say, not being an event guy, the way I think about like fees for talking, I generally just straight up, I, I, like, I won't. It's not a money question for me. It's, it's just in my business and what I do like, it is a reach and a connection thing for me. So like, isn't really a sum of money where it's like, okay, I'll go do this then for this sum of money. I don't know we say that. I mean, I'm sure there is, but for me, like my main threshold for is it worthwhile for me to do that talk or not is is it getting me in front of new folks? Like, is it going to introduce me to new talented people and how much effort is required? Which kind of takes me into like some conferences that content is very locked down. They really want to have their fingers in it and you got to go through like a number of revision cycles with like various different types of people to approve it, which is just frustrating. Right? Like if you are the subject matter expert on that thing and if you are the best person to give that talk in a perfect world, you can get out of their way and let them do it. Other conferences are not that way. Like, they're super flexible about it and, like, aren't going to step on your toes and. And all that. Hey. This episode is sponsored in part by firm 360. It is a practice management system that's just gonna. It's just gonna make it easier to get all. Get all this stuff done. As we talked about last week, it's firm360 because it covers everything in your firm. A single tool, projects, billing files, all the goods all in one place. Check out this testimonial from Janet Long from Peerless CFO Services. See if this. See if this sounds familiar. See if it sounds like you. Janet was looking for a solution for managing her firm's projects as their current methods of using spreadsheets. Oh, bless your heart. Janet was starting to fall apart as the firm grew. Hey, we all started somewhere. We all started with that back of the napkin, managing projects, and it's just a mess. And then you start hiring people, and they're like, I don't even know what I'm supposed to be working on right now. Let me tell you. They implemented firm 360 and were able to see major improvements and their visibility into staff workload and increased team productivity. Who doesn't want that quote? I'm always so impressed with your team and how fast you respond to requests. We never imagined getting such wonderful support help when we signed up for firm360, but it has been a blessing, for sure. Hey, that sound like you. You still hustle in those sheets. Stop it. Are you a Janet? Don't be a Janet. No, do be a Janet and get onto something better, something that your team's gonna love, and your clients will send you nice gift baskets for about what? Firm360. Learn more in the link in the show notes below. So it's very across the board, but like, that and, like, who is the audience? Like, those are kind of the two biggest considerations I take into account when I'm doing a talk. So, like, generally, if it's a. If it's a conference that's, like, not for accountants, I generally wouldn't do something like that because that's not my audience. Like, those aren't the people that I want to go out and meet. Like, if I'm gonna take, you know, five days away from producing YouTube videos and, like, producing daily shows and all these other things that, like, have sponsors and, like, that is how money is made. And, like, you know, my accountant community, like, which is a accountants and accounting firm runners, like, that is. Those are the People that are like funding this lifestyle and this business that I've been able to build. And so like even if somebody dangles like, hey, we'll pay you this to go do this talk, it's still taking away from my core business. So like I don't, I don't get that excited about those sorts of, of conferences. Nuts and bolts. Like behind the scenes. Some conferences will have like, they'll generally have some sort of like green room or something like that for the speakers to hang out like before they go out on stage. Depending on your level of celebrity, some like people beyond a certain threshold will like get their own green room and get their own special things in their little room. And honestly like at a lot of these conferences, like you'd be surprised how common that is and that they will cater to people to that level, which I don't know, like it's easy to, it's easy to be the person that's like, oh, why can't you just be like a normal person? Like, do you really need that? I also recognize like people deal with stress in very different ways. And so like if you're gonna get up and talk in front of you know, 500 or 1500 people, like how you need to deal with that to be at your best ahead of time is like, you probably know that better than anybody else. So like the level of, of like pampering is very different conference to conference. And I'm not like calling anyone specific out here. AICPA does a really good job with these. The like they do, they really take care of their speakers and like for how easy it is to pick on the AICPA sometimes, like they do take really good care of the folks that come and do talks for them. Compared to a lot of the other conferences that like I will go to, like QuickBooks, connect and scaling new heights and stuff like that, the AICPA conferences are going a little bit up, more like mid market firm level. So if like, if you compare the price of some of the AICPA conferences, there's this one, there's going to be digital in December, I'll probably be there. That one's going to be in Vegas. Also the representation of the accountants there, you're going to get some folks from bigger firms and so they can be some of the higher ticket conferences. I still enjoy them like the facilities and like the effort that they put into them and all of that. Like it is, it is good like premium stuff. Like the Aria is like a great venue. But that's why sometimes The AICPA conferences are a little more expensive than those other ones. But ultimately if it like the decision for you to like speak at a conference or not, it is a really good way to do a conference on the cheap. And a lot of these conferences have windows of time that they're like open for submissions so you can like submit a talk and go speak there. In fact, like QuickBooks Connect might be open right now. Some of the talks they like. We want to do these specific talks and we want these people to come do them. But there's a big block of talks that come from folks who are proposing doing talks, I think. So, like it is a good way to, to do a conference in a less expensive way in terms of other benefits. Like you get like good think person energy points. Like you score some points just from like the, you know, like the notoriety of all that. And like I'm going to be on one of, you know, the keynotes at Engage here and like a whole bunch of people have like tried to connect with me on LinkedIn because they're like, oh, I saw you were on the agenda, that's really cool. Oh, interested to learn more about you. And so that stuff matters. Like for some things in person at conferences, like these connections are like very like high resolution connections. Like it's not a cold dm, it's not somebody doing an email intro. Like there's a different level of human connection when you're able to meet people at these conferences that cuts through all of the digital noise that we are constantly dealing with every single day. And that is one really cool thing. If, like you're at an event and you're perceived as an expert in a specific thing, if you do make a connection there and if there is like a meaningful person in the audience there that can enable something for you, that connection happens on a totally different level than it does anywhere else, I think. So, like with a lot of my messaging now being around, like, how are you enabling serendipity for yourself? Like stop doing the ROI calculation and just put yourself in a position to, to stumble into that next cool thing that you could have never imagined. Like that is my life now. Like three or four years ago. Like I could have never imagined doing any of this stuff. If we're optimizing for serendipity, like conferences are a great way to do that. Like you should absolutely be engaging in those things. But I would say you don't have to be a speaker to get that out of a conference. Like I hear, I still hear too Many people talking about conferences through the lens of having to justify it as, like, what is the cost for those credit hours of continuing education that you're going to get? And honestly, I don't like, I do not run a booked schedule on talks. When I'm at conferences, I usually go to very few talks because it gets in the way of me, like, hanging out and actually talking with people that I want to build relationships with. So, like, the biggest value of a conference is not turning up and getting your continuing ad all the other people in the room. It's all the other people who are there who can enable things for you and put together connections that maybe you would. It would have taken you years to make on your own. You know, like, having those deep, super nuanced conversations. Like, that's what I love about these things. Also for me personally, like, I've just made a bunch of friends online and this is like, these conferences are like a giant family reunion. Like, there will be so many people that I hang out with. Like, I'll probably go to dinner with Chad Davis tonight. Logan will be here. Like, there's probably over a hundred people From Twitter and LinkedIn and all that stuff who are gonna be here. And so it's just like you walk around every corner and you're like, oh, hey, I know who you are. We, like, talk all the time. It's great to meet you. Wanna go grab lunch or something? It's just a super fun thing. I'm gonna be at a bunch of conferences this year. If you haven't done a conference before, if you have any questions about specific conferences coming out this year, drop them in the comments and I would be happy to. An weird, fiddly, embarrassing, maybe like risque questions you have about conferences or specifically those conferences that you've wondered about. Anything I could do to get you out to a conference, like, let's make it happen. So if you got any of those questions you've maybe been too afraid to ask, pop them in the comments. I think, like, a lot, like, honestly, probably 95% of the people that listen to this show do not regularly go to conferences. And it is one of the best things, like, one of the best changes I ever made in my professional career. And as soon as that light bulb turned on for me, I started thinking about, okay, who on my team needs to be turning up with these things too? And that was like a huge value for the team members and super energizing. And like, I think we, we look at conferences as accountants too much through the lens. Of ROI and not enough through the lens of like man who could we meet and like just think of that list of folks that are going to be there. There's going to be some group photos that come out of this conference that are just going to be a wild collection of people and that's super cool. Thanks for coming and hanging. We're going to be I'm going to be here for like six days. If you're an audio only listener buddy let me tell you you are missing out on quite the view. We've had a little monorail that's been motoring around in the background. I got a pretty cool room for these six days. My wife's flying in in three or four days. Who knows she might make an appearance but it'll be fun next week or so and obviously if you are here in Vegas let me know. Let's connect, let's hang and I'll see you tomorrow too Lo.