The Achieve Podcast - Matt Remuzzi (CapForge)

Welcome to another episode of the Achieve Podcast, the show where we highlight leaders, creators, and entrepreneurs who are building meaningful businesses, shaking up the industry, and having an impact. I'm Taylor Baker Baker, your host, and excited today to be joined by Matt Ramuzzi, owner of CapForge, and you can find them at capforge.com. Matt, thanks for joining us.

Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.

Oh, thank you again. And again, give us the backstory of how you got into space with accounting and helping businesses with their financial problems.

Yeah, I mean, it was a long, windy road. I got an MBA years ago. I did some consulting and other things. And sort of the last thing I did before I got into accounting was I worked as a business broker. So I was helping business owners sell their businesses. And the first question always was, okay, let's take a look at your financials and see where you're at, see what baseline value we can put on this? And very often the answer was, oh, the books, yeah, the financials, oh, they're about 6 months out of date, or, oh, my bookkeeper quit, or, oh, they're kind of a mess, or, oh, my wife does it. I know she doesn't know what she's doing, but I can't really fire her because she's my wife. There was always a story, and very often the story was that the financials and the accounting was messy, was out of date, was not very helpful. And so I thought, you know, maybe that's really the opportunity I should be pursuing here. I was looking for a business to buy myself, didn't really find one, but this opportunity just kept throwing itself in my face. So I finally said, you know what, let's give this a shot. So I opened up CapForge Bookkeeping, just myself in a spare office, or in, in the, you know, spare bedroom at home. And, you know, here we are 13 years later, 1,200 clients, 90 employees, you know, clients in all 50 states. It's been a great run. And the original thesis that small business owners really need a good solution for their bookkeeping turned out to be true. So, uh, I'm very happy with the way it worked out.

Wow, that's, that's impressive. That's awesome. You've grown up that fast in such a short time. Now, looking back for you, what would you say has contributed to that growth so much?

I think a big part of it for me was I didn't have a background in accounting. I wasn't sort of in a system or a rut of how this is how it works. I came to it sort of naively uneducated, unprepared. I knew how to do the bookkeeping, and I'd taken from my MBA class, I'd taken some refresher QuickBooks classes. But what I think was different about me was two key things. One, a lot of my early experience was in restaurants, and so obviously customer service is always top of mind in a restaurant, right? You always want to make sure that the guest has a great experience from beginning to end. That's how you get them to come back and tell their friends and bring their friends. And so I brought that attitude to accounting, which as it turns out is not that in accounting, and customer service is not one of the high points of most accounting firms in their things that they care about and, and focus on. So I think that was a unique perspective. And the other thing was I had been a business owner of various other businesses before I got into this. So when I was talking to business owners, very often the conversation was business owner to business owner, right? What are you struggling with? What are challenges you've had? What things are you running into? And I would say, oh yeah, I had that happen too, or, oh, I totally relate, this happened to me, I had this other business, we had these challenges just like you and we would talk owner to owner and we get 45 minutes in and finally they go, you know, this has been great, but I know you really came by to talk about bookkeeping. And, you know, they go, you're hired. Like, I don't even need to hear about your accounting or your bookkeeping because, like, I like you. You get me, you get my business. Let's just work together. So I think that was atypical of the accounting experiences that most business owners had in the past where they're talking to somebody who's very focused on the technical, not so much focused on customer service, and maybe not with the same relatable business owner experiences that I had. So I think those elements really helped. And then when I focused on building out the team, I was specifically looking for— I'm gonna say like, we want to hire nice people who also know accounting, right? But if you're not nice, I don't care how good your accounting is, you're probably not a good fit for us. There's lots of other places I'm sure you'll be great, but For us, we want nice people who also know accounting, and our clients, I think, really appreciate that approach.

Yeah, that is different than I would say a lot of the standard norm, like, we're really good at counting the beans and making sure the numbers line up, right? But human to human, like, yes, that's the point. Wow. Now, as you look back, for you, what turning points have molded the way you think about running the organization?

Um, I think my first goal was to get to 10 employees, because in the very early days, right, when you have 2 or 3 people— and in the early days we only did bookkeeping, we have since expanded to tax advisory and other stuff— but right, we have 3 people doing the books. If you lose one person, now you've got the 2 people left are each splitting 50% of that person who's left. Like, they went from busy to Oh my God.

Yeah.

What am I going to do? So I wanted to be able to scale enough that we could absorb, you know, you know, you don't try to lose people, but circumstances change. Things come up in life. People have different reasons, different motivations for coming or going. And so it's just the inevitable turnover that happens in any business. I was trying to really prepare for it once we got to 10 people. Then I was be able to kind of focus more strategically. What kinds of customers do we want to go after? What services do we want to add? What other more higher-level things do I want to think about? But the first 0 to 10 people is just survival mode. Let's just grow as quick as we can so that if we lose a customer or we lose an employee, I don't lose too much sleep and it's not too stressful. Um, so that was kind of the first just You know, let's just get to a point where I feel like we're— we can relax a little bit and then we can think more strategically about growing the business.

That makes sense. And as you've grown the business, what bottlenecks do you keep showing up? Even though you're like, I got it solved, then it shows back up.

Um, I mean, the number one biggest challenge for us, and I think for any, any accounting firm and maybe even almost any business, is communication with the clients. Right? That— because the clients that we have, they don't know how to do their own taxes, right? They don't know how to do their own bookkeeping. So they're not really judging us on our skill at that. Hopefully we are skilled and do a good job and everything. But what they're really judging us on is how quickly do they get back to me? How thoroughly do they answer my questions? How well do they help educate me on the things I should know about my business and my numbers? Because I'm not really a numbers person. I'm a plumber, I'm a cabinetmaker, I'm a restaurant owner, right? So how helpful are they to me in understanding my business and adding value and being supportive of the things that I don't know? So that's what we strive to do. And, you know, I think that's where we have recurring challenges. We keep setting the bar higher. We get back to people within 2 days, then we get— so we'll get back to people within 1 day. And now we try to get back to people same day and we try to, you know, offer as much service and support as we can. And that can be very time consuming. So trying to balance Meeting that mission with still having enough time to do the actual work and get everything else we need to get done too seems to be a recurring theme. You want to really be supportive and provide great customer service, but the cost of that can sometimes impact some of the other work. So trying to keep that balance.

Yeah, I can see that, especially you bring on new employees, teaching them the system. This is—

and a lot of them, you know, have come, they've been in accounting for 5 or 10 years and they're not used to the level of communication support that we're providing our clients. And so it's— that takes them some getting used to. Oh wait, I should drop this and get back to that person in a couple hours instead of a couple weeks like I used to. Yes, that is how we do it here. Uh, so there's an adjustment period for people as they onboard too, and we try to prep them and train them and provide support for them so they can do it. But that is definitely, I'd say, the biggest challenge, but also the most rewarding when we win there, because that's again, that's what clients judge us on. They can't tell if, you know, the, the 1120-S, if every box was checked correctly or every form was filled out or every additional schedule was added. But they know if we took an hour to go through and explain to them 3 times, you know, what a distribution in excess of basis is, because that's not an easy concept to understand on the first go around, even if you are an accountant and certainly if you're not an accountant. But they appreciate us taking the time to really help them get why and where they're at with their business and their accounting.

Yeah, having that expertise coming in, very valuable. You know, as you try to grow and you're messaging, your outreach, your marketing systems, what's been working well and where do you still feel like I need clarity in the roadmap?

So what's always worked well for us is referrals. You know, When we do a great job for somebody, we always try to ask, you know, is there anyone else you know that you think we would be a good fit for, or that you'd, you know, recommend that we talk to? And certainly people organically suggest all the time, hey, my friend, my neighbor, my buddy, my business partner needs some help. Um, the downside of referrals is that they are unpredictable, right? You might get 50 one month and 5 the next, and that's really hard to sort of plan for growth around and scale. So I'd say if we have a weakness, I always certainly— I'm sure we have multiple weaknesses, right? But one clear one in the marketing space is just having that reliable lead flow that says, okay, every month we know we're going to get between 25 and 30 new solid leads that we can convert to customers every month. And then if I knew that, okay, so every other month we need to hire one of these and two of these and go, oh, and that'll, you know, our growth will just be this nice straight line that forever goes up and to the right. We don't have that, so it's a little lumpier and sometimes we get caught where, oh, why, we've signed a lot of clients, we really need another person real quick. Or, you know, we just brought that new person on and there's not a lot of projects. So that's the, the perpetual challenge that we have.

That makes sense. Are there certain industries you'd like to focus on and help? And are you guys geographically kind of focusing or are you guys nationwide?

So we're really nationwide as far as geography. In terms of verticals, we do— we organically develop some concentrations. We have a lot of folks in the e-commerce space, okay, by accident, but we got real big there once we saw it was a good opportunity and we had a good solution. We also have a lot of dentists, we have a lot of small law practices, and then from there it's sort of a mix. We do also have a good handful of franchise systems where we're working with the franchisor and all the franchisees that come on. We'll, you know, we'll get them signed up and set up and take care of their accounting. But, you know, we have lots of different one-off businesses too that are just, you know, came to us often again through a referral or word of mouth or something, you know, hey, Joe has a business, can you help him? What does Joe do? Joe surveys for underground power lines. Okay, well, that's the only one of those we have. But at the end of the day, most accounting is the same, so I'm sure we can help them out. And great, and off we go. And, you know, um, we, we pick up a new client, you know, pick up new clients all the time with businesses we— they're the only one like that we have, but, uh, hopefully we can still do a great job for them.

Yeah, that's awesome. And having that, that dynamic combination, knowing numbers well, knowing the systems, and knowing people That's for you. Is there any specific clientele you like? This is our bread and butter. We like these guys. Or is it kind of like, you know what, it's people and numbers?

It's— it really is mostly people and numbers. I would say there's a handful that we don't, you know, we're not the best fit for. I would say manufacturing is not a strong suit for us just because, you know, between buying raw materials, having work in progress, and then, you know, spitting out finished goods and then possibly into a distribution channel which has further, you know, Um, those businesses from a high level we can do, but very often they need somebody really strong in-house who's getting that, that daily flow of information and updating and keeping track of it. It's just, that's a job that I found is really challenging, at least for us, to do from a remote standpoint, which is how, you know, all of our clients we, we work with remotely. So that's one where we've kind of learned to say You know, unless it fits within a very specific criteria or they have a really strong in-house team and they just need some additional support, you know, we tell, hey, we're not the best fit. And I would always rather tell somebody we're not a good fit rather than jump in, try it for 3 months. We're frustrated, they're frustrated. It ends up it wasn't a good fit to begin with, but now we've wasted 3 or 4 months of their time, our, you know, so we try to really make sure when we're talking to a potential client, that we're doing a good discovery call, we're figuring out all the, the nooks and crannies that we might have to delve into and making sure that we can really service that person effectively. And if we can't, I'd rather tell you right up front, hey, I don't think we're the best fit, and, you know, I don't want to waste your time, waste our time, uh, waste your money, you know, in something that we're not going to be able to deliver top-notch service for.

So smart, and that's, that's good business right there. So good job with that. Now, there's a lot of talk around AI and automation. Where have you guys found ways to utilize it internally?

So, I mean, it's impossible to live on this earth right now without hearing about AI, I think, and how it's coming and how it's changing everything and how you can't, you know, avoid its impact. Um, and, you know, we certainly want to keep an open mind and use any tool, AI or otherwise, where we can get better results more efficiently than whatever we're currently doing. Um, so that said, you know, we've tried a few different things. Some have worked, some haven't. One thing that, you know, for example, one tool that we built ourselves that's really been helpful is an AI, uh, tool that helps us rename files. So, you know, you go and let's say a client comes in and they need the last 12 months caught up, and they've got two different banks and they've got you know, 3 accounts per bank. All those statements come in and they're named, you know, something really intuitive like 7ZXY14AB-97. Okay, well, let me rename that to Chase, you know, account 4321, March 2025, or something I can use, right? So we built a little AI tool that now is able to do that because Mar— as important as that is, it's time-consuming, it's tedious, it's prone to fat fingering, and yet it can't— you know, we need to do it. So that seemed like a great application where if we could build a tool, we could take all those files in one batch, drop them into our thing, and have them automatically renamed using our naming convention. That took what could have been easily a 2-hour project and turned it into a 5-minute task that 4.5 minutes runs in the background, and then it goes up. Here you go. Here's a list. Just double-check it, make sure it all looks good. You say, yep, accept. And now it is. So, you know, that's a great use case of AI. We didn't, you know, we didn't let anyone go. We didn't shrink our team as a result, but it saves them from 2 hours of tedious work they can now put into something, you know, responding to customer emails faster or doing other you know, tasks that are more value-add that we can't hand off to AI. So we are absolutely tinkering with it and looking at our processes, and anywhere there's a place where you go, that takes time and effort but it's tedious and repetitive, let's see if there's AI that'll fit in that.

I like that. That's a good filter to use. Now, when you think about the next stage of the business, what are you most excited about?

I think the most interesting part to me is we really started working on building up our advisory and coaching piece. And I think, you know, as much as you need the foundation of bookkeeping and you need to make sure that your tax is planned for and taken care of, the place where you can see real impact in people's businesses and lives is when you can help them get a better handle on what's going on and materially improve their— the results they're getting. Grow sales, grow profit margin, cut costs, expand into new channels, new lines, new sales, what have you. Bring on that employee they've been wanting to hire for last 6 months. Those are the pieces that I think are the most interesting to me because each business is a little different. So you can't— you know, there's a certain sort of process to it, but everything is learning about how does this business work, which I find to be really interesting. I'm kind of just a giant business nerd. I love to learn how businesses work. And then, okay, what can we use from what we already know and what we now know about this business to kind of help tweak results and what priority order should that go in and what kind of results can we expect from it. And you can see actual changes in people's businesses that impacts how, you know, how much they can pay their employees and, and how much they can personally save and take away. And, you know, how their business can grow and benefit the community that they're in and everything else. And that to me is the, the most rewarding part of what we're doing and the part that we're currently working on really growing out.

Wow. Yeah, that could be very valuable for your business, for your clients, because so many people are like, I specialize in this, but there's so many elements you mentioned that are needed. So now, when you look at your own journey, Matt, the wins, the mistakes, what lessons stand out to you, and what do you wish you understood sooner?

I think the thing that stands out to me the most is that there have been lots of times along the way where I had a gut feeling and I ignored it. I said, you know what, I— maybe I'm overthinking, maybe I'm too quick to judge, maybe I'm, you know, there— I, I don't have any evidence for whatever is causing this gut feeling. And I would say not every time, but the vast majority of times, that gut feeling was a good pre-indicator of some problem that was going to come up later. And so I think the lesson to me has been, you know, and maybe don't make a decision based on that, but at least investigate further, right? Don't ignore that gut feeling or push it down or figure that it'll probably work out. It's there for a reason. Um, you know, it's evolved over millenniums, right? It probably in the, in the early days, right, it meant there was a saber-toothed tiger behind you, and ignoring that was a mistake. And so now, you know, in the modern day, it's telling us other things. This person may be more problematic than they seem at first. That client maybe not really accepting the expectations that we're trying to lay out for them, and they're gonna, you know, that's gonna be an issue. Or, you know, this, whatever it is, this vendor is going to be, or this business deal just isn't a good fit, or whatever it is, right? There's a reason you get that feeling in the pit of your stomach that's trying to tell you, hey, you know, the back of your brain knows something's up. Get it to the front of your brain. And do something about it. At least look into it, investigate it, figure out why you're having this feeling. And maybe there's something to it, and maybe you need to pay more attention to that. And it's, you know, again, it, it's easy to kind of push down and ignore, and you'd say, well, no, the opportunity looks so good, I, I think whatever problems come up, we'll handle them. But if I had listened to my gut, you know, a lot of my biggest headaches probably would have been completely avoided. And so now I really try hard to— if I get that signal, okay, stop. Let's figure this out. Why is this, you know, let's not be too quick to say yes. Let's make sure we know what we're getting into here because otherwise this thing wouldn't be going off.

I love that. That's a great filter where it's like, listen to it, that's a sign to investigate more. Like, don't make the call right away, but investigate. Yeah, great filter. Wow. So Matt, if you had to pick one constraint to solve, either you or somebody on the team, and over the next 90 days, what would it be?

One constraint to solve. Gosh, I mean, I guess I would probably go back to that marketing one. If somebody— I'm just not smart enough, or I haven't tried all the avenues, or what have you. But, you know, if somebody could say, you know, if you just focused on X, Y, and Z in terms of your marketing, you'd probably really open this channel up and you'd get a good consistent flow of new clients. I would love that because I have, you know, we've tried various things, different programs, different approaches, different, and nothing has been consistent. Some things work for a little while, some things don't seem to work at all. Um, but that is the one thing, boy, if I knew whatever the number was, if I knew we're going to get 10 new clients a month or 30 or whatever the number was, boy, would that make planning and everything else so much easier. But, you know, that's the, that's the big challenge is how many clients are we going to add, how many will offboard for various reasons. And how do we, you know, account for that into the future? That crystal ball would be great. I don't know if anyone has one. I haven't met them yet. Maybe they're out there. If they are, please give me a call. But that's what I would love to be able to solve.

That makes a lot of sense. A lot of businesses I hear, that's a big one right there. Like the predictability, not feast and famine.

Yes. Yes.

Oh, wow. So, Matt, for those who want to reach out and learn more, LinkedIn obviously is a good place to go. And then capforge.com. Anywhere else?

Yeah, I mean, CapForge, uh, the website is great because it has a lot of information about us, our services, how to get in touch with us. We have a ton of blog posts, videos, you know, different things I've done that they can check out if they want to get to know us a little better, free resources, etc. So I would start there, and then if there's anything, you know, we can help with, any interest in a conversation, question, please feel free to reach out. I'm happy to talk to anybody. You don't have to be potentially an accounting client or advisory client. I just enjoy talking to entrepreneurs. And, you know, who knows where it goes. Maybe we can help. Maybe you know someone we can help. Maybe we can help you down the road. Or maybe we just have a great conversation and that's as far as it ever goes. But, um, yeah, that's probably the best place to visit us.

Awesome. Thank you, Matt, for sharing that. Again, thank you for our sponsors today's episode: Achieve Fractional, which provides fractional executive leadership for growing businesses, If you enjoyed the episode, share it with a friend, with a colleague. If you have questions about your bookkeeping, accounting, about your strategies overall, reach out to Matt and the team. Again, go to the website, go to the resources, and just have the conversation. Like, learn what you don't know. Matt can be a great resource. So reach out, and we'll see you all in the next episode of the Achieve Podcast.