Episode 4: Leveraging Content Snare to Easily Gather Information from Clients with James Rose
Heads up: I use affiliate links for my fave products. If you click and purchase, I may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.
Alyssa Lang interviews James Rose, the co-founder of Content Snare who’s on a mission to help others gather information and documents easily from clients. We talk today about the ways Content Snare can fit into your firm and how to leverage it.
In this episode you’ll hear:
What Content Snare is and how it can help you in your firm
How to ensure you get the right information through rejecting and requesting information
Comparing Content Snare to other softwares and how it’s different
Why you shouldn’t rely on one software to “do it all”
How to create a great client experience with Content Snare
How Content Snare fits into a tech stack for bookkeepers
How to reduce overwhelm for clients in onboarding and monthly requests
Resources mentioned in this episode:
⚙️ ContentSnare (free 14 day trial of my favorite software to get information from clients)
⚡️ Magnetic Bookkeeping tech stack (this is the exact tech stack I use at my firm)
Listen to the Full Episode here 👇🏼
🎧 Listen on iTunes ⇨ Click here
🎧 Listen on Spotify ⇨ Click here
🎧 Chose another listening platform ⇨ Click here
If you know anything about me, you know I’m all about making life better through systems. Talking to James Rose, the co-founder of Content Snare, absolutely solidified my LOVE of streamlining!
James is on a mission to help business owners gather information and documents easily from clients. (Chasing down that paperwork can raise my blood pressure like no one’s business!).
In my firm, Magnetic Bookkeeping & Consulting, I already use Content Snare for my client onboarding process. But if you’ve never experienced the amazingness of this software, James explains everything you need to know including:
What Content Snare is and how it can help you in your firm
How to create a great client experience with Content Snare
How to reduce overwhelm for clients in onboarding and monthly requests
Let’s go!
What Is Content Snare and How Can It Help Your Business?
Content Snare wasn’t originally made for bookkeeping firm owners like us. BUT OH, MAN. We needed it. Once I discovered the power of this platform and how easy it was to automate my onboarding process AND my monthly document collection — I was hooked!
We spend so much time gathering documents and information through those MULTIPLE emails that feel repetitive, sometimes frustrating to send, and are huge time wasters. And sometimes our emails never get opened!
Chasing clients for information is sooooo time-consuming and frustrating. BUT it’s never-ending and a reality in the bookkeeping and accounting world.
Whether it’s onboarding (I have a whole blog on how to use Content Snare for onboarding new clients) or end-of-year information, it’s a lot. There are always 50 emails on a thread with multiple documents. And those documents may or may not be filled out correctly. It’s exhausting. So James and his partner created what is basically a form on steroids.
Here’s a screenshot of the page on Content Snare’s website that shows how to apply the tech to a bookkeeping or accounting firm. They’ve really thought of everything here!
There’s a few tech platforms that claim to do it all. But let’s be real, most likely; they don’t do it all well! I love a tech that takes one idea and does it well, and that’s exactly what you’re getting with Content Snare.
Other platforms can gather information, and similar software can “fetch” what you need. But Content Snare sends out requests to clients and can get very specific. It makes everything easier for the client and removes all friction so that it’s never “too hard” to do.
I’ve found that client experience isn’t as focused on or important on those platforms. James reiterates that’s Content Snare’s main thing. It’s the most important part of what they do — making sure the clients have a good experience.
When it comes to helping you in your business, clients will have a simple, frustration-free place to submit forms. That means less frustrated emails and phone calls coming your way and more work off your plate. And when they submit a form incorrectly (it happens), you can actually reject submitted forms (my favorite feature).
James also shared a little tidbit from a survey: On average, Content Snare users save around 71% of their time versus their previous methods. Watch a demo of how it works right here!
How To Create a Great Client Experience With Content Snare
James has his own bookkeeper, and he’s one of the rare species that doesn’t have to be reminded or pestered to get his paperwork in. I know, right?!
But for all clients who aren’t like James, you can automate Content Snare to “nudge” your clients on your behalf. Reminding them to send you the forms you’re still missing.
Think about that! If that saves you 15-20 minutes of your month, per client, that can give you back SO much time. It frees up time for you to focus on other stuff going on in your firm.
Also a huge client perk, Content Share has the ability to connect to Google Drive, given a specific folder. That’s super handy when we have documents coming in one at a time. You can download them as they come and know right where they’ll be.
(If you have a client or situation where you don’t need things until every single item has been turned in, you can export it ALL and download every document at once. It’s an efficiency DREAM.)
How To Reduce Overwhelm for Clients with Onboarding and Monthly Requests
Okay, now we know we love this tech. But how do we implement it and use it with clients without becoming totally overwhelmed? You can do that from the jump. There’s an option in Content Share where you can set conditions for each question. As a client is answering a question on a form, the form is shifting and changing to meet their needs.
Some firms will customize forms for each client they onboard. That takes a lot of time, and a lot of basic knowledge of the client is needed before they can even onboard. I do it a little differently now that I use Content Snare. I have one form that’s customized to ask them alllllll of the questions right off the get-go.
Questions like:
Do you have employees? Yes? Okay, here are all the forms we need for that information. No? Okay, let me take you to the next question “Do you have contractors.”
And it keeps going and going and going based on client answers. What client DOESN’T want their time saved and valued?
It reduces overwhelm immediately. Why give a client 150 questions if only 30 apply to them?! Content Snare is so amazing for clients to use, and you never risk giving them the “wrong” questionnaire and needing to go back to get more information from them because they are changing the live request as it meets their needs.
I love that it also gives you an opportunity to build relationships with clients by showcasing your personality. So many of these tech interfaces can seem so corporate and blah. Here, you can add your logo, gifs, and images to match your brand!
You can tweak whatever you need to put in your personality while still getting all the important information. You can also put instructions on each page, eliminating confusion and enhancing the client experience.
The human brain loves to put things off that we think will be a chore. And that’s really what this software helps to avoid! Maybe you’ve heard of Content Snare, but it felt too overwhelming to jump into. But once you see how user-friendly it really is and the benefit to you and your clients— you’ll be sprinting to get started using it!
If you want to learn how we leverage Content Snare in my firm, learn from the person who introduced me to Content Snare (Brooke Swan with Clarity Bookkeeping) and get it set up in no time? Check out my 6 month group coaching program Breakthrough for Bookkeepers & Accountants where Content Snare is just a tiny sliver of the program.
Are you gonna try Content Snare in your firm?
About our guest:
James Rose is the co-founder of Content Snare - a software platform that makes it easy to onboard clients and collect documents.
Once an automation engineer, his new priority is to help business owners regain their lives, be more productive and get more done in less time.
Connect with James Rose:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/_jimmyrose
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesrose0/
Thanks for listening. If this episode inspired you in some way, take a screenshot of you listening on your device and post it to your Instagram stories and tag me, @workflowqueen For more information about the Conquering Workflows & Systems for Bookkeepers & Accountants Podcast or interest in our programs or mentoring visit our resources below:
Visit our website: workflowqueen.com
Follow the Blog: workflowqueen.com/blog
Connect on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/alyssa-lang-wq
Connect on Instagram: instagram.com/workflowqueen
Connect on Facebook: Facebook.com/workflowqueen
Podcast Publishing Tools we use:
Podcast Editing: Ian Gilliam: iangilliam.com
