Tax advisers have a hard job: numbers, forms, tax returns, deadlines. The work is complex, high-stakes and, let’s be honest, rarely thrilling to outsiders. All the more reason for the calling card on the web to carry a bit of charm. A likeable presence turns a firm that does everything right into a firm people actually want to visit. And in the competition for clients, that is often what tips the scale.
Why likeable and credible are not opposites
Many accountancy websites look like they were designed out of fear: don’t get anything wrong, don’t seem too casual. The result is interchangeable, the same paragraph symbols, the same stock photos of ring binders, the same lists of services. Look like everyone else, and you get treated like everyone else: compared on price alone.
Yet clients rarely choose the firm with the longest list of services. They choose the one where they feel looked after. Likeability isn’t a stylistic flourish, it’s a signal of trust: here work people who enjoy what they do, explain it clearly, and can be reached. Credibility comes from competence and clarity, not from grey.
What a good firm website needs to do
A tax advisory firm’s website has to do three things at once:
- Give orientation: which clients does the firm work with, and which not? A founder is looking for something different to a family-run SME. Try to serve everyone, and you speak to no one.
- Build trust: show the people, explain how you work, make it clear how to reach you. What happens in the first conversation? How does working together digitally work? What does it cost, roughly?
- Get found: most instructions start with a search for “tax adviser + location” or a specific topic. Without a technically clean, search-friendly website, even the most likeable firm goes unnoticed.
On top of that come requirements that aren’t negotiable in this sector: data protection and cookie consent, secure contact channels and forms, accessibility, and a site that works on a phone, because that’s where people look first.
Getting tax done: an example
For a tax advisory firm we took exactly this approach under the title “Getting tax done”. The starting question was simple: if the work itself is already numbers and forms, why should the website repeat that? Instead, we set up design and technology so the firm’s personality could show through: clear language, friendly design, a structure that gets clients quickly to what they are looking for. Credible, but not stiff. Likeable, but not generic.
What to watch for in your own project
- Positioning before design: First work out what your firm stands for and who it’s for. Design without that answer is just decoration.
- Real people, not stock photos: Clients want to know who they’re working with. Good photos of the team are the most effective investment in likeability.
- Plain language: Explain your services the way you would in a first conversation, not the way the law is written.
- Technology you can run yourselves: A CMS the team can use to update news, deadlines and staff changes keeps the site alive.
- A partner who stays: Websites age. Plan for upkeep from the start.
How we support firms
At crossconnect, strategy, design, marketing and technology work in one team. For tax advisers, that means we work out your positioning with you, design a presence that fits your firm, build it cleanly and in line with data protection, and make sure it gets found. And we do it by looking through your glasses, because that’s the only way a website becomes a likeable presence rather than just another firm page.
If your website could use more charm, we would be glad to talk about it.
Frequently asked questions about firm websites
What should a website for tax advisers cost?
That depends on scope, from a compact firm page to a presence with a client portal, careers section and several locations. More important than price is the question of what the website should achieve: if it brings in even a handful of the right clients every year, it has usually paid for itself. Work back from the goal, not from the budget.
How do we get found on Google?
Through a technically clean website, clear pages about your services and locations, a well-kept Google Business Profile, and content that answers your clients’ questions, on deadlines, setting up a business, VAT, digitising bookkeeping. Likeability and visibility are not at odds; both come from the same clarity.
Can we show some humour on the site?
Yes, in the right dose. Humour doesn’t contradict competence, it’s a sign of confidence, as long as it suits the firm and doesn’t exclude anyone. The question isn’t whether you’re allowed to be funny, it’s whether the website sounds the way you sound in a first conversation.
How often does the website need updating?
Continuously, in small steps: team, deadlines, news, changes in the law. A CMS your team can run themselves makes that routine. It’s worth taking a fundamental look at design and technology every few years, or as soon as the firm has visibly changed.