This guy really chaps my hide…

My favorite Forbes contributor is at again.

For the past year and a half, Forbes blogger Stephen Dunn and I have been having a “spirited discussion” regarding the content of some of the tax resolution articles that he posts on the Forbes.com site.

Stephen is an experienced tax litigation attorney, and writes about tax law matters for Forbes. Every six months or so, he’ll write a fairly scathing commentary on the subject of tax resolution.

On the surface, Stephen’s pieces are consumer warnings about the flagrant tax resolution con artists that exist. His observations about that unruly sector are warranted, but his articles on the subject always take a sharp turn that really rub me the wrong way.

This article that he posted a few days ago is his most egregious yet — they keep getting worse.

Instead of just delivering a necessary consumer warning regarding due diligence, Stephen tends to veer off and attack the competency of CPAs and Enrolled Agents in regards to IRS collections matters. The fact that he does this in such a frequently read location is what makes me feel compelled to correct him.

I think it’s one thing to educate consumers, but it’s a whole other thing to misinform consumers for the sake of spreading an “attorney only” agenda. It’s also just not cool to openly disparage his professional colleagues (CPAs and EAs). You can read my lengthy comment to him at the bottom of his article, so I won’t rehash the whole thing here. But more than anything, it’s the smug sense of superiority that comes across in his writing that really gets my goat.

Fortunately, not all attorneys are like Mr. Dunn. All of the attorneys that I’ve trained in IRS collections representation over the past few years have actually been a pleasure to work with — every single one of them. I’m not trying to toot my own horn, but the fact that so many attorneys have come to somebody like me to obtain tax resolution training is a testament to the fact that the financial and tax procedure aspects of tax resolution are significantly outside the normal realm of “litigation” as to require specialized training. Even NTPI and ASTPS workshops have plenty of attorneys in attendance.

IRS collections representation is extremely multi-disciplinary. It seldom requires interpretation of law, almost always requires financial analysis, and always requires good communication and negotiation skills. All practitioners, … Continue reading

Finally, a tax resolution CRM that will save you time

One of the most frequently asked questions I get is for my recommendation on a good client management/case work management system for working tax resolution cases.

When I started in tax resolution, no such system existed, so I ended up programming my own. That system worked for my needs and the needs of my firm, but it was light years away from being something worthy of releasing to the entire world.

Since then, a couple of companies have sprung up to attempt to fill the void, with varying degrees of success in creating usable tools. I’ve never felt good about recommending either of the existing options, however, for a variety of reasons that I won’t go into here. Oftentimes, I simply end up suggesting that tax resolution professionals use a different non-tax specific platform, like 37Signals, SalesForce.com, or Insight.ly.

However, I was recently introduced to a brand new tax resolution case work management system that I have really taken a liking to. The system is called BeanStalk, and it is built to accomplish one task: Streamline your entire case work process.

BeanStalk is beautiful because it doesn’t try to be all things to all people, like some other software solutions. BeanStalk is all about the case work side of things only — the system picks up where your sales process ends and your client intake process begins.

BeanStalk is built to follow a logical case flow. It has built in client intake processes, and even allows for a secure, client-facing web portal for your clients to enter their 433 information (which saves you staff time and increases efficiency). The system has an awesome built-in financial analysis engine, allowing you to more efficiently determine OIC and CNC eligibility.

Along with the deadline reminders and other case management functions you would expect, BeanStalk provides the ability to automatically fill in all the necessary IRS forms for you when you need them — no more fillable PDF forms!

The system is built to handle cases as efficiently as possible, and the company founder is an experienced tax resolution attorney, so he’s designed the system from a tax professional’s perspective, not a programmer’s point of view.

I know you’re busy with tax season, but I’d really encourage you to check out BeanStalk before April 15th rolls around. Spend some time playing with BeanStalk (they offer a free trial so you can check it out), and I think you’ll … Continue reading

My latest postcard marketing test

Happy New Year’s Eve! I hope that 2013 was your best year ever, and that you’re already working on making 2014 even better.

In the spirit of Continuous And Never-ending Improvement (CANI), and because I had some spare copies of Tax Resolution Secrets that I wanted to get rid of prior to the move to Georgia, I recently decided to test a new postcard to market for tax resolution leads.

I was definitely anxious to get it out the door, and I placed the Click2Mail order on Thursday, December 19th. That means that postcards were hitting mailboxes the day before and the day after Christmas. Definitely not the best timing, but I really wanted to do the test and it was better to get it out the door than not do it all (that’s a marketing tip in and of itself, by the way).

Note: This was a proof of concept test. You should NEVER do single mailings as part of your real lead generation campaigns.

Here’s what I did: I selected business liens between $15,000 and $75,000 in value across the entire country, with phone numbers only, and inched the date forward until I had a reasonable number. I ended up with 799, with a cutoff date for the lien filing that was only 10 days prior to my mailing date. After removing non-standard addresses, I ended up with 720 that actually got mailed.

For the postcard, I actually created a Frankenstein of three of my favorite (and best performing) plain postcards, then rewrote that draft into a cohesive unit with an offer of a free copy of my consumer paperback book about tax resolution. The postcard directed people to a web page specially set up to order the book.

Premium members that are actively logged in to the site and reading this article at the blog will see a link at the bottom of the article for downloading the postcard and a screen shot of the landing page.

I should say that part of the reason I wanted to perform this test was because I’ve received a number of comments from readers lately questioning the efficacy of postcards. In the past week, I’ve had 12 new, unique visitors to the special landing page I set up for people to order the book, and 2 people actually requested the book.

At the same time, I have had three new people sign up for my … Continue reading