Effective Marketing for Accounting and HR Outsourcing | Reb Risty from Optima Office

Kevin Shirley: Welcome back to the PathMonk Presents podcast. PathMonk is the AI for website conversions. With increasing online competition, over 98 percent of website visitors don’t convert. The ability to successfully show your value proposition and support visitors in their buying journey separates you from the competition online. PathMonk qualifies and converts leads on your website by figuring out where they are in the buying journey and influencing them in key decision moments with relevant micro experiences like case studies, intro videos, and much more. Stay relevant to your visitors and increase conversions by 50 percent by adding PathMonk to your website in seconds, letting the artificial intelligence do all the work and increase conversions while you keep doing marketing as usual. Check us out on pathmonk.com. Hey everybody. Welcome back to another episode of PathMonk Presents. We’re really excited for today’s episode. We’ve got Reb, the VP of Marketing over at Optima Office. Reb, how are you doing today?

Reb Risty: I’m good. Thanks, Kevin.

Kevin: No problem. We’re really looking forward to learning about Optima Office today and all the work that you’re doing as VP of Marketing over there. But to get started, I thought we could give our audience a little bit of a background, if you will, about Optima Office. Can you tell us just a little bit about what’s it all about? Tell us about the company, just a little bit of background.

Reb: Yeah. So Optima Office is an outsourced accounting and HR firm. Basically, what we do is provide your full accounting team from your bookkeeper to your CFO. Smaller businesses and medium-sized businesses can’t always afford or need a full-time CFO or a senior accounting manager. Most businesses need a bookkeeper. What Optima does is help clients fill the gaps on their team, or we can provide the full outsourced accounting team, like I said, from bookkeeper to CFO, so that the client can be very strategic, as well as get their tactical accounting done.

On the HR side, which is very popular because we’re located in California, we have a lot of HR regulations. On the HR side, we do everything from HR management and creating your handbooks to recruiting, which are some of our key services. All that back-office stuff that ensures you stay compliant, your books are accurate, and that you’re financially and operationally HR-secure—that’s what Optima does for their clients.

Kevin: Excellent intro. Very well. Now that everyone knows a little bit about Optima, I want to focus on what you guys are doing from a growth and marketing perspective. To get things started, maybe you can tell us a little bit about the companies or industries that you typically serve and what sort of problems you are solving for them.

Reb: Yeah. Oh my gosh. We are doing so much. Optima is really industry agnostic. Because our bench is pretty wide, we have almost a hundred employees in very different seats, but they also come with a ton of background. Whether the client is in construction, manufacturing, or a nonprofit, we have a leader or someone who can fill those roles within those different industries.

What we’re really helping clients with is that gap. Usually, a company gets to a certain point, and they need that more strategic, more experienced person on their team, but there are budget constraints or other things going on. Optima is a great fit because we can come in, hit the ground running, and provide that client with what they need immediately. Most clients are coming to us because they’ve lost their CFO, their bookkeeper has messed something up, or their CPA can never get their taxes filed in time because the accounting team’s not getting everything in. Or they’re just not making really sound financial decisions for their business because they don’t have the information in their hands.

That’s where Optima comes in and helps them out. I like to think that most of our clients leave a lot smarter and a lot more relaxed. Business owners themselves—it takes them out of that financial seat so they can focus on what they’re good at, which is hopefully running their business, providing their service, or delivering their product.

Kevin: That’s an excellent answer. I can totally see a lot of use cases for this. Especially when you mentioned “hit the ground running,” right? When something goes wrong, and you need someone to fill in the gap, there’s usually some sort of void that’s been left behind. Not having to go through that process of getting someone up to speed with your business’s standard operating procedures and typical operations in-house is a huge advantage. Someone that already knows what to do from day one, who can get in, start evaluating what’s going on, and put together a plan of how to move forward—this sounds like an awesome service.

In terms of the audience, I think it’s pretty clear. It sounds like anyone that could really use some sort of fractional accounting services or HR services. How does this audience typically find out about you? What sort of acquisition channels are they typically coming through?

Reb: Yeah, we’re heavily word of mouth. If you think about the CFO role in particular, you’re probably not searching but maybe looking for how to fix a problem. We do SEO, and we are writing keywords for those types of things. But usually, we’re heavily referral-based. Some of our best partners are CPAs and bankers. They’re working as trusted advisors to our clients. A client may not even know they need a CFO or a change on their team. The bookkeeper’s doing CFO work, which is not good. You want segregation of duties as well.

Usually, they’re talking to their coach or banker, and they’re like, “Hey, especially the banking team mentioned the CFO or CPA—they just don’t have the numbers, so they can’t get the reports they need.” That’s a really good signal to them: “Hey, you should probably meet someone at Optima. They can help you, find someone to really come in and help you be more strategic and financially sound.”

On the HR side, oh my gosh, I would say our HR team really blew up over COVID, especially in California with all the things going on with remote work, different regulations, and government changes every month. Our HR team is amazing. They help our clients mitigate issues. Unfortunately, a lot of clients get themselves in situations where—I don’t want to say they’re getting sued—but maybe they’re in situations where they could be. It’s so easy with employees to try to do the right thing, but then you do the wrong thing. You really need a good HR team that can help mitigate those issues, set you up for success, and make sure you’re doing the right things to make your employees happy as well. We’re heavily referral-based, but we are changing things up on the marketing side.

Kevin: Excellent. Really well said. Really put together. I’m almost sold myself. Maybe I should be reaching out to you guys.

Reb: I’ve been doing this for almost 10 years.

Kevin: You’ve got the pitch down really well.

Reb: Yeah, and as a business owner too, I totally get it.

Kevin: The next question I wanted to roll into is a little bit about the website. I know that the website is always key, and I checked out the Optima Office website. It looks great. It’s well-designed. It definitely provides the information that everyone’s looking for. What role does the website play in terms of client acquisition? Are there any major strengths or weaknesses of the website? And what sort of work has gone into the website?

Reb: Oh, geez. Our website has gone through a lot of work. We decided to go onto the HubSpot platform two years ago. We were convinced to move the site and everything onto the platform. That itself created some challenges of just learning curves and getting everything moved over. Currently, on our internal team, we’re doing a huge overhaul with the sales and marketing campaigns because we are going to start doing a much more strategic effort to do outbound marketing.

The website—we’ve always approached it as a key component of our online footprint, our online brochure, if you want to call it that. We haven’t been heavily focused on trying to convert a lot on the site, but that really is changing this year and going into next year. Our strategy is to do more outbound paid ads. We’ve always done SEO and have been fairly successful in that. But now we’re really going to work on conversion rates and trying to convert that traffic.

We’ve been fortunate. Our site gets a lot of traffic. We’re seeing people filling out the forms. We’re able to capture a lot of that data in HubSpot, which is great. We’re working with the sales team, trying to connect that ROI—the marketer’s dream, right? Please tell me all this effort is worth something, and my boss appreciates it. There are so many facets, and that website is really core to what we do on the marketing side, especially as we start to focus more on outbound strategies and trying to build a site that converts more than it has before.

Kevin: I do know that when you put together a website that converts more, everything else looks good, right? If your website’s getting more conversions, the PPC results look better. The SEO results look better. The outbound results look better. The conversions are the core of all of it. We definitely know a thing or two about that ourselves over here at PathMonk. Next question. I wanted to move on to a little bit less about Optima Office and a little bit more about Reb as the VP of Marketing and kind of who you are and what you do on a daily basis. Maybe you can tell me, where do you go to figure out new tools, new tips, new methods, or just to grow as a marketing individual?

Reb: Podcasts first, for sure. There’s this one I really love. I’m sure you are, as am I, really interested in AI. I’m so curious. I’m like, how it’s evolving, how other marketers are using AI. There are a couple of AI podcasts that I listen to regularly just to stay on top of all the different changes. The big talk right now, I’m sure you know, is because Clyde released projects. I’ve been focusing on chat custom GPTs.

Second to that, I like to get on newsletters and read what’s hot, what’s going out there, and what other marketers are doing. Third, I’m in a couple of groups. One mastermind group I just recently joined is all about AI and trying to create automations and how to leverage that to create efficiencies and get more time back in your day, which I’m all about. Another mastermind is more focused on our CRM and strategic business decision-making around that. I really try to just stay in the know of what other marketers are doing. Otherwise, you get too stuck in your own hole, right? You just start looking heads down, and I try to keep my head up every once in a while.

Kevin: A mastermind class about how to reclaim more time and utilize the time more effectively? That sounds like something I would love to be a part of. Maybe, after this call, we can talk a little bit about it.

Reb: Oh yeah, I will be happy to introduce you to that.

Kevin: Next question. What are some of the key tasks that you focus on when we talk about your day-to-day work? So you’re starting your day. What are some of the typical things you start with and know every single day you want to make sure you get through X, Y, and Z?

Reb: Oh my gosh. I definitely have a priority list. I try to go into the day after the gym, and I’m actually learning Korean again, so I do that in my morning. But when I get to my desk, the first thing is I try to prioritize the top three things I’m going to do. The best way we do that is we have best practices in our team, and we use Asana for all of our internal team project management. The first thing everyone on the team is supposed to do is look at their tasks. What’s in red? What is hanging out there that you’ve been avoiding? What do you need to get done today, or does it need to get updated? All that.

So that’s the number one thing we do as a team. The second thing is then we go into the Asana inbox. We try to keep all internal team communication outside of our regular email. We really focus on capturing the data in Asana, making sure we’re giving clear instructions to each other and setting actual deadlines. Otherwise, as we all know, if I don’t have a deadline, it may never get done. I would say that’s the best system we found for keeping the team on track and myself on track. I live and breathe out of Asana. It’s worked so far. Sometimes things get a little crazy in there. Ours is massive. We’ve got a lot of projects going on, but it’s the only way we’ve found to keep the team together.

Kevin: Some sort of project management system, whether it’s Asana, Trello, or Monday. I think any of those are key to making sure you get your priority items focused on and completed in a relatively good amount of time. Otherwise, like you said, they’re just going to keep getting pushed and pushed. I want to move into the closing stages of the conversation. We’re going to be going through what we call the rapid-fire round. These are going to be some relatively quick questions where we’re looking for short, crisp answers. The first thing that comes to your head. They’ll be a little bit more playful, but hopefully, you’ll like them.

Number one, a nice, easy one. What’s the last book that you read?

Reb: What was the name of it? “Court of Thorns and Roses.” It’s a whole series. My sister made me read it.

Kevin: I’ll have to add it to my list. In terms of technology, if there were no boundaries in technology, what would be the one thing that you would want to have fixed for your role as a marketer today?

Reb: Meetings. If I didn’t have to go to as many meetings, that’d be awesome.

Kevin: Kind of like an AI version of yourself going on a call and then making a call of Reb. Sounds nice. Next one, if you could automate any repetitive task, what would it be?

Reb: My calendar. Somehow, I haven’t figured that out yet.

Kevin: That’s a good one and definitely not the first time we’ve heard that on this call either. A lot of different people have said that before. Moving on to the next question. What is one piece of advice that you would give yourself if you were to restart your career as a marketer today?

Reb: Oh my gosh. Don’t overthink it.

Kevin: Yeah, I would agree. I think that’s something that a lot of people struggle with. Those are some very wise words. It’s even something I think about all the time. Oh, did I do the right thing? Did I say it the right way? Assuming the call, you’re overthinking immediately. Really wise words.

Okay, so that’s going to actually wrap things up. I want to say, Reb, thank you so much for joining. But before we end things off, I want to give you the final word. And the final word is this: If someone watching this podcast was to forget everything that they just heard, what’s the one thing that they should remember about Optima Office?

Reb: That you don’t have to do your accounting and HR by yourself. In fact, you shouldn’t.

Kevin: There’s always someone out there to help, and Optima Office has those people ready for you. Really well said. Thank you so much, Reb. We appreciate your time on the call today. Thank you so much for joining. Let’s please stay in touch, and I look forward to chatting in the future.

Reb: All right. Thanks, Kevin.