A client first turned CPA Jason Blumer on to Xero in 2012. That moment revolutionized his 12-year-old business. Back then, Blumer & Associates CPAs was a typical small CPA firm, mostly using spreadsheets and QuickBooks, and serving small-to-medium businesses (SMBs) in and around Greenville, SC. “Accountants are typically stick-in-the-mud about adopting new technologies,” he said. “Often clients push them into something new.”

He was most interested in creative companies – ad agencies, designers, etc. – but found it hard to specialize given his geographical limitations. In 2010, one of his clients told him it had moved all its financials to Xero, an online accounting system based in New Zealand at the time, and asked if Blumer could work with it.

Blumer looked at it and realized it represented the next generation of online accounting services, something he had been looking for. “Back then it was still basically a New Zealand/Australian company, so they spelled things funny and the dates were backwards. I like to rib them about that,” he said.

Xero flew Blumer to New Zealand for training, and he became the first U.S. CPA certified on the system. Since Xero was about to launch the U.S. version of its service, Blumer advised the company on the market and regulatory environment.

Transforming the business

Blumer (left) quickly realized the revolutionary opportunities Xero offered him. Xero is designed specifically to automate business accounting for SMBs. The company CEO and his CPA can be in the account simultaneously, with an instant messaging feature that allows them to discuss issues or procedures as they come up, rather than having meetings every quarter to go over what already happened.

With fewer physical meetings, by the end of 2010 Blumer and his employees were transforming the company into a virtual entity. That took more than a year to complete, but by 2012 they had moved all of the company’s processes, even the phone system, into the cloud, and had moved all their clients to Xero. “We’ve used all of them,” he told his associates. “Xero is the best one.”

On July 1, 2012, “We shut the door of our office, just closed the door,” he said. Blumer CPAs had become a completely virtual company.

It also reaffirmed its commitment to serving clients in the advertising, design and development industries. Xero played a major role in that as well. The software had attracted a lot of creative companies that were used to working in the cloud and that saw the advantages of moving their financials there. “We got tons of leads from the Xero site,” Blumer said. “We had clients coming from us from all over the country. They didn’t care where we were.”

Redefining the CPA’s role

Xero revolutionized Blummer’s business in another, even more basic way, as well. Computers have automated much the manual work of traditional accounting, such as balancing accounts and entering transactions. “I think our profession is, right now, in the middle of dealing with a basic issue,” Blumer said. “What is our value?”

While some CPAs are struggling with this transition, Blumer said he’s delighted with it. “It’s letting us challenge our clients or coach them or do deeper tax planning to save them money,” he said.

That means Blumer & Associates is increasingly becoming a strategic financial adviser for its clients, providing services such as tax and strategic business planning. A lot of that work involves modeling what-if scenarios such as “What if I want my business to always have $10,000 minimum in the bank?” That may mean that the client has to collect receivables two days earlier or take out a business loan.

“We’re seeing a shift in the accounting business, and the firms that are leading the way can price their services higher and be more valuable,” Blumer said. “Customers are starting to migrate to those higher value firms.”

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