Making your office truly paperless is a large task, but starting with a robust software helps to get the process rolling. We talked to Cat Campbell, EA and owner, and MacKenzie Campbell, operations manager, of Tower Financial Partners about their paperless practice. They’ve been using Canopy in their practice for more than two years, and it’s now their CRM for everything. Here’s how Canopy enables them to have a paperless office and attract tech savvy clients.

Why did you start using Canopy?

Cat: We initially started using it for transcripts and tax resolution, and Canopy makes those processes a breeze. Even my non-senior people are able to use it to get a transcript on a client. The software is easy enough to use that you don’t have to be an enrolled agent to understand what’s going on.

How has Canopy impacted your business?

Cat: It saves us a lot of time by automating things like following up for documents. We can make a request and Canopy reminds our clients. It also has reduced our electronic storage costs because we are a paperless office; we don’t have to pay an additional company for storing all of our files. We’re also not paying for an additional CRM, so it has helped us consolidate our software purchases. We look to Canopy to be able to increase efficiencies and reduce associated costs.

MacKenzie: Canopy really helps me with inner operating procedures as well because we use engagements to track the steps of each process. It allows me to make sure that admin is not doing work we haven’t been paid for, that we’re not overcommitting ourselves, and that we are meeting deadlines. I can refine the processes and see bottlenecks easily.

How much time does Canopy save you?

Cat: Our admin easily saves 20 hours per week. I can prep for my weekly company meeting in less than 30 minutes with a comprehensive view of the tasks outstanding and progress we’ve made on our engagements.

How have your client interactions changed since you started using Canopy?

Cat: We don’t do intake appointments anymore for tax preparation. We have our clients upload things directly to Canopy. Our clients are fairly tech savvy. Most of our clients like it, and we’re able to help them understand the importance of protecting their personal information by letting them know we use a portal that is secure.

MacKenzie: Canopy helps us market to millennials. When I talk to millennial business owners, the first thing I let them know is that we will give them an app for everything we possibly can—we’ll never give them a piece of paper. We’d never be able to do that if Canopy wasn’t one of the tools we use. In this day and age, you can’t get a millennial to come in and sign a contract or bring you documents, and we don’t want to waste our time in the office taking care of that either.

Half of our team is millennials. Canopy is very intuitive on the employee side and the client side. I think our clients would laugh at us if we asked them to come pick up documents.

We’ve found that Canopy is as useful as you want to make it. 

More about Cat and MacKenzie 

Cat has a bachelor’s degree in Finance and Marketing from the University of Colorado, is an IRS enrolled agent and is certified as a financial coach through Crown Financial Ministries and Dave Ramsey’s Lampo Group. She has been coaching clients through their financial challenges and opportunities since 2003 and helping her clients through tax problems since 2011. She is the current president of the Colorado chapter of National Association of Tax Professionals and serves on the advisory board for an international non-profit that teaches business skills.

MacKenzie is a Colorado native. She recently returned to her hometown after working in the commercial banking industry in Seattle. In her time since playing lacrosse at Adams State University, MacKenzie has discovered her passion for coaching, even running a local high school team for a few years, and is now melding her two loves: coaching and finance. She also loves operations and ensures Tower’s processes are efficient and customer-driven. She is a participant in the IRS Annual Filing Season Program and is looking forward to pursuing her enrolled agency.

Interested in reading more user stories? You can check them all out here.