The reality of how my business works. The mechanics of running a remote consulting business. (Detailed)

I am currently in Dubai. I have flown in to see a close friend of mine who left the UK years ago and has recently moved to Dubai. Before I left for the UK I was talking to a prospect for lnks.to, where we eventually got talking about my consulting and how I work while travelling. Then while in the cab on the way to my hotel from the airport, the driver asked about what I do too. I thought it would be worth explaining here because I think others are too vague and I want to explain why I think the mechanics of the business works.
I am trying to share how the business works so this is going to be less of a deep dive into what I actually deliver but more about the processes that allow me to deliver. A more operational take if you will. That being said, I think I should explain a little about how I help clients because there is some important context here.
Who do I help
In the past, I would help small companies with Marketing and Operations. I would create strategies to help them overcome complex problems then help them roll out the strategy. While I have one or two clients that come to me for ad-hoc advice about marketing strategy and operational questions who are more generic companies, this is rare at this point so when I say “clients” for the rest of this post I am talking about Accounting firms.
More specifically, I work with operational leaders; CEO, Head of Operations, Operations, and Practice Managers within small accounting firms, typically with 10-50 staff, sometimes smaller, sometimes larger.
How I help them
In short I help accounting firms build scalable processes. This means working out the most efficient way to deliver the services they charge for or, processes they use to manage the team. (Sexy, I know)
I will typically help them break down how they are doing the service and what they can do to speed things up. Another example is advising what software they can use to make things easier. Then I advise on how to train the team to take on these new processes and systems. In many cases I deliver the training.
In the majority of cases at the moment, the way I am helping practices achieve this by rolling out Karbon which is a workflow management and communication software.
What does “efficiencies” actually mean?
Let me give you an example…
An accounting firm with 20 staff. They deliver payroll and 8 other services for their 300 clients. To keep things simple, lets say, each of these services require the following steps:
- Get information / update from the client
- Process the information
- Internal Review
- Client Review
- File
Lets say each of the steps takes time but lets just focus on the stages with client interactions. Requesting the information from the client and chasing them until they hand it over. Typically clients ignore the first couple of requests so this can take a little longer than one would hope. Here is how the process might play out in reality:
- Get information / update from the client
- Initial request: Remembering which client to chase, composing the email – 10mins
- Chase 1: Remembering which client to chase, composing the email – 5mins
- Chase 2: Remembering which client to chase, composing the email – 5mins
- Client Review
- Initial request: Remembering which client to chase, composing the email – 10mins
- Chase 1: Remembering which client to chase, composing the email – 5mins
- Chase 2: Remembering which client to chase, composing the email – 5mins
That is 40 mins in total. Now all team members doing this for all clients…
40mins x 300 clients = 12,000 mins or, 200 hours
200 hours x 8 services = 1,600 hours
An accountant might earn £20 per hour (assuming the London based accountant is on £45k salary). 1,600 hours x £20 per hour = £32,000.
This is a little misleading because some services like Payroll are done monthly and others are done annually like Statutory Accounts but it’s a good starting point. If anything it would be higher.
This means if we can reduce the time chasing clients from 40mins to 10 mins by using automation to request the information then we might be able to make significant savings in time and money because the time would go down to 400 hours. The cost of those 400 hours would be £8,000.
So we might be able to save the firm in this example £24,000 (£32,000 – £8,000).
I help them find and roll out these kinds of “efficiencies” to get more profitable and save time.
How does my consulting business work
Now, let’s take a look at how I find these clients and manage the process. I was going to say “there is more going on behind the scenes” but to be honest, this is pretty much it…
Acquisition
Let’s start with how I get clients. The main “channels” are:
Referrals: Most of my clients are referrals. This is where someone has worked with me in the past or, wants me to help their client roll out the software / manage an implementation.
Outbound emails: I look for firms online and email the leaders of the business asking if “saving money” or “streamlining delivery” would be useful.
If it sounds like they have issues I can help with, we’ll start a brief sales process.
Offers
When someone is interested in working with me, I typically pitch them one of 3 things unless they have come to me for something specific anyway. The offers typically fall into 1 of the following 3:
- Sent number of live training / guidance calls, on something very specific (how to use and setup x part of y software)
- Implementation package, this where I will train them on how to manage parts of a software while doing some of the setup for them
- Rolling out of larger projects, this is where I will analyse the business, make recommendations and then roll those out. These projects take over a year and I would agree to work x days a week (I hardly ever do this post covid, being prevented from working on site during covid then wanting to work remotely meant I have no longer been interested in this kind of work because it largely has to be done in person)
The pricing around these is pretty much set. I don’t really negotiate and the price is stated pretty early on in the conversations.
- Package 1: 4 consulting calls at £X
- Package 2: Full Implementation £Y
- Custom Project: X Days a per week Y weeks, Daily Rate (Minimum of half day)
There are a few people who have access to my calendar, they book in a call and I send the invoice shortly after. I am looking to set this up in lnks.to where they will fill in a form & pay, then that gives them access to the calendly link.
Delivery
Typically, the process of working with me looks like this, regardless of the package:
- We make contact, I add the contact to a contact “follow up list” in my CRM (lnks.to)
- We book in a call to discuss what the client needs and if I can help (You will often hear me describe this as a Discovery Call) (Calendly > Google Calendar > Zoom + Slides) if there is a fit, I will create an Opportunity in lnks.to to track them through the sales & delivery process)
- Propose process & agree timeline (Email or Zoom call followed up by email, update opportunity dashboard)
- First payment (Invoice via Zero or lnks.to product page) & Opportunity moved to “delivery steps” in lnks.to)
- Live calls, follow up actions (Zoom call, follow up Emails with Google Sheet worksheets / PDFs, Loom videos)
- Monthly invoicing (Xero)
- Handover any final deliverables (Zoom call, follow up Emails with Google Sheet worksheets / PDFs, Loom videos)
Toolkit

- lnks.to I have the CRM side of the business in here and I have one or two freebies on this page
- Karbon
- Xero
- Laptop / iPad / iPhone
- Loom
- Zoom
- Calendly
- Excel / Google Sheets
In conclusion, it’s probably not the sexist business setup you have ever seen but, it allows me to keep things really streamlined to fit my Ideal Average Day. The main benefits are:
I dictate my hours – clients can book calls regardless of which package works for them but, the hours they can book within are limited in my calendly. For example, I don’t take calls before 10am.
I am location independent – I can run this from anywhere in the world with an internet connection, I just need a laptop or iPad. I will be taking calls while here in Dubai & I have been managing clients from New York, (I blocked my calendar while in Michigan with family), Oslo, Cape Town, London, Lisbon, Brussels…
Easy to manage: Because I track things through a specific funnel and delivery process, I can jump onto anyone one of these calls and know where I am at / what I need to share.
Robust: if any of my devices fail, I can literally buy a new laptop or iPad that day and be up and running within the hour.

It’s taken a lot of experimenting to get here and while it’s simple to me, I get it will be new or sophisticated to many others. That being said, I think it’s possible for many people. Many of you reading this will be familiar with many of the tools I have described (or their competitors). It’s just I have put them together in a particular order around specific packages that I offer. I would encourage you to do something similar. Even if you don’t want to travel while working, knowing you aren’t reliant on one employer for your income and the freedom to control your time during “office hours” is invaluable in my opinion.
If you are interested in learning how you can leverage your knowledge and experience to do something similar, I have created a detailed guide called Remote Revenue, which you can get – here.