May 28, 2025 • 34 mins
We celebrate our 100th episode by giving listeners a behind-the-scenes look at our podcast journey, from inception to production challenges to our biggest wins.
• Started the podcast in January 2023 to help people we couldn't take on as clients
• Purchased a podcast course for $150 which provided crucial guidance on equipment, hosting, and editing
• Recording during tax season was challenging but strategic, as downloads are highest in the first half of the year
• Initially scripted episodes but became more comfortable with time, though still prepare notes for specific tax regulations
• Hired an editor (Kevin) which made continuing the podcast possible
• Our top three episodes: QuickBooks, paying kids from your business, and common startup mistakes
• Biggest wins include the personal finance series and S Corp series, which have helped listeners save thousands in taxes
• Moving to a bi-weekly schedule to make production more manageable
• Planning a second, more personal podcast focused on family life
Thanks for helping us reach 100 episodes! We'll continue providing tax and accounting wisdom every other week, focusing on the latest tax code changes and business strategies to help you save money.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
That one was weeks in the making because it was every
time something happened and Iwould just be like somebody got
bad advice on this.
I mean people that did whatthey were supposed to.
They reached out to expertsbecause they're like I don't
know, and then they were givenbad advice, and sometimes it was
a bad accountant or CPA, but alot of times it was somebody
that wasn't a CPA, that was outof their lane a little bit.
(00:21):
For example, I don't give legaladvice and sometimes lawyers
give accounting or tax adviceand it's not always the best.
So you know, we see some thingsand anyway, that was weeks in
the making because every timesomething like that would come
up I'd be like, oh yeah, thisneeds to go in that episode
because this is a big mistake.
Welcome to what your CPA Wantsyou To Know.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Tax and accounting help can be expensive, so we've
created this podcast to helpguide you through it all and
make you feel like you have aCPA in your back pocket.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
I'm Carson Sands.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
And I'm Taryn Sands.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
I'm a CPA with over 10 years of experience helping
people start and grow theirbusinesses.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
And I'm an MBA with a specialization in marketing and
entrepreneurship.
Taxes suck and we want to makesure you don't pay more than
your fair share.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
We're here to share everything your CPA wants you to
know.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
In a fun and easy to understand way.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Let's get started.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
Let's do it.
We are recording our 100thepisode today 100.
Woohoo.
I didn't really know what to dofor this episode.
It seems like a really bigaccomplishment recording 100
episodes.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
But I knew exactly what to do.
As the person who plans andcoordinates and edits all of the
podcasts myself, I knew exactlywhat to do in this situation.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Which is exactly what we're going to do today, is
kind of give you some insightinto how this works, and spoiler
alert Carson does not do any ofthat.
That he just said.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
What is editing again ?
I'm pretty sure I did that theother day.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
He has never, to this day, edited a podcast and he
couldn't edit one if you askedhim to.
So I am the podcast editor,which I'm not anymore, and we'll
get into that a little bit.
But today we just wanted tokind of give you a behind the
scenes look into the podcast,talk about how it went the last
two years and all of thesehundred episodes and what we're
(02:30):
going to do moving forward.
But first I just thought itwould be a good idea to share
about, like, why we started thepodcast in the beginning.
So you know, I know why Iwanted to start it, but, in your
own words, why did you want tostart a podcast about accounting
?
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Well, we had got to the point where we weren't
taking new clients and one ofthe first things we did was we
wrote our guide for newbusinesses, because, you know, I
had always told new businessesthe same thing and you told me
we should just write a guidethat explains that, so we can
help more people.
And then I think that you know,I knew that the podcast was a
(03:06):
way to reach a lot more people,because people either don't have
time or don't want to readbooks all the time.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
Right.
Yeah, I think that we were kindof on the same page of how can
we help people with thesequestions we're getting without
taking on new clients, and atthe time I was the one answering
our phone calls all the time,and most of the time it was new
business owners that were superconfused about how to start
their business Do I need an EIN,do I need to file an LLC?
(03:34):
And they were very desperate toget some help.
But we just weren't acceptingnew clients because we had too
many at the time and just notenough time to devote to our new
people.
So that's where the guide camein, and then somewhere along the
way, we decided a podcast wouldbe great long form content.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
Right, and you know, I think that a lot of people,
that any the kind of personthat's going to listen to an
accounting podcast is the kindof person usually that plans
ahead for their business, and sowhen people are planning to
start a business or to dosomething different, like that,
it seemed like a really helpfulway for people to just be able
to.
You know, maybe they don'tremember every single thing we
said on every single episode,but they know that.
(04:14):
Okay, I know they saidsomething about that, I heard
something about that.
I'm going to go back and findthat episode and then, you know,
whenever it becomes relevant.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Absolutely.
I think, like this and theguide, it's more beneficial to
people because they can go backand look at it, because you can
sit down with someone for anhour long meeting and it's very
helpful, but nine times out of10, they don't remember exactly
what you said.
So being able to go back andlisten to the podcast episode
when you need it or, like in ourguide, you can go back to that
part whenever it applies to youis so much more helpful than
just sitting down with a meetingand people sometimes don't
(04:50):
realize that because they dolike to sit face to face or book
a phone call with you.
But to have that like inwriting or in a podcast is so
helpful because you might needsomething again later on and you
don't have to try to thinkabout it and remember what they
said.
Sure, and then I think both ofus or anybody, I guess, that
listens to podcasts.
At some point in your headyou're like, oh yeah, having a
(05:13):
podcast would be so much fun andboth of us listen to a lot of
podcasts.
So I think at some point beforethis you had always said you
wanted to have a podcast and I Idon't know that necessarily you
wanted to have an accountingpodcast, but you did want to
have a podcast.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Sure, I mean I figure more than anything.
People want to hear all of mythoughts and opinions on
everything, but since I am anexpert in accounting, I guess we
decided to go that route.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Yeah.
So we decided sort of on a whim.
If you don't know me, I kind ofget bright ideas and then I
just tell Carson about them andthen the next day we're actually
doing the idea.
So it just kind of came up andwe talked about it and then I
bought a podcast course thattaught me how to start a podcast
.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
Yeah, and that was actually really helpful.
It wasn't one of those guidesthat is inspirational or
aspirational Not that there'sanything wrong with those, and
there was probably someinspiration in there as well but
it was a guide that actuallytold you specifically what to do
like physically do this andthat's how you can have a
podcast.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Yeah, I think I spent like $150 on it, which is the
best $150 I ever spent, becauseit didn't take me long to get
through the guide and I was ableto figure out how we needed to
record it, what equipment weneeded, our podcast hosting site
which I had no idea that youneeded a hosting site and then
some of the tools that peopleuse just to make your voices
(06:39):
sound better, and like whatmicrophones to get on Amazon.
Like it had everything in thereas far as a little bit of a
launch and a little bit of alaunch strategy.
So we knew that we needed toget our trailer up and going and
then we did three episodes,right, yeah, three episodes to
release, because if you releaseon Apple podcasts, it's better
(07:00):
if you release with multipleepisodes instead of just
launching with one episode.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
That plus the intro.
Three full episodes plus theintro.
But yeah, that course that youbought.
Do you want to tell everyonewhich one it was?
I?
Speaker 2 (07:12):
mean I would, but they don't sell it anymore, so
that's why I didn't mention it.
They don't sell it anymore.
It was a really great course,but they went a little bit of a
different direction.
So I think there's so many ofthose out there.
If you're looking to start apodcast, it was definitely worth
the money than trying to figureout everything on your own, and
I ended up having to buy a Maccomputer which I had never owned
like an Apple computer.
(07:33):
So it was really helpful totell me, like how to use the
editing software and all of that, which ended up being not too
complicated to figure out.
But definitely in the beginning, when we were trying to do like
the intro and figure out whatkind of music to put, all of
that it was helpful.
But all of that still probablywas the hardest part of the
(07:53):
process because we were tryingto get all of that finished up
during December so that we couldlaunch in January.
And then I had laryngitis.
So that was like the week thatI think we got.
We got a sitter that week tokind of help us, have a few
hours a day to finish upeverything, and then I couldn't
even like squeak out a word.
Speaker 1 (08:12):
Oh yeah, that was ironic, wasn't it?
Speaker 2 (08:14):
I was so mad because, like I'm very type A and I like
to plan things out, and we hadthis on the calendar ready to go
and then I just couldn't and soI was had like tea and cough
drops and all of that, and itstill irritates me to listen to
the intro because it's not whatI wanted it to be?
Speaker 1 (08:33):
Didn't we eventually change it?
Speaker 2 (08:34):
We tweaked it a little bit, yes, but we didn't
record all of it.
So we record all of it and Ican tell in my voice, which I'm
sure not everybody can.
But that's another thing.
Listening to your voice on apodcast is really hard at first.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Oh man, it's amazing how much deeper I think my voice
is in my head than it actuallyis, and sometimes I hear myself
talking.
I'm like wow, who's that whinySouthern old man?
Speaker 2 (09:00):
Well, I don't like the sound of my voice at all,
but I have actually receivedpeople saying like that you have
a really good podcast voice,which they didn't yeah For you.
They said that you have areally good podcast voice, Like,
oh, Carson's voice is so goodfor podcasts, but for some
reason they didn't say mine.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Nobody told me that.
I've actually specifically hadsomebody tell me that they love
listening to our episodesbecause you have such a soothing
voice and it relaxes her yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
Oh well, look at us, we both have good podcast voice
apparently.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
Well, great.
Well then, I mean, rogan, ifyou're listening, if you want to
give me a call to fill in, youknow I'll just take just the
money from that episode.
I mean, you don't have to payme any more than that.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
So I wouldn't say we're professionals yet, but I
mean, we do have 100 episodesdown and it gets easier.
I don't know if it gets easierbecause you're used to listening
to your voice and you just getused to it.
It sounds like that and it'sweird, or you know, you do get
better, but I do think that weare both better now than when we
started, for sure, because weused to have to stop like a
(10:02):
million times.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
Oh yeah, that's true.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
And we used to write out the episodes in the very
beginning.
We would write out the episodes, what we would say and
everything, because for me I donI don't think Kirsten had as
much of this but I would get sonervous when the microphone
would turn on and I would forgetwhat I was going to say.
And it's not like when you'regiving a speech you know there's
so many people in front of youthat you get nervous.
It was like, but the samefeeling, like I just couldn't
(10:27):
get my words out when themicrophone was on.
It seems really easy, but it isnot as easy as you think it is.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
And I remember I didn't always want to have notes
because I felt like, well, thisis a podcast on something I'm
an expert in, I don't need tohave notes.
It should already be in mybrain.
But the tax code is a giantmonstrosity and it's
ever-changing.
So it actually helped a lotwhenever I just kind of got over
my ego on that and was like no,I need to print out the notes
(10:54):
because the tax brackets changeevery year, the standard
deduction changes every year,all the rules change every year.
So I mean I might as well justprint it out and have it in
front of me so that I don't saysomething stupid or incorrect.
That would be embarrassing.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
Right, and I think for you sometimes it would be
hard to think of questions thatpeople would ask, because when
you're really good at somethingyou don't think of those
questions anymore and you have ahard time with that sometimes.
So I think just planning outthe episodes and trying to
incorporate all the questionsthat we've heard in the past was
hard because we would forgetthat and then the episode would
(11:30):
release and we would get thequestions.
I'm like, dang, we should haveincluded that.
So we definitely got better aswe went on by making sure that
we addressed all of the thingsthat we hear all the time, and
at first I think we left a fewof those out.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
For sure, but we did get better at that.
Just like anything else, Onceit's become, once it becomes
part of a habit, then I mean, ifI heard the same question three
times in a week, then I'd writeit down or shoot Taryn an email
and say okay, we need anepisode on this.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
Yes, and as we were getting questions in, we made
sure to add that to ourspreadsheet that we have for
episodes coming up and wedefinitely got into a really
good routine with the podcast.
Now I think it was such a goodidea to have something more long
form with accounting because,like you said, the tax code is
just long and always changingand it's just not something you
(12:19):
can explain in like a simplereel or post or email.
It's better to be able to talkabout it because even when
talking about something likepaying your kids or something
it's like, well, if you're this,then that, if you're this, then
that, if you're this, then this, and then the next step is this
.
So I feel like a long formpodcast of this type and then
(12:41):
just having the episodes thatpeople can tune into if it
applies to them is so helpful.
And that was our idea with thepodcast and I think that that
part of it we've done reallywell with that, because not only
can we give this information topeople that need it, that we
don't know that are listening,but also our clients.
They when they have a questionabout, like, updating their
(13:02):
forms at work or they're goingto send out a 1099, it was like
we were going through the sameinformation via an email and
being like, if you need any morehelp, like schedule a call
where they would have to pay, orI could send them this podcast
episode that would tell themeverything they need to know,
even the things they didn't evenknow to ask yet, which was way
more helpful for them.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
Yeah, and I have a tendency to always want to hedge
on everything that Taryn asksme or that people will shoot us
a Facebook message and ask andneed to hedge because there's
always so many.
It depends, and so you know,having the long form podcast
really helps with that, becauseI can put in all my hedges that
I need to, because it's unlessthis, until that, only if and
(13:44):
instead of this.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Yeah, you can rarely answer an accounting question
straightforward because of theIRS rules and guidelines.
It's just.
It's always it depends, whichis annoying to me and I'm sure
it's annoying to our clients aswell.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
Yeah, and, but that is usually the answer, like you
know.
Can I deduct this?
Well?
Speaker 2 (14:01):
it depends.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
And usually yes.
Unless you're rich, maybe not.
And then you know, we'll see.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Or people think that it's a simple question about
their W-4 and they're like it'sjust a quick question, can I put
this?
And you're like well, yeah, butI need a lot more information
(14:31):
make?
Speaker 1 (14:31):
How many kids do you have?
What kind of other deductionsdo you have going on?
Do you have any credits you'regoing to get for the year?
That's all the things that playinto it.
So by the time you reallyanswer the question accurately,
you almost have to do an entiretax return for somebody.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Yeah.
So I think that that's why thepodcast has been so helpful to
our clients too.
So our idea definitely pannedout.
It's doing what we thought itwould do, but let's talk about
kind of like the middle.
So we launched this podcast inend of January 2023.
And then that meant that we hadto release a weekly episode
every single week during taxtime, and I feel like that's
(15:04):
kind of where it caught up withus, because when we were
thinking about it, it was likeNovember, december, getting all
of our ducks in a row, and thenwe weren't as busy, but then tax
season hit.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
I remember we had talked about that, though we
were like if we started it,launched it earlier, we would
have more time to recordepisodes in November and
December.
That's when we're typicallyslower, but also we realized,
that's when a lot of peopledon't care about taxes at all.
They don't and so if we wouldput ourselves through that
struggle of okay, yes, it's hardto record podcast episodes
during tax season then, but ifwe do that during tax season,
(15:38):
that's when people actually careabout this stuff and maybe more
people will listen.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Yes, and we were right.
Our downloads are really highthe first half of the year,
pretty good, like through thesummer.
But when you get to the veryend of the year you know people
are more concerned with theholidays and just not thinking
about taxes in their businessright then, which I totally get
it.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
They're listening to fun podcasts while they wrap
Christmas presents and curse theholidays.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
Yes, exactly.
But what we didn't know, and wecouldn't have known until we
got into the situation, was howlong it was gonna take us to
record all the podcasts, editthem and upload them and have
them ready to go and thenactually share them with people
like our clients.
So that was the part that got alittle tricky was that we knew
it would take us usually like anhour a week to record the
(16:27):
podcast, but then we weregetting into the predicament
where I needed another hour toedit it and put in our intro and
music and all of that andupload it.
And a lot of times if ourpodcast released on Wednesday
morning at 2 am, I was editingeverything the night before.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
and that got a little hairy through tax season yeah,
especially, you know, because wedo have kids too, and I know
sometimes she would try to takeher laptop and edit while you
know, because we do have kidstoo and I know sometimes she
would try to take her laptop andedit while you know one of the
kids was in a gymnastics lessonor something like that.
But it's just, it's not thateasy because you have to have
your headphones and you have tobe able to hear everything and
you don't want to miss any.
I don't know stupid things thatwe say that might need to be
(17:07):
cut out.
So right.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
Definitely, editing was a lot more time consuming
than I thought it was going tobe and I was a new, a new editor
.
I had never done this before.
So in the beginning I was veryslow and as the year went by I
definitely got better and it wasquicker.
But one thing that also playedinto it was we were doing a lot
of guest episodes at the time,so I was setting up all of those
(17:31):
and all of the back and forthwith scheduling and emailing and
getting them to fill out somethings prior to the podcast and
everything.
But the editing is much moredifficult whenever you have
someone that you're interviewingfor so many reasons.
But that editing was much moredifficult and since then we do
some interviews, but we'veslowed down on that just because
(17:52):
it's hard to schedule and likeright now we're doing this on a
Sunday morning, the kids areplaying and it's just what
worked out this week.
And when you're interviewingpeople, it's way more difficult
to fit that in your scheduleright, that's true, I know that
you struggle with that.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
I mean, I didn't interview very many of the
people.
Those were mostly episodes thatyou did without me and that
actually helped during taxseason for me because that was
one more episode I didn't haveto record and I was able to
focus on doing tax returns.
But I know that took a lot ofextra work from you for sure.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Yes, but Since then we have actually hired an editor
.
That was one thing that Ineeded to take off my plate.
There was too many things onthe plate Like the podcast was
great and I didn't want to letgo of the podcast, but we were
just so busy in all areas of ourlife Like I felt like I was
going to explode.
So that's when we decided tohire a podcast editor and we
(18:47):
currently still use him.
His name is Kevin.
He is amazing and that reallymade the podcast so much easier
and more manageable for us justto record the podcast and I
don't have to think aboutediting it and I don't know how
to edit it.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
So thank you, Kevin.
Yeah, in spite of my earlierclaims, they were all false.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
Yeah, carson doesn't still doesn't know how to edit,
so that's something that'schanged since we started, and
it's one of the only reasonsthat we're sitting here today
recording the hundredth episode.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
Right, we had even at one point, I think, you were
like do we still even want to dothis Cause you were super tired
of editing it, and we justthought, well, but we had, you
know, built up quite a fewlisteners and felt like we were
helping people and we didn'treally want to let it go either.
So I mean, that made a bigdifference for us.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
Yeah, and we do enjoy doing the podcast, but it's
just like anything else in yourlife.
You kind of have to.
There's not as much time and,with three kids being extremely
busy with sports and school, youhave to make decisions.
And we kind of got to a placewhere we were trying to decide
if the podcast was something wewanted to keep doing and
ultimately we decided, yes, welove it, we're getting great
(19:53):
feedback, our numbers areincreasing, so it was time to
hire someone to edit it for us,which really took a lot off my
plate.
It's so much easier to jump inhere and record an episode and
then not worry about it than itwas to have to do all the stuff.
So that's something we changed.
And then, another thing wechanged what the beginning of
this year right is that we'reonly doing an episode every
(20:14):
other week instead of every week, which is also very helpful and
made everything feel so muchmore manageable, which is why we
decided we're kind of likedeciding if we're going to move
forward with it, but we decided,yes, in 2025, we're going to
continue to move forward withthe podcast.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
Well, it's every other week, is, I mean?
And there's no police that aregoing to arrest us if we release
an extra episode becausesomething comes up.
But when we started the podcast, there was so much information
that we wanted to get out therethat you know it wasn't just
about doing it weekly because oh, that's, you know, a good
schedule.
It's because there's so muchinformation too, and in fact it
could have been way more thanonce a week.
(20:52):
We just didn't have time to getthat many episodes out, but
we've covered so many topicsthat are still relevant.
I mean, of course, some of thebaseline numbers change with
inflation, but most of theinformation that we've put out
there, it still applies.
And if anything else does popup and we feel like we need an
extra episode, we can always dothat.
And you mentioned before that weenjoy doing this and we do and
(21:15):
I like that we're able to helppeople that maybe we don't have
space to take on clients rightnow, and we do get calls and we
have to turn people downsometimes, but I have had
several people tell us that, yes, their CPA wasn't proactive in
trying to get them to convert toan S-corp or do some of these
other things that save you a lotof money in taxes.
But once they push the issuebecause they listen to our
(21:37):
podcast, then they were able toget it done, even though we
weren't able to take them on asclients, and so it still saved
them a lot of money, and that'sbecause of the podcast.
So I think that's really cooltoo.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Absolutely, and I do think we tried to come at it
from a position of here'ssomething you can do yourself to
save yourself money in taxes.
So, like our most recentepisodes about paying your kids
and the Augusta rule, we madesure to explain exactly how you
could set that up in yourQuickBooks yourself so that you
can just turn it into your CPAwhen it's tax time.
So I do think that it's helpingsmall business owners that
(22:11):
aren't necessarily working withthe CPA every single week or
month or something like that,that are doing a lot of it
themselves, save a lot in taxes,and we want to help everybody
save taxes.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
Sure, and I like to think we're even helping some of
our colleagues a little bit,the other CPAs because people
that listen to this that are notour clients are probably doing
a lot better job of gettingtheir CPAs the right information
and in the right kind of way.
So I hope we're helping themtoo.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
I hope so, because our clients that listen, they're
my favorite clients, they knoweverything, they're like yeah,
you said on your podcast thatyou wanted it this way, and so
that's why I put this here andI'm like, yes, that's exactly,
it's perfect, so easy to workwith them.
And our favorite, my favoriteclients are the ones that are
doing the work and like teachingthemselves along the way,
(22:58):
because they're so easy to workwith and I don't know, it's just
, it's just so much are some ofthe best ones, the ones that
listen, that put in the effort,that try their best.
Speaker 1 (23:10):
I do enjoy that for sure, and we have people that
are past retirement age that aredoing a great job with the
technology and with doingeverything the way that we teach
here.
So we do appreciate that.
Yes, we do.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
So we wanted to just talk about some of our biggest
episodes that we had over thehundred episodes, and there's
the three top three.
The first one was aboutQuickBooks Not surprising, right
, I feel like everybody has somany QuickBooks questions.
So the QuickBooks episode,which maybe we need to do
another one, but also payingyour kids from your business
(23:44):
Also another big one that I feellike most people know about but
maybe don't take advantage ofit because they don't know how
to actually put it in place.
So hopefully that episodehelped.
And then five common mistakespeople make when starting their
business.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
That's good to know.
Speaker 2 (24:01):
Yeah, I think that that is such an important one,
so I'm glad that's one of thetop ones.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
That one was weeks in the making because it was every
time something happened and Iwould just be like somebody got
bad advice on this, and I meanpeople that people that did what
they were supposed to.
They reached out to expertscause they're like I don't know,
and then they were given badadvice, and sometimes it was a
bad accountant or CPA, but a lotof times it was somebody that
wasn't a CPA that was out oftheir lane a little bit.
(24:27):
For example, I don't give legaladvice and sometimes lawyers
give accounting or tax adviceand it's not always the best.
So you know, we see some thingsand anyway, that was weeks in
the making because every timesomething like that would come
up I'd be like, oh yeah, thisneeds to go in that episode
because this is a big mistake.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Well, I think it's a really helpful episode for
anybody starting their newbusiness, because it tells you
exactly how to set everything upwithout making a big mess later
on.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
One of the biggest ones I remember from that is
using your personal checkingaccount to run your business.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
Don't do that and we tell people that, like all the
time I mean every day we havemultiple episodes about that and
that's not what this episode isabout.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
But don't do it.
Speaker 2 (25:07):
If you listen to this podcast, you would never do
that.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
No, that's true, we know y'all.
Tell your friends, becausethey're the ones doing it.
Tell your friends.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
So I wanted to ask you what your biggest win of
this podcast was, and if youdon't have an answer, I have one
, and then you can have sometime to think about it.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Yeah, you go first.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
Okay, I think the biggest win for me is the
personal finance series.
Probably close second would bethe S Corp series, but the
personal finance series justbecause I felt like that was
something that we got to share.
That was kind of an extensionof us personally and our
business.
We went through Dave Ramsey along time ago, right before we
got married, and it reallysignificantly changed our lives
(25:47):
and got us into the rightmindset, I think, of just saving
and putting into retirement andnot overspending and things
like that, which definitelyresulted in the success of our
business, because if yourpersonal finances are a mess, so
are your business financesusually.
So I love that we were able totake that and help people.
(26:11):
I mean, it's not necessarilyjust taxes, but we were able to
incorporate that as an episodeand I've received so many
messages on Instagram about thatseries, about how we inspired
people to turn their personalfinances around, and I love that
because it was so life-changingfor us.
I'm glad that we were able tohelp inspire other people to do
(26:32):
the same.
Speaker 1 (26:33):
That is a good one, because there's, you know,
there's business is one thing,but your personal finances.
There's a fear there thatpeople have just to get started
and they feel out of control,and it adds so much stress on
your life that you don't evenprobably realize until you're
out of that situation.
And people do it all the time.
People have success and build aretirement making much less
(26:56):
money than you probably make,and so it can be done.
You just need to get control ofyour money, get control of
yourself.
Speaker 2 (27:03):
And if you haven't listened to that series and
you're thinking, oh man, thatsounds awesome, you can go back.
It was last summer that we didthat and there's, I think, four
episodes.
But it goes into retirement andsavings and what we do
personally and I thought it wascool that we could just kind of
bring that over here to thepodcast.
And it still makes sense, sinceit's personal finance and then
(27:23):
help people and it's somethingthat we're both very passionate
about.
So I think those episodes arereally good because you can see
how passionate and you can hearhow passionate we are about all
of the personal finance stuff.
Speaker 1 (27:34):
That's a good one.
I like that.
So what was your?
Speaker 2 (27:36):
win.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
I really liked the S Corp series.
I mean, I mentioned earlierthat you know, one of my
favorite things was that peoplewould reach out that would say
like, even though we couldn'tbecome a client, we, we did do
the S election and save you know, a ton of money in taxes.
And that that's a big one forme, because I just I really hate
whenever I see a tax return andI see you know a schedule C and
(27:57):
the people are making over$200,000 in profit and they're
just, you know, paying so muchunnecessary money in
self-employment taxes.
That's a big one, you know.
I like to think that all ofthat extra savings some people
are saving you know $20,000 ayear just from doing you know
something that we recommended,and I like to hope that they're
using that to, I don't know, payoff debt to tie into what you
(28:19):
said with the personal finance,or invest an extra $20,000
towards retirement or whatever.
You know that money can go along way.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
Absolutely.
I know when we first startedthe business I was keeping like
a little tally because we didn'thave that many clients yet.
So you would say like I'msaving them like $40,000 a year
by converting to an S-corp and Iwas trying to keep a tally for
the year.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
So we could be like we've saved hundreds of thousand
dollars and people switching toS Corp.
Oh, like the billboards whereit's like the lawyers put like
billions of dollars insettlement.
Well, that's how much they'vegot all their clients in their
total career.
And it sounds like a big number, Well, and I guess it is
sometimes but yeah, we can saythat yeah.
I mean, okay, Like over thecourse of our years of doing
this now we have probably savedmillions of dollars in taxes.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
For sure, and I love it when you send out an email to
somebody and was likecongratulations, that was a
great move to go ahead and moveforward with S-Corp, because you
saved $19,750 this year and, oh, guess what?
You'll save that plus moreprobably next year if your
business grows.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Yeah, that is nice, and people are always excited,
especially when they've been,you know, already making money
before that and just hadn't madethat step.
So that's a big one, yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
I like those too.
We worked really hard on those.
So if you haven't listened tothose series, go back and take a
listen to those.
But the last thing that I wantto talk about is just moving
forward.
What is this podcast going tobe like?
Moving forward, what are ourplans for it?
All that stuff.
Speaker 1 (29:49):
Well, even though we'll only be coming out every
other week on episodes, I thinkthat certainly some of the
episodes, you can expect more ofthe same the latest changes and
updates to the tax code, thingsthat affect businesses or
individuals, because everybodythat owns a business is also an
individual, so we covered thatas well.
You know a lot of that willstill be happening.
Anything that y'all need toknow that is new information or
that we haven't talked about yet, we'll be putting out there,
(30:11):
for sure.
Speaker 2 (30:11):
And I feel like we have just so many more episodes
on our like.
We have an idea list forepisodes that we'll still be
rocking and rolling with theevery other week.
But you know, at some point ifwe feel like we've covered
everything as well as we can,you know we might go back down
to like a monthly episode oreven less, if we just feel like
we're repeating ourselves.
(30:32):
But at this point I don't feellike that's the case.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
No, not yet.
Speaker 2 (30:36):
And just a little I don't know side note we, I guess
, have liked podcasting so muchthat we're thinking of maybe
starting another podcast.
Speaker 1 (30:44):
If you love listening to podcasts and you want to
listen to one about somethingelse besides accounting and you
like the sound of our voicesthen, we do have one coming out.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
TBD, yeah, so yeah, we're thinking about doing
another podcast personal podcastwith the kids and so we've
enjoyed it so much that we wantto do another one, so I guess to
say that it was successful.
Speaker 1 (31:07):
I think we don't know exactly what it's going to be,
but in theory it will be aboutthings that we do in our lives,
things that we do with our kids,and a lot of times people think
oh, you know, your kids are sonice and they're so there.
You know, it seems like they.
You know your kids are so niceand they're so they're.
You know, it seems like they.
You know they don't spend a lotof time on screens and like,
what do you do?
How do you keep them occupied?
(31:28):
How do you make them so niceand so polite and so smart?
I don't know.
I mean, that sounds like I'mbragging on my kids and maybe I
am a little bit, but they reallyare great kids and so um that
third one though, oh, she'sspicy, she's spicy.
Well, she's just mad becauseshe's smarter than the rest of
us and she's bored by ourstupidity.
Speaker 2 (31:45):
Yeah, I think so.
But our oldest daughter, who isdefinitely just like your
stereotypical first kid she'sperfect and happy and everyone
loves her and she's theteacher's pet All the things
that you would think of as afirst child she wanted to start
a podcast and Carson's like, oh,that's a great idea.
And I'm looking at them likey'all are crazy.
(32:07):
Editing takes so much time anddoing all the things we can't do
.
Another podcast, I'm barelyholding it together as it is.
And then a couple of weeks wentby and I just kept thinking
about it, kept thinking about it.
Actually, that's actuallythat's a great idea.
So I completely changed my mind.
And our oldest, who's 10 now,she wants to learn to edit
podcasts and stuff.
(32:27):
So I think it'll be.
It'll be really fun for us andwe have a lot that we want to
share about our travels and thestuff we're doing with the kids,
like book clubs and things likethat.
So if you have kids and any ofthat sounds great, yeah, stay
tuned.
We'll definitely share about itat least once or twice on this
podcast for anyone that'sinterested.
And I think that's all we havefor our hundredth episode.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
All right, 100.
Woohoo.
Speaker 2 (32:51):
We should have brought like champagne or
something.
Speaker 1 (32:53):
Well, nobody would be able to see it here.
Okay, there we go.
That was the champagne cork,did you hear it?
Cheers Okay, there we go.
That was the champagne cork,did you hear it?
Speaker 2 (33:01):
Cheers.
Speaker 1 (33:02):
We did tell everyone it's Sunday morning earlier in
the episode, so I don't know ifit's a good look for us to start
chugging champagne this early,we have to wait till at least
noon.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
Yeah, carson's actually taking the kids to a
slide park, so probably not agood idea.
All right, well, thank you fortuning in.
I hope you know you guysenjoyed this episode.
It's a little bit behind thescenes and a little less serious
than our other episodes, liketaxes are so serious.
Speaker 1 (33:26):
You probably didn't learn anything you needed to
know, but you might have learnedsome stuff that you thought was
enjoyable.
Speaker 2 (33:30):
Maybe it's interesting, I don't know.
Maybe this will be our worstepisode ever.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Four downloads, yeah, and it's just our phones, and
it's just our phones.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
And our iPads.
It's just us All, right.
Well, until next time in ournext helpful episode.
Thank you so much for listeningto what your CPA Wants you To
Know.
Podcast.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
This podcast is intended to provide accounting
and tax information foreducational purposes only.
All tax situations are uniqueand should be handled with the
assistance of a tax professional.
That one was weeks in the making because it was every
time something happened and Iwould just be like somebody got
bad advice on this.
I mean people that did whatthey were supposed to.
They reached out to expertsbecause they're like I don't
know, and then they were givenbad advice, and sometimes it was
a bad accountant or CPA, but alot of times it was somebody
that wasn't a CPA, that was outof their lane a little bit.
(00:21):
For example, I don't give legaladvice and sometimes lawyers
give accounting or tax adviceand it's not always the best.
So you know, we see some thingsand anyway, that was weeks in
the making because every timesomething like that would come
up I'd be like, oh yeah, thisneeds to go in that episode
because this is a big mistake.
Welcome to what your CPA Wantsyou To Know.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Tax and accounting help can be expensive, so we've
created this podcast to helpguide you through it all and
make you feel like you have aCPA in your back pocket.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
I'm Carson Sands.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
And I'm Taryn Sands.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
I'm a CPA with over 10 years of experience helping
people start and grow theirbusinesses.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
And I'm an MBA with a specialization in marketing and
entrepreneurship.
Taxes suck and we want to makesure you don't pay more than
your fair share.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
We're here to share everything your CPA wants you to
know.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
In a fun and easy to understand way.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Let's get started.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
Let's do it.
We are recording our 100thepisode today 100.
Woohoo.
I didn't really know what to dofor this episode.
It seems like a really bigaccomplishment recording 100
episodes.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
But I knew exactly what to do.
As the person who plans andcoordinates and edits all of the
podcasts myself, I knew exactlywhat to do in this situation.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Which is exactly what we're going to do today, is
kind of give you some insightinto how this works, and spoiler
alert Carson does not do any ofthat.
That he just said.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
What is editing again ?
I'm pretty sure I did that theother day.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
He has never, to this day, edited a podcast and he
couldn't edit one if you askedhim to.
So I am the podcast editor,which I'm not anymore, and we'll
get into that a little bit.
But today we just wanted tokind of give you a behind the
scenes look into the podcast,talk about how it went the last
two years and all of thesehundred episodes and what we're
(02:30):
going to do moving forward.
But first I just thought itwould be a good idea to share
about, like, why we started thepodcast in the beginning.
So you know, I know why Iwanted to start it, but, in your
own words, why did you want tostart a podcast about accounting
?
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Well, we had got to the point where we weren't
taking new clients and one ofthe first things we did was we
wrote our guide for newbusinesses, because, you know, I
had always told new businessesthe same thing and you told me
we should just write a guidethat explains that, so we can
help more people.
And then I think that you know,I knew that the podcast was a
(03:06):
way to reach a lot more people,because people either don't have
time or don't want to readbooks all the time.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
Right.
Yeah, I think that we were kindof on the same page of how can
we help people with thesequestions we're getting without
taking on new clients, and atthe time I was the one answering
our phone calls all the time,and most of the time it was new
business owners that were superconfused about how to start
their business Do I need an EIN,do I need to file an LLC?
(03:34):
And they were very desperate toget some help.
But we just weren't acceptingnew clients because we had too
many at the time and just notenough time to devote to our new
people.
So that's where the guide camein, and then somewhere along the
way, we decided a podcast wouldbe great long form content.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
Right, and you know, I think that a lot of people,
that any the kind of personthat's going to listen to an
accounting podcast is the kindof person usually that plans
ahead for their business, and sowhen people are planning to
start a business or to dosomething different, like that,
it seemed like a really helpfulway for people to just be able
to.
You know, maybe they don'tremember every single thing we
said on every single episode,but they know that.
(04:14):
Okay, I know they saidsomething about that, I heard
something about that.
I'm going to go back and findthat episode and then, you know,
whenever it becomes relevant.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Absolutely.
I think, like this and theguide, it's more beneficial to
people because they can go backand look at it, because you can
sit down with someone for anhour long meeting and it's very
helpful, but nine times out of10, they don't remember exactly
what you said.
So being able to go back andlisten to the podcast episode
when you need it or, like in ourguide, you can go back to that
part whenever it applies to youis so much more helpful than
just sitting down with a meetingand people sometimes don't
(04:50):
realize that because they dolike to sit face to face or book
a phone call with you.
But to have that like inwriting or in a podcast is so
helpful because you might needsomething again later on and you
don't have to try to thinkabout it and remember what they
said.
Sure, and then I think both ofus or anybody, I guess, that
listens to podcasts.
At some point in your headyou're like, oh yeah, having a
(05:13):
podcast would be so much fun andboth of us listen to a lot of
podcasts.
So I think at some point beforethis you had always said you
wanted to have a podcast and I Idon't know that necessarily you
wanted to have an accountingpodcast, but you did want to
have a podcast.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Sure, I mean I figure more than anything.
People want to hear all of mythoughts and opinions on
everything, but since I am anexpert in accounting, I guess we
decided to go that route.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Yeah.
So we decided sort of on a whim.
If you don't know me, I kind ofget bright ideas and then I
just tell Carson about them andthen the next day we're actually
doing the idea.
So it just kind of came up andwe talked about it and then I
bought a podcast course thattaught me how to start a podcast
.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
Yeah, and that was actually really helpful.
It wasn't one of those guidesthat is inspirational or
aspirational Not that there'sanything wrong with those, and
there was probably someinspiration in there as well but
it was a guide that actuallytold you specifically what to do
like physically do this andthat's how you can have a
podcast.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Yeah, I think I spent like $150 on it, which is the
best $150 I ever spent, becauseit didn't take me long to get
through the guide and I was ableto figure out how we needed to
record it, what equipment weneeded, our podcast hosting site
which I had no idea that youneeded a hosting site and then
some of the tools that peopleuse just to make your voices
(06:39):
sound better, and like whatmicrophones to get on Amazon.
Like it had everything in thereas far as a little bit of a
launch and a little bit of alaunch strategy.
So we knew that we needed toget our trailer up and going and
then we did three episodes,right, yeah, three episodes to
release, because if you releaseon Apple podcasts, it's better
(07:00):
if you release with multipleepisodes instead of just
launching with one episode.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
That plus the intro.
Three full episodes plus theintro.
But yeah, that course that youbought.
Do you want to tell everyonewhich one it was?
I?
Speaker 2 (07:12):
mean I would, but they don't sell it anymore, so
that's why I didn't mention it.
They don't sell it anymore.
It was a really great course,but they went a little bit of a
different direction.
So I think there's so many ofthose out there.
If you're looking to start apodcast, it was definitely worth
the money than trying to figureout everything on your own, and
I ended up having to buy a Maccomputer which I had never owned
like an Apple computer.
(07:33):
So it was really helpful totell me, like how to use the
editing software and all of that, which ended up being not too
complicated to figure out.
But definitely in the beginning, when we were trying to do like
the intro and figure out whatkind of music to put, all of
that it was helpful.
But all of that still probablywas the hardest part of the
(07:53):
process because we were tryingto get all of that finished up
during December so that we couldlaunch in January.
And then I had laryngitis.
So that was like the week thatI think we got.
We got a sitter that week tokind of help us, have a few
hours a day to finish upeverything, and then I couldn't
even like squeak out a word.
Speaker 1 (08:12):
Oh yeah, that was ironic, wasn't it?
Speaker 2 (08:14):
I was so mad because, like I'm very type A and I like
to plan things out, and we hadthis on the calendar ready to go
and then I just couldn't and soI was had like tea and cough
drops and all of that, and itstill irritates me to listen to
the intro because it's not whatI wanted it to be?
Speaker 1 (08:33):
Didn't we eventually change it?
Speaker 2 (08:34):
We tweaked it a little bit, yes, but we didn't
record all of it.
So we record all of it and Ican tell in my voice, which I'm
sure not everybody can.
But that's another thing.
Listening to your voice on apodcast is really hard at first.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Oh man, it's amazing how much deeper I think my voice
is in my head than it actuallyis, and sometimes I hear myself
talking.
I'm like wow, who's that whinySouthern old man?
Speaker 2 (09:00):
Well, I don't like the sound of my voice at all,
but I have actually receivedpeople saying like that you have
a really good podcast voice,which they didn't yeah For you.
They said that you have areally good podcast voice, Like,
oh, Carson's voice is so goodfor podcasts, but for some
reason they didn't say mine.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Nobody told me that.
I've actually specifically hadsomebody tell me that they love
listening to our episodesbecause you have such a soothing
voice and it relaxes her yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
Oh well, look at us, we both have good podcast voice
apparently.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
Well, great.
Well then, I mean, rogan, ifyou're listening, if you want to
give me a call to fill in, youknow I'll just take just the
money from that episode.
I mean, you don't have to payme any more than that.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
So I wouldn't say we're professionals yet, but I
mean, we do have 100 episodesdown and it gets easier.
I don't know if it gets easierbecause you're used to listening
to your voice and you just getused to it.
It sounds like that and it'sweird, or you know, you do get
better, but I do think that weare both better now than when we
started, for sure, because weused to have to stop like a
(10:02):
million times.
Speaker 1 (10:03):
Oh yeah, that's true.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
And we used to write out the episodes in the very
beginning.
We would write out the episodes, what we would say and
everything, because for me I donI don't think Kirsten had as
much of this but I would get sonervous when the microphone
would turn on and I would forgetwhat I was going to say.
And it's not like when you'regiving a speech you know there's
so many people in front of youthat you get nervous.
It was like, but the samefeeling, like I just couldn't
(10:27):
get my words out when themicrophone was on.
It seems really easy, but it isnot as easy as you think it is.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
And I remember I didn't always want to have notes
because I felt like, well, thisis a podcast on something I'm
an expert in, I don't need tohave notes.
It should already be in mybrain.
But the tax code is a giantmonstrosity and it's
ever-changing.
So it actually helped a lotwhenever I just kind of got over
my ego on that and was like no,I need to print out the notes
(10:54):
because the tax brackets changeevery year, the standard
deduction changes every year,all the rules change every year.
So I mean I might as well justprint it out and have it in
front of me so that I don't saysomething stupid or incorrect.
That would be embarrassing.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
Right, and I think for you sometimes it would be
hard to think of questions thatpeople would ask, because when
you're really good at somethingyou don't think of those
questions anymore and you have ahard time with that sometimes.
So I think just planning outthe episodes and trying to
incorporate all the questionsthat we've heard in the past was
hard because we would forgetthat and then the episode would
(11:30):
release and we would get thequestions.
I'm like, dang, we should haveincluded that.
So we definitely got better aswe went on by making sure that
we addressed all of the thingsthat we hear all the time, and
at first I think we left a fewof those out.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
For sure, but we did get better at that.
Just like anything else, Onceit's become, once it becomes
part of a habit, then I mean, ifI heard the same question three
times in a week, then I'd writeit down or shoot Taryn an email
and say okay, we need anepisode on this.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
Yes, and as we were getting questions in, we made
sure to add that to ourspreadsheet that we have for
episodes coming up and wedefinitely got into a really
good routine with the podcast.
Now I think it was such a goodidea to have something more long
form with accounting because,like you said, the tax code is
just long and always changingand it's just not something you
(12:19):
can explain in like a simplereel or post or email.
It's better to be able to talkabout it because even when
talking about something likepaying your kids or something
it's like, well, if you're this,then that, if you're this, then
that, if you're this, then this, and then the next step is this
.
So I feel like a long formpodcast of this type and then
(12:41):
just having the episodes thatpeople can tune into if it
applies to them is so helpful.
And that was our idea with thepodcast and I think that that
part of it we've done reallywell with that, because not only
can we give this information topeople that need it, that we
don't know that are listening,but also our clients.
They when they have a questionabout, like, updating their
(13:02):
forms at work or they're goingto send out a 1099, it was like
we were going through the sameinformation via an email and
being like, if you need any morehelp, like schedule a call
where they would have to pay, orI could send them this podcast
episode that would tell themeverything they need to know,
even the things they didn't evenknow to ask yet, which was way
more helpful for them.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
Yeah, and I have a tendency to always want to hedge
on everything that Taryn asksme or that people will shoot us
a Facebook message and ask andneed to hedge because there's
always so many.
It depends, and so you know,having the long form podcast
really helps with that, becauseI can put in all my hedges that
I need to, because it's unlessthis, until that, only if and
(13:44):
instead of this.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Yeah, you can rarely answer an accounting question
straightforward because of theIRS rules and guidelines.
It's just.
It's always it depends, whichis annoying to me and I'm sure
it's annoying to our clients aswell.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
Yeah, and, but that is usually the answer, like you
know.
Can I deduct this?
Well?
Speaker 2 (14:01):
it depends.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
And usually yes.
Unless you're rich, maybe not.
And then you know, we'll see.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Or people think that it's a simple question about
their W-4 and they're like it'sjust a quick question, can I put
this?
And you're like well, yeah, butI need a lot more information
(14:31):
make?
Speaker 1 (14:31):
How many kids do you have?
What kind of other deductionsdo you have going on?
Do you have any credits you'regoing to get for the year?
That's all the things that playinto it.
So by the time you reallyanswer the question accurately,
you almost have to do an entiretax return for somebody.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Yeah.
So I think that that's why thepodcast has been so helpful to
our clients too.
So our idea definitely pannedout.
It's doing what we thought itwould do, but let's talk about
kind of like the middle.
So we launched this podcast inend of January 2023.
And then that meant that we hadto release a weekly episode
every single week during taxtime, and I feel like that's
(15:04):
kind of where it caught up withus, because when we were
thinking about it, it was likeNovember, december, getting all
of our ducks in a row, and thenwe weren't as busy, but then tax
season hit.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
I remember we had talked about that, though we
were like if we started it,launched it earlier, we would
have more time to recordepisodes in November and
December.
That's when we're typicallyslower, but also we realized,
that's when a lot of peopledon't care about taxes at all.
They don't and so if we wouldput ourselves through that
struggle of okay, yes, it's hardto record podcast episodes
during tax season then, but ifwe do that during tax season,
(15:38):
that's when people actually careabout this stuff and maybe more
people will listen.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Yes, and we were right.
Our downloads are really highthe first half of the year,
pretty good, like through thesummer.
But when you get to the veryend of the year you know people
are more concerned with theholidays and just not thinking
about taxes in their businessright then, which I totally get
it.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
They're listening to fun podcasts while they wrap
Christmas presents and curse theholidays.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
Yes, exactly.
But what we didn't know, and wecouldn't have known until we
got into the situation, was howlong it was gonna take us to
record all the podcasts, editthem and upload them and have
them ready to go and thenactually share them with people
like our clients.
So that was the part that got alittle tricky was that we knew
it would take us usually like anhour a week to record the
(16:27):
podcast, but then we weregetting into the predicament
where I needed another hour toedit it and put in our intro and
music and all of that andupload it.
And a lot of times if ourpodcast released on Wednesday
morning at 2 am, I was editingeverything the night before.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
and that got a little hairy through tax season yeah,
especially, you know, because wedo have kids too, and I know
sometimes she would try to takeher laptop and edit while you
know, because we do have kidstoo and I know sometimes she
would try to take her laptop andedit while you know one of the
kids was in a gymnastics lessonor something like that.
But it's just, it's not thateasy because you have to have
your headphones and you have tobe able to hear everything and
you don't want to miss any.
I don't know stupid things thatwe say that might need to be
(17:07):
cut out.
So right.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
Definitely, editing was a lot more time consuming
than I thought it was going tobe and I was a new, a new editor
.
I had never done this before.
So in the beginning I was veryslow and as the year went by I
definitely got better and it wasquicker.
But one thing that also playedinto it was we were doing a lot
of guest episodes at the time,so I was setting up all of those
(17:31):
and all of the back and forthwith scheduling and emailing and
getting them to fill out somethings prior to the podcast and
everything.
But the editing is much moredifficult whenever you have
someone that you're interviewingfor so many reasons.
But that editing was much moredifficult and since then we do
some interviews, but we'veslowed down on that just because
(17:52):
it's hard to schedule and likeright now we're doing this on a
Sunday morning, the kids areplaying and it's just what
worked out this week.
And when you're interviewingpeople, it's way more difficult
to fit that in your scheduleright, that's true, I know that
you struggle with that.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
I mean, I didn't interview very many of the
people.
Those were mostly episodes thatyou did without me and that
actually helped during taxseason for me because that was
one more episode I didn't haveto record and I was able to
focus on doing tax returns.
But I know that took a lot ofextra work from you for sure.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Yes, but Since then we have actually hired an editor
.
That was one thing that Ineeded to take off my plate.
There was too many things onthe plate Like the podcast was
great and I didn't want to letgo of the podcast, but we were
just so busy in all areas of ourlife Like I felt like I was
going to explode.
So that's when we decided tohire a podcast editor and we
(18:47):
currently still use him.
His name is Kevin.
He is amazing and that reallymade the podcast so much easier
and more manageable for us justto record the podcast and I
don't have to think aboutediting it and I don't know how
to edit it.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
So thank you, Kevin.
Yeah, in spite of my earlierclaims, they were all false.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
Yeah, carson doesn't still doesn't know how to edit,
so that's something that'schanged since we started, and
it's one of the only reasonsthat we're sitting here today
recording the hundredth episode.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
Right, we had even at one point, I think, you were
like do we still even want to dothis Cause you were super tired
of editing it, and we justthought, well, but we had, you
know, built up quite a fewlisteners and felt like we were
helping people and we didn'treally want to let it go either.
So I mean, that made a bigdifference for us.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
Yeah, and we do enjoy doing the podcast, but it's
just like anything else in yourlife.
You kind of have to.
There's not as much time and,with three kids being extremely
busy with sports and school, youhave to make decisions.
And we kind of got to a placewhere we were trying to decide
if the podcast was something wewanted to keep doing and
ultimately we decided, yes, welove it, we're getting great
(19:53):
feedback, our numbers areincreasing, so it was time to
hire someone to edit it for us,which really took a lot off my
plate.
It's so much easier to jump inhere and record an episode and
then not worry about it than itwas to have to do all the stuff.
So that's something we changed.
And then, another thing wechanged what the beginning of
this year right is that we'reonly doing an episode every
(20:14):
other week instead of every week, which is also very helpful and
made everything feel so muchmore manageable, which is why we
decided we're kind of likedeciding if we're going to move
forward with it, but we decided,yes, in 2025, we're going to
continue to move forward withthe podcast.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
Well, it's every other week, is, I mean?
And there's no police that aregoing to arrest us if we release
an extra episode becausesomething comes up.
But when we started the podcast, there was so much information
that we wanted to get out therethat you know it wasn't just
about doing it weekly because oh, that's, you know, a good
schedule.
It's because there's so muchinformation too, and in fact it
could have been way more thanonce a week.
(20:52):
We just didn't have time to getthat many episodes out, but
we've covered so many topicsthat are still relevant.
I mean, of course, some of thebaseline numbers change with
inflation, but most of theinformation that we've put out
there, it still applies.
And if anything else does popup and we feel like we need an
extra episode, we can always dothat.
And you mentioned before that weenjoy doing this and we do and
(21:15):
I like that we're able to helppeople that maybe we don't have
space to take on clients rightnow, and we do get calls and we
have to turn people downsometimes, but I have had
several people tell us that, yes, their CPA wasn't proactive in
trying to get them to convert toan S-corp or do some of these
other things that save you a lotof money in taxes.
But once they push the issuebecause they listen to our
(21:37):
podcast, then they were able toget it done, even though we
weren't able to take them on asclients, and so it still saved
them a lot of money, and that'sbecause of the podcast.
So I think that's really cooltoo.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Absolutely, and I do think we tried to come at it
from a position of here'ssomething you can do yourself to
save yourself money in taxes.
So, like our most recentepisodes about paying your kids
and the Augusta rule, we madesure to explain exactly how you
could set that up in yourQuickBooks yourself so that you
can just turn it into your CPAwhen it's tax time.
So I do think that it's helpingsmall business owners that
(22:11):
aren't necessarily working withthe CPA every single week or
month or something like that,that are doing a lot of it
themselves, save a lot in taxes,and we want to help everybody
save taxes.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
Sure, and I like to think we're even helping some of
our colleagues a little bit,the other CPAs because people
that listen to this that are notour clients are probably doing
a lot better job of gettingtheir CPAs the right information
and in the right kind of way.
So I hope we're helping themtoo.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
I hope so, because our clients that listen, they're
my favorite clients, they knoweverything, they're like yeah,
you said on your podcast thatyou wanted it this way, and so
that's why I put this here andI'm like, yes, that's exactly,
it's perfect, so easy to workwith them.
And our favorite, my favoriteclients are the ones that are
doing the work and like teachingthemselves along the way,
(22:58):
because they're so easy to workwith and I don't know, it's just
, it's just so much are some ofthe best ones, the ones that
listen, that put in the effort,that try their best.
Speaker 1 (23:10):
I do enjoy that for sure, and we have people that
are past retirement age that aredoing a great job with the
technology and with doingeverything the way that we teach
here.
So we do appreciate that.
Yes, we do.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
So we wanted to just talk about some of our biggest
episodes that we had over thehundred episodes, and there's
the three top three.
The first one was aboutQuickBooks Not surprising, right
, I feel like everybody has somany QuickBooks questions.
So the QuickBooks episode,which maybe we need to do
another one, but also payingyour kids from your business
(23:44):
Also another big one that I feellike most people know about but
maybe don't take advantage ofit because they don't know how
to actually put it in place.
So hopefully that episodehelped.
And then five common mistakespeople make when starting their
business.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
That's good to know.
Speaker 2 (24:01):
Yeah, I think that that is such an important one,
so I'm glad that's one of thetop ones.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
That one was weeks in the making because it was every
time something happened and Iwould just be like somebody got
bad advice on this, and I meanpeople that people that did what
they were supposed to.
They reached out to expertscause they're like I don't know,
and then they were given badadvice, and sometimes it was a
bad accountant or CPA, but a lotof times it was somebody that
wasn't a CPA that was out oftheir lane a little bit.
(24:27):
For example, I don't give legaladvice and sometimes lawyers
give accounting or tax adviceand it's not always the best.
So you know, we see some thingsand anyway, that was weeks in
the making because every timesomething like that would come
up I'd be like, oh yeah, thisneeds to go in that episode
because this is a big mistake.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Well, I think it's a really helpful episode for
anybody starting their newbusiness, because it tells you
exactly how to set everything upwithout making a big mess later
on.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
One of the biggest ones I remember from that is
using your personal checkingaccount to run your business.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
Don't do that and we tell people that, like all the
time I mean every day we havemultiple episodes about that and
that's not what this episode isabout.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
But don't do it.
Speaker 2 (25:07):
If you listen to this podcast, you would never do
that.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
No, that's true, we know y'all.
Tell your friends, becausethey're the ones doing it.
Tell your friends.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
So I wanted to ask you what your biggest win of
this podcast was, and if youdon't have an answer, I have one
, and then you can have sometime to think about it.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Yeah, you go first.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
Okay, I think the biggest win for me is the
personal finance series.
Probably close second would bethe S Corp series, but the
personal finance series justbecause I felt like that was
something that we got to share.
That was kind of an extensionof us personally and our
business.
We went through Dave Ramsey along time ago, right before we
got married, and it reallysignificantly changed our lives
(25:47):
and got us into the rightmindset, I think, of just saving
and putting into retirement andnot overspending and things
like that, which definitelyresulted in the success of our
business, because if yourpersonal finances are a mess, so
are your business financesusually.
So I love that we were able totake that and help people.
(26:11):
I mean, it's not necessarilyjust taxes, but we were able to
incorporate that as an episodeand I've received so many
messages on Instagram about thatseries, about how we inspired
people to turn their personalfinances around, and I love that
because it was so life-changingfor us.
I'm glad that we were able tohelp inspire other people to do
(26:32):
the same.
Speaker 1 (26:33):
That is a good one, because there's, you know,
there's business is one thing,but your personal finances.
There's a fear there thatpeople have just to get started
and they feel out of control,and it adds so much stress on
your life that you don't evenprobably realize until you're
out of that situation.
And people do it all the time.
People have success and build aretirement making much less
(26:56):
money than you probably make,and so it can be done.
You just need to get control ofyour money, get control of
yourself.
Speaker 2 (27:03):
And if you haven't listened to that series and
you're thinking, oh man, thatsounds awesome, you can go back.
It was last summer that we didthat and there's, I think, four
episodes.
But it goes into retirement andsavings and what we do
personally and I thought it wascool that we could just kind of
bring that over here to thepodcast.
And it still makes sense, sinceit's personal finance and then
(27:23):
help people and it's somethingthat we're both very passionate
about.
So I think those episodes arereally good because you can see
how passionate and you can hearhow passionate we are about all
of the personal finance stuff.
Speaker 1 (27:34):
That's a good one.
I like that.
So what was your?
Speaker 2 (27:36):
win.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
I really liked the S Corp series.
I mean, I mentioned earlierthat you know, one of my
favorite things was that peoplewould reach out that would say
like, even though we couldn'tbecome a client, we, we did do
the S election and save you know, a ton of money in taxes.
And that that's a big one forme, because I just I really hate
whenever I see a tax return andI see you know a schedule C and
(27:57):
the people are making over$200,000 in profit and they're
just, you know, paying so muchunnecessary money in
self-employment taxes.
That's a big one, you know.
I like to think that all ofthat extra savings some people
are saving you know $20,000 ayear just from doing you know
something that we recommended,and I like to hope that they're
using that to, I don't know, payoff debt to tie into what you
(28:19):
said with the personal finance,or invest an extra $20,000
towards retirement or whatever.
You know that money can go along way.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
Absolutely.
I know when we first startedthe business I was keeping like
a little tally because we didn'thave that many clients yet.
So you would say like I'msaving them like $40,000 a year
by converting to an S-corp and Iwas trying to keep a tally for
the year.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
So we could be like we've saved hundreds of thousand
dollars and people switching toS Corp.
Oh, like the billboards whereit's like the lawyers put like
billions of dollars insettlement.
Well, that's how much they'vegot all their clients in their
total career.
And it sounds like a big number, Well, and I guess it is
sometimes but yeah, we can saythat yeah.
I mean, okay, Like over thecourse of our years of doing
this now we have probably savedmillions of dollars in taxes.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
For sure, and I love it when you send out an email to
somebody and was likecongratulations, that was a
great move to go ahead and moveforward with S-Corp, because you
saved $19,750 this year and, oh, guess what?
You'll save that plus moreprobably next year if your
business grows.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Yeah, that is nice, and people are always excited,
especially when they've been,you know, already making money
before that and just hadn't madethat step.
So that's a big one, yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
I like those too.
We worked really hard on those.
So if you haven't listened tothose series, go back and take a
listen to those.
But the last thing that I wantto talk about is just moving
forward.
What is this podcast going tobe like?
Moving forward, what are ourplans for it?
All that stuff.
Speaker 1 (29:49):
Well, even though we'll only be coming out every
other week on episodes, I thinkthat certainly some of the
episodes, you can expect more ofthe same the latest changes and
updates to the tax code, thingsthat affect businesses or
individuals, because everybodythat owns a business is also an
individual, so we covered thatas well.
You know a lot of that willstill be happening.
Anything that y'all need toknow that is new information or
that we haven't talked about yet, we'll be putting out there,
(30:11):
for sure.
Speaker 2 (30:11):
And I feel like we have just so many more episodes
on our like.
We have an idea list forepisodes that we'll still be
rocking and rolling with theevery other week.
But you know, at some point ifwe feel like we've covered
everything as well as we can,you know we might go back down
to like a monthly episode oreven less, if we just feel like
we're repeating ourselves.
(30:32):
But at this point I don't feellike that's the case.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
No, not yet.
Speaker 2 (30:36):
And just a little I don't know side note we, I guess
, have liked podcasting so muchthat we're thinking of maybe
starting another podcast.
Speaker 1 (30:44):
If you love listening to podcasts and you want to
listen to one about somethingelse besides accounting and you
like the sound of our voicesthen, we do have one coming out.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
TBD, yeah, so yeah, we're thinking about doing
another podcast personal podcastwith the kids and so we've
enjoyed it so much that we wantto do another one, so I guess to
say that it was successful.
Speaker 1 (31:07):
I think we don't know exactly what it's going to be,
but in theory it will be aboutthings that we do in our lives,
things that we do with our kids,and a lot of times people think
oh, you know, your kids are sonice and they're so there.
You know, it seems like they.
You know your kids are so niceand they're so they're.
You know, it seems like they.
You know they don't spend a lotof time on screens and like,
what do you do?
How do you keep them occupied?
(31:28):
How do you make them so niceand so polite and so smart?
I don't know.
I mean, that sounds like I'mbragging on my kids and maybe I
am a little bit, but they reallyare great kids and so um that
third one though, oh, she'sspicy, she's spicy.
Well, she's just mad becauseshe's smarter than the rest of
us and she's bored by ourstupidity.
Speaker 2 (31:45):
Yeah, I think so.
But our oldest daughter, who isdefinitely just like your
stereotypical first kid she'sperfect and happy and everyone
loves her and she's theteacher's pet All the things
that you would think of as afirst child she wanted to start
a podcast and Carson's like, oh,that's a great idea.
And I'm looking at them likey'all are crazy.
(32:07):
Editing takes so much time anddoing all the things we can't do
.
Another podcast, I'm barelyholding it together as it is.
And then a couple of weeks wentby and I just kept thinking
about it, kept thinking about it.
Actually, that's actuallythat's a great idea.
So I completely changed my mind.
And our oldest, who's 10 now,she wants to learn to edit
podcasts and stuff.
(32:27):
So I think it'll be.
It'll be really fun for us andwe have a lot that we want to
share about our travels and thestuff we're doing with the kids,
like book clubs and things likethat.
So if you have kids and any ofthat sounds great, yeah, stay
tuned.
We'll definitely share about itat least once or twice on this
podcast for anyone that'sinterested.
And I think that's all we havefor our hundredth episode.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
All right, 100.
Woohoo.
Speaker 2 (32:51):
We should have brought like champagne or
something.
Speaker 1 (32:53):
Well, nobody would be able to see it here.
Okay, there we go.
That was the champagne cork,did you hear it?
Cheers Okay, there we go.
That was the champagne cork,did you hear it?
Speaker 2 (33:01):
Cheers.
Speaker 1 (33:02):
We did tell everyone it's Sunday morning earlier in
the episode, so I don't know ifit's a good look for us to start
chugging champagne this early,we have to wait till at least
noon.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
Yeah, carson's actually taking the kids to a
slide park, so probably not agood idea.
All right, well, thank you fortuning in.
I hope you know you guysenjoyed this episode.
It's a little bit behind thescenes and a little less serious
than our other episodes, liketaxes are so serious.
Speaker 1 (33:26):
You probably didn't learn anything you needed to
know, but you might have learnedsome stuff that you thought was
enjoyable.
Speaker 2 (33:30):
Maybe it's interesting, I don't know.
Maybe this will be our worstepisode ever.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Four downloads, yeah, and it's just our phones, and
it's just our phones.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
And our iPads.
It's just us All, right.
Well, until next time in ournext helpful episode.
Thank you so much for listeningto what your CPA Wants you To
Know.
Podcast.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
This podcast is intended to provide accounting
and tax information foreducational purposes only.
All tax situations are uniqueand should be handled with the
assistance of a tax professional.
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