How to build your successful Immigration Practice

You’ve chosen your career path as an Immigration Consultant, but now what? How can you build a successful Immigration Practice when you are just starting out?

Here are five key steps to launching a successful practice. 

Step 1. Get the Right Education

The right education puts you on the fast track to success in your new career. The Immigration Consultant Diploma program is the national standard here in Canada to prepare you for a career as an Immigration Consultant. Ashton College offers this popular program online. It’s easy to apply and with flexible schedule options and instructors with real-world immigration experience, you will get a practical education that is nationally accredited and prepares you to succeed in the RCIC exam.

Step 2. Pass the Exam

Once you have graduated from an accredited Immigration Consultant Diploma Program, you can’t just go ahead and start Immigration business. First you must qualify for and pass the RCIC (Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant) Exam. A successful result on your exam allows you to legally practice as an Immigration Consultant in Canada. 

The right education will prepare you for the exam, but with so much at stake, many students like to take additional preparation courses to ensure they pass the exam on their first try. Ashton College offers a Live Online RCIC Entry to Practice Exam Prep Course that can give you extra practice and both a practical and psychological edge on exam day. The more familiar you are with the exam process and the kind of questions you might expect, the more confidence you will have when you are in the exam. 

Step 3. Choose your Niche

To set the stage for your business success, the best practice is to choose a niche specialty within the Immigration Consulting field. Decide who your target market is. You can focus on Business Immigrants, International Students, or Refugees. If you focus your business on a specific sector than you can build your reputation within that area and within your target market. 

It’s hard to market your services well if you are trying to attract everyone. It’s better to target a niche audience and focus your message and marketing.  A specialized Immigration Incubator offers you more in-depth education in this specific area so that you can choose your specialty early in your career and attract the right clients right away – setting your business up for short and long-term success. 

Step 4. Create a Marketing Plan

Once you have determined your niche, you have to have the ability to communicate what your unique offering is and you need to know where to find your target audience. A marketing strategy will help you articulate your key messages and plan out how you will attract your desired clients. 

It’s a wise investment to get some support in this area. An Immigration Incubator can offer workshops, guidance, and support to help you develop a marketing plan that is right for you and that will be effective in your target market and with your target audience.  IPZ, an incubator and accelerator that provides you with professional resources and guidance in this area. 

Step 5. Get a Mentor

It’s so much easier to be successful when an experienced mentor walks alongside your. To start Immigration business without the guidance of someone who has already been there puts you at a disadvantage vs. someone who has a mentor. A mentor can save you from going in the wrong direction, can help you understand the practical side of business and even help forge introductions to potential clients and business partners. 

This is where an incubator and accelerator can offer critical support. IPZ.ca offers mentorship opportunities exclusively to its members. It’s pretty hard to meet a mentor if you are just starting out in the business, so an Immigration Incubator that will provide this service for you is a worthwhile investment. 

Wherever you are on your professional journey, there are people and programs available to support you so you can help others achieve their immigration goals. 

Important Areas Immigration Consultants Need to Know

Thousands and thousands of people apply to come to Canada each year through Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC). These potential immigrants choose to come to Canada for a wide range of reasons: better living conditions, to rejoin family, acceptance of a job and many others. 

Taking an accredited immigration consultant diploma program is the first step in becoming a regulated Canadian immigration consultant and helping individuals with their applications to immigrate. However, standard applications aren’t all that an immigration consultant must be familiar with. There are a number of aspects that involve much more complex treatment and two of these include refugee immigration law and tribunal immigration law. There are specialized courses in both these areas to help immigration consultants expand upon their knowledge and work with the more extensive cases. 

What is Refugee Immigration Law and Why is it Important?

A refugee is described as someone who has left their former country and feels unable to safely return. To be determined a refugee in Canada, the individual must already be in the country – either at a port of entry, or after they’ve been admitted – and they must request “refugee protection”. In order to receive that protection, the refugee must go through a tribunal process that follows refugee immigration law practices. 

The person wishing to receive refugee protection and stay in Canada should contact a professional who has taken their immigration consultant diploma program and achieved regulated immigration consultant status. It would also be of the most benefit if the consultant has added a specific course in refugee immigration law. This expertise is important because the tribunal process requires a case to be prepared and those familiar with the immigration system and refugee immigration law in particular are the best individuals able to help make a successful case. 

It’s wise to begin preparing the case immediately upon requesting refugee protection so that everything is ready and in place at the time of the claim being presented to the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB). The IRB is an independent tribunal that serves solely to make decisions on immigration and refugee cases following immigration laws. IRCC is the body that will be responsible for the eligibility of a refugee claim, but the IRB Makes the decision on these claims and decides who is deserving of refugee protection.

While refugees make up a small part of overall immigration numbers in Canada, there are still a large amount of cases. Of the 321,035 immigrants admitted to Canada as permanent residents in 2018, 45,758 of them were protected persons and refugees – about 14%. This means that cases may take longer than hoped for the refugee, the immigration consultant and the tribunal, however, it does allow for the time to prepare a case. 

If, after the case is heard by the tribunal, it’s decided that the individual has reason to fear returning to their former country (for reasons of race, religion, political status, social group, etc.) they will be given refugee protection and will be able to apply for permanent residence in Canada. If the case is not favourable and the request for protection is denied, there may be an option for an appeal or a Canadian Federal Court review of the case’s outcome. 

It is important to know that anyone who is a security concern to the country, has committed human or international rights violations or has a criminal record is considered inadmissible to Canada. There are also other factors that may lead to someone being inadmissible. However, IRB does hold admissibility hearings to determine if someone has the right to be admitted under law. 

What is Tribunal Immigration Law and Why is it Important?

Tribunal immigration law is linked to refugee immigration law. As mentioned above, refugees must present their case to the IRB, however, the tribunal also deals with admissibility (as previously noted), detention review hearings (detention of foreign nationals and permanent residents), immigration appeals and refugee appeals. Therefore, for an immigration consultant to be able to represent a client before the tribunal, they must have completed an immigration consultant diploma program that includes a thorough understanding of tribunal immigration law. This may also include having taken a specific course in tribunal immigration to provide even more understanding of and information about the tribunal processes. 

Programs like the Immigration Consultant program online, certificate in Refugee Class Immigration Law and certificate in Immigration Tribunal Practice from Ashton College are good choices for a number of reasons. These programs are taught by leaders in the field of immigration who have represented others in the tribunal process. Ashton College was also one of the first west-coast education institutions to delivery an accredited immigration consultant program and has seen this program produce many well-accomplished consultants. 

Not every immigration consultant will want to take on the challenges of tribunal immigration law, but they must at the very least have a solid understanding of the process. However, it’s important to note that if a client ends up before the tribunal, it is far better for that client to have someone representing them that they have worked with and they trust. Therefore, being able to present cases to the tribunal is an aspect that will make an immigration consultant that much more valuable to their clients. 

Because of the various areas the IRB reviews, it is definitely challenging for an immigration consultant to be experienced in all aspects. There must be an understanding of and familiarity with the refugee process and the various appeal processes that go through the tribunals’ system. This means an immigration diploma program must go into the rules of the IRB, procedures for the various cases it sees and other aspects like removal orders, stays to removal orders, IRCC examinations and judicial reviews. Plus, there is a need for additional courses like those in refugee immigration law and tribunal immigration law.

Taking the time to get to know a potential client is just part of what an immigration consultant does. They must also have a thorough understanding of the range of immigration cases they may have brought to them when an individual is looking for help and expertise. While not every immigration consultant in Canada will wish to work with refugee and tribunal cases, it is essential that all consultants have a strong understanding of these cases and how they work in order to properly identify them and either represent a client or refer them to a fellow consultant.