Many freelancers are still holding onto techniques of age-old accounting, where paper-based processes rule the world, even though technology is available and waiting to replace paper. This in turn has led to a number of general mistakes and inefficiencies that not only make the freelance life harder, but also costs more money—in more ways than one—down the road.
Inefficiency: The Real Enemy
The paper method of accounting almost immediately creates a stunning lack of visibility that you can no longer afford to ignore. It not only makes it difficult to determine where money is coming into your business versus where it’s going out, but it also makes it much harder to identify small problems now before they become much bigger, more expensive problems.
Other signs that you’ve outgrown your accounting process are little things that, when added together, amount to a massive inconvenience. Why spend time (and gas money) coming into the office to sign paper check payments when you can digitally sign them from wherever business takes you? Why take hours of phone calls from vendors asking about the status of invoices when you could automatically send notification by opening and reviewing their invoices? Why spend more money on ink cartridges, paper and postage when sending payment electronically is less expensive?
To get paid, think about how much time you spend keeping track of open invoices in Microsoft Excel, or worse, by memory. Think about the wasted time spent driving to the bank and waiting in line to deposit checks. Now think of how this time could be put to better use.
Truth is, paper accounting methods were used for so many years not because they were the absolute best choice, but because there were no alternatives. Now that technology offers new options, there’s good and compelling reason to make a change.
Electronic Invoices: The Future is Here
Online invoicing in particular benefits small business owners everywhere in a wide variety of ways that go above and beyond simply sending professional invoices. Viewpost not only makes it free to send online invoices, but it’s now also easier than ever (and free) to track invoices through approval and payment scheduling to know when you’ll be paid. All funneled through a single online experience.
Sending invoices from Viewpost also allows you to sync invoices with your accounting software, further cutting down on the amount of important but largely redundant work required to keep everything up to date. Instead of generating an invoice and manually entering that information into your accounting software, why not have it all happen instantly, at the touch of a button? After all, that’s where the world’s moving.
Viewpost also empowers you to better manage your cash flow so you can make the most of opportunities to grow your business.
Just because something used to work doesn’t mean you have to keep using it forever (ask anyone who owned a laserdisc player during the 1980s). Viewpost provides a startlingly simple online invoicing service—in addition to a wide range of other solutions designed for freelancers everywhere—with access to the complete, actionable invoice and payment data you need to run a business and increase accounting efficiency
If you’d like to find out more about electronic invoicing or the ways Viewpost can help you grow your business, please don’t delay, contact us today.
