Managing your small business is no easy task, especially when you don’t have the compliments of some online invoicing tools that are essential for small business owners coupled with competitors in your industry.
To properly manage your business, you must ensure that you have things put in place, especially your finances.
When it comes to financing management, creating an invoice is the best, but then it is also tasking when doing it manually.
Manual invoices can cause distractions and mistakes, making you miss out on growing your business easily.
However, invoicing is now much easier because of technology. There are different online invoicing tools such as ProInvoice to help make financial management much easier.
That is why in this article, we have for you reasons why online invoicing tools are important to your small business.
Why is Online Invoicing Tools Essential For Business?
1. Helps to Save time
One of the advantages of making use of online invoicing tools is that you get to save time.
Manual invoicing is tedious because it means that you have to do a lot of self-calculation, drawing, and accounting.
And all of these can be time-consuming especially when you are new to them. Online invoicing tools help save time because it is automated.
All you need to do is to fill in blank spaces and let the system do the calculation for you. Automatic calculation is only one of the ways that online invoicing tools help you to save time.
2. Improves Business Cashflow
With being able to create invoices more easily with online invoicing tools, you have time to focus on the cash flow of your business.
This means that you have time to expand your business, thereby improving your money income.
Also, with these tools, you can reduce delays in payment from your customers because you can easily send recurring invoices to remind them about payment.
By being able to avoid all the manual tasks of sending invoices by yourself, you are sure that there’s no way you will forget a client who owes you money.
3. Helps Reduce Business Error
Financial business error is detrimental to the existence of any small business.
With online invoicing tools, you can reduce errors in accounting because of the automatic calculation and record-keeping mechanism that comes with the tool.
During manual invoicing, because of all the tasks you have at hand, and already managing other activities in your company, error while calculating is almost inevitable.
4. Boosts Business Professionalism
Online invoicing tools such as ProInvoice help make your business look professional to your clients.
With the format and structure of your invoice, your client will be able to tell that they are dealing with a legit business.
Creating invoices on ProInvoice allows you to put your brand logo; having your brand logo on your invoices can help with professionalism and quick identity from your clients.
The client doesn’t have to wonder who an invoice is coming from. Also by receiving the invoice via mail, it shows that your company is moving with time.
5. Gives you Valuable Insight About Your Business Data
Another advantage that small businesses enjoy in using online invoicing tools is being able to have insight into their finance.
With a proper recording system that comes with the tool, business owners will be able to track their finances properly and know where a particular payment is made for example.
Having insight into your business will give you a proper plan on how to expand your business too.
Challenges Small Businesses Face without Online Invoicing Tools
Without making use of online invoicing tools, there are some challenges you will face as a small business. Below are some of these challenges which can cause setbacks in your business finances.
i. Time Consumption
When not making use of online invoicing tools, there will often be bad time management. This is because manual invoicing takes time.
While invoicing manually, because you need to be careful in creating the invoice for your client, making sure that you do not miss any details, you are bound to waste time.
And as they say, “time is money,” which means with bad time management, your business might not actualize the profit it ought.
ii. Prone to Human Errors
Errors are very bad for any company. As humans, we are prone to error, and this can lead to mistrust in your business by clients and potential clients.
Some common mistakes that can be made are leaving out of detail or wrong numbering. While in a haste to create and send your invoice, an error can happen.
iii. Late Payments
Late payment is another thing that not making use of an online invoicing tool can cause.
Clients whether new or old can sometimes forget to pay for the service you have provided. Since you are busy with other business activities, you may not remember to constantly remind these clients to pay up on time.
This can easily disrupt the cash flow of your business.
iv. Your Company will have an Inefficient Bookkeeping
Accurate bookkeeping is important for any company, especially a small business. With manual invoicing, you may lose track of payments that your company has made or clients have made to your company.
This can cause bad money management and planning for your business
v. There’s a Limit to Payment Options You Accept
Making use of online business tools makes you more than one payment option because the invoicing tool already has payment platforms that it accepts.
These platforms can help you receive money with ease, even from foreign clients. Whereas, the same cannot be said during manual invoicing.
vi. Shows some Lack of Professionalism
Manual invoicing can be unprofessional in some ways such as the absence of your company’s logo, or a mistake you have made while invoicing.
To have a professional brand, some things must be put in place, such as making use of an online invoicing tool in this new age.
vii. Difficulty Scaling
Manual invoicing is difficult to manage. Imagine sending invoices manually to many clients and making calculations for the account of your clients.
This can be a great task that can easily be cut by using an online invoicing tool.
Conclusion
There are ways to help make your small business more organized, one of which is using an online invoicing tool.
Having the time to manage your business finances and other activities in your business is one way of guaranteeing growth.
As a small business, you want to make sure that you are in vogue with technology and making things easier for your clients, that is why invoicing tools are important.
