R U Spending Too Much Time Alone?

Many new students learnt how to use online accounting software like Xero and MYOB Business Essentials during the Covid Period because they were working remotely from home. Most of those students thought we had just started working from home ourselves but we told them we’ve been online for over a decade.

The conversation topics that came up a lot was how can you work from home, do you get lonely, do you get distracted etc?

The reality is that our entire team work from home and once you are used to the discipline of working from home you can take lots of breaks when you need them and can focus better on customer service. I found some research that showed just how much time people are now spending alone.

Over 45yo’s and over are spending the most time alone

I wrote this blog after coming across this fascinating information because of something I recall Jo-Anne saying about starting your own bookkeeping business.

Apart from the challenges of understanding:

• how to market yourself,
• what questions to ask prospective clients to see if they are an ideal fit, and then
• how to start working for someone as a contractor

One of the biggest things I too realised when I started my first business was that you are doing a lot of the work alone. Most medium sized businesses have a dedicated staff member who performs each of the marketing, sales, office support and technical work but as a micro business owner you’re doing it all yourself.

This is OK when you are doing the work you know how to do, particularly if you enjoy it, but learning how to do the other things that you NEED to do is the challenge to do alone.

A decade of US Statistics

Up-skilling is the hardest part

When I first started out in the training business I was amazed that people would pay good money to be trained in how to use software. Then I began to realise that learning how to use software was something I LOVED doing so to be paid for passing that knowledge on was a great bonus.

When we started to create case studies about the businesses I was involved in or business owners that I worked with I realised the value of building case studies around the tasks that people perform using the software.

It can sometimes be a painstaking task of identifying each type of task or transaction and then building transactions around them but when we receive positive feedback about the courses and support materials it’s very rewarding.

Our Xero & QuickBooks Courses are based on the MYOB AccountRight training course case studies we created in the late 1990’s and update several times each year.

Once you’ve mastered the operations, customer service, digital marketing and financial bookkeeping side of your business your life becomes a bit more bearable if you’ve learnt some good time management and goal setting skills.

This is one of the reasons I am surprised that people sometimes spend over $40,000 buying a business where they perform professional services. The hardest part is up-skilling in all aspects of business but after 2 years or so the biggest value of being in any system is the lead generation side and you can do that yourself these days with Google Ads and Social Media.

It depends on your age bracket

When you look at the stats it makes sense when you spend more time alone or with co-workers, partners or children because you are normally at a different stage of your life.

We’ve found a much larger percentage of students starting their own bookkeeping business are over 45 years old. They normally have some qualifications, business experience and life experience so they make great bookkeepers.

Enrol into a Bookkeeping Academy Training Course package and get free membership of our bookkeeper talent pool. We’ll help you build your brand, get discovered online and start invoicing for your time.