Category: Small Business Productivity

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Want to use Dropbox to replace your USB thumb drive?

dropbox_cloud based storage for MYOB datafile backup

I wrote earlier in the week about Google Drive and asked the question about how it compares with Dropbox to store and share files in the cloud. Today we provide you with a free training tutorial video to show you exactly how Dropbox works. It’s simple.

Many people talk about dropbox as a means for storing files and sharing them with other people but it’s also important to realise that you can use dropbox as a backup solution to store important files like your MYOB datafile. It can also be a place where you store common documents that a group of people are working on.

Remember that when you backup to a place like Dropbox you are effectively keeping a copy of your file “off site”. If your building goes up in flames or your computers are stolen you still have access to those files!

A great feature about Dropbox is that many people can share a folder and as soon as a file is uploaded into a shared folder, or as soon as a shared file is modified you receive an instant notification in your system tray area (at the bottom right, near the time, of your Windows desktop).

FREE Outlook Course with MYOB & Xero Courses

EzyLearn FREE Student Inclusions logo

The Dropbox Training Course is included as a FREE Student Inclusion when you enrol into selected Office Admin and Bookkeeping Courses.

Watch the video below and start enjoying the benefits of cloud based computer storage. Remember to click on the heading of this blog to see the video at our blog site and subscribe if you want to receive these free tips automatically in your email.

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Want to see what MYOB looks like when it’s hosted in the cloud?

Remote_desktop_connection_icon for MYOB hosted in the cloudAs part of our Continuing Professional Development (CPD) program for our Bookkeeping Academy we write and inform about products and services that will help bookkeepers build their business and job seekers learn new skills to become more employable.

We recently wrote about companies that offer MYOB hosting. This enables companies to access their MYOB datafile from no matter where they are and it also enables remote contractors to manage a companies bookkeeping from their own homes. In this blog post we include a video demonstration about how easy it is to use MYOB in the cloud.

We spoke to John from Bluewave who use to promote his MYOB hosting services under the domain MYOBinthecloud.com (we think it’s a great name because it describes the service that he offered very accurately) and he was kind enough to give us a demonstration account so that we could give a hosted version of MYOB a spin. He said that they provide hosted solutions for more than just MYOB and we were able to create an invoice and email it using Microsoft Outlook.

The MYOB version we used in this demonstration is the stable version 19 (as opposed to MYOB AccountRight version 2011 that had a lot of bad publicity). The great news about MYOB is that it’s navigation hasn’t changed significantly for at least 10 years from our experience.

If you area reading this blog post via email, click on the heading to be able to see the video). If you want to ensure that you get each update as it is published via your email feel free to subscribe. If you want to create your own blog using WordPress and Google Feedburner learn how to create it in our WordPress course.

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Hundreds of businesses already use MYOB hosted in the cloud!

ozBeanz MYOB Approved Hosting Provider for MYOB in the cloud
Screen Shot from ozBeanz website

In our research about cloud based accounting software we discovered that MYOB have an approved hosting reseller program. This is a program where MYOB partners with companies who specialise in providing hosting services so that MYOB users can access their data file from anywhere.

We recently spoke to one of those hosting businesses and took their service for a test drive and it was amazingly quick and did everything we needed it to do. We were able to login, access the MYOB data file, create an invoice and email it via the cloud based hosting account!

[quote]This is a definite boon for Remote Contractors who provide bookkeeping services from their own home, like working mums.[/quote]

The term cloud means different things to different people and Heather Cox from asponline wrote an excellent article about hosted MYOB services. We spoke to the people at ozBeanz as well and they have been MYOB Approved Hosting Providers for many, many years.

Do you have any experience using MYOB in the cloud? If you do, we’d like to hear from you at our Facebook page.

Our MYOB training course is also in the cloud so you can complete all 5 MYOB courses no matter where you are.

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What is a PAYG tax table and how does it work?

ATO 2013 tax tables for online MYOB payroll training courseWe recently announced our updated MYOB Payroll Course videos and training workbook and were asked to explain PAYG tax tables in a bit more detail. We’ll explain tax tables using the data from the ATO website relating to tax tables for the 2013 financial year.

We recently witness a federal budget and there are usually some changes in each budget that relate to tax tables or tax thresholds. These tax tables simply define how much tax you pay for each threshold and the simplest way to describe it is to define the first category. This category is called the tax-free threshold and it is the level at which you don’t pay any tax. The annual pay for this level will be $18,200 from 1st July 2012 (the beginning of the next financial year). Any money you earn up to this level you don’t pay any income tax on.

Any money you earn over this tax-free threshold amount but less than $37,000 will be taxed at 19c per dollar.

The most important thing to note is that just because you earn $50,000 doesn’t mean you will be taxed at 32.5c in every dollar you earn. You’ll be charged

  1. zero for the first $18,200, 
  2. 19% from $18,200 to $37,000 and then 
  3. 32.50% for each dollar over $37,000.
Stay tuned for more bite size chunks of knowledge in the coming weeks as we evolve our MYOB Payroll training course. Make sure you subscribe to receive these posts via email.
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We help you in the “Do More Make Less” Australia

Australian employment share by activity - bookkeeping services using MYOBWe were spilling through the recent federal budget information (as you would) and found some interesting facts that we wanted to share. We were actually looking for the new tax tables to explain more about how they work for our recently updated MYOB Payroll Course, but thought the information was enlightening. It’s also another reason to learn how to use MYOB so you can perform bookkeeping tasks!

We found it relevant because our online MYOB and Excel training courses provide education and new skills for individuals to participate in the provision of services in Australia’s knowledge based economy. Is all that jargon too much? It just means that more and more workers are being paid for using their brains and skills to perform tasks (like bookkeeping) and less on making or growing stuff.

You might also be reassured by our relatively low and constant unemployment rate.

And, just in case you weren’t aware, our online MYOB training courses include

  1. Training Videos
  2. Training workbooks with exercises and
  3. Knowledge review to test your skills

PLUS they come with LIFETIME student access so you can have access to new content as it is created for no extra cost.

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Get a WordPress mobile site because Google says 75% need it

Google Smartphone mobile usage stats - get a WordPress websiteWe recently wrote about WordPress plugins that are available for websites built using the WordPress CMS (Content Management System) that enables the website to be viewed better on a mobile phone and statistics provided by Google (which you can check out and dive into yourself) show that we are one of the world leaders in mobile phone adoption.

Interestingly just under 25% of Australian smartphone owners used the website browsing capabilities of their phone to perform job searches!

We made the decision to use WordPress for our website several years ago (and build a WordPress Training Course) because it is:

  1. An open source solution
  2. Used by millions of website owners around the world
  3. Supported by plugin and themes developers

With the importance of Google searches to bring inquiries to your business and the adoption of Smartphones every business needs to have a website that:

  1. Looks Professional (using inexpensive WordPress themes)
  2. Can be viewed easily on a smartphone
  3. You can update yourself!

Check out the Google OurMobilePlanet website and get all sorts of interesting stats for yourself.

 

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MYOB Payroll (Processing Pays) Workbook now available

Payroll is one of the most significant costs involved in operating a business and also represents the main form of income for Australian workers. Our MYOB course development for the coming months is focused on increasing the depth of skills taught about how to handle Payroll using MYOB accounting software.

TFN Declaration Form - MYOB (processing pays) Payroll training course and workbookThe beta version of our latest training guide for Payroll is now available as part of the 17 new MYOB training tutorial videos we have produced for the MYOB Payroll course. The videos provide the visual demonstrations for the tasks that are covered in the workbook and the workbooks provides you with step by step instructions about how to load tax tables, create employees, process pays and perform reconciliation and end of year tasks regarding payroll.

Our MYOB Payroll case study for the course involves a hair styling salon that employs staff to operate their salon. Follow their journey as new employees come on board.

There will be more to come so make sure you subscribe so you can receive these blog posts via your email. We’ll also be producing some Excel spreadsheet files for students to use regarding payroll and we’ll have some free demonstration videos as well.

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Need help with Payroll and MYOB?

help with MYOB Payroll and Superannuation SG online training course and supportWe use the EzyLearn blog to inform new and existing students about new course content, tips and tricks and free training that we make available from time to time. Today we are announcing the completion of the workbook and training videos for our online MYOB training courses.

Our MYOB Payroll course has been created and you’ll soon be able to learn how to create employee cards, setup the payroll tax tables, choose wage categories, pay benefits, superannuation information, perform a payroll run, send pay slips, generate payroll advice reports, pay your SG liabilities, reconcile your super and wages payments and print out payment summaries.

Although the course has been created we are finalising the knowledge review questions that are used as part of our assessments for students who want a certificate after they complete their MYOB training course.

Did you know that our LIFETIME student membership entitles you to review the training material (including videos and workbooks) for the rest of your working life? This includes new content, so enrol now at today’s prices and have access to MYOB training course content for life!

Stay tuned for more updates in the coming week! IF you are not a subscriber, subscribe here.

 

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Every WordPress website can look great on a smart phone

WordPress Plugin WPTouch shows your website on smart phoneIf you have read our blog on your Smart Phone lately you might notice that it is reasonably easy to read on a smart phone. The images in this blog post show the difference between a WordPress website and a WordPress website that uses a free plugin that makes them easy to read on a smart phone, it’s called WP Touch.

We mentioned the great service from Google earlier this week that shows you what your website looks like on a mobile and how it’s also linked to the partnership that Google have with MYOB Atlas in Australia.

We mentioned also that WordPress is a free software program used by Millions of website owners around the world. We installed a simple free plugin to create a much better reading experience (see the image on the left).

Our online WordPress course with LIFETIME access shows you how to install Plugins to get much more functionality out of your WordPress website and blog system.

The best part of WordPress is that it is used by Millions of developers around the world, who are developing Plugins, themes and many other exciting tools to enable you to create great websites, cheaply.

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Signatures make Outlook sexy

Microsoft-Outlook online training course and supportSometimes we release training videos for free to help our readers and students and also demonstrate the quality of the videos in our online training courses for Microsoft Office, MYOB accounting software and WordPress Content Management Systems.

Today we release a training video that demonstrations via video how to create your own signature in Microsoft Outlook. I personally prefer to use Google Apps for my email because of its SPAM capabilities as well as the fact that I can log in from any web-enabled computer and send/receive emails.

In this video Allison demonstrates an easy way to create a signature, format the text, insert an image (our logo) and save it. She then looks at associating that signature with new email messages as well as replies and forwards. You might be aware that Outlook enables you to setup many different email addresses and this great tool can be used for each of them.

If you are reading this blog post via email, click the heading to see the video at our blog site. If you want to start receiving these via your email inbox feel free to subscribe. Want to see our range of online training courses?

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Accept credit cards with your iPhone, Android or iPad?

 

Accept credit cards with your iPhone, Android or iPad – Square webWhen we first started our computer training centre in Dee Why on Sydney’s Northern Beaches we used a Merchant Account from the National Australia bank and rented a credit card terminal. In this scenario there was a

  • setup fee,
  • initial deposit,
  • minimum term,
  • monthly fees and
  • transaction fees for every sale.

Plus, if you weren’t a good negotiator you would pay some ridiculous transaction fee on every sale.

Things have come a long way with the recent announcement in Australia by PayPal of their Paypal Here service that turns a smart phone into a credit card processing machine! It’s also very similar to the Square concept that has been available in the US for some time.

You now don’t need a merchant facility with a bank to receive credit card payments from customers. You can get a tiny device that attaches to your smart phone to accept credit card payments and you can just bump smart phones to transfer funds. If you are reading this blog post as an email, click on the heading to get to our blog site and watch the Paypal Video.

Paypal enables you to pay internationally by using a paypal account and that account can be attached to your bank account as well as your credit card so it may become your one payment method. We use Paypal as our payment gateway for course enrolments and as a result students can enrol from all over the world and companies can even pay with an eCheck!

With no setup or monthly fees your business could start accepting credit card payments using its own business paypal account and stay tuned for some new training material for bookkeepers using MYOB to perform bank reconciliations using a Paypal account.

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Did you know that WordPress is free Website Building software?

EzyLearn Online Training Course Website for MYOB, Excel and WordPressMany people think that creating a website is complicated and expensive but it’s not and here’s why. WordPress is an open source program which means that anyone is free to download and use the software (for building websites). 

The only complicated parts of using WordPress to create your own professional website is installing it on your hosting and using the right combination of words and images to encourage people to call you, complete a form or order from you. Even getting a professional new logo for your business is now cheap and fast using crowdsourcing.

Our online training website where we deliver one of Australia’s most popular MYOB Online Training Courses is built using WordPress and we have a WordPress course that teaches you how to use the software.

The other piece of great news for small businesses that want a website is that you can choose from thousands of professionally designed “themes” that cost from zero, free and zilch to a modest amount like $50-$200.

For tricky parts including buying a domain name (use companies like NetRegistry or MelbourneIT) where you can buy a domain name for less than $20 pear year and hosting you can find from thousands of large and small providers.

NEW: We use and recommend Rose Hosting and SiteGround

The hardest job when you have a company website is that you should be adding to, editing and improving your website every week by creating new and relevant content that Google Search Engines collect and then share freely with people who are looking for you. That’s called Content Marketing!

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Can you really setup a VoIP phone system in 5 minutes?

Sometimes we use this blog to let you know about other projects we are working on and companies that we partner with. Today we share some information about VIRION and their great new phone system for small businesses.

Small Business Phone system using VoIPOur online training courses are a form of “cloud” based service. For example, you can access the MYOB training courses from anywhere in the world using just a username and password. It’s the same for small business phone systems using VoIP technology. You can purchase a small business telephone system for under a thousand dollars, plug it into your broadband internet, configure it in 5 minutes and start making and receiving calls from anywhere.

Best of all you can:

  1. Take your phone number with you when you move
  2. Port your Telstra number across and save a lot of money
  3. Get professional features like voicemail to email and much more.
  4. Save hundreds of dollars per month in call charges

We’re now using virion business grade VoIP and we’re also creating some training videos for them to educate their dealer network. Take a look at a quick and simple training video we created.

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Send debt collection letters using Microsoft Word from within MYOB

LIFETIME online training course access for MYOB, Excel and WordPressAre you using the Microsoft Word templates that come with MYOB? They are a great way to combine the data in your MYOB accounting software with the layout power of Microsoft Word. It’s also a great way of avoiding the emotions involved in chasing money, particularly if it is long overdue. Using Word Templates with MYOB enable you to maintain a professional, well planned approach to your finances.

This blog post contains a new video that will form part of our MYOB online training course. This course delves into the deeper parts of MYOB using some fancy and very handy features of the software. If you are receiving this blog post via email, make sure to click on the heading to get to our blog site to access the free video.

We won’t go into too much description here as the video speaks for itself, but we want to let you know that this new suite of videos will be available for existing students for no extra charge as part of our LIFETIME online training course access feature we announced in January 2011. If you want to receive our blog posts via email, just subscribe at our blog site.

Enjoy..

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Do you have to compete against workers from Bangladesh and The Philippines?

Philippines Remote Workers and Virtual AssistantsHigh Speed Internet, Software as a service, Crowd-sourcing websites, cloud-based services. They are all making it easier for small business owners to hire workers from anywhere in the world for rates that are much lower than Australia’s minimum wage.

I have written several blog posts about these new and exciting developments because they finally give small business owners the ability to hire like many large Australian companies. Finally, your local small business can have a professional logo or website without having to pay thousands of dollars. This might not be a good thing for Australian workers though…

I was interested to read an article about the PURGING of the professions in the Sydney Morning Herald because it highlights the huge issues that might face our workforce in the decades to come. There is one thing that does stand out in all this glum scenario and that is the value of Australian Qualifications, the ability to speak English (with an Australian accent) and the value of Continued Professional Development (CPD) to be current in your knowledge.

Most importantly it is important for Australian workers to be as aware as possible about software that can greatly improve their “productivity” so you can get more done in less time.

If you are not subscribed to this blog you can do so at this link. We have some exciting new announcements and new content for both Advanced Excel and some extra features using the latest version of MYOB AccountRight Plus so stay tuned.

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New Training Material: Advanced Microsoft Excel 2010 videos

Excel Online Training Course 308 - pivot table value field settingsSometimes we use the EzyLearn blog to provide some free tips from new training material that we create, like manipulating Pivot Tables we mentioned earlier in the week. Today we are announcing that 14 new training videos are now available for our advanced Microsoft Excel course (number 308).

This is the list of videos that are now available:

Video for 3.1.1 – Using AutoFilter

Video for 4.1.1 part 1 – Cleaning up data using AutoFilter

Video for 4.1.1 part 2 – Cleaning up data using AutoFilter

Video for 5.1.1 – Perform an Advanced Filter

Video for 5.1.2 – Advanced Filter using Wildcards (search text within cells)

Video for 5.1.3 – Advanced Filter for multiple search criteria

Video for 5.1.3 – Narrowing search results using Advanced Filter

Video for 6.1.1 – Inserting a Pivot Table

Video for 6.1.2 – Filtering data in a Pivot table

Video for 6.1.3 – Sort dates by month in a pivot table

Video for 6.1.5 – Changing the value field settings in a pivot table

Video for 7 – Creating pivot table charts

Video for 8.1.1 – Get months values using the Choose function

Video for 8.1.2 – Show grades for student results data using CHOOSE function

 

Our new video references match the many exercise tasks you can complete to master the skills taught in the videos. Everything you watch in the videos you can re-produce using the exercise files that come with the course. The training workbooks contain step by step instructions so you can print them out and practice where-ever you are.

If you are an existing EzyLearn student with LIFETIME access you’ll have access to these new videos and all new content that we create. Stay tuned for more updates soon as we create new videos for the other advanced Excel topics covered in courses 308 and 309. Plus we’ll show you how to create your own macros.

If you like what you read and want to enrol to take advantage of lifetime student access as well as access to all levels of Microsoft Excel for just one price, use our enrolment form. Enrol into the Excel course today and start by 5pm tomorrow (next business day).