Search Results for: cloud accounting

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Is Credit Management Just About Getting on the Phone?

comp_credit-management_bookkeeping-business

It’s Good Business to Set Out Your Credit Management Policy at the Outset

CRITICAL TO THE SUCCESS OF ANY BUSINESS is the ability to maintain a healthy cash flow. But doing so requires effective credit management processes.

Unfortunately, too many business owners feel uncomfortable talking about credit and debt management upfront with new clients.

They (falsely) believe it begins if, and when, a customer doesn’t pay a bill. But, in fact, credit management starts much, much earlier than that — long before the two businesses even agree to work with each other, to be precise.   Continue reading Is Credit Management Just About Getting on the Phone?

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Is Your Resume Costing You a Bookkeeping Job?

It’s easy to spot bad Microsoft Word skills

203 Microsoft Word Beginners Courses for sales letter, flyers, resumes, cover letters and tender proposalsWe’ve had several hundred bookkeepers Pre-Qualify for our National Bookkeeping, Bookkeeper Directory and most of them upload a resume demonstrating their qualifications, experience and references but I’m baffled at how bad the formatting is in these resumes!

To help our students do the best job presenting themselves on paper we’re including the Microsoft Word Course for free when you enrol into either the MYOB Courses or Microsoft Excel Courses (when you choose the all courses and 12 months access with Certificate option). That’s a saving of $267!

Resume writing tips for bookkeepers

Here are some tips we’ve published in the past:

The problem with making mistakes with your Microsoft Word formatting is that questions could come up in an interview. The Interviewer might throw in a question about software skills, particularly if you’ll be writing some detailed reports or proposals, forecasts etc. in the new job.

Online Training Course special offers for MYOB, Xero, Excel, Word and more
Click the image to see our current special offers!

Here are some extra tips for Bookkeeper resumes

Most of the Microsoft Word skills you need to write a good resume are covered in our Word Intermediate Courses, but we’re including the entire 9 courses so you can become a power Microsoft Word user! Here are a couple other things to think about when writing you resume:

  1. Include an image – it makes you stand out and brings the reader closer (make it a selfie where you’re smiling 🙂
  2. Use tables or “Set tabs” to make columns line up
  3. Headers and Footers demonstrate a sophisticated knowledge of Word
  4. Include your full name and desired role in the filename (we’re all using files these days! use it to your advantage)

The last one about filenames is a big one because if interviewers are like me they’ll put all the resumes for one role into a folder and I find myself renaming most of them!

FREE Microsoft Word Workbook

We spend a lot of time on marketing so I assume that you know we offer free samples of our training material, but I should mention again that the Microsoft Word sample is actually the entire Word Beginners Course 201 Training Workbook, make sure you get it! Get it now.

Quickbooks Course Update

intuit-quickbooks-accounting-software-training-courses-logoIt’s been a while in the making, but we have the final draft of our Quickbooks Course workbook! Unlike some training companies, we write up a detailed course story based on a real business scenario and use that as the basis for recording our screen videos that demonstrate how to use the software. We’ve had a huge number of Course Alert Registrations and they’ll ALL receive a free copy of the workbook, so if you haven’t already registered do it NOW!

EzyLearn Wholesale Partner Update

earn money working from home using and teaching how to use MS Office, MYOB, WordPress, Facebook, Xero and moreI made a brief reference to our new Enrolment Voucher system in a recent post about BAS deadlines and we’ve got an update. The new enrolment voucher system is now in beta testing which means we’ll shortly be inviting EzyLearn students who love our courses to receive a massive wholesale discount on selected courses. Make sure you register your interest.

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Bad Payers Cost 12 Working Days to Collect $13,200

flowchart of the cash conversion cycle

Credit Management is an Extra Job

credit-management-training-assessment-management-and-enforcement

I’ve always believed that as soon as you offer credit you’ve got yourself another business – a credit management business.

When we first created our MYOB Daily Transactions course we designed it to take students through the cashflow process of where money goes when it first leaves your bank account and these are the main steps:

  1. Money in the bank (cash asset)
  2. Buy stock (inventory asset)
  3. Products sold on account (accounts receivable asset – Trade Debtors)
  4. Customer pays their account (cash asset)

The interesting part of this business process to me is the marketing (choosing the products, pricing, marketing message and advertising) and the credit management to get the money back.

Continue reading Bad Payers Cost 12 Working Days to Collect $13,200
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BAS Service deadline looming – BAS Audits, self assessment and benchmarks

BAS Service, compliance anxiety and cash-flow

MYOB GST, reporting and BAS training coursesIt’s that crazy time when the end of financial year TAX and quarterly BAS periods combine to cause compliance anxiety for business owners and managers if they don’t have a handle on their bookkeeping processes and accounts. This is often caused by not having the best team available for all the tasks required and I spent some time during the week speaking with Tracey our MYOB, Xero and Quickbooks Trainer from Rockingham in WA about the different levels of bookkeepers and whether they could complete tasks relating to a BAS Service. Here’s some of the information that I thought you’d find useful.

Getting receipts as evidence

The biggest issue that many bookkeepers experience is getting information from business owners, particularly small businesses that are stretched between:

  • the work they need to do every day
  • Keeping and filing the financial records like receipts
  • Getting the financial records to a bookkeeper or accountant

I’ve written in the past about the ways that small businesses file their receipts as well as cloud technology like Shoeboxed (who now seem to prefer selling their services to accountants and bookkeepers and have removed the educational video that demonstrated how the software works!), but Quickbooks Online has a downloadable app that enables business owners to capture a photo of each receipt for each transaction and if business owners utilise this function they can save a lot of money in data entry and evidence of expenses that could be expected as part of a BAS audit by a BAS agent.

BAS Audits, red flags and tricky GST codes

I’ve mentioned in a previous blog that you can hire a cheap bookkeeper to take care of your data entry and only use the services of a more expensive bookkeeper (ie. BAS agent) for purposes of confirmation of expenses and the GST components of these expenses. In this case a simple BAS audit involves witnessing these source documents to confirm that there is no error in calculating the money owed to the ATO. If you’ve had any of the following transactions you’ll probably need to pay close attention to the information in your BAS lodgement and mention them to your bookkeeper:

  • Purchasing a motor vehicle
  • Motor vehicle expenses
  • Real property purchase
  • Any purchase coded as a GST-Free transaction
  • Low value purchases (under $82.50) that are coded as GST free
  • Purchase of second hand trading stock
  • Hire Purchase contracts
  • Local fees and handling charges for imp

Learn more about BAS Audits by BAS Agents and the benchmarking and self assessment that ATO use and recommend

TIP!: Bank feeds can cause more work!

I’ve written a lot about bank feeds in the past and included a blog post about how bank feeds work in MYOB and Xero. Bank feeds can be a real time saver because they automatically bring your bank transaction records into your accounting software, but Tracey mentioned that in MYOB you should bring them in BEFORE you do any reconciliation tasks otherwise you may need to undo any reconciliation work you’ve already done so watch out for that!

Need One-to-One training or a QuickFix on MYOB, Xero or Quickbooks?

We did a lot of one-to-one training when we operated our physical training centres in Sydney and the training was often completed at our training centre (because we had it!). Now I’m thrilled to advise that we’re helping local bookkeepers in your area deliver MYOB and Xero training according to our profession course structures! To learn more visit the National Bookkeeping training page. You’ll also discover that our bookkeepers area also available to fix problems or lack of knowledge with the QuickFix service so check that out.

Coming up..

Here is what we are currently working on and what will soon be published or made available at our LMS.

  • Guide to Credit Management (aspects of a business and your accounting software where you can tighten your credit management processes). We’re creating this guide in conjunction with the local bookkeeper at National Bookkeeping
  • Xero Course training material update (workbooks and videos are being updated and added as we speak so stay tuned for more announcements soon
  • Wholesale training course and partner offer – we’ve beefed up our Enrolment Voucher system to help more business buy cheap courses
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Xero now looks like Quickbooks Online and MYOB needs an upgrade

Xero, Quickbooks and the plus button

xero-dashboard-is-starting-to-look-like-the-quickbooks-online-dashboard-xero
The Plus button in Xero

We’re currently completing new, updated content for our Xero courses and one thing stood out more than anything else – the PLUS button in the top right hand corner! If you are familiar with Intuit Quickbooks you’d immediately recognise that their PLUS in the top centre of the screen is how you access most of the software’s features and I’ve always liked how easy it makes navigating the software. If you compare the two of them you may think that the Xero software still has some way to come.

The other thought I had about this change is “how much will Xero change its user interface”? People get used to how to navigate around a software program (User Experience) and don’t want things to change too much and that has been a great feature about MYOB – their navigation has remained fairly consistent for two decades.

Will cloud services be upgraded like their computer software peers of the naughties?

Microsoft might be the inspiration for change for Xero because although most of the formulas and functions in Microsoft Excel remain the same, the way you navigate around the software changes every 3-6 years. This is a boon for the larger software training companies that charge extra for courses in the different versions (we include all versions for the one price of course 😉 but it can be frustrating for staff who have to re-learn how to navigate the software and their spreadsheets when the office software is updated.

xero-dashboard-is-starting-to-look-like-the-quickbooks-online-dashboard-quickbooks
The PLUS menu in Quickbooks has more features

While we are on the topic of upgrades and how annoying they are I received an email from my accountant to upgrade the MYOB version that we share so that she can access the files to work on them! I can say for sure that I once again felt that MYOB are behind the timeline as they fight to stay in control when looking at how they develop their software compared to the other accounting programs like Xero and Quickbooks where the software is updated and live.

Testimonials for Xero, MYOB and Microsoft Excel courses

On a different note, I asked our web guy to get some information about where our students are located around Australia and at the same time get some of their testimonials quotes onto our website. He’s not finished yet, but when I see the different suburbs from all over Australia I reflect on the same picture over 10 years ago when we were operating physical training centres in Sydney’s North Shore, Northern Beaches and Parramatta and our students were located within 20kms of each centre.

It’s a wonderful feeling to see students doing our courses from all over Australia but it’s even better when we see enrolments from UK, Canada, US and Hong Kong because it shows the true power of cloud based services.

When you want to become a Registered BAS Agent

Start a bookkeeping business not a franchiseLast week I wrote about starting a bookkeeping business while you are working your day job and I just want to add a note that may be very useful for those who want to become a registered BAS agent. National Bookkeeping offer a BAS lodgement service through our licensees and it is a great way for qualified bookkeepers (who have their Cert IV in Bookkeeping or Accounting) to work with an organisation and build up the hours they need to register as a BAS agent via the Tax Practitioners Board.

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How Much Should You Pay for Bookkeeping Business Marketing

Bookkeeping business marketing includes price, packaging and the marketing message

michael-locke-talks-about-marketing-and-it-applies-to-bookkeeping-businesses-tooI had an opportunity to interview the man who managed the entire marketing program for Dyson when they came to Australia from the UK and helped Dyson become a phenomenal success and a leading brand in Australia. Michael Locke pointed out very clearly in that interview that product (and service) design, including packaging and pricing, is one of the pillars of good marketing – one of the Four P’s and Bookkeeping Business marketing is the same. Watch the video to learn more.

Many bookkeepers, particularly those starting a new bookkeeping business after coming from the corporate accounting world, think in terms of earning dollars per hour and days per week whether they work short term or several days a week so a big part of our bookkeeper induction into National Bookkeeping is to help manage their calendar for multiple clients and clients of different sizes.

Business plans, spreadsheets and other templates for bookkeepers

bookkeeping-basics-free-education-guideIt’s not hard to find a template for a business plan and if you are good at spreadsheets or have used Microsoft Excel in the past you’ve probably already got some good “templates” to work with. Things like business cards, flyers and prospect questionnaires are included in the National Bookkeeping licence but again I’ve met many bookkeepers who spend money on graphic design, websites and flyers before they even “advertise” their message to potential clients and I often ask how important that really is considering most clients make a decision based on the person they communicate with for bookkeeping work.

We include our Microsoft Excel Course – all 9 in the licence. We also include the MYOB and Xero courses and if you let us know you’d like to be promoted as a local face to face trainer for MYOB we’ll work to connect you to businesses who want to learn how to use these programs for their business.

While I’m at it I should mention that our Beefed Up Bookkeeping Basics – Level 2 workbook is included in the licence as well as a number of new workbooks, guides and other content that we are currently working on!

Less work for you and a team to help you succeed

deb-crompton-bookkeeper-from-mandurah-wa-local-myob-and-xero-portrait-smlI’m writing this post because I’ve had several conversations with Deb, our Mandurah Bookkeeper licensee, and we’ve managed to focus most of our time on constructive marketing content for blogs, flyers and other material that we’re working on together to get her discovered in her local area. There’s work that Deb needs to do but its focused on customer service and helping local businesses rather than on marketing.

The other aspect of starting a bookkeeping business as a National Bookkeeping licensee is that the

  1. Cost is very low
  2. Mark and I are able to provide mentoring support to our licensee to help them during the various stages of their bookkeeping business
  3. Our content marketing team can focus on building a great story around you, and
  4. We can leverage the national marketing reach of our existing websites

Something small business clients like is that National Bookkeeping licensee are vetted during the Pre Qualification process so they feel confident that they are working with high calibre bookkeepers (and even qualified accountants with corporate experience).

Looking for experienced bookkeepers in Brisbane/Gold Coast and Melbourne

We’ve received interest from small businesses in Melbourne and are also looking at expanding our marketing in Brisbane Gold Coast so if you are looking for more clients and want to be part of something bigger Pre Qualify now.

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Release: New Training Guide for Basic Bookkeeping

The meaning of basic bookkeeping terms

You don’t need to know double entry bookkeeping to complete our online MYOB, Xero and Quickbooks Courses but the more you know the better. We include educational videos about basic bookkeeping terms in our bookkeeping courses and they were created by Jacci a Registered BAS agent, but we’ve also created a separate bookkeeping basics guide that is available to you for free.

Receive payments MYOB payment termsThese are the types of terms I am talking about:

  • General Ledger
  • Chart of Accounts
  • Trial Balance
  • Tax codes like FRE, N-T, GST and CAP
  • How to create proper tax invoices
  • Cash and Accrual accounting
  • Income and Expense accounts
  • Sales & Purchases vs Cashbook
  • Debits/Credits
  • Change in Debit and Credit accounts
  • Credit Control
  • Debtors and Creditors report

When you perform the daily bookkeeping tasks for a business you focus on the tasks at hand like:

  • buying goods on account,
  • paying bills,
  • making sales and generating invoices and then
  • keeping track of the payments and receipts.

When you learn how to do these tasks using accounting software you don’t need to understand all the debits, credits and double entry of accounting because the software takes care of it for you.

invoicing and purchases in MYOBThe most popular of our MYOB courses is the Daily Transactions Course 502 because it takes students through a typical scenario of the accounting transactions of a VoIP telephone system supplier and installer.

This telephone company is very similar to a plumber, electrician, builder and most tradespeople because they combine products and services in their invoices. They’ll also often hold an inventory of items they sell regularly and they need to purchase items specifically for a job they are working on for a client.

If you are looking to take on all the bookkeeping tasks for a small business you’ll need to know all aspects of how to use accounting software but if you are just looking for data entry or an accounts payable and receivable job the Daily Transactions course may be all you need.

Read about the contents of this course here or delve in deeper into the case study examples of the MYOB Daily Transactions Course Workbook.

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Intuit Quickbooks is NOT listed as SuperStream Compliant

Quickbooks is not on the ATO Certified Product Register for Payroll Software that’s Superstream compliant

Intuit Quickbooks offers a free Windows app twice as fast - did MYOB make the right choiceWe had a call just last week about our forthcoming Intuit Quickbooks course from someone who wants to use it for their payroll and to manage payroll compliance. This student mentioned that they had been to the official ATO website and couldn’t find Quickbooks on there anywhere! We delved a little deeper and confirmed that Intuit, nor Quickbooks appeared anywhere on the Superstream Certified Product Register. The much smaller SAASU was there and so was Intuit’s old Australian distributor, Reckon, but there was no sign of Intuit and here’s why – they partner with KeyPay who provides all payroll related capabilities of Quickbook – currently for no extra money.

But it took even more effort to find Keypay because the Australian company who makes Quickbooks preferred Payroll software is called something different again – they’re called Webscale Pty Ltd!

Free Intuit Quickbooks Course Workbook for everyone who Pre-registered (no charge)

If you’re thinking of switching to Intuit Quickbooks in the cloud I hope this helps make a better informed decision. If you are interested in receiving a free copy of the Intuit Quickbooks training course we are about to launch make sure you visit our QuickBooks Course page and pre-register.

Check out the ATO Certified Product Register and while you’re at it check out Intuit’s statement on their compliance for SuperStream and another on their partnership with ClickSuper.

[button link=”http://ezylearnonline.com.au/cloud-accounting/quickbooks-training-course/” color=”green” newwindow=”yes”] Register for Free Quickbooks Training Course Workbook[/button]

 

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Is MYOB really a CRM and which CRMs are best for people in sales?

CRM = Customer Relationship Management

THE PURPOSE OF HAVING a CRM is so that when you call one of your clients or prospects, you know everything about them and can start a conversation based on what they’re looking for — their needs.

This might seem a little strange when you think about it because you could be out of date with your info (say you’ve entered old information on this particular client) but, casting this quibble aside, CRM’s are generally a terrific way to provide excellent customer service, on a consistent basis, and this is often the competitive edge that will you need to stay in business. (I’ve written a little comparison of real estate agent CRM’s but I wanted to add a couple other ones to the mix for good measure.)

Accounting Software and CRMs

Cloud CRMs that integrate with MYOB AccountRight - online training coursesIn the early days, MYOB used every aspect of their software to sell itself to small business clients.

The fact that the software enabled business to keep contact details and search for past orders was a good reason to call the software a CRM.

However, times have moved on and even with powerful and well known CRM brands like Salesforce, there seems to be dozens of CRM providers to choose from, with prices ranging from $15 per month/ per seat to over $150! In fact if you head over to MYOB’s Add-On Centre you’ll find plenty of CRM’s that now integrate with their software.

We are now entering the integration phase of software development – which cloud-based services integrate with other services you’re using – and we wrote an article at the beginning of the year about a home appliances technician who uses accounting software integrations on his tablet to run an efficient and profitable little business.

Real Estate Agent CRM’s

best-real-estate-agent-crmsOne thing that has become apparent to our team lately (we’re working on social media marketing for real estate agents) is the difference in mindset between bookkeepers and real estate agents and if you think about it for a second it makes sense.

Bookkeepers are usually people who just want to get themselves into their work and sort out the financial and accounting details whereas real estate agents want to find big shiny things to sell and earn a commission based income.

It’s the classic back office versus front office personality style, the salesy and bold vs the unassuming and detailed office admin person.

The thing that real estate agents are looking for in a CRM are:

  • Quick and Easy contact detail collection (do it once and get all the data) – ideally at open homes
  • Automated categorisation of contact (Who’s keen and what are they looking for) – often defined by the type of property they enquire about
  • Constant messages pinging prospects with their brand (like weekly emails about their open homes this weekend)
  • Great reporting to see what works (so they can repeat it) – like how many emails sent, calls, open homes etc

The relationship with a real estate agent is often brief and very intense because property owners (vendors) will be speaking sometimes every day with their sales agent to see how the selling process is going. With property marketing campaigns in the capital cities like Sydney and Melbourne only lasting a couple weeks in some instances there is a massive amount of information to be collected yet the reporting needs to be simple.

My Preference for CRMs is Simple

zoho-crm and cloud based integrationAlthough I’ve had some exposure to Salesforce when I originally spoke to that company (many years ago and much has probably changed) they only offered yearly plans (but showed them as a low monthly fee) and the upfront cost was too high so I didn’t go down that path.

Instead I found some great nimble tech startups (at the time, now they’re quite a bit bigger) who offered software that did all the basics very well and offered normal cloud-based pricing ie. low monthly fees: Zoho CRM and HighRiseHQ

I found that these two programs did many useful things. They:

  • enabled me to integrate with our form collections (no need for double entry)
  • gave me the ability to very easily make comments every time I spoke with them
  • integrated with my email marketing software
  • enabled me to use tags to categorise and find contacts
  • offered a low monthly cost!

The Dark Horse in Real Estate CRM’s is CreataCRM

CreataCRM integrates with MYOB Cloud and is used by top performing McGrath real estate agentsI had the pleasure of meeting Reece, the managing director of CreataCRM, at Cebit 2016 and was amazed I’d never heard of this company before.

When I took a look at their software I was blown away – here is an Australian based software developer who has worked with some of the top performing McGrath real estate agents to build a complete and thorough cloud-based CRM with all the integrations you could ask for, including:

  • MYOB AccountRight (live and even the old v19)
  • Xero
  • VoIP telephony
  • Email broadcasting
  • Workflow Automation

The most amazing part about their software is that it costs just $11 per user per month! Now that is a lot of software and a VERY low price. I’m thrilled to be able to share this information with you because here is a company with a great product that focus more on their product development and software features and less on making themselves look big and flashy.

If you have had any experiences with CRM’s I’d love to hear from you and add further depth to our conversation and study into CRM’s.

Xero online training course

At EzyLearn we offer online training courses to help you up-skill and find employment. Choose from our range of cloud-based online accounting software courses, to business start up and management courses, to marketing and sales courses, or update and further your skills in a range of Microsoft Office programs (Excel, PowerPoint, Word) or social media and WordPress web design). 

 

 

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Announcement: Free Courses for EzyLearn Students

Free Excel, Word, WordPress and PowerPoint Courses

Horizontal Banner with software training courses in MYOB, Excel, WordPress, Word, Xero, Facebook and digital social media marketingWe’ve secretly been offering these courses for free for at least 6 months so students (if you’re already one) will have known about it, but I wanted to tell everyone that this is available. What does it mean? It means if you enrol into an MYOB or Xero course for example that once you log into our training site using your student account login details you’ll automatically be able to click on these courses and enrol yourself into the beginners course without paying any money or entering any course password!

We’ve always made samples of our training workbooks or videos available to students who want to learn more about EzyLearn and how we work so we want to do MORE for students who have made a commitment to pay for a course with EzyLearn.

How does it work

The first thing is to choose the course you want to do (or the combination of courses – to get a special offer discount!) and then enrol. Once you are a student in our system you’ll then be able to explore each of the other courses. When you get to the Free Courses (we use the term Free Student Inclusions) you’ll be able to enrol yourself and jump right into the course.

The great thing is we literally give you EVERYTHING in that course: videos, workbooks, exercise files and knowledge review tests, and not just a couple of training resources, so if you’re a beginner with any of those courses you’ll have the fundamental skills under your belt!

facebook marketing and advertising course onlineShare the love

My team and I have been doing a LOT of work lately on social media to help real estate agents build strong online profiles (check out the free video about inserting Youtube videos into a WordPress website!) so we understand the benefits of a Facebook page and to build a community so please feel free to “Like” us and share our details with your friends, family and contacts. Heck, that’s even easier to do now that you can give them some free stuff!

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Bank Recs is BAS preparation but lodgement is legal

Due dates for BAS lodgement can be deferred by BAS agents

Due dates for lodging BAS's and extensions for BAS Agents using the BAS Agent portal - Bank Recs do most of the work
Image: ATO website

If you’re doing your BAS with the help of a Tax or BAS agent you might be aware that although the actual due date for the March quarter BAS is 28th April you can get an extension by using a tax or BAS agent to the 26th of May.

We’ve had quite a few conversations lately with bookkeepers about whether they can do this or not and if not who can they turn to, to do it.

When you lodge a BAS with the ATO you are effectively telling them how much you’ve earnt and spent but more importantly you are defining how much the business actually pays in tax – and they DON’T want you to get this amount wrong.

If the amount is wrong and in your favour you may incur fees and charges and the TAX and BAS agent system (that is managed by the Tax Practitioners Board) has been set up to assume that only someone who has the training and experience is responsible for lodging these important documents. If they get it wrong a small business owner can sue them for the time it takes to fix the problem and for this BAS agents need professional indemnity insurance.

Non-registered Bookkeepers and BAS Agents

xero-myob-learn-with-ezylearn

The good news for both businesses AND ordinary bookkeepers who are NOT registered BAS agents is that you can have a bookkeeper do your data entry, as well as help you with various aspects of your business accounts and administration (like accounts payable, receivable and even customer service etc) for a good, low rate.

All you need it confidence in using MYOB or Xero accounting software. Our Xero Complete course will teach you everything from setup and configuration through daily transactions like invoices, purchases, expenses and payments and advanced topics like BAS, Reporting, Payroll, Projects and cashflow reporting.

Many of these bookkeepers operate as independent contractors so the small business doesn’t need to employ a staff member to do the books [want to start your own bookkeeping business cheaply? Look at joining National Bookkeeping] and some of them are very experienced in bookkeeping and even running their own businesses.

The good news is that you can still use one of these bookkeepers to take care of the accounts side of your business and use your accountant or a BAS agent for the BAS preparation and lodgement.

Bank reconciliation done right is where all the work is done

Now we have the BAS lodgement details out of the way let’s get into the bank reconciliation. This work is often done by the accounts person or contractor and it’s where most of the time and effort in preparing a BAS is spent. If this is done correctly the BAS preparation is pretty simple so it made us delve a little further into the steps taken in doing this work. Here are the simple steps:

  1. Launch your accounting software
  2. Go to the bank reconciliation area
  3. Start matching entries in your software with lines on the bank statement (much easier and faster with bank feeds and Internet banking).
  4. Reconcile each month
  5. Run your BAS report

Many people at this stage will need to provide copies of their bank statement to their accountant, BAS agent or bookkeeper so that person can see actually real world evidence of that transaction (sometimes bank feeds are perfect either). It’s at this stage that you realise whether you made the right choice in the bank you choose because not all banks are equal in Australia even if they are grouped as the BIG four. I’ve written about my disappointment in how hard it is to use a bank like NAB before and I’m afraid I’m gong to have to do it again, comparing NAB to CBA for the ease of getting bank statements.

Bank Statements and Internet Banking – Bad news NAB

CBA Netbank easy to get past statements up to 7 years old compared to NAB business banking

CBA provide 7 years of storage for bank statements so if you do have to go back and get an old one guess what? No calls to make, not bank statement fees to pay, no need to search through your filing cabinat for paper statements, all you need to do is go back to that period and download the file as a PDF and email it to your accountant or bookkeeper.

NAB is too old, statements are hard to get and customer service needs to change with statement search

To do this with NAB is very similar to walking into one of their branches (well the one they just closed down at Dee Why anyway) – it’s old, clunky and hard to work with and often I’ve found you need to email or call or do physical searching around your office for this rudimentary information – this task alone can make the whole bank reconciliation experience very frustrating.

Do your end of year reports now

facebook marketing and advertising course online

While we are on the topic of reporting you may be aware that there are some tax deductions and expenses that you can claim this financial year so it’s a good time to know exactly how you have performed this financial year. Plus you’ll see how far short or ahead you are from last year and you can do your own Jerry Harvey style clearance sale – everything has to go, go, go because we have TOO MUCH stock.

We’re preparing some blogs that’ll be published shortly about some of the deductions and tax breaks you might want to take advantage of. Hopefully after these we’ll be able to focus on our online digital marketing courses like Facebook Pages for business and Facebook advertising for real estate agents! Every one will benefit from these Facebook courses but we’ll slant towards how real estate agents can use Facebook to attract vendors in their local area – it’s fascinating.

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QuickBooks and PayPal Want To Help You Get Paid QUICKER!

Quickbooks is stealthily forming partnerships to fight MYOB and Xero

Quickbooks Online is back and they want to beat MYOB and Xero

Small business owners know better than anyone the difference an an invoice paid on time (or early) can make to their cashflow.

Yet, getting paid on time, never mind early, remains as elusive as a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.

A union between PayPal and QuickBooks Online hopes to change that. Manage your Credit Risk! Continue reading QuickBooks and PayPal Want To Help You Get Paid QUICKER!

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Break through the ceiling with a killer elevator pitch

Business Networking Strategies – the Elevator Pitch

marketing your small business in an elevator 2For a lot of people, when they start a new business, they take a training course. It might be in an area relevant to their industry or profession, it might be a general training course, like our small business StartUp course, or it might be training in particular software, like our MYOB or Xero training courses. The best way to practice an elevator pitch is to practice all the time.

Training is incredibly important, but it’s no substitute for real-life interaction with other business owners, with whom you can gain valuable insights and perspectives on owning and operating a new business in the real world. This is what makes attending regular networking groups and events an important undertaking for any small business owner – old or new.

I recently wrote a blog post on what you should do at a networking event, but there was one point that we didn’t cover in great detail because I felt that it required a blog post of its own, as it’s crucial to your success as a networker: the elevator pitch.

Honing your elevator pitch

Perhaps you’ve heard of the term elevator pitch before. It’s most often used to describe a business or organisation’s mission statement; the name reflects the idea that you should be able to explain what your business does in the time it takes to ride an elevator. When you write a business plan, in it you need to include an executive summary, which explains what your business does or will do; it’s also your elevator pitch.

But your elevator pitch needs to do more than just explain what your business does. It also needs to encourage people to want to do business with you – or at least, continue listening to what you have to say. If you’ve completed our small business marketing course, then you’d have already practiced writing and honing an elevator pitch for your business when you wrote the executive summary of your business plan.

Be interesting, but above all, be compelling

Remember the goal of a business plan is to entice someone to invest in your business or idea, but the plan itself can run for many pages, detailing strategies and tactics for ensuring your business’s overall success. Most banks and financiers don’t have time to read every single business plan that lands on their desk, so they turn to the executive summary to see if the venture seems like a good fit for them.

It goes without saying, then, that your executive summary needs to be compelling, as does your elevator pitch. If you’ve written a business plan for your business, this is a good place to start when developing the elevator pitch you plan to use at a networking group or event. Be personable, though, and keep it conversational. Remember that the person on the receiving end of your elevator pitch is unlikely to be reading it; they’re listening to you deliver it instead, so you need to be comfortable giving your elevator pitch, while also seeming authentic.

Key elements of an elevator pitch

In crafting your elevator pitch, it’s crucial to include the following key elements:

  • Hook people with a good opening line that makes them want to hear more
  • Tell people what you do, not what you are
  • Repeat key information, such as your business name or main product or service
  • Be interesting and authentic
  • Use plain language when you’re describing a problem your product or service solves
  • Think about your end goal and ensure your elevator pitch services to achieve it
  • Finish your pitch by asking the other person what they do.

You should know have a good understanding of what to do at a networking event or group; now it’s just time to find a group to try out your new skills. Try meet-up.com or your local chamber of commerce to find groups near you. Make sure to RSVP if you are going to attend, and then stick to it. If something comes up, let the organiser know, so they don’t hold the meeting up waiting for you.

For more information on how to use networking groups to your advantage, including information on referral marketing, continue reading our blog.

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Will you always be a MYOB Bookkeeper?

Now that you are more Internet savvy will you change careers from bookkeeping?

What is a better business to start? Bookkeeping or MarketingA report by the Department of Industry, Innovation, Science, Research and Tertiary (thank you to whoever shortened it subsequently) in 2012 attempted to identify the links between education and jobs. The report created for the NATIONAL VOCATIONAL EDUCATION AND TRAINING RESEARCH PROGRAM (NCVER) had 4 key findings and this was the first one:

[quote]Some fields of education have tight links to the workplace (for example, nursing), while others have a much weaker relationship with specific jobs, such as in finance and agriculture.[/quote]

I was reviewing the courses we offer and the most popular are our:

  1. MYOB Courses (has been our biggest seller since 2008),
  2. Xero Courses (which have had a MASSIVE uptick in enrolments this year) and
  3. Microsoft Excel (doing very well now that we tell people about it).

As you can see our most popular courses are financially based ones and most of the students are aiming to either change careers or start their own bookkeeping business so they can work more flexible hours. If we look at the research paper and understand that our students (and most bookkeepers) are working in a variety of different business sectors it makes sense that they’ll be exposed to many different and new skills, particularly as businesses adopt the use of more software and in particular Internet based software – ie. the Cloud.

Is marketing a better career choice than bookkeeping?

High job prospect growth for marketing people may make people change careersIf I look at what I spend most of my time doing it’s marketing, and I have to admit I prefer that work to bookkeeping, but you might also find that it’s not unusual for financial types to broaden the type of work they do.

Page 22 of this report, under the heading Trajectories and motivations,  the report uncovered:

[quote]Students’ reasons for wanting to undertake further study are related to the reasons why they embarked on study in the first place. While getting a job was at the centre, this was interwoven with their priorities, values and circumstances more broadly. One nursing student reflected the views of other students saying, ‘This is my area. In five years time I will be a nurse. In ten years time a nurse. I will be a nurse until I retire’. Students undertaking accounting and finance programs saw their field in broad terms which included management and other aspects of the finance industry, but also included related areas such as marketing.[/quote]

I recently wrote about bookkeepers offering marketing advice to their clients and my discovery of this report re-confirmed that this is possible on a professional level!

Is Content Marketing the best type of marketing for small businesses like real estate agents?

I have to admit something at this point. My team and I are working on a project offering content marketing solutions for real estate agents and our showcase real estate agent sells homes in Sydney’s Lower North Shore. If you search for him you’ll get to the website that we’ve just assembled and you’ll experience the significant changes it will go through over the coming weeks as he finishes his round of educational videos for people who are looking to buy or sell a property. Go on, give it a quick search – his name is Derek Farmer.

With the importance of content marketing / online marketing / digital marketing it’s no wonder that this profession has great growth potential and just like bookkeeping it is work that can be completed on a contract basis and better still from your own home!

Here are some posts I recently wrote about WordPress and Content Marketing:

What is inbound marketing?

Can a bookkeeper give marketing advice?

How do you manage your online content marketing?

Who really cares about Sensis? Yellow Pages? Content Marketing shows you care.

Blogging for Business Training Course

Content Marketing vs Google Adwords

Want to try Content Marketing for your business?

I’ve teamed up with a some writers and editors and other marketing types to create our Content Marketing services (and course – which is currently in development) and if you are interested in being kept in the loop you can register at our content marketing course page for free – follow the links.

[quote]Work with me to put your content marketing strategy together[/quote]

Better still I’m one of the mentors for the Marketing training course at the Australian Small Business Centre (whose small business management courses are delivered via our LMS – Learning Management System) so if you enrol into that course (and choose the mentor option) you’ll be able to work with me to put your content marketing strategy together.

 

[button link=”http://ezylearnonline.com.au/courses/sales-and-marketing-courses/content-marketing-training-courses/landing-pages/”]Content Marketing free Registration[/button]

Register to stay informed about Content Marketing Training and Opportunities

 

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How do you manage your online content marketing?

What’s all this about content marketing?

Content marketing and automatic marketing response marketing can help real estate agents standout and build credibility for property vendorsWe’re busy developing a new content marketing course because as a form of online marketing, content marketing is finally starting to come into its own. Content marketing has actually been around for many years – it’s been known as custom publishing, branded content, branded journalism, and custom media – but as it became more popular, marketers began referring to it as content marketing to make it easier to for their clients to understand.

Content marketing is basically the process of creating valuable, informative content – blog posts, email newsletters, ebooks, etc – and sharing it online to help attract and retain customers. But because it requires a lot of content to be produced and regularly, many small businesses are outsourcing their content marketing needs.

Your content marketing needs to have a purpose

To make the most out your content marketing, you need to have goals and a strategy in place to achieve them so you’re not just wasting your time. This is the same as traditional marketing activities, which we cover in our Small Business Management Course. You also need to be able monitor how each piece of content is going at achieving those goals.

If you’re also hiring a content writer or strategist to help you with your content marketing, you also need a way to easily collaborate. Now, if only there was a way to monitor and analyse your content marketing AND schedule and set content marketing tasks for those people you’re working with…

A tool for schedule and managing content marketing

Well, as we’ve recently discovered, there is! It’s a cloud-based content marketing and editorial calendar called CoSchedule and it allows you to schedule and create content marketing tasks, assign those tasks to your team, create and publish blog posts, share links to content via social media, and monitor the success of your content and the social media platform all within the CoSchedule app.

It’s a very powerful, very useful tool for small businesses that work with a number of remote workers who are based around the country, as it allows complete collaboration with your team and also integrates seamlessly with WordPress. It also helps you to optimise your blog titles and your social media sharing to help drive your web traffic.

By providing you with detail stats – and also integrating with most web analytics software, including Google Analytics – you can see what content performs well and what doesn’t, so you can improve you content in the future.

You need to know your readers to succeed

Because content marketing is about creating engaging and interesting content, whether it’s blog posts or ebooks or something else, it’s vital that you know what content your customers like and what the don’t, so you can ensure you’re always keeping them engaged.

In a post I wrote about content marketing not so long ago, I mentioned how important it is to know and understand your reader, because that’s what’ll help you to engage and interest them with your content. If you have highly engaged people consuming your content, they’re more like to share it with their friends, family and other people in their social networks.

This helps to spread the word about your business, which will bring you more customers and make you more money. But better than that, it’ll also help you to see new opportunities and areas into which you can expand your business.

Content marketing can help expand your business too

We used the feedback we received from our content marketing activities when we decided to develop the Xero training courses and the currently in-development content marketing course; it also guided us in our decision to partner with National Bookkeeping who are taking on licensees and helping them to start their own bookkeeping business.

Yes, we got all that from content marketing! Because through our content marketing, we got to know you, our readers, and what you were interested in and that allowed us to look for the types of courses and business opportunities that would interest you. You can do the same for your business too.

Learn about content marketing from the experts

If you’d like to learn about content marketing, our new content marketing course is currently in development. We’re working with an Australian journalist, a successful small business owner, and a digital marketing specialist to create a relevant, easy-to-follow course that’ll guide you through the process step-by-step. In the meantime, you can subscribe to our blog to continue reading our posts, where we’ll keep you updated on how it’s progressing.

If you’re looking for the opportunity to start your own home-based bookkeeping business, we recommend you get in touch with National Bookkeeping, who is taking on licensees. We’ve made all of our courses available to them, which will include our content marketing course when it becomes available so their licensees can learn all about starting and operating their own bookkeeping business.

What about content marketing for real estate agents

We’ve recently become aware of the need for real estate agents to build their own personal profile and credibility online. Property vendors who want to sell their property are (like the rest of us) increasing looking online for selling agents who have good experience and great reputation to sell their properties at the highest possible price and as quickly as possible. Watch this space as we learn more.

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What Type of Education Does The TPB Accept For Its New CPE Requirement

Type of Education for CPE Requirements of the TPB

What Type of Education Does The TPB Accept For Its New CPE Requirement

Earlier this year, the TPB changed the requirements of the tax and BAS agent registration renewal process, now making it essential for all BAS and tax agents to participate in some form of education under its new continuing professional education (CPE) requirement.

According to the TPB, tax agents must participate in a minimum of 90 hours of CPE over the standard three year registration period, while BAS agents must participate in a minimum of 45 hours over the standard three year registration period. The Institute of Certified Bookkeepers have enabled completion of our Microsoft Excel Training Courses be accepted for CPD points.

Types of study approved by the TPB

As you’ve probably guessed, for your study to be recognised by the TPB and go towards your CPE registration requirement, the study has to relate to your area of work as a BAS or tax agent. While a short course on DIY home maintenance wouldn’t be covered, a seminar conducted by a qualified accountant who specialises in the building industry would be recognised by the TPB, even if it’s being led by a colleague at the firm where the BAS agent works.

The TPB has specified a number of activities that they consider relevant to tax advice, BAS and tax agent service you may provide:

  • Seminars, workshops, webinars, courses and lectures
  • structured conferences and discussion groups (including by phone or video conference)
  • tertiary courses provided by universities, registered training organisations (RTOs), other registered higher education institutions or other approved course providers
  • other education activities, provided by an appropriate organisation
  • research, writing and presentation by a registered tax (financial) adviser, tax or BAS agent of technical publications or structured training
  • peer review of research and writing submitted for publication or presentation in structured training
  • computer/internet-assisted courses, audiotape or videotape packages
  • attendance at structured in-house training on tax related subjects by persons or organisations with suitable qualifications and/or practical experience in the subject area covered
  • attendance at appropriate Australian Taxation Office (ATO) seminars and presentations
  • relevant CPE activities provided to members and non-members by a recognised professional association
  • a unit of study or other CPE activity on the Tax Agent Services Act 2009 (TASA) including the Code of Professional Conduct (Code).

If you’re a member of a recognised professional association

The second-to-last activity included in that list, you may have noticed, accepts any relevant activity provided by a recognised professional organisation. There are quite a few professional organisations recognised by the TPB, as you can see on their website, but the one probably most relevant to bookkeepers is the Institute of Certified Bookkeepers (ICB), with which EzyLearn is also a training partner.

The ICB is an association established to support bookkeepers and BAS agents by regularly holding seminars and training workshops, giving members access to marketing materials – such as customisable e-newsletter templates and unique email addresses – listings on the ICB directory and IT support, among many other things. Because they’re also accredited with the TPB and recognised by the ATO, they also possess a fair bit of influence with both organisations, making the lives of its members much easier.

In this case, being a member of the ICB, gives you access to a number of TPB-certified continuing professional education courses, seminars, lectures and workshops that can be counted as part of your CPE quota; members can also access a CPE register within the ICB dashboard to record their CPE activities.

Courses you can study as an ICB member

EzyLearn Online Course CPD points for bookkeepers and marketing professionals

As a member of the ICB, you’re able to take any of the courses that they consider relevant to your profession as a bookkeeper and BAS agent, and which they consider to be continuing your professional education. This would include any of our MYOB or Xero training courses, but would also include our Excel and Word training courses as they’re both used to assist you in doing your job as a bookkeeper and BAS agent.

If you’re a BAS agent and your registration with the TPB will come due on or after July 1, 2016, you will be required to have participated in CPE to be eligible for renewal.

Joining the ICB and taking advantage of the many free and discounted seminars, workshops and courses, like one of our online training courses in MYOB, Xero, MS Excel or Word, is a good way to ensure you remain compliant with the TPB’s tax and BAS agent registration terms.

To find out more about joining the ICB, visit their website. Alternatively, if you’d like to learn more about starting your own bookkeeping business or working as a home-based bookkeeper, subscribe to our blog for all the latest news and updates delivered straight to your inbox.