100: Stop Dreading Your Bookkeeping Whether You Are Starting A Business, Self-Employed

100: Stop Dreading Your Bookkeeping Whether You Are Starting A Business, Self-Employed, A Solopreneur, Entrepreneur, Mompreneur, Business Owner, Side Hustler, Freelancer, Bookkeeper, Virtual Assistant, Or VA

Do you dread working on your bookkeeping for your business? Have you neglected it, and now it seems like a project you’ll never be able to tackle? We all know how essential it is to have accurate and timely financial statements so that you can make sound business decisions, but your bookkeeping doesn’t have to be dreadful. If you take some pretty simple steps, you can change your bookkeeping to be a much easier task that you can handle and have the knowledge and understanding of your business that you need to be successful. In today’s podcast episode, I’ll help you create a process for doing your own bookkeeping that will help you feel less stress and anxiety while eliminating the dread that many business owners feel when they think about bookkeeping for their business. When you decided to start your own business, bookkeeping may not have been the first thing that excited you, and you are not alone. Most business owners are busy running their businesses and don’t take the time to keep up to date with their bookkeeping. Whether you are a self-employed individual, a solopreneur, entrepreneur, mompreneur, freelancer, small business owner, a remote, virtual, online, or in-house bookkeeper, or a virtual assistant or VA, you may be thinking that bookkeeping takes up a lot of time. It’s easy to put off, but if you take some time to implement the steps I mention in this episode, you’ll stop dreading your bookkeeping and find that it is possible to simply make your bookkeeping easy. These tips are essential whether you are using a computerized software system like QuickBooks, Xero, Wave, or FreshBooks for your business finances; or doing your bookkeeping manually with an Excel spreadsheet or even a Google Document…

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Show Notes:

Welcome Back…Do you feel stressed or anxious when you think about doing your bookkeeping? Do you think that doing the bookkeeping for your business is annoying or frustrating? If so, you are not alone. After all, unless your business is doing bookkeeping for others, and you love working with numbers like I do, you probably have a business providing a product or service other than bookkeeping that lights you up. Your business should get you excited. As the saying goes, if you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life. But that doesn’t excuse you from having control and understanding your business finances. This is a crucial part of owning a business. It is an essential part of your business that needs to be done, even if you think it is a waste of time. Did you know that cash flow is one of the major reasons businesses fail? As a business owner, you need to understand and manage your business finances. This means keeping accurate accounting records and having your bookkeeping up to date. When you have your bookkeeping under control, and you are able to utilize your financial statements to make sound business decisions, you are setting your business up for success.

I want to dive a little deeper into why it is so essential for you to be making good business decisions based on your financial statements. Making decisions in your business is hard, even if you don’t have accurate financial information helping you make these decisions. How would you know if you could afford to make a large purchase, spend money on an expense, or if you needed that money for the cash flow to carry on the business? Would you know when and how much additional inventory you need? How would you know how much money you could allocate to an expense such as advertising? Should you hire an employee, and do you have enough cash flow to pay all your bills? What if you would make expensive mistakes like not paying bills or taxes on time which would result in late fees, penalties, and interest? What if you didn’t know who owes you money or customers who are not paying on time? You wouldn’t know who to follow up with or charge late fees. What if you forgot to invoice your customers, and you were giving your work away for free? You could also be paying for expenses that you no longer need or that you’ve stopped using. All of these poor decisions add up and can impact your cash flow. If you don’t have the proper financial information, you are making decisions for your business blindly. As time passes and you don’t keep up with your bookkeeping, it gets harder to find the time to work on this now more significant bookkeeping project or task. The bigger you feel this bookkeeping project gets, the more you will find the feelings of dread building up, and you’ll want to tackle it even less. Just like any other chore, like doing laundry or cleaning the house or garage, if you do it a little at a time, it doesn’t pile up, and it is much easier to keep up with.

Alright, so how can you make your bookkeeping easy and avoid that awful dread feeling? What if bookkeeping was just easy? What if I told you it could be easy? Your mindset will change as you develop processes to make your bookkeeping easy, and you can do this in just four simple steps. The first step is to make sure you have a bookkeeping system that you are comfortable with, are able to use efficiently, and it doesn’t cause you to feel overwhelmed from the start. You could be using a pen and paper method, keeping track of everything manually using an Excel or Google spreadsheet, or a computerized software system like QuickBooks Desktop or QuickBooks Online. Think about the system you are currently using. Are you happy with it? If not, what would you like to utilize instead? Do you understand the system you are using or are you ready to make a switch? You need to make sure that the bookkeeping system you are using is working for you and that you are able to stay current and maintain it. The most highly recommended solution I have for the business owners I work with is QuickBooks Online. There are many different QuickBooks Online solutions available, starting at about $20 per month. If you are interested in learning more about getting QuickBooks Online for your business, you can go to www.FinancialAdventure.com/quickbooks, and you can also receive 30% off your first six months.

The second step is to automate as much of your bookkeeping process as possible. I know this can be harder if you are utilizing a manual bookkeeping system, which is one of the reasons I recommend a software system like QuickBooks Online. With this option, you are able to import bank transactions and easily categorize and enter them into your books with one simple click. This also provides real-time records so t