Best Financial Apps For Your Business & Taxes
U.S. Taxes are due this Wednesday, July 15th. Have you done yours?
Yes, the deadline got pushed back from April, due to the pandemic. I'm helping my mentee go through hers later today. She still hasn't gotten her stimulus check yet but with talk of another check potentially being considered for August, it's important to make sure her tax return is filed on time and with the right info.
That's where some online apps may come in handy.
Does anyone remember when apps didn’t exist?
It’s hard, right!?!
Our smartphones have become such a huge part of our day to day lives, it’s almost impossible to imagine what it was like without them. Except… it’s not even the phones themselves, is it?
Almost no one uses their device for its primary purpose (phone calls, anyone?) anymore.
Instead, we all use apps. Apps for productivity, apps for entertainment, gaming apps, banking apps - the list goes on. Yet while most people have hundreds of apps for their personal use, many fewer know how to utilize the best apps for their business.
There are several types of apps that can prove invaluable for small business owners and freelancers, and I've gotten asked about what financial apps I like. Here are a few...
Tax Apps
The first type of app we’ll talk about is probably the most important for your business...an app that takes care of your taxes and your bookkeeping. The most popular ones are FreshBooks, Wave, Xero and Quickbooks. You link it up to your bank account and the app helps you create invoices, plus tracks your business income and deductions, including one of my favorites with Quickbooks...tracking your mileage! No more having to remember writing down your mileage every time you leave the house.
I use Quickbooks, so I'm more familiar with it. I've used FreshBooks before too, and it's much more intuitive, not much to "learn." However, I felt like I outgrew it faster. With Quickbooks, you can automatically categorize transactions as personal or business-related, which means that even if your business cash flow is having to go through your personal account, you can still easily keep track of everything. Just swipe right for business expenses and swipe left for personal ones.
It's the same with mileage. The QB phone app just automatically asks you, at the end of the trip, if it's a personal or business expense and it adds up the mileage deductions for you. You can connect your accountant to your Quickbooks account too, so they can easily pull up all of the information, making tax time sooo much easier, than having to find all of your receipts for deductions. If you've been meaning to sign up for Quickbooks, I have a discount if you sign-up using this link. (Full disclosure: I make some money for referrals, but I promise that I love this product or else I wouldn’t be recommending it to you!)
Payment Apps
Have you ever visited a pop-up store or market, and been pleasantly surprised that you can pay by card? Payment apps make all this possible without the stress of big, clunky pieces of equipment. You can receive payments through a tiny receiver connected to an app on your phone. There’s absolutely no reason not to give it a try - believe it, the ease and speed of your transactions will be instantly improved. Not only that, but some providers also allow for offline activity, where the transaction is logged and processed when you next have connectivity. As anyone with a mobile business will know, this flexibility is completely invaluable!
Payroll Apps
If you run a business with your own employees, first of all, congratulations! Starting a successful company is hard, and one sign that you’ve made it is having a roster of full-time staff, however small it might be. It also means you need to start considering how to pay all your employees. Payroll apps can make this whole process so much smoother, and even allow you to manage your payroll on the go. You and your employees can complete a whole host of actions on the best payroll apps, including managing holiday and unpaid leave requests, updating personal details, viewing and downloading pay stubs, and more. With all this functionality, it will save you so much time to bring in more business and be the #Boss.
Budgeting or Cash Flow App
Finally, it's important to know your numbers in your business. Quickbooks can help you do this in a simple way, so it's kind of an all-in-one system. Float, Pulse, DryRun, PlanGuru and Wave are also cash flow apps, and all of them except Wave syncs up to Quickbooks, so if you need a more robust cash flow app than what Quickbooks has, then you can connect QB with these other cash flow apps.
These apps are not the be-all of all financial apps, of course, but it's a good start to make sure you don't have to be the bookkeeper and accountant in your business. These apps will also help you save money from having to hire a bookkeeper. Let me know if you have any questions! And please subscribe by filling out your e-mail address below and sign up for a complimentary 1-on-1 session by clicking on my signature below. I'm here to give you more ways to create financial freedom!
