Cloud accounting lets your business, its staff and its advisers see the same financial information online, from anywhere. With bank feeds bringing in transactions daily, your numbers can be far more current than a desktop file updated once a quarter, which helps you make better decisions.
Current is not the same as correct. Bank feeds and automated coding still need someone to reconcile and review them, so check when your books were last reconciled before you rely on a report.
The power of data lies in both its timeliness and its ability to be tailored to the individual business. Raw data by itself is hard to use well. By connecting tools such as receipt and invoice capture, bank feeds and industry-specific software to your core accounting system, your business can start to approach the detail and data integrity of larger organisations.
By increasing your business’ level of data accuracy, you’re not only better positioned to meet your day to day compliance needs accurately and efficiently, but you’re also setting up your business to take advantage of the data at its disposal by summarising and presenting the data in ways that are specific and useful to your business.
To make the most of your data, focus on the key drivers of your business and its industry. The key drivers of an architecture practice (utilisation, work in progress, debtor days) differ from those of a creative agency (retainer revenue, project margin), so narrow in on the data points that really move your cash and margin.
Once decisions have been made about the core drivers of your business’s success, most cloud systems will allow you to tailor reports to focus on selected data points, either from the core platform or from a linked industry-specific application.
Undertaking an analysis of the key trends you have identified across these data points can then be developed into a set of visual management reports that allow you to have a finger on the pulse of your business on a day to day and week to week basis.
Identifying the key business drivers and the underlying data flow that reports on them is a great foundation for building a reporting pack that helps you as a business owner analyse current trends and make solid decisions about future direction, quickly and accurately.
To maximise the return on investment in your cloud data, diarise time each week, and each month to review the reports that your cloud system produces for you to assess your performance against current goals and re-set goals and actions for the next period.
Lastly, never forget the maxim, ‘rubbish in, rubbish out’. Integrations move data quickly, but they also move errors quickly, so regular human review of coding and reconciliations matters.
Visory runs bookkeeping, payroll, accounts payable and receivable for growing businesses in cloud accounting software, with a dedicated team and its AI, Delphi, overseen by that team. Visory Insights then turns the numbers into a plain-English monthly read with your Business Performance Partner. Visory’s head office is in Melbourne, and its bookkeeping services for Melbourne businesses work to Victoria’s payroll tax and leave rules. Book a discovery call.
About this article
Written by The Visory Team. Published . General information for Australian businesses, not advice for your situation.
