Having wrapped up this most recent Technology Tuesday, the intrigue around Xero is fresh. For many businesses, we look towards QuickBooks® as central to their accounting ecosystem. There are other businesses where Xero fills the same role for them, after learning about them; their specific needs and use requirements.
What is Xero™?
Xero is online accounting software for small businesses. Jake relayed Xero was born with the cloud in mind – since its inception in 2006. Its aim was to allow for greater collaboration between small business owners, and their accountants tasked in overseeing their business financial health. It was brought about by its founder and his accountant who were trying to get a real-time read on their New Zealand-based business at the time.
What is Unique to Xero?
Looking at its streamlined interface, presenter Sophia mentioned Xers dashboard using plain English. By not relying on accounting jargon, business owners get a high level presentation of their financial health, without getting overwhelmed in figuring out what the numbers mean.
The Dashboard there looked clean, but still had enough information displayed where you can start digging deeper into the numbers by clicking onto corresponding objects.
Sophia demonstrated basic invoicing process, as done in Xero. She showed how easy it was to create, and customize, items you invoice your customers – on the fly. She moved around the various options during item creation.
A big draw for Xero would be the fact it allows unlimited collaboration, meaning you can have as many workers as you need to help monitor your business financials and the data driving them. You can also customize levels of access for each user.
If Xero Allows Unlimited Users to Work in it, How Much Does it Cost?
Based on the webinar, and Xers site, the pricing structure is simple: three basic plans – tiered by feature set. The set of features bordering each level center around the number of transactions you can send and reconcile. If you go with the top tier of features, you get these:
- Multi-currency
- Expenses – capture and manage claims
- Projects – track project time and costs.
As of the webinar recording, our colleague Jacqueline was provided means to get people started on Xero at promotional pricing from the standard monthly costs of $9, $30 and $60 – respectively.
What Makes a Good Candidate for Xero?
If you need the collaboration Xero offers, then the chances are high yore a good fit. But, collaboration alone shouldt be the deciding criterion – as attractive a criterion it is. We need to look at workflow considerations: what yore used to; what yore willing to get used to; and the overall picture of how you do business.
With Out Of The Box Technology, you have a consulting legacy unmatched in the industry. We will learn your business, inside and out. We do our diligence to find the best solution for your industry and use requirements. We will work with you determining if Xero, and its available integrations, best fit everything around your business. If we arrive at a point where it doest, wre prepared to look at other avenues.
In the meantime: contact us if you have additional questions.
Keep your eyes peeled for a possible follow-up where a deeper dive of Xero will be conducted!
