My daughter Amy’s wedding truly belongs to the digital age.
The wedding has its own website (!), complete with photos of the bride and groom and helpful instructions for the big day.
The invites are virtual – just click to register that you are attending.
Guests will be asked to fill in a form with their menu choices well in advance of the wedding.
As for photos, guests will be able to watch a short video of the event before it’s even over. And then Amy and Andy will be able to order all their photos online.
It’s all so efficient – and so very different to my wedding to Thelma some 40 years ago.
I still remember the slow drip of RSVP cards landing on our doorstep; the printed menus for the wedding breakfast; and the thrill of getting our first look at the wedding photos with ‘PROOF’ stamped all over them, months after the event!
Technology hardly featured.
Weddings back then were also a much more formal, rigid affair. There was a set order to the day and very little personalisation.
Technology and changing social conventions have allowed Amy and Andy to be a lot more flexible in what they offer their guests, and how they structure their day. The options they’re considering – like an ice cream and pizza van – were simply not on our radar all those years ago. And there was simply no way to coordinate guests’ menu choices in advance.
The services we offer our clients have evolved in similar ways, thanks to modern technology.
For example, everyone imagines that accountants spend their days sifting through huge piles of receipts. But the reality is that our clients now take photos of their receipts on their phones, and upload them to our accounting software which files them in the right place in a matter of seconds.
Or, once upon a time, physical purchase orders used to be distributed to six different people, all of whom needed to notice the paper on their desks and then sign it. It could take days!
Nowadays, the form is uploaded to the accounting software, everyone involved gets a notification, and boom, it’s off. Paperwork can’t get lost and everything is so much quicker.
The upshot is that technology has made accounting much more efficient. Instead of chasing paperwork, my team now has more time to do work that really matters, like helping clients understand their numbers and make good financial decisions.
It’s also created a much more dynamic, personal experience for clients.
The technology of yesteryear was one-size-fits-all. Nowadays, we can really fit the accounting software to your business – for example, setting up codes the way you want them and in a way that suits your products or services.
Or we can integrate the accounting platform with your existing software so that they speak to each other, streamlining processes and making sure that you get the data in the way you want it.
But while I suspect that almost all of Amy and Andy’s friends now use the same technology for their own weddings, the adoption of modern accounting technology is patchy.
There are still so many companies doing things the old fashioned way – manually, or using legacy software that is clunky and slow compared to what’s available today. It doesn’t have to be ancient – even software that is seven or eight years old is likely to be considerably out-of-date.
If that’s the case for you, it’s problematic.
When your competitors are processing their accounts quickly and you’re taking weeks…
When their tech is set up to produce useful financial data that you never see…
And their accountants can spend their time giving helpful financial advice, while yours spend the bulk of their time filing invoices…
…It’s not just an inconvenience. It puts you at a competitive disadvantage, just like working with computers from 2014 would do.
When you work with us, one of the first things we do is look at your accounting platform to make sure it is fit-for-purpose and serves your business well. Often, businesses don’t realise how their technology is holding them back, and how modern accounting software can help transform their financial affairs.
Where possible and necessary, we move clients onto the wonderful iplicit software, which offers all the benefits I’ve outlined above and is truly life-changing for many businesses.
We want you to be on software your business can grow into, rather than software you’ve already grown out of.
It’s all part of our work to bring your financial management up to world-class standards, and make sure that your finances are handled in the same professional way that a corporate would expect – even when you’re much smaller.
So if you think your financial management is due an upgrade – and your accounting software might be, too – why not get in touch. Simply email me or call us on 01279 647 447 to find out more about how we can help you.
Warmly,
Garry
