Time Tracking, Invoicing, and Getting Paid Faster with Freshbooks

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Time Tracking, Estimating and Invoicing using the amazing Freshbooks

This lens is all about Freshbooks - It's an online time tracking, invoicing, support and expenses solution that enables any business, freelancer or individual to manage their clients and projects online - quickly and conveniently.

Freshbooks was launched on May 1st, 2004 in Canada. Since that date, Freshbooks has had over 500,000 new users.

I use personally Freshbooks to manage my client invoicing and support, and my projects - time tracking makes managing your time so much clearer - I love the timer application!

It's helped my business so much - so I'm writing this to tell all of you all about it!

I'm trying to move my business entirely to a web-based structure so I can manage it easily from anywhere I can get an Internet connection. The plan is to become totally mobile and travel the globe whilst running my business. It's possible, and it's my plan!

I try out an awful lot of different tools and applications in search of the 'golden eggs' - the ones that save so much time, increase my productivity, save me money, or simplify an aspect of the business.

I thought I'd start writing about the ones I've kept using because they're effective, time saving, low cost or free, and help me in my business, and personal sometimes, life... It's also great writing practice!

Visit Freshbooks for your FREE account

Breaking News - Freshbooks is now available as an Iphone application, so you can even use it on the go when you can't take out your laptop or get to your desktop.

Feb 09: I've now been using Freshbooks for some months, and I couldn't imagine trying to live without it - it truly is a killer app!

News: Freshbooks one of the Top 10 International [Web] Products of 2008

ReadWriteWeb have recognized FreshBooks as one of the Top 10 International [Web] Products of 2008:

FreshBooks, the Canadian online invoicing, time and expense tracking service for individuals and small companies, has been showing steady growth over the past year according to Compete, and claims to have over 500K new users since May 2004.

"We compared FreshBooks with other online accounting services in August this year, and decided it was easy to use, includes a host of useful features, has an active forum, and offers benchmark data by industry to its users. More recently, we looked at FreshBooks Report Cards which provide an insight into how your business fares in relation to other businesses in your profession. Selected as one of the PICK 20 top Web 2.0 leaders in Canada in September this year, we think FreshBooks deserves a mention here too".

Mike McDerment from Freshbook accepted the honour - "It's an honour to be mentioned alongside the best applications from other countries around the world. Thanks ReadWriteWeb".

Freshbooks Time Tracking Screenshot

Freshbooks Time Tracking Video

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The Freshbooks Manifesto

Freshbooks' mission is to deliver fast and simple invoicing and time tracking services that help you manage your business.

They call these "Unaccounting" (TM) services and they will:

* Save you time
* Be easy to use
* Make you look professional (think Fortune 500 professional)
* Let you manage your books without an accountant
* Secure, encrypt, and back up your data
* Be available 24/7 from anywhere with any computer and an Internet connection

Using Freshbooks to Generate Invoices Quickly and Easily Screenshot

The BIG Question - You and Your Online Business

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A Sample Freshbooks Invoice Screenshot

I predict... Rob's eye on the Future!

My prediction

Within the next 7 years, 80% of small businesses will use online business applications

Reader predictions:

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Freshbooks Client Support System Screenshot

The Benefits of Using Freshbooks

There are lots of benefits to using Freshbooks - my personal favourite is the ability to track the time I'm spending on different projects, be they client work or my own.

Some of the many other benefits are:

* You save time billing - Serious time
* You get paid faster because it's easy for your clients, and you can automate invoices
* It's so easy to use - you need no tech skills
* You can customize it with your own style and logos, and look super-professional
* Quick set up - for you and your clients
* You can get a free account, or the 30 day money back guarantee on a paid account. I'm still running mine with the free service - there's no time limit on it!

Visit Freshbooks

Freshbooks Features

* Easily create, send and manage invoices.
* Track time (for you and your staff).
* Track project activities.
* Send invoices by email or US post.
* Accept payment with PayPal, Authorize.net and more.
* Automatically send invoices and late payment notices.
* Create robust reports and import/export your data.

Visit Freshbooks

It's the Online Business Debate!

Is the move to online applications inevitable?

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Yes, we'll all have to use them or be left behind

Optimist1 says:

yes

No people will keep most of their operations on their own computers

 

Freshbooks RoadBurn 2008

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More Road Burn 2008

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Some of the Many Reports Available to You Automatically from Freshbooks

Books to Help You Save Time

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See Freshbooks on Fox News, October 8th 2008

Unfortunately I couldn't embed this video on this lens as it's not hosted at YouTube, but you can see Mike from Freshbooks on Fox News here

On the right is a screenshot of the Freshbooks Timer that you use to log the hours you spend working on different projects - client projects or your own personal ones.

You simply start the timer when you begin, then when you've finished you pause the timer and press 'log hours' to automatically fill out your timesheet.

Freshbooks Customers Voice their Opinions

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Another Freshbooks Customer

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More Freshbooks User Feedback

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Who Uses Freshbooks?

Here are some of the types of businesses benefitting from Freshbooks:

Teams who track time and Invoice:

* IT Consultants
* PR Firms
* Engineers
* Market Research
* Architects
* Design Studios
* Dev Shops

Freelancers who do it all:

* Web Designers
* Journalists
* Consultants
* Virtual Assistants
* Lawyers
* Web Developers
* Bookkeepers

Service Providers who get paid painlessly:

* ISPs
* PC Technicians
* Alarm Companies
* Web Hosts
* Pool Cleaners

And that's just a few of the professions using Freshbooks... get your own free account and try it out

Findings from the Freshbooks Customer Survey 2007

Finding #1: FreshBooks users save valuable time

Our users reported that since they started using FreshBooks they save on average 4.5 hours a month. To put that into perspective, our customers bill an average of $80 per hour so with 4.5 extra hours a month to do their actual work (and not invoicing) they can earn an extra $360 per month. That's over $4000 per year. Not bad for a service with paid packages that start at $14 per month.

Finding #2: FreshBooks users get paid faster & collect more

FreshBooks users also report getting paid 4 days faster, and one-third are collecting at least 10% more money than they were before FreshBooks.

Finding #3: FreshBooks users are sharing the love!

We are truly humbled by these findings, even more so by the fact that we raised the percentage of users that would happily refer FreshBooks to a friend or colleague, from our 2006 referral rate of 98%, to an incredible 99%. Find it all hard to believe? We do too to be honest, but we've learned from our users how they do it and we are going to spend some time in future postings explaining FreshBooks users achieve these results and how you can too.

The 2007 Freshbooks Customer Survey Results

More Freshbooks Customers

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Yet More Freshbooks Customers

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Selected Freshbooks Videos on YouTube

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The Blog from the Guys at Freshbooks

The latest posts from Freshbooks HQ

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Reader Feedback

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Manage Your Time Stylishly and Effectively

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by

robbell

I'm Rob Bell, from West Yorkshire in the North of England,where I work with diverse clients to grow their businesses through intelligent internet and marketing... more »

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