Striven was recognized as an industry leader in G2’s overall and mid-market ERP software categories in 2021.
G2, the leading provider of business software reviews, has ranked Striven as one of the top Overall and Mid-Market ERP Software products for both the Summer and Fall of 2021.
According to customer-sourced data at G2:
Striven’s Quality of Support ranks as 9.2/10 (ahead of the 8.1/10 ERP industry average)
Striven’s Ease of Use ranks as 8.8/10 (ahead of the 8.1/10 ERP industry average)
100% of users rank Striven either 4 or 5 stars.
To read the full story, please click here to view the press release.
Striven was recognized as an industry leader in GoodFirms.co’s “Top Remote Work Software” and “Top Business Management Software” categories in 2021.
Lumberton, NJ – GoodFirms.co, a leading review and ratings service of software products and service companies, has named Striven to two of its “Top Software of 2021” categories: Remote Work and Business Management Software. The top software solutions and organizations were selected based on remote work capabilities, improved productivity, and the ability to respond to market dynamics.
Striven and other software firms were required to offer tools that aid organizations in their work-from-home efforts, offer data-driven insights, and deliver superior project management capabilities.
The analytical team at GoodFirms utilized its expertise and experience to perform extensive research and analysis to curate their lists. Check out Striven’s GoodFirms.co profile here.
ABOUT STRIVEN Striven is an all-in-one business management software providing a complete end-to-end cloud solution for most professional industries. It not only offers billing and invoicing tools, but also includes solutions for customer and contract management, projects, tasks, inventory, HR, and more. To learn more, visit striven.com.
ABOUT GOODFIRMS.CO GoodFirms is a full-fledged research and review platform that helps software buyers and service seekers to opt for the best software or firm. GoodFirms, just as the name suggests, is a dedicated community of “performing” IT companies as well as software solutions. To learn more, visit GoodFirms.co.
Striven was recognized among the most trusted software systems to help automate tasks and improve processes.
Lumberton, NJ – Digital.com, a leading independent review website for small business online tools, products, and services, has named Striven to several of its lists: Best ERP, Best Accounting, and Best Billing & Invoicing Software of 2021. The top solutions were selected based on automation features, integrations, and reporting capabilities.
Striven and other software firms were required to offer tools that reduce manual labor, provide integrations, and demonstrate superior customer service. Additional requirements include reporting tools to analyze data and measure productivity.
ABOUT STRIVEN Striven is an all-in-one business management software providing a complete end-to-end cloud solution for most professional industries. It not only offers billing and invoicing tools, but also includes solutions for customer and contract management, projects, tasks, inventory, HR, and more. To learn more, visit striven.com.
ABOUT DIGITAL.COM Digital.com reviews and compares the best products, services, and software for running or growing a small business website or online shop. The platform collects Twitter comments and uses sentiment analysis to score companies and their products. To learn more, visit digital.com.
Taking stock of everything that goes into your business’s accounting processes isn’t always as easy as popping numbers into a spreadsheet.
There are many great software products that will handle all of your basic accounting needs—QuickBooks is one of the most popular choices among small business owners due to its affordability, intuitive UX, and reliability.
However, one crucial aspect of accounting and accounting software tends to be routinely overlooked: it goes far beyond the numbers.
QuickBooks is great for crunching the numbers. For small- and medium-sized business owners, this is often priority #1. Once this need is met, what happens next? Will QuickBooks be able to offer your business the additional tools required to grow?
Just because QuickBooks and Quickbooks Online provide a viable solution for many small businesses doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the best choice for yours.
If your business is even starting to feel as though it requires a more robust, personalized, and human approach to accounting software, it’s time to start asking some of the important questions that will lead you down a better, more productive path.
Why Do I Need A QuickBooks Alternative?
You may already know that your business is ready to make the switch to a more full-bodied accounting solution, or you may not. If you’ve already enrolled in Quickbooks or QuickBooks Online, the reasons for leaving may be less apparent at first.
Financial management goes well beyond accounting—understanding, analyzing, and improving upon your organization’s complete financial health requires connectivity to all silos of your business. This means your accounting software solution should integrate seamlessly with your CRM, inventory management, and project management solutions.
In an ideal scenario, housing all of these processes under one roof (an all-in-one software solution) will improve all aspects of your business. In fact, 64% of companies that make the switch to ERP software noted an increase in business performance.
Outgrowing QuickBooks isn’t simply about outgrowing accounting software—it’s about exploring new methods, approaches, and technologies that are vital in achieving and sustaining long term, year-over-year growth.
Any single-purpose software, no matter how proficient, can ultimately only be just that. For your entire organization to operate at its maximum efficiency and potential, it takes a software that seamlessly connects every corner of your business.
An all-in-one software solution provides more than just accurate numbers—it increases efficiency and accuracy across the board. Don’t spend time tracking down documents and transferring files between software applications. If all of your data transparently lives in one place, you’ll be able to find single, accurate, and universally accessible data sets with ease.
ERP software with natively integrated accounting is much more cost efficient than QuickBooks in terms of the total services offered. While QuickBooks provides excellent and cost-efficient accounting services, it doesn’t offer the complete suite of functionalities that ERP software can.
As your business scales up, you’ll need a full suite of features that can scale with it.
It’s much easier to know what you’ll gain from something than it is to know exactly when to implement the plan. Is there ever a good time to “break up” with QuickBooks?
If you can answer “yes” to some or all of the following questions, it could be a sign that your business is beginning to outgrow QuickBooks:
Is it difficult, impossible, or too time consuming to import and export data between QuickBooks and other systems/software?
Do you find yourself manually re-entering data in multiple places?
Do you have more than 30 users that need access to financial information?
Do you feel like you and/or your staff could be doing more to reduce errors?
Are you relying too heavily on workarounds to manage information?
Is it difficult to manage the oft-changing budget requirements of tasks and projects?
Are you having trouble updating, keeping track of, and/or monitoring your inventory in real time?
But what happens when you’re ready to add additional inventory? When you need variable billing services? When some of your employees are working remotely?
Even if you find yourself answering “yes” to many of the questions above, it’s natural to be hesitant about making a software switch. Transferring the entirety of your data may seem like a logistical nightmare at first glance. Fortunately, that’s far from the reality.
The main reason that this type of data transfer isn’t as painful as originally perceived has nothing to do with software—it’s all about the support staff behind the software.
Beyond taking care of the back-end, development-centric hurdles, the software you move on to in your post-QuickBooks journey should have a stellar team of professionals that assist throughout the onboarding process.
Whether you want to proceed with a slow, management-first rollout, a hybrid (business or product specific) rollout, or an immediate “big bang” rollout, the choice should be yours—with intelligent recommendations from software professionals, of course.
In short, look for software that has a support team who really understands you and your business beyond the numbers.
What To Look For In A QuickBooks Alternative
We’ve covered the “why” and the “when”—naturally, it’s time to talk specifically about the features to look for in a QuickBooks Online alternative. Beyond accounting, it’s important to explore what other ERP alternatives have to offer. After all, your finances are just one piece of puzzle.
Universal Accessibility
These days, the ability to access financial data from anywhere is more important than ever. Whether you’re on a phone, tablet, or a personal computer, you need accurate information at a glance.
You’re not the only one who will benefit from this—the right ERP will allow you to provide instant access to anyone you specifically authorize. Cloud accounting software allows this data to be securely shared with your external accountant, CPA, legal counsel, or any other financial professional.
Integrated CRM
A common approach for many businesses is to purchase separate accounting and CRM software solutions. While it may seem prudent at first to differentiate between data from the sales and accounting departments, the opposite is true—these two data sets need to properly communicate at all times.
Numbers don’t always tell the whole story—just because certain sales figures are positive doesn’t always measure company-wide profitability. Without taking into account the full financial picture of all of your business’s financial silos, recognizing profit is often unnecessarily tedious and time consuming.
Entering data in triplicate, hunting down scattered records, and generating incomplete reports make it difficult to assess a proper financial path going forward. Spending more on new equipment, renovations, and even employees becomes more challenging and time consuming when it’s unclear how much financial ammo you have to spare in the short term.
In short, software communication, connectivity, and transparency are the keys to unlocking the full power of your finances.
Project and Task Management
Projects and tasks are hardly set in stone. Goals shift, obstacles appear, and—most importantly for you—budgets need adjusting. If your accounting and project management software don’t communicate, it can be tough to determine the profitability of each individual project.
According to one Harvard Business Review study, 1 in 6 projects had a cost overrun of 200%, with the average project exceeding budgets by 27%. If contracts, invoices, and expense reports are disconnected from the rest of your financial records, it’s much more difficult to identify projects that are draining resources beyond an acceptable threshold.
Spending less time sorting out the financial and logistical details surrounding a project and more time working on the project itself will not only improve your operational efficiency, it will help give you a clearer, more accurate picture of your bottom line.
Inventory Management
Taking control of your inventory starts with taking control of the way that you view it. By utilizing software to automate, track, and update the inventory aspect of your supply chain, you’ll be able to more quickly add new items, be notified of low stock levels, and intuitively configure a barcoding protocol.
Data from your sales and purchase orders shouldn’t have to be copied or transferred between multiple software titles—the sales reports you generate should include all pertinent tracking information and vendor costs sourced directly from your inventory management system, not from someone who manually copied data from your inventory management system.
Your revenue stream is the lifeblood of your business. Warehouses full of products, fleets of service vans, various legal documents—whatever industry you’re in, the materials you need for day-to-day operations represent one of the largest operating costs that you’ll have to account for.
Instead of determining retroactively how much your business spent on specific items, be proactive—not reactive. Make sure all costs of these purchases are available to be viewed and assessed alongside the rest of your finances in a centralized document storage system.
Wrapping Up Your Search For A QuickBooks Alternative
Accounting software will proficiently handle all of your account needs, but that’s simply not enough.
Your business is more than just accounting—it’s sales, operations, project management, and so much more. The software you enlist for your business should exemplify this by seamlessly integrating every element of your business under one (digital) roof.
Our experts know exactly how tough it can be to get reliable, accurate, and—in many cases—free information about what software solutions are a good fit for your business. We’ve carefully cultivated a list of the 10 Best Business Management Software solutions to aid you in your search.
Not every choice is easy—the best decisions seldom are. The best software solutions won’t necessarily be the flashiest or the most popular. Even the term “best” is a relative term—really, the important thing to look for is what software will be the best fit for your business. Adaptability, flexibility, and personalization are what brought you success in the first place. Stick with these same core values when exploring software solutions.
Excel may have been around for over 30 years and is a well-established staple for many businesses, but like most pieces of archaic technology and data management methods, it may be time to put it behind you.
Excel is still relevant, which is why so many companies rely on it, but it’s better for use with developing spreadsheets as opposed to in-depth sales reports and other more complex applications.
Don’t count on it to serve as the main database for all of your data, especially if you’re gathering too much data for it to handle.
While Excel may still be useful for basic calculations, scheduling, setting budgets, charting, and planning, it’s not as ideal for analyzing or visualizing data, keeping your reports updated, or sharing information with colleagues or clients.
If your business is still dependent on Excel to develop a weekly or monthly sales report, there are several reasons why you’re better off turning to a more efficient solution.
Kicking the Habit of Using Excel
Excel is like many other bad habits.
It begins innocently until it becomes a problem and the person becomes dependent on it. For example, that one-cup-of-coffee-a-day habit can develop into multiple cups, until even missing a single cup on schedule can result in a headache.
Bad habits can quickly go from beneficial to downright hazardous before you know it, oftentimes after the damage has been done.
The same goes for Excel, which may have begun with a single employee using the platform to create a comprehensive initial spreadsheet.
That spreadsheet, or several of them, may have been invaluable in managing many pieces of data to help develop sales reports.
However, over time, that advantage may have developed into a disadvantage as those spreadsheets collected more and more data, and various errors may be overlooked until they become a hindrance.
If you find that you’re still depending on Excel for financial management and completing sales reports, this software may be hurting your business in ways you’re not even aware of, much like other bad habits.
There are several reasons why Excel is potentially more of a detriment to your business than a help.
Excel Doesn’t Function as a Reliable Database
Spreadsheets can be helpful in keeping data organized in the short-term and in smaller quantities, but they’re no substitute for an accessible and secure database.
It’s best to avoid using Excel spreadsheets to manage large amounts of data, as the platform is basic at best and potentially dangerous to use at worst.
Excel is capable of handling many entries, but you’re likely to start experiencing performance issues with your operating systems if you don’t have the hardware to handle substantial amounts of spreadsheet data.
In fact, the more formulas you use in your spreadsheets, the sooner you’re going to suffer from sluggish PC performance and crashes, which can seriously hurt your business.
There are multiple problems you can experience with Excel that make it less than ideal for use as a database.
Data Errors Can Put Your Business at Risk
One of the biggest problems with relying on Excel spreadsheets is the potential for various errors.
The larger the spreadsheet and the more numerous the formulas, the more likely your sheets are to have multiple errors.
As a result of these errors, large businesses have lost billions.
Even perceivably tiny errors such as a faulty copy-paste have culminated in millions lost for some of the largest corporations.
If big, well-established companies can make mistakes with their spreadsheets, so can you.
It’s important to keep in mind that human error is always a factor when people are counted on to manually enter and manage data.
You could be the most thorough person with an eye for the smallest details, but you just might miss that one typo or miscalculation that could significantly harm your business.
If you do become aware of the error, it can also take a lot of extra time and effort to identify and address it, which you could otherwise avoid with a more reliable system.
If your sales reports are more likely to contain errors, you’re also less likely to be confident in the data you’re collecting and presenting.
That uncertainty could also cost you if you can’t pinpoint the best direction to take based on your reports.
You Can’t Trust Formulas to Maintain Accuracy of Data
The nice thing about Excel is that it comes packed with many formulas and functions that you can use to help automate spreadsheets.
However, the caveat is that the accuracy of data calculated with these formulas is only as accurate as the individual entering the initial data points.
Many of the calculations used in Excel are very complicated, with the need to manually enter various figures or program them, through the use of multiple spreadsheets and cascading formulas.
In the process, you’re probably going to make a mistake at some point.
If you’re great with numbers and have years of experience in Excel, and you know precisely how to set up and manage the myriad functions and formulas, you might avoid most errors.
Unless this is the case, it’s usually more work and trouble than it’s worth.
Insecure Sharing Can Leave Data in the Wrong Hands
When working with a data-driven sales team, it’s important to be able to cohesively collaborate.
One of the most important elements of effective collaboration is data sharing, including the ability for entire teams to easily access trends, metrics, financial data, and key performance indicators, among other insightful and actionable data points.
While Excel can enable you to share data in a presentable format that’s easy to understand, it’s not the best method to use for data sharing.
Relying on Excel for sharing sales and other data can lead to lost and forgotten emails, misfiling issues, and in worst-case scenarios, data falling into the hands of people who should never see it.
Using Excel, you can easily lose track of who has access to your data and what they’re doing with it.
You may also run into other issues when sharing your data. For instance, some recipients of data may experience slowed performance or inaccessibility due to varying operating systems and weaker hardware.
In other cases, sharing the same spreadsheet can result in overwriting and multiple data entry errors that are harder to catch.
Excel Can’t Effectively Visualize Data
In addition to being an unreliable database, another problem with Excel is that it’s just not useful for visualizing your sales data.
If you’re considering using Excel spreadsheets to help build a sales dashboard or another type of business intelligence dashboard, consider looking for another option.
Excel may allow you to visualize data with pie charts, graphs, and other visuals, but it will be difficult to share them with your sales team.
Too many inconsistencies can arise as people look at multiple versions of an Excel dashboard, and errors are practically inevitable.
Instead, consider opting for business intelligence software to function as a dashboard that offers consistent results.
The Advantages of Using Business Intelligence Software
Through the use of dependable business intelligence (BI) software, you can experience several benefits that you won’t find when solely using Excel for sales reports.
BI software can effectively serve as a hub for all of your sales data and reports using a centralized platform.
Instead of working with multiple programs and data sets that you need to balance and manage separately, keep it all together in the same platform with a comprehensive BI solution.
The following are some specific benefits that you’ll get with the right BI software behind your sales teams.
Reduce or Even Eliminate the Risk of Human Error
Good BI software will allow you to connect it to all of your current data, which can help minimize the risk of errors, including issues with improper copy-paste and typos.
To access and consolidate all data, the right BI software solution will be able to integrate with programs like CRMs, Google Ads, and many other platforms.
Benefit from a Sleek and Intuitive Design
Today’s BI software features better designs than simple spreadsheets, keeping your dashboard and reports visually engaging as well as accurate and accessible.
Features such as filters, sorting, and zooming can make it easy to navigate your sales reports and visualize them in any way you want.
You won’t need to worry about getting lost in massive and potentially confusing spreadsheets that are likely to give you a headache.
Data visualizations can also be far more appealing than what you would get with charts and graphs on Excel and other basic platforms.
Securely Update and Share Your Database
Using a safe BI solution, you can send sales dashboard data securely through the use of formats like live links, PowerPoint presentations, or PDFs.
You may also be able to integrate your dashboard with another platform used for collaboration among internal teams.
You can even schedule report updates to ensure everyone regularly receives the latest sales report.
Stay Consistently Up-to-Date
One potential source of inconsistency among sales teams is using outdated spreadsheet data, as you often need to refresh the sheet once you make any changes to data points.
You don’t need to worry about constant manual refreshing with the latest BI software.
As soon as you make any changes, your sales dashboard can automatically update to the latest version, which everyone on your team will see.
Subsequently, you’ll never inadvertently work with outdated dashboards and reports.
Perform More Accurate Calculations with Formulas
You don’t need to be a math or economics whiz to work with formulas thanks to today’s BI capabilities.
The right software will also be able to provide you with the modules and tools you need to make accurate calculations with the right formulas.
You no longer need to balance all of those functions and formulas in your head when they’re at the tip of your fingers.
Review Analytics Remotely
Regardless of where you and your team are located, you can make sure you have access to the sales dashboard from any access point.
Using secure mobile devices, your sales team can use an equally secure app to access the dashboard and make any changes or view real-time data.
At the same time, everyone will be able to see the same sets of data, as the dashboard automatically updates with the latest information if your team makes any changes.
Have Complete Control Over Accessibility
Apart from being able to safely and securely share data internally or with remote access, you can also make sure the wrong people never access your dashboards and reports.
BI software can help ensure that only those with explicit permission to view your data will be able to see it, and you can optimize security by controlling individual access to dashboards, reports, or pieces of data.
You can even make sure that specific groups of people have access to specific relevant data sets. This eliminates the need to create separate dashboards for different users, saving you even more time and effort.
BI Software Can Give You Everything You Need from Your Database
Excel hasn’t completely outlived its usefulness, but it’s not meant to be an all-in-one solution for sales reporting and data management.
As your business grows and you need a system that can handle the accumulating data, you will need to adapt by implementing a more reliable solution.
While Excel can help you get started, consider using business intelligence software to maintain the integrity of your data, eliminate errors, improve security and shareability, and keep your data consistently accurate.
Using a complete BI platform, your sales teams will be fully equipped to measure performance and meet your business goals.
When it comes to setting expectations for 2021, the bar is admittedly low. But, after what seemed like an eternity for small business owners, more help is arriving.
As the second coming of the PPP prepares to roll out, provisions have been made that will bring your dreams of upgrading your technology and software to life.
While the new PPP still requires that payroll costs must make up 60% of forgivable expenses, there’s a new twist—cloud computing costs and services will now be considered a forgivable expense.
To put it simply, any cloud computing service will be FREE for your business courtesy of Uncle Sam. (AND it’s tax deductible now, too!)
President Trump has delayed signing the bill citing a desire to send larger, one-time stimulus checks to all citizens, but we assume that the provisions provided for small businesses will not be altered.
Here’s What’s New This Time:
New covered operations expenditures – “means a payment for business software or cloud computing service that facilitates business operations, product or service delivery, the processing, payment, or tracking of payroll expenses, human resources, sales and billing functions, or accounting or tracking of supplies, inventory, records and expenses”
Expenses applied to PPP loan forgiveness are now deductible for federal tax purposes.
If you didn’t get your money from the first PPP, you can ask for more this time.
