7 Ways Online Invoicing Simplifies Your Business

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No one enjoys invoicing.

At its best, it’s a time-consuming, tedious process. At its worst, it’s a nightmare of late payments, lost invoices, and never-ending games of phone tag.

The good news? There’s a way to free yourself from the madness: online invoicing.

Online invoicing simplifies your business in 7 essential ways.

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1. No more snail mail

It’s the 21st century, but some businesses still send out invoices via snail mail.

Snail mail is inefficient. For every invoice you send out, you have to print it, put it in an envelope, and stamp and address it. This process may be feasible for small businesses, but if you’re sending out dozens of invoices a day, it’s impossible.

And that’s just getting them out the door.

Invoices sent in the mail can get lost, and you never truly know when they’ll arrive in your customers’ mailboxes.

Online invoicing relieves some of this pressure with digital invoices. Each invoice has a digital record of when you sent it, so you never lose track, and they’re sent instantaneously, so you don’t have to wait on the post office to deliver.

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2. No more paper invoices

If you’re still using snail mail, then you’re probably still using paper invoices, which come with their own set of challenges.

Paper invoices can be easily lost or abandoned on a desk, and they’re a hassle to file and store.

Online invoicing takes you from paper to the cloud, where you can access your digital invoices from any internet-connected device. No more misplacing invoices, storing them, or searching through files to find the right one.

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3. No more hunting down contact information

Every time you create an invoice, you have to hunt down the company’s contact information. You might have to find the information for your contact person in a specific department, or maybe you scroll through a directory or search the company online.

In any case, it’s an annoying process that sucks away time.

Online invoicing saves you from the search by finding the contact information you need, which is already stored in your accounting system, and automatically populating it in the invoice. You don’t have to find a thing.

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4. No more following up

One of the most stressful and frustrating parts of invoicing is following up on payments. You have to strike the right balance between sounding too firm and too polite—you want your payment, but you don’t want to unnecessarily sour the business relationship. Trying to find the right words can be paralyzing.

You might even forget to follow up entirely. It’s one of those tasks you might have on your list but never get around to because you’re so busy. And then a few weeks have passed, and you realize you still need payment.

Online invoicing takes the stress out of following up by automatically sending email reminders to your customers. You simply send off the invoice along with a templated email reminder to pay. You can even set up recurring reminders to be sent out a week or two weeks later.

You don’t have to hover over the keyboard, worrying about what to say, and you don’t have remember to keep following up. The system automatically sends email reminders, so you don’t have to think about it.

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5. Make it easier to pay (and receive payments)

Paying off an invoice isn’t always easy. Your customers have to check their own records, make sure everything matches up, follow your specific payment procedure, and, finally, send payment.

If they get distracted or confused at any point, they could abandon the process for a few days or weeks, until it’s forgotten and you’re missing your payment.

Online invoicing makes it easier for your customers to pay you—and easier for you to receive payments. Your clients get a link in their inbox, and when they click it, they’re taken to a secure web form where they can pay right away.

Fewer steps in the payment process means less friction and fewer chances for your customers to get distracted or confused. And it means you get paid faster and spend less time on collections.

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6. Less time spent on data entry/administration

Online invoicing uses the power of the cloud to automatically sync with your accounting software. There’s no more entering the same information twice or manually reconciling invoices—you simply create an invoice in your accounting software and upload it to the online invoicing portal. When your customer pays, their payment is automatically applied to the invoice, so you don’t have to manually reconcile your ledger.

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7. Fewer errors

There are dozens of points in the invoicing process that are vulnerable to errors. An invoice could be lost in the mail or left on a desk. You could enter the wrong contact information or make a mistake when reconciling the invoice.

Online invoicing can’t eliminate every error, but it can certainly reduce them.

Digital invoices are harder to lose than physical ones, and they leave behind a digital track record in a cloud-based system that both you and your customers can access. That means a lower chance of duplicate or lost invoices, and you don’t have to go digging through files to find a misplaced invoice.

The built-in automation of online invoicing means you don’t have to manually reconcile invoices or do double data entry—two more chances for errors in creep in.

Online invoicing lowers the chance of errors in the invoicing process and gives you peace of mind that everything is running smoothly.

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Conclusion

Invoicing is an integral part of doing business, but it’s not always easy or seamless. Countless errors and challenges can get in the way and drain your company’s time and resources.

Online invoicing relieves some of the pain by eliminating the worst challenges. Whether you want to ditch snail mail and paper invoices, automate your invoice reconciliation, or just want an easier way for your customers to pay, online invoicing can simplify your business and give you more time and attention for what really matters.

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Niki Blois

Niki is a writer for Century Business Solutions covering integrated payments, credit card processing, and how to increase payment efficiency.

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