How Migrating to QuickBooks Online Changed My Life

How Migrating to QuickBooks Online Changed My Life

Author: Kelly Gonsalves

I know it sounds kind of silly to say, the title that is.

Of course, we talk all the time about how technology has changed the world, and the lives of billions. Every day, innovations and inventions save lives, and the cloud has saved mine.

I might be a little dramatic. I’d probably still be alive without the cloud. But honestly, my life would be very different without it, and I’m not the only one. According to Garter, the global revenue accrued from cloud-based business services totaled USD $600 billion in 2023, up from $490 billion in 2022. This revenue includes services bought and paid for by businesses. Both the reliance on cloud-based services combined with the number of businesses offering those services is leading to exponential growth in the industry.

On a more personal level, I may not have stayed in Accounting for very long, let alone founded my business, Totally Booked, without the cloud.

The point is, the cloud has enabled me and my business to reach heights I couldn’t have imagined. Totally Booked is cloud-based, with QuickBooks Online at the center, allowing me to serve my clients, and myself, better…and from anywhere with WiFi.

However, being in the cloud has done more than affected my career but that’s where I’m going to start. For the personal stuff (including getting to hang out with my friends & my family more), skip down a bit. I totally won’t judge you.

(I will, a little bit.)

Totally Cloud

My career really started as part of the larger migration of accounting technology from Desktop to the cloud. From the way I run Totally Booked and work with clients, you might’ve never guessed that I started my career using Quickbooks Desktop.

When I was getting started, I didn’t know about the many options this industry had to offer. I took a QuickBooks Desktop certification course, and little did I know that Quickbooks Online was waiting for me.

Now, I can’t say I didn’t see the shift coming both for myself and for the industry as a whole. Quickbooks Online was officially released in 2004, which I know is long before I got started but that definitely doesn’t mean it was as popular as it is today. Back then not a lot of people were using it because the original version needed improvement.

For many of my would-be clients they didn’t know the difference in functionality between Desktop and Online, the security of a cloud platform was their biggest concern. I remember when I took my first QuickBooks Online certification course one of the instructors compared their security to that of online banking and I still use that analogy to describe it to my clients. As it turns out, their cybersecurity concerns were, from my perspective, easily avoidable. While, as a report from IBM has shown, 45% of all cyberattacks are cloud-based, the majority of them came as a result of human error.

When I decided to move all of my clients to QuickBooks Online a client asked me if working remotely and in the cloud would make the process more efficient, I confidently said yes and that was the end of the discussion. The reality is that they trusted me to make the right decisions for my business and theirs.

Having the ability to work with clients’ financials directly in QBO, collaborate on Zoom, and have documents uploaded directly to the cloud meant I was able to streamline my workflow and it no longer involved sending Desktop files back and forth. Plus, I didn’t have to leave the office anymore, and my business expanded far beyond the NYC subway map. From my office, I could easily work with clients across the country, and help them work with businesses around the world. Today I worked with a client in New Zealand and another in Spain.

The bottom line, for me, was that the pros far outweighed the cons. Time saved, increased efficiency, and third-party integrations with the software that my clients’ were using to run their business was all it took for me to see that cloud-based accounting was the way to go.

Efficiency

Being able to work the hours in my day more efficiently meant I could bring on more clients, offer more services like consulting and advisory, and do a bit of marketing. I started to take advantage of social media, had a website built, and started to attend more accounting conferences like the one that introduced me to QBO in the first place.

Forbes published an article over 10 years ago about cloud-based solutions cutting labor costs by up to 50% for businesses across many industries, not just accounting. Imagine what that number is now.

In a much more recent McKinsey article, they state that collaboration technologies (such as those made available by cloud-based technologies), have been known to increase productivity by up to 30%, with the potential to unlock over $100 billion for the global economy. These technologies increase efficiency by allowing business owners like myself to pay fewer people and get more work done.

For those of you who stuck around, here’s the fun part.

The fun stuff - NETWORKING

I know I said fun stuff and networking within two lines, but hear me out. While networking can be intimidating it can also be one of the most rewarding things you’ll do for your business. I’ve been to a lot of conferences, mastermind groups, and meetups since starting Totally Booked and every time meet someone great and learn something new.

For example, at the last conference I attended there were sessions about how to move from Desktop to Online, and let me tell you, the process is so much smoother now than it was 7 years ago! There is now assisted or self-service migration and an online migration tool along with a toolkit! You can even bring over things like bank rules & custom reports from QuickBooks Desktop now. Your client will also be able to keep their old Desktop data for a whole year after canceling their Desktop subscription. And as much fun as that is I was also able to spend time with some of the smartest individuals in our industry and learn from them in a more casual setting, like a Las Vegas nightclub.

I will admit that QuickBooks Online alone is not enough for me to get everything done, but that’s why it’s great that I can customize the client experience with third-party apps like Zapier, Liscio, Synder, & Corpay One along with so many more. Integrating these apps as a way to replace manual processes has given me more time to spend with my clients helping them make important decisions. Using apps has also helped me create a better work-life integration as I’m not working non-stop to get the data where it needs to be. I can start my day by paddle boarding on the lake, or I could move across the country for a few months (I actually did this), attend family functions, and be there for moments that matter.

While working in the cloud has made my business more efficient, the biggest thing for me has been the time I’ve gotten back. When I was first getting started, I knew I couldn’t be chained to a desk and surrounded by papers in a dusty office every day. I wanted to be someone different, someone that my clients could relate to. I wanted to be me. And I think I’ve done just that.