Budgeting software – traditional or online?
An online budgeting system can significantly benefit your business in various ways:
Running a successful business means keeping up with the cash flow I the company, monitoring income, expenses. Budgeting is one of the cornerstones of responsible financial management, because it defines where expenditure can happen.
Lets work through some areas where budgeting is effective.
Firstly , we need to know HOW to start a budget
- Create a list of income and expenses, including salaries, other income streams to get an accurate picture of income. Use at least 3 months
- Create a spreadsheet or list of you expenses. Include fixed (expenses which don’t change), and variable (groceries, entertainment)
- Categorise your expenses, and prioritise them. Identify which can be used to cut costs.
List the goals, in priority order.
Why budget?
- Improved financial management
Budgeting means answerability and procedures are in place to monitor income, expenses, and cash flow in real-time, ensuring you always have an up-to-date picture of your financial health.
2. Forecasting
Generate accurate financial forecasts based on historical data and current trends, helping in better planning and decision-making.
3. Reduced corruption
Have pre-arranged steps in place, which means that decisions to spend money, are pre-thought, pre-arranged reducing opportunity for impulsive decisions, and spending in unintended places.
4. Answerability
Expenditure then requires answerability and accountability
Let’s compare traditional budgeting vs online budgeting software
| Traditional budgeting | Software budgeting | |
| Efficiency | Manual entry and calculations, time-consuming | Automated processes, saves time and reduces errors |
| Accuracy | Prone to human error, requires meticulous double-checking | High accuracy with automated data entry and calculations |
| Real-time tracking | Difficult to maintain, often outdated | Real-time updates and tracking of financial data |
| Reporting | Manual report generation, limited customization | Automated, customizable, and detailed reports |
| Accessibility | Physical documents or spreadsheets, limited access | Cloud-based access from anywhere, multiple user collaboration |
Without a budget management system, it is basically impossible to keep track of your money, provide accurate forecasts and reach your financial goals. Many business owners feel overwhelmed when they think of sitting down, having a meeting and setting up the budget, but it doesn’t have to be that way.
Intoweb’s budget management system comes in the form of customisable software and makes it easy for small to medium and even large companies to be in charge of forecasting, profit and loss reports etc. If you are a business owner, it is unlikely that you have the time to handle your company’s accounting even if you have the skills to do so.
Apart from the budget management system all you need is someone who is employed to oversee the whole operation of the system and feed the system with the relevant information and figures… it could be all the man power required.
The availability of money in the budget is the basis upon which most decisions are made within any organisation, having all the facts when making these decisions is quite important with a budget management system you can be sure that you have covered all the aspects such as, forecasts and planning and that you have taken all variables into consideration.
Reports and general financial information is merely a click away when your company runs on budget management system.
There are thousands of entrepreneurs who run businesses and do not have any formal financial planning or management qualifications, these are the individuals who will benefit most from a budget management system and benefit from knowing that none of the important factors are overlooked. This is priceless peace of mind.
