Why We Love Freshbooks "Painless Billing"

Why We Love Freshbooks "Painless Billing"

Freshbooks is an online invoicing SaaS (Software as a Service). Their tagline is “painless billing”, and they aren’t kidding around. They make invoicing so easy. Back in 2005 while starting ATX Multimedia (now Alt Creative), I started looking for a better way to invoice my clients. I didn’t have an accounting background so many of the invoicing options such as Quickbooks overwhelmed me.  I just wanted an easy way to send and track invoices and let my clients choose their payment method. Freshbooks was the only invoicing system that I could find that would allow me to email a link to the invoice that could be paid online, so I was sold. Many companies have entered the space since and I have occasionally looked at their features to see if the grass is greener, but none of them have ever swayed me because Freshbooks has something unique – they actively build loyalty.
How do they do that? First, let’s look at some of their features:

1.       Ease of Use: They’ve taken care to put thought into the look and the usability of their system.  They pay attention to their users and use that feedback to continually roll out feature updates.

2.       Professional Image: Each invoice is 100% branded for our company. When a client logs into the client portal to view all of their past invoices, they see our logo, not the Freshbooks logo.  Being that we are a creative agency, we care what that portal looks like. It has to be beautiful, easy to navigate, and carry on the quality that our clients expect from us. Freshbooks totally delivers.

3.       Time Tracking:  For any freelancer or agency tracking time is crucial, but sometimes painful. Freshbooks added a multi-user time tracking system so you can track your time easily and then instantly generate an invoice from that system.

4.       Item Invoicing: One of the ways Alt Creative creates revenue aside from client projects is through maintenance programs and hosting. We can invoice clients for these items as well using the Freshbooks system.

5.       Automated invoicing and collections: Freshbooks allows you to set recurring invoices.  Clients can even enter their credit card into the system for automated monthly invoicing.

6.       Security: You invoices and online payments are secure giving clients the confidence to pay online, which means you get paid faster!

7.       They track everything: One of the best things about Freshbooks is that we can see if a client has viewed their invoice. We can run reports to get a better idea our revenue breakdown. Freshbooks even tracks how long on average it takes each client to pay based on their history.

8.       API integrations:  Alt Creative uses several different “cloud” services and SaaS providers and we love it when they can “talk” to each other. Freshbooks can integrate with your accounts on Basecamp, Outright, MailChimp, Shoeboxed, ZENDesk, Capsule CRM, and so many more!

So, all of these features sound pretty great, right? What takes Freshbooks from being great to being the only invoicing SaaS we’ll ever use? It’s how they run their business and their customer service.  They actively support their users through their forum, their blog, and they even have a customer support phone number which is rare in the world of online hosted software. I’ve watched this company grow and I’ve met several of their employees and I am always surprised by how passionate they all are about their industry. I mean, really, who gets passionate about invoicing? How many people in the accounting software industry do you see display actual joy for their jobs? They find meaning in helping small businesses get paid and that is why they continue to add features to their product and reach out to their community. It’s contagious and it’s why Alt Creative will always be a Freshbooks client.