Bookkeeping and Invoicing for Freelancers

I'll be honest, my expertise is not in accounting.

I don't think this comes as a surprise to anyone reaching out to me for digital marketing help. But, since I am trying to run a business here, I realize that I need to find a system that works for both me and my clients.

Over the past few months, I have tried out a few different methods for bookkeeping and sending out invoices. My first stop was Excel, which I think nearly everyone has some experience with.

Although I still use it for tracking my hours and basic cash flow, I felt like Excel wasn't cutting it. I was still having to manually enter bank data and log information across invoice templates, which left room for transferring errors.

Since my long term goal is to turn freelancing into a full-time operation, keeping up with several different payment sources, multiple softwares, and scheduling invoice dates was proving to be unsustainable.

Lucky for me, my clients understand that I'm a one-woman team and this is my first year working for myself. One of my clients introduced me to a bookkeeping software that he had experience with, and so far has been working out! It's a Canadian app called Wave.

Wave is a great free tool. I was able to set up automatic and reoccurring invoices within an hour of linking up my bank account. It sends an email request to my clients directly from the app to give them the option of paying through their secure payment portal. The portal only takes 1% fee per transaction, which I think is reasonable (and comparable to alternate payments forms).

Creating my own branded invoices was also leaving room for error - but Wave covers that too. It's as easy as filling in a template, plus you can import your logo and brand colors for professional invoices that take less than 10 minutes to prepare. Once you receive your payment, it automatically syncs to your accounting software - which makes it pretty much impossible to mess up or lose track of.

They have automatic visualization tools that I find super useful, since in my experience, lists of numbers can easily get overwhelming. Opening the app to graphs and charts allows you to visualize your finances immediately.

Wave seems to be the one-stop solution to my bookkeeping and invoicing issues, but I'm definitely open to hearing from other freelancers about their experiences with bookkeeping. Are there better softwares out there? I'd love to hear from you.

Again, thanks for reading and keeping up-to-date with my little updates on my route to freelancing. Is there anything else you want to hear about my experience so far? Send me a message.