The world changed forever in 2020 and that far-reaching set of consequences expands to some horizons you might not have considered. For instance, until now, QuickBooks was always the favored choice for businesses looking for effective accounting software for their small firm or startup. Those times are changing and many SMBs are abandoning that service in favor of NetSuite. It’s a switch that will benefit many users with NetSuite ready to take on the challenges of this new world with a stronger focus on remote working.
We’ve taken the time to compare and contrast QuickBooks with NetSuite — an option we’d generally consider to be a far better bet in 2021 and beyond. Read on as we take a look at both suites and explain why NetSuite is great for more than just its remote working functionality.
What is NetSuite?
First founded in 1998 under its original name of NetLedger, NetSuite has continued to be a key part of the web-hosted accounting software world ever since. Over the past 20 years, the company has gone from strength to strength and is now the leading cloud-based ERP solution for businesses. Consistently forward-thinking, users can utilize NetSuite to automate front and back-office processes such as financial management, revenue management, fixed assets, order management, billing, inventory management, and much more. Offering an all-in-one solution for businesses ensures it will be an immensely attractive proposition for all types of companies.
How does NetSuite help small businesses?
As a small business, it’s important to find a cost-effective solution that can grow alongside your company’s growth. It can be tempting to be lured in by an entry-level software solution but it’s a bad idea if you’re planning on expanding your business at any time. That’s where NetSuite helps businesses most — it grows with your ambitions — ensuring you spend less time dealing with administrative tasks and more time tackling your core mission.
Able to automate mission-critical tasks, you can avoid being overwhelmed by invoices, missing orders, and reconciliations, instead leaving NetSuite to tackle your business finance in a tailored way that works for your industry. Alongside that, there’s real-time insight across every line of business, so you can spot how to optimize your firm as well as make more informed decisions. That can help you add new product lines as well as figure out how to engage better with your customers.
Everything about NetSuite for small business is designed in a way that is flexible, agile, and scalable, so you get the service that your business requires, rather than a one-size-fits-all-solution that never actually fits your requirements.
Robust and adaptable, NetSuite is a cost-efficient service for all ambitious small businesses.
How do QuickBooks and NetSuite work?
For accounting software, QuickBooks has the brand recognition of Coca Cola or Google, at least for its field. Odds are you already know the name so it’s got to be the best service, right? Not necessarily. While QuickBooks has been around for more than 20 years, it doesn’t offer a better service.
Crucially, NetSuite is exclusively cloud-based. It’s the leading cloud-based ERP solution thanks to a wealth of features that go far beyond simple accounting. QuickBooks was originally a desktop-based application and while a cloud-based solution exists, it’s not generally well regarded due to limited features and slow navigational features. Being built from the ground up with cloud services in mind has been a huge advantage for NetSuite clients.
What features do QuickBooks and NetSuite offer?
It’s important to pick accounting software that offers all the features you could want. QuickBooks is fine if you simply want to deal with basic financial management for your firm and you’re not too interested in collaborative features or anything more than that.
However, as the name suggests, NetSuite offers a full complement of enterprise-grade applications. Effectively, it’s a full suite of everything your growing small business could want. That includes marketing automation, Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software, order management software, e-commerce software, point of sale software, along with inventory and warehouse management software.
If you want to keep on top of every single section of your business, all from one piece of software, NetSuite has you covered. QuickBooks is good for doing, well, your books. It’s fine for the basics but you’ll need to add additional software to your business to be able to do much more. NetSuite saves you the hassle of arranging new software as well as learning (or teaching your staff) new methods. You can even use it for controlling your shop floor if you have a retail-based business.
The best part? If you don’t need all these features, you can easily personalize your NetSuite service so that the system is tailored for your business, saving you the hassle of a convoluted software suite.
What size business is QuickBooks and NetSuite best for?
No small business plans on staying small for long. Everyone is ambitious and you want software that will grow with you. Purely in terms of financial management, NetSuite has more going for it than QuickBooks.
QuickBooks offers services like accounts payable, accounts receivable, general ledger, budgeting, and the ability to deal with multiple currencies. NetSuite, however, offers all that plus fixed assets, multi-company support and consolidation, subscription billing, forecasting, financial planning, and much more. It will grow alongside your business, plus you can deal with it all online rather than needing to install separate software tools.
Why is being cloud-based so important for accounting software?
We’ve made a lot of mention of how great it is that NetSuite is cloud-based, but it’s worth reinforcing.
Right now, many businesses are split up, forced to work remotely from home due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Even once life returns to normal, many businesses are considering flexible working to be a good option for the future. Cloud-based solutions make this a far easier option to facilitate.
By working through cloud-based solutions, you have multiple advantages. For one thing, there’s no need for anyone to install software onto their laptop or desktop PC. That’s perfect if you don’t have an extensive IT budget and some of your employees have ageing systems.
For another, cloud-based software is much easier to collaborate on. Rather than needing to send files across to other users, everything is stored online, leaving you all to easily work together without any friction between arranging files and relevant data.
QuickBooks offers an online solution but it’s simply not as effective as NetSuite’s, which has been designed with cloud-based usage in mind every step of the way.
What accounting software should I choose?
So, what accounting software is best for you? Simply put, It’s NetSuite. In the past, QuickBooks suited a small office environment but in these modern times where folks are working remotely and collaboration is everything, you can’t go wrong with NetSuite.
Once you also consider how well NetSuite will grow in tandem with your evolving business needs and how you can use it for so much more than simple accountancy, it’s sure to save you a lot of time and money, allowing you to have a one-size-fits-all solution rather than needing to juggle multiple apps.
Make the change now to NetSuite and enjoy more flexibility for your firm.
