Shownotes
Business Building Insights
- You don’t need to be a finance expert. You just need systems so the financial part of your life is taken cared of.
- Keeping records can be as simple as an excel spreadsheet.
- Bookkeeping is simply what money comes in, what money goes out and why.
- Money is the life blood of your business. That’s what allows your business to keep going.
- You definitely want to keep your business finances separate from your personal finances.
- Invest in software that will automatically create reports for you. They save you time and are directly linked to your bank account.
- Build a habit. Spend a few minutes each day to check transactions.
- Price is part of your brand. It’s communicating how valuable things are. When you don’t include the price of your time in what you make, it’s like telling clients and yourself that your time isn’t valuable.
Resources Mentioned
Wave Financial Quickbooks Fresh BooksContact Links
Website Facebook InstagramGift Biz Resources
Join our FREE Gift Biz Breeze Facebook Community
If you found value in this podcast, make sure to subscribe and leave a review in Apple Podcasts or Google Podcasts. That helps us spread the word to more makers just like you.
Thanks! Sue
Transcripts
Hi there.
Speaker:You're listening to gift biz on rapt episode 204 at its
Speaker:core. What you're trying to do is just keep a record
Speaker:of where money comes from and where money goes and why
Speaker:At Tinton gifters,
Speaker:bakers, crafters and makers pursuing your dream can be fun.
Speaker:Whether you have an established business or looking to start one
Speaker:now you are in the right place.
Speaker:This is give to biz unwrapped,
Speaker:helping you turn your skill into a flourishing business.
Speaker:Join us for an episode packed full of invaluable guidance,
Speaker:resources and the support you need to grow your gift biz.
Speaker:Here is your host gift biz gal Sue moon Heights.
Speaker:Hi there,
Speaker:it's Sue And thank you so much for joining me here
Speaker:today. As always,
Speaker:today's a really special podcast because we're approaching a topic that
Speaker:you guys have asked me for over and over again,
Speaker:whether it's in comments in gift biz breeze,
Speaker:the private Facebook group or in maker's MBA,
Speaker:our signature course.
Speaker:A lot of questions come up about how to handle money
Speaker:and so often people just want to ignore it,
Speaker:shove it to the side and not face it,
Speaker:and you know what?
Speaker:When you do that,
Speaker:then you're setting yourself up for if not big trouble for
Speaker:sure. A lot of extra time involved,
Speaker:getting prepared for taxes and honestly not really having a pulse
Speaker:on your business,
Speaker:how well it's doing,
Speaker:or areas where you need to improve.
Speaker:So lucky for us,
Speaker:I have Lynn here who's going to talk through how to
Speaker:start understanding all of the dollars within your business,
Speaker:what tools you should use,
Speaker:and a very simple accounting formula that will let all of
Speaker:us just go.
Speaker:We can just breathe.
Speaker:Numbers don't have to be so hard.
Speaker:They can be our friend.
Speaker:Before we dive into the show,
Speaker:I want to tell you where I believe we are going
Speaker:to be at the time this podcast goes live.
Speaker:I've been sharing with you over the last five or six
Speaker:episodes or so that I've had something really exciting in the
Speaker:works and that is a daily planner made specifically for you
Speaker:gifters, bakers,
Speaker:crafters and makers.
Speaker:I didn't know it was going to take as long as
Speaker:it has to actually get them all printed up and have
Speaker:them available,
Speaker:but this is the week that they should be ready,
Speaker:so I'm super excited to share that with you.
Speaker:I'm recording it now,
Speaker:hoping everything stays on time in preparation for that.
Speaker:I've also created a video that gives you an inside look
Speaker:at the planner,
Speaker:but even more than that,
Speaker:I go through what has become a for me in terms
Speaker:of productivity in my business and that is what I've termed
Speaker:the power of purpose.
Speaker:People often ask me how I get so much accomplished in
Speaker:my days and apart from being a little crazy and Morgan
Speaker:a lot of hours,
Speaker:what I do is employ the power of purpose to make
Speaker:sure that all the time I'm putting in is getting the
Speaker:most reward.
Speaker:I'm using my time as efficiently and properly as I can
Speaker:and I do that through the power of purpose.
Speaker:I invite you to watch this video.
Speaker:It will share with you the concept of the power of
Speaker:purpose and it ties wonderfully into the fact that you're going
Speaker:to want to schedule time to do your new numbers,
Speaker:your new friends,
Speaker:right, that you're going to know about from the show,
Speaker:and then it also goes into what the new inspired daily
Speaker:planner is all about.
Speaker:If you already have a planner that you're using,
Speaker:no worries at all because a lot of the concepts that
Speaker:I lay out can be applied to bullet journals or whatever
Speaker:other planner you have.
Speaker:I bet you're wondering where you can get your hands on
Speaker:the video.
Speaker:Just go to gift biz,
Speaker:unwrapped.com forward slash.
Speaker:Planner I guarantee you you're in for a real treat and
Speaker:now let's get to the topic at hand,
Speaker:bookkeeping numbers,
Speaker:how to make it work for you and your business.
Speaker:You're going to see.
Speaker:Lynn just has such an easy calm way of talking and
Speaker:this is the perfect approach that we need to understand how
Speaker:to implement this into our businesses.
Speaker:Let's roll Leisure of introducing you to Lynn summer.
Speaker:Men of Lynn Summerlin financial coaching.
Speaker:Lynn helps entrepreneurs feel less stupid and sad about their money
Speaker:through practical skill building,
Speaker:habit change and mindset work.
Speaker:She speaks about budgeting as radical self care and loves coaching
Speaker:clients and seeing them light up,
Speaker:realizing that they're not doomed after all.
Speaker:Lynn lives in South Portland,
Speaker:Maine with her feisty daughter,
Speaker:snaggletooth dog and chickens named after strong woman.
Speaker:Boy, if that doesn't get your attention,
Speaker:I don't know what does.
Speaker:Welcome to the gift biz on rap podcast.
Speaker:Lynn, thanks for having me,
Speaker:Sue. I'm so excited to be here.
Speaker:I am thrilled that you're here too.
Speaker:I think this is going to be a really fun and
Speaker:lively conversation and when people hear that it's about money,
Speaker:they might be,
Speaker:well, I don't know about that,
Speaker:but gift is listeners.
Speaker:I guarantee you this is going to be a lot of
Speaker:fun and you are going to learn a ton.
Speaker:I'm not like your usual finance nerd.
Speaker:No, I could tell that from the second I met you.
Speaker:But let's share with our audience a little bit about who
Speaker:you are through a motivational candle.
Speaker:So if were to describe The color and the quote that
Speaker:would be on a candle that is aligned with you,
Speaker:Lynn, what would it look like?
Speaker:I think this is such a fun question by the way.
Speaker:I don't think I've ever been asked anything like this on
Speaker:a podcast before and it really got me thinking,
Speaker:I'm like,
Speaker:what color would I be?
Speaker:And I actually was just in a Yankee candle this weekend
Speaker:with my daughter and I was like,
Speaker:which of these candles best represents my spirit?
Speaker:So I think the color would be,
Speaker:I've been really into this like Marigold color recently because it's
Speaker:sort of fresh and fun and bold without being shallow.
Speaker:It's rich and interesting.
Speaker:I'd take everything about that.
Speaker:So I think the color would be like this rich Marigold
Speaker:color. Beautiful.
Speaker:I see that in you already.
Speaker:Bright sunshiny et cetera.
Speaker:Yeah. And so what about a quote or a mantra or
Speaker:saying that would also be on your candle?
Speaker:So my favorite,
Speaker:I'm actually a huge lover of inspirational quotes,
Speaker:which makes me feel sort of like cheesy,
Speaker:but I just really love them.
Speaker:But there's only one that I've got framed in my office
Speaker:and it's a quote from lout Sue and it says if
Speaker:you do not change direction,
Speaker:you may end up where you're heading.
Speaker:Ooh. The first time I heard that I was like,
Speaker:Oh right where exactly.
Speaker:Like where am I heading?
Speaker:What have I done sort of in my life?
Speaker:What is sort of like the likely outcome of what I'm
Speaker:doing right now and is that what I wanted to do?
Speaker:And I love sort of keeping that in the back of
Speaker:my mind,
Speaker:working with clients and working on my own business.
Speaker:Like what is the likely outcome of what I'm doing right
Speaker:now and what my clients are doing?
Speaker:Is that what we wanted or will want to be intentional
Speaker:about it?
Speaker:Love it.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:it sounds simple but there are so many people who are
Speaker:doing, doing,
Speaker:doing, doing,
Speaker:doing, doing and then when you ask,
Speaker:well what's the end result?
Speaker:What are you looking to achieve?
Speaker:They have trouble putting it into words.
Speaker:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker:And I've been guilty of that too.
Speaker:Oh yeah.
Speaker:We do all the time.
Speaker:Which is why I don't think it's ever like ever stopped
Speaker:doing it.
Speaker:I think it's just about awareness building so that you can
Speaker:sort of see it while it's happening before it you've sort
Speaker:of had the consequences and go Oh right,
Speaker:I'm going to get back on track for the thing I
Speaker:actually wanted to do rather than like the default way of
Speaker:being. Yeah.
Speaker:Being intentional with what you're doing.
Speaker:Yeah. Cause it can be a lot of waste of time
Speaker:too. Absolutely.
Speaker:We get stuck in doing things that we find are easy
Speaker:and then we don't do the things that we really need
Speaker:to do that will advance the business.
Speaker:Absolutely. I do that all the time and I think that
Speaker:falls within our topic to actually absolutely numbers.
Speaker:Except if someone's handing me like a bill or a penny
Speaker:or I'm exchanging money for something,
Speaker:I want numbers to me and bookkeeping and all of that
Speaker:get really scary.
Speaker:So, and I'm sure a lot of my listeners feel the
Speaker:same way as do all fine.
Speaker:So well yeah.
Speaker:Cause that's why they're your customer,
Speaker:right? They're our clients.
Speaker:Give us a little bit of a backstory.
Speaker:What led up to the wiser miser?
Speaker:My background,
Speaker:so I have an,
Speaker:so I studied business,
Speaker:I really love accounting.
Speaker:But my background before grad school,
Speaker:I have an undergraduate degree in sociology,
Speaker:which if you don't know,
Speaker:is basically just the study of human behavior in group settings.
Speaker:So like why do we do the things that we do,
Speaker:which I just really love studying the way that people behave
Speaker:and all of that stuff.
Speaker:And the short story of how I really got into this
Speaker:was that when I finished college,
Speaker:I had like the great American dream of tons of student
Speaker:loans, a credit score in the toilet and like a shiny
Speaker:new credit card debt that I didn't know what to do
Speaker:with. I think that's a nightmare.
Speaker:It's like sort of like everybody,
Speaker:it's like go to college and everything will work itself out
Speaker:and it didn't work as was the story for a lot
Speaker:of people.
Speaker:I say tried all the things.
Speaker:Some of them worked,
Speaker:some of them didn't.
Speaker:Some of them worked well when combined with other things and
Speaker:I started informally coaching friends and family over the years and
Speaker:the words sort of spread from there.
Speaker:Well you weren't calling it coaching then,
Speaker:right? You were just like,
Speaker:Hey, let me help.
Speaker:I'll help you.
Speaker:Exactly. Eventually someone was like,
Speaker:well, how much do you charge to do this?
Speaker:And I was like,
Speaker:I don't charge money for this,
Speaker:but I loved doing it.
Speaker:So I started doing that a little bit more and then
Speaker:in doing that work I realized there was really significant need
Speaker:for business people and people who are self employed and who
Speaker:had sort of a side hustle to understand.
Speaker:They might go out,
Speaker:my personal finances are okay,
Speaker:but maybe not where I want them to be,
Speaker:but I really don't understand business finance.
Speaker:And I was like,
Speaker:Oh, I can help you with that.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:I started accounting.
Speaker:I have a master's degree in business.
Speaker:I can help you read a financial report without having a
Speaker:mental breakdown.
Speaker:I actually started adding that into my coaching and I started
Speaker:a bookkeeping business,
Speaker:which I don't do a lot of that anymore.
Speaker:I do have,
Speaker:I have a couple of bookkeeping clients and we're probably doing
Speaker:a little bit more with that this year,
Speaker:but really just getting into like how can I help people,
Speaker:like you said on the intro,
Speaker:feel less stupid and sad about your money and I really
Speaker:specialize in working with people who are self employed half their
Speaker:businesses because I think there's like an extra level of identifying
Speaker:our own self worth with the size of our bank accounts
Speaker:and just an extra level of complexity when we're really good
Speaker:at the thing that we do,
Speaker:but we don't necessarily know how to read a financial report
Speaker:where maybe we can read it,
Speaker:but we don't know how to use it to make financial
Speaker:decisions or we don't know how to get started doing our
Speaker:bookkeeping. What do we even need to be paying attention to
Speaker:when really we didn't get into it because I love making
Speaker:candles or something,
Speaker:which as a side note,
Speaker:I'm excited to be on your show because I actually really
Speaker:in another lifetime I used to be like an artismal candle.
Speaker:Candlemakers You did.
Speaker:It feels like a very,
Speaker:very long time ago now,
Speaker:but there was a time in my life where that's what
Speaker:I did and I actually really thought about doing that as
Speaker:that was one of the first ideas I had for like
Speaker:I'm going to make this my business and it didn't end
Speaker:up being what I did.
Speaker:Obviously this is what I do now,
Speaker:but so I have a lot of love and respect for
Speaker:the makers in the world doing what they do.
Speaker:Oh, love that.
Speaker:Well, you are the right person for us to be talking
Speaker:to them for sure.
Speaker:I think when it comes to numbers and finances,
Speaker:and people have said this before,
Speaker:like there's no course on how you're supposed to run your
Speaker:Life. And personal finances are one thing.
Speaker:And clearly you can get in a heap of trouble if
Speaker:you're not doing some type of bookkeeping or accounting for personal
Speaker:life, which I think we kind of all forget.
Speaker:But then when we go into business doing what we love,
Speaker:right, you still have to do all the other things,
Speaker:right? And it's not optional the way it is in our
Speaker:personal finances.
Speaker:Right? And so we get into candles or making cakes or
Speaker:whatever it is.
Speaker:But the thing I remember that you said Lynn,
Speaker:and I don't know if you remember this,
Speaker:but we were chatting over dinner.
Speaker:You were talking about all of this because I was kind
Speaker:of like wondering if you should be on the show,
Speaker:because I've had my audience asking about bookkeeping and I'm like,
Speaker:Oh, she may be my girl.
Speaker:Like I gotta find out.
Speaker:And the one thing you said that I loved so much,
Speaker:you were sharing with me your story a little bit more
Speaker:than what we're talking about here cause we want to get
Speaker:into the guts of it.
Speaker:But the thing you said to me is,
Speaker:and then I realized that I can do what I love
Speaker:every single day of my life.
Speaker:And that is what you're doing right now,
Speaker:helping people with their finances because it comes so easy to
Speaker:you. Yeah.
Speaker:So so many of our listeners,
Speaker:what they're making comes so easy and we want them doing
Speaker:more of that and not get caught up in this.
Speaker:Absolutely. I'm a huge believer in doing the thing that you
Speaker:do best and then figuring out a way to simplify the
Speaker:other things that are important.
Speaker:Like your finances are important.
Speaker:You absolutely should pay attention to them,
Speaker:but you don't need to be a finance expert.
Speaker:You just need to have some comfort and some systems so
Speaker:that you can make sure that that part of your life
Speaker:is taken care of without having it take over your life
Speaker:so that you can put your energy and your time and
Speaker:the thing that you actually do.
Speaker:Beautiful. Okay.
Speaker:You have a way of just lowering everyone's blood pressure.
Speaker:Good. All right,
Speaker:so let's start from the beginning.
Speaker:We've got someone who's just started their business and give gift
Speaker:his listeners,
Speaker:if you're already into your business and you don't have a
Speaker:bookkeeping method,
Speaker:that's okay.
Speaker:Now you're going to learn what you need to do.
Speaker:So don't be hard on yourself.
Speaker:Just pay attention and get it put in place.
Speaker:That would be my advice for you,
Speaker:but let's start with someone,
Speaker:cause I think it's just a cleaner,
Speaker:easier way to go.
Speaker:Someone who is starting their business,
Speaker:they've gotten to the point where they've made some candles.
Speaker:Let's stick with that.
Speaker:And someone's told them they should start selling them.
Speaker:And so now they're starting to do some financial exchanges.
Speaker:Yeah. What is your advice here?
Speaker:So the first thing that I would recommend is you just
Speaker:need to keep a record.
Speaker:So just as a background,
Speaker:when we say bookkeeping,
Speaker:this can sound really intimidating,
Speaker:but all this needs to mean is a record of what
Speaker:money is doing in your business.
Speaker:So what money comes in,
Speaker:what money goes out and why you want to keep a
Speaker:record. And this can be as simple as a Google doc
Speaker:spreadsheet or an Excel spreadsheet or something.
Speaker:I would recommend a spreadsheet and something digital over paper records
Speaker:or like a word document,
Speaker:but anything is better than nothing.
Speaker:But what you need to record is just like,
Speaker:okay, so on this day,
Speaker:this much money exchange hands between me and this other person
Speaker:for this reason.
Speaker:So at the crux of it,
Speaker:I find it really helpful to people to realize it can
Speaker:be as simple as that.
Speaker:Absolutely. There are tools that make this easier.
Speaker:There are things that you can do to make this easier.
Speaker:There are templates out there,
Speaker:but at its core what you're trying to do is just
Speaker:keep a record of where money comes from and where money
Speaker:goes and why.
Speaker:Oh my gosh,
Speaker:that does sound so easy.
Speaker:Yeah, like you can totally do that.
Speaker:Okay, but why do I even care,
Speaker:Lynn, while you,
Speaker:Because your highest goal here is to make sure the IRS
Speaker:isn't paying any attention to you whatsoever.
Speaker:Oh my gosh.
Speaker:So true.
Speaker:You never want the IRS to be paying any attention to
Speaker:you and the way to do that is just to keep
Speaker:good, clean records that aren't unusual or anything.
Speaker:The second thing is this information is going to help you
Speaker:grow and understand your business.
Speaker:So understanding how much money am I making?
Speaker:Do I have clients that I'm making more money from?
Speaker:Are there products that are more profitable than others?
Speaker:So profit margin is a little out of the scope of
Speaker:probably what we're going to talk about here,
Speaker:but understanding things like how much money am I making?
Speaker:Where is all my money going?
Speaker:Is there money leftover at the end of this?
Speaker:All of those things are going to help you understand and
Speaker:grow your business,
Speaker:particularly as yours just getting started.
Speaker:I think a lot of makers,
Speaker:I'm fortunate to count a lot of makers among friends of
Speaker:mine and they're just like,
Speaker:I'm just sort of making the thing that I like and
Speaker:we'll see if it sells and I'll make 10 different things
Speaker:and you might be going,
Speaker:well, how do I figure out which one's doing better?
Speaker:So your financial records can help you figure out which one's
Speaker:selling the best,
Speaker:which one's making the most money,
Speaker:that sort of thing.
Speaker:So it's can also be really helpful for you as a
Speaker:business owner to just understand where money is flowing in out
Speaker:of your money.
Speaker:Because money is like the lifeblood of your business.
Speaker:It's what allows your business to keep going.
Speaker:And it's really important to just understand if it's healthy or
Speaker:not. So at its most basic,
Speaker:again, we're just trying to record where's money coming from,
Speaker:where's it going?
Speaker:And the reason for that is both because we have to
Speaker:do that legally.
Speaker:We have to have this information for tax purposes.
Speaker:But also because it's important for us as business owners to
Speaker:understand how our business is doing and money is the clearest
Speaker:way for us to understand,
Speaker:get like sort of a pulse check.
Speaker:How are things going?
Speaker:Are they going well?
Speaker:Is there anything that I want to be paying attention to?
Speaker:Okay, perfect.
Speaker:So at the most basic,
Speaker:if you were doing nothing else,
Speaker:you're capturing all the money.
Speaker:So it's not just when you sell product,
Speaker:but it's also if you buy something for your office,
Speaker:well obviously supplies for your product,
Speaker:but even if you're buying something for your office,
Speaker:if you're buying services to have someone help you with your
Speaker:website. So it's everything,
Speaker:Every single thing,
Speaker:Every single thing,
Speaker:money in,
Speaker:money out who it's going to,
Speaker:who it's coming from,
Speaker:and then why.
Speaker:Yeah, so if you're buying supplies,
Speaker:want to note that it's supplies and it might be useful
Speaker:to have,
Speaker:depending on what you're making,
Speaker:it might be useful to have a little bit more detail
Speaker:than that.
Speaker:So you might say,
Speaker:let's say you're making candles,
Speaker:you might have different waxes for different types of candles.
Speaker:So you might record that so that later down the line
Speaker:as we get into a little bit more detail,
Speaker:we can use that to help us track inventory.
Speaker:So we could say,
Speaker:well I bought the type of wax that I make pillar
Speaker:candles out of on this day and it lasted me this
Speaker:long. So you can sort of get the sense of that.
Speaker:So you might have a little bit more detail on the
Speaker:actual materials that you're using to make your products.
Speaker:One of the things that you'll,
Speaker:particularly for tax purposes,
Speaker:you want to have a record of inventory and that includes
Speaker:like both finished products and in progress products.
Speaker:So if you've got half made candles or something,
Speaker:I trying to think Kickstarter not really,
Speaker:you never going to have finished them,
Speaker:but candles,
Speaker:you certainly might,
Speaker:or like a knitting project,
Speaker:you might have something on the needles still.
Speaker:And you also want to have a sense of your raw
Speaker:materials. So this can be a great way to start pulling
Speaker:in some of that information as well.
Speaker:But for things like office supplies,
Speaker:you can just simply just record office supplies.
Speaker:You don't need to be like,
Speaker:well I bought 16 pens and ream of paper.
Speaker:You can just like that might be useful for you to
Speaker:have. But from a financial record standpoint,
Speaker:you really just need to have office supplies or website help
Speaker:or what have you.
Speaker:Marketing, it can be fairly generic for most things.
Speaker:Again, except for the supplies you're actually using to create the
Speaker:product, you want to have a little bit more detail on.
Speaker:Got it.
Speaker:Okay. And as you're talking,
Speaker:I try to put myself into our listeners shoes to think
Speaker:of other questions that they might be asking.
Speaker:And I would think that there might be some people saying,
Speaker:okay, I got that because I pay on my credit card
Speaker:all the time.
Speaker:So all the information is just sitting over on my card,
Speaker:so I'm fine.
Speaker:What would you say to that?
Speaker:So yes and no.
Speaker:If your business and personal finances are completely separate,
Speaker:which if you're listening to this and you're cringing a little
Speaker:bit, that's okay.
Speaker:That's normal.
Speaker:But you should.
Speaker:I mean like I'm just going to lay down that right
Speaker:now. They should be separate.
Speaker:Yeah, and that's actually for a couple of reasons,
Speaker:both from a bookkeeping perspective so that it's a fresh year.
Speaker:Do yourself the favor of giving yourself completely separate finances from
Speaker:your business because at the end of the year,
Speaker:if you haven't got into a place of bookkeeping system,
Speaker:you do have only those single place to look,
Speaker:so you've got your maybe your business credit card and your
Speaker:business checking account that two places to look and you're like,
Speaker:okay, great.
Speaker:I've got all this information.
Speaker:I can download it and I can make sense of it.
Speaker:I can send this to a tax preparer.
Speaker:If your personal finances are mixed in there,
Speaker:that gets significantly,
Speaker:we'll call it spicier And you never really know for sure
Speaker:how your business is doing.
Speaker:If ever that topic comes up.
Speaker:I always like this is the one thing I'm really stringent
Speaker:on. Yeah.
Speaker:You want them to be really separate Also from an attack,
Speaker:like a legal and tax perspective,
Speaker:and I'm not a lawyer,
Speaker:but it is absolutely one of these things that have you
Speaker:were to get audited for instance,
Speaker:it's much easier if you have a business credit card that
Speaker:only only ever has business purchases on and you have say
Speaker:a lunch on there.
Speaker:It's a lot easier to say,
Speaker:yes, obviously this is a business transaction.
Speaker:Look that I have this calendar,
Speaker:I have a meeting with a supplier or something like that.
Speaker:I was traveling.
Speaker:If there are no personal things on there,
Speaker:cause if you're like,
Speaker:well also there's my takeout from the other night,
Speaker:it's a lot more difficult to then justify to an auditor.
Speaker:Yes, these are business expenses.
Speaker:So there's a lot of reasons to keep those things separate.
Speaker:Plus it's a waste of time.
Speaker:Then at the end of the year to try and have
Speaker:to go through and and tally it all out.
Speaker:Okay, so let's go back.
Speaker:Let's say this person who's using an Excel spreadsheet,
Speaker:they're documenting everything we've just described.
Speaker:Let's complete what that process looks like for a year.
Speaker:So you're inputting information,
Speaker:inputting, inputting,
Speaker:inputting, and it gets to the end of the year.
Speaker:What do you do with that set of information then?
Speaker:Yeah, so what you've just created is called a general ledger.
Speaker:And these financial reports that we talk about that are generated
Speaker:by financial software like QuickBooks or FreshBooks or wave,
Speaker:which are all really common tools that people use,
Speaker:but even if you're using a spreadsheet,
Speaker:it can be overwhelming to look at the names of these
Speaker:things and we're like,
Speaker:Oh, here's this fancy thing.
Speaker:So this list of transactions is called the general ledger,
Speaker:which is basically just a list of all the transactions that
Speaker:happen in your business.
Speaker:And from there,
Speaker:when I do my own bookkeeping,
Speaker:I really just export a general ledger.
Speaker:And from there I'm creating profit and loss reports,
Speaker:which is a summary.
Speaker:It's just saying,
Speaker:okay, over the course of a given time period,
Speaker:let's say the year 2018 you might generate a profit and
Speaker:loss report,
Speaker:which is just a high level.
Speaker:Okay. This is the total amount of sales of these different
Speaker:types of products or services and this is where all of
Speaker:my money went for the whole time period.
Speaker:Not every single transaction,
Speaker:but here's all of my marketing expenses summed up into a
Speaker:thing and you can do that by if you're using Excel,
Speaker:you could make a pivot table which are very simple,
Speaker:easy to use,
Speaker:things to just summarize data.
Speaker:That could be your profit and loss report.
Speaker:If you're using a tool like QuickBooks,
Speaker:they create that for you automatically.
Speaker:Yeah. I want to get into the tools like a minute
Speaker:with someone who doesn't have any tools yet.
Speaker:I just wanted to finish up that and then we'll talk
Speaker:about the tools.
Speaker:Absolutely, and if you're having a tax preparer or something like
Speaker:that, the only piece of information that you actually really need
Speaker:is a general ledger.
Speaker:They can always work with that and create what they need
Speaker:out of that.
Speaker:I know my own tax preparer prefers that.
Speaker:I summarize those things like,
Speaker:Hey, what's your total expense for marketing?
Speaker:What was your total expense for contractors?
Speaker:So profit and loss report is sort of that next step
Speaker:and literally that sounds fancier than it is.
Speaker:It's also sometimes called an income statement,
Speaker:but all that is is a summary of the things on
Speaker:that general ledger.
Speaker:So like add up all the marketing and that goes in
Speaker:a line,
Speaker:add up all the sales that goes in a line and
Speaker:then you subtract all of the expenses from all the revenue
Speaker:in that Kizzy or net income.
Speaker:And that essentially is the profit you made and the profit
Speaker:is what you use to pay your taxes and to pay
Speaker:yourself. And I would even suggest,
Speaker:I mean you don't have to be a real XL guru
Speaker:to do this,
Speaker:but I would suggest that to make it even easier on
Speaker:yourself when you're recording initially money In or money out where
Speaker:it was from,
Speaker:and then have those different columns in Excel as the categories.
Speaker:Oh, cost of ingredients,
Speaker:cost of,
Speaker:well maybe office equipment,
Speaker:but then have a couple of different lines so that then
Speaker:you'll have the sums of those columns that are either expenses
Speaker:or in comm.
Speaker:Then you're already done.
Speaker:And then you're just building it up from the start.
Speaker:Jeezy peezy from there.
Speaker:Easy peasy.
Speaker:So that's what you send over to someone who is preparing
Speaker:your taxes.
Speaker:Exactly. Got it.
Speaker:Okay. Wonderful scene.
Speaker:Bookkeeping doesn't need to be so hard the way Lynn's describing
Speaker:it. It's really easy and right after a word from our
Speaker:sponsor, she's going to get into some of the tools to
Speaker:make it even easier.
Speaker:This podcast is made possible thanks to the support of the
Speaker:ribbon print company.
Speaker:Create custom ribbons right in your store or craft studio in
Speaker:seconds. Visit the ribbon,
Speaker:print company.com
Speaker:for more information.
Speaker:Now Let's get into why you might be interested in investing
Speaker:in FreshBooks or QuickBooks or one of the software programs that
Speaker:can do a lot of this for you.
Speaker:What's the value of doing it that way?
Speaker:So the value of doing it that way is,
Speaker:there's certainly a little bit more work upfront,
Speaker:especially if you're getting started.
Speaker:Some of those tools have so many features,
Speaker:which are great for those of us who are a little
Speaker:bit further along in our business.
Speaker:But when we're starting out and we'd be like,
Speaker:I don't need all of that.
Speaker:This is overwhelming.
Speaker:I'm getting confused getting this set up,
Speaker:but the value in using something like that is first of
Speaker:all they're going to create a lot of those reports for
Speaker:you so at the end of the year you just have
Speaker:like a click of a button like make me a profit
Speaker:and loss report done,
Speaker:make me whatever it balance sheet.
Speaker:The other thing,
Speaker:and this is I would say even more valuable is they
Speaker:are likely to connect directly to your bank accounts so that
Speaker:you do not have to type anything when you're going in
Speaker:here because we think about it and it can seem really
Speaker:simple like,
Speaker:Oh at the end of the week or the end of
Speaker:the month,
Speaker:I'll just go in and enter all of my receipts,
Speaker:but what if you forget a receipt or you get busy,
Speaker:which is I think best laid plans.
Speaker:We all think but your business starts doing really well and
Speaker:you're busy.
Speaker:It can be very easy to lose track of that.
Speaker:If you were using a tool that is connected to your
Speaker:bank or your credit card directly with a click of a
Speaker:button, they're pulling in all of that information and you're just
Speaker:going, yep,
Speaker:that's marketing.
Speaker:That's supplies.
Speaker:And that's office stuff.
Speaker:So very,
Speaker:very simple.
Speaker:It makes it a lot quicker and easier.
Speaker:Again, saving you time and energy and attention,
Speaker:all of those important resources so that you can spend your
Speaker:time on the thing that you actually do.
Speaker:So how does that actually work?
Speaker:So say I have QuickBooks and I charge supplies on my
Speaker:card, does it automatically go over or does it question you?
Speaker:Or is there an app?
Speaker:Like how does that work?
Speaker:If you're going to use something like,
Speaker:I really recommend using an online tool.
Speaker:So if you're gonna use QuickBooks,
Speaker:I would recommend QuickBooks online and I'll just make a note
Speaker:on QuickBooks is very,
Speaker:very full featured,
Speaker:which can be great and can also be really overwhelming.
Speaker:And it's okay.
Speaker:Focus on just a couple of things at once.
Speaker:And I would also recommend if you're looking into QuickBooks,
Speaker:to not use QuickBooks self employed,
Speaker:I find it to be,
Speaker:I just don't find it to be a very good thing
Speaker:and it was difficult to then convert that into QuickBooks online.
Speaker:So of those I would recommend QuickBooks online.
Speaker:FreshBooks is a great option.
Speaker:Waive is a pretty good option.
Speaker:Wave is also free.
Speaker:So all of these when you start using them are going
Speaker:to ask you to add your accounts and so that's going
Speaker:to actually,
Speaker:because it's you know,
Speaker:you're talking to accountants,
Speaker:there's sort of two meanings of the word account.
Speaker:One is literally a bank account or a credit card.
Speaker:So you're going to enter in U S you might say
Speaker:checking account,
Speaker:he would name it in your checking account.
Speaker:You would enter your online banking information.
Speaker:So an authorize it to connect directly to your bank through
Speaker:online banking.
Speaker:They're going to pull in those transactions for you.
Speaker:So that's when you log back into WAV or QuickBooks.
Speaker:There are new transactions for you to approve.
Speaker:The other way that they use accounts.
Speaker:The word accounts in that context is actually like what we
Speaker:were referring to is categories.
Speaker:So you're setting up what they call your chart of accounts.
Speaker:Don't let that overwhelm you.
Speaker:That's just a list of the ways that your money might
Speaker:get spent or earned.
Speaker:It's just the categories.
Speaker:So you would set up those bank account connections and then
Speaker:you would come in on a regular basis.
Speaker:I recommend at least once a week,
Speaker:I really recommend actually that people log into their bookkeeping system
Speaker:every day,
Speaker:but for very,
Speaker:very short periods of time.
Speaker:We don't want this to be overwhelming,
Speaker:but what we're trying to do there is build a habit.
Speaker:So spend two minutes a day in there,
Speaker:just like checking transactions,
Speaker:going and categorizing them.
Speaker:So the very first time you have a transaction at your
Speaker:local vendor that supplies your waxes,
Speaker:for instance,
Speaker:QuickBooks or wave or whatever you're using isn't going to know
Speaker:what that is,
Speaker:but you're going to say,
Speaker:Oh, this is supplies subcategory wax.
Speaker:Great. The next time that you have a transaction of that
Speaker:same vendor,
Speaker:the tool that you're using,
Speaker:all of these are really designed well to automatically assume that
Speaker:it's the same as last time.
Speaker:So all you have to do is sort of give it
Speaker:a good thumbs up,
Speaker:say, yep,
Speaker:I approve.
Speaker:That is what it is.
Speaker:So they learn over time and then make it even easier.
Speaker:So you can see compared to a spreadsheet where this really
Speaker:reduces the time and energy that you're spending on this,
Speaker:making it simpler and allowing you to feel more confident and
Speaker:get more clarity out of it because you're actually able to
Speaker:spend the time that you would have spent entering information in
Speaker:and getting insights out of it instead.
Speaker:And it's a much more professional way to do it too.
Speaker:Yes. And as you grow,
Speaker:you'll be able to really transition.
Speaker:Again, a lot of these tools have so many features that
Speaker:you don't need right now,
Speaker:but you might need an a year and you're not going,
Speaker:Oh, now I have to pay someone to take all my
Speaker:information out of this spreadsheet and put it into wave or
Speaker:something. Right.
Speaker:You can just start there.
Speaker:Like I said,
Speaker:it can be overwhelming,
Speaker:but just really focus on,
Speaker:you're just setting up those categories.
Speaker:You're setting up your bank account feeds and you're just categorizing
Speaker:those transactions as they come in.
Speaker:Those are really the only things you need to focus on
Speaker:when you're getting started.
Speaker:Oh boy.
Speaker:And I would say if wave is free,
Speaker:then there's really no reason not to do it that way.
Speaker:Yeah, and I kind of feel like if as your continues
Speaker:to go,
Speaker:you're just building up additional history that at some point you're
Speaker:going to want to transition over.
Speaker:So why not?
Speaker:If there's no financial issue that barrier's crossed already.
Speaker:Right. And there's no reason not to use wave,
Speaker:right? Yeah.
Speaker:There's no reason not to.
Speaker:I think their user interface is a little bit clunky,
Speaker:but again,
Speaker:it's free.
Speaker:I find QuickBooks to be overkill for most people and fresh
Speaker:books is a nice easy to use tool.
Speaker:It's relatively affordable though.
Speaker:They, I think they recently increased their prices,
Speaker:but their focus is primarily on actually invoicing,
Speaker:which I think for a lot of your clients is probably
Speaker:not that useful.
Speaker:Right. It's more for service oriented,
Speaker:but like coaching and all that.
Speaker:Yeah, so wave is a great option.
Speaker:It's free.
Speaker:It's going to do all the things that we're talking about.
Speaker:It's one of those things,
Speaker:like you said,
Speaker:you might as well get started now keeping track of this.
Speaker:Even if you're like,
Speaker:Oh, I only have like five transactions a month,
Speaker:great. It'll be so easy for you to keep this up
Speaker:to date then.
Speaker:Right, and get in the system and understand it And really
Speaker:build that habit.
Speaker:That's such a crucial thing that I try and teach people
Speaker:and with like your initial goal is just to start doing
Speaker:something. It doesn't need to be right.
Speaker:You just want to be doing it.
Speaker:You want to be building a habit of doing it so
Speaker:that you can always iterate on that,
Speaker:but you really want to be building up a habit of
Speaker:doing those things and paying attention to them.
Speaker:And my guess is that if you're going in fresh,
Speaker:let's just stick with wave,
Speaker:but I'm sure QuickBooks does the same thing when you're opening
Speaker:an account,
Speaker:it probably walks you through how to set up too,
Speaker:so you don't have to already know.
Speaker:You just have to follow whatever the prompts are,
Speaker:enter the information,
Speaker:right? Yep,
Speaker:absolutely. Perfect.
Speaker:Okay. How about somebody who says,
Speaker:Hmm, I cloud all my financial information just up there available
Speaker:to anybody?
Speaker:That sounds not very secure to me.
Speaker:I would say that there is always an element of risk
Speaker:when you're putting information on the internet.
Speaker:That said,
Speaker:I do it and I have all of my clients do
Speaker:it because I think that risk is absolutely worth the reward.
Speaker:And I also think there's a huge risk.
Speaker:It may not be a security risk,
Speaker:but there's a huge risk of keeping information and say on
Speaker:your local hard drive,
Speaker:what if your computer breaks down or keeping things on paper.
Speaker:What if things get lost or they over time they become
Speaker:illegible Or taken Or taken where you have a an electrical
Speaker:fire in your space and suddenly your receipts are all gone.
Speaker:I have a client who is going through an audit right
Speaker:now and he is like,
Speaker:may I let you know that receipts over time fade to
Speaker:the point they're completely unreadable and he's like,
Speaker:don't put them in a shoe box in your garage like
Speaker:I did.
Speaker:Oh boy.
Speaker:Yeah. I thought I was being smart by keeping all of
Speaker:my receipts and again,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:security. He was like,
Speaker:I don't want to put this stuff in the cloud,
Speaker:but it really came back to bite him.
Speaker:So I also think that in today's age there is a
Speaker:lot of focus on the security of things like that because
Speaker:if for no other reason than huge multinational companies and organizations
Speaker:are using the cloud for very secure information and they're paying
Speaker:heavily for the security of those and all of us are
Speaker:benefiting from that.
Speaker:Yeah, and if we're going to develop the habit that you
Speaker:drilling into us,
Speaker:we're going to be in seen our account every day hopefully,
Speaker:but for sure once a week.
Speaker:So you're going to catch something pretty quickly if there's an
Speaker:issue. Exactly.
Speaker:You're going to be paying attention to it and if there's
Speaker:anything that comes up,
Speaker:you'll notice it more quickly because you're paying attention to it.
Speaker:Right. I'm in the cloud with everything too and it took
Speaker:me a little bit to decide and feel comfortable with doing
Speaker:it, but now that I am,
Speaker:I'm so glad because I can access it anytime from anywhere.
Speaker:Okay. You talk a little bit about in your intro about
Speaker:money mindset,
Speaker:and I'd love to hear a little bit more about that
Speaker:and I'll tell you why.
Speaker:I've talked to a couple people and they're like,
Speaker:what? How do people have issues with money?
Speaker:I mean I just want to make more,
Speaker:but I do know that there is a big struggle with
Speaker:money for some people.
Speaker:So I would love for you to talk to that for
Speaker:a little bit.
Speaker:I think we all have some weird hangups about money.
Speaker:Even if we do feel like,
Speaker:well I just want more of it,
Speaker:which is still a mindset thing and I actually,
Speaker:it's funny that I do this work on money mindset now
Speaker:because for a long time I really resisted doing that because
Speaker:I saw myself as the practical financial person and I sort
Speaker:of sold myself the story that there's either practical financial people
Speaker:or there's like woo sort of folks and I'm squarely in
Speaker:between those two things.
Speaker:I definitely have my feet in both of those worlds and
Speaker:I think we all have some issues with our money mindset
Speaker:and not even necessarily negative ones,
Speaker:but there are stories that we're telling ourselves.
Speaker:There are ways that we think and feel about our money
Speaker:that impact our behavior with our money.
Speaker:And whenever I start working with someone,
Speaker:one of the first questions I ask,
Speaker:I just say,
Speaker:so why are we on the phone right now?
Speaker:And suddenly when I'm hearing about their grandparents' relationship with money
Speaker:and all of these things,
Speaker:they're like,
Speaker:well, my partner is like this and I'm sort of like
Speaker:this and my buyer's Briggs personality type is like this and
Speaker:so therefore blah,
Speaker:blah, blah.
Speaker:And I was like,
Speaker:wow, this is like if I asked you how you spent
Speaker:your weekend,
Speaker:which in a lot of ways is you have a limited
Speaker:resource that you have to spend and then you get more
Speaker:of it just like money.
Speaker:Nobody is talking about their grandparents' relationship with their weekend or
Speaker:the way that their parents spent their weekends.
Speaker:So we all have stuff there and it's absolutely worth just
Speaker:acknowledging that,
Speaker:knowing that that's a thing.
Speaker:As you start to do this work on your money,
Speaker:whether it's even just paying attention to your bookkeeping,
Speaker:you'll find yourself starting to say things to yourself and other
Speaker:people about money.
Speaker:So I should do this.
Speaker:I shouldn't do that.
Speaker:I know I should be doing the bookkeeping.
Speaker:I know that I should be paying attention to this and
Speaker:just sort of doubting yourself,
Speaker:should I be paying quarterly taxes?
Speaker:Should I do this or I'm not any good at this.
Speaker:This is just not for me.
Speaker:That's not my sort of thing that's for other people.
Speaker:So all of that is mindset.
Speaker:All of that is what we're talking about.
Speaker:And I think it's super important to just know that that's
Speaker:a thing that nobody really knows what they're doing.
Speaker:We don't do a good job culturally of teaching people about
Speaker:this would make it weird to talk about and that's okay.
Speaker:That's just how this works.
Speaker:There's no after,
Speaker:there's no like I've finished that work.
Speaker:It's just about being aware and being able to see it
Speaker:while it's happening.
Speaker:So I think particularly for business owners and self-employed people,
Speaker:there is a lot of passion in our work.
Speaker:We love what we do,
Speaker:we do it because we love it.
Speaker:And we also have some hangups sometimes about making money from
Speaker:that about something that we love,
Speaker:particularly if we're in some sort of helping profession or we're
Speaker:doing something that maybe we're donating some portion of the proceeds
Speaker:to charity or something.
Speaker:We feel like we shouldn't be profitable.
Speaker:That's something that comes up a lot.
Speaker:Boy, in the maker community,
Speaker:you're so right.
Speaker:Land. Yeah.
Speaker:Particularly with women,
Speaker:I see a lot of like,
Speaker:I shouldn't want to make money off of this.
Speaker:I should just do it for the love of it,
Speaker:which sure love what you do,
Speaker:but you should also make money off of it.
Speaker:I teach people a lot and I was like,
Speaker:profit is how you pay yourself,
Speaker:how you invest in your business,
Speaker:how you grow.
Speaker:And I know for me,
Speaker:making more profit and not just money,
Speaker:but profit like after all of the expenses are done,
Speaker:making more profit is how I do things like grow my
Speaker:team and give people good jobs and that's really valuable to
Speaker:me. Right.
Speaker:And I think because it's so easy for us,
Speaker:we don't think that it's a skill or we certainly don't
Speaker:account for our production time because we're just making,
Speaker:maybe we charged for materials,
Speaker:but never the time.
Speaker:Absolutely. But the other thing that we have to remember,
Speaker:and I see this a lot,
Speaker:is not everybody can do those things.
Speaker:Not everybody is able to knit or has that creative flair
Speaker:and they so appreciate and it brings joy to their life.
Speaker:What you're able to produce for them,
Speaker:you are doing a favor to somebody by being able to
Speaker:sell a product that you make,
Speaker:even though it does come easy to you,
Speaker:it doesn't always for them.
Speaker:And that just shows you're doing the right thing.
Speaker:You're in the right business.
Speaker:Just like we were talking about in the beginning,
Speaker:Lynn, when you're like,
Speaker:I can't believe that I'm making money off of something I
Speaker:love doing every day.
Speaker:Yeah, well,
Speaker:absolutely. I think especially when we're pricing our products or services
Speaker:or whatever it is that we're working on,
Speaker:our price is part of our brand and it's communicating to
Speaker:our clients.
Speaker:And really importantly,
Speaker:I think we forget about this lot.
Speaker:It's communicating to us how valuable this thing is.
Speaker:Oh, good point.
Speaker:When we don't include the price of our time in something
Speaker:that you make,
Speaker:you're telling your clients and yourself that that time is not
Speaker:valuable. And I think within the business owner community,
Speaker:there's a lot of identification of our own self worth with
Speaker:our work because we love it so much and it just
Speaker:feels like who we are.
Speaker:I'm just a candle maker,
Speaker:I just love it so much and I could do it
Speaker:all day long and it wouldn't even feel like work to
Speaker:me and it's just what I love doing.
Speaker:And so of course I'm just going to do it for
Speaker:free where I'm just going to charge for materials and it's
Speaker:a way of communicating to everyone in our lives,
Speaker:including ourselves,
Speaker:that our time is invaluable,
Speaker:that this thing that we're doing,
Speaker:this active creation isn't actually valuable.
Speaker:And I think we do everyone a disservice when we do
Speaker:that. And you're not going to be there for the long
Speaker:haul because that is not sustainable.
Speaker:Absolutely. You cannot do any of this if you're at a
Speaker:profit is how you stay in business.
Speaker:Exactly. And I would contend you really don't even have a
Speaker:business if you're selling at cost because you're not making anything.
Speaker:Yeah. I mean even from like an IRS standpoint,
Speaker:if you don't make a profit in three out of every
Speaker:five years,
Speaker:it's a hobby.
Speaker:Oh, that's the definition.
Speaker:That's the definition.
Speaker:Yep. If you're not making a profit three out of every
Speaker:five years.
Speaker:Oh, I didn't know that.
Speaker:Very interesting.
Speaker:All right,
Speaker:so you are so fortunate you have a view into lots
Speaker:of different personality types,
Speaker:I guess I'll say lots of different types of businesses,
Speaker:all of that are there a couple of,
Speaker:I don't really want to call them mistakes because I don't
Speaker:think people do them intentionally.
Speaker:They just don't know.
Speaker:You know?
Speaker:And then they transition when they are working with you because
Speaker:they learn how to do things.
Speaker:Right. But are there cautions that you could share with us
Speaker:of things that you've seen that you would recommend to us
Speaker:to watch out for or not do?
Speaker:Sure. I think the biggest thing that comes up when you
Speaker:ask me that is just not getting started sooner.
Speaker:So in terms of just keeping good financial records and letting
Speaker:our fear and our shame and our overwhelm keep us from
Speaker:doing anything at all.
Speaker:I would say that's the biggest thing that I wish I
Speaker:could really drill into people's heads,
Speaker:like just get started.
Speaker:Don't worry about perfection,
Speaker:just work on building a habit and a system,
Speaker:something that feels like it fits into your life and it's
Speaker:doable for you and then you can always improve that later.
Speaker:But really just get started.
Speaker:Don't let this be this big scary thing in your life
Speaker:that you don't pay any attention to.
Speaker:Just begin and you can always get help because one of
Speaker:the things that I see time and time again is when
Speaker:we get started on it,
Speaker:it doesn't feel as scary to us anymore.
Speaker:We may not be doing it perfectly,
Speaker:but we are doing it.
Speaker:And so we have more confidence to ask questions and to
Speaker:get clarity where we need it and to figure out what
Speaker:we need to do to make it better.
Speaker:So really the biggest thing is just don't let your feelings
Speaker:keep you from actually doing something about your finances and your
Speaker:business or your life And what you have already talked about
Speaker:right here is so achievable.
Speaker:I mean,
Speaker:everyone can write when they're done listening to this show,
Speaker:get started,
Speaker:pull up an Excel spreadsheet.
Speaker:Yeah, and you can just get started from today.
Speaker:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker:You can always go back and say,
Speaker:okay, now I need to pull in the first part of
Speaker:the year.
Speaker:Get started from today.
Speaker:What happened today with your money?
Speaker:What happens tomorrow with your money?
Speaker:You can go back later again,
Speaker:really trying to just build a habit and build a system
Speaker:that works and improve on it later.
Speaker:Perfect. Are there any other cautions you would give us or
Speaker:should we leave it at that for now?
Speaker:I think really that's the big one.
Speaker:And then some of the things we've already talked about keeping
Speaker:your business and personal finances combined for too long will give
Speaker:you so many headaches down the road.
Speaker:Just split them,
Speaker:just do whatever it is,
Speaker:you know if you need to apply for a new credit
Speaker:card for your businesses.
Speaker:And I would also just let you know too that until
Speaker:you get to the point where your business is like an
Speaker:S Corp or a C Corp,
Speaker:which is for many people may never happen and for a
Speaker:lot of other people is years down the line.
Speaker:You not need to have like an official business bank account
Speaker:or a business credit card.
Speaker:It just needs to be a separate.
Speaker:So this can be as simple as going to the bank
Speaker:that you already have a bank account with and just opening
Speaker:another account and starting to do your business transactions from there,
Speaker:just separated immediately wherever you are right now.
Speaker:Do whatever steps you need to do in order to make
Speaker:the next business transaction happen in a separate account from your
Speaker:personal finances.
Speaker:Perfect. Okay.
Speaker:And at what point in business should somebody start considering hiring
Speaker:out for bookkeeping?
Speaker:I would say if you have a system that you've started
Speaker:using and it still just never gets done,
Speaker:it's too important to knock it down.
Speaker:So if you find yourself in a position where it's just
Speaker:never ever getting done for you and you have the cashflow
Speaker:in order to be able to hire that out,
Speaker:then I think it's worth doing.
Speaker:That's it.
Speaker:I think there's so much value in doing it yourself.
Speaker:I'm a big believer in doing things myself before I hire
Speaker:them out so that I can make sure that that person's
Speaker:doing a good job,
Speaker:that I know what I need and don't need,
Speaker:that they're not selling me services that aren't applicable for me
Speaker:and my business and so that I can look over it
Speaker:and go,
Speaker:yeah, I feel comfortable with this.
Speaker:I'm glad that someone else is executing on this,
Speaker:but I'm still the person making the strategy and the plan
Speaker:for this.
Speaker:I'm still the person who's directing this work.
Speaker:And I think with your numbers,
Speaker:it's so valuable to build a see them.
Speaker:And really get in there and there's something about looking at
Speaker:them on a regular basis yourself versus looking at a report
Speaker:at the end of the month that somebody else makes for
Speaker:you. That is just really,
Speaker:really value added,
Speaker:but that's it.
Speaker:If you really are at a point where you're like,
Speaker:cut, I've been in business for years and I just keep
Speaker:not doing this,
Speaker:then it's too important to not get done.
Speaker:So if it's really a matter of like it's just literally
Speaker:not going to get done,
Speaker:then hire someone.
Speaker:Alternatively, if you feel very confident and you're like,
Speaker:I've got a system,
Speaker:it works.
Speaker:I'm doing it all the time.
Speaker:I know my numbers like the back of my hand.
Speaker:I feel very confident with this.
Speaker:I just don't have time and that point,
Speaker:it's also a good time to hire out.
Speaker:One of my goals for 2019 is to hire out my
Speaker:own bookkeeping,
Speaker:which is silly because this is what I do and it
Speaker:doesn't take me very long to do it,
Speaker:but it's one of those things where I'm like,
Speaker:Oh, needing to track down this and to pull in this
Speaker:report and do X,
Speaker:Y, and Z.
Speaker:And it's not like I'm not going to keep looking at
Speaker:my numbers,
Speaker:but I don't necessarily,
Speaker:at this point it doesn't make sense for my time to
Speaker:be spending doing the day to day number crunching and data
Speaker:pulling in and lugging in here and pulling out this piece
Speaker:of information.
Speaker:So I would say if you're sort of in one of
Speaker:those things where it never gets done or it always gets
Speaker:done, you just don't have time for it anymore.
Speaker:Those are both quick times to think about hiring somebody out
Speaker:Or your time is more valuable doing something else,
Speaker:right. It's going to grow your business if you're not inputting
Speaker:numbers, but you're out marketing or going to shows or whatever.
Speaker:Like I love doing my own bookkeeping actually.
Speaker:Like I'm that sort of nerd.
Speaker:Well, you go ahead and enjoy that Lynn Or I love
Speaker:doing my own bookkeeping,
Speaker:but it doesn't make sense for my business for me to
Speaker:be spending my time there.
Speaker:Exactly. This has been so great because I love the fact
Speaker:that it sounds so doable And I really think it is
Speaker:so doable for everybody.
Speaker:It really can be.
Speaker:If you were to tell one person exactly where to get
Speaker:started, where would you go?
Speaker:That's such a great question.
Speaker:Yeah, they don't want to think about it.
Speaker:They don't want to know,
Speaker:should I do an Excel spreadsheet?
Speaker:Should I go to wave?
Speaker:Should I hire out?
Speaker:What would you do?
Speaker:I would just start using waves.
Speaker:Then in that case,
Speaker:honestly, I would just start using wave.
Speaker:It's free.
Speaker:It's relatively easy to use and it's going to make things
Speaker:simpler for you than using a spreadsheet.
Speaker:All right,
Speaker:good. I was thinking that was what you were going to
Speaker:say, but I didn't want to suggest it.
Speaker:I just wanted to hear you say it.
Speaker:Their website is wave apps.com
Speaker:but if you Google wave wave accounting or something,
Speaker:you'll find it.
Speaker:Wave apps.com
Speaker:all right you guys,
Speaker:I will check it out and I will put it in
Speaker:the show notes so that you can see it,
Speaker:but it sounds like Lynn already knows wave apps.com
Speaker:but I'll just confirm that for you guys over in the
Speaker:show notes.
Speaker:But yeah,
Speaker:so anybody who does not have a bookkeeping system yet is
Speaker:just starting out to now know where exactly to go.
Speaker:One place that it,
Speaker:and guess what it's done.
Speaker:You have accomplished so much today.
Speaker:Once you've done that and you're setting your business up properly
Speaker:as you're moving forward,
Speaker:so you'll be able to put a big Pat on your
Speaker:back tonight when you go to bed.
Speaker:Absolutely. Yeah.
Speaker:So Lynn,
Speaker:so much value you've given us,
Speaker:we would like to return that to you by way of
Speaker:a virtual gift.
Speaker:This is a magical box containing unlimited possibilities for your future.
Speaker:So this is your dream or your goal of almost unreachable
Speaker:Heights that you would wish to obtain.
Speaker:Please accept this gift and open it in our presence.
Speaker:What is inside your box?
Speaker:Well, first of all,
Speaker:thank you.
Speaker:You're welcome.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:isn't it so funny to think about like,
Speaker:even though I do this all the time,
Speaker:I ask clients stuff like this,
Speaker:I'm like,
Speaker:Oh, you want me to talk about my dreams and hopes
Speaker:right here in front of other people?
Speaker:It's the law of attraction.
Speaker:Know. I know.
Speaker:I think that the thing that comes up when you asked
Speaker:me that as I really want to do a Ted talk,
Speaker:I want to talk about managing your finances,
Speaker:your day to day finances,
Speaker:budgeting, all of these things as a form of radical self
Speaker:care because I just believe so strongly that healing this part
Speaker:of your life can change so many parts of your life
Speaker:and just make you feel so much more confident and clear
Speaker:about everything in your life.
Speaker:And I seen it change people's lives and I want that
Speaker:for so many more people than I'm able to reach.
Speaker:And the platform that I have right now Love it.
Speaker:And I just,
Speaker:just by the way of your style and making it so
Speaker:calm and easy and because when we see numbers,
Speaker:I just see like dollars and all of that flying in
Speaker:front of my face.
Speaker:Right? Like you're just like freeze up for like,
Speaker:Ooh, I can't,
Speaker:but you're so calming and you're just is so clear and
Speaker:so clean.
Speaker:Plus you've got such a fun personality.
Speaker:I think you'd be fabulous with a Ted talk.
Speaker:I think.
Speaker:That's awesome.
Speaker:Wonderful idea.
Speaker:Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker:Watch for it.
Speaker:2020 maybe.
Speaker:All right then.
Speaker:All right,
Speaker:we just said it.
Speaker:So there you go.
Speaker:And if people want To know more about you with the
Speaker:wiser miser and your whole business,
Speaker:where would you direct them to go?
Speaker:Yeah, so you can find me on Facebook and Instagram at
Speaker:Lynn Summerlin and I would spell that,
Speaker:but I'm sure it's faster to just have you put something
Speaker:in the show notes,
Speaker:but so you can find me on Facebook and Instagram and
Speaker:Lynn Zimmerman and you can find,
Speaker:my website is Lynn summer,
Speaker:men.com and I've got some great content on there on my
Speaker:blog. Actually,
Speaker:I've got some stuff about DIY bookkeeping and like how often
Speaker:should you be doing what and more information about it.
Speaker:How would I know if you're ready to hire a bookkeeper
Speaker:and what questions do you ask them?
Speaker:And all of those things are on my website.
Speaker:So I think those would be great compliments for what this
Speaker:conversation we've already started having to,
Speaker:Okay. Now my final question to you is so random,
Speaker:but I cannot leave without asking you this.
Speaker:Great. Why don't we got your chickens are named after strong
Speaker:women. Yes.
Speaker:What is that about?
Speaker:So it started when I first got chickens,
Speaker:gosh, it's been three years now,
Speaker:maybe a little bit longer.
Speaker:I got chickens and I just want him to name them
Speaker:ridiculous things.
Speaker:So we had a chicken named Judy Garland and wrote a
Speaker:Morgan stern and Dorothy's born ACH and uh,
Speaker:and we just had these great chickens and then we actually
Speaker:named one of them true VI,
Speaker:which is Dolly Parton's character and steel Magnolias.
Speaker:I'm a huge Dolly Parton fan.
Speaker:Like it's silly.
Speaker:I just love Dolly Parton so much and just it became
Speaker:a thing that as I got more chickens,
Speaker:I named one of them after my,
Speaker:the principal of the high school that I graduated from that
Speaker:I admire so much because I got chickens around the time
Speaker:of her retirement and I was just thinking about her.
Speaker:Did you tell her you needed to get afterwards chicken after
Speaker:you, you should be so honored.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:and I,
Speaker:it's just like a really nice way for me to just
Speaker:think about and be continue to be inspired about the people
Speaker:in my life that really keep me lit up in a
Speaker:way, even while I'm just like collecting eggs and letting my
Speaker:chickens wander around in the yard.
Speaker:I just love that.
Speaker:That's awesome.
Speaker:Thank you so much for sharing that and thank you also
Speaker:for all the information that you've given us here on the
Speaker:podcast. Yeah,
Speaker:absolutely. Thanks for having me on.
Speaker:See, I told you bookkeeping doesn't need to be so hard.
Speaker:I think we just get it in our mind that if
Speaker:you're not a math person or algebra was scary to you
Speaker:in high school,
Speaker:that it's going to be more of the same.
Speaker:It's not the case.
Speaker:It's so much easier,
Speaker:and Lynn laid it out perfectly for us,
Speaker:so thrilled that we've got this information now that we can
Speaker:use so that we can make our business stronger and healthier
Speaker:for the future.
Speaker:I'm going to keep these final comments pretty short today because
Speaker:I really want you to go over and watch my video
Speaker:about the power of purpose.
Speaker:Again, you can see it right over at gift biz,
Speaker:unwrapped.com forward slash.
Speaker:Planner. There's opt in.
Speaker:You Don't have to give me your email.
Speaker:I'm just so happy that I can provide this information to
Speaker:you. So go over there and check it out right now
Speaker:and I look forward to being together again next week on
