For small businesses, successfully completing invoicing, billing, and payment processing can take a substantial amount of time. But with the right systems in place, managing your finances and getting paid on time is much easier. 

Digital tools like invoicing and time tracking software will make your operations function smoother and give you more time to focus on higher-priority items. From tracking billable hours to accepting payments online, we'll look at how you can make your business run more efficiently. 

Why is leveraging invoicing software important?

Leveraging invoice software can provide several advantages for your business. By integrating your tech and invoicing software, you’ll increase efficiency, accuracy, and convenience when it comes to generating your customer invoices. 

Automated features within the software allow you to speed up the invoice creation process and reduce errors related to data input or calculations. Additionally, users can access their invoices anytime and anywhere with an internet connection. This will make it easier for your teams and customers to review and pay their invoices, creating a more efficient system for both parties.

Another great feature of free invoicing software is the ability to set up automatic payment reminders with timely reminders sent out via email or SMS — meaning you can reduce late payments and maximize your cash flow. And with different payment terms and methods settings, you can easily customize the system to fit your business needs.

Let's explore leveraging these advanced features and making the most out of free invoicing software. Invoicing software with the right features will allow you to: 

  • Custom branding
  • Get paid faster
  • Track billable hours
  • Eliminate redundancies
  • Simplify banking integrations
  • Gain financial insights
  • Send automatic payment reminders
  • Accept online payments
  • Control inventory

Combined, these features enhance your brand reputation by letting you provide accurate, timely invoicing making it easier to receive payments from your clients. 

Improve brand awareness and get paid faster

Having a professional, polished brand image is essential to building trust with your clients. Creating a brand reputation takes time to build correctly, but it only takes one or two mistakes to damage. 

By using digital tools like time tracking and invoicing software, you can showcase your services without any glitches, enhancing your brand name with your current clients. 

Free invoicing software helps build your brand and client trust by allowing you to create beautiful, custom invoices that solidify your professionalism. Even further, you can build automatic recurring invoices, so you never have to worry about starting over each billing period. 

Track billable hours

Keeping track and organizing billable and non-billable hours is essential to any business. With free invoicing software, it's easy to track your billable hours with a click of a button. 

You can easily create projects and tasks per project, and when it’s all done, simply “send to invoice,” and all the details will be ready for your clients to complete the payment. This feature not only saves you time but also ensures billing accuracy so that you get paid fairly for your work while also reducing any potential redundancies in billing. 

By tracking billable hours, you can also optimize your workload. Having insights into how much time you spend on each task or project can help you improve efficiency and accuracy and ensure that customers are being billed the right amount for their services. 

This feature is especially crucial for sole proprietorships and freelancers that are working as a one-person shop while also handling billing and payments to outside vendors. 

Simplify banking integrations

When dealing with invoicing and payment processing, it’s critical that your invoicing software can connect your bank accounts and sync transactions automatically. This means that all your sales and purchases are recorded in real-time, allowing you to monitor your income and expenses quickly and accurately. 

Another feature of integrating your invoice software with your banking is that it provides an extra layer of security for you and your clients — so you can rest assured that your financial data and personal information is safe from cybercriminals. 

Gain financial insights

Many free invoicing software solutions feature powerful analytics capabilities that help you gain valuable insights into your finance, such as easily tracking payments, identifying spending trends, forecast cash flow, and making more informed decisions about how to grow your business.

These analytics can shine a light on the financial health of your business and identify any gaps in revenue versus expenses that you may have otherwise overlooked. 

Send automatic payment reminders

Automatic payment reminders are one of the most advanced features of free invoicing software. This feature allows you to set up alerts to be sent out to customers who have outstanding invoices. With this feature, you can save time and ensure that your invoices are paid on time.

Accept payments online

On top of integrating your invoicing and banking operations, being able to accept payments online is no longer a luxury — it’s a necessity. Harvest’s seamless invoicing software makes it easy for clients to pay for your services online thanks to integrations with PayPal and Stripe.  

The ability and convenience to accept online client payments is another essential layer of quality customer service. The best part is that you won’t need to hire expensive third-party services to manage your online payments. 

Control inventory

You'll have better control over inventory, ordering, and payables by using free invoicing software that integrates with the other apps and digital tools you and your team know and love. 

For example, you can track stock levels and set up automatic notifications when it’s time to replenish them. Or you can keep tabs on what you owe vendors and suppliers, ensuring that all payments are made on time. Best of all, many free invoicing software solutions feature powerful analytics capabilities that help you gain valuable insights into your finances. 

Invoicing and time tracking software go hand-in-hand to give your team the ability to enhance their workflows and invoice quickly for the time spent on a project or task. If you want to streamline your invoicing processes, sign up for a free trial at Harvest today.