Many small business owners understand the value of accountants for meeting tax filing deadlines, yet today’s accountants offer far more. Not only are they numbers crunchers; today’s accountants serve as leaders, strategists, technologists, and advisors that can bring immense benefit to any organization.
Accountants offer businesses invaluable services that can save them money, reduce risk and comply with regulation while managing growth. Here are seven ways an accountant can assist their business:
Accurate Bookkeeping
No matter the size or industry of a company, accurate bookkeeping is of utmost importance. This back office function offers up-to-date figures that business owners or managers can access anytime to make important decisions, evaluate success and plan strategies. Furthermore, accurate bookkeeping helps companies submit complete packages when reporting taxes to reduce the chances of errors leading to audits as well as costs associated with correcting tax returns.
Accurate books allow a business to accurately evaluate its expenses, an essential step toward increasing profit growth. A company might find itself spending more than it earns and an accountant can assist it in revising the budget accordingly.
Accountants can help businesses take advantage of sales opportunities and boost competitive edge by monitoring cash flow. If a raw material or product is at a reduced price, an accountant may advise on stockpiling to take full advantage of any cost-cutting opportunities that present themselves.
Professional accountants can identify additional potential growth opportunities by analyzing pricing, cash flow patterns and inventory management systems. Furthermore, an accountant can detect problems such as disappearing inventory or late payers that might thwart growth efforts – providing solutions for them as necessary.
Accounting may not seem exciting to many people, but its relevance to business success cannot be overstated. An accountant can free you up so you can focus on growing your company instead. Reach out to Demian & Company Certified Public Accountants today for more information about our accounting and bookkeeping services!
Cost-Effective Tax Preparation
Small businesses frequently hire accountants because of the money-saving potential they bring. This is particularly true when it comes to tax preparation; an accountant will ensure compliance with state and federal regulations while simultaneously reducing your overall tax liability.
Accountants for small businesses in Mansfield are well-versed in the latest tax credits and incentives, meaning that they can help your business take advantage of them. Furthermore, accountants provide advice on structuring your business to maximize these advantages – it’s vitally important that you partner with one who possesses both commercial awareness and expertise for optimal business operations.
An accountant will help you craft financial forecasts that provide insight into how your business is faring on an ongoing basis, enabling you to make smart decisions regarding spending, growth and potential risks that might impact its bottom line.
An accountant will assist in developing a plan to expand your business while remaining compliant with state and federal regulations, thus minimizing your overall risk and helping ensure long-term success.
Even though there may be reasons not to use an accountant, their worth to your business cannot be overstated. They provide invaluable insight and expertise, enabling you to focus on other aspects of running your company while an accountant helps prevent costly errors from being discovered by HMRC and recoverable from.
Budgeting and Forecasting
Budgeting and forecasting can often go overlooked when running a small business, despite multiple roles having to be filled simultaneously. Accountants can help SMEs develop an effective plan and realistic forecast to support growth; the process involves setting out goals, strategies and priorities for their company as well as serving as a roadmap towards long-term success.
No matter if you’re planning for the coming fiscal year or raising funds, having accurate and up-to-date financial projections is vital to creating effective strategies that allow your organization to thrive into the future. Financial forecasting allows you to accurately predict expenses and income as well as create strategies that allow it to overcome any hurdles it might face along its journey.
At the core of every effective financial projection is setting realistic and measurable goals and creating an action plan to help meet them. Instead of solely focusing on revenue growth, for instance, you could set more specific and less susceptible to external influence goals such as reducing debt, increasing cash flow or creating a contingency fund.
Accountants can work closely with you to interpret data and understand its significance for your business, which can be invaluable. A professional accountant’s help can also free up time for more important matters; accountants can even assist with expanding into new territories or merging businesses by helping evaluate viability opportunities.
Cash Flow Management
Financial planning and administration is one of the key factors for business expansion and survival. Achieve positive cash flow means your company has more funds coming in than it spends; this puts you in an advantageous position to invest in activities that will further develop your enterprise and help it flourish.
Cash flow refers to both cash that comes into a business via sales, loan proceeds, interest income and other sources; as well as cash used for expenses like inventory purchases, payroll payroll rent utilities and taxes. An accountant can create a cash flow statement or budget that helps you quickly understand how the inflow and outflows compare.
Your business’s primary financial objective should be ensuring it has sufficient funds on hand to fulfill all its financial obligations, such as paying suppliers and employees, purchasing inventory and equipment purchases, paying taxes and meeting other expenses. Any cash received into an organization will be recorded under its accounts receivable while any outflowing is tracked via accounts payable.
Your accountant can also help you calculate your cash flow by comparing the total cash your business receives with what it spends during a specific timeframe, such as week or month. They’ll use any differences in cash as an estimate of how long you’ll need short-term financing solutions.
Gaining an accurate view of your cash flow will also enable you to anticipate and prepare for seasonal dips in revenue. By planning ahead and having enough in the bank for employees and vendors to pay them on time, a good understanding of cash flows allows businesses to better anticipate slow seasons that could put them behind on payments.
Strategic Planning
Accountants provide more than simply financial transaction recording; they’re leaders, strategists, technologists, advisors and business specialists who can help your company become an efficient, compliant entity.
One of the more under-appreciated services an accountant provides to businesses is strategic planning. Strategic planning involves setting long-term goals and devising ways to meet them; an accountant has a full view of your company finances and strategies that make them ideal advisers when it comes to strategic planning.
Effective strategic planning requires considering variables within your control and being flexible enough to adapt with changes in the environment and customer demands. To deliver maximum value to customers, strategic planning should also include a SWOT analysis which identifies strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
An effective strategic plan should have a clearly outlined scope and action plan with specific tasks and milestones for each of your strategic priorities. For instance, if adding midlevel providers is one of your strategic priorities, then your work plan must outline who is responsible for each activity involved in making that strategy happen.
Many businesses conduct strategic planning as an annual exercise based on budget cycle. Unfortunately, this approach often leads to myopic thinking that only continues what’s already in motion while restricting innovation. Instead, strategic planning should occur on an ongoing basis and adjust as conditions and priorities shift – an excellent accounting firm can assist your company with crafting an adaptable strategic plan which can be reviewed regularly and kept current.