In the Virtual Business, time tracking is very important as much as marketing. It tells how many hours you worked on a certain project, how much more you need to do other tasks and let’s you budget your time to become “more productive”.

“Time is money”. How often have you heard this quote, I don’t know but for me, I’ve heard this a hundred times or maybe a thousand in my growing up years. It sunk into me of course, that’s why I am into this business now. But what I didn’t know at that time is that we can organize our time, tasks, clients and even contractors using different tools such as Freshbooks (http://www.freshbooks.com/index-st.php).3

And that’s not all… Freshbooks also has other features! That’s the reason why it’s not called a “time tracker”, but “Cloud Accounting”. Let me just share the key features I’ve seen from getapp

• Online Invoicing
• Time Tracking
• Recurring Invoices & Auto Payment
• Team Timesheets
• Late Payment Reminders
• Expense Tracking
• Accounting Reports & Taxes
• Automatic Expense Import
• Mobile Apps
• Attach receipts (PDF or Image)

Some of you may be asking the following questions:

1.  “Why get Freshbooks when you can get something without a monthly fee?”.
2.  “Oh, I’m an accountant and I can bookkeep by myself, why get that?”
3.  “Another tool to learn, I don’t need another headache, don’t I?”

Well, let me answer them one by one. I am not trying to promote freshbooks here alone as I am not an affiliate. I am simply showing how you can save time using technology. There are other Cloud accounting applications out there and you are free to choose any of them. Freshbooks is just a personal choice because I’m already using it.

Now, let’s get back to answering the FAQ’s (Frequently Asked Questions).

1.  Every inventor has their product patented and it’s their ingenuity that lead them into creating a certain product that can help hundreds if not millions of people. Any online applications are the same. The founder where the idea initiated, the programmers, the cost of perfecting the tool, the marketing efforts so people would know it exist and what for, has a cost to it. It cost them so much that they need to get it back and earn from it, of course!

If you’re getting something that you install in a PC, you can’t access it from anywhere. And if you’re a business owner that’s always on the go, you need to be able to track your operations most of the time, if not 24/7. That’s the difference. That’s what you’re paying for. If it’s saving you time, labor and pain in the butt, I think the price is fair and just.

2.  Regarding this issue, I know most people will think that buying an online system is not practical if you have an accounting or even bookkeeping background. Why not, right? But look at the argument here.

As a business owner, how much is your time worth? Are you charging $40, $50 or even $70 an hour?

How much is Freshbooks again? $19.95; $29.95 and $39.95… per month..

How much time do you spend manual bookkeeping on a daily, weekly and monthly basis? Now, do you see the math? I guess, I need not explain more and let you do the thinking.

3.  Another tool to learn. Why get scared of that? It’s not like we all have cellphones 15 or 20 years ago but we’re able to learn how to use it to our advantage, right? It’s just the same. Besides, learning new things is fun. Freshbooks site has a lot of webinars and information that may help you including their customer service hotline.

So, still having hesitations?

In my next blog, I will be discussing the basics of Freshbooks, where to go to get certain training and will show you some screen captures of how it looks like. Let me know  what else you want to learn and I’ll try to write a blog about it, too! Just leave a comment below this post and let’s start learning more things about business and getting easy at it!