Prepare your digital crystal ball and calculate your money like a boss. Nothing is more essential to you as a small company owner. Several tools are available to help you analyze projected income and expenses in order to get a handle on your company’s future cash flow. They range from simple spreadsheets to sophisticated visualization programs. Here are five tools to help you forecast your numbers. Budgeting spreadsheet A basic spreadsheet can help you keep your finances on track
For some, there’s nothing like rolling up their sleeves and getting their hands dirty with an Excel spreadsheet. If this describes you, here are some templates to get you started. Futurpreneur Canada offers a cash flow template that covers everything from describing initial expenditures to estimating cash flow month by month over a two-year period.
SCORE, the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) network of business mentors, has its own cash flow and financial projection templates to help project cash flow over a 12-month or three-year period.
Each of these websites provides its own helpful instructions to get you started with your cash flow prediction template, so that even non-ninja accountants can get a grasp on things. What’s the best part? Everything is free.
QuickBooks cash flow projector
QuickBooks desktop includes two options for predicting short-term cash flow. The first method, cash flow forecasting, analyses outstanding invoices and bills in the accounting system to forecast your cash on hand over the next month or so.
You may also utilise the cash flow projector feature, which is included in various desktop versions of QuickBooks. This allows you to review historical accounting data and make manual modifications while also importing accounts payable data.
The QuickBooks cash flow projector will only project out six weeks. You’ll need something with more power if you want a longer-term view with more delights.
Float
While various accounting products may include basic cash flow forecasting, there’s a lot to be said for a best-of-breed solution that does one thing really well. Float is a cash flow forecasting solution that works with QuickBooks as well as two other popular online accounting programmes, Xero and FreeAgent.
Float pulls accounting data straight from those packages and uses it to make daily or monthly cash flow estimates. Its “what if” analysis capabilities show you what happens to your cash on hand over time when you change parameters, and it also allows you to construct numerous scenario layers that indicate what might happen in various circumstances, such as hiring a new employee.
The online application provides budgeting tools that allow you to explain how your company’s money will be spent and then follow those budgets throughout the month.
Dryrun
Dryrun also accepts data from Xero and QuickBooks to track your forward cash flow. It allows you to track partial payments and engage with workers and business experts so they are aware of your situation.
Another component of this system is sales forecasting. It pulls data straight from the web-based CRM platform Pipedrive, allowing you to integrate possible deals into your cash flow prediction, improving its accuracy.
Sales are only one piece of the cash flow jigsaw. What are you spending your money on? Dryrun’s budget system allows you to construct your own categories and auto-repeating budget items that you can see in various degrees of detail.
The what-if modelling method in DryRun allows you to examine numerous scenarios at the same time, utilising various data points in each prediction. How much are you spending on marketing? Or staff?
Pulse
Pulse allows you to monitor current cash flow on a weekly or monthly basis, as well as anticipate future cash flow utilising tools to assess the impact of a new project or spending on your cash on hand.
To reduce your burden, automatically import data from QuickBooks and then utilise it to illustrate cash flow in a series of reports. For those doing business worldwide, this application also tracks cash flow in several currencies.
With Pulse, you can create user accounts with varied degrees of access, ranging from Owner to Read Only. Pulse provides you with an at-a-glance report, showing your cash flow and profitability in varying time periods
Whatever technique you choose, the key to good forecasting is precisely accounting for expenditures and income. Being truthful about your financial aspirations is essential in cash flow planning. You’re almost halfway there if you can extract data from your accounting system.
