The affordable pricing and costs of QuickBooks software makes it a top choice of small business owners. With QuickBooks accounting software, business owners can easily manage their finances from home, work or while traveling. QuickBooks accounting software is owned by Intuit, a top U.S. software company.

A great feature of Quickbooks software is that it’s scalable and can meet your company’s growing needs with any of its products. You can choose from a broad line of Quickbooks software products designed to meet your unique business accounting and financial management requirements. You can purchase any of the QuickBooks top three products: QuickBooks Simple Start, QuickBooks Pro and QuickBooks Premier for less than $500. In addition to the affordable pricing, you receive a money-back guarantee with every QuickBooks purchase. Weigh the pricing and costs of Quickbooks software by taking a closer look at the Quick Books products.

1. Determine if QuickBooks Simple Start will meet your needs.

2. Learn more about the features of QuickBooks Pro software.

3. Obtain business planning strategies with QuickBooks Premier software.

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Spend less for accounting tools with QuickBooks Simple Start

QuickBooks Simple Start, QuickBooks basic software, offers user-friendly tools to monitor sales and expenses for less than $100. This QuickBooks software combines accounting, bookkeeping and business management tools designed for first-time users and includes all of the necessary tools to allow small businesses to track invoices, sales, expenses and customers in one central location. The software's detailed tutorials allow you to get started quickly.

I recommend: Learn more about QuickBooks Simple Start by checking out the QuickBooks website. Read more about QuickBooks Simple Start pricing by visiting PriceWatch, which provides information from several QuickBooks software vendors.

Try QuickBooks Pro accounting and financial management solutions

If you have more in-depth invoice and reporting needs, you can try QuickBooks Pro for less than $200. QuickBooks Pro is Intuit's most widely used software and comes highly recommended by businesses. This software helps businesses manage a range of accounting tasks, such as creating invoices and reports and tracking cash flow and expenses.

I recommend: Read more about QuickBooks Pro by checking out customer reviews on PriceGrabber.com. You can also obtain detailed information about QuickBooks Pro features and pricing by visting PC World.

Manage your business effectively with QuickBooks Premier software

For less than $400, you can buy QuickBooks software with all the bells and whistles--its premier product. The most advanced version of QuickBooks professional software, QuickBooks Premier allows businesses to not only track revenue and expenses, but it also gives businesses the tools to create a formidable growth strategy. With QuickBooks Premier, companies can assess overall performance, manage customer and vendor relationships and obtain planning tools to help their business expand.

I recommend: Learn more about QuickBooks Premier by visiting TopTenREVIEWS. Check out a full QuickBooks software pricing review by visiting QuickLabs.

Tips & Tactics

Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• •  In addition to purchasing computer software QuickBooks, you can buy basic access to QuickBooks Online for less than $10 a month. With Quickbooks Online, you can access your business finances at home, work or on-the-road.

QuickBooks is by far the most popular accounting software ever written. It is easy to use, affordably priced and adaptable for use by most any small business. However, at one time or another, you may need help with either a basic area of QuickBooks or a more advanced question involving:

1. Installation for desktop or networks
2. Setup and chart of accounts
3. Entering checks, bills, invoices
4. Tax advice
5. Troubleshooting

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Start with the source

QuickBooks has a wealth of information on its Web site, for installation, setup, troubleshooting, and further links.

I recommend: Go to QuickBooks support for information on both free and paid support options. If you want self-help support, you can go directly from this page to Intuit's knowledge base.

Hire a set-up pro

One of the most important decisions immediately following the installation of QuickBooks, is to ensure proper setup, including the chart of accounts.

I recommend: QuickBooks is always better with a QuickBooks Certified Pro Advisor who can guide you one-on-one on the correct setup for your business. Fees can range anywhere from $35 per hour for those with bookkeeping skills to several hundred dollars or more for those who are high level CPAs.

Train yourself

There are four primary resources for QuickBooks training, ranging from self-help tutorials to paid instruction.

I recommend: The QuickBooks learning center is built into QuickBooks itself. Intuit CD Interactive Training and Instructor-led seminars offer authoritative help and third party trainers such as RealWorld Training offer a full suite of QuickBooks seminars and CD-ROM training products. Also, organizations such as The Sleeter Group will come to your business and train you.

Find tax and bookkeeping advice

The ultimate goal of keeping your books is to track information to help you better run your business and to provide an organized data structure to do your taxes efficiently each year.

I recommend: If you do not have a local CPA or tax practitioner available, Intuit has a network of 20,000 pro advisors that comprises bookkeepers, CPA's, IRS Enrolled Agents and Tax Practitioners.

Troubleshoot with an expert

The help within Quickbooks can be sufficient for everyday operations, but there are communities of experts who provide their expertise on a variety of subjects for free.

I recommend: Intuit provides an online community where users and pro advisors exchange ideas. Yahoo also has a list of long-running online communities that are moderated by experienced QuickBooks users.

Tips & Tactics

Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• •  Help Materials: Intuit has the best collection of help materials both in the product and on its Web site.
• •  Expert Advice: It is advisable to contact a QuickBooks Certified Pro Advisor before you setup your QuickBooks. It will save you time and money in the long run.
• •  Training: Your learning method will totally be determined by your personal preference; there is no one right way to learn.

QuickBooks accounting software is viewed by many businesses as an essential accounting program, assisting in the organization and preservation of a variety of business financial activities. However, when a business opts to buy QuickBooks software, it is important that the staff members utilizing the product are effectively and economically educated and trained on its use. After all, it is not very helpful to have a QuickBooks program if you have no QuickBooks software education and training in place to make sure everyone on your staff gets the most out of the product.

Becoming educated on the computer software QuickBooks doesn't have to be difficult. There are a number of resources to assist in learning about QuickBooks financial software with which you should:

1. Review materials provided to businesses by the manufacturer of QuickBooks and QuickBooks software providers.

2. Investigate training classes for QuickBooks basic software, QuickBooks premier software, QuickBooks pro software and other available versions.

3. Seek out certification training with respect to QuickBooks and programming as being certified in the programs' use will give your company and your employees more credibility and marketability.

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Start QuickBooks software education and training by reviewing what is provided by the manufacturer

Naturally, QuickBooks software providers are going to have some of the best knowledge about the various QuickBooks programs. It is important to start here and get materials to help with the education of these programs.

I recommend: Intuit is the manufacturer of QuickBooks and, because of their close association with the product, their site has a lot of information available. There is also only one training provider which is endorsed by QuickBooks, RealWorldTraining.com.

Incorporate effective QuickBooks software training, even if they are not officially endorsed

There are a number of economical and varied educational training programs. It is also important to note that there are a variety of levels to be considered when it comes to training to work with QuickBooks programs.

I recommend: QBalance.com offers website visitors an extensive variety of different levels of training for learning more about QuickBooks, from beginners to more advanced software users. Amazingelearning.com offers video training on QuickBooks. Computer-training-software.com is a site which offers CD training and education on QuickBooks and the various programs.

Become certified in QuickBooks accounting software

Certification is a step up from simply taking a course with regard to QuickBooks. There is physical documentation of one's progress, skills and commitment. As such, training to become certified in QuickBooks can often be more expensive, time consuming and involved. However, many businesses find it worthwhile because of the more extensive education and training provided.

I recommend: Education-Portal.com explains the benefits of QuickBooks certification over simple training, while establishments such as GatlinEducation.com offer certification in the programs.

Tips & Tactics

Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• •  When deciding on the proper education or training format for one's business, carefully consider the audience and how specific employees learn best. It might be helpful to learn how the audience prefers to learn before making a firm decision on the QuickBooks educational and training material for a business or department.

If your business uses QuickBooks software to help manage your money, you probably realize that some of the terminology differs from what your paper accounting systems used. If your business has recently started using QuickBooks software, you may not yet understand what all the new words mean. Many of these key terms have definitions similar to paper accounting systems. With QuickBooks software, key terms will become more familiar as you use the program for your accounting needs.

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Items

Items allow you to post transactions to certain accounts that you've set up in QuickBooks. You, as the user, can determine to which accounts your items post.

I recommend: For an in-depth definition of items and to learn how to set them up in QuickBooks, check out the explanation at JenniferThieme.com.

Memorized transactions

In QuickBooks, users can set up transactions that repeat, or recur. These recurring transactions make up your memorized transactions.

I recommend: To learn more about memorized transactions and to get a lengthier, more comprehensive definition, visit QBalance.com.

Template reports, memorized reports

Like memorized transactions, users can also set up reports to run on a recurring basis. These reports, called template reports and memorized reports, depend on a few variables.

I recommend: PowerTools Software explains the variables, defines both types of reports, and shows QuickBooks users how to set up both template reports and memorized reports.

Chart of accounts

QuickBooks software allows users to set up accounts, viewable in a chart of accounts. This chart of accounts allows you to view other information about those accounts, as well.

I recommend: InformIT devotes six pages of its website to not only explaining what a chart of accounts is but to informing how you can use it to maximize the benefits of QuickBooks.

Profit centers, cost centers and class lists

Profit and cost centers help you see how disparate parts of your business work together. In QuickBooks, profit and cost centers show up on your class list. Profit centers, cost centers and class lists all dovetail together in the QuickBooks software suite.

I recommend: Flagship Technologies defines these phrases and explains how they relate.

Accounts payable and accounts receivable

Accounts payable is how much money your business owes people and accounts receivable is how much money people owe your business. In the QuickBooks software suite, users can also create accounts payable graphs and accounts receivable reports.

I recommend: Intuit, the parent company for QuickBooks software, explains these terms and its associated reports and graphs on the support portion of its website.