Packaged apps, training and clients

I certainly agree with Alan's last paragraph. One of the reasons we are using Twinfield Online Accounting is that the early training stages can be made so much easier for the client. We share the same data and we can fix their problems quickly and easily.

After reading the article I have started using Camtasia Studio. It's a great package. Thanks for pointing it out Dennis.

I am a non-accountant who has put a great deal of effort into developing an online accounting package that that was both capable and as easy as possible to use. For the average user intent on running their own SME business accounts and understanding the financial state of their business the main need for training lies in trying to understand what their accountant is saying to them half the time.

Accounting terminology really gets in the way of communication and few accountants really understand what it is that their clients don't understand because they have internalised the heuristics of accounting, and have forgotten what it is like not to see double-entry as "natural" or how the P&L relates to the balance sheet.

For the user, the training is generally required the first time they start using a computerised accounts package. Much like learning a foreign language, the second package is generally picked up quickly by a user. They will simply look to see how the new package does the small number of key activities they performed in the old package.

Online packages offer accountants a chance to hand-hold new clients, monitoring their use of the package in the early days so incorrect usage can be fixed early rather than receiving a mess of accounts at year end to be unravelled at considerable cost.

Thank you gentlemen for your comments, the training ideas have certainly given me food for thought. I did write some training instructions for a lady who I recently taught to use Sage, but the idea of writing online tutorials is certainly one I'll explore further.

Heh… well, it's my ambition to get AccountsVision running on an Intel Mac, once technologies like WINE become more stable.

In the accounts production market, nearly everybody has Windows but I like to think I've brought a bit of Mac thinking to the accounts prep world. I could give examples, but I'm saving them for my blog (our new site should up in about a week).

I was thinking of AccountsVision

Of course, yes!

Try Snapz Pro

Dang - I'm on Mac...

DemoBuilder's pretty good too

Our app (AccountsVision) works in quite a different way to the mainstream accounts production apps out there and we felt the best way to get the message across was to produce a series of animated tutorials.

To do this, we looked at Camtasia, but also found DemoBuilder (www.demo-builder.com). If memory serves me correctly, it was actually cheaper and allowed us to do more with the tutorials.

Jason/David: A lot of people misunderstand what I am saying. It is NOT either/or it is either/and.

Jason - thanks for the mention!
Training and support are always issues, and products like Twinfield and Winweb try to make sure they are more intuitive than the stone age (or living dead as Dennis calls them) traditional products. Our customer Goodman Jones is taking an innovative approach by loading all of the training manuals and documentation on to a client extranet, which also has "How To" guides and FAQs, and allows the clients to post comments (which immediately trigger an e-mail to the support team) and allow proper interaction (a real example of CRM that isn't just a contacts database). They've put this together, not using some fancy intranet or wiki software, but by using the TypePad blogging software that they use for their SME blog. A very pragmatic and practical solution. I'd suggest you do a follow up podcast with them about it Dennis.

I have chatted with Emily a few times in recent weeks/months, admittedly about winweb and the future of accounting in the form of SaaS.

For those already established practices out there, of which there are a great deal, it goes to prove there is no one size fits all solution (yet), I have the advantage I can put my lot in with winweb and that’s it, but for most this will not be possible, they will still need to have a stable of products out there, like Winweb, Twinfield, More and such like.

What is good to hear is that a practice like Cannon Moorcroft have someone within their company who they have appointed to have the responsibility for accounting software and keeping them up to date, and in many cases dare I say it ahead, not that many out there doing this I should think (in my experience).

In answer to the question though, I think in order to give ‘best advice’ then they will need to think about the SaaS benefits (of which I don’t think you can argue there are many) and offer probably a small stable of solutions i.e. WinWeb and maybe Twinfield (see David I am selling for you!) additionally maybe More (now if more go SaaS that will be interesting, is Bob listening?), but also I guess they will still need to offer Sage, no matter what you say about Sage it is a recognized brand!

Training, well I guess in terms of forcing a client to do things in a prescribed format More certainly has the edge, but, WinWeb with online assistants must take the prize for a 24/7 we can help solution, again with both of these solutions it is reliant to some extent on if the adviser in the first place does his/her job right with training, but even if they don’t how much effort does it take to keep an eye on things, especially with an online product?

I am interested to hear the views of others.