Each year, I survey tens if not hundreds of products from
independent developers who add value to the QuickBooks community by
solving hard problems faced by QuickBooks users and consultants.
Before awarding the “awesome” label, I dig deep into each product
asking all the hard questions I think consultants and business
owners will eventually ask. I usually find that the developers of
these products know much more about their target customer set than I
do, so I try to first satisfy myself that they understand enough
about how QuickBooks works and then I move to their solution and see
if they’ve developed an easy-to-use, quality product that I would
recommend to my clients and to other consultants who need confidence
in the products they recommend.
I survey products in several vertical markets where QuickBooks
may not have all the needed features, or where clients want
customized solutions. Most of the winners are software, but several
are hardware and software combinations.
SourceLink – Electronic Documents Attached to QuickBooks
Forms
Personable, Inc.
http://www.personable.com/
Pricing: $189 single
user, $589 for 5 users, $989 for 10 users
Who its for:
SourceLink is targeted to small companies that want a low-cost
paperless solution and who want access to electronic documents from
within QuickBooks.
SourceLink is best suited for the smaller business whose needs
are focused on storing electronic documents linked to QuickBooks
transactions, and who don’t have other need for data retrieval, data
entry, or storage and retrieval of documents outside of the
QuickBooks system.
SourceLink is a cost-effective electronic document management
solution, integrated with QuickBooks. SourceLink allows users to
link electronic files to their QuickBooks records from within the
QuickBooks application itself. SourceLink lets users instantly store
and retrieve financial records - bills, invoices, customer
agreements, etc. - directly from QuickBooks. SourceLink also lets
users attach electronic “sticky notes” directly to 25 different
record types in QuickBooks.
. . .
About QuickBooks Add-ons
In 2003, Intuit released its Application Programming Interface
(API), provided free to developers in a Software Developer Kit
(SDK). This SDK opens up the 3 plus million user base to software
developers who add value to QuickBooks by creating add-on products
for QuickBooks. Even a casual programmer using Microsoft Office and
Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) can develop an application to
read from and write to a QuickBooks data file.
Intuit themselves are using the SDK to write add-on applications
that are bundled with QuickBooks. For example, the Financial
Statement Designer (included with QuickBooks Premier: Accountant
Edition) uses the SDK to allow you to create GAAP formatted
financial statements.
To search for QuickBooks add-ons, visit the Intuit marketplace
site (http://marketplace.intuit.com/) or Mike Block’s
independent site located at www.quickbooks-add-ons.com.
For more information about developing add-ons for QuickBooks
visit http://developer.intuit.com/.
Note: The Sleeter Group does not accept any compensation
in exchange for considering or including a product in our list of
Awesome Add-ons.
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