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You are a successful contractor.  You have built your Electrical, HVAC/Mechanical, Residential, General Construction or Heavy Duty Construction business into a reputable and successful business which customers have grown to trust.  However, like many contractors using QuickBooks or Sage 50, you have no clue or somewhat of a clue as to which projects are profitable and which are not.  You also struggle with administrative costs and reliability on project information coming from the field/job site.

You are not alone and technology can help.  We live in a world that offers technology and innovation in almost every aspect of our life.  If you have ever thought, “there has to be a better way” chances are there is.

We see customers struggle with data entry, errors, missed invoicing and not knowing project profitability on a daily basis, because we are also in the construction industry and know what that “better way” is.

Instead of having your technicians/supervisors/project managers manually fill out field tickets and/or timesheets why not have them enter the project information like time, equipment, materials directly into your accounting/project management system from the field?  Do you know or could you estimate the time savings, reduced errors and increased revenue streamlining this process could realize?  Chances are its tens of thousands of dollars every year. 

Are you asking yourself now “it seems there is a better way, I should consider this?”

Then you should consider the solutions and services available. 

My team is holding a complimentary online presentation (webinar) on this topic on Wednesday, January 18^th.  Click Here for more information.

I hope this information helps you uncover ways to utilize technology in your business.

It’s time to put your generic, off-the-shelf accounting software back on the shelf – accounting and job costing are the mainstay of any construction business, so you need a system that meets all of your construction-specific needs.

Competition is tough. To win more contracts and ensure project profitability, your estimates need to be more precise than ever – and with Sage 100 Contractor, you can put your best bid forward.

With Sage 100 Contractor, project commands are close at hand so you can intercept problems before they become issues. This includes:

• Viewing lists of outstanding project tasks
• Keeping in constant communication with team members
• Sending automatic schedule notices at prescribed intervals
• Monitoring the statuses of subcontracts, including changes, invoices, and balances remaining
• Checking material status reports

The details shouldn’t control you, you should control the details – and with Sage 100 Contractor, you will.

Business growth and increased market share are important to strive for, but if your growth isn't organized, you'll end up investing unnecessary time, money, and manpower to go, essentially, nowhere.

You can prevent this, however, by implementing Sage 300 management and business accounting software.

These are the value-added benefits of implementing Sage 300:

As your business grows, it will outgrow its software – your new needs will no longer be met with small business accounting software – and it will be time for an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. An ERP system is integrated business management software that manages data across multiple business activities, including accounting, project/service management, inventory control, human resource management, timekeeping, customer relation management, ad-hoc/dashboard reporting and much more.

Editor's Note: This post was originally published in September 2014 and has been updated for freshness, accuracy, and comprehensiveness.

It’s the kind of business story we love: a startup service company with a niche market in the oil and gas industry expands its operations as it gains more experience, employs the right people, builds positive networks, and utilizes today’s technology.

Often, though, as bids are made and new projects started, a certain amount of disparity can occur between the company objective and the mission to keep the current workflow moving smoothly. What’s needed is an intervention of sorts, where a software platform can take on the duties of maintaining transparency, the accurate transfer of documents, and change order management for service business.

An investment in an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system may be one of the best investments a small business can make. ERP solutions are no longer just for large companies; as the costs have come down, it’s easier than ever for small and medium-sized businesses to operate similarly to – and compete with – larger enterprises.

Here are ten reasons to move away from your small business accounting software:

If the size and scope of a project are relatively small, project management is often quite straightforward. When it comes to managing multiple projects, however, or a single project with many moving parts, a useful resource planning tool can be a project manager’s best friend.

While QuickBooks software by Intuit is a necessity for many startup companies that can't afford an expensive accountant, there comes a time when something that handles more complex tasks is necessary. A business that outgrows QuickBooks and doesn't update its software will find itself losing ground to the competition until it shifts gears and gets a more robust platform.

Your company may be in danger of slowing itself down by staying with the software, but how do you know you have outgrown QuickBooks?