Xero App Series: Spotlight Reporting
By now, you’ve surely heard of Xero’s beautiful cloud accounting software and possibly even implemented it across your business. Many of our clients have taken this step “into the cloud” and are reaping the rewards of having real-time visibility over their accounts, debtors and other mission-critical financial data. Having your bank feed(s) set up, most of your transactions can be automatically coded by the system and reconciled on a constant basis. This means statements can be prepared at the click of the button, invoices can be generated, payroll can be processed and so much more.
Allworths Partner David Downie wrote about the benefits of cloud-based systems last year:
In our own business, we have moved to using cloud-based software applications, or “apps,” for: practice management, preparation of accounts and tax returns, employee payroll, human resources compliance, employee engagement and coaching, IT security training and testing, document transmission and signature, online meetings, invoice processing and financial reporting. In the cloud software industry, the collection of apps used by a business is referred to as its “app stack.” As you can see, ours has become quite extensive and this has unlocked significant new efficiencies and opportunities for our clients.
In this blog series, we wanted to draw your attention not to Xero’s core features but to the 800+ add-on apps that feature in Xero’s App Marketplace of approved third-party software providers and products. This ecosystem of added functionality is part of Xero’s winning edge over other accounting systems, bringing a world of additional possibility, insight and power to your business.
Over the coming months, we’re going to look at a different Xero app each month and explore the significant added value it brings. These apps are in use all over the world and are some of the most popular currently available in the App Marketplace.
We would be very happy to assist you with any further questions, especially if you are interested in a trial implementation at your business! The first cab off the rank is…
Spotlight Reporting
Spotlight Reporting offers a variety of comprehensive performance reports, full three-way forecasting, customisable dashboards and advanced consolidated reports for multi-entity businesses and franchises.
Category: Reporting and forecasting
Rating: 5/5 stars on Xero
Founding details: Spotlight Reporting was founded in 2003 and built by progressive accountants for progressive accountants.
Scenario: You’re a small business and you have found that reporting and forecasting future cash flows are becoming increasingly time consuming and confusing. You struggle to foresee how particular decisions are going to affect your business financially, and this may be made more difficult because you have numerous businesses whose data you would like to consolidate. If you relate to any of these statements, then Spotlight Reporting could be for you!
Spotlight Reporting aims to generate better business outcomes for:
- Owners and CFOs → monitor performance and easily deliver insights to you, your leadership team and Board
- Franchises, industry specialists and not-for-profits → access to group-wide benchmarking, visualisation and consolidation to save you time and effort
About:
Spotlight Reporting is made up of four products to create easy performance reports, dashboards, forecasts and consolidations. Once the app is connected with Xero, your data will be automatically shared with Spotlight Reporting, streamlining everything.
Reporting:
Reporting is a management reporting tool that leads to better business outcomes by helping clients or businesses make informed decisions. It allows users to consolidate up to 50 client organisations with multiple currencies, visualise cash flows and monitor liquidity, and drive action through its ability to pre-populate reports and share insights, among numerous other features.
Forecasting:
Effective forecasts and cash flow management can be the difference between a business’ success or failure. With this product you can easily import budget data, generate full 3 way forecasts with flexible rules and plan for the future by creating ‘what if’ scenarios, as well as many other things.
Dashboard:
Prioritise your time and focus on what really matters. Dashboard provides you with an instant snapshot of your business’ performance by giving you the option to select between a wide selection of displays and charts to review financial and non-financial metrics.
Multi:
This feature allows you to aggregate, rank and benchmark, thereby streamlining multi-entity reports where comparisons are key. As such, it is most suitable for franchises, not for profits and industry specialists. This product allows you to see a consolidated view of up to 500 organisations, organisation rankings and KPIs, visual scorecards and chart galleries.
Integration with Xero:
Spotlight Reporting seamlessly integrates with Xero, enabling accountants and businesses to import actual and budget data from Xero with the click of a button. The integration unlocks all functionality available in Spotlight, including unique features such as industry templates, action plans, cash flow forecasting, executive summaries, advanced consolidations with multi-currency and intercompany eliminations, etc.
Given all the current economic and financial uncertainty, it’s probably a good time to get ahead of your cash flow situation by using a relatively new but already tried and tested financial forecasting product like Spotlight reporting. Insights about what’s coming just around the corner and the ability to play out different financial scenarios before they happen are the keys to making responsible, data-driven decisions in businesses of all types and sizes.
Feel free to contact us if you would like to learn more about integrating Spotlight Reporting with your Xero account.
