[00:00:00] Hey, welcome to another episode of the Simply Booked Podcast. This week I am talking about one of the main reasons that I have seen why business owners put off hiring a bookkeeper. It's because they think they need to clean up their mess before hiring someone. They might be too embarrassed that they've co-mingling their personal in business expenses or a lack of a system.
[00:00:23] or simply not knowing what they're doing. A lot of people are embarrassed and feel like they should know what they're doing, but you don't. That's what I'm here for. is this you? If so, you aren't alone. People always say to me that they are will hire me once they get their ducks in a row. What they don't realize is that I help clients do exactly that.
[00:00:43] I put ducks in the. On the Daily , I'm picturing one of those cute baby duck videos where Mama Duck is helping all of her little ducklings onto the curb and then they fall over and she keeps going back to pick them up, keeping them in line, and then they finally end up off screen in a cute little line of fuzzy duckling waddles.
[00:01:03] That's me. I'm Mama Duck, and all you have to do is be willing to get me those ducks of yours safely across the street and up over the curb so we can look at everything you've been this year from the safety of the green grass on the other side. So to tell you the truth, I got a little lost in that analogy.
[00:01:23] I love baby ducks, but I also love cleaning up a mess. Nothing is more satisfying to me than turning chaos into organized piles that actually means something. And this is a judgment free zone. Your miss is not the biggest reason why you need a bookkeeper. Your mess is the biggest reason why you need a bookkeeper.
[00:01:44] It's not the reason that you aren't ready. Got it. As long as you're open to advice on how to clean up your mess, if you're willing to change systems perhaps switching to a bank that is bookkeeping friendly, I can help you with bite size tasks to switch you to better systems. Smoothly. Trust me, it's hard to do that on your own.
[00:02:05] Switching banks is a big deal that people are scared about, but if you had a checklist and you knew what steps to take and which vendors to update your routing information and all of that, it would a lot smoother and a lot less, taxing to your brain, don't you think? So? I value efficiency, and I don't wanna waste your time either.
[00:02:27] So if you want your bookkeeping done and done correctly, pretending like you will get it in order before you hire a bookkeeper is not going to serve you well. The end of the year is drawing near. And January and February are always really busy times for bookkeepers. You probably already know that , that's when a lot of business owners realize that they never touched their books last year, and now the deadline is staring at them in the face and they know it needs to be done.
[00:02:55] And that's when people call me. I am describing a ketchup project, basically. So if you've never touched your books, you don't have a bookkeeping system, a catch up project is getting them started from scratch. Cleanup is when you have a bookkeeping system that might need to be tidied up a little bit or a lot bit , or sometimes scrapped entirely and started from scratch, which becomes a ketchup project.
[00:03:20] What some people don't realize is that cleaning up a bookkeeping system is not, that's not maintained, correct. Actually takes more time and money than starting one from scratch. So if your biggest takeaway from this episode is to call the bookkeeper, stop kidding yourself. You aren't going to get this done.
[00:03:38] And even if you do, is it even correct? As a business owner, you have two options. You can spend your time on something or you can spend your money on something. And if you take too long to. You end up spending both time and money. Don't be that person. Let this be the year you get your books caught up or cleaned up, then keep that bookkeeper on monthly so it never gets behind again.
[00:04:01] Obviously, I would love to work with you, but there are so many good bookkeepers in my network. If I don't have the capacity for new clients at the moment, I am happy to refer you to someone else who has room for. You can always fill out my form on my website, simply Booked Dot llc, and see what my availability is.
[00:04:20] I anticipate having room for a couple catch up projects in the beginning of 2023. Will one of those be you? Tag me on Instagram if this episode spoke to you, and if you are going to get your act together in 2023, this is your year. Thanks for tuning in to today's episode. I'll see you next time.
