Profitcents

[BOB W]

I was called yesterday and logged into one of their presentations. I did purchase their full program at a substantial discount from their list price. Has anyone used the program and what do you think of it?

[veritas]

What is profitcents?

[Unregistered]

I am scheduled to do the demo next week,

What do you think of the product, so far?

What do you plan on using it for?

What did you end up paying for it?

JoshInNC

[BOB W]

Profitcents

It is a self use on-line program that evaluates a client's business between 2 or more periods. It gives a text report with graphs on key issues in everyday language. The text report is computer generated by a patented program, so they claim.

I ran two reports last night and was somewhat impressed. But, bottomline, it will all depend on how a client responds to it. We as accountants may like it, but how a client responds is what really counts. That is why I asked > "has anybody used it?".

The list price for all their programs is very high for a sole practioner. It is even higher based on how many employees a practice has, go figure. A one man show will pay list of $1,200 and change. After the online demo they offer everyone ( sole practioners) a $499 price. The original sale person said there was a 20% discount if I logged into the telephone/web conference. Well, after the demo I reminded the follow-up sales person of the 20% discount, so I paid $399. He had to check with someone to confirm that I could get it for $399, and I did. Don't be to quick to tell how many employees you have. I just happen to have none.

[veritas]

I looked at their website. Other than providing an industry comparison I don't see any benefit in the program.

Quick ratio, current ratio, inventory turns, percentage of sales for certain expenses, sales and gross profit comparisons. All pretty standard stuff.

[BOB W]

I agree..........

with you 100%.

( I just wrote a complete response and "blip" it disappeared from the screen. I will try to remember all that I said. My edit to this will appear when I am done.)

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SEE POST BELOW

[veritas]

Good point

You are correct that we tend to focus on the weak areas and not point out the strong areas.

.

[BOB W]

Full post again

I agree with you that this is standard "stuff". But how many times have you/we put in writting what we accountants have been taught and put it in words that average "Joe" could understand without confusing our clients, probably never. Yes, you may have picked out issues about a business's problem area and brought it up to them with suggestions for remedies.

Giving praise for the good operational areas may be left out. Sure you may say "you have a good business but you need to look at "this or that"". This works and works well most of the time.

I believe there is a value to these generated reports but am uncertain how a client would receive them. I see it as a way to sit with my clients with a specific agenda for that meeting, more than an outline and less than a remedy for problem areas. But a start for my client's awareness of their behavior and the effect on their business. The meeting would finish with brain-storming and suggestions.

Can this be done without the program, yes. But why, the program gives a full report in presentation format in a maximum of 15 minutes. This cannot be done manually in that time.

Also> you can edit any part of the report in "Word" to futher customize all or certain sections as well as add you own areas. I can see me creating some standard paragraphs in word and copy/paste them into the generated report for a personal/specific client touch.

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[Unregistered]

I must agree with Bob when he talks about the convenience of using an already programmed program togenerate the reports, etc. Sure we can produce that stuff ourselves, by depending on who you are, it may not be cost effective.

[Unregistered]

I tried ProfitSense two years ago; reports were superficial/observations generic; especially P&L verbiage. I did not renew. Also many of my clients have Loans to/from stockholders which made many ratios meaningless. I stalled with Sales rep for a couple months and the price fell dramatically!

[BOB W]

I tend to agree with you with the "superficial/observations generic" remark. But, how was it received by your client? As accountants we look at these reports from a different point of view.

As far as "loan to/from officers", they can be removed for the calculation; so I don't see that as a problem. Did you do any customization of the report?

My big question was, How did your clients welcome the report?

[unregistered]

profitcents

we have used it for a few years and find it to be very useful

[TaxBird]

I have used ProfitCents with clients for about two years now. My client base is primarily entrepreneurs. Being a naturally competitive and visually oriented group I find the visual appeal of the reports combined with the 'scoreboard' aspects helps this group to actually 'hear' what I'm saying. They want to know how they fare compared to their competition but being a private lot don't really share much with each other. And my group in particular anyway doesn't want to hear a huge dissertation on it, at least not without good visuals. The visual brings them in which gives me an opportunity to get my nuggets in.

Most importantly, as Bob mentioned, I couldn't produce a report this visually appealing in 15 minutes.

One thing, though, about the pre-written text. If you don't like the generic text, you can always export the report (formatting holds up well) and edit as you wish.

In summary, my client base likes it, in so far as I can tell.

[BOB W]

Taxbird...

...thanks for the reply. Which report do you usually run? Is the report presented in a sit-down meeting ?

I see that a certain amount of editing will need to be done in "Word", just to customize for particular clients. Is there anything that you can add from your experience with the program and/or from your clients?

[TaxBird]

...thanks for the reply. Which report do you usually run? Is the report presented in a sit-down meeting ?

I see that a certain amount of editing will need to be done in "Word", just to customize for particular clients. Is there anything that you can add from your experience with the program and/or from your clients?

I generally use the 'For Profit Business Analysis' reports. [My NPOs are Churches and Condo associations and the PC NPO reports are yet helpful]. I've also not yet had a chance to test the new analytical procedures so I don't know how that stacks against the model I currently use.

Depending on who you have, it helps to start with the basic report. Once they see the value then I bring them in a level at a time, depending on how well they understand the information presented. I am at the point now where I have a few clients for whom I only use the extreme reports. As a next step, I plan to introduce training for them/their staff in calculating and interpreting their metrics so that eventually they will have a system that can give them 'real-time' metrics.

I typically introduce these in June and keep up a quarterly schedule thereafter. Usually a one hour 'sit-down' meeting every quarter. I find that this helps me 'plan' with them all year round as opposed to being crushed in December despite requests for finacial updates starting in June. And surprisingly, they will keep these meetings.

For me the ProfitCents reports are a way to introduce smaller companies to an overall philosophy of improving their business intelligence. Usually I get clients that are bookkeeping or tax (or both) nightmares. I clean up their stuff, train their staff (or them) and give the work back (except for the tax and FS) while maintaining some kind of oversight. This gives me a doorway to do other, more satisfying (to me) work/projects for them.

I will say, that I do prime any new clients by telling them that I will be 'nosey in their business all year round'. That they can't expect to get the best results if they pile it on in December because by then all opportunities for the year (except for the most basic) are gone. If they are receptive to that, then I know they are the client for me. I get very little satisfaction from just cranking out tax returns. The tax returns have to be the end result of some pretty cool stuff we've been doing all year round.

In a nutshell, I find it helps to use the reports as part of an overplan to graduate client service upwards.

Well Bob, this was a longer response than I had intended but I hope it helps.