Pulse

Case Study: nGen Works

Posted on December 9th, 2009

Below, Carl Smith from nGen Works tells us how Pulse makes his business smarter and allows him to make better decisions.

Tell us about yourself and your business.

nGen Works is a digital creative firm that provides web design, web development and internet marketing consulting services to clients in the U.S. and abroad. We are an unwavering proponent of the user experience, putting people before technology. We’re also the creators of Happy Webbies and like to drink beer. And play video games.

Carl Smith - Search & Rescue
Carl Smith is the founding member of nGen Works, a digital creative firm that has been building some of the world’s finest hand-crafted websites since 2003. Carl has made a name for himself in the web world by always defending the needs and wants of the end-user. He has been privileged to lead teams that have been awarded the New York Art Directors Award For Interactive Development, The Hospitality Industry’s Best of Show Award, two National C.A.S.E. awards for Educational Web Development. He has also been featured in Kelly Goto’s best selling book Web Redesign: Workflow That Works. Carl spends most of his free time complaining about sites that say “click here,” chasing his daughters, and praying they never make Spiderman 4.

What were the reasons that lead you to start using Pulse?

I started using Pulse to kill that sick feeling in my stomach when I didn’t know if we would make payroll. Being in an industry full of 50/50 payment projects, or getting paid in thirds, it can be super confusing when money will come in. Receivables don’t tell half the story, or even a third sometimes. So I went looking for a solution and low and behold I found Pulse.

Ultimately [Pulse] helps me see potential outcomes as I play with “what if” scenarios.

Describe how you use Pulse and how it fits within your accounting workflow.

Basically I use Pulse separately from our accounting system. As the business owner, it’s really my toy and my baby. I manually update when it looks like cash will come in and variations in payables. Sometimes I look at how cashflow from a project will impact us and decide if we really want a project, or if a client starts acting up what the impact will be if we walk away. Thanks to Pulse I know right now we’re solid through May of 2010 so we can take 2 weeks off as a company at the end of the year. Without Pulse I might not be as confident in that decision. It also helps when looking at employee bonuses and planning for conferences. Ultimately it helps me see potential outcomes as I play with “what if” scenarios.

What do you like most about Pulse?

The flexibility. It’s so easy to add or remove a project, or shift a receivable or expense. It’s also easy on the eyes which is a plus for us. It’s funny, but I’ve shown it to colleagues and clients because I think it helps position us as a smart business. Hopefully I’ve turned a lot of people onto Pulse.

It’s funny, but I’ve shown it to colleagues and clients because I think it helps position us as a smart business.

How has Pulse helped your business?

Pulse makes nGen Works smarter. We make better decisions because we can see further. You could say it’s lowered our stress level by removing the fear of not knowing.

Is there anything else you’d like to add?

I speak quite a bit about establishing trust with users, and I use Pulse as an example. I asked you to provide the ability to zero out over a year ago and you ended up adding that feature in. You had me as a customer at that point because you listened.

Case Study: Base-10 Design & Development

Posted on December 8th, 2009

Below, Casimir Loeber from Base-10 Design & Development Inc. tells us how Pulse takes the “fear and stress out of cash flow projection and management.”

Tell us about yourself and your business.

My name is Casimir Loeber and I am co-founder of Base-10 Design & Development Inc. We are a creative agency that specializes in custom web design and development, print and graphic design. We are a tight team that prides itself in our agility and ability to come up with a solution to almost any visual or technical problem. We are located in Vancouver, B.C. Canada and serve clients around the globe.

What were the reasons that lead you to start using Pulse?

As most entrepreneurs will know, there are never enough hours in the day to do the work that pays the bills, let alone the behind the scenes work most of us hate to do. Both my business partner and myself knew from the beginning that we were not the accountant types or even good bookkeepers. What we did know how to do was preserve the paper trail and plug numbers into websites. This lead us to pulse which allowed us to visualize our cash flow before our brains turned to snow with receipts, spread sheets and accordion folders.

If we have a large prospect on the horizon we take 2 seconds to put it in Pulse to see how it effects us; simple as that.

Describe how you use Pulse and how it fits within your accounting workflow.

Before we had a bookkeeper we would simply export our invoice totals from our invoicing system (Freshbooks!) and enter these values as income in pulse. We were pretty good with our expense paper trails and would just go through our credit card and cheque book for these values. As things started to ramp up and consume more time, we hired a bookkeeper and gave her the keys to our pulse account. She was able to pick it up in no time and now all we do is log in every couple of days to see where we are, where we are headed and where we came from. If we have a large prospect on the horizon we take 2 seconds to put it in pulse to see how it effects us; simple as that.

What do you like most about Pulse?

What I like most about pulse is that it turns something that is very number heavy and hard to visualize into something that is easy to look at. I can take a quick look at my Pulse account and see exactly where we miscalculated on a quote and how long it took us to recover from that. The reporting functionality is definitely the strong point with pulse and has the potential to be expanded in many great directions.

I can take a quick look at my Pulse account and see exactly where we miscalculated on a quote and how long it took us to recover from that.

How has Pulse helped your business?

Pulse has taken the fear and stress out of cash flow projection and management. It has seriously made it so that I can sleep better knowing that I am not going to randomly run out of cash tomorrow. It is easy to learn and easy to teach, so integrating it into our work flow was not an issue at all.

Is there anything else you’d like to add?

I want to say 2 last things. The first being that seeing the blue line climb upwards and the green bars tower over the red, makes me want to dance. Secondly, I can’t wait to see what the people at Pulse will cook up next.