Did you see the new tool Google Spreadsheet? It’s pretty cool. Wish I had something like this when I worked outside the home. There’s always somebody who didn’t have the right software on their computer. Being able to share spreadsheets easily, quickly with little to no setup of any kind whatsoever is nice. The bigger picture though is not about software. I’ll get to that in a while. First, let me share about another very interesting web based software I found – FreshBooks.

FreshBooks is an accounting and billing software completely web based. Right now all billing is electronically handled, customers are billed through email but they are also working on the ability to mail out paper invoices for you. The interface looks easy and very un-accounting like – which is so nice. Accounting software always give me a headache. FreshBooks can also track time for you. Great for service providers. You can manage up to 3 clients for free, there after, plans start at $14 a month up to $39 a month.

If you’ve seen these type of thing before, you’re probably thinking so what? What’s so fascinating about it? Well to be honest, it’s not new and certainly not earth shattering development. Over a year ago I have tested scripts that would do similar things but the point to this whole post is as I said before, not about the service. It’s about the bigger picture.

We’ve been hearing on and off about Web-based software or software as a service for a while. These two examples are just some of the product of all that talk. Personally, there will always be some things I prefer desktop based. After all, who can afford to pay a monthly fee for every itty bitty piece of software they use? But, I’m loving the Internet based versions more and more. Since I purchased a Mac (my husband and I are even planning to build our very first Linux laptop), I’m more inclined to choose and purchase web-based software for compatibility reasons. There is almost none. What will run on a web browser will run on any platform. Of course the clincher is web access but even that will eventually be a non-issue.

On another note, web-based software would make a lot of sense for micro to small business owners. This is because many of us do not have nor do we have the means to have tech help. I’m not talking about one off outsourced projects. I’m talking about a tech person to help train us, deploy software, procure software and more importantly maintain it. We have to do it ourselves and that when you actually sit down and calculate the cost is very expensive not to mention absolutely bad way to use your time. Web-based software allows us to ‘hit the ground running’ so to speak, making it very appealing.

Technorati Tags: business, internet, management, security, technology