“Have I paid that vendor yet?” you ask yourself as you sort through the dozens of invoices you’ve received this month. Definitely not the way you wanted to spend your Friday afternoon.
As your small business grows, manually managing accounts payable (AP) processes becomes more challenging, time-consuming and error-prone.
Enter accounts payable software. These platforms can automate processes like invoice management and payment processing while syncing to your accounting software to ensure nothing slips through the cracks.
This article offers an overview of the six best accounts payable software solutions for small businesses so you can find just the right platform for your needs. We’ll also give you a list of the features you should look for when choosing a platform, plus tips for how to make your decision.*
Financial admin eating up too much of your time? We can take it off your plate
Automate your accounts payable processes with Juni and free up your day for more impactful work.
*The information about all the platforms discussed in this article was collected between 9 January 2024 and 11 January 2024. This article was written and approved by Juni and is intended as marketing material.
.svg)
.svg)
Whenever you’re researching software, whether that be an accounts payable solution or inventory management platform, you need to be clear on what functionalities your business needs. So before we get into our list, here are some features you should prioritise when selecting accounts payable software:
Let’s take an in-depth look at our list of software. For each platform, we’ll list its features (as well as its limitations), explain how pricing works and point out what kind of business it’s best fit for.
Juni’s platform for ecommerce entrepreneurs comes with automated accounts payable features that can help you run simpler, tighter and more accurate financial admin. With Juni, it takes just seconds to auto-collect, pay and even finance your invoices.
By collecting and scanning your invoices automatically, then pre-filling all the important payment details, Juni saves you time and reduces the risk of human error. You can also automatically import your receipts and invoices with your dedicated Juni inbox for effortless spend management, plus match receipts to transactions.
What’s more, if you need to reduce pressure on your cash flow cycles, Juni offers financing options for certain types of payments, giving you up to 120 days to pay.*
The platform goes beyond accounts payable features, also offering business accounts and cards, features to optimise cash flow management, powerful accounting automations, fast transfers and storefront integrations.
Most suitable for: Ecommerce entrepreneurs and small businesses
Juni has two plan options:
You can try our Scale plan for free for the first 30 days.
Based in Copenhagen, Pleo is a business spending solution with built-in AP automation software. Pleo’s invoice management features make it easy to capture, process, approve, pay and bookkeep invoices in a central location. With over 50 supported currencies, Pleo users can seamlessly pay vendors across the world.
Most suitable for: Companies that need to pay invoices in several currencies
Pleo has three plan options:
Spendesk is a spend management platform with accounts payable features like invoice automation and approval workflows, giving you greater control over the invoicing lifecycle and your AP processes. By using Spendesk, you can minimise (or eliminate) manual data entry for your invoicing processes, plus get real-time insights into your spending patterns.
Most suitable for: SaaS, tech and fintech companies
Spendesk doesn’t list its pricing options, so you’ll have to reach out to sales to get a quote
Sage Intacct’s cloud-based invoicing software helps small business owners and finance teams automate invoice management with the power of AI. For example, simply upload or email an invoice, and the software will automatically extract details and populate fields for your approval. The platform can also detect duplicate invoices, helping you stay in control of your expenses and avoid costly errors.
Most suitable for: Businesses that need powerful analytics tools
Sage Intacct has three plans for its accounts payable software. All plans come with three months free:
While SAP Concur isn’t specifically designed for small businesses, it’s still a good fit for solopreneurs and SMBs looking to automate their AP processes. The platform automates invoicing processes, meaning you can pay suppliers quickly without constantly having to double-check invoices and complete transactions yourself.
Most suitable for: Businesses with immediate plans to scale
SAP Concur doesn’t list its pricing options, so you’ll have to reach out to sales to get a quote.
Visma is the parent organisation for a number of accounting and invoicing solutions across Europe. It has designated products for 15 different EU countries, such as Visma eKonomi, its designated Swedish accounting platform. Visma eKonomi has basic AP features for paying vendors, but it has a range of other accounting features that can help you streamline your financial admin as a whole.
Most suitable for: Small businesses in Sweden
Visma platform prices range depending on which country you operate in and the Visma product you select. Visma eEkonomi has three plans that come with supplier invoicing features:
You can have all the software comparison guides in the world available to you, but if you aren’t intentional about your decision, you may end up choosing software that falls short for your needs. Here are a few steps you can take to help you make the right decision when selecting an accounts payable platform for your small business.
By digitising the traditionally paper-intensive process of handling invoices and payments, AP software is not only more efficient than manual processes, but also minimises the possibility of errors, like a missed or incorrect payment. Having more visibility over invoices, due dates and your general spending patterns can help you maintain tighter control over your financial operations.
But to get the most out of a platform, you need to make sure you’re choosing the right one for your needs. For example, if you run an online storefront, you’ll want to choose a solution like Juni that has the specific needs of ecommerce entrepreneurs in mind.
By choosing a software solution that’s a good fit for you, you’ll make your business more agile, resilient and competitive. Meanwhile, you’ll get back more time in the day to focus on what you most love about running your company, whether that’s marketing your product, interacting with customers or finding ways to scale.
Financial admin eating up too much of your time? We can take it off your plate
Automate your accounts payable processes with Juni and free up your day for more impactful work.
*Juni Invoices is available for EU-based companies only. Media financing is available for companies registered in NL, SE, DE, FR, ES, IT, FI and NO, upon eligibility. Fees and terms and conditions apply. Click here for more details.
Accounts payable automation software helps businesses manage and track the money they owe to suppliers, vendors and other parties. Essentially, this type of software helps business owners and finance departments handle their payment processes by recording invoices, tracking due dates and organising information.
While you can manually manage your accounts payable process, this approach can be time-consuming and error-prone. A better way to keep track of accounts payable is by using specialised accounts payable software that tracks and pays your invoices for you.
You can automate accounts payable processes by using specialised software. These platforms handle a number of tasks, including:
"Only six more to go," you tell yourself as you upload yet another receipt to your accounting software. We all know the pain of searching for receipts across emails and platforms and trying to match them to expenses.
This becomes even more challenging the larger your business becomes and the more vendors you have to pay. You can avoid most of that frustration and wasted time with the right spend management software.
But not all spend management platforms will be a good fit for your business. For example, digital commerce companies need solutions that take into account sector-specific expenses like ad receipts and multiple platform payments, while small businesses need tools that simplify their financial admin, not complicate it.
This article takes a look at the six best spend management software solutions so you can find just the right platform for your needs. We’ll also give you a list of the features you should look for when choosing a platform, plus tips for how to make your decision.*
Spend less time on spend management
With real-time spend overviews, receipt matching automation and powerful integrations, Juni will make you forget what a hassle managing your expenses used to be.
*The information about all the platforms discussed in this article was collected between 17 January 2024 and 19 January 2024. This article was written and approved by Juni and is intended as marketing material.
Before taking a closer look at the tools on our list, here are six features your spend management software (also known as expense management software) should come with:
Bonus: Look out for spend management platforms that come with built-in accounts payable and invoice automation features, which will help you centralise your financial admin and save time.
Now, let's explore the solutions on our list in depth. For each platform, we’ll list its key features (as well as its limitations), explain how pricing works and point out what kind of business it’s best fit for.
Juni helps businesses in digital commerce manage their cash flow, track their expenses and optimise their profits with features that are specifically designed with ecommerce companies in mind.
While it’s not specifically expense management software, you can use the platform for your spend management needs. Juni's goal is to give everyone in digital commerce, from the CFO to the accounting team to marketing managers, everything they need to focus on business growth.
Juni’s expense management features are especially valuable for users who have multiple receipts coming from different media buying channels and online transactions. With Meta and Google Ads integrations, plus powerful receipt matching, expense management suddenly becomes easy. On top of that, you can also manage your unpaid invoices and accounts payable processes within Juni, bringing your financial admin under one roof.
All of this comes with easy access to media and inventory financing for up to 2 million EUR, helping you free up your cash flow and grow your business.*
*Juni Invoices is available for EU-based companies only. Media financing is available for companies registered in NL, SE, DE, FR, ES, IT, FI and NO, upon eligibility. Fees and terms and conditions apply. Click here for more details.
Most suitable for: SMBs and mid-market companies in digital commerce
Juni has two plan options:
SAP Concur helps you streamline processes to deliver efficiency savings, with a focus on eliminating manual data entry, lost receipts and unclaimed VAT refunds. As such, it’s best suited to larger organisations. The platform helps you reduce the risk of human error and compliance issues with automations, plus the software can identify potential mistakes and discrepancies in real-time.
Most suitable for: Larger and enterprise organisations
SAP Concur doesn’t list its pricing options, so you’ll have to reach out to sales to get a quote.
Zoho Expense is the business expense tracking app from the Zoho suite of business tools, which means it integrates with Zoho’s other financial management apps. It’s a reasonably priced platform suited to handling all aspects of expense management and reporting for SMBs. Zoho Expense automatically records expenses from receipts, simplifying and automating the expense reporting process.
Most suitable for: People already using other Zoho products (namely Zoho Books)
Zoho Expense has three plans for its spend management software:
Expensify is a spend management solution for keeping track of business expenses on the go. Most of the expense management functionality can be done on your phone, while a series of handy integrations help to automate and streamline processes around uploading and allocating receipts. Plus, it’s easy for employees to create and submit expense reports for quick reimbursement.
Most suitable for: Small businesses with lots of employee expenses
Expensify has two plans:
One of the many features of smart accounting software QuickBooks is its built-in expense management tool. There are obvious advantages to expenses being handled via your accounting platform, like how easy it is to claim business expenses for tax purposes. And when you connect your bank to the platform, QuickBooks automatically matches and organises your receipts to transactions.
Most suitable for: Businesses who want more comprehensive accounting tools built into their spend management software
Quickbooks has five plans:
Fortnox is a cloud-based accounting software platform based in Sweden that helps businesses manage their accounting and bookkeeping processes, as well as other financial admin like spend management. Users can take photos of receipts and instantly upload them via a mobile app, and the platform automatically fills in date, amount and VAT.
Most suitable for: Businesses that operate in Sweden
Fortnox has three plans:
The information in this guide can help you make your decision, but ultimately, you need to factor in considerations about your business and its needs when choosing a platform. Here are three things you can do to ensure you’re choosing an ideal solution.
As you’ll notice from the list above, different software solutions are more suitable for different business industries and sizes. For example, Juni is spend management software built with the needs of ecommerce companies in mind. So when researching a platform, pay close attention to what type of business (big or small, ecommerce or SaaS) it’s best suited for.
While it shouldn’t be the only factor that guides your decision, you can’t ignore pricing when choosing a solution. You need to find a healthy balance between a platform you can afford (and doesn't go over budget) that still gives you all the key features and functionalities you need to run smarter, more efficient financial admin.
You may be a small business now, but if you have plans of scaling in the future, you want to make sure your expense management solution can scale with you. Juni, for example, caters to both SMBs as well as mid-market companies, meaning we can provide the solutions you need from the time your business is founder-led to when it has 100+ employees.
While you can never remove expense management from your to-do list, you can find a platform that does most of the work for you. The best spend management software is one that not only simplifies financial operations but also contributes to strategic decision-making and the long-term financial health of your organisation.
To find a platform that does all that, you need to make sure you’re making your selection with the unique needs of your business in mind. For example, if you operate in digital commerce, you want to choose a solution like Juni that comes with ecommerce-specific capabilities, like features designed specifically for media buying and online transactions.
So take your time finding the right platform—doing so can lead to significant time savings and valuable insights into spending patterns, helping you improve the overall financial health and success of your business.
Spend less time on spend management
With real-time spend overviews, receipt matching automation and powerful integrations, Juni will make you forget what a hassle managing your expenses used to be.
Spend management software is a platform or tool that helps businesses manage and control their expenses. This type of solution usually includes features for receipt management, expense reporting and approval workflows. Plus, these platforms often integrate with accounting software, as well as sync with banks and credit cards.
There are a number of benefits to using spend management software to control your expenses, including:
The price of expense management software varies depending on the size of your business and what industry you operate in, as this will impact which platform you choose. Prices range from as low as £7 per month to almost £100, and some spend management systems also offer free plans to certain users.
If you’re a finance professional working for a commerce business, you understand how important it is to find the right balance between spending and maintaining cash reserves. Yet when you move at a fast pace without effective spend management tools that’s often hard to achieve.
One key metric you can monitor to determine your business’s health and success is its burn rate – the rate at which your company is spending its capital. For commerce businesses, where margins can be tight and cash flow volatile, keeping your burn rate under control is essential.
In this blog, we’ll explore why burn rate is crucial for ecommerce companies, how you can optimise it and how tools like Juni can help.
Let’s start by brushing up on some key concepts:
Burn rate is a financial metric that indicates how quickly your company is spending its available capital. It’s typically measured on a monthly basis. For commerce businesses, particularly those operating online, burn rate is a critical measure of financial health. It directly impacts your company’s runway – the amount of time you can continue operating before needing additional capital. This is crucial when balancing inventory, marketing and operational costs.
To calculate your business’s runway, divide your total cash reserves by your burn rate. If your burn rate is high, that means your runway will be shorter. As a result, your company has less time to react to market fluctuations, optimise inventory or strengthen its profitability.
For online retailers, a high burn rate can be a major red flag. It might indicate that your company is overspending in areas like marketing or inventory without seeing a corresponding increase in sales. As a result, you could run into cash flow issues, forcing your business to make quick, often unfavourable decisions such as discounting products or cutting back on essential services. A high burn rate can also deter potential investors, who may see your business as high risk.
There are many strategic measures you can take to monitor and control your company’s burn rate. These include:
Your ecommerce business probably works with multiple channels, suppliers and payment systems, all of which can make financial tracking complex. Consolidating all your financial information in one place gives you a comprehensive view of your spending. This involves engaging stakeholders across your business (such as marketing, supply chain and customer service) to ensure that all expenses are accounted for and can be monitored effectively.
Suppose your business increases its marketing spend to drive sales. In that case, you also need to ensure that the increase in revenue justifies the higher spending. Regularly comparing your burn rate against your revenue allows you to adjust spending in line with sales performance, so you maintain a more sustainable burn rate.
Seasonal trends and promotions are common among most commerce businesses, and these can cause spikes and dips in both spending and revenue. Analysing your burn rate over time can help you identify these trends. For example, you may find that your burn rate increases significantly during holiday seasons due to higher inventory and marketing costs. By understanding these patterns, you can plan for them, ensuring that your cash flow remains healthy even during high-spend periods.
Identifying non-essential expenses
To improve your burn rate, start by identifying non-essential expenses. This might include redundant software subscriptions, underperforming marketing campaigns or excess inventory that ties up capital. Eliminating or reducing these costs can have a significant impact on your overall burn rate, freeing up resources that can be better invested elsewhere.
Forecasting for better financial planning
Effective cash flow forecasting is indispensable in managing your burn rate, especially in the unpredictable world of ecommerce. By predicting various financial scenarios, you can prepare for potential downturns and make better decisions that align with your business goals. For example, forecasting can help you anticipate how much inventory to purchase before a major sales event, reducing the risk of overstocking or stockouts.
Cutting costs if necessary
Sometimes, reducing your burn rate requires reducing costs. For online retailers, common areas to consider include renegotiating supplier contracts, optimising logistics or scaling back on non-performing marketing campaigns. The key is to make cuts strategically, so you don’t compromise your ability to drive sales or keep customers satisfied.
Budgeting
A well-structured budget is a fundamental tool in managing your burn rate. It’s important to set clear spending limits across various departments such as marketing, inventory and operations. Regularly reviewing your budget against actual expenses helps keep your burn rate within manageable limits. Effective budgeting requires collaboration across departments to ensure that everyone understands and adheres to financial constraints, which is especially important in a fast-moving environment like online retail.
Increasing revenue without increasing expenses
One of the most effective ways to improve your burn rate is to increase revenue without a corresponding increase in expenses. For e-commerce businesses, this might involve optimising your pricing strategy, enhancing customer loyalty programs or expanding into new sales channels with minimal additional costs. The goal is to boost your top line while keeping your bottom line stable, so you improve your business’s overall financial health.
To keep your burn rate under control, it’s helpful to use spend management tools. Solutions like Juni offer many features designed to help maintain a healthy balance between burn rate and runway, including:
For online retailers, managing multiple payment gateways, currencies and sales channels can be a major administrative challenge. Juni’s platform lets you centralise your financial data, so it becomes easier to monitor and manage your expenses across the board. With our Juni cards and mobile payment capabilities, you get a real-time overview of your spend across multiple currencies and platforms. This centralisation helps you keep your burn rate on track while also streamlining administration.
Autocollecting and matching invoices and receipts
Managing invoices and receipts manually is time-consuming and prone to errors that can impact your cash flow and financial accuracy. Juni Match automates this process by integrating with your Gmail, and automatically collecting and matching receipts and invoices from platforms like Facebook Ads, Shopify and TikTok. This automation is particularly beneficial if your marketing spend is spread across multiple channels.
You can also automate collecting any of your receipts or invoices, either with our Gmail integration and supported vendors, or with email forwarding. By improving the accuracy of your financial records, you gain more oversight and control over your burn rate.
Syncing bank accounts to centralise spend
Ecommerce businesses often juggle multiple bank accounts, payment processors and revenue streams. This makes it challenging to track cash flow accurately. Juni lets you integrate and track all your financial data, including payments from platforms like PayPal and Stripe, in one unified dashboard. This seamless integration gives you a full overview of your cash flow and makes it much easier to track expenses, so you’re in a better position to monitor your burn rate and avoid unexpected cash flow issues.
Setting controls to manage employee spend
Managing employee expenses is also critical in controlling your burn rate. Juni lets you set custom spending limits and permissions on virtual cards to ensure that employees stick to company budgets. This helps prevent overspending, particularly during peak sales periods or marketing campaigns, keeping your burn rate in check.
Accessing flexible financing to boost cash flow
Commerce businesses often face the challenge of balancing inventory and marketing purchases with cash flow. Sustaining growth can be tricky when there’s high spend on inventory and marketing in the run up to peak seasons, while bridging the gap during low periods
Juni Capital offers fast and flexible financing options that allow you to extend payment terms, finance inventory and even fund ad campaigns. By improving liquidity, these financing solutions help you negotiate better terms with suppliers and manage cash flow more effectively, all of which helps you maintain a healthier burn rate.
Close books faster at month-end with automation
Closing your books quickly at the end of each month is essential for accurate financial reporting, particularly in a fast-moving industry like ecommerce. Juni’s platform integrates with accounting tools like Fortnox and Exact Online, automating your month-end closing process and reducing manual work. It also provides real-time data that you can use to make informed decisions about your burn rate and overall financial health.
Managing your burn rate effectively can mean the difference between scaling your business and struggling to grow. By centralising your financial data and automating key processes, spend management tools like Juni can give you more control over your expenses, optimise your cash flow and ultimately help you overperform against your burn rate.
Want to see how Juni can help you control burn rate and extend your runway? Get started now.
.svg)
