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let's be honest none of us started a business to do bookkeeping but without it most businesses don't last very long so let's go over the bookkeeping basics for small business what is it why it's important and how to do it in a few simple steps and I'm talking as simple as smashing the like button for the YouTube algorithm it truly helps the channel okay let's get right into it foreign starting with what is bookkeeping and why is it even important so the textbook definition of bookkeeping is the systematic routine method of retrieving financial information categorizing that information and putting it into an accounting system and generating reports that are then used by decision maker to make better financial decisions in the future yeah here's a definition you can actually understand bookkeeping is the recording of past financial data so that you can make future business decisions so how can you perform the bookkeeping duties for your small business well all it takes is a simple six step bookkeeping process and step number one is to gather Source documents Source documents are original records for a transaction things like an invoice a sales order or receipt for example all of these documents have a date a buyer and a seller an amount and the product or service that was provided now most people don't keep physical copies of their Source documents instead they rely on bank statements to tell the story in most cases bank or credit card statements have all the information needed to substantiate a transaction but keep in mind that cash transactions are not recognizable using bank statements alone and if you have a cash transaction you have to retain the physical receipt or recall the purpose of the transaction to to correctly classify those types of transactions so as a tip it's good practice to use a debit card or a credit card to make and receive all payments this way you or your bookkeeper can rely mostly on your bank statements to classify transactions making step one extremely easy step number two categorize your transactions classifying your transactions into a specific category is the core of the bookkeeping process and there are five main categories that transactions can fall into you have assets liabilities equity revenue and expenses and each of these categories can be broken down into further subcategories like a subcategory for inventory story under assets and the first step in categorizing is to identify which category a transaction belongs to like cash would be an asset future obligations like payroll or a loan would be considered a liability equity increases with revenue and capital contributions and Equity is decreased with distributions and expenses the sale of products or Services would be considered revenue and the cost to generate that Revenue would be considered expenses so to help with the organization in categorizing of transactions I would recommend you use a software like QuickBooks step number three is to reconcile your transactions a great bookkeeper will reconcile their transactions to make sure each and every transaction is accounted for and this idea of reconciling is actually pretty simple it's the process of matching all of your transactions that are on your bank statement to what's in your accounting software and when you're dealing with hundreds and thousands of transactions it can be pretty easy to double count a transaction or two or simply miss one and reconciling helps catch all errors you start with the beginning balance on your statements which should match what's in your accounting software and then check the line by line to make sure every transaction is accounted for step number four prepare financial statements the process of adding classifying and reconciling your transactions provide the input for financial statements and there are three main financial statements that should be prepared a balance sheet an income statement and a cash flow statement your balance sheet is also known as a statement of financial position it contains assets liabilities and Equity transactions the assets on the balance sheet must equal liabilities plus Equity if not your balance sheet is out of balance your income statement is also known as your profit and loss statement or p l for short it contains your revenue and expenses the income statement simply tells you how profitable you are at any given period now your cash flow statement has three components cash from operations cash from financing and finally cash from Investments the cash flow statement shows how transactions from the balance sheet affect your cash account alright let's move on to the last two steps step number five is to read your financial statements so you prepared those financial statements now what most businesses fail or succeed based on their financial statements therefore it's critical that you review your financial statements understand your financial statements and take advantage of the Insight they provide this key action is the difference between you having a more profitable business this year than you had last year and in order to read your financial statements you should understand how they're structured so let's look at the structure of a balance sheet remember the a balance sheet must balance assets are listed first and liabilities and equities are listed last now assets are ordered in terms of liquidity or how long it will take for that asset to convert into cash and for this reason cash is always the first thing listed under assets for this reason cash is the first thing you will see on a balance sheet followed by other current assets like accounts receivable in inventory now long-term assets are listed after current assets and fixed assets like equipment take into consideration depreciation something called a contra asset that would reduce the asset side of the balance sheet and you can think of depreciation as the amount of an asset that has been used up now the liabilities section is listed similar to assets where current liabilities show before long-term liabilities current liabilities are debts due within 12 months common accounts listed under liabilities are accounts payable wages payable and credit cards common accounts listed under long-term liabilities are things like bank loans car loans and capital leases the equity section is listed last on the balance sheet it shows the ownership in a business it's sometimes referred to as the book value or the net worth of a business since its value equals assets minus liability also retained earnings is a section under Equity retained earnings are the dollar amount of earnings reinvested back into the business all right we're making progress let's look at the structure of an income statement the first component of an income statement is revenue AKA The Top Line it's the dollar amount of products or Services sold at a given time the revenue section can be broken down further into specific types of income based on the products and services that are sold the next item is the cost of goods sold or cost of sale these are the direct expenses associated with selling your product or your service examples are inventory cost or labor the other expenses of the business are listed below gross profit and the bottom line of the income statement is called net income it's the amount after subtracting all expenses of the business business it answers the question what is the profit or the loss of the business now let's look at the structure of the cash flow statement the cash flow statement tracks the cash coming in and out of the business these cash inflows and outflows are broken into three categories operating financing and investing cash flow some operations are the cash activities related to performing the everyday regular ongoing activities of the business activities like selling products or Services would be considered cash flow from operating activities now cash flow from financing relates to Capital raising activities of the business when your business starts repaying the loan that is considered a financing activity and financing activities don't just account for loans they account for Equity too so if your business issues stock to investors that is also a financing activity cash flows from investing simply relates to the gains and losses from your business Investments when your business buys stock in another company that is considered an investing activity now the final step in the bookkeeping process step number six is to make decisions based on the data remember the purpose of bookkeeping is to help you make better more profitable decisions the balance sheet outlines your companies assets liabilities and equity which means the balance sheet can be used to gauge the liquidity and sustainability of your business let's use an example of a company that has a million dollars in net income their balance sheet shows three months of income in accounts receivable knowing this information the owner might decide to shorten the collection period to have more cash on hand the income statement tells you the operating performance of your company it lists out the revenues and expenses and spits out a profit or a loss the cash flow statement tells you how much cash you have on hand if you're operating cash flow decreases then you might reassess some of your operating expenses or even your pricing in short bookkeeping can be the difference between you having a more profitable year this year than you had last year simply because you now have accurate data to make smarter decisions with so if you haven't already go ahead and like this video for me it helps other business owners to see this video And subscribe to the channel for more information that helps you save on taxes and build your business I'm Karan from Life accounting and I'll see you in the next video