Introducing Zoho Invoice
Raju Vegesna March 28, 2008 02: 19 am
We just rolled out a new addition to the Zoho Suite - Zoho Invoice. This new application joins other business applications from Zoho like Zoho CRM, Zoho Projects, Zoho Meeting, Zoho People, Zoho Creator & Zoho DB.
Zoho Invoice is an online invoice generation and tracking application. It lets you create, send and track Invoices & Estimates. To create an invoice, first you add customers, define items (products or services) and then create invoices. Once you create an invoice, you have options to Email, Print or Export your invoice as a PDF.
You can define Recurring Profiles (Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly or Yearly) and let Zoho Invoice automatically send invoices to your customers. You can also define late fees, tax, discounts etc for the invoices you create.
Inside the application, you can also setup a ‘Payment Gateway’ (through PayPal, currently) which lets you accept payments directly from your customers once the invoice is emailed out.
The Settings section lets you first define your Company Details, Logo, Currency (yes, we support multiple currencies) and Tax info. This module has a Templates section which lets you customize the layout, look and feel of your invoices. You have the option to choose from a set of pre-defined templates or you can create your own. You can also define/customize email notifications settings as well for sending customized messages to your customers.
The reporting module provides different reports on the data based on Sales, Customers, Payments, Tax etc. The embedded Zoho Show slideshow below explains the setting up workflow & the various functionalities that Zoho Invoice has on offer.
Being a finance app, security is an important aspect. By default, Zoho Invoice comes with SSL support even for free users.
Integration:
Zoho Invoice currently has an integration into Zoho Projects. If you are working on a project and want to invoice your client, you can do so by creating an invoice and choosing the option to ‘Create Invoice from Zoho Project’. Going forward, this application will also be closely integrated with Zoho CRM and other Zoho Apps.
Pricing:
The pricing is simple & affordable. It is based on the number of invoices you create. It obviously comes with a free version that lets you create upto 5 invoices per month and it has several packages ranging upto the ‘Elite’ package that lets you create upto 1500 invoices/month for $35/Month. More information on the pricing is available here.
Bigger Picture:
As you might have noticed with our recent announcements, our applications go far beyond a productivity suite. We have a suite of applications focused on Productivity & Collaboration. Then, we also have a set of Business Applications needed to run a business online. Zoho Invoice is a nice addition to our Business Application set which addresses the business needs of SMBs.
Please do give this new app a try and let us know your feedback.
Popularity: 59% [?]
Help others find this article:
i was just about to create an Invoicing System, for myself … using Zoho Creator and hey …. you have beaten me to the draw.
look forward to the day when you guys create a reasonably complete suite of apps ZOHO-ERP ?? for small and medium businesses …
cheers and all the best
[…] The free version lets you create 5 invoices a month, and there are 4 levels of pricing [more] […]
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Great addition. When will this application be connected to Zoho Creator? and more generally, when will the rest of your apps be connected to Zoho Creator, so that users can define their data needs in ZC access the data from your more function-specific apps?
Dear Gabriel,
That’s one thing we are working. We will get this implemented soon.
Regards,
Mani.
[…] and track invoices online.Zoho evangelist Raju Vegesna outlines the product’s new features here. It’s pretty straightforward: You add customers, products or services and a recurring payment […]
Zoho Invoice is really amazing application. Congrats.
When is this going to be embedded in Zoho CRM?
You guys developed a separate application that Zoho CRM users are asking to have embedded on it already for a long time. Are you going also to charge for more than 5 invoices for Zoho CRM for free users?
[…] I saw the annoucement of Zoho Invoice , which prompted me to write this post. As an owner of a small business, I am seriously […]
John, after this weekend’s update, our next biggest priority is for Zoho CRM to join the Zoho single sign-on system. That will set the stage for integration. We have show-cased Zoho Projects integration with Invoice, and it will be similar. One reason we developed a separate application is that this area needs a sharp focus all by itself, and a module in CRM won’t do it full justice. On pricing, honestly, we haven’t worked out all the details (the release happened about a week earlier than scheduled because of an accidental blog post!).
Sridhar
[…] product’s new features is presented here. According to VentureBeat, it’s pretty straightforward: You add customers, products or services […]
Zoho just gets better and better! Amazing!
[…] is continuing to dominate this space with product launches every now and then. Today they have added Zoho Invoice to their catalogue. Zoho invoice is an online easy to use invoice generation and […]
[…] online Suite of applications is increasing and they continue to dominate with their products. Zoho has introduced Invoices to the online application suite. With this application, you can create invoices which can […]
[…] updated: March 29, 2008 at 2:05 amFiled under: Web Applications 1 Views Zoho has added an online invoicing application called “Zoho Invoice” to its online […]
Great work guys!
Zoho now has a long list of cool products.
Guys,
Unless you offer an integrated suite then this can only impede rather than help businesses. For instance, if I have an order in CRM how do I relate/convert that to an invoice in Invoice? Surely it is wiser to shelve the new releases and concentrate on the really important features that your users want
maybe the Zoho approach is more like a “Banyan” rather than a “Sequioa”?
http://waternoice.com/2008/03/29/a-returning-indian-entrepreneur-reflects/
—
Sequoia Vs Banyan Tree
American companies are like Sequoias, Indian companies are like Banyan trees. Like Sequoias, American companies grow tall and large to maximize their size. Like Banyans, Indian companies grow far and wide to preserve their territory. Like Sequoias, American companies invest several years to efficiently grow their trunk and broaden the base before branching out. Like Banyans, Indian companies diversify at the earliest possible opportunity throwing aerial roots back to the ground to add more stability to the conglomerate. Like Sequoias, American companies scale new heights at a scorching pace through inorganic, yet scalable growth. Like Banyans, Indian companies survive the test of time by incessantly growing in an organic fashion from generation to generation. Turns out, Sequoia is the national tree of USA, while the Banyan Tree is the national tree of India. It is no co-incidence that they mirror the respective cultures.
—
David, there is a trade-off between offering invoice as a feature of CRM vs invoice as a separate service (that will integrate with CRM in future). We felt that billing/invoicing is sufficiently complex, with a fair amount of functionality that if we loaded it into CRM, it would bloat the UI, make it harder to use. Once it gets harder to use, the value of CRM drops dramatically.
Specifically on CRM, we have just made an big upgrade; watch for an announcement on all the new features and enhancements.
Sridhar
Adobe released Share, similer to your Viewer.
Love Zoho Invoice. Set it up and sent out my first 2 invoives in less than an hour. Great application. Keep them coming. I like the idea if integrating this with creator. The possibilities are endless
Great job guys!
This is meant more for business to consumer isn’t it? I work at a marketing firm where we have estimates/invoices we send to clients, and then the other following business-to-business documents:
- Request for Quote: If we are asked to do a brochure, we send an RFQ to three printers, we get back their quotes and award the job to the best bidder.
- Purchase Order: This is where we take the awarded quote and create a document that says “we expect to get a bill on these terms.”
- These purchase orders then get invoiced to clients with 15% to 80% markup.
- And then we get invoiced for the Purchase Order.
- Everyone gets paid when we get paid.
I hope in the future you plan to offer those type of documents as well.
John:
We are working on integrating Zoho Invoice with other Zoho Services. We will keep you updated on this.
Josh:
Thanks for posting your comments. Yes, you are right, but I would like to slightly rephrase the terms used.
There are two types of transactions -
1. Business to customer transactions
2. Business to vendor transactions
This service is meant for tracking the transactions between business and its customers. We support raising invoices, sending quotes, tracking invoices for payments, receiving payments from customers etc. We are yet to support receiving purchase orders though there is a simple mechanism to associate a purchase order with the invoice by specifying its number in the invoice.
We don’t track the transactions between business and its vendors. That is we don’t support raising RFQs(Request For Quotations), receiving quotes, sending purchase orders, receiving invoices etc. This is not in the scope of this service (at least for now :-)).
Siva
Hi,
Any plans on opening up an API?. I’d be great to be able to integrate Zoho Invoice with online stores and other websites.
Thanks,
Zoho Invoice is outstanding.
Hello,
I’ve just been experimenting with Zoho Invoice and was wondering if there is any way to have an estimate template which is more than one page.
My company’s invoice style is a single page but our estimate format contains a cover page, estimate details and a signature/sign-off page for approval of the work.
Does anyone know if it’s possible to set this up?
Thanks,
Tom
@Ismael
We do have plans to open up the APIs. We are working on it.
Tom
Multi page estimates are possible. Can you please send us a sample estimate?
Regards
Siva
Is it possible to add an attachment to the outgoing emailed invoice from the online app?
Hi
We do have plans to support attaching files while sending invoices. Currently it is not supported.
We also recommend using Zoho Viewer instead of attaching the files to the e-mail. Please do the following -
1. Go to http://viewer.zoho.com
2. Browse the file you want your customers to view.
3. Choose the appropriate “expiry time” - 1 day, 1 week, 1 month or Never Expiry
4. If possible upload your attachment in “.doc” format.
5. View it to see how it looks.
6. Cut & Paste the URL from address bar into the e-mail.
Hope this helps.
Regards
Siva