How Your Bookkeeper Can Help You Grow

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Last Updated: August 13, 2026
Published: November 20, 2021

People toss around the term “bookkeeping” all the time, but what does it really mean? What is small business bookkeeping, and how can working with a bookkeeper help your business grow?

Bookkeeping is the process of recording and managing a business’s financial information. A bookkeeper will record a business’s daily transactions, expenses, and other financial data so that a clear picture of the business’s financial standing is always available.

The Financial Reports a Bookkeeper Provides

Your bookkeeper should provide, at a minimum, three main reports:

  • The Income Statement
  • The Balance Sheet
  • The Cash Flow Statement

They should also complete financial administrative and tracking tasks for your business, including:

  1. Managing accounts receivable and payable
  2. Posting debits and credits
  3. Monitoring your debt levels and applying payments to debts when bills are due
  4. Reconciling your bank and credit card accounts every month
  5. Providing accurate financial statements at tax time
  6. Reporting on issues and variances that come up

When your books are up to date, you can see the financial health of your business in one quick glance, which can help you determine how, where and when to grow.

How Bookkeepers Help Can Help Your Business Grow

1. Knowing Your Overall Financial Health

With proper bookkeeping, small business owners can keep their fingers on the pulse of their financial health. This allows you to not only keep tabs on your business’s current cash flow, but also strategize for the future. Good financial reports allow you to reflect on the following questions:

  • How are you doing compared to last year? Compared to five years ago?
  • Which customers are most profitable, and which months are most profitable? This information can help you focus your efforts and be strategic about breaks and vacation.
  • Are you in good shape to expand or to add staff?
  • What will you owe at tax time?

Regular reports from your bookkeeper are needed to not only run your business, but also to expand. If you’re seeking funding, investing and/or are working to prove profitability, good financial reports are essential.

2. Providing Help with Decision-Making

With an efficient bookkeeper, a business can ensure accurate and efficient management of assets and liabilities. This can aid in internal decisions, like where to put a revenue surplus, as well as external ones, such as an investor’s choice to help fund the business.

3. Monitoring Progress

Bookkeeping tracks financial progress toward goals. Your outsourced bookkeeper can keep track of sales as well as profit margins for specific accounting periods. For example, the financial reports your bookkeeper provides might help you determine which products or services have the best returns for your business, allowing you to make strategic decisions about where to put your time, money, and effort in order to reach your income goals.

4. Avoiding Costly Errors

If the person doing your bookkeeping is not properly trained, or wears too many hats, they are likely to make errors, which can be quite costly and damaging. Bookkeeping errors may seem small at first, but if they are left unfixed, they can lead to bigger consequences, such as a late payment or a tax audit.

Everyone at BookWerks™ is highly experienced and uses cross-checks to avoid errors.

Working with a Pro from Your Industry

When possible, try to work with a bookkeeper who has experience in your industry. At BookWerks™, we have a robust team of bookkeeping professionals who have experience in a variety of industries. It is usually possible to find someone on staff who has experience in your industry. This person will have ideas for helping you build your business.

What Do Bookkeepers Do, Exactly?

Bookkeeping includes the following tasks:

  1. Recording transactions: Bookkeepers track metrics such as sales, expenses and cash flow.
  2. Managing bank feeds: Cloud-based accounting software is linked to a company’s bank accounts so that bookkeepers can view transactions in real time. Many bookkeepers will use software like Xero or QuickBooks so that business owners can collaborate virtually and view the online portal, too.
  3. Reconciling bank accounts: This involves ensuring information in the accounting software matches the information on the company’s bank, credit and income statements.
  4. Handling accounts receivable and payable: Large organizations may have a bookkeeper for each department, but small- to mid-sized business bookkeepers are often charged with maintaining all incoming and outgoing transactions.
  5. Financial reports: Bookkeepers are responsible for preparing financial statements and reports. For instance, a bookkeeper might organize and prepare a statement for the fiscal year that details gross and net revenue.

Good bookkeeping can mean the difference between growing your business at a predictable pace and stalling out. If you’d rather not do it yourself, search online for bookkeeping companies nearby.

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The Best Bookkeeping and Accounting Services for Small Businesses

Using outside accounting and bookkeeping companies who specialize in helping entrepreneurs often make sense. You will have more time to spend on your core business, and always know where you stand financially. You can do it yourself, but do you want to? Most business owners, unless they are highly trained in financial recordkeeping, find it works better to outsource. How do you know if you need a bookkeeper, accountant or both? Bookkeepers keep track of the day-to-day, using standard accounting practices to accurately record transactions, reconcile bank and credit card statements, and keep you in the loop with monthly reports such as balance sheets, profit and loss statements and income statements. Accountants are more big-picture–and usually more expensive–offering tax and advisory services. Your accountant will prevent tax errors and resulting audits. Because they know the rules, accountants can tell you how much money to set aside, and ensure you don’t overpay.