Creating and sending invoices, tracking their payment status, and following up with clients can be a time-consuming process for small businesses. There are dozens of software platforms on the market that aim to ease that burden, including QuickBooks, Square, and PayPal. As powerful as these may be, many businesses still prefer using Excel spreadsheets for invoicing, owing to its ease of use, customization capabilities, and the capacity to integrate highly complex calculation logic. However, invoice spreadsheets also suffers from the lack of a centralized data repository and limited workflow capabilities, which can prove detriment to businesses that are actively scaling up
The combination of SpreadsheetWeb and monday.com provides a powerful alternative for those businesses that still turn to spreadsheets for their invoicing requirements. These spreadsheet models can be turned into full blown web applications with SpreadsheetWeb, allowing for all of the core functionalities and flexibility that Excel provides, without the classic hindrances associated with a decentralized, file-based approach. Once the application is complete, it can be seamlessly integrated with a monday.com board for optimal simplicity and workflow compatibility.
Let's see how an invoice application created on SpreadsheetWeb from an Excel file can be integrated with monday.com:
First, create a board on monday.com and create the required columns, corresponding to those defined within the invoice application. Afterwards, navigate to the Apps marketplace, search and add SpreadsheetWeb Apps to your account.
Once the module is installed, the invoice application can be hooked into the monday.com board. While adding the application, the system will ask for an application name, which is just a friendly identifier to remind you of its purpose later. Additionally, you will be prompted for the application link and identifier, which can both be found in the SpreadsheetWeb Control Panel.
If the column names on the monday.com board match the names in the application, the bindings can be automated by clicking on the ''Auto Populate'' button. Subsequently, the inputs and outputs can always be edited or modified if any have been missed, or if some should not be included
Finally, create a new invoice record on your monday.com board and run the application. You will see that all the entered data is mapped from the board to the SpreadsheetWeb application, and the product details can be worked on from the app. All calculations will execute throughout the data entry, and the results (matching those from the Excel file) will be displayed within the application.
When you click Submit, the data will be saved to the board and the total due column will be populated back into monday.com. If any subsequent changes are needed, the application can be run again, with each change stored back into the board upon save.
Since SpreadsheetWeb decouples the calculation logic from the file-based spreadsheet approach, the platform also allows for a slew of capabilities beyond Excel’s offerings. An application may be configured to include PDF invoice generation, dynamic email support, or even execution of custom-coded logic to integrate third-party downstream systems.
In conclusion, invoice spreadsheets created in Excel are commonly used by small businesses. With the fusion of SpreadsheetWeb and monday.com, you can transform those spreadsheet-based invoices into fully customizable and complex web-based applications, tailor-fit to your business requirements.
