About 3 months into my business, I started getting a pretty large steady stream of clients. At the time, I was using Numbers (the Apple equivalent of Excel) to track my client payments and expenses, and a custom PDF to send invoices and estimates. This, of course, began to eat up a bunch of time because I had to use 2-3 different programs. I gave up on the custom invoices and started using PayPal invoices, but had clients complain that it wasn't very professional, so I know I needed something to help me out.

The time to make the estimates & invoices alone were normally 30 minutes to an hour a piece!

The most important feature to me, was the fact that it wasn't a "cloud" app and there wasn't a monthly fee. I tried Freshbooks and looked into apps like Basecamp, but the monthly fees were just too much, especially if you hold the variety of clients like I do. Plus, they were online based, which meant I didn't have access to the information when I was without internet. The next important feature was the timer in the toolbar. I'm terrible at remember to set timers, so having it at the top of the computer screen really helps, especially being able to switch between projects quickly.

It literally takes me less than 5 minutes to type the details into any estimate, and less than a minute to create and send an estimate. It's also allowed me to quickly see what clients have open estimates and owe money. The detailed reports section also allowed me to get through my taxes in about 30 minutes this year. :)

It's allowed me to give custom estimates that give me a reference to point out at clients when they're out of spec. Even though I don't charge hourly, using the timer allows me to see how long projects take and adjust my invoices to match. Therefore, I'm allowed to charge more for the work I'm able to do. Also, since it's no longer taking me a couple of hours a day to manage clients, payments and estimates, that's more billable work I'm able to do.