As a CFO or Controller, you are responsible for ensuring the financial health of your organization. One of the most critical areas of focus is revenue accounting. Revenue is the lifeblood of any business, and managing it effectively is essential to the long-term success of your organization. In today’s fast-paced business environment, it’s more important to than ever automate revenue accounting. Finance and accounting teams feel the pressure of inefficient, manual processes as they recognize financial data’s crucial role in informing and progressing business strategy. Real-time visibility and data accuracy are critical factors that drive business growth and decision-making. Therefore, process inefficiencies and lack of scalability are no longer acceptable. Revenue accounting automation and real-time analysis are necessary to speed the processes that drive operational efficiencies and, ultimately, enable you to stay ahead of the competition.

“According to 2019 research from CFO Magazine, 48% of businesses with a recurring revenue model struggle to meet accounting and reporting challenges.”¹

Automation lends itself well to processes like accounting, which are filled with rules, schedules, and predictable behaviors. Especially now, it’s essential to leverage technology and software to remain agile and proactive in uncertain times.

Here are the top 3 reasons to automate revenue accounting:

1.  Operational efficiency: Automating the revenue recognition process eliminates manual processes and disparate systems. Manual processes are time-consuming, error-prone, and difficult to manage. You can increase operational efficiency by automating these processes; allowing your organization to grow and scale more effectively.
   
   
2. Compliance: Automation can help you stay compliant with industry regulations such as ASC 606, SOX, and audit controls. By automating the revenue accounting process, you can ensure that all revenue transactions are recorded accurately and promptly, reducing the risk of restatement.
   
   
3. Strategic enablement: Automating the revenue accounting process can provide valuable, real-time insights into your revenue streams. This allows you to make more informed decisions. For those who are seeking a merger and acquisition or an IPO, automation can better prepare your organization with accurate and timely reporting. Timely and accurate insights into remaining Performance Obligations, customer churn reports, revenue waterfalls, and deferred revenue reports are needed in real-time for strategic decision making.
   

Overall, automating revenue accounting can help you save time and reduce errors while also providing valuable insights that can help you make more informed decisions. As a CFO or Controller, it’s important to consider how automation can help you achieve your goals and drive long-term success for your organization. After all, the cost to restate revenue or failing an audit heavily outweighs the cost of automation.

The key is focusing on technology investments that deliver value, long-term cost savings, and, solid ROI. You should choose a solution that is easy to use and integrates with your existing software to reduce data-entry work and increase efficiency. 

Considerations:

• Ease of use – How easy is it to use the software? 
• What is the user experience like? 
• Implementation – How long does it take to implement and deploy the software? 
• Integrations – What other applications does the software integrate with? 
• Configuration – Can the software be configured to your specific needs?
  

Strategically designed to simplify complex revenue recognition, RightRev automates when and how to recognize revenue based on predefined rules. In addition, our hyper-scale technology accommodates transaction volumes and performance expectations for all revenue models. To learn more about our revenue recognition capabilities, request a demo today.

^{1 Recurring Revenue Rising, CFO Magazine, Gerry Marletta, February 27, 2019}