How FreeAgent Hit The Big Time With Small Solutions

When I set up FreeAgent with my fellow co-founders Olly and Roan in 2007, we had a clear vision for what we wanted our business to achieve. We were former freelancers, we all knew how frustrating it was to wrestle with a spreadsheet when doing our bookkeeping and we wanted to build an accounting system that would help those kinds of small businesses traditionally under-served by mainstream software.

Since then, we’ve seen FreeAgent grow into a multi award-winning cloud system used by more than 40,000 people around the world. But throughout that time we’ve strived to maintain our focus on the people FreeAgent was always intended to help - freelancers and micro-business owners. Here are a few ways we’ve done that.

Owning our niche

A lot of our incumbent competitors have traditionally offered - and still offer - broad “one size fits all” software that isn’t actually a great fit for a very small business. They’re either so full of jargon that you need an accounting qualification in order to decipher it all, or they’re packed with complicated features that you simply don’t need when you’re a freelancer or small business owner.

"We may not even have survived at all if it wasn’t for people telling their friends"

From the outset, we’ve strived to make FreeAgent a better fit for these kind of businesses and to help make their day-to-day bookkeeping as easy as possible. That means no complex terminology and no big business-specific features (like departmental reporting); just software that is easy for non-accounting people to understand and use.

Listening to our core audience

While you may think you know what’s best for your audience, the truth is that it’s your customers who have all the answers. That killer feature idea that you think will change the world may turn out to be a damp squib if no-one actually uses it, so you have to listen to what people actually want before you start anything.

When FreeAgent was in its infancy, we had a small network of friends and fellow freelancers who became our first customers, and we asked them what they really wanted to see from an accounting system. What features would they use? What functionality was an absolute must-have? How much would they pay for it?

Armed with this information, we were able to tailor the system to best suit their needs - and that’s something we’ve continued to do to this day. We use a variety of channels to receive customer feedback and we try to gauge exactly what people actually want, rather than what we think they want. Of course, we can’t always deliver every feature request, but we try to focus on the big things and do as much as we can.

Encouraging word-of-mouth buzz

Without referrals from our customers, it’s doubtful that FreeAgent could have become the success it is today. We may not even have survived at all if it wasn’t for people telling their friends about how good our software is and how much it helps them.

We introduced our own referral scheme at a very early stage in the business, and that’s been vital in encouraging word-of-mouth recommendations. Every new customer receives their own personal code and, every time they successfully refer someone to us (who goes on to become a paying subscriber), they get 10% off their bill.

The discounts are cumulative, so if you refer 10 people, you get to use FreeAgent for free - and that’s something that has really resonated with our customers.

Building key relationships

Although freelancers tend to work on their own, there are still a lot of support organisations and groups who provide help and resources to them - and we’ve worked hard to build relationships with them. We’ve worked closely with IPSE (formerly known as the PCG) for many years and we have built partnerships with organisations like the National Enterprise Network who deal primarily with freelancers and very small business owners.

Through these relationships, we’ve been able to speak with more freelancers and small business owners than ever before and show them how FreeAgent can help make their bookkeeping (and their lives) easier.

Going the extra mile

We’ve built a culture at FreeAgent where everyone wants to push the boundaries and do the very best for our customers. We take the time to help people and try to make their lives easier, and that’s something that our customers really value.

We have a dedicated team of support accountants on hand to provide super-friendly and invaluable support that helps users with the software - and who achieve very high satisfaction scores among our customers. They’re also a key reason why our Net Promoter Score (NPS) currently stands at 76 - way above the industry average of 26 for software & apps.

We also provide whitepapers, infographics and guides about specific accounting topics and distribute these for free (to non-FreeAgent users as well as our customers), as well as hosting free, weekly Q&A sessions with our Chief Accountant on social media.

We strive to set ourselves apart from our competitors by providing small business owners with the tools, help and support they need - and that’s been a major reason for our success.