Within the Vendasta platform, the terms "Accounts" and "Companies" are foundational elements, each serving a distinct role in how you interact with the platform. Understanding the differences between them can enhance your experience and streamline your operations.
Accounts: Billing relationship
An Account in Vendasta is a legacy entity that has been the backbone of our platform for many years. It is the administrative record that encompasses the billing, service provisioning, and historical data for our clients.
Key Aspects of Accounts:
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Billing Center: Accounts are tightly integrated with our billing systems. They are where all financial transactions, product activation, invoices, and billing details are managed.
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Back-end Foundation: While not directly visible in the front end, Accounts support numerous essential functions behind the scenes.
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Legacy Features: Many of the platform's original features and processes are designed around the Account structure, such as Opportunities, Orders, and Snapshot Reports.
Companies: Customer relationship
A Company is a newer concept introduced with our updated CRM system, designed to serve as the primary interface for managing client relationships. They focus on customer interaction, sales management, and operational details that support the growth and maintenance of your business connections. They contain the majority of data you would typically find within the accounts.
Benefits of Companies:
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CRM-focused: Companies center on managing your interactions and opportunities with clients.
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Visibility and Access: Provide a more intuitive and streamlined user experience for relationship management activities, such as engagement and keeping information up to date.
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Future vision: While already capture most of the information from accounts, the goal is for Companies to become your 'Single Source of Truth' for business representation on our platform.
The Distinct Roles
Accounts: These are mainly used for handling your financial dealings on Vendasta. This covers billing details, product activations, and payment histories. To initiate these processes, you will need to create an account from the company if not already created. When the business information for an account is changed, it will sync with the Company details and vice versa.
Companies: These are centered on building and maintaining customer relationships. They help you track potential leads and manage ongoing client interactions through the activity timeline. This is the interface you’ll engage with the most.
Currently, you can perform some actions, like generating Snapshot Reports, managing opportunities, and processing orders on the company page via the company’s associated account. We're in the process of expanding this to include automation, product activation, project tracking, and invoice management in the same manner, which will consolidate your workflow into one convenient page.
For any further clarification or assistance, our Support team is always ready to ensure your Vendasta experience is both proficient and pleasant.