Customizing Invoices Within QuickBooks Online

Today, I’m going to let you in on a secret that gives you a super quick and easy way to make sure your customers open your invoice: customizing! A customized invoice is an opportunity to enhance your brand and produce something eye-catching for your customers.

Before we get into it, ask yourself these questions:

• Appearance – Do you want your brand image to be subtle? Or bolder? Try to match your existing marketing efforts to create a sense of uniformity.
• Data-fields – What information matters most to your customers? How much information is too much? Do you provide clients with specific details or a summary?
• Format – Are your invoices easy to read? Which data fields are absolutely necessary? Should you use larger fonts to improve?
• Personality and Tone – Is being approachable important to your business? Do you want to sound casual or official? Edit the text accordingly.

Now that the wheels are turning, what’s an invoice without a logo ? This is your brand’s identity and is included in all of your sales forms in QuickBooks Online. Your logo is created outside of QBO, so keep in mind these parameters when making yours:

The logo should be:

• a .gif, .bmp, .png, .jpg, .jpe, or .jpeg file
• smaller than 10 MB
• 24-bits or less in bit depth (or color depth)
• Square or circular-shaped

You can either add your logo in the Company tab in Account and Settings:

Or add directly when customizing your form in the Design tab (we’ll get to this below).

So how do we get there? Start off by going to the Gear Icon in the upper right-hand corner and click on Custom Form Styles under Your Company.

Then, click on New Style and choose Invoice .

Our layout screen is user-friendly and gives you all your options in three tabs: Design, Content, and Emails.

• Design - this is where you can edit/add your logo, add some color and choose your font.
• Content - here you can edit your information, add website/address, and change labels and their widths
• Emails - choose whether to show full or partial details and create your message for your customer

The bulk of your work will be in the Content tab. There are many customizations available, but I’ll go over some important areas.

In the first edit section, you’ll be able to choose what information shows up in your header. Uncheck any of the boxes to remove that field.

In the middle section, you can adjust your columns, select what you want to be included, and write descriptions. You can also opt in to include a customer’s balances, payments and credits, and their total amount.

In the third section, you can add in a message and footer text, while also choosing any discount, deposit, or estimate fields.

The last thing you will do is make sure your email reflects your invoice exactly how you want, and voila! You are ready to use this template for your invoices. Each tab discussed is a piece of the puzzle that gets you an invoice to be proud of, with little work on your end.

Check out the video below that walks you through this process step by step.