Business Software

What is cloud business software and who is it for?

Cloud business software is a business application you use from the browser without installing it on your computer or server; its data is kept on the provider’s infrastructure and you pay by subscription. Installation, version updates and backups are the provider’s responsibility, not yours. It is particularly suited to:

• Businesses that have outgrown spreadsheets: customer lists, quotes, stock and leave are kept in separate sheets and nobody knows which file is current.
• Companies without an IT team: those who do not want to deal with setting up servers, updating programs and taking backups.
• Distributed teams: field sales, branches or remote staff who need simultaneous access to the same data.
• SMBs working with an external accountant: those who want to give their accountant view access instead of handing over documents every month.

The LIONFIN catalog has three products: CRM, Bookkeeping / ERP, and HR and Staff Tracking. You can use one or several, depending on your needs. Plan limits such as user and employee counts are kept up to date on the plan cards on this page. Note that the bookkeeping product is built around Turkish tax rules, so it fits companies operating in Türkiye best.

What can you manage with the cloud CRM?

A cloud CRM (customer relationship management) collects your customers, companies, sales opportunities, quotes and related tasks in one place, making every step of the sales process visible. The LIONFIN CRM includes:

• Contact and company records: contact details, call notes and past correspondence live on the relevant record; customer history is not lost when staff change.
• Opportunity and quote tracking: see which stage each opportunity is at, which quote was sent and how it ended.
• Email and calendar integration: correspondence and appointments with customers are linked to the CRM record.
• Task and reminder management: follow-ups such as “call three days after the quote” are not forgotten.
• Sales reports: see sales performance by rep, period and stage.

The real benefit of a CRM is that knowledge is kept in the company’s shared memory rather than in people’s heads or personal inboxes. When a sales rep goes on leave or leaves the company, whoever takes over sees the customer’s whole history on one screen.

What does the bookkeeping / ERP software cover?

Bookkeeping / ERP software keeps customer and supplier accounts, stock, invoices and bank transactions in a single system, organising the business’s day-to-day financial records and giving your accountant clean data for the statutory books. The LIONFIN bookkeeping product includes:

• Account management: customer and supplier balances, collections and payments, due-date tracking.
• Stock management and multiple warehouses: stock in and out, quantities per warehouse and transfers between warehouses.
• e-Fatura and e-Arşiv sending: issue and send your invoices electronically.
• Bank reconciliation: match bank transactions to account records to see quickly who has paid.
• View access for your accountant: your accountant can view the records with their own account, cutting down on document handovers.

Bookkeeping does not replace statutory accounting; its purpose is to keep daily records accurate, timely and in one place. Statutory books, tax returns and financial statements remain your accountant’s responsibility.

How does e-Fatura and e-Arşiv sending work?

e-Fatura is Türkiye’s mandatory electronic invoice, issued and transmitted between two taxpayers registered with the Turkish Revenue Administration (GİB); e-Arşiv is the electronic invoice issued to recipients who are not registered in the e-Fatura system (individual customers and unregistered companies). The bookkeeping software helps you issue the right type of invoice for each recipient.

To use this feature, your business must be enrolled in the e-Fatura and e-Arşiv schemes with GİB. Which businesses must switch depends on turnover, sector and regulations, which change over time; confirm your own position with your accountant. During the switch, the software-side configuration is done together with the support team. If your company is not established in Türkiye, these features will not apply to you, and the CRM and HR products are the more relevant choices.

What does the HR and staff tracking software provide?

HR and staff tracking software brings leave, overtime, attendance records and personnel files into a digital system, freeing HR processes from paper and scattered spreadsheets. The LIONFIN HR product includes:

• Leave and overtime tracking: employees submit leave requests in the system, and remaining leave days and overtime are recorded.
• Mobile clock-in/out: staff record when they start and finish work from their phone; practical for field and branch teams.
• Payroll preparation reports: reports from leave, overtime and attendance data that feed into the payroll process.
• Personnel file archive: contracts, diplomas, certificates and other documents are kept per employee in a digital archive.
• Approval workflows: leave and similar requests are finalised after approval by the managers you define.

Payroll preparation reports are not the payroll calculation itself; wage, tax and social security calculations are done by your accountant or payroll software. Employee data is personal data, so you must inform your staff as required by data protection law and limit access to the system to those whose role requires it.

Which business software should you start with?

The starting point is the process that wastes the most time or causes the most errors in your business; starting with the product that solves the most urgent problem usually works better than rolling out all three at once. Decision table:

Adding the second product once the first has bedded in and the team is used to it reduces resistance to change. Each product’s user or employee limit is on its plan card; judge the number by your growth plans, not just today’s team.

Cloud software or a desktop program installed on a server?

Cloud software removes the burden of installation, updates and backups and gives you access from anywhere. A desktop program installed on your own server keeps your existing habits and customisations but leaves infrastructure management to you. A comparison of the two models:

If you do not want to give up a desktop program you have used for years, you can run it over remote desktop on an RDP server. Teams that want to customise an open-source ERP on their own server can choose Odoo hosting. Either way, remember that server management and backup responsibility move to you.

How do you roll out business software?

Rolling out cloud business software consists of starting the subscription, setting up the company and users, importing existing data and getting the team used to the system. With no server to install, the technical preparation is small; the real work is organising the process and the data.

1. Subscription: choose the product that fits your needs from the plan card and complete the order.
2. Basic configuration: company details, warehouses, product groups, sales stages or leave types are set up.
3. Users: team members are added and what each person needs to see and do is defined.
4. Data import: your customer, product and account lists are sent as spreadsheets and imported during setup.
5. Trial period: running the old method and the new system side by side for a short time in the first days makes missing settings easier to spot.
6. Full switch: the old spreadsheets are archived; from then on the software is the single source of truth.

Cleaning your data before importing it saves the most time: the same customer recorded under two spellings, missing tax numbers or products no longer sold should be weeded out before the import.

How is your data protected in the cloud?

With cloud business software, your data is kept on infrastructure monitored 24/7 by NOC and SOC teams in our data center, backups are handled by the provider, and access is over an encrypted HTTPS connection in the browser. Your own usage habits matter as much as the infrastructure measures:

• Personal accounts: every employee should sign in with their own username; shared accounts make it impossible to track who changed which record.
• Limited permissions: give staff access only to the screens they need; account balances, salary and personnel information in particular should be visible to few people.
• Strong passwords: use unique, long passwords and keep them in a password manager.
• Departing staff: close a leaver’s access on the same day.
• Shared computers: make signing out a habit on shared devices.

CRM, accounting and HR data contain a great deal of personal data. As data controller, your obligations under data protection law (transparency, retention periods, access rights) remain; the terms on which data is processed are set out in the service agreement.

How do you get support and training for business software?

Send your setup, configuration and usage questions about the business software through a ticket from the Support section of the customer panel; the support team passes it to the relevant product specialist. The most common topics during rollout are:

• Adapting sales stages, quote templates and report views to your company.
• Configuring e-Fatura and e-Arşiv and checking the first invoices.
• Importing bank transactions and setting up reconciliation rules.
• Defining leave types, approval workflows and mobile clock-in rules.
• Opening view access for your accountant.

To help your team adopt the software, we recommend naming a “lead user” in each department. This person helps newcomers, collects common questions and handles communication with the support team from a single point. After a few weeks of use, reviewing your processes and trimming unnecessary fields and steps improves long-term adoption. When opening a ticket, stating which product and screen you are on, what you want to do and the warning you see speeds up the fix.

What should you ask when choosing business software?

When choosing business software, look at the answers to these questions before the feature list: who will use it, which data will move across, how will it work with your accountant and existing systems, and what happens as you grow? These questions prevent most choices that are regretted later.

1. Who are the users? Count the people who will use the software every day separately from managers who only view reports, and judge the plan’s user limit accordingly.
2. Which data will move? Check the current format of your customer, product, account and staff lists and how tidy they are.
3. What does your accountant need? Before choosing bookkeeping software, ask your accountant how they work and which reports they expect.
4. What is your e-invoicing status? If you operate in Türkiye, confirm whether you are registered with GİB and whether you are required to switch.
5. Is there a way out for your data? Being able to export your lists keeps you free to move to another system later.
6. How will you get support? A support channel that keeps a written record matters, especially for time-critical work such as invoicing.

If you share the answers in a support ticket, we can work out together which product is the right place to start.