Behind The Hustle: Zach Johnson
It happened again.
Intuit raised the prices on QBO.
It happens every summer.
But the exact timing of this annual announcement felt especially emotional because it happened while a bunch of bookkeepers and accountants were gathered in Orlando at the Scaling New Heights conference.
And to be even more specific it happened a mere couple of hours before a breakout session called “Picking Your Platform: Xero or QBO”.
Now Xero had to pay mucho dinero for that breakout slot, but no amount of money in the world would have purchased the collective discontent of QBO users that was percolating in that room, and across the conference as a whole, after that Intuit email went out. There were at least 7 other General Ledger bookkeeping tools that were also vendors at the conference. I heard directly from them that they were getting lots of visitors to their booths because of that email as well.
Aside: I attended the Xero vs QBO session because I am friends with both of the presenters, Amanda Aguillard for Xero and Alicia Katz Pollock for QBO. They had to submit their slides to the conference education team several weeks before the conference. One slide was a little chart of a blue column and a green column comparing the pricing of different tiers of each software. When they advanced the deck to that slide, the collective, audible response in the room was like out of a Hollywood movie. “Not anymore.” “Yeah right.” “Oh please.” No lie y’all, the person behind me said “Bye, Felicia.” 🤣.
My girl Amanda was just like “I’m staying out of this” and trying not to smile too big. Alicia navigated it very well. Intuit should send her a check.
To be clear, every single software company raises their prices. Most do it annually.
But still every year we hear the refrain “Oh, this is it! I’m moving off of QB!”. And yet another year goes by.
The refrain is familiar because it is really difficult for bookkeepers to actually make significant changes to their practice. They say the words to their peers and friends, but then, back in the quiet of their own desks, the weight of making such significant changes seems overwhelming.
And the marginal cost of the price increase is juuuuussssttt small enough to not hurt that badly.
Look, I am never going to tell you what bookkeeping software to use to serve your clients.
But I will say that if you want to change, you need to do it in community. Not on an island.
Our sponsor this week has a program for people called The Holistic Accountant. It is hosted by Seth David of Nerd Enterprises. At 48 weeks, it is a serious program for people who are ready to make big changes to their business.
The members in that program will most certainly not be on an island.
Bang that graphic to apply and learn more.
💰 Veronica Wasek of 5MB Academy has just updated and relaunched her Complete QBO Cleanup System course. That means that this is 100% the most up-to-date cleanup course that you could buy right now*. Use code NEWCLEANUP26 for 18% off through Tuesday, June 23. One cleanup project WAY more than covers the low cost of this. And there are payment plans available.
💰Through June 21, there is a discount on the course library from Akadian Accounting Education. For $97, the subscription includes access to all of their core educational programs* (P.S. always reach out if you are reading this past the deadline because I can probably connect you with their team to get a current deal).
CAS Fundamentals (Bookkeeping Fast Track)
Applied CAS Accounting (QBO Gym)
Advanced CAS Accounting (QBO Cleanup)
QBO ProAdvisor Certification Training – Level 1, Level 2 and Payroll
Please always send me any news of deals that you hear of that others might benefit from.
Items with a “+” are hosted by me. All these events can be viewed and registered for in the DESCRIPTIONS of each event on the Bookkeeping Side Hustle Calendar.
📅 June 25 - The FREE SmartAccountant.AI Masterclass. In 90 minutes, you’ll see how AI handles your 4 core accounting workflows live. Not explained. Built. Real prompts. Real data flow. Real output your team can use.
📅 June 30: QuickBooks ProAdvisor Level 1 and Level 2 recertification deadline. Here are two resources to help you pass those exams quickly.
Alicia Katz Pollock and Matthew Fulton breaking it down on YouTube.
QBO Recertification Made Simple* from Akadian (reach out if you want our community’s evergreen discount code for Akadian courses)
📅 +July 1: Behind The Hustle: Jennifer Anderson. Subscribe to the YouTube channel to watch and catch up on all episodes in the series.
📅 July 21 - Oct 8: QuickBooks Online Complete Hands-on Training*. Over 12 weeks, you’ll build real QuickBooks Online company files step by step, using practical case studies that mirror the daily work bookkeepers and business owners actually do. Learn the full bookkeeping workflow, ask questions as you go, and walk away with practical confidence, 72 CPE credits, and lifetime access. (Whoooo daddy, the lifetime access part is what really melts my butter).
Subscribe to the YouTube Channel
🌶️I share one of these posts every year in this newsletter. The “QBO increased their prices again” post. I love Derek P’s comment “That’s how you know summer is coming to an end”. 😂
🌶️ Tracy Clark found a post published by the Institute for Veterans and Military Families called From Military Spouse to Entrepreneur: Taking Back Control of My Career. She said it made her tear up. Spoiler…the video she found features my own story.
💪 You can watch Zach Johnson’s Behind The Hustle interview. A few things stood out to me.
He is deeply niched. Gusty.
He was solo, then grew to a team of 4, and now is back solo as he moved out of bookkeeping and into CFO level consulting.
He talked about how he uses Zoho One in his tech stack. I think this is my first guest that has talked about Zoho. They have so many products beyond their General Ledger (called Zoho Books). Fascinating!
💪 Basically every breakout session I attended at Scaling New Heights mentioned AI. But the one that stood out the most as the most practical was taught by Jan Haugo. Her session was called “Scaling Without Headcount: Designing The AI First Firm”.
During the session, Jan didn’t even mention her own material (speakers aren’t supposed to self-promote), but a few of us in the back of the class were poking around her website during the session and we saw that she is offering a free AI masterclass for accounting pros. She has a big AI brain and is an actual accounting pro. She was really good, y’all. Take a look at that free AI masterclass.
💪 Alicia Katz Pollock is doing another round of her college-style course QuickBooks Online Complete Hands-On Training*. If you think you or your staff need “class time” and “class mates” to become extremely proficient in QBO, this program might be your best option. And, in case you missed it, Alicia was just named the 2026 #1 ProAdvisor Educator of the Year by Insightful Accountant. She knows what every button in QBO does. And how to outsmart the software.
💼 Anyone in Massachusetts? A job in MA was added to the the Job Guide along with a few others!
If you are hiring, please feel free to post your job description so we can share it here in this list.
🎪 I copied something my mother did for me when I was young and left home for 3 weeks on a high school trip.
I sent my sons to Boy Scout camp 2 weeks ago. Before they left, I took time in the early morning hours to write sweet notes on plain white 3x5 note cards for each day they were gone. Each one was put into a small envelope with a couple of pieces of hard candy and the day written on the outside of the envelope.
Nothing glamorous at all. No Amazon pre-order required. They took up hardly any space in their foot lockers.
I’ll say that I think the most important part of this is that the entire exercise was completely analog. I used no AI. I had to force myself to carve out time and brain cells for two of the people in the world who mean the most to me. I had to think about each boy and the things I wanted to say to each one. Each card contained just a sentence or two. Some cards had a Bible verse. Some just recounted a memory that I thought might make them smile.
They admitted that the candy helped motivate them to open each day’s envelope. But they both told me they appreciated the little messages, too.
🎢 My husband was such a great sport attending his first accounting conference. Everyone at Scaling New Heights was so welcoming and patient with him. He is a very smart guy (and flies fighter jets, y’all), but he knows nothing about the accounting industry. The goal was to give him the chance to learn A LOT very quickly so that he can determine if he is interested in working for my company after retiring from the Navy next year. I think there is a good chance he will do it!
🎢 I had brunch with a local bookkeeping friend, Jodi! 10/10 recommend just asking someone to lunch. If you don’t know how to find someone, comment here on Substack and I’ll give you my best tips for finding a local bookkeeping friend. Shoot, there is a decent chance I’d even know someone to connect you with!
🎢 Last week I was in Orlando at the Scaling New Heights conference, so I didn’t do any bookkeeping work. I even had a guest host for my Tuesday “FreshBooks Office Hours” (2nd time I had her fill in for me and it feels so good to know that part of my business can run without me!).
I am still very anxious about my client pipeline feeling pretty dry, so did host my monthly “lead magnet” call this past Thursday. That is my open monthly Free FreshBooks Q&A where people can come ask me one FreshBooks question for free. I am hopeful that at least 2 of the people that attended will convert to paying clients. And one of them should convert to an affiliate commission for signing up for a FreshBooks account. We have a very strong system of running these 1x per month calls, so there is very little work that I have to do related to hosting this any more. So that 1-hour meeting should provide a decent return on my time.
⚡With so much talk about AI - check out this interview with Josh Hsu and how to use AI in the back office.
✉️ Delighted this video helped this community member! 🎥 “Is a bookkeeping business right for you?”
This is the best video about starting bookkeeping. Thank you. Thank you for all the resources and information! ~Valenice
Keep hustling!
Kate
-Chief Hustler-
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