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• Aaron Patzer, Founder and CEO of Mint, a popular online money management service. (RWW coverage of Mint)
• Gabe Griego, Vice President of Marketing at Wesabe, a "part money management tool, part community" service. (Wesabe was profiled in our recent round-up post Banking 2.0: Money Management Moves to The Cloud)
• Mu Saleem, Community Director of Tip'd, a new online community "for financial news, ideas, and tips".

RWW Live is hosted as always by Sean Ammirati, with Richard MacManus and Marshall Kirkpatrick from ReadWriteWeb on the call.

Before the show starts, we're interested in what questions you have for the panelists. Please leave a comment on this post and one of the RWW crew on the call (Sean, Marshall, Steve and myself) will do our best to ask your question.

We will post the audio from the show at the end, but we hope you join us LIVE on Calliflower or Facebook.

UPDATE: the show is now finished, here is the audio:

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To do so, however, you have to give Mint the login data for all your accounts, which raises alarms for some users, especially because Mint is still a relatively new entity in the finance business.

As we pointed our earlier this month, Mint's users are relatively young, with a median age of 28, but by adding investment accounts and the new IRA calculator, Mint should be able to slowly become more mainstream, especially in these tough economic times. In the future, Mint also plans to allow for bill payment and stock trades through its site, but for now, it is only a data aggregator.

If you would like to read more about our take on personal finance in the cloud and a look at Mint's competitors, have a look at our comparison of the top 10 personal money management sites on the Internet.

These sites aren't just simplified versions of our former desktop apps, either. Instead, they offer a number of features that take advantage of their "always on" status. Forget downloading updates and typing in your transactions line-by-line, these new banking 2.0 sites can offer you better insight into your financial situation with no additional effort on your part beyond just logging in.

Mint

Mint.com may be the most popular of the online banking apps today...or perhaps it's just the most hyped. The site currently claims to serve nearly 400,000 users, manages over $12 billion in transactions, and has saved $100 million+ for its users. On Mint.com, you can manage your bank account, credit card accounts, loans, brokerage and investment accounts, and more. The site also provides guides that can help you make big financial decisions like buying a new car or home. The feature which makes Mint unique is their ability to scan through your bank account and credit card transactions in order to help you find savings. They do this by matching you up with offers for new credit cards with lower rates or by negotiating a lower rate with your current company.

Wesabe

Wesabe takes what's normally a private activity - financial management - and makes it social. Like other online banking apps, Wesabe lets you see all your bank accounts and credit cards in one place. You can categorize your transactions and see spending and earning summaries. Where Wesabe is different is that it takes your data, anonymizes it, and shares it with the Wesabe community. That aggregate data is then analyzed for patterns and those results are shared with everyone. For example, Wesabe can show the cost of an average transaction at a particular merchant.

Geezeo

Geezeo is very much like Mint.com in that it offers a centralized site to access all your financial accounts including banking, credit cards, loans, etc. Where they are a bit different is in their community aspect. Instead of anonymized data, they offer community-focused areas like Groups and Goals where you can socialize and learn from others who have the same financial concerns that you do. Geezeo also stands out for letting you upload your own bank account data, if you so desire, instead of having to set up accounts to upload into Geezeo automatically. Transactions can also be manually entered. Geezeo offers a mobile app too, that lets you check your balances and available credit from your mobile phone.

Expensr

Expensr is an online personal finance application which was recently acquired by recommendation engine Strands. The site is now being integrated with Strands' recommendation technology to produce a new product, moneyStrands, which analyzes your financial history in order to recommend products and services you may find appealing. The site lets you import your bank account files into their system using a secure uploader. The app will then auto-categorize your transactions. You're presented with a variety of pie graphs and bar graphs that break down your spending to show you where your money is going. You can compare yourself to your peers by tagging yourself with keywords like "young professional" or "college student" and then look at your spending habits versus the average from that particular group. Expensr also offers budgeting tools which can help you plan for the future.

moneyStrands

After acquiring Expensr, Strands has been working to combine its technology with their own recommendation engine. The end result is moneyStrands, still in private beta. Ultimately, the site will offer you a way to aggregate your financial information in one place and see instant snapshots of your finances. Recommendation technologies will present you with services you may be interested in and you can anonymously compare your habits with others. At the moment, Expensr and moneyStrands appear as separate web sites, but perhaps they will become more integrated in the future.

Xero

Where Mint.com may appeal to former Quicken users, Xero.com appeals to former Quickbooks users. This kiwi startup offers daily bank reconciliation as well as invoicing, reporting, A/R, A/P, expense claims, and other bookkeeping tasks. For those considering the switch, a handy page on the Xero web site lets you show your accountant exactly what Xero can and cannot do so that you can analyze whether or not their service is right for you.

Rudder

Rudder made their official debut at the recent DEMO conference in San Diego. Unlike the other apps reviewed here, Rudder focuses on bills more than banking. With Rudder, you can determine how much money you have available to spend while still paying all your bills. The app aggregates your banking and credit card accounts, but the focus here is not on what's taken place in the past (historical trends, spending habits, etc.). Instead, Rudder focuses on the future by letting you know what's left in your account for spending and saving. The best feature about Rudder, though, is that it doesn't force you to log into their site to get this information. The app delivers balances, transactions, and upcoming bills directly to your email inbox.

Green Sherpa

Another app which debuted at DEMO was Green Sherpa. At first glance, the app appears to be very much like its competitors with bank account aggregation, reconciliation, and budgeting tools. However, Green Sherpa offers a combination of features which appeal to those who are making the transition from desktop apps. The app lets you input transactions manually and offers a more advanced cash flow projection than Mint.com does. However, the app's most unique feature is its sharing aspect. You can choose to give other people (like a family member or accountant) access to your data. While that makes Green Sherpa stand out, they've entered a crowded space where competitors already have solid leads, so it may not be enough to win people over.

Buxfer

Buxfer is another app offering a home to all your accounts. It will auto-download your data, categorize your transactions, and help you budget. Buxfer addresses the privacy concerns that many have with banking 2.0 sites by integrating with Google Gears. The app uses Google Gears to store your account login information on your own computer, only syncing back the data collected, not your private credentials. They also offer a groups feature which will appeal those sharing expenses with others, like roommates, for example. You can use Buxfer to track and settle IOUs with others through the site. This makes the app more appealing to a younger crowd, as does its mobile integration. You can access Buxfer via SMS, Twitter, email, on on the mobile web.

Shryk

Shryk is a company which just launched at the TechCrunch50 conference. Their two-pronged approach is designed to help kids achieve financial literacy. The first part of that approach is a service called iThryv which teaches kids about earning, saving, and managing money. This product is sold through banks and credit unions and is also available free to educational institutions. The second part of the Shyrnk platform is WeProsper.org. This is an online community where teachers, schools, and financial institutions can come together and develop new tools and methods to promote financial literacy.

Security Concerns?

For obvious reasons, some people will find the thought of banking in the cloud frightening. This is, after all, data that requires a high level of security. However, with banks themselves offering online services and bill pay, people are beginning to see that "online" doesn't necessarily mean "insecure." In fact, having your banking data stored on servers run by a business may actually be more secure than having a Quicken file saved on your laptop, a device which could be easily lost or stolen. Also, because home users don't tend to back up their data as often as they should, a hard drive crash could mean a complete loss.

Challenges

Although there are a number of sites to choose from in this competitive space, there are still some challenges to overcome. For one, because almost all these companies are U.S.-based, the banks they support are U.S.-based as well. This leaves potential international customers without a way to participate. Some of the companies state in their F.A.Q.'s that they plan to add support for more banks worldwide in the future, but that's only likely to occur if the company can first gain a foothold here in the U.S.

Another issue with these sites is that there is almost no support for small community banks and credit unions. Unless the site allows you to import your transactions manually (which somewhat defeats the purpose), you're out of luck. Why is that almost all major banks are available yet so few of the smaller banks are? This is the type of service that could help keep smaller banks more competitive with their big bank counterparts, so you would think some of them would be interested. Is the burden on the banking 2.0 sites to help smaller banks get online or is it up to those institutions themselves? Perhaps the banking 2.0 sites need to be working a way to automate the import of transactions from any bank, regardless of whether or not the institution itself supports the site. The first company to come up with a solution like that could really set themselves apart from the rest of the pack and gain a whole new set of customers in the process.

Conclusion

Banking 2.0 is still very much an emerging technology trend. Yet with the young generation of digital natives now entering the workforce and starting their careers, you can be sure that they will have an impact on this space. They will expect their banks to support not only online banking but also other online money management tools such as these. This is not a generation that's known for their brand loyalty, so you can bet that they will be all too happy to change banks if they decide they want to use one of these services and their bank isn't supported.

Banking 2.0 represents only one aspect of the growing trend that is cloud computing. Just as other desktop software is being threatened by new online apps, desktop financial management software is threatened as well. These banking sites go up against expensive and unwieldy desktop software while offering their services for free and finding you savings. In our current economy, that activity gives banking 2.0 the potential to go mainstream fast.

So what is the state of online accounting software? In this post we'll tell you about our awkward experiences trying out different packages. But we want to hear about your own experiences with online accounting software, because there is still much to learn about this market.

The Big Guns: Slow, Except Intuit

The existing market leaders in accounting software for SMB and personal use are desktop software vendors such as Intuit (with Quicken and QuickBooks) and MYOB. Relatively few of these have made solid moves towards web-based software.

One that has made moves to cover the threat of online software, is Intuit. It's had QuickBooks online for some time now, for small businesses. In January this year it released Quicken Online, its consumer offering. With Quicken Online Intuit is competing fiercely on price, with a 60-day free trial and then from as little as $2.99 per month. It differentiates itself from startup competitors by either offering lower subscription cost or being advertising-free.

It's hard to see Intuit not gaining majority market share of online accounting, given its resources and market leverage in traditional accounting software. Allen Stern of CenterNetworks had similar sentiments back in January.

A quick note about Google and Microsoft. We wrote a post end of last year called Online Accounting: The Next Killer App For Google Apps. 9 months later, still no sign of an online accounting app from Mountain View. As for Redmond, it too has seemingly little interest in this market.

Business Accounting: New Kids on the Block

Startups such as Freshbooks, Xero and Zoho are directly competing with the likes of Quicken, on purely accounting features - invoicing, payroll, expense tracking, etc. We have tested out several of these products and they all have impressive 'web 2.0' type designs, which make inputting data a pleasure (almost).

In this post we'll focus on Freshbooks. It offers online invoicing, time tracking and expense tracking. It has a subscription business model similar to Basecamp (from $14 p/mth onwards) and claims to have over 400,000 users. In our tests it was easy to use and had a lot of nifty features, such as getting a view of your outstanding invoices at a glance. It also has integration with Basecamp (our preferred project management service here at RWW) and offers an API. Freshbooks has an active forum and a browse through its forum showed a very helpful staff.

Another neat feature, which we pointed out in an earlier post today called Four Ad-Free Ways that Mined Data Can Make Money, is that Freshbooks offers benchmark data by industry to its users - e.g. compared to other graphic designers, maybe you're charging less and getting your invoices filled slower than most.

The only real downside we found was an inability to handle more than one currency per account. This is a major problem, but it's one that almost every online accounting service shares. Even the desktop accounting software we've been testing recently failed when it came to multiple currencies (and/or usability of that feature).

Still, Freshbooks is a breath of fresh air to online accounting, if you'll pardon the pun. We really want to be able to use it, so let's hope multi-currency support isn't too far away. Freshbooks has a number of supporters among friends of RWW, judging by the feedback we got via Twitter. Adam Metz proclaimed: "If you want to get paid on time, stay Fresh(books)". steaprok quoth: "Freshbooks is great, have used them for sometime, no complaints at all".

Other similar services

Another service worth mentioning here is Xero, a New Zealand based app that has actually done an IPO - on the local NZ sharemarket. In our tests a few months ago it had many useful features, similar to Freshbooks. However it is currently only available in New Zealand and it too can't handle multiple currencies. Like Freshbooks, Xero promises support for this feature by end of the year.

Kiwi friends of RWW liked Xero. Sigurd Magnusson of CMS SilverStripe told us that his company uses "Xero, except are forced to use MYOB to deal with U.S. Dollars (e.g.our involvement with demconvention.com)". Ben Young said that "I use Xero. Simply the best. Streamlines that part of the business for me whilst we are growing. Not location dependent...very handy".

Also check out Zoho Invoice (which claims to support multiple currencies) and Cashboard, two relatively recent entrants to this space.

Personal Money Management Products

Over the past couple of years we've seen a number of impressive new entrants to accounting software - products such as Mint, Wesabe, Expensr (acquired by Strands in April), Geezeo and Rudder. These products are focused on personal financing, such as budgeting and bank accounts.

Mint has received a lot of press (some would say hype). Currently Mint.com claims to serve nearly 400,000 users, manages over $12 billion in transactions, and has saved $100 million+ for its users. It recently released a new design, which we reviewed on ReadWriteWeb. The new design focused on the major new features added to Mint since their launch: enhanced budgeting tools, the addition of brokerage and investment accounts, mortgage accounts, student loans, and auto loans. In addition, we wrote, Mint has added six new "how to" guides that can help you with your major financial decisions. These include things like saving for retirement, paying off your student loans, buying a car, creating a personal budget, and more. The guides are the start of a new educational series for the site.

Mint seems like a great solution for US people who want to manage their money online. The downsides are that it's not international, there is no data import option (an important feature that many other online accounting packages have) and Mint doesn't cater to people who don't bank with large, national banking institutions.

This segment of the online accounting market - which is loosely termed 'money management' - is arguably the most exciting, because there are new software opportunities being explored. An example is moneyStrands, which we reviewed at the end of April. moneyStrands is employing recommendations technologies, such as enabling users to anonymously compare themselves to others with similar traits - e.g. demographics.

Conclusion

After all our testing, we're almost ashamed to say that we're still using custom spreadsheets to manage the accounts here at ReadWriteWeb. That's because multiple currency support is critical to our business, but sadly lacking in many of the products we tested. We'll check out Zoho Invoice though, as they claim to have implemented it.

Tell us in the comments if you're using online accounting software to manage your business or personal finances. What 'web 2.0' features have you come across in these products that have particularly impressed you?

top image credit: quickenonline

One of the best things about using web apps is that you don't need to download updates, install new versions, or go buy a new boxed product every year or so. However, in Mint's case, the speed with which they innovate - they claim to implement customer-driven improvements every six weeks - meant their new features were being overlooked by their users. People who signed up to manage their bank accounts were often not aware that the site could help them manage their other accounts, too, since those features weren't offered at the time of initial registration. Calling attention to these features was the main goal of the site's redesign.

Today, the site launches with a new look and feel which brings the focus back to the major new features added to Mint since their launch: enhanced budgeting tools, the addition of brokerage and investment accounts, mortgage accounts, student loans, and auto loans. In addition, they've added six new "how to" guides that can help you with your major financial decisions. These include things like saving for retirement, paying off your student loans, buying a car, creating a personal budget, and more. The guides are the start of a new educational series for the site.

What It Looks Like

Below we have both the old version of Mint.com and the new version. Do you think the redesign is an improvement?

Before:

After:

Before (Features):

After (Features):

The New Mint: All Flash, No Substance?

For the happy U.S. customers who are able to use Mint.com, the redesign is sure to be appreciated as it really does give the site a fresh, new look and makes finding out about new features easier than before. However, Mint is still ignoring the needs of those customers who don't bank with large, national banking institutions. One of the most requested features is for Mint to allow for data uploads - that is, the importation of downloaded files be them in .QIF, .QFX, .QBO, or even .CSV or .TXT format. For those who chose to bank with smaller community banks or credit unions - a choice often made because of the typically lower fees that those institutions provide - Mint.com is not an option. That's a shame because if anyone is interested in using a service to save money, it could very well be these folks.

By keeping their niche so narrow so as to not include a good portion of the U.S. banking population, Mint.com is allowing its competitors, sites like Wesabe.com and Geezeo a big advantage. Today, both of those sites have FAQs that state "if your bank isn't available, let us know and we'll add it!" They also both support data upload. Meanwhile, Mint's FAQ, hidden away on their forums, reads "...we are adding new banks as quickly as we can," and "Mint currently doesn't support features that would allow customers to import data from another source (Quicken, Excel, etc.). We're looking to see if we can provide support for these down the road."

We hope that since Mint.com has a fresh new look now, they will focus on offering their Webby-award winning services to more people now, too.

Customers of Spanish bank BBVA will now be offered recommended products and services, individual and anonymized aggregate analytics and personalized goal setting and alert services, all based on their banking activities.

What's Interesting About This Deal?

Using the Strands Social Recommender technology, BBVA will be able to offer intelligent observations and suggestions for personal finance. A demo of the product shows, for example, that users of the system might be given interesting statistics about the financial activities of people in a particular demographic group, then asked whether they belong to that group. It's like having a private, personal, math-powered financial adviser available for your use on demand.

With interfaces for the iPhone, BlackBerry and Nokia phones - analytics and recommendations will also be available outside of the desktop web browser. This is the kind of heavyweight application to see coming from online recommendation services.

Privacy Concerns

How will bank customers feel about having their personal and financial details thrown into the collective pot for analysis of recommendations to other customers? We think it may take some getting used to, but that kind of information is undoubtedly being aggregated inside of banks already. The prospect of allowing users to benefit directly from their collective data is an appealing one.

Will the recommendations offered all point crudely toward buying more services from the bank? Given the huge war chest that Strands commands and the caliber of hires they've made over the last year, we hope that the company's banking recommendations and observations will prove truly useful and engaging for customers and not just for the bank's bottom line.

Only time will tell, but we've said for some time that in a world drowning in data - powerful recommendation technologies that help point towards personally meaningful information have huge potential. Financial services are the next frontier for these experimental technologies and we hope that Strands will disclose statistics in time demonstrating the impact their service had on the financial lives of users around Europe.

Disclosure: Strands is a RWW sponsor.

For every $1000 you spend with the Brighter Planet credit card, the company purchases 1 ton of CO2 offsets. Through the end of 2008, Bank of America will match this by 50%. BrighterPlant is a for-profit corporation, but given the state of the environment I'm not going to quibble with anyone for starting a private company aiming to improve things.

The company was started as a project in an environmental economics course at Middlebury College in 2005 and launched in the US last month.

How Data is Collected

The most interesting part of the Brighter Planet service is its method of tracking your personal ecological impact. The website doesn't ask users to fill out a lengthy questionnaire to gather information for processing through any of several available carbon footprint calculators. It also doesn't track individual purchases and their respective impact.

Instead, the company starts with an average and works backwards. "We take the total US carbon inventory as determined by the EPA and divide that by the population," co-founder and Director of R&D Andy Rossmeissl told me. "Inside of that average we've identified how it breaks down into average flying, average driving, etc. so when people decide to tell us about themselves, we're refining our previous average assumptions by using real data."

Users can provide as little or as much information about their activities as they like. Brighter Planet uses postal codes cross referenced with a local power system database to determine the percentage of a person's power that's likely produced through various means.

When you tell Brighter Planet what kind of car you drive the service imports data from the EPA's fuel efficiency tables to determine that car's carbon output. The site offers steps you can take to further reduce your impact. Incorporating monthly utility bills is next on the list of additions to the data set.

Next Comes the Social

Brighter Planet says the next step in implementing group functionality. While privacy is a concern when dealing with financial data, the company believes this is an obstacle it can overcome.

Watching your group, or multiple groups you belong to, work to decrease their collective carbon footprint could be another powerful means of motivation.

I would really like to see things like imported Attention Data be used to personalize carbon reduction tips. Working with personal data like this begs the question about how a company like Brighter Planet can leverage some data portability to improve its services.

I like what Brighter Planet is up to. I think their approach to data, motivation and aggregate personal change is very interesting.