From signup to running your business — a practical setup guide

A step-by-step path from signup to running orders, stock and invoices: let the AI build your types, import CSVs, add your team with real permissions.

Broad steps rising through open gateways toward a horizon

This is the order we would do it in, with the parts that actually take time called out honestly. Set aside an afternoon. Most companies need no outside help for this part, and there is nothing to install. Statutory work AxisIQ does not do — GST filing, e-invoicing, payroll returns — stays with your accountant and existing tools.

Before you start: answer four questions

Write these down. Every decision below falls out of them.

  1. What do you sell, and what do you call it? Products, SKUs, services, jobs, consignments.
  2. What is the journey of one order? From the moment a customer asks to the moment money is in the bank. List the stages in your own words.
  3. What do you track that is unusual? Batch numbers, expiry, mill lot, warranty period, engineer assigned. This is where standard software fails you and where the ten minutes you spend here pays off.
  4. Who needs to see what? In particular: who should not see cost prices and margins.

Step 1 — Create the workspace (2 minutes)

Sign up, name your organisation, set your default currency. Invite your team now or later; the 7-day trial covers up to 10 Full and 25 Operational Users.

Step 2 — Make the data yours (30–60 minutes)

Let the AI workspace builder interview you. It uses the answers to the four questions to create your record types — orders, products, stock, customers, suppliers, whatever you actually call them — alongside the built-in invoices, payments, accounts and locations. Then review what it built.

Then, from question 3 above, add your fields. Text, numbers, dates, choice lists, money, or links to other records. If you track something it did not create — repairs, site visits, rentals — create a new type for it; it gets the same screens, search, reporting and assistant support as everything else.

Two settings worth doing now:

  • Auto-numbering. Give your invoice or order number field a pattern like INV-{seq:4:yearly} so numbering stops being a manual job.
  • Currency. Set the org default; individual amounts can still differ.

This step is the one that determines whether the system fits. Spend the time here, not later.

Step 3 — Bring your data in (30 minutes)

Export what you have to CSV — from spreadsheets, from your old tool, from your accountant. Spreadsheet workbooks you want to keep as workbooks (a quoting model, a planning sheet) can come in whole through Axis Sheets instead.

Import in this order, because later records point at earlier ones:

  1. Customers and suppliers
  2. Products
  3. Stock records
  4. Open orders
  5. Open invoices and payments

Import up to 500 rows at a time. Validation runs before anything is written, so a mismatched column tells you what is wrong instead of half-importing. Closed history is optional — most businesses import open items only and leave the past in the old system for reference.

Step 4 — Put the work on a board (15 minutes)

Take the process from question 2 and build a Work Queue for it: one stage per step, with an intake rule that drops matching records in automatically.

Awaiting payment, ready to pack, packed, shipped. Now the whole team can see the day's work, and moving an item on is one click or one barcode scan.

Step 5 — Set the permissions (15 minutes)

From question 4: create a group per role — warehouse, sales, finance — and grant each one what it needs. Use field masking to hide cost and margin from the roles that should not see them.

Then use the simulator: pick a person, pick an action, check the answer before anyone hits a wall.

Step 6 — Automate the thing everyone complains about (15 minutes)

Pick exactly one. The best first flow is small, obvious and daily:

  • Email the customer when an order is marked shipped
  • Generate and attach the invoice PDF at the same moment
  • Flag anything below reorder level, every Monday at 9am

One working automation teaches the team what the platform is for better than any demo.

Step 7 — Ask a question (2 minutes)

Open Ask Axis and ask something you would normally build a report for. "What did we sell last week?" "Which customers owe us the most?" "What is about to run out?"

This is the moment most teams get it.

What to do in week two

  • Turn your three most-asked questions into saved reports, and put them on a dashboard.
  • Add a PDF template for your invoice or delivery note so documents stop being made by hand.
  • Connect your store if you sell online, and script the sync you actually want.
  • Post your first ledger entries if you are running the books here.

If you get stuck

Email hello@axisiq.co. Early-access customers get hands-on help with the move, including the CSV mapping, at no cost.

Ready? Start a 7-day trial — no card required.