Quick summary
For many businesses, finding financial analysis software that truly fits their organisation can be challenging. Both Fathom and Spotlight Reporting offer robust financial platforms that simplify analysis and reporting, but they do so in different ways.
Choose Fathom when...
- You manage multiple clients or business entities: Fathom’s Portfolio and Dashboard features make it easy to monitor dozens, or even hundreds of clients or entities in one location. For accounting and advisory firms, it works best for 100+ clients, offering quick insights into top or underperforming clients and allowing fast, customisable report sharing.
- Communication with stakeholders is central: Fathom’s beautiful, clear, visual reporting facilitates deeper discussions and makes insights highly engaging for clients.
- You want value for money: With Fathom’s Pro plan, businesses can scale usage without incurring additional fees, as it covers forecasting, KPIs, and consolidation. Also, the setup is intuitive enough to get teams up and running instantly.
Choose Spotlight Reporting when...
- You need to consolidate 300+ entities: Supports consolidation for more than 300 entities with the Multi plan, helping companies manage larger portfolios efficiently.
- You want to produce industry-tailored reports: Pre-built templates for different sectors allow firms to generate relevant and detailed client-ready reports effectively.
- Your firm is ready to invest in training: Businesses that can afford step-by-step and structured onboarding may be more likely to use the platform’s full capabilities.
Both Fathom and Spotlight Reporting are well-known in the management reporting space, but the right choice depends on your organisation’s size, complexity, and reporting priorities.
Quick comparison snapshot
Integrated reporting and forecasting
Fathom vs Spotlight Reporting: Feature-by-feature comparison
Reporting capabilities
Fathom strengths:
- Offers a large list of default financial KPIs and allows you to build your own custom KPIs to track profitability, cash flow and efficiency.
- Interactive visual reports that simplify complex data and improve financial storytelling. Also, provides the ability to build scheduled reports.
- Allows for the seamless generation of board-ready reports using predefined templates, with the option to add commentary and tailor to the client's needs.
Spotlight Reporting strengths:
- Provides tailored report templates specifically designed for various industries, like e-commerce, agriculture, and construction.
- Has an AI feature called “AI Suggestions” to allow quick executive summary generation or enrich existing summaries in reports.
- Offers a broader chart gallery, with over 100 chart styles for customisation needs.
Forecasting and planning
Fathom strengths:
- Includes built-in three-way forecasting, bringing together the profit & loss, balance sheet, and cash flow into a single, connected model.
- Forecasts and multiple scenarios can be incorporated into reports, allowing firms to compare outcomes and communicate insights to stakeholders confidently.
- Robust cash flow forecasting software that lets businesses create forecasts driven by key operational inputs, such as revenue, expense changes, or sales volumes, and instantly see how changes affect cash flow and performance.
Spotlight Reporting strengths:
- Forecasts are managed in a separate, dedicated module from the main reporting tools, which provides a structured workflow for planning.
- You can link business drivers, such as sales units or cost assumptions, to accounts, allowing for scenario planning and what-if analysis.
- Multiple company forecasts can be rolled into a group-level forecast, with the ability to eliminate inter-company transactions for more accurate consolidated results.
Multi-entity consolidation
Fathom strengths:
- As a financial consolidation software, strongly supports consolidations of up to 300 entities for single currency consolidations, and up to 50 for multi-currency consolidations.
- Group accounts are maintained accurately through account-level eliminations, including full-account eliminations where appropriate, and partial eliminations as required. Foreign exchange adjustments are also supported.
- Gives advisors and CFOs comparative insights into performance drivers by allowing comparisons across entities.
Spotlight Reporting strengths:
- Supports up to 75 entities in the standard plan, with the option to scale more than 300 entities through the Multi plan upgrade.
- Provides a guided workflow that allows you to manage inter-company eliminations at both account and entity levels, including foreign exchange adjustments.
- Setup for huge groups is possible, but it can require more manual supervision and planning to manage entity limits effectively.
Integration ecosystem
- QuickBooks integrations:
- Fathom: Integrates with QuickBooks Online and Desktop as an Intuit Accountant Platinum Partner. Online data is automatically updated daily, and you can trigger a manual sync at any time.
- Spotlight Reporting: Supports QuickBooks Online and also QuickBooks Desktop via Desktop Connector. Once the initial data import is done, you can re-import the updated data for faster updates.
- Xero integrations:
- Excel/Google Sheets:
- Fathom: Allows importing of financial data via Excel files (supports up to 96 months of data) and non-financial KPIs via Google Sheets.
- Spotlight Reporting: Supports Excel import for both financial and non-financial data.
Comparison deep dive
Full reporting, forecasting, consolidations and KPIs are available only under the Pro plan. Portfolio plan is limited to summary reports and dashboards.
Included in core Reporting / Business plans.
Forecasting and dashboard
Included in Fathom Pro plans and not on Portfolio.
Comes standard across all plans.
Both Portfolio and Pro plans give access to the Insights Dashboard for client-over-view, while full reporting, forecasting and consolidation tools are reserved for the Pro plan.
Supports oversight of multiple client organisations through user-management and entity/group settings, enabling firms to control access and grouping.
Included in the Pro plan, with multiple entities up to 300 for single-currency consolidations, and up to 50 for multi-currency consolidations.
Allows for 75 entities in the standard plan. Requires Multi plan upgrade to scale for more than 300 entities.
Sleek, interactive visuals designed for client presentations.
More functional-based visuals, with less emphasis on aesthetics.
Uses a tiered subscription model. Pricing varies by plan (Pro or Portfolio) and scales with the number of companies added.
Tiered modular plans with add-ons (Forecasting, Dashboard, Multi).
Scalability to more companies/clients
Scales efficiently as firms add more companies, reducing the average cost per entity under higher tiers.
Stepped jumps, possible upgrade costs for advanced modules.
User experience comparison
Learning Curve
Fathom:
- Intuitive setup: You can start using the platform easily and independently due to its intuitive interface. Onboarding support is available upon request if needed.
- Minimal configuration: Out-of-the-box KPIs and pre-built templates reduce setup time.
- User-friendly: Financial insights dashboard software is designed for all stakeholders across the business, making it easy to navigate and interpret data.
Spotlight Reporting:
- Structured implementation: Typically spend more time upfront setting up before firms are confident in using all modules.
- Template-driven setup: Industry-specific reports and pre-built templates are strong but require initial configuration.
- Customisation options: Extensive reporting options allow firms to tailor outputs to different clients, industries, or sectors, but this can mean a steeper learning curve.
Daily usage
Fathom:
- Dashboard navigation: Reporting, forecasting, and consolidation can be accessed smoothly from one interface.
- Quick report creation: Pre-built templates allow for consistent client-ready reporting packs that can be scheduled for automatic delivery.
- Visual storytelling: Beautiful, interactive, visual reports that spark meaningful client conversations.
Spotlight Reporting:
- Modular workflow: Reporting, forecasts, and dashboards are separate modules within the Spotlight Reporting suite, which allows you to focus on specific areas.
- Highly customisable templates: You can adjust reports for specific industries or sectors, such as e-commerce, schools, or agriculture.
- Comprehensive outputs: Detailed, clear reporting is provided for informed decision-making.
Support channels
Fathom:
- Highly rated support: Provides in-app messaging, email (support@fathomhq.com), and phone support 24/5 globally, with messages typically receiving a response within 15 minutes. Additionally, all subscription plans include full access to customer support, with no tiered restrictions.
- High satisfaction ratings: Fathom consistently maintains customer satisfaction scores (CSAT) of above 95%.
- Award-winning service: Recognised as “Customer Service Organisation of the Year” at the 2022 Australian Service Excellence Awards.
- Full help centre and resources: Provides detailed guides, tutorials, and articles covering all platform features. Also offers on-demand resources, such as product walkthroughs, webinars, and best-practice sessions to support ongoing learning.
Spotlight Reporting:
- Customer partnership approach: Works with businesses in a partnership model, giving them advisory-style support and dedicated assistance.
- Customer success specialists: Assists with onboarding and growth (although availability depends on the plan tier).
- Full help centre and in-platform learning: Offers a library of articles, videos, and frequently asked questions that you can access online. Plus, provides training resources that are designed to help you learn while using the platform.
- Plan-dependent service levels: Higher-tier plans may gain personalised attention, while smaller firms might receive less individualised support.
Conclusion
Fathom can be an excellent choice for businesses that value efficiency and creating meaningful customer communication, thanks to its intuitive interface, transparent pricing, and beautiful, clear, insightful reports. Meanwhile, Spotlight Reporting is great in extensive settings, where sophisticated consolidation is crucial.
Ultimately, the right choice depends on your client base and reporting needs. The next best step is to explore each solution to see how it aligns with your firm’s objectives.
Try Fathom today
You can start with a free 14-day trial to try Fathom for yourself, or explore our feature page for more details.
Contact us if you need further help in selecting the right reporting solution for your firm, and our dedicated team can help you make an informed decision.
Frequently asked questions
- What is the main difference between Fathom and Spotlight Reporting?
Fathom is designed for firms seeking an intuitive, self-service platform that allows for the quick generation of reports for meaningful and engaging client conversations. Spotlight Reporting is ideal for firms that require large-scale consolidation, modular workflows, and pre-built industry-specific templates.
- What’s the difference between Fathom and Spotlight Reporting forecasting?
Fathom offers three-way forecasting with unlimited scenarios and embeds forecasts into reports. Spotlight also supports three-way forecasting with multiple forecast versions, but its forecast module is separate from its reporting module.
- Can both Fathom and Spotlight Reporting handle multi-entity consolidation?
Yes, both Fathom and Spotlight Reporting can handle multi-entity consolidation. Fathom supports up to 300 entities, while Spotlight Reporting supports more numbers with its Multi plan package. The choice ultimately depends on the size and complexity of your firm’s consolidation needs.
- How do pricing models differ between Fathom and Spotlight Reporting?
Fathom uses a clear per-entity pricing model where you select a plan based on the number of companies you’ll connect. Spotlight Reporting offers tiered plans, with optional add-ons, such as its Multi plan for higher consolidation needs.
- Can both Fathom and Spotlight Reporting integrate with Xero or QuickBooks?
Both Fathom and Spotlight Reporting integrate with QuickBooks and Xero. Fathom provides automatic daily syncing, while Spotlight Reporting’s multi-entity data updates require manual imports for changed periods.
- How different are the support channels for Fathom or Spotlight Reporting?
Fathom provides multi-channel support (in-app messaging and email) with consistent availability across its paid plans. Spotlight Reporting offers tiered support levels, meaning the level of support may vary depending on your plan.
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