How to Create a Quickbooks Online Customer Portal

Ready to build a seamless QuickBooks Online customer portal that makes client management, secure document exchange, form completion, and e-signatures effortless?

Many businesses using QuickBooks Online struggle to find a client portal solution that's intuitive yet robust enough for professional use. Thankfully, Foyer offers the ideal solution—a streamlined and powerful client portal.

In this guide, I'll show you exactly how Foyer transforms your client interactions by simplifying communication, secure file exchanges, form filling, and electronic signatures. I've included helpful resources below as well to support you every step of the way too.

Why Use a QuickBooks Online Customer Portal?

As QuickBooks transitions more fully to its Online platform, businesses now have an incredible opportunity to elevate their client experience and operational efficiency through seamless integrations. Foyer takes full advantage of this by offering a powerful yet simple-to-use customer portal that can be used with QuickBooks Online.

With a QuickBooks Online customer portal, you and your clients will enjoy:

• Secure File Exchange: Safely upload and download sensitive documents anytime.
• Integrated Communication: Centralize client conversations within the portal to simplify interactions.
• Customizable Forms: Collect client information quickly and accurately.
• Effortless E-Signatures: Digitally sign important documents without hassle.

By leveraging Foyer, your business can manage client relationships more intuitively and efficiently. Spend less time chasing down files and more time providing exceptional service and value.

Excited to set up your Foyer-powered QuickBooks Online portal? Let's get started with the straightforward 5-step guide below.

Step 1: Pick a Client Portal Service

To build your client portal, start by selecting the right software to match your business needs.
Choosing the best service can feel challenging, but we've created helpful guides specifically for small businesses and accounting firms to simplify the process.
If you're still unsure which platform to select, Foyer is an excellent choice.
Foyer offers all the essential tools you need for smooth and secure client interactions, no matter your industry. With Foyer, you can quickly set up a client portal for secure file sharing, encrypted messaging, secure email, and easy integration with DocuSign for e-signatures.
All communications and data within Foyer are protected with end-to-end encryption, giving you complete confidence that your business's and clients' information remains secure.

Step 2: Complete the Onboarding Process

To set up your client portal, simply visit our onboarding wizard and enter your name, email address, and business name. You'll have your own client portal up and running within just one minute—no commitment required.
By default, your portal will be accessible via a Foyer subdomain (e.g., "example.usefoyer.com"). During onboarding, you'll have the option to choose your desired subdomain. If you'd prefer to use a subdomain from your own website (like "portal.yourbusiness.com"), our Support team can easily configure that for you—just reach out anytime.
Need inspiration for naming your portal? Check out our guide on client portal names for helpful tips.

After the onboarding process completed, you'll be redirected to your customer portal's home page.

Step 3: Add Clients and Files to Your Client Portal

On the left side, you'll find a navigation drawer where you can easily access and customize all your portal's features, including secure file sharing, custom forms, knowledge bases, and more.
For now, we'll focus on how to share files and add clients, but later in this guide, we'll briefly cover some of your portal's most essential features.

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A common scenario is sharing files securely with a client, and Foyer offers two convenient ways to do this.
You can invite clients directly to "Spaces" (you'll need to know your client's email address), or you can simply share a link to your "SafeDrop" page, allowing clients to send files without needing to sign in.
I'll walk you through both methods, starting with inviting clients directly to a Space.

But first, let's quickly clarify what a "Space" is.
Spaces are secure, private areas where you can exchange files and messages securely with clients and team members. All files and conversations within a Space are only accessible to its members, much like a private group chat in apps like Teams, Slack, or iMessage.

To create a Space, navigate to the "Spaces" page by clicking "Spaces" in the left drawer, then click the "+" icon on the left side.

When creating a new Space, you'll see a dialog similar to the one below. Here, you can name your Space and select the members who should have access to the files and messages shared within it.
Additionally, you can share Spaces with "Groups." Groups make it easy to organize your business contacts and assign permissions to an entire external team or company all at once. We'll explore this more in the next step!
If you need to add a new client quickly, simply click the "Invite a new Client" button.

All you need to invite a new client is their email address. Other details like their name, phone number, or profile picture are optional—clients can always add these themselves later!
Before saving the new client, consider these two useful organization options:

First, Tags. Tags help you categorize clients using customizable labels, such as the industry they're in (e.g., "Law Firm" or "Healthcare").

Second, Groups. Groups allow you to organize your clients based on the businesses or organizations they belong to. Using groups simplifies assigning access to resources like Spaces or Pages to entire companies, eliminating the hassle of managing permissions for each individual client.

Any new clients you add will automatically appear in the "Members" list and have immediate access to the files shared within your new Space.
To add a group, simply start typing the group's name and select it from the results. Groups can be added to your Space exactly the same way as individual clients.

Once you've added all the users and groups you'd like, click "Save", and you'll be taken directly to your new Space.
Sharing files within your Space is easy—simply drag and drop files into the window or click the "Options" button to upload. Foyer supports files of any size and type, and even allows you to upload entire folders at once.
If you ever need to add or remove users or groups from the Space, just head over to the "Settings" tab and edit the members list.

That covers the first method of sharing files through your client portal using "Spaces." Now, let's explore the second method—allowing your clients to securely send you files without having to log in.
In your Foyer client portal, this feature is called SafeDrop.
Every organization using Foyer automatically receives its own SafeDrop portal. You can find your SafeDrop link on the "Home" tab or by directly visiting "example.usefoyer.com/upload" (remember to replace "example" with your organization's subdomain).

You can share your Foyer SafeDrop link with any client, allowing them to effortlessly send you files from any device. Clients simply enter their name, email address, an optional message, and upload as many files as needed.
Files uploaded via SafeDrop will automatically appear on your Spaces page, labeled clearly as "SafeDrop from ...". Just like regular Spaces, both you and the client will receive notifications whenever new files are uploaded.
Clients who use your SafeDrop portal will be listed as "guest" clients on your Clients page. To keep your business contacts organized, you can easily click on any guest entry to assign appropriate tags or groups.

Step 4: Integrate Your Client Portal Into Your Website (Optional)

Now that your client portal is fully set up, let's integrate it with your website!

The exact steps may vary slightly based on your website hosting provider, but the general process remains straightforward. You'll want to add a link in your website's navigation bar that directs users either to your Foyer client login page or to your SafeDrop page (for secure file uploads).

• If you're linking directly to your client login page, the URL format will be:https://yourorg.usefoyer.com (Be sure to replace "yourorg" with your chosen subdomain.)
• If you're linking to your secure file upload page (SafeDrop), you'll use this URL instead:https://yourorg.usefoyer.com/upload (Again, don't forget to replace "yourorg" with your organization's actual subdomain.)

Great! Your client portal is now seamlessly integrated with your website. Next up, let's explore some additional features that will enhance your business workflows.

Step 5: Explore Your Client Portal's Features

White-Labeling Your Client Portal

With any customer portal, white-labeling is essential for aligning the portal with your own brand identity. White-labeling helps your clients easily recognize your brand and builds trust by showing them your customer portal is official and trustworthy. Beyond trust, there are several other great benefits to white-labeling as well.

Foyer’s customer portal makes white-labeling easy, allowing you to customize colors, logos, emails, your domain name, and more.

On the "Org" page, you can update:

• Your Logo
  Displayed on the login and sign-up pages, throughout all logged-in pages, on all forms, and your SafeDrop page.
• Name
  Shown prominently in the header and on the login and sign-up pages.
• Color
  Applied to the header and buttons throughout the portal, ensuring consistent branding.

Additionally, if you scroll down the Org page, you'll find Foyer’s customizable email templates, which let you personalize the invitation emails sent to both clients and staff.

How to Create Knowledge Bases In Your Client Portal

With your Foyer client portal, sharing knowledge among your team and clients is easy and intuitive.

To create knowledge base pages, simply head to the "Pages" section and click the "+" icon in the left drawer. Give your page a title, then add content using the rich-text editor, which supports embedding videos, inserting images, text formatting, and much more.

By clicking the edit icon (next to the page title), you can select exactly which users or groups have access to the page. Shared pages will appear under the recipients' "Pages" tab. Staff members can collaborate directly within these knowledge base pages, while clients will have read-only access.

Additionally, you can set a specific knowledge base page as your portal's homepage. This means clients and staff can immediately access critical content upon logging in—perfect for onboarding, training, or providing quick links to important resources, greatly enhancing the overall usefulness of your customer portal.

While some businesses choose external platforms like Notion for their knowledge bases, integrating your knowledge base directly into your Foyer client portal provides an all-in-one solution for simplified access and collaboration.

How to Make Custom Forms For Your Client Portal

When interacting with other businesses, you’ll often need to collect custom information—whether it's feedback, onboarding details, or other important data.

Foyer offers an easy and effective solution called Forms. With Forms, you can effortlessly gather exactly the data you need by choosing from a variety of customizable fields (such as text fields, file uploads, and multiple-choice options).

All responses collected through your forms are securely stored directly within your client portal, making it simple to share and collaborate internally with your team. Forms also support file uploads of any size and type—perfect for securely receiving large files. Simply add a field, select the “file” option, and save your form.

Every time a form submission occurs, your staff will receive an immediate email notification, ensuring you never miss an update. Users can easily manage these notifications through their notification settings.

To get started, navigate to the "Forms" tab, select "Form Definitions," and then click "Add Form."

Each form consists of "steps," and each step can contain multiple fields, such as textboxes, file upload inputs, or checkboxes. You can choose between two built-in styles for your forms: "Stepper"—which splits each step into separate pages (ideal for mobile devices), or "Row"—displaying the entire form on a single page (great for desktop use).

How to Keep Your Customer Portal Secure Using Audit Trails

Client portals aren't just about productivity—they're about security too. That's why Foyer includes comprehensive audit trails, ensuring you can easily track every important security event within your organization, helping protect both your clients and your business.

Every audit log entry includes the exact timestamp, the user involved, and a clear description of the action performed. To maintain security integrity, these logs are permanent and cannot be deleted, giving you a reliable way to revisit and review past events at any time.

Here are a few examples of audit log actions you can monitor:

• File deletions
• File previews
• Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) enabled or disabled
  (critical for detecting potential security breaches)
• Failed login attempts
  (helps identify unauthorized access attempts)

Foyer tracks over 50 distinct audit events, providing a thorough picture of what's happening in your portal at all times.

Additionally, if you have clients in regulated industries such as healthcare, detailed audit trails become essential for compliance when handling HIPAA data or other personally identifiable information (PII).

To simplify your security oversight, Foyer also includes powerful search, filtering, and sorting tools for audit logs, making audits straightforward and efficient.

How Will You Use Your Quickbooks Online Customer Portal?

I hope this guide made it easy to create your own Quickbooks Online Customer Portal!

If you have any existing data that you need to migrate into your client portal, let our Support team know, and we can discuss a solution for you.

Thanks for reading. If you have any questions at all, please send a comment below!