Desktop professional tax products are one of the major areas to be affected. Sales of Lacerte and ProSeries will now be handled more like subscription products instead of products that are accounted for as license sales.
The company is also gearing up for a major push to convert desktop QuickBooks customers to QuickBooks Online. For the first time, there were more QBO customers than desktop customers signing on during the most recently ended quarter. The number of QBO subscribers hit 683,000, up from 624,000 on April 30. And it was up 40 percent from the 487,000 at the end for fiscal 2013.
Intuit is planning initiatives to entice users and accountants to move to QBO. Changes in the company's approach to the market, according to CEO Brad Smith.
"We are strengthening the desktop product with ongoing experience release," Smith said.Those will not sport new features but will concentrate on making the product easier to use, but will also have connections to online products, such as e-invoicing and the Intuit Commerce Network.
There will also be incentives for customers and accountants to move to QuickBooks Online.