How to Save Time and Money by Automating Processes with Integrated ERP

There never seems to be enough time in the day to manage financials, inventory, and manufacturing processes or to capture and analyze all of the resulting data. You and your employees have important tasks to take care of and your business software could be holding you back from achieving ideal productivity. Time is short. Here’s how to save time and money by automating processes in ERP. Watch Your Data, Not the Clock

Watch Your Data, Not the Clock

How quickly can you access data from the various departments within your organization? Where are the sales figures, income and expenses, or labor information and how do you go about getting the most current data? If you’re like many businesses, using disparate specialty software to manage all this information, you probably need to jump through several hoops to get it. Weekly meetings, emails to departmental managers or digging though paperwork takes up valuable time. The longer it takes to get your data, the older it is when you get to use it which makes for risky decision-making.

In today’s fast-paced marketplace, you don’t have time to wait for key metrics to cross your desk. Don’t watch the clock, watch your data. By replacing outdated software and rigid legacy systems with more agile, modern technology, you’ll be able to monitor data in real-time and use it to respond faster to new opportunities, watch for exceptions or deviations, and drive successful business growth.

Flexible, Integrated ERP Delivers Time-Saving Automations

Centralize your data to make it easier for your people to enter, access and reach. Today’s integrated ERP solutions, like Microsoft Dynamics GP, provide all the functionality you need within a single solution. You can manage financials, inventory, supplier and vendor information, manufacturing and distribution operations, and other core business processes in one place. Integrating this data offers several time-saving benefits:

1. Workflows: Built-in and customizable workflows streamline data entry. Users can enter data more efficiently, improving productivity throughout your organization.
2. Alerts and notifications: Establish alerts to notify leaders when a certain task or situation takes place—for example, when an invoice reaches too many days outstanding or when inventory drops to a certain level. Using real-time data allows your people to spot potential problems faster and take proactive steps to correct and prevent exceptions.
3. Consolidate data: Data is far easier to find and use within a centralized, integrated system. You and your team can access data from anywhere and at any time, without having to wait for a meeting or a report sent through email. Microsoft Dynamics GP also offers mobility, enabling you and your team to access data while working from home, at lunch or at a customer’s office.
4. Business intelligence: ERP also offers dashboards, robust reporting and other business intelligence features. Leaders can review and analyze data from across the enterprise and use it to make swift, prudent business decisions.

It’s Time to Replace Outdated Software with ERP

When it comes to running a successful business, time is of the essence. Don’t waste any more time with outdated software and inefficient processes. Arm your team with time-saving tools and take advantage of real-time data. It’s time to replace outdated software with ERP. Contact OTT, Inc. for guidance with choosing and deploying the ERP solution that will best support your unique business needs and goals.

Deliver a Superior Customer Experience by Understanding the Customer Journey

A customer may have many interactions with your business that go beyond the relationship with a sales representative. Marketing, sales and customer service interactions offer many opportunities to nurture the relationship and develop insights that promote long-term loyalty. To deliver a superior customer experience, you must fully understand the customer journey.

Understand and Satisfy Customers Through Journey Mapping

Your sales representatives work hard to understand and satisfy your customers. Ask any one of them and they’ll be happy to list off a specific customer and their preferred products, how long they’ve been a customer, and any number of unique things about that customer or the business they represent. While all of this is important to increasing customer satisfaction, your sales reps aren’t the only employees who engage your customers.

Customers may interact with your business or employees through marketing campaigns, sales orders, customer service, your accounting team, on social media or your website, and with post-sale follow-up. Many businesses perform journey mapping to identify each of these touch points, and for good reason. Each touch point is important. While a positive customer experience with your sales team is essential, on the other side of the coin, a poor experience with your accounting team or being routed through the call center to get a simple product question answered could cost you a loyal customer.

Turn Customer Data into Actionable Insight

Mapping the customer journey uncovers information you need to make improvements and strengthen customer relationships. Using a modern business management solution to capture key customer data is essential for turning this information into action. Dynamics 365 is a powerful solution that will support these efforts. Formerly known as Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Dynamics 365 is being used by many businesses to capture core business data in addition to key marketing, sales and customer information.

Dynamics 365 will centralize key data from across your organization from accounting to inventory to sales and marketing. Centralizing data makes it easier for your employees to enter, locate and analyze. By centralizing data within Dynamics 365, you will be able to hone in on the customer experience through each touch point within your company.

Armed with real-time, reliable information, you will be able to identify what makes your customers tick. Business intelligence features will highlight trends in sales, marketing activities and other key areas. You will be able to discover which marketing campaigns are getting noticed and which are converting to sales. You will learn which platforms your customers prefer – whether that’s online, social networks or email.

Just as important as knowing how to engage customers, you will also be able to follow trends that may suggest friction. Should marketing efforts fall flat or sales begin to drop, you can take action to address potential weaknesses before they grow into bigger problems.

Strengthen Sales, Marketing and Customer Satisfaction with Dynamics 365

Capture the data being generated each day with Dynamics 365, then put it to good use. Modern technology offers many benefits, but it all comes down to your ability to capture the right information, analyze it and use it to drive growth. Contact OTT, Inc. to learn how to strengthen sales and deliver a superior customer experience.