Is a Lack of Integration Holding Your Business Back?

Does your business use an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solution? If you’re reading this, then the answer is probably yes. Or, at least, you’re interested in purchasing one. What about a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software? You know, so you can manage leads, customers, opportunities, quotes etc.? How do you sell your product? Maybe through a catalog or retail outlet? Maybe through a web store? If a web store, on what platform is your e-commerce site built?

I’m throwing a lot of questions at you but here is the really important one: If you’re using two or more software systems to run your business, how are they talking to each other? How are they integrated with one another so you’re tracking sales, receivables, and payables? A proper system integration ensures you’re not duplicating data and effort by maintaining uniquely identifiable customer records, inventory counts and order data which are the same in each system.

A lack of integration or a poorly implemented integration can mean duplicate data, slow order processing, fulfillment delays, unhappy customers, and profit loss. We’ve seen companies with third party integrations who don’t see orders from their web store hit their fulfillment operation for days.

A change in one system which is not properly anticipated in another system can mean the orders aren’t communicated from the web store to the ERP or from the ERP to the warehouse at all! This is a nightmare for any operations manager.

Imagine customers ordering products from you and never getting them? Or worse, they get the product but the order isn’t billed and nobody ever notices. Gasp! The prospect is fairly frightening but you can prevent this

An IT systems expert should always be on hand to check the status of an integration. Daily reports should be generated by each system to show possible errors in the integration which can then be promptly handled by your staff.

The best third party integrations keep logs of what is communicated between systems so users can confirm smooth operations and a seamless order to cash process.

The ideal option is to remove the need for a third party integration altogether. Needless to say, if one of these systems can require an IT budget and constant oversight, the need for two or more of these systems can create a hairball of systems that’s difficult to effectively manage.

Systems like NetSuite, which are built on a single, unified platform in the cloud, can allow companies of any size to use the same database to run all operations. With ERP, CRM and e-commerce built on the same platform and using the same database, clumsy integrations can be avoided and the budget to maintain them can be directed elsewhere in the company.

Imagine a web store or a Point of Sale (POS) system that takes orders and puts them directly into your ERP system, tracks customer-based pricing, commits products from inventory, fulfills the order and bills the customer all from the same screen using the same customer, inventory and order records. Combined with the use of security roles and workflow, the entire business can be run in just such a smooth manner taking the pressure off third party integration entirely.

Of course, integration is sometimes absolutely necessary and it’s not necessarily an evil that must simply be tolerated. When properly implemented and overseen, integrated business applications can indeed run smoothly. But if you need to consolidate, then consider your options for removing from the equation an integration that cannot be maintained properly with the resources you have.