Understanding order automation as a logical 'first step' on the road to a full accounting and ERP integration solution
Wednesday, December 6, 2017Lauren Macdonald
Struggling to sell the business leaders at your company on the idea of implementing a full accounting integration solution right off the bat?
We get it. Accounting Integration can be complex, expensive, and at times overwhelming.
So what can you do? Start off small and simple by suggesting easy order automation for a “quick win” that will show your business’s leaders how investing in integration will be worth the effort and up-front costs.
Consider the following:
The logical ‘first step’ in any accounting integration solution is to start by automating the flow of order data from the eCommerce store or retail trading partner, back into the accounting/ERP system.
Most, if not all, of the businesses that choose to automate their processes begin here.
Here’s a few reasons why:
- Most businesses selling 200+ orders a month are no longer able to keep up with the manual data entry this requires.
- It’s easy for the person at the company who is exploring automation to sell their superiors on the fact that order automation would free up valuable time and resources for the company.
- Stakeholders often give up on ideas and/or projects when they seem overly complex or too difficult to implement easily
- Most business leaders won’t go “all in” on a project unless they have evidence early on that there will be a substantial Return on Investment.
Get your feet wet with order automation, and then delve in deeper:
When you implement order automation, you tie up loose ends that could be slowing down your supply chain and harming your customer service. This is because every sales order is populated in the back-office accounting/ERP system in near real-time, making your entire business process more efficient.
We recommend selling the key stakeholders at your business on the need for order automation, first, and then advocating down the road for other data integration that would be helpful for your business as well.
Here’s some other data flows you can consider after your order automation is live:
- Inventory updates
- Shipping/Tracking information
- Product data
- Customer data
- ASNs