Definition: An Enterprise Resource Planning system is a software packed with many features that can help you to do tasks like product planning, product development, accounting, sales management, inventory management, human resource and many more. Having this multitude of features in one software suite makes this too an essential part of any industry.
How Much Does ERP Software Cost?
This is a fair question. The implementation process of an Enterprise Resource Planning system or ERP system represents a significant investment of money and time.
To be honest, figuring out how much ERP system costs is a tricky question to answer. ERP systems are complex and there are multiple factors that need to be considered prior to a final estimate can be given.
However, understanding parts that influence the cost of the ERP will help give you a better idea of how much you can expect to pay.
Following are the key factors that influence the total price of ERP software:
The number of users: Irrespective of business type, most of the time ERP systems are priced on a per-user basis. So, the more users that need to access the ERP system, the costlier the licensing cost.
Type of business: It’s obvious that no two organisations are the same. For example, the wide size manufacturing industry will need a more robust and sophisticated system than a small service type business. To select the best manufacturing ERP software, conduct deep requirement analysis. Until you have done the analysis, ERP software vendors won’t be able to offer an estimation.
Third Party Add-ons: To increase the functionality of the manufacturing ERP, many software vendors integrate Add-ons from other companies as well. Because the 3rd party products are designed to personalize & enhance experience working with the ERP system, you can expect to spend about 10 to 15 % more of the overall software costs.
Additional customization:Since each business is unique, off the shelf solution won’t be able to answer every need. You will be needing additional customization to fulfil your needs. Whether you provide in-house developers or hire from outside, customization will increase your manufacturing ERP software cost.
Upgrades: Like all other programs, your manufacturing ERP software will need upgrades to avoid becoming obsolete. You must plan how often you will be needing upgradation process and how much you will spend when you will go through the process. When an important upgrade becomes available, you’ll have to spend an upgrade fee. During the upgradation process, you might require additional software and hardware to run the system smoothly as well.
Maintenance: Unless you are thinking of obtaining a cloud-based ERP system, most of the system will require ongoing maintenance. Ongoing maintenance totally depends on the vendor. Carefully consider who will support you after the implementation of the ERP system. Sometimes vendors send 3rd party employees to run scheduled maintenance, however, this is not an ideal method. Talk in brief about after sales support and know how things will carry on after installing. The cost of ERP maintenance is about 12 to 18 % of the investment in a system.
The Bottom Line?
This blog can offer you the starting blocks you must have to build a comprehensive ERP budget, for your manufacturing business, as well as a good way to evaluate your total Manufacturing ERP system cost. However, if you are looking for a more detailed answer or have a question about ERP for the manufacturing industry, get in touch with our experts, they are waiting to answer your call 24/7.
AI or Artificial intelligence is the next big technological revolution which is already here, and an entrepreneur should not ignore it; they have to embrace it in order to secure business success. If you stay vigilant you will see there are hundreds of businesses, every shape and size already started harnessing the AI’s power- from bank evaluating the enormous amount of data to detect fraudulent transfer, to small businesses deploying chatbots on their website to improve customer satisfaction, AI has already started to change our life.
Machine learning, voice recognition, and virtual assistant are some of the biggest symbols of how AI is being utilized to simplify or enhance business processes and services. Tech giants such as Facebook and Google regularly use AI to display advertisements depending on the user’s shopping history, age, preferred brand, location, etc. Google’s Okay Google or Amazon’s Alexa is a groundbreaking technology on the AI front. These corporations are funding heavily in AI systems in order to expand their operational effectiveness and provide enhanced customer satisfaction.
At Unicode Solutions, we believe AI has enormous potential for improving the way organizations operate. AI will definitely enable companies to continuously adapt processes based on past experience — ushering in vast improvements in customer targeting, for instance, because deep learning algorithms will be able to spot patterns in behavior that are more likely to lead to sales. In supply chains and manufacturing, potential benefits will include predictive maintenance of equipment, along with yield and inventory optimization.
Artificial intelligence is the next big thing, and business owners shouldn’t neglect it; they must embrace it. Why? The top 3 reasons are stated below:
Giving 24/7 customer service: Do you know what’s the best thing about the machine? Well, like you and me, they don’t go on vacation nor neither they need to sleep! Considering the fact that, chatbots are getting more intelligent to understand different human emotions such as fear, confusion, anger, and joy. So when a chatbot encounters adverse emotions from distress clients, they can transfer it to a human for more to take over & finish assisting the clients.
Automation:For the last few years, automation is continually changing the dynamics of business. It has been recognized as one of the main trends in marketing and sales. And according to experts, it’s not going to step back! Studies conducted by McKinsey stated that 85% of sales- related jobs could be automated by the year 2020, which is almost here! And it’s on the track as well because as a CRM development company, we are witnessing a huge number of enterprises are coming out to know about sales and marketing software for their business’ and the reason is quite obvious.
So, what benefit an organization can gain by automating sales related tasks? Well, first of all, the sales representative will spend less time collecting data & more time finding their true capabilities. It also needs to mention that personalized, real-time content targeting generates 20% more sales opportunities. With behavioural targeting systems, intelligence tools will be capable to nurture potential leads at the initial stage, personalized cost, or give recommendations about offering discounts to certain prospects. And so to increase the chance of successfully closing the deal.
Simplify Usage of CRM: Sales CRM or Customer Relationship Management combined with AI technology can automate the collection and data analysis process efficiently and without active involvement with human hands. This deep data analysis will offer deeper knowledge regarding customer preference. A good build sales CRM can recognize prospects who will likely respond to an email and then the tool can automatically deliver emails to them. This increases the chance of saving valuable resources as well as boost the chance of successfully closing a deal.
With AI, the sales person doesn’t have to manually go through the huge number of leads to find out qualified leads. AI can do that process within minutes, which in turn saves a lot of time and improve the efficiency of the business and productivity of sales reps. So if you need to simplify the Sales CRM usage and make the sales process more efficient, having AI-powered CRM would be a wise decision.
Wrapping up:
The 21st century is definitely is the beginning of the Golden Age of Information & AI technology and it is time for organizations to take a hard look at their businesses and discover methods to start integrating these trends. In the end, there’s no doubt about the effectiveness of AI in the world of sales. So if you aspire to win more sales through more efficient selling, it is time to include Artificial intelligence technology into your business. It is the future of businesses that can surely take your business to the next level.
If you want continuous business growth, you understand that CRM or Customer Relationship Management system is essential. According to a study conducted by Nucleus Research, on average, a CRM user can experience more than 8 USD return on every dollar they invest in CRM tools.
Most businesses that use CRM software, leverage it for sales because it helps keep customers and potential customer contact information in one place. Despite being a major sales assistant, if you own an e-commerce business, you will be needing more than a sales tool though. you will need a tool where you can manage your inventory, read your stock status and do more. If you are considering buying the shelf solution, that might not work for you. What you need is a custom solution for your needs. However, if you want to know How to Build a CRM System for Your eCommerce Business, continue with this post!
So before we begin explaining how you can build a great e-commerce CRM software, you must know what benefits you will get from having a personalized solution. The benefits follows:
Scalability
Reliability
user-friendly
Compatibility
Better Analytics
Perfect Fit to Your Needs
competitive business advantage
Business Processes Improvements
Now, let’s see the Step-by-Step Guide to Creating Custom CRM Solutions for E-commerce Business
Know your goal:It’s essential to recognize what you want from the CRM. Otherwise, the development process will last much longer than you would like it to.
Our recommendation at this point is to have definite goals for your e-commerce CRM, set of functions or features, and your expectations towards how the software should simplify business processes in a company. In the ideal world, all this must be noted and handed to your IT partner development team.
Define the role: It’s a great idea to prepare a categorization by roles in the CRM (e.g. marketing, inventory management, sales). Each role will have access to specific functionality as well as data. This will help you reduce the potential risks of data breaches among departments that aren’t supposed to see it.
Designing and Building the Wireframes: This stage lays the groundwork for further development. During this phase, make sure you talk to the development company if you think the design is not up to the mark. One piece of advice- bring in your employees and ask them if the navigation and UI look easy to them. If any changes required, let the CRM software developer know. At this point, it won’t be difficult to make the changes, however, if the development phase starts, to change specific things would be a daunting task for the developer and the vendor can charge extra depending upon the changes and extra time they spend.
Internal Software or SaaS Platform: If you have any plan to turn your custom-built Customer Relationship Management system into a software as a service in the future, it’s advised to start developing the backbone of the software for this from the very first day of the product development.
Summing up, it’s worth stating that well-built e-commerce, CRM system can double the efficiency and productivity of your business and team. This tool is a must-have if you want to fight with your competitors and present your customers with the best service and treatment they desire.
In case you need any help with CRM for your e-commerce business, you may contact our team to get a professional consultation. Our team has expertise in building CRM software for healthcare, financial institutions as well as e-commerce, and the entertainment industry. Reach out to Crims today to secure your businesses’ tomorrow.
