It’s amazing how much time and energy continues to be spent on duplicate data entry and re-keying information generated by one system into another. Human-based data entry is prone to errors, takes time, and carries with it the burdens of employee costs and resources. It is a problem that businesses of all types have battled for years even though enabling solutions have been around for a while.
Methods of integrating applications and data have existed for quite some time, and in recent years these methods have expanded to include a wide variety of platforms and more open standards-based approaches. Even in the small business world, business owners using traditionally limited software products can enjoy sophisticated extensions and integration of their applications and business data.
To provide a simple example of the problem: when an individual writes a check, that check must be recorded for several purposes including the recording of the cost or expense as well as the reduction of funds in the bank account. When a product is sold to a customer, inventory is relieved, sales are increased, accounts receivable or cash is increased, costs of goods sold are experienced, and customer activity is captured. All of this information must be recorded, and the activity accounted for throughout the financial and operational systems and can represent a tremendous burden if not automated. This also means that data exists in a variety of places, increasing the challenges of information collecting and reporting.
Cloud-based integration and infrastructure services such as DBSync and Microsoft Azure enable seamless collection, transformation, aggregation and storage of business data. Whether linking accounting with sales CRM or pushing financial and operational data to an Azure data warehouse for analytics, Noobeh and DBSync provide the data engine and the infrastructure to put it all together.
A small business owner’s situation offers a direct illustration. He sells computer parts through an ecommerce website. Orders from this website are emailed to his order operators, who then turn around and re-key the orders into their accounting system where the inventory is also tracked. Because of the increasing number of sales orders and product purchase orders to enter on a regular basis, there were three operators working in the department responsible for making sure website orders make it into the accounting system. Orders were frequently missed or misplaced, entry errors caused problems in accounting and product delivery, customer satisfaction went down, and the cost of handling web orders was increasing.
By implementing a single software solution, the company was able to not just address the current problem, but was set up to seamlessly increase business without increasing headcount. The solution was a system which takes transaction data from the ecommerce system and imports it into the accounting/ERP system. This single step allowed the business to reduce and redirect personnel costs, improve accuracy and timeliness of data entry, and increase customer satisfaction as well as overall business performance.
In even a small company, one piece of information may be used in a variety of ways and in a variety of systems. This complexity is found in simple business models as well as larger and more complex enterprises, revealing the value of integration solutions and automation tools at every level of operation.
Mendelson Consulting and Noobeh cloud services recognize that every business needs the right information at the right time to operate effectively. Our expert teams help businesses implement the solutions which bring business data together, empowering workers to be more productive and giving stakeholders the decision-support tools they need.
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On July 9, 2019, support for SQL Server 2008 and 2008 R2 will end. That means the end of regular security updates and general support for the product. Are you ready?
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Microsoft has made a decision to include more “cloud” capability in its offerings for small business, ending the life of the successful Small Business Server line and replacing it within the Windows Server 2012 family. Some businesses are continuing with locally installed servers and are upgrading to Windows 2012 Essentials (or other editions) for in-house use, but more businesses every day are electing to deploy their servers and systems in the cloud instead.
Cooper Mann Consulting 