QuickBooks Not So Quick Anymore?

As your business grows, it is often prudent to take a close look at your systems and how efficiently they perform for your business. Many small and mid-size companies utilize QuickBooks, Excel spreadsheets and other platforms that were an optimal choice in the early days of their organizations’ evolution, but over time those systems have become dated and inefficient. Contact Meridian Business Services today for more information on how you can save time, money and make technology work for you on the #1 Cloud-Based ERP NetSuite.

Below are  common challenges we see organizations running QuickBooks experiencing and how to overcome these obstacles:

1. It’s difficult to find out what’s really happening across the business in real-time.

This is a common problem when your staff must hunt for the right spreadsheets, data is stored across different departments, reports are error-prone/quickly outdated/difficult to access, and challenging to gain a comprehensive view across all business units.  The solution is to obtain an operating system with the intelligence that enables you to see your whole business in one place in real-time. In addition, an intelligent system will provide customized role-based views, reminders, and objectives that sync with Outlook and calendars to drive the day.  For example, a CEO might see profit, loss, and sales charts while an Inventory Manager might see open purchase orders and current stock levels.  A cloud-based platform that contains data across all departments allows for a current and accurate view of any portion of the organization at any time.

2. There are too many manual processes for entering and reconciling data across multiple systems.

When there are several different systems that do not “talk” to each other, it can make workflow difficult and untimely. Streamline communications across departments, enforce accountability, minimize costs, and reduce manual errors with an integrated platform that keeps tabs on all business processes.  Modern systems have customized workflow creation capabilities that improve the manual processes.  This will not only save time, but it will create transparency of everyone’s job and processes, while eliminating the headache caused when an employee goes on vacation, is out ill, or leaves the company.

3. More accounting is being done outside QuickBooks than in it.

Finance staff members often use several applications to do their jobs. Payroll, asset management, CRM, sales, accounting and additional financial data is usually stored on different systems.  As systems become increasingly dated and difficult to work with, the company often can’t adapt which can negatively affect growth.  As your organization grows, a scalable platform can not only accommodate growth, but can also make audits a breeze, assist with tax laws/regulatory compliance, improve day to day operations, and integrate the increasingly popular contingent worker staff.

4. Sales are lost because employees can’t get information fast enough.

Customer expectations are shifting, and they expect a world-class experience from companies of all sizes.  Ecommerce has set the standard for all consumers — “The Amazon Effect.”  They expect real-time stock levels, confirmation of orders/delivery status, ability to call customer service after order placement for changes/additions, and more.  When their expectations aren’t met, they go elsewhere — It only takes a few minutes for them to look up your competitor online and your sale is lost. It is a wise decision to get on the ecommerce bus or be left behind.  With integrated software, you will be able to deliver a world-class customer experience while collecting customers’ data for future and repeat business.  An integrated eCommerce and ERP platform also provides a faster time to market with a lower overall TCO for comparable functionality.

5. The organization spends too much time worrying about technology instead of focusing on business results.

The hairball effect of multiple systems is challenging to manage.  Often, as a result of this “electronic spaghetti” upgrades are costly and challenging – resulting in version-lock.  However, the combination of cloud, social, data and mobile technology gives small and mid-size companies the chance to deploy a comprehensive, integrated systems landscape and compete with companies of all sizes. The willingness to try is critical.  Technology can be a cost-effective tool that lead to the drivers for success:

• Timely information and insight: real-time data across all departments at the touch of a single button
• Report with accuracy: ability to drill down from the big picture down to single transactions for precise numbers and data
• Define business processes and discipline: use software that conforms to your business and can adjust for your growth
• Self-Sufficiency: Your ability to manage the system(s) without requiring costly third-party support services and self-administer business process changes through “No Code” or “Low Code” graphical workflow editing
• Central source for the truth: all data in one integrated system

Now more than ever is the time to take a close look at your operating system for warehouse management, ecommerce, financial transactions, reporting and more.  If you find yourself spending too much time compiling information to run a singe report from different departments, then it’s probably time to make a change.

NetSuite’s modern approach to business management provides you with a platform that overcomes the challenges above and grows with your company:

• Cloud solution – NetSuite is the #1 Cloud-Based ERP with 60,000+ organizations running the platform. In less than 24 hours you have a new software platform available for configuration without the need to purchase costly servers.  The platform also provides bi-annual updates, so you are always on the latest version.
• Unified Platform – One solution across all segments of your organization – ERP, financials, warehouse, eCommerce, Business Intelligence.
• Built for your Industry – NetSuite’s SuiteSuccess model has customized the platform for your industry to accelerate implementation and provide the data and wokflows you need from the start.
• Flexible Platform – Provides a platform that makes it easy to add unlimited number of custom fields and database tables along with “code-less” graphical workflow editing. Now a Power User can build your business processes without hiring a developer.
• Self Sufficiency – Allows the organization to make the required changes to business processes to stay competitive as the business environment grows at a faster rate without requiring costly support from the vendor or costly software updates.