Category: Morse Data News and Events
See InOrder ERP at IRCE 2016
In June, the InOrder Team is attending the IRCE in Chicago, which is the world’s largest eCommerce event. If you’re looking for a leading ERP system with a strong eCommerce platform, stop by our booth (#585) and ask what InOrder can do for you.
8 Great Things to Know About InOrder
- InOrder is a fully integrated system that includes tools for order entry, demographic collection, return authorizations, repeat orders, order history, correspondence, and order taking. This means that you have the critical information you need in real-time, and your customers have up-to-the-minute views of what’s in stock. Information is all in one place where everyone who needs it can see it, from Marketing, to CSRs, to Management.
- InOrder is scalable to easily accommodate additional modules, enhancements, and users as your business grows. So you only buy what you need when you need it.
- InOrder offers US-based technical support.
- Contact management capabilities that easily accommodate additional CSRs for seasonal sales, and gives CSRs complete information from a single database.
- Marketing software supports complete marketing management with target list generation, promotions, personalization, loyalty programs, Email marketing, and more.
- Easily manage your financials in real-time across all departments. InOrder’s Job Cost Tracking and Report lets you track and report on the many detail-oriented tasks within your organization. Quote ongoing fulfillment jobs and individual kit building projects and automatically calculate project costs and profitability as the job parameters change – letting you know how low a quote you can submit and still turn a profit.
- Manage multiple client data separately in one database, yet allow them access through your customized, real-time system.
- Real-Time eCommerce links your website directly to your InOrder database. This flexible yet robust module gives you multiple images per item, short and long item descriptions, category and hierarchy controls, up-sell, cross-sell, B2C or B2B presentations based on login criteria and a completely customizable look and feel.
Wish Lists Make Ordering Easy
A wish list is a basic feature of online stores that let customers buy when they’re ready, and makes ordering and re-ordering easy.
The InOrder Wish List feature allows web customers to build a list of products they hope to purchase in the future.
Users may add items to their wish lists, in addition to placing “regular” orders on the web site. The InOrder Wish List is maintained as a separate order, which enables them to be viewed or edited from InOrder in the same real-time fashion as regular web orders. Inventory levels are not affected by wish lists until wish list items are added to the shopping cart.
When a customer adds an item to his/her wish list or views the wish list, the View Wish List page is displayed. Items may be removed from the wish list and quantities may be updated on the View Cart page.
Shoppers may add one or all items from their Wish List to their shopping cart, and they may move items from their shopping cart to a Wish List.
If enabled by your settings, items on a shopper’s wish list may also be displayed on a carousel on the home page.
The InOrder Wish List Enhancement provides the following features:
- Allow customers to convert their wish list into an active shopping cart.
- Allow customers to move items from their current shopping cart to their wish list.
- Allow Customer Service Reps to view a customer’s wish list and edit it when necessary. This can be useful when talking to a customer.
- Allow your Marketing Department to collectively report on and review items from customer wish lists. This can be helpful when making pricing or reorder decisions.
- Display wish lists on a carousel on the home page.
- Inventory levels are not affected by wish lists until wish list items are added to the shopping cart.
Contact us for more information about InOrder Wish Lists features.
How Many Ways Does an ERP System Improve Your Business?
An ERP system can help your business thrive by aligning with your business strategy, improving decision-making, and improving responsiveness to your customers.
An ERP system integrates information across your organization. It relies on a single database and automates the flow of information. It keeps all of your information in one place, and easily lets others across your enterprise view it, including marketing, customer service reps, and management. This data sharing leads to greater efficiency within your organization.
A well-designed ERP system incorporates the aspects of your business to give you a clear view of it. Real-time inventory and order tracking provides up to the minute views of what is in stock and where, across all channels, including retail point of sale, call center, and the Web.
An ERP system integrates your systems and processes with everything you need to manage your business, from financials to CRM. Keep track of products, customer spending patterns, available credit, and how much they owe. You can even automate tasks, such as providing shipping and delivery estimates, recovering abandoned carts to increase your revenue, prompting customers to visit your website using your packing slips and receipts, or avoiding backorders resulting from high volume customers.
So, how many ways can an ERP system improve your business?
Get InOrder at the Operations Summit 2016
The InOrder Team is attending the 5th Annual Operations Summit in Cincinnati OH April 12-14 at Duke Energy Convention Center.
If you’ll be at the Operations Summit and you’re for a place to eat while you’re there, here are my Cincinnati restaurant picks and reviews, for your stay at Operations Summit 2016.
- Taste of Belgium 1133 Vine St. Cincinnati OH 45202 (513) 381-4607
Only a 15 minute walk to the corner of 12th and Vine. A must-try home-made waffle experience that is worth any wait time. And there is always a wait time; however, they do take some reservations. Best for breakfast or brunch. 80% of customers order the shiracha chicken and waffle dish, and I would again every time.
- Senate Pub 1212 Vine St. Cincinnati OH 45202 (513) 421-2020
An upscale bar with great eats, just across the street from Bakersfield and kiddy-corner from Taste of Belgium.
- Bakersfield OTR 1213 Vine St. Cincinnati OH 45202 (513) 579-0446
Mexican fare that includes my favorite short rib tacos, just across the street from Senate Pub and kiddy-corner from Taste of Belgium.
- Pho Lang Thang 114 W Elder St. Cincinnati OH 45202 (513) 376-9177
A 6 minute drive, or a 10 minute bus ride, North down Elm and into the Findlay Market. Known for their pho noodle soup, and a phenomenal banh mi (gilled lemongrass pork) sandwich.
- Terry’s Turf Club 4618 Eastern Ave Cincinnati OH 45226 (513) 533-4222
A 15 minute drive East, down the Ohio river but still in Cincinnati limits. A medium sized home-made diner atmosphere, full of nostalgia and circuses. Best juicy burgers in Cincinnati, and one of the top places ever featured on Diner’s Drive-in’s and Dives. Terry’s decor is full of bells and whistles. Also Terry and his brother frequently engage the audience to provide back stories, trivia, and laughter.
- Virgil’s Cafe 710 Fairfield Avenue Bellevue KY 41073 (859) 491-3287
Just across the Ohio River in Kentucky, this down-home fine dining establishment works great for lunch or dinner. Reservations are recommended.
- Blue Ash Chili 9565 Kenwood Rd Cincinnati OH 45242 (513) 984-6107
All three locations are in the Northeast suburbs of Cincinnati. At the nearest from the Convention center (under 30 minutes) in Blue Ash Ohio, usually all the seats are just about taken, but I’ve never waited more than a few minutes. Blue Ash Chili is an flavorful chili experience that for chili fans, is definitely worth passing the Cincinnati skyline. Several clever dishes add chili to a few special foundations such as spaghetti or over fried jalepeno caps.
- Island Frydays 2826 Vine St. Cincinnati OH 45219 (513) 498-0680
A dive cafe featuring rich and savory caribbean chicken plates.
- Melt Eclectic Cafe 4165 Hamilton Ave Cinncinati OH 45223 (513) 681-6358
A tiny Cafe, with a daunting but quick line that usually runs out the door, but a clever system that gets you a table when your food is ready. The perfect savory Melt sandwich can be had here.
5 Helpful Articles for Your Business
- Are you considering offering in-store pickup? Consumers are interested.
- Make sure your employees are properly trained in cyber security. And check out the free posters from Halock Security labs.
- Are you considering offering your products to shoppers in other countries? eMarketer explains the who, where, how, and why of cross-border shopping trends.
- Is your profitability suffering because your operations are not efficient? This article may explain why.
- Motivate shoppers to use your website for researching your products and make it easy to buy from you by providing what they need. Embrace your Comparison Shoppers to build confidence, trust, and interact with them.
Capturing Sales From Comparison Shoppers
Some shoppers research in stores, where they can touch and feel products, and then buy online at the best price they can find. This type of shopping challenges stores to find ways to capture sales before they walk out the door. They have to discover what motivates their customers to buy in-store, sign up for a store loyalty program, and interact with the store on Facebook. Could it be instant gratification and no shipping costs? Return policies?
Shoppers also research online and buy in stores, and online businesses need that same information. What motivates customers to buy online, sign up for a loyalty program, and interact with your business on Facebook?
Researching and comparison shopping is as common online as it is in a store, and all businesses need to make sure they’re doing all they can to keep their customers and attract new shoppers.
Do your customers research online and buy in the store, or do they research in the store and buy online? How do you capture their sales?
Payment Gateways Pushing Ahead with SSl/TLS Transitions Despite PCI SSC Extension
If you process payments for credit cards or PayPal, you may be aware that the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) announced last year that payment applications must transition from SSL and early TLS versions to newer and more secure TLS versions by June 2016.
While the PCI SSC has more recently extended the migration completion date to June 2018 (http://blog.pcisecuritystandards.org/migrating-from-ssl-and-early-tls), some (not all) individual gateways are still proceeding with plans to disable all versions of SSL and early TLS versions before this date.
Among these individual gateways, PayPal has recently announced that they will “move forward in implementing these security standards this year” (June 2016) despite the PCI SSC extension (https://www.paypal-knowledge.com/infocenter/index?page=content&widgetview=true&id=FAQ1914&viewlocale=en_US). Also, Paymentech previously announced plans to transition to only newer versions of TLS in June 2016 and has recently announced an extension only to December 2016.
Re-evaluate Your ERP System Before the Next Shopping Rush
It’s almost spring! Ducks will soon be chasing after their chicks and keeping them in line. In preparation for the day their eggs start hatching, they will be finding a safe place for them, building a nest, protecting it. They will be organized and efficient.
Just like those ducks that keep everything InOrder, you work hard for your business, protecting it and growing it to its full potential. You make sure you have a safe place to do business, quality products, and experienced customer service to build your reputation.
To keep the momentum, it’s beneficial for any long-time software users to evaluate how they’re using their software and determine whether improvements can be made in their processes. Your business is constantly evolving and improving, and your processes and ERP system must improve with your business. Spring is a great time for this – the holiday rush is over and it’s time to prepare for improvements before the next holiday. Here are some things to consider as you evaluate your ERP system.
Is your staff doing manual tasks that can be automated? With the right ERP system, you can automate tasks such as providing shipping and delivery estimates, recovering abandoned carts to increase your revenue, prompting customers to visit your website using your packing slips and receipts, or avoiding backorders resulting from high volume customers.
Are you getting the most out of your web cart? How fast can customers find your products? Your ERP system must be committed to helping you improve the shopping experience you deliver, while lowering costs and increasing sales. Customers want to quickly find what they want, track shipments with real-time order status, and personally manage their account information.
Are you using your ERP system to its fullest advantage? Equally as important as having the best technology is knowing what it can do for your business, and using it to continuously improve your workflows. Have your employees reverted to old processes? Adequate training means the knowledge and support of your system is in the hands of qualified users.
When it’s time to re-evaluate your ERP system, give us a call. Morse Data is committed to Change Management and Continuous Process Improvement. Changes can get out of line, but we can help get your ducks InOrder.
4 Helpful Articles for Your eCommerce Business
- If you saw a rise fraud attempts this holiday season, you weren’t alone. Check out these findings from ACI Worldwide detailing an increase in eCommerce Transactions and corresponding fraud attempts.
- Security is a big deal in retail, and hackers know it. Trustwave has advice for holding them at bay.
- If you use Magento, make sure you address these critical cross-site scripting vulnerabilities.
- Use these suggestions to recover up to 30% of abandoned carts.