Business the board programming robotizes the cycles connected with business benefits and investigates explicit essential information. They are fundamental for proficient and quick business executives. Notwithstanding, confronted with the overflow of the executive’s arrangements accessible available, organizations need assistance tracking down their strategy for getting around and picking the one that addresses their issues, consequently, the subject of our article.
Business Management Software: Definition
Business management software is a tool that computerizes all company business operations. This management software is part of ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and CRM (Customer Relationship Management).
- Commercial management software centralizes all commercial information.
- It automates a maximum of tasks related to the stages of Customer Relationship Management (CRM): prospecting, sales, delivery, invoicing, and loyalty.
- It collects vital data related to these steps and provides statistical tables for analysis in real-time.
- Some tools offer additional features: for project management, for example, or an accounting software component to record accounting entries, expense reports, etc.
Thanks to this type of CRM tool, you optimize the company’s commercial management by making it faster and more fluid and obtaining a refined vision of the critical indicators.
The Commercial Management Of A Company: Definition
The term business management is a term encompassing a large number of functions and resources within a business. Commercial management brings together the entire retail chain of the company, from the prospecting stage to the conclusion of selling the company’s product or service to its customers. Commercial management, therefore, concerns all the methods and tools in place in the company to optimize both commercial relations and the management of sales cycles.
Good commercial management makes it possible to pilot the organization, manage the interactions with its current and potential customers, and follow the sales and the stocks. In possession of this different information, the company can anticipate its commercial actions and operation, which is why the commercial management of a company is regularly compared to its backbone.
What Is Business Management Software Used For?
As the definition indicates, commercial management software is a central tool for organizing, automating, structuring and controlling the company’s operation. Thanks to this software, your company will ensure the complete management of its services while obtaining clues to make strategic decisions. More precisely, with computerized management software, you will:
- Establish purchase orders, delivery slips, sales invoices and quotes in 3 clicks.
- Reduce the time spent managing to invoice = almost automatic creation of commercial contracts (no re-entering of information)
- Reduce the risk of errors related to manual entry.
- Follow prospects in the conversion funnel.
- Improve the conversion rate.
- Centralize commercial information and documents by customer = improves and accelerates customer relationship management.
- Facilitate bank reconciliation,
- The gain in efficiency (alerts, even automatic reminders in the event of non-payment)
- Have a refined vision of the commercial activity and the company’s profitability (thanks to the dashboards to follow the customer orders, the receipts, the turnover by the customer, etc.)
- Provide support for strategic decision-making.
- = allows centralized management of the sales department
Therefore, commercial management software will give the company a real competitive advantage, regardless of the sector of activity (construction, logistics, transport, medical, craftsman, merchant, trade, etc.). The computerization of commercial management saves time because your quotes and invoices, purchase orders and delivery are generated more quickly.
This tool also makes it possible to centralize information, avoiding duplicates and errors. This software solution gives you a real-time dashboard of all business management indicators. Ultimately, you manage the company smoothly, without error or wasting time looking for information.
Another benefit of business management software is the standardization of your company’s business process. Indeed, this allows you to ensure that all prospects and customers go through the same sales funnel phases. You are thus confident that the commercial line of your company is respected.
How To Choose Between Commercial Management Software And Business Management Software?
The distinction and the choice between the two software categories must be made considering the company’s needs. Does the company need to optimize its entire business process? Does it only need to maximize invoicing and follow up on outstanding payments? Does it want software encompassing the whole business process without the administrative part?
Does its development shortly lead it to choose software that can add features over time to support its development? After identifying his company’s needs, the manager or the company’s strategic functions can evaluate the software’s scope of actions to select the appropriate type of software.
It is necessary to know for the choice of the commercial management software adapted to the company that most of this software, if they propose the entirety of the commercial functions, however, have a dominant functionality (CRM, invoicing, treasury…).
It is, therefore, advisable to find out about the main functionality of the different software because, depending on their dominant functionality and the prices charged, your company may (or certainly not) have an interest in opting for software with CRM functionalities. It is significantly developed if you mainly want access to treasury software, for example.
What Are The Complementary Modules To Commercial Management?
Commercial management software – crm software – will often integrate one or more additional modules into the retail component:
- A module instead focused on the accounting program.
- the configuration in several currencies for an import and export activity
- a collaborative project management module – time management
- logistics software with purchasing management, order management, stock and inventory
- A financial management or analytical accounting module to calculate interim management balances, cost prices and margins, etc.
- a module dedicated to cash: cash monitoring, budgets and cash forecast according to given deadlines
- a module dedicated to monitoring checks (for merchants)
- a module dedicated to cash monitoring (for merchants)
- a connection to the e-commerce site to retrieve data, in particular, online payment
- more rarely, a human resources management module (training management, payroll follow-up, expense reports per employee, follow-up of absences, leave)
Functionality related to inventory tracking is ubiquitous in a CRM. It consists of monitoring the evolution of purchases and stocks in real-time. The objective is to anticipate shortages and restocking. With commercial management software + inventory management software, you have better visibility on this part of the business closely linked to the commercial department. You can restock in time by anticipating your needs. You become more responsive.
How To Determine Your Needs?
To help you identify your specific needs, we advise you to call on an expert (chartered accountant, a management consultant or an expert among the consultants you work with). This professional will provide you with an outside perspective and decision-making support, namely, choosing software that suits your business model and organization. Before choosing your management solution, identifying your needs and objectives is essential.
- What features are necessary for your business to run smoothly?
- What are the specificities of your activity or profession?
- Which additional management modules do you find relevant?
- What is the size of your company (VSE, SME, large company?)
- What will be the acceptance rate by your teams?
- Do you need a collaborative commercial management module with several accesses?
- What are the usage preferences (SaaS* and Cloud mode, software to be downloaded to workstations, etc.)?
*Saas stands for “Software as a service” and means the tool is an online software version via a secure web connection.
How To Choose Business Management Software?
Traceability And Centralization Of Information
The objective of your management tool will be to centralize your business with one single agency. This will allow you to save time in daily management (archived documents, for example).
How To Set Up Such Software? More Simplicity
Without commercial management software, the company’s teams often use office software (e.g. Excel office automation) to manage the company’s activity (commercial activity, inventory management, etc.). This software has the advantage of being easy to use: good commercial management software must also be easy to handle; offer good ergonomics so as not to break team habits.
With the development of Web technologies, dematerialization, development of Smartphones and tablets, access to information in real-time has become a habit: good business management software must also guarantee this flexibility. It must save time for the teams, so it must be able to connect with any medium (tablet, computer, smartphone) or operating system (iOS, Android, Windows, etc.). The software must be easy to use but also intuitive. Of course, the stored data will always be secure.
Software Adapted To Your Activity And Your Size.
An industrial company will have different needs than a service company. For a service company, the commercial management software will be helpful in the proper management of invoicing, appointments, and employee schedules, for example. For an industrial company, the added value of the software will probably be in the excellent management of its stocks. The same comparison can be made depending on whether the company is large or small (VSE, SME). Commercial management software must therefore adapt to the activity of the company and its size.
A Complete Tool With Functionalities Adapted To The Company
Excellent commercial management software is complete; the latter must provide the company with all the necessary features to function correctly. Using software that meets many functions (accounting, commercial management, inventory management, etc.) is advisable. This will save you from installing and using many software programs simultaneously and therefore, from a gain in efficiency.
How Much Does Business Management Software Cost?
The costs of business management software vary. It would help if you first determined the following:
- The number of users expected
- The volume of give to treat
- Expected features
Implementing the software can be more expensive when the company requires a certain level of customization of the parameters or within the framework of the integration of software solutions such as ERP or integrated management software package – ERP software package.
According to our observations, auto-entrepreneurs, VSEs, and SMEs often use tools instead of invoice software with integrated complementary modules: accounting module, inventory management module, and customer and prospect follow-up module…
This type of device is similar to, or even equivalent to, CRM / commercial management software, even if it is presented as solely dedicated to invoicing quotes and managing commercial contracts. Conversely, larger structures will prefer to use commercial management software positioned as such, compatible with their accounting software. Inevitably, this solution is more complete and, therefore, more expensive.
The management accounting component, but especially the component dedicated to commercial actions, is generally more advanced in commercial software with the automation of many activities in addition to invoice management, in particular in the follow-up of contacts in the sales cycle, segmentation leads, automatic follow-up for non-payment, customization of many parameters, sophisticated decision support tables.
As you can see, business management software or invoice automation is a performance lever for self-employed and small businesses, SMEs and large companies. It allows you to manage your activity with much more finesse and responsiveness. You win! At the manager’s blog, we test the different tools and select the best software. Our work will help you choose the business management software adapted to your actual needs at the right price.
Comparative Table Of Business Management Software
We have produced several comparative tables of the different types of software:
- Our comparison table of invoicing software
- Our CRM comparison table
- Our cash management software comparison table
Read Also: What Is A Sales Administration Manager?
