Anyone who has a job knows that there’s more to running a company than just their position. This is acutely obvious to business owners and key stakeholders. To aid in a smooth workflow, businesses should consider having robust business management software. These systems become even more necessary as businesses begin to scale upwards.
Business management software allows teams to manage and better understand their changing landscape through efficient and accessible interfacing. Through advancing technology such as machine learning and process automation software, the minutiae of day-to-day tasks get taken out of the hands of employees so they can better concentrate on other, more pressing matters.
Why Use Business Management Software?
Business management software helps teams of all sizes get organized, save time, lower costs, and boost morale. These programs aid with both internal and customer-facing tasks. Business management software can aid in aspects like inventory management, employee scheduling, analytics, content management, and accounting.
Having many aspects of businesses operating on the same platform allows for a centralization of data. Here are some key benefits of using business management software:
Getting Organized
Whether a team is storing employee data such as addresses, phone numbers, and birthdays, or storing data on customers such as emails, names, and orders, these vast amounts of information can become cluttered or even inaccurate if not organized properly.
This is especially detrimental if multiple teams need to access such data, such as marketing or sales teams. Instead of a mish-mash of documents spread throughout a company, having them all in one place and allowing them to be updated in real-time keeps teams agile.
Saving Time and Money
Time and money are saved when teams are allowed to work efficiently and independently. For example, instead of employees needing to request data or documents from stakeholders, they can retrieve them themselves. This also allows teams to have more autonomy and responsibility. In turn, with expedited processes, expenses are saved on staffing or overtime hours.
Many business management systems are powered through automation so that data can be collected and analyzed with fewer touch points from employees. Automation leaves less chance for human error, so data isn’t erroneous or duplicated. Some examples of tasks that can be automated are sending newsletters to clients, customer service chats, and scoring leads.
With time and money saved, these resources can go back to employees or be reinvested into the business to improve customer products and services. Integrating business management software is a quick way to increase returns on investments.
Features of Business Management Software
Truly, the sky’s the limit as far as what business management software can do, so fostering open communication is key. Having a trusted technology partner to help tailor features to business needs is the first step to a more organized business.
Ideally, the implementation to different aspects of the business is integrated into a cohesive unit. What follows is a non-exhaustive list of features that can be included in business management software.
Customer Relationship Management
Customers are the lifeblood of any business, regardless of industry or sector, B2B, or B2C. Providing world-class customer service is what makes a business memorable and worth returning to. Generating qualified leads is a massive task, so retaining those customers requires tact, and maintaining those relationships is paramount to the longevity of a business.
As such, effective CRM software allows businesses to stay in touch with existing clients through audience segmentation, scheduled messaging, and customer service channels. Some of these channels include ticketing systems or live chats. Live chats can either be actual agents or bots. Chats aid in both lead scoring and after-purchase services, such as facilitating repairs or returns.
Project Management
Project management requires stakeholders to be able to oversee and delegate in real-time. Teams are working on many tasks simultaneously, meaning the platform needs to be neat and organized.
With a strong project management system in place, tasks can be tailored to the needs of employees, whether that means more granular assignments or additional support. As workflows become more dynamic, having an equally robust and agile system prevents bottlenecks in the future.
Content and Social Media Management
Whether communications come to a customer on an owned or a social channel, the contents and scheduling need to be stored efficiently. These systems should be dynamic and responsive as well, in case of pivots in messaging, topic, or timeliness.
Despite being at the mercy of nonowned channels, there are ways to make the best of it. Management solutions allow companies to plan and execute content without actually needing to use a mobile-first approach. These systems can also field responses to engagement, which you can then store for analytics teams.
Cloud-Based Solutions
Upgrading current systems to modern technology allows businesses to become involved with the latest innovations, including the cloud. Cloud-based solutions are an attractive option not only for data storage, but also for employee retention.
The pandemic has truly changed how people work and has shaped their views of how they should do work. With the cloud, employees can have more flexibility to work from home, or anywhere else for that matter.
What to Look for in Business Management Software
No two businesses are the same, and that’s a good thing. However, that does mean that not every organization will have the same needs regarding business management software. Here are some key features that every business should look for, regardless of industry.
Organization and Integration
Whether a business is using management software for supply chain management, fostering customer relationships, internal resources, or all of those things, the system needs to be organized and thorough. Even if a handful of software is needed to achieve productivity in all aspects of a business, they should at the very least be integrated with each other.
If data is being stored in obscure spots, or one aspect of the business is marooned on its own in a different software program, this leads to road bumps and frustrations.
While the software needs to be the backbone of the organizational system, it is also up to teams to establish best practices and keep clutter to a minimum. This is especially true for high touch, high traffic, and high visibility documents.
User Experience
In the same vein as organization, the user experience of business management systems needs to be intuitive, accessible, and heuristic. It is counterproductive to have a derivative and cluttered program that gets in the way of itself. Instead, teams should be able to find and use what they need without fighting the platform that holds it.
Progress tracking should be intuitive and catered to teams as well. The way accounting teams track progress will likely look vastly different than the way human resources does. Therefore, business management software needs to be flexible enough to cater to its users. There is no use trying to fit a round peg into a square hole.
Visibility and Security
Data should be available on a need-to-know basis – nothing more and nothing less. Stakeholders should be able to easily access the information to run reports, make business decisions, and calculate expenses. Similarly, business management software can have built-in accountability measures such as tracking employee hours or task management.
Whether the information is regarding internal or external assets, it needs to be readily available to those who need it. Even more so, data should be updated in real time, to allow for accurate decision-making. Lastly, this information should also have the ability to be reverse engineered, to find sources of changes, and create accountability.
However, this information should not be readily available to those outside the scope of privilege or even outside eyes in general.
Therefore, ensuring that a company’s technological assets are safe from malicious actors should be at the forefront of every business owner’s mind, especially in the age of big data and cybersecurity threats. Some best practices to consider are multi-factor authentication and end-to-end encryption.
Security is also important when considering international or domestic needs. For example, some countries, such as the UK, have strict data laws that impact what can be known about users.
Therefore, it is key to stay compliant on the international stage to avoid legal troubles in the future. As such, the business management software needs to be malleable enough to edit in case of future changes that are out of company control, but doesn’t degrade in usefulness over time.
Maximize Your Capabilities With Business Management Software From Orases
Suppose this article resonated and inspired you as a stakeholder. Contact Orases to schedule a free consultation so you can learn ways to grow your business as a software partner.
Orases takes a careful collaborative approach, and relies on industry best practices to get the job done. No two businesses are the same, so Orases strives to build relationships that are as varied and unique as yours. Let’s make your vision a reality.
