http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJ8keDGoNPU

Doug Tanner of Altec explains what sets his company apart from other document solution providers.  Their premiere product doc-link captures and automatically indexes invoices, purchase orders, accounts payable and payroll checks, and all reports from your software accounting package. It also eliminates opening vendor invoices received via mail by allowing vendors to fax or email documents directly to doc-link taking out an often timely step.

For more Sage Summit 2012 videos be sure to visit our YouTube channel.

The post Sage Summit 2012 Interview with Altec appeared first on Think, The Blytheco Blog.

We were so happy to announce the first ever winners of Blytheco’s Client Awards at last week’s Sage Summit Conference.  At Blytheco, we have so many clients doing some incredible work, and it was fun to recognize them and their accomplishments.

The winners were:

Best use of social media

ACS Technologies, based in Florence, SC.  ACS makes church software for things like member check-in, volunteer management, data security and remote work support, online giving, event/group planning, communication. They have a really engaging and active Facebook and Twitter presence, blog, and Community page, plus a cool Discussion board on their client portal. They also present special touches like cute avatars of their “Community Evangelists” – their whole approach is very friendly and compelling. Hats off and thanks to Dean Lisenby and his team, who use Sage 500 and SalesLogix to deliver a great suite of products.

Longevity to Blytheco

Oren Levy of Zaharoni Industries accepted this award. Zaharoni, a distributor of semiconductor products and user of Sage 100 and SalesLogix, is based in Hawthorne, CA and has been a Blytheco client since 1994!

‘Best Use’ Award

This award recognized the client that has really made a strong investment in technology to improve efficiency and meet business goals. The Vincit Group of Chattanooga, TN was our winner, using Sage 500, FAS, Sage HRMS to provide solutions for food safety sanitation, water and energy management.

Community Service

In honor of our CEO Stephen Blythe’s passion for service, we recognized Central Virginia Community Services for their work in providing adult, child, and family behavioral health services in Central Virginia since 1969. The organization is based in Lynchburg, VA and utilizes Sage HRMS and Fund Accounting to help achieve their mission.

Unique Approach

At Sound Productions, Joshua Curlett has set up a very unique and efficient system for importing the frequent and complex vendor pricing changes and discounts they were challenged with. This award winner stocks and sells all major brands of professional audio equipment and accessories, is based in Dallas, TX and uses Sage 100.

Congratulations to all winners – we appreciate the opportunity to serve such innovative leaders!

Check out all our photos of Sage Summit 2012 here.

The post Recognizing Customer Excellence at Sage Summit appeared first on Think, The Blytheco Blog.

Got a business with international ambitions?

Sage ERP X3 is a proven solution for mid-market customers with international ambitions and multi-national requirements. Sage ERP X3 technology is available on all leader platforms in the market with End-to-end process integrity and data consistency in your Webtop across the enterprise.

Generally, X3 is ideal for businesses with 50 to 5000 employees, subsidiaries of group, international companies, and companies with a strong growth in manufacturing, distribution and services industries.

[Video: Is Sage ERP X3 Right For Me?]

1. Functionality, not complexity

When engaging in your ERP selection process looking for less complexity does not mean that you need less functionality. Sage ERP X3 provides your company with deep and broad first-class functionality, while remaining simple to implement and to use. Put together a list of your key requirements and look what systems are able to support them all within a simple, integrated design. Of course, you can simply consider looking at Sage ERP X3!

2. Integration, not interfaced

As you start you ERP selection process, you’ll realize software integration does not mean just applications that work together. It also means that they exchange real-time information,share a common database and user interface and, more importantly, they evolve together. Many ERP systems are hiding functional gaps by offering a ‘modular design’, which often requires custom interfaces and complex maintenance. Only Sage ERP X3 gives you both rich and fully-integrated functionality in all areas of your business for accounting and financial management, purchasing, inventory, sales, customer relationship management AND manufacturing.

3. Scalability

Evolution means the ability for your ERP system to grow with your business. Sage ERP X3′s integrated design provides your company with all thefunctions it needs now and in the future. You can simply activate the functions as you need them. It’s all there from the beginning. It is also a flexible system that can be easily parameterized to fit your organization’s changes, scaling up to more than 2,000 users. After your ERP selection process you’ll find you can rely on Sage ERP X3 to help you grow!

4. Web-native, not web-enabled

Web-native means that your system can be accessed the same way in both client/server and Web mode. Some ERP software systems may offer a customized web connection to dedicated functions, but few can provide your company with the ability to operate the system locally or through the web in the exact same fashion. Think of the advantage you could have with this advanced communicative architecture when expanding your business over multiple sites, or considering developing relationships with premier suppliers, partners or customers!

5. Multi-country by design

Global trade requires global tools. Not only is Sage ERP X3 available in ten languages and legislations – including China – allowing users to access the system in their own language wherever they are, but country-specific parameters, such as legal and market requirements, are centralized to offer a single global solution. Sage ERP X3 makes it easy to share common data and processes between different foreign sites or subsidiaries, while respecting their own specific usages and business rules. During your ERP selection process keep in mind that more than 3,000 companies worldwide are using Sage ERP X3 in more than 53 countries and 165,000 users.

6. Low cost of ownership

With functionality and ease of use, cost of ownership might be among your first selection criteria. And of course, all ERP vendors claim to provide their customers with the best possible return on investment. But when it comes to the total cost of YOUR project, the cost might not be as low as you thought, as your company certainly will require more services to customize its solution! We built Sage ERP X3 to dramatically reduce the time of implementation and customization, while providing most of theadvanced features you need as a standard, because reducing the cost from the implementation on is the best way to guarantee a faster return on investment!

7. Commitment to success, not loyalty programs

How much time have you spent arguing to get some support from well-known software vendors? With a business unit entirely dedicated to Sage ERP X3 operations, Sage offers you the best of two worlds: a reactive mid-sized organization committed to our customers’ success, backed by a world leading business software provider and its first-class R&D centers.

 For more info on how to reduce cost and risk with Sage ERP X3 download this whitepaper.

The post 7 Reasons to Implement Sage ERP X3 appeared first on Think, The Blytheco Blog.

1. NetSuite is the world’s #1 cloud ERP solution.  SAP has incurred cloud product recalls, product terminations, and numerous product delays – customers should be skeptical.
2. NetSuite supports large and growing services firms.  NetSuite is truly scalable to large enterprises with unique features such as resource allocation grids, expense caps, overrides, etc.
3. NetSuite provides the most advanced project invoicing.  NetSuite’s flexible revenue recognition and project billing cannot be matched (i.e. multiple rules on a per-project basis).
4. NetSuite provides comprehensive visibility into projects.  It is more difficult in SAP BByD to navigate from global project views, to project outlines, to the individual task level.
5. NetSuite supports advanced resource management workflows.  It is more difficult to allocate project resources in SAP (i.e. book specific or generic resources in booking requests).
6. NetSuite includes powerful project budgeting features.  NetSuite provides stronger and more intuitive project budget control, budget accounting, and budget development.  Or instead can we say – “Flexible budgeting allows insightful planned vs. actuals reporting”
7. NetSuite dramatically lowers operational risk.  Unlike SAP BByD, NetSuite offers a financially-backed uptime SLA, certification of security processes, and proven scalability.
8. NetSuite better supports multi-national service firms.  Firms that require real-time financial consolidation, inter-company resource management, and divisional budgeting choose NetSuite.
9. SAP BByD’s closed architecture limits integration support.  NetSuite’s standards-based, open architecture enables greater connectivity to existing systems (i.e. financials, MS Project, etc.).
10. SAP BByD is not easily customized.  NetSuite supports rapid configuration of processes, interfaces, roles, and reports so that customers are up and running faster.

Why Professional Service Organizations Prefer NetSuite

For case studies that prove the power of NetSuite, visit here.

For a free product demo to see just what NetSuite can do for you, click here.

The post @NetSuite SRP vs. SAP Business ByDesign: Top Ten Differentiators appeared first on Think, The Blytheco Blog.

Orange.  That’s their color.  And sales tax – that’s their game.  The people at Avalara are passionate about what they do.  In fact, I’ve never seen a team so diligent and determined to come up with the latest innovations to calculate rates, manage exemption certificates, file forms and remit payments.  Avalara’s AvaTax let’s you do all of this plus reduces audit risk, all from the cloud.

AvaTax also provides seamless, transparent integration with 100+ existing ERP, accounting, ecommerce and Retail POS systems making it much easier for you to be sales tax compliant.

Best of all, the app allows you to get intelligent sales tax calculations in your own software.  AvaTax Calc integrates with your accounting or ecommerce software to deliver real-time sales tax calculations based on up-to-date sales and use tax rules. This includes sourcing rules, product taxability and jurisdiction assignment. Increased audit activity by taxing authorities demands businesses prove sales tax compliance through accurate calculations and reporting.  AvaTax Calc makes compliance simple with transaction history and on-demand reporting.

To find how out more on how to survive a sales tax audit, download our free whitepaper.  For the secret sign of Avalara and to find out more about them, watch the YouTube video below from last year’s Sage Summit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmhdM5fX3YI

The post How to Survive a #SalesTax Audit with @Avalara [VIDEO] appeared first on Think, The Blytheco Blog.

NetSuite delivers all the key capabilities sales people need to drive renewals, quote the customer correctly, upsell customers, and ensure that they are aligned with the latest product offerings and company strategy:

Upsell Management:

NetSuite lets you monetize existing customers with strong upsell and cross-sell management features, even allowing service functions to upsell. NetSuite also provides strong sales incentive compensation management to balance customer acquisition with upselling/cross-selling and to enable the roll out of SPIFs and upsell/cross-sell sales plans.

Customer Success: Managing Revenue Performance
“We have to responsibly manage growth, and NetSuite provides the business application infrastructure that we need to do exactly that.”
— Rob Gottschalk, Director of Sales Operations, SolarWinds

Integrated Pricing and Quote Management

NetSuite supports agile pricing for subscription plans in response to customer or market demand, allowing you to:

• Ensure that sales quotes are up-to-date with the latest finance and pricing information
• Effective-date new customer agreements
• Update billing processes and prorate payments
• Communicate pricing changes to the sales and service team
• Synchronize quote management, financial management processes and incentive compensation.

To see exactly how NetSuite works, try a free demo.

Sales Commissions Management

Compensation and commissions visibility are key to keeping sales people focused on their target, which can be particularly challenging in complex software contracts. NetSuite gives you a number of ways to manage and adjust commissions, including:

• Complex commission schedules can be managed centrally, and set monthly, quarterly, bi-annually or annually to allow for maximum flexibility
• Commission rules can be configured based on quota, sales or quantity
• Calculation options enable you to calculate commissions based on a linear scale, marginal scale, or no scale at all.
• Support for complete commission plans allows for multi-tiered scheduling and maximum flexibility in creating sales compensation formulas
• Retroactive commissions options enable you to make changes to compensation plans, as needed, when needed
• Target commissions enable sales managers to set a goal and calculate commissions for the entire sales team.

Clear Business Visibility

NetSuite’s strong dashboard and reporting capabilities help you drive revenue management and financial reporting, and manage customer profitability. They let you continually monitor recognized revenue; examine breakouts of recognized revenue across the various elements; and achieve detailed visibility down to the transaction level. They help ensure that you’re confident in reporting your financials and you’re able to quickly diagnose any unforeseen issues. In addition, they equip you to handle the more complex revenue and deferred revenue reporting (by region, product line and so on) resulting from new revenue recognition rules such as EITF 08-01 and EITF 09-03.

NetSuite helps you minimize “cost-to-serve” by giving you a handle  on all direct and indirect customer costs — including acquisition costs, service costs and product delivery costs. You can see which customer
segments drive margin and which don’t, so you can change strategy accordingly.

NetSuite’s real-time visibility even extends to mobile devices such as Blackberry and Apple iPhone, with the NetSuite for iPhone application. It enables decision makers and any employee interacting with the customer to have comprehensive access to the latest customer and business information, no matter where they are.

For more info on how to survive and thrive in new software industry, download this free whitepaper.

The post How to Survive and Thrive by Driving Sales Performance with @NetSuite appeared first on Think, The Blytheco Blog.

NetSuite provides an integrated software-as-a-service (saas) business management application for accounting and financials, enterprise planning, manufacturing, e-commerce, customer relationship management, and reporting.
The core application provides functionality for order and billing management, global subsidiary and business unit management, and partner relationship management.

NetSuite differentiates itself on its foundation on a single customer record, so sales, support, billing, accounting, shipping, and business intelligence all access the same data. Other components of NetSuite to support software companies include:

• Revenue accounting. Support for revenue recognition standards, automated revenue calculation, and pre-built revenue recognition reports help companies to manage and support revenue recognition requirements.
• Renewal and maintenance revenue management. Data configuration and workflows to support both subscription-based and maintenance-based ongoing revenue streams enable companies to target renewals and contract end dates, manage billing, and identify cross-selling and up-selling opportunities.
• Industry-specific dashboards and metrics. Role-based dashboards and prebuilt reports provide real-time visibility into licenses, maintenance, and deferred revenue projections.
• Support for software-related financial management requirements. Support for SOP and EITF standards help software companies to manage business growth while institutionalizing support for key audit requirements.

Nucleus found many software companies deploying NetSuite either moved from an on-premise application such as QuickBooks, Microsoft Dynamics GP, or ACCPAC, or had been using custom in-house applications to support their business. To understand the impact of adopting NetSuite on software businesses, Nucleus conducted in-depth interviews with 23 NetSuite customers in the software industry.  They asked questions about:

IT savings 

Most software companies moving to NetSuite fell into two categories. Some companies were using homegrown or basic applications such as QuickBooks that could not support their needs for growth or reporting. Others were using multiple on-premise applications and sought an application with lower support costs and a more integrated view of their business. Those in the former category were able to save on general employee productivity because of fewer system crashes and less time spent in spreadsheets. Most of those replacing on-premise systems saved both software license maintenance costs and IT staff.

Nucleus found software companies moving from on-premise applications to NetSuite eliminated an average of $23,000 in software license maintenance costs per year, with a high of $50,000. IT staff savings for those companies ranged from 50 percent to 65 percent of total IT time. These savings reflect the change companies experienced in moving from other applications to NetSuite. Many also recognized that moving to an integrated enterprise application environment in the cloud enabled them to support growth that would have required significant additional investments in software, hardware, infrastructure, and personnel to support. Nucleus analysts estimate that an onpremise application providing similar functionality would cost at least $50,000 in initial software fees, $20,000 in hardware, and $50,000 a year in license maintenance and support costs for a low-end on-premise ERP project.

The amount companies can expect to save on IT with NetSuite will depend on the number and support cost of applications that will be replaced and the amount of IT time spent on building custom reports. In many cases, customers can justify their NetSuite investment based on IT savings alone.

For more on how NetSuite can benefit your business and save you money, download the free whitepaper.

The post How NetSuite Affects (and Improves) Software Companies appeared first on Think, The Blytheco Blog.

For those of you not yet familiar with Netsuite or Quickbooks Online, you should know that at their core they are both cloud ERP platforms and with their frequently discounted pricing, QBOL might seem like a more viable option (Online Plus package is now going for $16.95 down from $34.95) – but that should tell you more about QBOL’s sales and satisfaction rate more than anything else.  Where Netsuite and QBOL majorly differ is that one is a scalable complete accounting, inventory, CRM, and e-commerce cloud system with a simple user-interface and the other is primarily used for accounting purposes and offers complex bare-minimum options.  After reviewing the top ten differences between Netsuite and QBOL, it’s kind of easy to see why so many more seem to be more pleased with the former.

• Quickbooks Online doesn’t include a dashboard, making user interaction more difficult and less visual. Netsuite on the other hand, has a dashboard, a tailorable interface, plus the option of role-based presentation. For a product demonstration to see exactly how this looks, click here.
• Netsuite has the ability to link with and support campaigns within teams while QBOL does not.
• There is no keyword marketing support within QBOL.
• Unfortunately, QBOL lacks any inventory management.  That’s a shame really as so many require inventory management as a part of their ERP platform – particularly when those risk having lost, damaged, or unaccounted-for inventory.  Netsuite is complete and offers inventory tracking and support.
• Quickbooks Online lacks a native CRM system.  Many people nowadays want a one-stop-shop for both their ERP and CRM needs and understand the importance of integrating the two. Netsuite is that one-stop-shop.
• You need a third party integration program called AccountDynamics (extra $39/month) to synchronize between salesforce and QBOL.
• You cannot track purchase or sales orders within Quickbooks Online. In Netsuite, you can.  D’oh!!
• QBOL doesn’t have change orders.
• Nor do they have work orders.
• And last, but certainly not least, the customer data you’ll find in Quickbooks Online is scarcely limited.  While Netsuite gives you a ton of demographical and marketing info, QBOL only offers customer name and contact details.

Check out this free recorded webinar on why next-generation sales professionals leverage Netsuite for cloud ERP.

@BlythecoLLC

The post The Top Ten Reasons to Choose Netsuite Over Quickbooks Online appeared first on Think, The Blytheco Blog.

Last week we discussed the 10 best ways to improve your ERP strategy.  Now, we’re going to discuss the 6 best practices when implementing them. When choosing to implement a new ERP system it is extremely important to consider all the inherent risks that will arise throughout the process. Implementing an ERP system will affect multiple people, groups, stakeholders, and business processes in your organization.  Any project, software-related or not, that deliberately crosses organizational boundaries is ripe for potential complexity and risk.

1. Define clear goals and objectives

Make sure you clearly define what your organization is looking to achieve with implementing a new ERP system. An ERP system will affect many departments and business processes throughout your group. Making sure you clearly define what objectives, needs and deliverables each group within your organization is looking to achieve will help better ensure the system you choose is capable of effectively achieving the overall goals.

2. Choosing the right software

To gain full value from an ERP system, you must match the software to your organization’s information needs, processes, functional requirements, and workflows. Consult various vendors and ensure that the ERP system you are sold can truly fulfill your needs.  Here are just some of the few ERP systems out there.

3. Prepare for business transformation

ERP is fundamentally about changing, or transforming, information flows through an organization. By definition, therefore, both roles and processes are likely to change during the ERP implementation. Many projects neglect the need to devote time and resources to change management. Ensuring that a clear process is defined and implemented to help workers through process of change from the old system to the new.

4. Training and Support Resources

A new ERP system will need highly qualified consultants experienced at implementation and training. Make sure the vendor you choose has consultants readily available to train and support your staff on the daily use of the system and any problems and questions that could arise. Also make sure that there is a clear training program defined for new hires and is supported by the ERP software company.

5. Clear Implementation plan and timeline

A crucial part of implementing an ERP system is deciding the exact steps of how it will be done and when. Make sure all affected departments in your organization are consulted as to when the best time it is to implement the new system. For example, choosing to implement an accounting ERP system at year-end accounting closing would be a bad decision. Making the cut over to a new system in the most crucial periods of business is not a good decision.

6. Allocate the necessary resources

Ensure that you allocate the necessary resources, both financially, managerially and end to end support for training and change management. Allocating not enough resources to the overall definition of your organizational needs, choosing of the right software and preparing for the overall change, can break your business.

To meet the new Sage ERP family, check out this webinar.

The post 6 Best Practices for Implementing Your ERP System appeared first on Think, The Blytheco Blog.

Enterprise relationship planning, or ERP, is by no means a ‘piece of cake’ to implement. Horror stories abound about failed installations, unresponsive vendors, and wasted investments. ERP can indeed be complicated, however many organizations can’t find themselves able to function without it— It’s used anywhere from the optimization of inventory management to the organization of accounts payable. Despite the ubiquity of ERP among many organizations, it can still be difficult to grow your business with the right ERP tools.  Thus, when wanting to implement a new ERP system, it’s important that it efficiently brings together different aspects of your back office for greater insight into business processes.

Today’s ERP offerings are still convoluted, but smaller companies especially have more choices in ERP solutions designed for their requirements. In order to implement ERP effectively, you should remember to stay close with your vendor in order to have easy access to customizations and configurations, choose the right delivery and access model for your business, and of course, use this list as a guide!

1. Focus on the ways ERP can optimize your business processes.

You must first know exactly how your business operates.  If you have in-house human resource functions along with the need to manage products or inventory, you should totally be aware of these needs before you can identify the ERP functionality that can support your various business processes. It’s important to be open to some change, however; an ERP implementation can alter some business processes, and your organization will need to adapt its processes to match.

2. Understand your organization’s business goals and decide how ERP can support them.

ERP is intended to boost your company’s bottom line by optimizing your business processes, so it needs to be linked to your organization’s business goals. To this end, it is probably not a bad idea to integrate both your business’s CRM and ERP initiatives. It’s crucial, then, that you identify the ERP functionality — from advanced financials to supply chain management (SCM) to sales force automation (SFA) to workforce management — so it can help you attain those goals. Your ERP goals need to be specifically outlined and defined.

3. Understand your back office workflows.

Simply put, you need to know how your employees perform their jobs every day in order to maximize efficiency. These results should be gauged daily and compared to the amount of production at [the very least] the end of each week.

4. Consider Web-based ERP solutions.

Everybody’s doing it!  Most notably SAP, Microsoft, and Sage have moved into the cloud and now offer full-featured hosted ERP solutions that are delivered via the Internet. If an on-premise solution is not available to you because of limitations in IT staff, SaaS might be actually be a better option for you.

5. Involve employees from IT and the departments impacted by ERP in the implementation.

It’s important that everyone is on the same page – not just the people physically installing the new system.  Furthermore, since many departments within an organization are affected by ERP, it’s good to have a consistency in understanding among employees. It is important for the people who use ERP on a day-to-day basis to also be a part of the implementation process as they can provide feedback on how to optimize system functionality.

6. Dedicate members of your IT staff to your ERP implementation.

Even if you’re working with a vendor to install an ERP solution, you should have some employees focused only on the implementation.  Needless to say, your vendor probably won’t be around as constantly as your employees, and it never hurts to have some extra brains around in case of a system failure.  This is why it’s also important to frequently back up your data!

7. Full ERP implementation rarely happens overnight

Be patient. Most ERP deployments take several months or even a year to be fully implemented — Yikes?!  No, don’t fret; this timeframe is typical for most ERP modules in midsized-to-large businesses but not necessarily indicative of small business ERP implementations. ERP systems should be installed in phases, one at a time, and must be methodically tested.

8. Limit customization of the ERP solution.

There are so many ERP solutions available that you’ll surely find one that matches your organization’s business processes. While some customization is typically necessary, remember that the less you need to customize the solution, the easier it will be to maintain and upgrade, particularly if your current IT staff changes.

9. Budget for training.

Most modern software is so user-friendly that most people can boot up and go.  ERP is unfortunately not like most modern software.   Luckily, there are places like us that offer On-Demand training for many Sage ERP products. These feature tutorials, how-tos and other whitepapers.

10. Prepare data for the migration earlier rather than later.

Business data is at the heart of every ERP solution, and it must be migrated from your legacy databases to the new ERP software. To be effective in the system, data must be accurate, complete, and consistent — that means cleaning it before migration. Start cleaning your data early in the implementation and create data entry standards that will be in place by the time the system is live.

For an overview of the Sage ERP family, check out this product portfolio.

The post 10 Tips on Improving Your ERP Strategy appeared first on Think, The Blytheco Blog.