Would it help your business if your customers had the ability to check your inventory for themselves? Could they then order directly if they knew that you have inventory ready to ship?
Do you wish that you could update your inventory information through a browser online? If your answer is yes to these questions than online inventory management is a solution you should be considering.
With an online inventory system, your customers and your vendors can have access to your inventory information through regular internet access without any additional software installation required. This also means that your sales turnaround is faster as your customers can just make a decision on the spot, once they know that there is stock available for the item that they want to purchase.
On the back-end, your inventory system is managed by your order fulfillment department, which tracks the order and proceeds to send the item to your customers, as soon as the orders are received. Indeed, your order fulfillment and shipping department can be located at different locations. With an online inventory management system, this is possible as both parties will have access to the same system and status updates can be made anywhere. Therefore, stock availability levels will always be kept up-to-date.
Additionally, this system also has the ability to work together with your web server where the online inventory system acts as the database in which your web server pulls information on available stock. In addition, item descriptions and prices can be changed directly on the online management system and reflected on the web pages viewed by your customer. This way, you will have a seamless system that just requires edits and new data entries to be done once.
Online inventory management systems have always been very easy to use. When incorporated into a form that can be accessed via a web browser, only minimum staff training is required on its usage. Furthermore, different levels of access can be programmed into the system to enforce security. This way, there can be user levels, administrator levels or even employee level access into the system.
Additionally, if you are implementing a system where you do not hold much inventory, but instead get your vendor to drop ship the items directly to your customers, you can manage this system through an online inventory management system where orders are received and sent out immediately. This will keep your customers happy as they are able to receive shipments quickly, and will eliminate the hassle of shipment maintenance as well as inventory management.
Finally, an online inventory management system gives internet businesses an edge by providing convenience and simplicity. Indeed, without these tools, businesses will fall behind their competitors as they will not be able to realize cost savings as well as the increased revenue that better customer service usually results in.
Ken Town is VP Research and Technology at Invendia, a leading provider of Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) and Web-based Inventory solutions.
