After a few years in business, you have come to realize that an order management system is no longer a luxury. It is a necessity! Your business has grown. You find that the old pen and paper system, flipping through clipboards, and manually tracking inventory is no longer feasible. Errors are occurring on a regular basis and you are ready for an upgrade. But how do you know what to choose?
What Will Work for You?
There are many OMS (order management systems) to choose from. There is no right answer for every business. The key to the correct OMS is to understand exactly what your needs are, so you can choose the best platform for you.
Understanding your business requires more than just knowing what your business does. You need to have a full and complete grasp of HOW your business does what it does. For example, if you are an apparel retailer, you might know which items you sell, but do you know HOW you sell them? Do you sell mainly from a brick and mortar storefront? Perhaps you also sell from an online website. Are customers able to buy through social media? Are they able to access your site from mobile devices like smartphones and tablets? Is all your inventory stored in the same location? Do you have multiple warehouses in different locations? How are the orders fulfilled? Can a customer buy online and pickup in store (BOPIS)? Can a customer buy online and return in store (BORIS)? Can a customer order an item over the phone? Can a customer order multiples of the same item and ship to different locations?
Involve Your Whole Team
Knowing the answers to each of these questions is your first step toward getting the right OMS. The correct way to get the answers, is by using your staff. You should create a steering committee, including managers and employees from each department that will benefit from the use of an OMS. While members from your IT department should definitely be included, it is most important to include those team members that actually interact with the customers and are responsible for stocking the warehouse, and picking, packing, and shipping the orders. Without their input, you might be neglecting major pain points because you are unaware that they exist!
For someone who has one retail location with one warehouse (or stock room), the answer would likely be the most simple off the shelf OMS. However, for someone who has unique requirements (like shipping perishable items), is growing their business, or who already has a medium to large business, a robust, scalable OMS is definitely preferable.
Define Your Objectives
It is important to define your objectives before jumping in and purchasing the first OMS that you see. You need to know which features are an absolute priority for you and which would be "nice to have." Your steering committee should prepare a list with all of their requirements, including, but not limited to, typical order volume, number of skus, existing hardware and software, and time allotted for full implementation and onboarding. Once your needs are detailed, you are ready to research the different systems available. Each system will have its strengths and weaknesses. However, you should choose the one that most fits your current needs and offers easy scalability as your business grows.
A Customizable and Scalable Solution
There is one order management system that will fit all your needs. SkuNexus is the only fully customizable order/inventory/warehouse management system! With SkuNexus, all the basic features are built in. However, what makes us stand out from other OMSs is our fully customizable platform. With our Cloud Edition, we can do all the customizations for you. With our Enterprise Edition, we will provide full access to our source code so you can do the customizations yourself. Whichever way you choose to use SkuNexus, you will see that we are the best order/inventory/warehouse management system for your company!
Click here to see how we can help you!