1. WebERP

It is a web based ERP system for small and mid sized Enterprise. The LAMP application has a stable code base and is packed with features suited for distributed businesses in wholesale and distribution. The features sales order, accounts receivable, user defined sales analysis, purchase orders, accounts payable, inventory management, general ledger, manufacturing, multi-language, multi-currency, complex tax system support. It also has multiple inventory locations with serial number and lot tracking facilities as well as full double entry accounting. In addition, it offers sales orders support for assemblies and kit-sets.

2. Openbravo

It’s one of the best open source ERP software for SMBs. Openbravo is a web-based program that was based on Compiere ERP program. It provides the entire status of a company that includes production information, inventory, customer information, order tracking and workflow information.

Openbravo accompanies wide ranging features that makes it easier to handle for end users. Some of its key features include dimensional reporting, alerts, email, keyboard navigation. It is easily configurable and tailors the existing functionality and business rules and is capable in adding many new functionality without any programming.

The ERP software offers better compatibility and sharing, allowing export of single file or a collection of files to Excel, CSV, or PDF directly from the application. Users can easily create third-party modules or plugins or even browser the directory and choose the shared functionality created by other users to install. It allows high scalability enabling deployment in single server or on a cluster of them, serving up to thousands of users. Any record in the system can be easily audited and traced to user who created it.

3. Compiere

Compiere is organized uniquely to avoid the duplication of information and the need for synchronization. With an innovative design Compiere allows easy customization of the application. Modules included in the ERP solution include Customer relationship management, Quote to Cash, Requisition-to-Pay, Partner Relations Management, Warehouse, Supply Chain Management, Performance Analysis, Double-entry Book-keeping, Work-flow-Management and Web Store.

4. xTuple

The xTuple PostBooks is an integrated ERP, CRM and accounting system, based on the xTuple ERP Suite.

Modules for ERP xTuple

• Accounting: general ledger, accounts receivable and payable, bank reconciliation, financial reporting
• Sales: quotes, order entry, sales reporting, shipping
• Product Definition: items, infinite-level bills of material (BOM)
• CRM: universal address book, incident management, opportunity management, to-do lists, project management
• OpenRPT: open source report writer
• Inventory: multiple locations, other advanced warehouse features
• Light Manufacturing: work orders, strong support for make to order
• Purchasing: purchase orders, receiving, vendor reporting

PostBooks is a cross platform application that runs equally well on Windows, Linux and Mac. It is fully internationalized with support for multiple tax structures, multi-currency, multilingual translation packs maintained by xTuple’s global community.

5.  OpenERP

This is a complete open source ERP software, designed to address the enterprise needs and processes. OpenERP integrates accounting, hr, sales, crm, purchase, stock, production, services management, project management, marketing campaign. It offers separate client and server components and XML-RPC interfaces. Open ERP is complete and modular system with 350 modules. The ERP software has a strong MVC architecture with an object database, a dynamic GUI, distributed server, flexible workflows, and customizable reports. The database is PostgreSQL and the server part is written in Python.

The key features of OpenERP include management accounting, financial accounting, inventory management, sales and purchase management, tasks automation, Human Resource Management, marketing campaigns, help desk, and point of sale.

Apart Linux, Windows and Mac interfaces, OpenERP has an web interface eTiny that is also available for the Turbogears web framework. OpenERP is widely  used by customers looking to automate their sales processes effectively.

6. Apache OFBiz

It is an Open Source Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system that provides a suite of enterprise applications that integrates and automates several business process of an enterprise. The  framework offers a common data model and sophisticated business processes. There is a common architecture for all applications build around data, logic and process components. Apache OFBiz  is built on open source technologies and standards like Java,  Java Enterprise Edition (JEE), XML and SOAP.

Apache OFBiz comes with a wide range of functionalities  that include

• Accounting (agreements, invoicing, vendor management, general ledger)
• Asset Maintenance
• Catalogue and Product Management
• Facility and Warehouse Management
• Manufacturing
• Order Processing
• Inventory Management, automated stock replenishment etc.
• Content Management System (CMS)
• People and Group Management
• Project Management
• Sales Force Automation
• Work Effort Management
• Electronic Point Of Sale (ePOS)
• eCommerce
• Human resources (HR)

OFBiz introduces the concept of screens where each page typically represents a screen.  It’s architecture allows rapid customization of the application to a business needs without any new coding.

7. JFire

It is a comprehensive and flexible ERP solution for businesses of all size. The system offers enterprise processes with powerful analysis, reporting, and customization options. It has been designed to be highly customizable. JFire is a highly scalable system that can support small companies as well as giant companies with extensive user base, multi-currency & multi-language requirements. JFire is developed with the latest technologies such as J2EE 1.4, JDO 2.0, Eclipse RCP 3.3.

Key modules in JFire include

• Accounting
• Flexible Price Configurations
• Store Management
• Reporting
• Integration with external payment and delivery interfaces
• CRM

8. ERP5

This is a strong community that offers powerful ERP solution for small businesses. ERP5 is fully packed with features that includecustomer relationship management ( CRM), production management (MRP), supply chain management (SCM), product design management (PDM), accounting, human resources and e-commerce. For the small businesses, ERP5 has an Express edition which integrates ERP, CRM and KM funtionalities.

It offers a web based platform that can be used and configured for users and administrators through a browser. It provides an intuitive and polished user interface that makes an easy to understand ERP system.

9. Opentaps

It is a complete open source platform. Opentaps features a modern architecture that includes a complete full ERP and CRM solution.  The ERP solution also includes mobile connectivity and built-in business intelligence tools. Key modules in opentaps are Online Store, CRM, Warehouse Application, Financials, Purchasing and Administrative Applications

Although not the best of the lot opentaps serves as one of the best open source ERP software as an alternative to expensive and inflexible commercial ERP solutions. It would perfectly fit the replacement for in-house solutions that are difficult to maintain or extend, or as a starting point to build your unique business model and processes.

10. ADempiere

It is essentially a business suite that combines ERP, CRM and SCM support for business processes. ADempiere is an open-source ERP software that provides a framework for extending and customizing to meet business needs. Adempiere is developed in J2EE technology, especially using the JBoss application server. It’s database support is restricted to Oracle and PostgreSQL.

How do you improve revenue?  Increase sales…duh.  CRMs can increase sales so get one for the sales department, right?  Wrong.

The problem here is that sales people are generally not a process oriented group of people.  You see them out for dinner, on the phone talking with someone that might as well be a buddy they are going out for beers with later – they golf, email, and often don’t look like they are working very hard.  HOWEVER they are working hard.  Their job is to build relationships with the clients.  Doing this requires flexibility in their work schedule, which not only requires their appointments and lunch breaks to be flexible, but it requires that the tools they use to be quick side-notes in their day.  Phone and email follow you everywhere and so should the CRM; however the ability to push and pull information from the CRM needs to be as flexible as their schedule.  This tends to make sales people a much harder team to get to adopt a CRM.

The second group of people that are thought of when it comes to implementing a CRM is the marketing department.  Good marketing equals increased revenue.  Marketing is more of a process oriented job and tends to have routines and schedules that are much more orderly than sales.  While they still need to be flexible in their ability to put out a value proposition, they’re timelines and policies are more easily defined.  The marketing department tends to adapt to a CRM more easily than the sales department because often times a single workflow can accommodate many marketing campaigns and creating campaigns can become streamlined through the use of a CRM.  However, the marketing department already has routines and policies in place that allows them to do their job effectively and bringing in new tools will always have a bit of a learning curve.

Where a CRM is adopted the easiest and most effectively is with the service personnel.  They often have strict structures as to how to handle operations and management continually looks at how to improve policies to improve efficiencies so adoption rates tend to be highest with service personnel over the other departments.  Once a service team has converted to the new system there is an immediate improvement to customer service and operational efficiency.  The beauty of having the service team on-board quickly is that all the information that they enter into the system becomes available to the other departments – sales people can quickly and easily lookup customer inquiries and marketing can start to run reports on topics and trends.

By getting the service personell involved early on with the CRM implementation, the adoption rate for the sales and marketing departments is much higher.

CRMs can facilitate increased revenue, improved operational efficiences, and help provide outstanding customer service, but without input from senior management and their “signing up” to help meet numbers on ROI, deployment will not be as successful.  At the end of the day, senior managers will be responsible for the successful deployment of your company’s CRM initiative.  After all, once the CRM provider has implemented the system to meet your business’ requirements, it’s senior managements responsibility to make sure that your metrics are met and to provide feedback on where things can be improved for future enahancements and additions to your CRM system.

Not only is it important to ensure that your CRM is not deployed from the top-down, it’s equally important to ensure that Senior Managment are involved from start to finish!

Check out the new site!

www.iTeamTech.ca

I appreciate any feedback you have.  Feel free to leave a comment and let me know what you think!

During the initial phase of your CRM deployment, it’s extremely important to not only consider the requirements of senior managment, but to ensure that the CRM meets the needs of the sales and service personnel.  It has been said that users need to obtain 3 units of benefits from a system in order for them to see value in 1 unit of work that they a required to put into the system.  If this is not addressed, CRM deployments can quickly become unsuccessful.

Times are tough and a lot of companies are finding it difficult to get online with an effective website.  Advertising budgets are down and businesses are trying to find cost-effective ways to advertise online without having to put up all the cash at the start.  By streamlining some of our tools and slimming down our packages, we were able to come up with a way to pump out a great website at a reduced cost.  Under a new brand, Web in 7 will provide a streamlined design that is only $1000 including any applicable taxes and although this website can be considered a stepping-stone to the higher-end designs that iTeam and Black Tie Graphics have built their reputations on, it’s our intention to provide a high-end custom designed style that fits well with the company brand.  We don’t want to compromise in style or design as that is ultimately not going to get small businesses a good kick-start to the online advertising.

There is a couple catches though!  I won’t mention it here – we’ll wait till the site is launched – but I will say that there is a qualification process.  Not every small business will be able to get this product the first time they apply.  By restricting applicants to a certain guideline, it greatly reduces our time to develop a site, while still maintaining our high level of design quality.  Web in Seven’s website design and marketing technique is designed for small-businesses looking to launch an online presence and begin getting indexed in the search engines.

Again, Web in Seven’s platform will be totally scalable.  It’s not like those companies where you spend $500 or $1000 on a template site – when you want to upgrade, you have to throw away the original design.  The design is meant to look great on its own, then be able to be scaled up to a $10k+ site campaign – if that’s how much you were thinking of spending .

We will launch the marketing site for Web in Seven in the next few days.  In the mean time, there will be updates and a bit of information about our progress there.  Take a look and let me know what you think!

www.webinseven.com

Most CRMs tell you how they think your business should manage relationships with your customers: here’s how you create a lead and here’s how you track a service request.  The issue with this is that the underlying problem is not being addressed.  If the goal is to improve the performance of an organization’s customer service, then the first step is to develop a customer service process.  Once this process has been implemented and refined, the problem of finding the right CRM becomes almost moot.  The organization will define the requirements and then can easily define what is required of the CRM to enable the process to run more smoothly and efficiently.

Most CRM systems offer an off-the-shelf solution, but if your business is anything like mine, it’s not an off-the-shelf problem.  Thus finding a CRM that is flexible and customizable is key to solving your business problem.

• Increased revenue and profitability through repeat and new business
• Improved customer retention and employee satisfaction
• Increased operational efficiencies through simplified management routines

But first, what is CRM?

Customer Relationship Management has been defined as a business approach that integrates people, process and technology to maximize relationships with all customers, through the seamless coordination between all customer-facing functions.

Yet, according to estimates provided by leading analysts, over half of all CRM projects fail to meet their initial ROI targets. A recent study published by Nucleus Research, Inc. found that 61% of Siebel Systems’ reference customers reported negative ROIs from their CRM implementations after two years of use. Another report issued by The Gartner Group, Inc. estimated that well over 65% of all CRM projects fail. There are a handful of reasons at the root-cause of CRM failures. We will review each, and identify the strategy that you can use to avoid common these pitfalls.

I’ll cover the flowoing pitfals of CRMs over the next few days:

• Viewed as a technical, not a business, problem
• Driven from the top down
• Lack of senior management involvement
• Not targeting the areas of highest adoption
• Driven by the IT organization vs. business leaders
• Trying to do too much at once

In a nutshell, CRM software is essentially just a database which enables staff to store, manage and access sales and marketing data.  CRM solutions should be able to manage existing customers and prospects, provide access from virtually anywhere in the world, be able to quickly generate customer profiles for sales and marketing reference, analyze customer needs and preferences, identify customer attributes to reveal optimal marketing methods, and be able to work in colaboration with other software and methods that your company uses to operate effectively.

Here are some pointers to choosing the right CRM:

• Capture relevant information about interactions with customers.  CRM systems can help collect, store, share and mine information about customers, but it needs to collect the right information and be able to run reports and reflect changes in real time
• Deep coverage of your business is required to fully utilize the benefits of a CRM.  It’s often not enough for just the sales department to use the CRM.  When a CRM is used by the sales, marketing and customer service areas of your business, the benefits to your bottom line increase exponentially.
• Integration with your current business workflow will not only save a tremendous amount of time, but ensures that the CRM is fitting your company rather than your company fitting the CRM.  Your staff should already have general or specific routines that they follow during the sales and service process.  By integrating a CRM with these workflows you are able to monitor what works best and ensure that your staff stays on track.  If you don’t have concrete workflows, a CRM consultant should be capable in helping you get started in the right direction.
• Integration with other software that your business uses can have a postitive effect on the bottom line.  By reducing the amount of paper-work as well as reducing the probability of human error, CRMs can become the central interface for inputing data into your company’s systems.
• Technical support is a must for successful CRM solutions.  CRM software are some of the most sophisticated technologies on the market.  Ensuring that your company can not only have a CRM setup and installed properly, but upgraded and taught to your staff is crutial.  A consultant that can help improve workflows and give recommendations on marketing and data-mining is worth their weight in gold.
• Customizable to fit your company.  CRMs can often cause more overhead than they earn.  The problem with many CRMs is that they force you to change the way you do business in order to accomplish their goals.  Although it is always going to take a bit more time to document customer information, a CRM should not take up more resources than it gains.

Many CRMs have virtually identical features, so finding the one that stands out as the best fit for your company can often be difficult.  CRMs should capture relavent information about your customers, integrate with your current business process, and be flexible enough to fit into your company so that it will be used by a large range of staff.  In finding the right CRM, your company will see how this type of system can truly help you flourish and grow.

One thing that really bugs me about the iPhone is that you cannot plug in an SD card and there is no tactile feedback when you press a “button.”  The Samsung Omnia supports up to 16GB SD cards so the total capacity could potentially be 24GB, and it vibrates when you press stuff…not bad Samsung.

There’s a bunch of other cool features as well, but I’ll let you explore that.  Here’s the link to the phone:

http://pages.samsung.com/ca/omnia/English