Category: Blogs

Business Management Solutions

There is a lot more to being a good manager and leader than first meets the eye. Most obviously you need to manage tasks and your staff well, and you should also be technologically savvy so you can choose the right software solutions for businesses to ensure that the office runs as smoothly as possible. Just as importantly though, managers need to value their employees, and this includes several things.

• One of the best managerial tips we can offer is to listen to your employees. If they have concerns, are having a difficult time with something or have any questions, make time to hear them and ensure you really listen. They are a valuable part of your business, so you need to respect them by giving them the time and attention they deserve. If you do, they will respect you in return and work hard for you.
• Ask your employees questions. Studies have shown that asking questions makes your employees feel more valued and confident. This also gives you a better picture of where things stand.

If you liked our Tips for Managers, you may also like our Business Development Tips.

OnSite Classes: Business Management Software Training

If you are looking to introduce your managing staff to your new onsite software systems, or you want to become more proficient with how you are using your software solutions for business, the best thing you can do is utilize one of our management software training opportunities. We have a training program to meet every company’s needs, including onsite training classes, ShopWorks University, webinars, and training center events.

New training center programs have been planned recently, and more are currently in the works for the new year. The next event we are offering covers Core Training, and will take place from Wednesday, January 29, through Friday, January 31, from 9 am to 5 pm, each day.

The course costs $495 per attendee, and the price includes the classes you will be attending, the necessary materials, and breakfast and lunch for all three days. As a price break for the new year, each additional employee from the same company will only cost an additional $350.

This course is perfect for customers who are new to the OnSite 7 apparel management system, or for customers who want to implement or update their system. If you have been using OnSite 7 for several months or years, and are relatively familiar with all of the basic functions, this seminar would be repetitive for you.

Once you complete this seminar, you will know everything you need to know to set up and begin using your system effectively. If you still have questions or want to delve deeper into your system, look into further training opportunities past the training center seminar.

Choosing Accounting Software: Keep It Simple

Accounting tasks, from keeping your books current, to entering a customer’s address on a quote, take up a large amount of time. One of the fastest, easiest ways to cut down on business costs and time is by investing in a well-developed accounting software.

When searching for the right software solutions for business, start by listing small business accounting features that are integral for the smooth operation of your business. Some that you may want to consider including on your list are inventory management, the ability to manage customer contacts and work with any current software you have, sales tracking, budgeting, estimates, payroll, business tax reporting and merchant account support for accepting credit cards. You may also want to look for accounting or software that was designed specifically for businesses in your industry, like commercial screen-printing software or print estimating software, since it was created to run smoothly for businesses with issues like yours.

Next, consider important questions, such as: will the software help grow your business, and does your bank support the choosing accounting software you consider purchasing? If you are unable to download transactions from your bank straight into your system, you might as well continue doing your accounting tasks by hand.

You also want to find out if you can restrict access to your system for some users, if the software comes with a free trial so that you can find out how it works before committing time and resources to installing it, and if it is an online or desktop software. Many companies prefer online software, since it can run on multiple computers simultaneously, and is safe since it runs through an internet browser.

In structuring your business, there are two main areas of design that you need to consider and both are very important. The first is ensuring that you have the correct software solutions for businesses so that the business side of your company is designed efficiently, and the second is the physical design and layout of your office. Studies have shown that both need to be well designed for your employees to work as efficiently as possible.

Tests in office space layout by many different companies have found that successful office spaces in the future will look nothing like the stiff, blocky cubicle layouts that are common today. Having a combination of individual and group work spaces that are functional yet still flexible gives employees the freedom they need to approach issues creatively and work up to their best abilities. Focus on comfort more than traditional ideas of efficiency in your office layout and you will see even greater returns than you imagined.

Small Business Database Solutions

If you’re like many small business owners, you’ve been running your business at least partly out of Excel spreadsheets. And why not? Excel makes it easy to browse, add, edit, copy and present data—not to mention simple formulas, flexibility and integration with other office software.

However, Excel soon hits limits once you start using it for larger, more complex data entry. The “educated guesses” that Excel (and other spreadsheet applications like Google Docs  Sheets, Open Office Calc. etc.) attempts to make about what your data means and how to format it can make your data inconsistent and messy quickly, especially since each cell is an island to itself. Excel also finds it tough to work with multiple datasets in combination, answering detailed questions about the data, and it doesn’t scale well—if your spreadsheet grows too big, performance suffers. Finally, it’s difficult to collaborate—there’s little concept of a “master set” of data or version control (the ability to go back and compare versions from past dates or from different collaborators) for everyone to reference.

Let’s give a concrete example of this process.

Imagine that your T-Shirt printing (or laser engraving, or screen printing) business has grown to the point that multiple orders are coming in each day. You’ve been tracking orders from the sale phone call to shipping in Excel, and so far it’s been good to you. Any problems that have come up have been easy to fix, and, after all, you or one of your employees have been the only person entering data.

But now you’re growing, the spreadsheet is bulging and you just hired on a new office clerk and accountant. Problems start popping up:

Oh, our customer Edgewood Industries just changed their address and hired a new buyer—why can’t we easily change the shipping address and contact record in a central place? By the way–which orders have the current customer address and which ones have the previous one? Is column 84 an absolute value or a formula result? Why is column 145 formatted differently in some cells than others? Whoops! Who ran the sort function just on the customer’s last name without selecting the rest of the table? You mean I have to scroll al the way to row 876 to find George’s order? I just had to run the n+1 function several times just last week to make more columns for extra order notes! Why is there so much redundant information? Surely we don’t need to mention our home town on every single order except for that small handful of orders outside town, do we? I just can’t get this report to come out straight…we never decided on a naming convention for our most popular products or our pricing format. Why is that order from two weeks ago entered twice? Grrr…Ed’s in there editing something and I need in there right now—if I copy it and make changes, then we’ve got TWO spreadsheets to deal with…

If you find yourself dealing with any of these situations, it may well be time to look at a database business solution. A database stores large amounts of data easily, thanks to it’s highly structured approach. Relational databases are the most powerful solution because of their ability to link tables of related information together instead of simply storing tons of redundant information. Databases also force consistent data entry, thus allowing it to be easily, quickly and consistently retrieved for reports, invoices and other uses.

The only “disadvantage ” to a business database solution is that databases are for storing data, not displaying it. However, many applications are built to stack on top of databases, retrieve their data, and display it, as well as offer an easy interface to add, update or delete data.

Our flagship product, OnSite, is built on the database-driven FileMaker Pro platform, thus allowing a robust interface with all the power and simplicity of a database and no “double-data entry”. It’s business software made specifically for the promotional products, apparel printing and related industries. Check out its features here and schedule a demo to find out for yourself.

 

Big Data and Small Business

Big Data—large amounts of data that can be sifted through (or “mined”, to use the industry buzzword) to find trends, missed opportunities and better processes—are growing ever more accessible to small businesses. Cloud technologies, mobile technologies, social media and ever more affordable and easy-to-use ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems now allow small businesses to stay on top of marketing efforts, sales, orders, shipping, accounting, cash flow, budgets, balances, inventory management, project management, fleet management, human resources and more. All this information, if processed and analyzed well, can be invaluable to make real-time decisions that have huge benefits for small business. Database-driven solutions can handle or generate this big data beyond anything a spreadsheet was designed for, making your company database the perfect solution to track and run every aspect of your business.

Call us at 800-526-6702 with any questions you have about our database solutions for small business.

One of the best ways to promote and sell a product is to let it speak for itself by using images that sell products. While some people will read the copy created and placed on an ad, many more will look at the images you chose. In fact, the photographs and images you chose are the elements that determine whether people will read your ad further and research your company more — or not.

When selecting images, you will often be selecting one of two types of images: those that show your products or services, or those that help create a mood that supports your brand, products or images.

When choosing the first images, make sure they are accurate. Don’t display images of flowers in vases if you are selling bouquets of flowers without vases, or people will be confused and disappointed when they receive the final product. If you use On Site software, you can manage and store your advertising images directly in your company system.

If you are choosing images from the latter category, make sure they are dynamic, cleanly shot, and strongly contribute to the mood and brand you are actively trying to create. These photos should challenge, inspire, provoke, entertain or enrage. Essentially, they should create an emotion that helps you reach your final goal.

Whichever images you select, though, it is important to be sure that you have reliable software solutions for businesses, like sign business software or Apparel ERP, where you can store them and reference them at a later date.

Creative Ways to Increase Business

Business can be difficult in a slow economy, and business owners and managers often have to get creative to keep pulling in new customers and orders. Here are several creative ways to drum up business, even when the economy is sluggish.

• Everyone is putting on sales and advertising more to try to attract business. As a promotional products company, you can take advantage of this by taking out classified ads that advertise the marketing and advertising benefits of using your products. Business will see the opportunity for mutual growth and come to you with orders.
• Make sure you have good software solutions for business, information services and a strong onsite system, so that you can respond to customers in a timely fashion, provide a professional front on your website and give the best customer service possible. Focusing on providing the best business experience around will ensure that customers will return with their friends even when business is slow.
• Get creative with direct mail, and target groups that take advantage of your services. Focus around holidays and other times of good feelings and light spirits. Spring is a perfect time to begin a new campaign, as people are beginning to brighten and spend more time outside interacting with the world.
• Network with your own vendors and contractors. You never know where you will find a lucrative connection, so make sure you are friendly and open with everyone with whom you come into contact.
• Find out where small groups meet by studying your local newspaper and bulletin boards. Attend meetings and begin building relationships that can then benefit your business.

How do you know if you are outgrowing QuickBooks?

Your business is growing. Like most small businesses in the apparel industry, you probably rely on QuickBooks to run your apparel industry business. You’ve been tracking your expenses, staying in sync with your bank, emailing professional invoices, and paying your employees with QuickBooks for some time now and all is balanced. Even syncing with your accountant for taxes.

Still, you have that aching feeling that something is not quite right. Maybe. . .

•  You realize you need a better way to create consolidated financial reports and the flexibility to format reports to meet your requirements.

•  You just added more employees, product lines, production capability, or locations and you realize that QuickBooks is not providing the reports you need to keep up with your growth.

•  You will be adding offerings, new joint marketing campaigns, as well as a B2B online store for your key clients in the next six months, and you would like to be able to analyze sales based on a combination of location, size, and order — so some sophisticated, integrated spreadsheets would be great.

•  You know that your invoicing is too simplistic and needs to be upgraded to accurately reflect your new services, such as adding more printing types to your decorated apparel line.

•  Not to mention you just hired a couple of new managers to run some new profit centers, to implement systems that log transactions throughout the day, as well as keeping tight, detailed control of ramping production.

You feel loyalty to QuickBooks — even an appreciation. You launched your business with QuickBooks, but times have changed, your business has grown and you would like to adopt a more robust system designed to take your accounting to the next level. You may be outgrowing QuickBooks.

If that’s the case, then congratulations! You are ready for Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). “Oh, but that’s only for medium to large businesses and it’s far too costly.” you might be saying. Not necessarily–ERP for Small Businesses is available in many industries, often designed and supported by folks who cut their teeth in your micro, niche markets.

ERP software applications help growing businesses manage and connect information from all core areas of the enterprise to improve effective decision-making and efficiently integrate accounting and related operational tasks. ERP software solutions promote visibility throughout the entire organization, allowing decision-makers to streamline accounting as well as inventory management, order management, human resources, supply chain, product life cycle, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), and more.

With an advanced ERP system, you can boost accounting and related business management processes through built-in visual process flows that allow for ease of use, and flexible personalization. You can establish a strong business management foundation with powerful core accounting and financial modules that streamline everyday chores into simple tasks. You can even customize options — streamlining your entire accounting and purchasing process from order to receipt.

Still Wondering if You Are Ready for ERP?

If any of the following sounds familiar and you realize that you are outgrowing QuickBooks and getting ready to move on:

•  You are tired of manual processes and basic spreadsheets that must be managed outside of QuickBooks for complex tasks. You would like a more organized way of automating accounting processes and reducing manual tasks, especially duplicate data entry tasks…thus gaining more accuracy.

•  You want greater efficiency — and control. It’s not enough to pull a separate Excel report that is not integrated with the accounting software…thus losing your analytics. You want a better way to analyze and track your data. You want quick access to greater information so that you and your team can be more productive and effective. You find yourself more intrigued by the promise of business intelligence.

•  You want to be able to import data from outside systems, like customized billing entries, and you need to enter more than a few transactions a month. A flexible, automated workflow for vendor invoices would be nice. QuickBooks just seems a little too small these days in terms of meeting your accounting requirements.

Outgrowing QuickBooks is a Badge of Honor — You are Successful

QuickBooks did a terrific job in organizing the early days of your apparel industry business. Now, you are ready for the path to ERP. Evaluating potential ERP solutions for your enterprise can be time-consuming, but essential. The best ERP systems are those with open module architecture and support for everything from purchase management to project management. The cost and time required to adopt an ERP system will be quickly justified when you realize the benefits of managing your business at peak efficiency — ready to face your next stage of growth.

Yes, QuickBooks offers what they call “enterprise systems” and uses third-party add-ons. But a quick look at these “solutions” shows that they are still way too general in scope, thus requiring much more cost to customize. Not only that, most of these add-ons were made specifically for the non-enterprise versions of QuickBooks, thus resulting in less-than-optimal integration with QuickBooks’ Enterprise solution. A proper Small Business ERP already replicates how the industry works…at no extra cost.

Shopwork’s OnSite ERP is business software specifically designed for the promotional products, decorated apparel, and related industries. Let’s prove it to you with a demo of ShopWorks OnSite.

ShopWorks originally grew out of Jam Graphics Inc.’s need for a reliable business management software program. Jam Graphics Inc. was rapidly developing in the 1990’s, but there wasn’t a program that could handle their growing business needs, so they decided to create a program themselves.

Eventually, this program evolved into a new company, later named ShopWorks, which still aims to meet the goal of developing the most efficient, affordable industry-specific software on the market. In the past several decades, the expert software developers at ShopWorks have combined computer know-how and years of industry experience to do just this.

ShopWorks’ programs don’t just offer some of the best software solutions for businesses; they also offer computer solutions and business solutions. The reason that the developers creating and perfecting the programs can create such perfect business solutions is that they themselves have worked manually in the industries that they are developing the programs for. Don’t combine three or four programs from software developers who don’t know your job as well as you do; trust people who have done the same work and know exactly what you need.

Biggest Business Mistakes Over Good Customer Relationships

The foundation of any good business is strong customer relationships. Just as your company can’t run without strong software solutions for business or good products, it also can’t keep its doors open without customers. The impulse to strive for the highest profits at any cost can seem overwhelming at times. Thus, one of the biggest mistakes businesses can make is basing customer relationships on prices and profits.

Every relationship is built on a foundation, and that relationship will only stay healthy as long as your relationship is strong. Building customer relationships on mutual benefit — meaning good quality products for fair prices — and good customer service and accountability means your relationships will be sustained for years to come and your company will flourish. If you base those relationships on getting the highest price possible, that relationship will wither and your customers will build new ones elsewhere.

One of the best ways to make sure you maintain healthy customer relationships and provide great customer feedback is to have a reliable on site system and information service. By investing in good business software, you are also investing in healthy customer relationships and efficient business practices, ensuring your company a long and steady future. The ShopWorx software system helps you manage customer correspondence, update customers on their order from the time it is placed until it is delivered, and set and monitor industry prices to ensure yours are fair.

For more information on how you can provide great customer service and sustain healthy customer relationships, call ShopWorx today.