So you’re running a small business dealing with products. You might be a family-owned wholesaler or distributor, or someone who sells artisanal goods at state or county fairs.
As every small business owner knows, how you manage your inventory can make or break your business. Stock up too much of a product and your cash flow dwindles; stock too little of a fast-selling line and you risk losing sales. Here’s how to save time and money by using almost free inventory management software.
START WITH CLOUD-BASED SOFTWARE
You’re probably using cloud-based software at the moment. This is software accessed through a web browser or mobile application that stores your data in remote servers that you don’t see. Email, scheduling, word processing and spreadsheet apps are all examples of cloud applications.
The same applies to inventory management software. An app to manage your customers, suppliers, products, orders and shipments should live in the cloud, too. And for web apps that are accessed through a web browser, there’s nothing to install or maintain as the app will update itself automatically in the background.
One example of web-based inventory management software that is almost free is EMERGE App. This is an order, purchase and inventory management software that has a free subscription tier if your business needs are modest. Otherwise paid tiers start at $29.90 per user; about the cost of two week’s worth of lattes.
CONSOLIDATE YOUR SALES CHANNELS
Once you’re on board with your favorite inventory management software, you should consolidate all your sales channels in one place. This means that sales orders from your website, e-commerce stores, telesales and kiosks at state and county fairs should be brought together in the software.
By doing this you don’t need to search high and low for sales orders from various places. Also, the web-based nature of the software allows any mobile tablet or laptop to be used to enter sales orders as they happen. This provides real-time and accurate inventory levels across your business.
USE TIME-SAVING TIPS AND TRICKS
Depending on your choice of inventory management software, your application should save you time and frustration in your daily workflow with built-in tips and tricks. After all, you are using technology to work better, faster and cheaper.
One example is generating customized quotations and emailing them directly to your customer — all from within the software application. Another is issuing a purchase order, shipment or invoice directly from a sales order. In some cases, an invoice generator may come in handy as well. Or, if you’re importing goods, calculating landed costs automatically and distributing them in proportion to the goods in the purchase order.
INTEGRATE WITH OTHER BUSINESS SOFTWARE
While inventory management software should take center stage in any small business that deals with goods, it should also work and share data with other business software that you might use.
If you’re using a web-based accounting package, for example, your inventory management software should be able to export customer invoices, supplier invoices and credit notes to your accounting software.
This saves you the trouble of re-entering the data (along with mistakes) and the accounting app is used to generate in-depth financial reports of your sales, purchases and inventory levels. These reports can then be used to forecast demand with better accuracy and avoid overstocked and stockout situations mentioned earlier.
As a small business owner, it’s sometimes hard to draw the line between work and family life. And it’s particularly tricky when you’re running a home office! Using technology in your business, such as inventory management software, will help you to work better and faster, and make more time for the things that truly matter.
Morgan Arron
Wednesday 22nd of January 2020
You have provided great knowledge and I like the best free inventory management software that will help you precisely track your provisions, guarantee great stock levels, and oversee merchant relations.