Trending Now

Descartes Releases May Global Shipping Report: April 2024…

New Articles

3 Insightful Decisions That SOLOCHAIN WMS Can Assist Manufacturers With

manufacture
Archives, Global Logistics, Global Trade Daily, Warehousing

3 Insightful Decisions That SOLOCHAIN WMS Can Assist Manufacturers With

Leave a comment

The digitization of supply chains is well underway. SaaS solutions, such as the SOLOCHAIN WMS, have made it easier for manufacturing companies to reap the operational benefits of new technology solutions, rapidly obtain ROI, and stimulate growth. 

In this blog, we take a quick look at the three scenarios that illustrate how the SOLOCHAIN WMS not only improves daily operations on the floor, but also provides management crucial information to help leaders make better decisions. Find out how SOLOCHAIN concretely enables more efficient and cost-effective activities in the warehouse and paves the way to better client experience, sustained growth, and higher margins.

Planning Production in a Time of Supply Chain Disruptions

Many pieces and parts go into making a forklift that usually must be acquired from various vendors. When supply chain disruptions leave items blocked in container yards here and there across the coast, it quickly becomes difficult to determine when the needed pieces will be delivered. This severely limits a manufacturer’s ability to plan production and, consequently, to adequately manage clients’ expectations.

SOLOCHAIN gives a forklift manufacturer the ability to manage orders and locate incoming items across all channels from one easy to read interface. Once SOLOCHAIN is integrated with their ERP and their vendors’ systems, the manufacturer can the leverage the WMS to identify every container, every truck, and every facility where ordered items are located, as well as any changes to delivery dates. Thanks to that data, the manufacturer can precisely determine production calendars, find alternative solutions when need be, and keep their customers apprised.

Maintaining high service levels in a time of disruptions gives the forklift manufacturer a competitive advantage that opens new possibilities for growth.

Making Candy Bars that Make Everyone Smile

Manufacturing in the food & beverage industry requires that operators pay attention to a variety of details: FIFO across different temp zones, items consumed in a batch, customer shelf-life requirements, etc. To ensure its commercial success, a candy bar processing facility must be able to rely on the right data so that items are consumed at the right time and processed products are efficiently picked and shipped that meet the client’s standards.

SOLOCHAIN supports all activities in the processing facility, from the reception of ingredients to the production of processed goods to shipping the candy. At every step, adaptable mobile workflow and graphical tools are accessible to employees on intuitive, easy to read interfaces. Dashboards provide them the right information to ensure that items are handled properly and efficiently. SOLOCHAIN will, for example, communicate FIFO data to employees picking ingredients, guaranteeing that stocks are efficiently consumed and losses are avoided. It will also inform employees of a client’s shelf-life requirements, making sure that picked items meet their standards and are not returned, which avoids costly penalties.

Meanwhile, SOLOCHAIN affords management granular visibility on crucial information: who is performing what task, details regarding production progress, all inventory modifications in real time, and the status of orders fulfilment. Thanks to intuitive dashboards and detailed reporting capabilities, the SOLOCHAIN WMS enables faster order fulfillment, improved customer satisfaction, and, ultimately, higher margins.

Download WMS SOLOCHAIN Product Sheet Here

Efficient Recalls at the Ice Cream Factory

While all manufacturers do their best to steer clear of having to perform recalls, they remain a part of the game. The real differentiator between competing companies is how well recalls are managed. The key, of course, is to achieve recalls that are precise and expedient. By doing so, operators avoid crippling financial penalties and maintain the high service levels that have allowed them to build strong customer confidence over time.

Thanks to its powerful traceability capabilities, SOLOCHAIN informs a manufacturer such as an ice cream maker of all the items that were consumed in a batch. Moreover, it allows the ice cream maker to rigorously trace each and every one of these items, from vendor to customer. And if that wasn’t enough, the WMS also contains a visual tool that makes it easy for employees on the floor to verify, understand, and comply with FDA regulations.

SOLOCHAIN therefore makes it easy for the ice cream maker to precisely identify which lot of cream was problematic, which batches of ice cream consumed that cream, and which must consequently be recalled. SOLOCHAIN let management know of the exact location of every unit from these batches, enabling them to make precise and efficient recalls. Thanks to SOLOCHAIN, no good ice cream goes wasted!

Generix Group North America provides a series of solutions within our Supply Chain Hub product suite to create efficiencies across an entire supply chain. Our solutions are in use around the world and our experience is second-to-none. We invite you to contact us to learn more.

checks
Archives, Banking, Global Trade Daily

Check use drops, but still plenty of room for efficiency gains

Leave a comment

AFP, the Association for Financial Professionals released the 2022 Payments Cost Benchmarking Survey underwritten by Corpay. The survey looks at external costs such as bank/payment provider fees, reporting, interchange for credit cards, etc., and internal costs such as personnel, technical equipment, IT support.

Treasury and other financial professionals can now compare their costs of making and receiving seven types of payments–check, ACH credits and debits; wires; credit and debit cards; real-time payments, and virtual cards–against benchmarks for similarly sized companies. This is useful information for identifying areas for optimization and in making the business case for further automation.

This time around, the cost of incoming payments has also been segmented by tender type, a recognition of the fact that impact to vendors should be part of the equation when implementing a new payment strategy.

Survey Says…

This survey was completed about 18 months after COVID-19 began and reflects the acceleration of electronic payment adoption driven by work from home policies. The typical organization now reports processing between 500 to 999 checks per month and 1,000-1,999 outgoing payments via ACH Credit. In 2015, the median number of checks processed per month was 1,000-1,999 while the ACH Credit median was 500-999 per month.

Data collected from nearly 350 accounts payable professionals confirms that paper checks are considerably more expensive than all electronic payment methods except for wires. Even though the survey found high awareness of the cost of checks compared to electronic methods, 92% of organizations continue to accept them.

Survey results indicate that despite lower overall check processing median transaction cost for issuing a paper check range between $2.01-$4.00 per check

Increased efficiency was the primary reason cited for transitioning to electronic payments (92% of respondents), compared to 82% of respondents that cited cost reduction. This marks a shift in focus; according to the 2019 AFP Electronic Payments Survey—released well before the pandemic hit—the top three drivers were cost savings, fraud controls and better supplier/customer relations. Efficiency in terms of speed and ease of reconciliation were ranked 4th and 5th respectively in 2019.

Fraud remains a top concern, with 67% citing fraud concerns as a primary driver for electronic payment adoption. Fifty five percent of organizations with revenue greater than $5 billion said the move was part of a larger workflow automation project.

Despite the new focus on efficiency, results from this year’s survey suggest that paper checks are not going away anytime soon. Despite nearly two thirds of organizations saying they would replace paper checks with electronic payments if there was a cost benefit, 37% of all respondents said they would continue to use paper checks regardless of costs.

The report cites the ubiquitous nature of checks, tradition, the challenges of converting vendors to electronic payment methods, and longstanding systems and routines as enduring obstacles to change. This thinking, along with other internal Corpay market research, suggests that many organizations remain unaware of changes in the payments market that could help them achieve greater efficiencies, cut costs and better prevent fraud.

Our take:

-Card payments remain underutilized. Procurement, T&E and virtual card processing can be easier to automate as vendors often have systems in place to capture data from ERP and procurement systems. As treasury and payments professionals continue to focus on tightly managing working capital , credit cards can be a very valuable tool. Organizations should evaluate their average cost of capital, cost of credit, and credit terms, and the opportunity cost of accepting/not accepting cards when evaluating them as part of an overall larger payments strategy.

-The adoption of virtual cards in particular is still relatively low—23% across all respondents. Virtual cards offer all the working capital benefits–including rebates–associated with traditional credit cards. But since these single use cards can only be used by the specified payee in the specified amount, they offer unparalleled protection against fraud. Considering the focus on fraud prevention, virtual cards warrant a more prominent place in organizations’ vendor payment strategy.

-The 2019 AFP Electronic Payments Survey reported that the cost to convert customers from paper checks to electronic payments was the number one drawback to conversion. This cost was not considered in the Benchmark survey, but treasury and finance professionals are well aware of the ongoing manual labor involved in enabling vendors for electronic payment. What they may not be aware of is that Fintechs such as Corpay have large, cloud-based acceptance networks and take on that effort on behalf of their customers.

-The study looked at seven different payment methods. The majority of companies are using at least three but some may be using all seven. That means they are likely running several discrete payment workflows. Where that is the case, they could achieve further efficiencies with a payment automation solution that consolidates all payment methods into a single workflow.

-Companies with annual revenue between $1-$4.9 billion are the heaviest users of wire payments, which can cost up to 12 times as much as a check. This is likely due to an organization with a global footprint that is sending more wires to vendors overseas. Companies this size may not yet have a global operations infrastructure and access to local payment systems and banking partners. These companies could benefit from a payments partner specializing in cross-border payments.

As the Benchmark survey notes, the cost to receive a check is typically half of what it is to issue one, and large AR departments have efficient, often touchless processes in place for processing them. Prior to the pandemic, that meant vendors often did not feel the same sense of urgency to digitize payments.

During the pandemic, convincing vendors to accept digital payments became a much easier discussion as both parties were motivated to move to an electronic format while their teams were working remotely. That created a tailwind for the move off paper checks, which has been far slower than anticipated in North America. Streamlining your payment process and migrating to less expensive, more efficient payment methods should be your priority for 2022.

By Corpay, a FLEETCOR company.

business relationships
Archives, Commentary, Global Trade Daily, Special Reports

5 Ways To Strengthen Your Business Relationships And Grow Your Company

Leave a comment

Another record year for entrepreneurship could be in store for 2022. But how many of these new business owners end up succeeding will depend on more than the quality of the products and services they offer.

Creating and nurturing customer relationships allow businesses to offer a more personalized and enticing customer experience, which produces the buyer loyalty that is vital to a company’s long-term success, says James Webb (www.jamesharoldwebb.com), a successful entrepreneur in the medical and fitness sectors and author of A Country Boy’s Journey To Prosperity.

“Relationships are the greatest asset an entrepreneur has,” Webb says. “To retain customers, it requires a process that turns every touchpoint with a customer into an opportunity for communication, trust, and mutual growth.”

But Webb emphasizes that an entrepreneur’s success is also highly contingent upon the strength of other business relationships as well.

“Good relationships with employees bring new meaning to work, strong productivity and new ideas that carry the business forward,” Webb says. “Relationships with financial partners allow you to take risks. Mentors and colleagues can help you view strategy and processes through a different lens.

“The more you cultivate all of these business relationships, the more you, they, and your business can grow. But you can’t take them for granted. Relationships are gardens that need tending.”

Webb offers these tips to entrepreneurs on how to strengthen their relationships with customers and other business associates:

Invite customer feedback. Webb says to truly know where your company stands with customers and what you can do to improve and better meet their needs, you need to survey their thoughts about your products and services – ideally in person. “Most of the time unsatisfied customers don’t approach you with a detailed list of things they’d like for you to improve on,” Webb says. “They just leave for one of your competitors. So set aside time to get their feedback and show them you care.”

Make your customer feel valued through the entire experience. “Consider the customer experience from start to finish,” Webb says. “Find opportunities to go the extra mile and make shopping with your company enjoyable. Positive words will spread like wildfire about your business, especially on social media, and remember, negative words can spread, too. Make customers feel they’re a part of something special by making them feel special.” A key part to the customer experience equation, Webb notes, is providing good website content that gives them insight and a quick path to solutions.

Encourage a sense of ownership among your employees. Webb says giving employees a voice in major decisions, more responsibility and allowing them to own stock are ways to create a sense of ownership and strong ties between your employees and your business. “Inspiring your employees to love your business as much as you do will strengthen your company’s foundation,” Webb says. “Your business will be that much more likely to survive setbacks and grow.”

Be generous with compliments. “Employees know you can’t give them a raise every time they do a good job, but recognizing them when they do good work makes them feel appreciated and goes a long way toward making them want to stay at your company,” Webb says.

Value your vendors. People who service your company regularly are a big part of the infrastructure that keeps your company rolling. “Treat them like honorary employees,” Webb says. “Everyone from your suppliers to your web designer is an important part of your extended team, and nurturing these relationships with nice gestures and consistent communication will just make your company stronger from the ground up.”

“It’s critical to be humble enough to understand that you need great relationships to succeed as an entrepreneur,” Webb says. “I’ve seen talented people fail because they thought they could do it alone.”

_________________________________________________________________________

James Harold Webb (www.jamesharoldwebb.com) is the author of Redneck Resilience: A Country Boy’s Journey To Prosperity. His career in radiology saw him rise from a technologist to becoming a leader in the industry as the entrepreneur of several companies focused on outpatient medical imaging, pain management and laboratory services. In 2014, Webb turned his attention to the fitness sector and developed, owned and oversaw the management of 33 Orangetheory Fitness® franchises throughout North Texas. They were all sold to a private equity group in 2019. He currently owns the franchise rights for Dallas, Austin and Houston for BeBalanced Centers, a homeopathic hormone weight-loss franchise. His team has three stores open with plans for another 15 to 20 over the next four years.

enterprise marketplaces
Archives, Global Logistics, Global Trade Daily

10 Reasons to Embrace Enterprise Marketplaces

Leave a comment

Sellers must think strategically to unlock the power of these powerful new ecommerce technologies.

The pandemic sparked a surge in online selling — and not just by DTC brands serving customers while they were hunkered down at home. The B2B digital commerce space has also seen massive growth over the past two years, a trend that has only been accelerated by the rise of enterprise marketplaces.

What is an enterprise marketplace? Well, we’re all familiar with online marketplaces such as Amazon, Etsy, or eBay that focus solely on connecting buyers and sellers. An enterprise marketplace does much the same, but it’s typically run by an organization that wants to sell its own products and services to customers, and creates a marketplace to offer complimentary products, strengthen its partner networks, or create a better experience for its customers.

The world of enterprise marketplaces is remarkably diverse, including multi-vendor marketplaces, procurement-focused marketplaces, and branded marketplaces. In all cases, though, the enterprise marketplace approach is a powerful paradigm that’s changing the way that organizations sell online. Let’s take a closer look at some of the key benefits that well-run enterprise marketplaces deliver for their operators, vendors, and customers:

1. New revenue streams. Subscriptions, transaction fees, and value-add services or support charges enable marketplace operators to collect revenues without managing their own inventory or building out warehouses. Frankfurt Airport, for instance, invested in an online marketplace, and now collects membership fees from airport retailers who list products and offer promotions to passengers.

2. Customer experiences. Marketplaces are a great way to expand from B2B into B2B2C, or D2C models while still delivering engaging experiences. Andikem, the chemical fulfillment marketplace, achieves this by providing supply-chain transparency and fulfillment efficiency, keeping prices low for buyers.

3. Elimination of pain points. Marketplaces can offer solutions to customer headaches in areas such as supply chain and fulfillment. DOZR set up its WebStores marketplace to address an unmet need by helping construction contractors to rent equipment more easily, and now connects 15,000 suppliers with hundreds of thousands of customers.

4. Smarter procurement. Marketplaces are a perfect solution for complex procurement scenarios, helping buyers such as large companies or government agencies to coordinate across multiple divisions, subsidiaries, or business units while maintaining strict ordering processes. SupplyCore, the logistics solutions company, achieves this with a digital platform that manages complex orders without manual input, enabling customers to track order status from quote to delivery.

5. Streamlined purchasing. Marketplaces can support complex B2B purchasing arrangements, improving efficiency and lowering costs for everyone. Tundra Restaurant Supply, for instance, has built a flexible marketplace that allows it to offer customized experiences, discounts, and free shipping even for big buyers such as Chipotle.

6. Better franchise relationships. Franchise businesses can use an enterprise marketplace model to create a collaborative environment, maintain visibility into franchisor-franchisee relationships, and improve outcomes for customers. French retail franchise V and B does this well: their cloud-first marketplace centralizes inventory and streamlines operations for HQ, franchises, and suppliers.

7. Expanded product offerings. With competition growing, mass-market retailers are increasingly creating marketplaces to grow their product offerings. Walmart Marketplace, Amazon’s biggest US challenger, now uses its 5,000 brick-and-mortar stores as a value-add: vendors get a chance to sell in-store, and shoppers get access to a far wider array of products.

8. Better use of existing assets. Organizations with a large distribution footprint can maximize their assets with a marketplace. Target, for instance, leverages its distribution and store network to power its invite-only Target Plus marketplace, and promotes hand-picked brands across its Target.com and mobile ecosystem.

9. Better product information. Enterprise marketplaces can elevate product presentation — a valuable proposition for B2Bs with large SKUs and complex offerings. PartsBase, the world’s largest aircraft parts marketplace, delivers value by maintaining detailed product information for 15 billion parts spanning 100,000,000 inventory lines.

10.  A stronger ecosystem. Businesses with large partner networks can use marketplaces to centralize and enable collaboration. Toyota Material Handling achieved this by gathering over 200 certified dealers on its platform, delivering a more engaging partner experience and ensuring a better product selection for end-users.

Think strategically

Unlocking these benefits doesn’t happen all by itself. Organizations need to think strategically about their enterprise marketplaces in order to get the most bang for their buck.

That starts with building out the operational infrastructure you need to succeed, including clear purchasing processes, fulfillment workflows, and payment systems. You’ll also need to communicate clearly with all stakeholders, including your outside partners and your own employees, in order to make sure that everyone understands the strategic goal of the marketplace and is committed to pulling in the same direction.

Operators also need to go into the process of building a marketplace with clear eyes, and an understanding that creating a successful marketplace requires committing serious resources. From building out digital infrastructure to retraining employees and engaging with partners, you’ll need to invest if you’re going to build a successful marketplace — and the amounts needed can be a dealbreaker for brands that aren’t sufficiently mature or ambitious.

Finally, you’ll need to develop the right toolkit. Fortunately, that doesn’t mean building everything yourself: these days, there are a wide range of marketplace management platforms to choose from. Many marketplace tools are designed to support conventional marketplace operators, though, and don’t include the features needed for enterprise operations. Be sure you do your due diligence, and select a marketplace solution that’s designed to support the specific needs of B2B and enterprise operators.

Plan for success

The bottom line is that enterprise marketplaces are changing the way that businesses of all kinds buy and sell online. That’s potentially a lucrative opportunity for operators — including manufacturers, distributors, retailers, franchisors, and even government actors.

The more crowded the enterprise marketplace grows, though, the more competitive the space will become. That means new and existing operators will need a careful and measured strategic approach in order to gain a foothold and build a successful marketplace.

When you’re thinking about the potential benefits of running an enterprise marketplace, then, it’s important to plan ahead. Focus in on exactly what you’re hoping to achieve — and develop the strategy, partnerships, and toolkit you need to achieve your own specific goals.

__________________________________________________________________

Yoav Kutner is the CEO and co-founder of Oro, Inc, which has created OroCommerce, the No.1 open-source eCommerce platform built for distributors, wholesalers, brands, and manufacturers. Yoav previously co-founded and served as the CTO of Magento.

B2B
Archives, Global Trade Daily, Special Reports

What B2B Marketing Trends Can We Expect to See in 2022?

Leave a comment

Major shifts in the global market are impacting how B2B companies approach marketing. After 18 chaotic months, innovation is accelerating at a rapid pace. The digital transformation of the economy and the rise of e-commerce are likely to spark significant change in 2022.

Current data suggests these trends are likely to define B2B marketing in the coming year, so businesses would be wise to embrace them.

1. Spending Shifts to Mobile-First Strategy

In 2022, mobile and digital advertising will continue to become central to B2B marketing efforts. At the same time, marketers are also adjusting to a work-from-home reality. Around 70% of B2B buyers and decision-makers prefer remote or digital interactions with vendors.

Gartner predicts this number will tick up by an additional 10 percentage points by 2025. These buyers will likely respond better to more digital marketing strategies, as well.

Many marketers will likely shift to a digital-first marketing approach that prioritizes mobile advertising and content over offline and more traditional strategies. This will probably come with growing ad spend — though growth is on track to be slower next year than it has been in the past, partly due to the lingering effects of COVID-19.

As the amount of millennials in decision-making roles has grown, so has the number of buyers who want a seller-free experience. Less personal and direct approaches to marketing may become more popular among B2B marketers as a result.

2. Changing Lead Generation Channels

Generating quality leads remains a top goal of B2B marketers. How they are developed is likely to change significantly in 2022 and through the rest of the decade.

COVID-19 impacted how events are hosted. While some businesses pivoted to online events and others chose to delay or cancel, all marketers had to adapt quickly to the reality that in-person events were no longer always available to generate leads.

Jurgen Desmedt, head of marketing at Europe-based CDP vendor NGDATA, told CMSWire that social media is emerging as a major lead-generation channel.

B2B marketers are more often taking to social advertisements to generate leads that previously came from events. Uncertainty in B2B marketing may also be driving the pivot to social media. Marketers unwilling to commit fully to in-person interactions may instead look toward other methods requiring less commitment.

The most popular style of social media marketing is also changing. Many marketers are now more interested in highly targeted and personalized strategies. Many platforms offer targeting tools with extremely fine levels of detail so they can deliver niche content to specific audiences.

Scheduling apps may help smaller businesses and solo entrepreneurs manage an increasingly complex strategy that delivers niche content to various audiences.

3. Growing Focus on Customer Psychology

The “neuromarketing” strategy allows B2B marketers to spend more time than ever focused on the individual psychology of key buyers and decision-makers. In practice, this may look like a shift from topic-driven to persona-driven marketing in B2B. Marketers will focus on honing in on their target audience’s particular needs, desires, and interests to generate more effective ads, content, and events.

Client personas will become a more important marketing consideration as a result. There’s also likely to be a greater focus on matching searcher intent and developing deeper content calendars.

4. Innovation to Engage B2B Customers

Cutting-edge technology will help marketers create campaigns that more effectively engage potential buyers in 2022. Optimizing for new types of search — like image and audio — may be essential to capture traffic. AI and marketing chatbots could help marketers reach more customers and reduce the amount of time potential buyers spend waiting.

In some cases, new technology and the focus on psychology may also mean the growing use of high-tech advertisements that generate interest and secure potential buyers’ attention.

Interactivity in emails can increase conversions and improve ROI — helping businesses get more out of their email campaigns. AMP emails, which enable marketers to provide app-like functionality inside a message, are one common method for delivering this interactivity.

Similar uses of personalization and interactivity in other forms of marketing may also provide results like these.

5. Original Research and Top-Quality Content

Online resource centers, blogs, content hubs and more have become a valuable tool for B2B marketers. In 2022, original research is likely to become even more important for marketing efforts.

According to data from the 2020 Demand Gen Report, B2B buyers increasingly look to a business’s original content when making purchasing decisions. This has become a significant trust marker, signaling to buyers that the company puts stock in its organizational knowledge and experience. Research also provides some early value to a potential buyer,

Because content has become a trust marker, simply writing posts to generate traffic and leads will no longer be enough. Information needs to be top-quality to encourage buyers to investigate the brand further or get in touch with the business’s sales team.

Various content strategies will likely be necessary to deliver high-quality information relevant to B2B buyers’ interests.

Customer psychology will likely be important to content teams. Effective use and reuse of posts will allow marketers to take full advantage of what they develop. Breaking things up to enable the tracking of micro-conversions could provide marketers with additional insights into reader behavior and interests.

Certain content types will also probably be more valuable than others. A business’s niche, original research, white papers and other forms of highly valuable and in-depth content may provide the most value to readers — building trust and generating interest.

Video content remains one of the top content types, overtaking blog posts and infographics in popularity. However, the high cost of producing video content may be a barrier to its use by some businesses.

How B2B Marketing Is Likely to Change in 2022

Uncertainty and digital transformation will likely have a significant impact on B2B marketing next year. Marketers are beginning to leverage mobile-first approaches, invest more in social media and adopt cutting-edge technology, like chatbots and interactive emails. This will be vital to effectively reach people and boost sales moving forward.

These new strategies and tools may help companies adapt to a market where buyers are more interested in digital channels and personalized content. Marketers must be prepared to embrace the upcoming changes to effectively reach their target audiences in 2022.

payment
Archives, Banking, Commentary, Global Trade Daily

Top 5 Payment Providers for Retail Businesses

Leave a comment

Payment providers are critical in assisting organizations to thrive as technology, new payment choices, and markets continue to evolve. Making your website capable of making online purchases, on the other hand, is more difficult than you might think. Connecting your website to a payment processor frequently necessitates significant technical knowledge. Fortunately, third-party payment service solutions provide this functionality without complication to process transactions and improve the shopping experience for your customers.

There are various types of payment service providers in the market. They differ in terms of features, capabilities, and pricing. How can you know which one is right for you?

How to select a payment provider for your retail business

Choosing a payment gateway for your retail business can be more difficult than you think. When assessing payment providers for your website, you can consider a point of sale software connected with secure payment terminals or look for the following crucial features:

Fees: Different pricing schemes might have varying effects on your business. You should be careful of providers that charge for set-up, monthly fees, and variable volume levels. Transaction Processing: You should keep track of how long it takes you to receive paid following the transaction.

Integration: Before choosing a provider, you may ensure that the payment solution interfaces with your website or any of your other applications.

Customers: You should take into account your consumer base’s preferences. Using a supplier that your customers already use for their payments can ensure a faster and less complicated checkout for the vast majority of your customers. Do you have a large number of eBay customers? They are probably familiar with PayPal, for example.

PCI Compliance: You should ensure that your provider adheres to PCI DSS requirements to ensure safe transactions for both your customers and yourself.

Let’s take a look at some of the best payment providers accessible for your retail business!

Paypal

PayPal is often considered the “godfather” of all payment gateways. It becomes a dominant presence in the industry with over 375 million active registered accounts in over 200 countries.

During the checkout process, PayPal Express Checkout asks customers to leave your site and log in with their PayPal account or establish a new one. Your website will have a PayPal button.

Customers leave your site to check out and connect to their PayPal account, or they pay by credit card without needing to sign up for an account when using PayPal standard. PayPal Pro enables you to host and modify the whole checkout process, without requiring the customer to leave your site. It also takes credit cards over the phone, fax, and mail.

Stripe

Stripe is one of the most well-known eCommerce payment gateway services. It was founded in 2010 and today controls between 10% and 20% of the market (second only to PayPal). Having trouble figuring out how to connect a payment gateway to Shopify for example? Not to worry! Stripe’s integration with Shopify is simple.

Furthermore, Stripe operates in over 40 countries and accepts over 135 currencies, allowing your consumers to pay in their currency while you get payments in yours. Stripe Checkout is ideal if you do not want to create payment forms from scratch. It is a payment form that can be embedded into a desktop, tablet, and mobile device. Customers do not leave your site to finish the transaction because they store their payment information with Stripe. Stripe is quickly becoming a household name in the business, and for good reason.

Square

One of Square’s biggest features is how simple it is to set up. Users can install the program for free on any iOS or Android device and accept payments using a free plugin mobile credit card reader provided by Square. Merchants may accept credit card payments with only a smartphone or tablet, making it ideal for food carts, farmer’s markets, craft stalls, and other mobile merchants.

Braintree

Braintree is a payment gateway that combines flexibility, security, and customization. It was purchased by PayPal in 2013 when the online payment giant realized the potential of its competitor. Braintree accepts international payments in over 130 currencies in over 45 countries and regions worldwide.

Wepay

WePay is a bit of an enigma in the digital payment provider market, but it is still beneficial for enough small eCommerce business owners that we placed it on this list. The uncertainty stems from WePay’s failure to make its pricing plan transparent. If you are interested, you must contact them directly for a quote.

Having said that, Wepay has a plethora of appealing features. There are no cancellation costs, for example. That’s correct. Unlike most other payment gateways, you will not be fined if you choose to stop using WePay’s services

Conclusion

Choosing a payment gateway provider will be one of the first milestones in your trip through the world of retail businesses. With this information cutting down the list of payment solution alternatives, you’ll be ready to conduct additional studies and choose the ideal solution for you.

__________________________________________________________

Richard has been an enthusiastic writer in the retail industry for more than 3 years. He mainly writes about how POS solutions help retailers improve their business efficiency and maximize profit. With long-year experience, Richard never stops updating his industry knowledge so that he can spread it to the world and help people realize the true potentials of having a digitalized POS system in this modern age.

vendor
Archives, Banking, Global Trade Daily, Special Reports

How to Adopt a Powerful Approach to Vendor Payments

Leave a comment

Spurred by the need for remote work capabilities, companies today are trying to move from manual processes to electronic vendor payments. This transition is easier said than done. On the face of it, electronic payments seem more efficient but, without the proper tools and partners, they can end up causing more work. It pays to think about electronic payments from a holistic perspective from the start to avoid this roadblock.

An efficient payment process is one in which you can send a single payment file–containing all your payments–to a payment automation provider, without it requiring any additional follow-up. If you have any questions or need to check on payment there should be one centralized place where you can view all that information while your payment partner handles any payment errors that occur. Linear and simple!

A far cry from efficient

That is a far cry from what happens when you don’t have the right tools or partners in place. Many companies try to piece together different products for different payment types. They may choose a banking partner for sending ACH payments, an outsourced check printing firm, a credit card partner, and a tool for automating the payment approval process.

Seems simple, right? All you have to do is call up your bank or enterprise resource planning (ERP) provider. No request for proposal (RFP) process is required; no need to run vendors and contracts through legal and compliance. Even if each partner can only handle one or two pieces of the process, it seems easier than finding a new partner to handle the whole thing from end to end (which is not as complicated as it sounds, to be fair).

Adding these electronic processes to your back-office as separate elements may feel like a quick, inexpensive way to move to electronic payments, but it could come back to bite you. This patchwork approach creates more inefficiencies that surface pretty quickly and have to be addressed by the accounts payable (AP) team on an ongoing basis.

No time to optimize

It is easy enough to launch a card program, but there is a lot that goes into optimizing that program on an ongoing basis. You will be responsible for contacting vendors to see if they’ll accept payment by card and maintaining a responsive contact at that company that is willing to run the card when prompted. AP teams rarely have time to do that, making their card programs less successful and often below the levels of rebates they were expecting.

Security can also be an issue with in-house card programs. When you’re managing a card program in-house, you’re probably using purchasing cards or T&E cards rather than virtual cards, which likely means you’re not keeping cards secure.

In my role at a previous company, I was the person responsible for running those (unfortunately insecure) card payments. We kept copies of customers’ credit cards in an unlocked drawer. Whenever they were ready to pay, we would go into the drawer, pull the card number and run through our terminal or portal. That’s a pretty common setup, and it’s nowhere near as secure as a virtual card. Also, if the card number changes or is hacked you will need to communicate that to every supplier who has been running your card, adding additional hours of work to your team.

Managing an ACH program poses many of the same challenges. Reaching out to vendors to get them on the program, collecting, and keeping up with changes in banking information is a lot of work that usually nobody has spare time for. Also, storing vendor banking information in a way that is compliant can be tedious and has a lot of red tape. Working with a vendor that is already SOC compliant can save time and money. Few organizations can keep up with all the technology and training needed to prevent ACH fraud, which is the fastest-growing form of payment fraud.

Routine complications

Teams may also find that routine payment runs are more complicated with a piecemeal setup. Instead of running one payment file every time, you’ve got to work with three different systems and partners that aren’t communicating with each other–four if you’re also making cross-border payments. You’re managing too many relationships and projects, and anytime you need data to research a payment you’ve got three different places to look.

There are some banks that offer full AP, but they’re not actually technology providers. They’re just running your payments through one or more vendors and charging you a premium for it. Since banks are not the actual service provider, any time you have a question or a problem, they’re going to have to take it to the service provider and then get back to you. You’re adding time and another layer of communication. Not to mention you probably won’t get the same level of services–payment indemnification, fraud protection and error resolution–from most banks or software providers either, but you can with a payment automation provider.

A scalable approach

Arguably the biggest challenge with electronic payments is vendor enablement–getting vendors set up and then managing their payment data on an ongoing basis because vendor data is dynamic. Neither a bank nor a collection of providers is a large-scale vendor network. According to Nvoicepay internal data, about 25% of your vendors will change their information each year. You’ll need someone on your side to manage those changes.

Our platform is powered by the cloud, making managing a vendor network scalable. Cloud-based payment providers can handle the data all at once on behalf of all their customers that pay that vendor. If the payment provider enables a vendor for card payment, that vendor is enabled for card payment for every customer that pays them within our network. By leveraging the payment provider’s network, you can pay far more of your vendors electronically with no extra effort on your part.

Vendor payments are a process. Up until the last decade or so, we didn’t have technology that could address the whole payment process from end to end. There was no “Salesforce for payments.” All we had was a collection of different payment products. Each of the payment products required a certain amount of manual work on the front end to be able to send the payment and on the back end to reconcile and fix any errors. There was a tremendous amount of inefficiency.

Today, you can hand off all that work to one company–a company that specializes in vendor payments and customer service, and has the process down to a science, using technology to automate as much of your process as possible. Implementation takes just a few weeks. It requires a few hours of IT time, your vendor list, and an hour or two of initial training. The final step in simplifying your entire AP process is sending one payment file and letting your partners handle the rest. Now that’s real efficiency.

__________________________________________________________________

Maggie Schroeder, CPA is a Senior Solutions Consultant at Nvoicepay. She previously worked as an accountant, as an auditor for Deloitte, and as a consultant helping small to medium-sized businesses find partners for business and AP automation software.

ROI
Archives, Banking, Global Trade Daily

How to Calculate the Real Benefits of ROI

Leave a comment

There’s a healthy number of ROI opportunities within the payment automation sphere, and it’s relatively easy to estimate for any given organization by doing a payment analysis. Unfortunately, many professionals don’t take advantage of the available opportunities—or otherwise can’t recognize them due to the constantly shifting payment landscape. Payment automation companies make it their business to identify the options for each firm based on their unique needs and criteria.

For example, Nvoicepay scans for ROI possibilities by looking through vendor and payment data from the previous year. We focus on areas that will produce the most positive impact: transactional cost reduction and increased rebates, for example. Altogether, there are several areas where organizations see positive ROI from payment automation. Below are seven ways in which payment automation supports time and money savings, and how payment automation companies can lend a hand in achieving these goals. The examples given are based on our internal data.

1. Reduced check payments.

Checks are the most expensive and time-consuming way to pay vendors. While switching vendors to electronic payment can be a time-consuming project, keeping to the status quo becomes even more costly in time and dollars in the long run.

While check costs vary by company, the general cost to print and mail checks is between $3 and $8 per check. This includes purchasing check stock, envelopes, postage, and staff time. We find that most organizations can reduce the number of checks they’re writing by about 70 percent.

For example, if you’re writing a thousand checks per month at $3,000, switching 70 percent of your vendors to electronic payment options will reduce the number of checks to roughly 300, costing $900. In this scenario, you’d save $2,100 monthly and $25,200 annually.

2. Increased rebates.

Find chances to earn rebates, whether that’s making payments to vendors within a certain time limit, or meeting other requirements that ease up on the receivables workload. For companies that maintain a large vendor base, it can be tricky to scope out advantageous prospects.

We have found that roughly 15-20 percent of vendors accept credit card, which is an excellent place to start looking for rebate potential. It’s startlingly effective to ask vendors if they’re able to accept card. If even 150 vendors out of every 1000 switch to virtual cards, especially if they’re highest-paid vendors, you have the chance to generate rebates on hundreds of thousands of dollars each month.

3. Enabling vendors for electronic payments.

Setting vendors up for electronic payment requires several steps, including reaching out to each vendor to ask which forms of payment they’ll accept, and collecting and verifying the provided information. Based on our experience enabling nearly a million vendors in our network, we estimate that this process takes roughly 30 minutes per vendor. To switch 350 vendors to electronic payments would take about 700 hours of enablement work. If you pay your accounts payable team $25 an hour (a conservative estimate) the time spent on enrolling the 350 vendors would cost your company $17,500. Taking advantage of payment automation’s enablement programs often significantly reduces this cost, as well as the time spent on the process.

4. Prevented or resolved ACH errors.

ACH files are very rigid and difficult to work with. Making one mistake can run the risk of the entire payment file being rejected. On a more granular level, misapplied ACH payments are very time-consuming to retrieve. We estimate that glitches affect one percent of ACH payments, with an average resolution time of 45 minutes per payment.

5. Stopped payments, refunds, and reissues.

Retrieving payments can cost more than simply the bank’s stop payment fee. Also included is the time it takes to communicate the error with the payee, figuring out the right amount, and re-issuing the payment. Or perhaps also asking for a refund in the event the initial payment went through before it could be stopped. We have found that roughly .05 percent of payments require this type of intervention, and each occurrence can take about 45 minutes to resolve.

6. Supplier follow-up and outreach.

Every year, about 25 percent of vendors will have some kind of change that requires an update to AP records. This can include an address, company name or bank account change, or even contact changes for new employees.

The average time to work through those changes is about 15 minutes each. If you have 2,000 vendors, about 500 of them will require some updating each year. This costs about 125 hours annually or $3,105 at $25 an hour.

7. Prevented or resolved erroneous payments.

Payment errors happen—it’s an unavoidable—and familiar—aspect of any payment process. But automation can help to prevent a majority of the errors that are caused by accidents.

Based on our internal metrics, we estimate that the average AP person spends 45 minutes per error. We’re calculating based on an error rate of about 1 percent, which is our organization’s average—this number may be a conservative estimate for some businesses. Using this number, if a company makes 1000 payments a month, ten will require error resolution. That equates to about seven and a half hours per month, or 90 hours annually, at a total cost of $2,250.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, fraud also poses a threat. It’s a bit harder to estimate the ROI on fraud prevention because losses vary depending on the level of a breach. That said, it’s not outside the realm of possibility to expect fraud to measure anywhere from hundreds to millions of dollars.

Yes, And…

The seven items in the list are some of the most common, calculable issues that Nvoicepay sees in our incoming customers. That said, there are other issues that are more difficult to calculate, which is why they didn’t make our list. These include issues like late payment fees and lost discounts due to slow payment turn-around times.

That’s not to say those issues, or others, aren’t important. But the time and money costs—as well as the value in fixing those issues—are simply more subjective.

Most organizations are aware that checks are expensive, but they may not take the time to analyze how much their older processes are costing them. This is probably the biggest obstacle to automating payments—the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” notion. When you never add it all up, then you don’t see how broke it actually is.

By taking a simple, conservative, holistic view of the hard cost savings and operational efficiencies you can achieve, it becomes much clearer what the ROI is, and more importantly, all the areas in which your organization can move forward by automating.

__________________________________________________________________

Mark Penserini is VP of Partner Management at Nvoicepay and has over 25 years of operational and technical experience specializing in project management across Healthcare, Finance, and IT operations.

procurement
Archives, Global Logistics, Global Trade Daily

How to Optimize Your E-Procurement Process

Leave a comment

While modern technology generally vastly improves procurement operations, there still is a right and wrong way to establish an e-procurement program. Behind-the-scenes is where things can go very wrong. Inexperienced managers using ineffective strategies can significantly increase risk. Some things that may happen include data inaccuracies or failure to collect it, improper supply or shortage issues, poorly chosen vendors, and something known as dark purchasing.

To avoid these problems and streamline the e-procurement process, it’s necessary to optimize various aspects of the operation.

Tips to Optimize Your E-Procurement Process

You should already have a strong e-procurement system in place, utilizing various tools, applications, and professionals to ensure the operation is carried out smoothly. You may have had this in place for years, or maybe you’re just starting. In either case, you’ll want to focus on optimizing those programs.

Here are some ways to ensure procurement optimization is happening well and delivering value.

1. Conduct Market Research

Even with digital support, due diligence is necessary. Procurement teams must carry out market research to understand product fulfillment times, vendor or supplier performance, supply chain bottlenecks, and similar factors within the organization. Using tools that specialize in e-sourcing, e-tendering and e-informing practices will provide the most benefits. Most e-procurement solutions centralize supply management — including obtaining and comparing supplies — and aid in the order approval process.

The research also provides the type of information that can be applied to optimize the process. Start by building a comprehensive picture of what each supplier will be doing, how orders will be filled and how reliable the various channels are. It’s also the perfect time to develop risk assessment strategies, so there’s a way to deal with each potential challenge or obstacle.

2. Focus on E-procurement Planning

Acquisition and procurement teams must have strategies in place for e-sourcing, e-tendering and e-ordering. How can the team make sure the inventory is accurately monitored and new supplies are coming in regularly? What’s the plan to deal with damaged, missing, or counterfeit goods?

E-procurement solutions can be used to optimize every stage of the procurement cycle, including:

-E-sourcing

-E-tendering

-E-ordering

-E-reverse auctioning and contracting

-Web-based ERP

-E-informing

Acquisition teams should utilize the tools to plan for the initial stages of procurement and beyond. For example, e-ordering includes support to monitor deliveries, which aids receiving practices. Having that information is always beneficial, but a proper plan will detail how it should be used to inform future events like inventory management, order fulfillment or pass-through shipping to other businesses.

There is also a regulatory component to the entire process, which means understanding the various laws and regulations and how they apply to certain situations. Compliance must be absolute. At least a small portion of the team should be focused on meeting compliance and regulatory requirements, with constant monitoring and revised plans.

The Federal Acquisition Regulations state that the acquisition process should always involve proper coordination throughout an operation using a dedicated procurement plan. Without one, operations could turn disastrous.

3. Master Vendor Research and Selection

Selecting a vendor or supplier is generally an involved process that requires assessing and utilizing various metrics. E-procurement solutions streamline this. For example, electronic catalogs can help with researching, selecting and interacting with vendors — specifically when bidding for orders.

E-cataloguing also makes the landscape more competitive, as suppliers are required to be more transparent and provide comparable quotes.

Above all, it leads to stronger supplier-management dealings through a more effective research and selection process. Proactive supplier development, adherence to approved vendor lists, real-time performance metrics, and up-to-date records and information are available through digital solutions. That makes it easier than ever to manage and keep up with relations.

It’s important to maintain strong management strategies for three major reasons. It helps build long-term relationships, enables a proactive quality management system and includes sub-tier contract flow downs through auxiliary vendors.

4. Incorporate Advanced Metrics and Automate

Leveraging e-procurement systems for active monitoring can go a long way toward improving performance and efficiency.

The best strategy is to have a more proactive approach, dealing with events as soon as you know about them, bracing for impact, and possibly even enabling alternate methods to mitigate losses. Fortunately, real-time data solutions and modern technologies, like IIoT, can make this much easier. Today’s e-procurement solutions also incorporate machine learning and mathematical modeling, both leveraging advanced forms of analytics.

First, you’ll need to ensure you’re working with vendors who have embraced Industry 4.0 and are actively utilizing their own forms of real-time data. Assuming real-time data implementations already exist across your operation, the next step is to unite those data streams and leverage an analytics platform that can identify mission-critical supply trends.

That incoming data can tell you what will happen, when it might occur and what that might mean for your business. Moreover, predictive modeling can help you strategize the actual events and build more successful solutions to the challenges. You can track expenditures, monitor risks new and old, reduce bottlenecks, predict errors, keep up with market demands, and much more.

5. Close Out Contracts for Good

Building long-term relationships is a valuable approach, but you will have temporary terms and contracts too, and there will be times you work with a supplier in a one-off transaction. By combining all necessary tools under a single user interface, e-procurement systems make it simple to deal with the many intricacies of vendor management.

Whether it’s a long-term deal or a temporary one, you should ensure the contract and the acquisition are truly severed at the close of a relationship. You may need to conduct exit interviews, greenlight inspections, double-check contract terms, count inventory or supplies, and so on. Digital tools should help facilitate these interactions and organize, store and recall the data later, especially during critical moments.

Every e-procurement strategy should have a phase or rule that deals with this close-out procedure. Streamlining the process can help sustain your forward momentum when moving to new relationships and beyond. It also provides valuable insights if you ever have to circle back.

Preparing Your E-procurement Teams the Right Way

As a procurement manager or executive, overseeing the operation can be challenging. There are many challenges that need to be addressed along the way.

To do that, you’ll need to conduct the right market research, strengthen planning and master the vendor selection process through deep analysis. You’ll also need to incorporate real-time operations and performance metrics in a meaningful way to power proactive responses. Finally, remember to close out contracts properly, which includes collecting and processing a host of vital information — like exit interviews, greenlight inspections and more.

By preparing your e-procurement crews, you’re ensuring your business can continue, streamlined and successful, even in the face of major supply chain disasters. Therein lies the true value of an optimized process.

supply chains
Archives, Global Logistics, Global Trade Daily

Supply Chains Must Be Ready To Adapt Fast

Leave a comment

It’s been months since factories in China shut down due to the rapid spread of Covid-19 throughout the country. Global supply chains felt the factory closures first as these manufacturing facilities were often the start of chains that delivered raw and finished goods around the world.

 

Battlefield commanders in the Second World War knew that a lengthy supply chain was a risky supply chain; in peacetime, some 80 years later, the world’s economies know it, too. However, while supply chains have struggled back to their feet, the enormous economic damage to the demand side of the supply/demand equation remains.

High Winds and Heavy Damage

An economic recession comes on gradually and its signs and symptoms can be seen months before in declining consumer spending, reduced hiring, increased layoff notices, rising unemployment, shrinking output and so on. On the other hand, the pandemic blew in like a sudden, violent summer storm, wreaking havoc overnight.

To their credit, CSCOs (Chief Supply Chain Officers) responded as agilely as they could; they saw how the plunge in demand ran neck and neck with the plunge in supply and tried their best to adapt their organizations to seize on new demands being created for products like masks, sanitizers, ventilators and so on. Boston Consulting Group (BCG) refers to these as “rapid response” efforts. In the early days and weeks of the global health crisis, those in the supply chains worked tirelessly to pivot and perhaps even profit from these overnight demands.

Rapid Retrenching Within Supply Chains

Companies were taking other critical steps at the same time, part of their rapid responses; they tried to create as much transparency within supply chains as they could. They assembled lists of the vital components they needed while determining the reliability of supply and, if necessary, finding alternative suppliers in order to keep production running and customer deliveries fulfilled. McKinsey stated in a March 2020 report that several industries (automotive, consumer and mass retail) had two to three months of inventory, at best, unless steps were taken to minimize that risk.

Fortunately, six months along, many governments, corporations, public health officials and the general population know a great deal more about the virus today than in the first few weeks and have implemented coping strategies to mitigate the ongoing crisis. CSCOs are now beginning to think about what the future of their businesses will look like in a post-pandemic world and are facing many questions – some that may remain unanswered for some time.  When will an effective vaccine arrive? When will the current high levels of unemployment in the U.S. and other countries come down?

A recent poll shows that nearly half of American households where a job was lost, believe the loss is permanent, meaning some 14 million jobs could be gone for good.

Boston Consulting Group has laid out five areas in which efficiencies can be realized within a supply chain:

Achieve Complete End-to-End Visibility from Supplier to Customer

Wide open visibility means the CSCO can see cost controls, inventory, quality, lead-time, and service, all in real-time. Such a transparent supply chain can only be achieved through implementing technology solutions designed for supply chain use but Boston Consulting maintains that the value impact is considerable:

-8%–15% service improvement

-10%–15% savings across end-to-end supply chain and cost of quality

-5%–20% working-capital improvement

Reprioritize Capabilities

Taking this step, says BCG, means implementing new, flexible processes that would be essential to managing highly changeable demand and supply. Key to these processes would be refined Sales and Operations planning and “demand sensing”, essentially a way of spotting the first shifts in demand patterns through the use of data analysis and artificial intelligence. Boston Consulting claims companies could see at least a 10% increase in their sales forecast accuracy, something that has desirable ripple effects throughout a supply chain.

Closely Integrate with Suppliers, Vendors and Customers

It makes sense in a supply chain to have as much integration as possible because that ensures that every vendor and supplier can see in real-time whether customer demand is set to tick higher or lower. This type of integration involves sales teams in the front office and S&OP teams in the back office, all with access to analyzed data from an ERP.

Streamline Complexity

BCG has suggestions for the warehousing component in a supply chain: reduce low-volume SKUs and create dedicated lines for specific products while reducing the number of locations where a SKU is placed in order to simplify planning and limit inventory build-up. The payoff? A 10% to 30% savings in manufacturing-conversion cost,  5% to 10% reduction in inventory levels and increased supply chain efficiency.

Develop a Risk Strategy for the Future

There are four elements to this component:

-Rethink contingency supply-chain vision and strategy to address potential risks and enable greater flexibility

-Build more agility into the supply network to meet new business requirements

-Invest in automation to boost speed and flexibility

-Eliminate costs across the end-to-end supply chain to fund innovation and growth

The cost benefits could be substantial:

-5%–15% top-line growth

-15%–20% initial operating cost savings to fund the “journey”

-3%–5% EBITDA improvement.

Take the Technology Express Route

The fastest way – indeed, the only way – to reach the cost savings outlined by Boston Control Group is through implementation of the right technology solutions. These solutions exist today and are designed specifically to meet supply chain challenges. Generix Group North America has a suite of such technologies within their Supply Chain Hub offering which can achieve these goals.

Contact Generix group today and find out how we can boost the value within your supply chain operations.

This article originally appeared on GenerixGroup.com. Republished with permission.