The goals of all startups are the same: to grow and scale. However, in the hustle and bustle of focusing on the idea or the product, they tend to overlook key factors needed for the foundation of a sustainable business. Startup founders who wear too many hats often tend to overlook what is happening inside their company with the key business processes.
Small companies can function reasonably well even with separate systems and processes for sending emails, finance and operations, human resource and marketing, and customer management. But as they grow bigger, disparate systems and manual business processes become cumbersome, less productive, error-prone, and too convoluted to manage efficiently.
One of the most important roles of ERP is that it automates most of the daily operational tasks and business processes for companies. It consolidates and integrates data from various departments like accounting, finance, operations, supply chain, human resources, marketing, and, sales and provides organisation-wide visibility and real-time business intelligence for informed decision-making and accurate forecasting. On top of that, it also breaks departmental silos by facilitating information sharing and collaboration, improves productivity and operational efficiency, saves costs and enhances customer service, which is all that a business can wish for to grow and scale efficiently.
As a startup, implementing an ERP solution means choosing the most cost-effective and scalable software that you can also quickly implement. And Dynamics 365 Business Central can be the best option for your startup if you are looking for a cutting-edge ERP solution that meets your requirements.
How can a cutting-edge ERP help your entrepreneurial venture?
1. All-in-one solution
As an entrepreneur, you have multiple roles and many things to take care of. The good news: ERP can make things more convenient for you. Dynamics 365 Business Central integrates sales, service, finance, and operations, enabling seamless team communication regardless of the size of your organisation.
Decision-makers can view critical business data of these departments and visualise business analytics with the real-time dashboard. Beyond productivity, this real-time view of data greatly improves your decision making and business planning.
2. Integration helps with informational flow and reduces operational costs
Business Central integrates with several platforms, including Dynamics 365, Microsoft Outlook, Teams, SharePoint, Power Platform, and LinkedIn. Since these business applications are part of the Microsoft Ecosystem, they are all very much compatible with each other. And that’s a plus point as you don’t have to worry about incompatible data and document formats and you also won’t have to pay extra for future integrations.
Also, Microsoft App Store features numerous third-party extensions that can enhance the functionality of Business Central for specific industrial processes. For example, you can integrate with Sirius Payroll 365 to streamline the payroll processing and Sirius Octopus 365 to maintain, share, synchronise, and retrieve data across a corporate group.
Integration helps with seamless information flow, efficient task delegation, productivity enhancement, errors reduction, and improved corporate operations by consolidating information, connecting disparate processes and departments and breaking down data silos. Integration also provides more powerful insights and a complete picture of the business, which results in significant shift in performance and a competitive advantage.
3. Rapid implementation without much hassle
Startups typically have a small team with no dedicated IT team and little funds to have any major IT infrastructure. So, you might be concerned about just how long it is going to take to implement an ERP system since there are several cases where implementation can take 30 percent longer than anticipated.
But don’t worry because Cloud-hosted infrastructure eliminates the need to wait for internal IT infrastructure procurement. And with dedicated experts at Dogma Group, you will experience a streamlined implementation process with the Business Central journey in as little time as possible.
4. It’s hosted in the cloud: cost-effective, secure and convenient
One of the best features of cloud ERP is its scalability. Cloud deployment gives you the option to add or reduce users and features depending on your need as time goes by.
You can also eliminate the costs associated with set-up, IT resources, multiple solution licenses, infrastructure and related support. Also, your data is safely and securely hosted in Microsoft’s world-class cloud.
With cloud-hosted ERP, start where you are, and use only those features that you need at the moment, and easily scale up as you grow.
5. Stay within your ERP budget
Unlike the legacy systems that are rigid, Dynamics 365 Business Central is flexible and adaptive to your business needs. Depending on your budget and expansion plans, you can scale your system up or down.
Implementation costs can be a concern as most implementations cost three to four times more than what was initially budgeted. But, Business Central for startup quick-starter pack from Dogma Group can help you implement the ERP solution within a week without exceeding your budget.
6. Migrating data is easy
The migration process is simple in Business Central. For example, you can easily migrate your business data from an Excel file to Business Central. You can even import customer, vendor, and item data into the Excel template with a few clicks.
Also, use the checklist functionality to ensure that all the important business data are migrated. This helps with smooth customer onboarding as you already have data in your system as soon as the implementation is completed.
7. Accelerate growth and transform your processes with advanced AI capabilities
You can connect reports, charts, and Power BI data from accounting, sales, and purchasing to get accurate insights and confidently make financial decisions.
Similarly, the late payment prediction extension uses a machine-learning classification model that gives you out-of-the-box benefits from Artificial Intelligence without a data scientist. Here, the AI analyses the customer behaviour and suggests you with appropriate actions. For example, with this functionality, you will be able to decide whether you can give credit to a customer or not based on their transactional behaviour history.
Along with these functionalities, you can forecast sales and inventory, generate sales quotes directly from Outlook and other tools to drive better results at an affordable price.
