Leveraging your Existing EDI to Automate Order Processing

www.conexiom.com How to Leverage Your Existing EDI Investment to Automate Order Processing www.conexiom.com 1 As a leading edge distributor or manufacturer, you’re constantly searching for new ways to become more efficient and to answer the constant pressure to do more with less. Leaning out operations and committing to continuous improvement are ongoing objectives essential for future success. Optimizing your business gives you a competitive advantage and strategically, this means looking for the ‘big wins’. If you’re like most busy sales and fulfillment organizations, you’ve already made considerable investments in your business. Managing your extensive internal resources and impressive product portfolio has likely required the capability of a reliable Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system. Now that accounting, inventory control, and communications are enjoying new levels of efficiency, you’re ready to focus your efforts on a new area of the business. Pressure to Do More with Less www.conexiom.com 2 So where can you get the most bang for your buck? One key area primed for optimization is the sales order process. Many companies are familiar with Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) solutions and many have already implemented EDI with some of their larger, more technical customers. But successfully setting up EDI between enterprises is no easy task. Initially, implementing an EDI solution requires an upfront investment both in terms of time and money, as well as a high level of collaboration and technical expertise for both you and your customers. Building the foundation to be able to seamlessly translate EDI orders successfully into your ERP system requires technology, software, people, and new business processes. The Move to EDI Ordering www.conexiom.com 3 Once the EDI solution is up and running, the benefits are impressive. Eliminating the order processing components that used to rely on manual touch means that you can enjoy faster, error- free ordering. Not only is the EDI-process more efficient, but it reduces the cost per transaction, offers better data quality, shortens business cycles, and provides better visibility. It’s a great business decision and a big win for both you and your customer. After successfully building the EDI infrastructure, it’s easier to implement with additional customers who are ready to embrace EDI. After all, the infrastructure has been created and tested. In fact, many organizations find EDI so incredibly effective that they find themselves wondering how it’s possible to convince more customers to embrace it. Benefits of EDI www.conexiom.com 4 Unfortunately, EDI is not the norm and the majority of customer POs arriving today still require manual processing. Typically customers create their own PO and either email or print/fax their orders in. Even faxed and emailed documents need to wait for a human touch stalling the order cycle process. This means your customer service team needs to manually key the critical data into a sales order in your ERP system before the order can be processed. Manual sales order processing is archaic, labor-intensive, time consuming, and prone to errors. Not only does manual processing not add any value to your customers, but it actually negatively impacts customer satisfaction. There are simply too many touch points that slow down order cycle time and introduce opportunities for costly errors. In an increasingly competitive marketplace, your future success is ultimately determined by your ability to process and ship orders quickly and accurately. Processing Non-EDI Orders www.conexiom.com 5 It’s clear that EDI ordering is incredibly effective, but what about all of your non-EDI enabled customers? As an IT Director or E-Commerce Manager, it’s likely you’re facing internal pressures to automate the sales ordering process with more customers. Not only would this alleviate the burden on your customer service representatives (CSRs), but it would accelerate order cycle times and reduce costly errors. Not to mention creating the capacity to handle a higher volume of orders without additional staff. But the reality is that EDI is simply not feasible for all customers. It’s not about the size of their business, but a lack of internal expertise, resources, or even the desire to switch to EDI. Although you can continue to approach your customers one by one and attempt to persuade them to make the switch, the truth is that the desire for a successful EDI implementation needs to originate with your customer. Convincing Customers to Embrace EDI www.conexiom.com 6 As nice as it would be if every order arrived electronically in a standard format that automatically translated into a sales order in your ERP system, it’s simply not reality. Each customer has their own preferred way of doing business. And since you’re in business to serve your customers, you need to embrace each customer’s uniqueness or you might risk losing them. Customers who need to create purchase orders for their own internal business processes are reluctant to embrace the duplication of effort involved in using shopping carts, web-forms or standard templates. And who could blame them? So it seems unlikely that you might be able to convince thousands of non-EDI enabled customers to change the way they do business, but where does that leave you? You’ve put in the time and made the investment. You’ve built a solid infrastructure and you’re already accepting electronic orders. But you can’t seem to persuade more customers to make the switch to EDI despite the impressive benefits. Embracing Each Customer’s Uniqueness www.conexiom.com 7 Clearly automating the sales order process is the right move to reduce errors, lower transaction costs, and create deeper operational efficiencies. But your customers don’t want to be burdened with helping you. So how can you optimize your business further? What options are available to leverage the investment you’ve already made? What if there was a way to receive EDI on your end without impacting your customers? Sounds too good to be true? Thanks to Conexiom®, it’s possible. Conexiom doesn’t require any changes to the way your customers currently do business with you. In fact, you don’t even have to tell them you’ve made any changes to the way you operate. Leveraging Your EDI Investment www.conexiom.com 8 Here’s how it works. Conexiom allows you to treat email and print/fax orders like standard electronic documents from an EDI solution. It captures the essential data from a customer purchase order regardless of the format submitted. Are you currently accepting hundreds of different formats? No problem – it can handle as many formats as you do with 100% data capture accuracy. This allows the customer to continue to do business in the way they prefer, while recognizing the critical data from POs automatically. With its sophisticated mapping process, Conexiom allows customer data to flow into your existing ERP system like any other EDI document, while automatically routing orders to the appropriate channels and providing total visibility before orders even reach your ERP system. Most importantly, new customers can be enrolled electronically in a matter of minutes, enabling non-EDI customers to enjoy the same benefits as your EDI-customers. Conexiom is Your Secret Weapon www.conexiom.com 9 Are you ready to simplify your business and accelerate order cycles? Are you excited about the opportunity to triple the speed of order processing while enjoying greater accuracy? Eager to say goodbye to manual order processing, costly mistakes, and a mountain of paperwork? How about improving the way you do business to offer better customer satisfaction, empower your CSR team, and improve customer loyalty? Conexiom can help you achieve these benefits and more. Moving error-free orders seamlessly through the order cycle process without human intervention will positively impact your bottom line. Not only can Conexiom save your CSR team time, but it reduces the cost of processing each order and enhances your company’s profitability all without impacting your customers or requiring any specialized hardware or software. The Conexiom Advantage www.conexiom.com 10 Print to Conexiom Seller Company Order Entry System (ERP) Email EDI Document Buyer Company Purchase Order System EDI Translator How Conexiom Works Just Like EDI www.conexiom.com 11 select Select a small group of customers to get started (usually 5-10) create Create accounts for each customer in the Conexiom System Gather and submit a collection of recent purchase orders (POs) for each customer map Map relevant PO information to where you expect to see it in your ERP system define Define business rules for notifications and exception handling 6 5 4 3 1 2 receive Receive training on how to manage customer accounts and on-going support gather Conexiom allows you to communicate electronically with as many customers as you desire. Simply select the customer-pack that works for your business and watch how easy it is to reach the next level of sales order automation. Getting started with Conexiom is easy. After successfully enrolling thousands of customers, we’ve developed a proven implementation process complete with your assigned Onboarding Specialist to ensure you see results even sooner. Typically, new customers are able to roll out Conexiom in a matter of hours spread out over a few weeks or less. Once the initial group of customers is successfully enrolled and the process has been mastered, it’s easy to expand the solution to include additional customers and to realize the full potential of sales order automation. How to Get Started With Conexiom www.conexiom.com 12 Are you ready to leverage your existing EDI investment? Are you excited to say goodbye to manual order processing and increase accuracy rates? How do you feel about shortening order processing times by up to 90%? And reducing the cost of processing orders by 80% or more? If you’re ready to enjoy the next level of sales order automation, give us a call at 1.866.860.3388 to learn how you can get started today. Are You Ready to Experience the Difference?  866-860-3388  [email protected] Conexiom® allows manufacturers and distributors to focus on serving customers and managing supplier relationships instead of entering data. The patent-pending Conexiom solution was created by ecmarket, a cloud solutions developer. Conexiom revolutionizes critical sales and accounting business practices by automating manual entry with 100% accuracy. Conexiom effortlessly converts emailed and printed customer purchase orders and supplier invoices into automated sales orders and invoices, enabling companies to focus on driving growth. Conexiom helps organizations across the globe maintain a competitive edge. For more information visit www.conexiom.com About Conexiom