The last two and a half years have been a little rough on everybody, to say it lightly. The world has witnessed supply chain problems, incredible labor shortages, and now we’re trying to face down a seemingly inevitable bout of inflation.
When business leaders are forced to look uncertainty in the eyes, they focus on finding ways to make their companies run more efficiently, often putting the foundation of their efforts into robust bottom lines and revenue growth opportunities where they’re available. This means today is the day for proactive management strategies that focus on high-margin items in inventory, automating labor costs and the tasks that can drive up those costs, and reducing human error that can ultimately be quite costly to businesses. If you’re a leader in your organization, you’re probably trying to figure out how to adjust your budget in a way that controls costs in the face of increasing prices.
Fear not! NetSuite’s 2022 Release 2 has some great updates that’ll help you achieve your goals and come out of this relatively unscathed.
NetSuite Improved Inventory Management and Visibility
NetSuite’s Smart Count solution was created for mobile device use, enabling your team to accurately count inventory while minimizing impacts on sales and store processes. This new platform lets your staff remove manual, paper- or spreadsheet-based procedures, thereby reducing surplus labor costs that come with after-hours cycle counts.
The Smart Count system relies on an automated, live-cycle-counting tool. It can be used without asking your staff to freeze transactions where business is being conducted, meaning your customers won’t be inconvenienced. Managers can easily create lists, so employees are aware of which items need to be accounted for, incorporating pre-determined business rules and criteria for inventory-count days. With this tool, you can set it up such that it automatically triggers counts that need accuracy checks if they drop below a certain reorder point. This helps ensure inventory isn’t ordered before the levels are actually low enough to need replacements.
NetSuite’s Item 360 dashboard is another great tool to have in your toolbox. It helps simplify inventory organization and planning with its easy-to-use interface that gives transparency into every bit of data that’s relative to the current position of an item, in one centralized location. It’s not just about the basics—Item 360 displays relevant KPIs, current transactions, stock levels, counts of inventory in specific locations, and notifications, all in a single dashboard.
When you use Item 360, you can proactively manage inventory and supply chain problems that otherwise could eat up employees’ time and effort and harm your bottom line.
Smart Financials and Budgeting to Boost Profits
NetSuite recently introduced its new Rebates and Trade Promotions SuiteApp, which is intended to optimize profits and reduce manual accounting duties through the automation and centralization of manufacturer rebates and promos. This SuiteApp mechanically and precisely identifies rebates and trade promos to all applicable transactions, centralizing and automating them in one single place so your finance team can easily see the whole lifecycle of the vendor and customer rebate program process, including:
- Creation
- Execution
- Accrual
- Reconciliation
With this tool, it’s easier than ever before to create and manage agreements. You can quickly define and capture terms such as duration, discount method, transaction qualifications, and stackability. The app will automatically calculate rebates by combining stackable promos where available, or selecting the ideal deal when non-stackable codes are the only options. This helps ensure customers are getting the best deals on the products they purchase from your organization.
This new feature was also designed to help you automate the settlement and reconciliation processes. It supports multiple calculation methods, such as flat amounts, fixed costs, and guaranteed profits, as well as a number of cost-based options. Add to this the fact that rebate amounts are automatically accrued as transactions post to the general ledger, and you’ve got a tool that can’t be beat in today’s world!
One more thing to note—you can use improved financial reporting and analysis functions to track estimated or proforma claims and disbursements so you can better account for returns and other deductions that might occur when you issue final payments.
New CRM Dashboards, Roles, and Reports Help Improve Your Customers’ Experiences
If you haven’t heard of the new NetSuite CRM Add-On, take a moment to check it out. It offers enhanced sales and marketing automation, as well as enhances customer service capabilities. It features new roles and dashboards that are built specifically for sales reps, sales managers, marketing team members, and customer service reps, giving each individual better insight into the data that’ll help them serve current and prospective customers better.
Additionally, there’s a new feature that helps add visibility into lead and sales activity with real-time forecasting and reporting. It’s called CRM Workbooks, and it’s designed to work with the new CRM Add-On, as well as the 10 pre-built SuiteAnalytics reports that are featured directly within the platform. CRM Workbooks was designed to aid with sales performance metrics and KPIs, such as quote-to-sales conversions, opportunity forecasting, and won-versus-lost opportunities. This tool helps remove the time required for the design and preparation of reports from spreadsheets while simultaneously minimizing the risk of human error.
Take Advantage of NetSuite 2022 Release 2 Features With MIBAR
If you’re ready to enhance your company’s operations, we’re ready to help you get the job done! To stay on top of new NetSuite releases or to take advantage of new features, it’s important to have guidance from an expert NetSuite partner like MIBAR.
As a leading NetSuite partner, we’ve established a genuine methodology to help maximize every dollar of your ERP budget and ensure NetSuite is meeting your needs. We assist businesses just like yours to identify areas of risk and inefficiency, rescue implementations, assist with NetSuite enhancements and improvements, provide support, training, and much more. Learn more about our NetSuite support services.
