Your choice of a new enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution will have long-term consequences for your business. So take your time and consider every aspect of your decision-you don’t want to miss any important details.

Admiral ERPWhat is the vendor’s customer churn rate and reputation for service after the sale?

Post-sale service is critical for successful ERP implementation. It’s also an essential part of helping you get the most out of your ERP investment throughout its life. New tax rules will emerge. You might expand your lines of business or add new locations. Your product offering and customer base, along with their expectations of you, will continue to evolve. The list goes on, but the point is that conditions will change. And because your ERP solution is at the heart of your business, it’s important to choose a vendor that not only delivers the functionality you need but, equally important, also offers service and support after the sale. To choose a vendor that can help you manage changes, here are three specific points to check.

  • Is the vendor’s ERP solution well-known in your area and in your industry? If so, it will be easier and more economical to find and tap into assistance for implementation, support, and ongoing engagement.
  • Does the vendor or their reselling partners offer a full range of customer support skills and capabilities? Expertise with the specific ERP solution you’re evaluating is essential, of course. But could the vendor’s support team also help you with customer relationship management, productivity software, and other applications you want to integrate with your ERP? How about their experience with both on-premises and cloud-based ERP solutions, or a hybrid solution involving both approaches?

Ask the ERP vendors on your short list about the scope and cost of their customer support plans, as well as references within their customer base. Providers that have earned a reputation for excellent ongoing service and support will be able to point to long-term relationships with satisfied customers. Also, inquire about their customer churn rate: are they losing customers faster than they add them? Unhappy customers part ways with vendors that are accessible and responsive before the sale, but who become harder to find and work with once the contract is signed.

Why Microsoft Dynamics ERP?

Microsoft Dynamics has a long history of customer service and community, with a strong reputation for service after the sale. And our network of reselling partners around the word offer their own local support and service programs that keep you and your business moving forward after the initial implementation. Our customer community rivals any in the industry, with well-established user groups, online discussion forums and Convergence, our annual customer conference. With more than 300,000 Microsoft Dynamics customers worldwide, some customer churn is inevitable, but we take pride in our customer retention and satisfaction benchmarks, and our strong reputation for providing service after the sale.

Customer Stories

Read how our customers are investing in their future using Microsoft Dynamics ERP.

D’Arrigo Brothers Company of Massachusetts: Terminal Market Produce Distributor Takes Charge of Operations with ERP Software

headON Communication: Electronics Distributor Connects Systems to Simplify Operations, Enable Executive Control

CompassLearning: Education Technology Leader Controls Business, Streamlines Finance with Cloud-Based ERP

To learn more about Microsoft Dynamics ERP for small and mid-sized businesses visit Admiral Consulting Group
at www.admiral-usa.com/erp.htm or call 1.888.737.5725

Admiral Consulting Group Cloud ComputingThe first step in moving to the cloud is understanding its necessity. Most companies use the cloud as a way to drive change and force change with their processes.

Admiral Consulting Group believes the cloud can help with:

  • Cost – optimize your requirements. Pay as you go gives you ultimate flexibility.
  • Agility – Match your IT and business needs with cloud automation
  • Contracts – Write the Service Level Agreement that is right for you.

Once you are in a cloud environment, you can:

  • Analyze
  • Adjust reliability requirements
  • Calculate costs

Learn more about the value of the Cloud to your business at http://www.sdcexec.com/article/10449276/it-isnt-easy

Fore more information contact Admiral Consulting Group at 1.888.737.5725 or info@admiral-usa.com

Leave A Comment, Written on February 21st, 2012 , Admiral Tags:

Admiral Consulting Group WMSCustomer Service is essential in retaining business. How do organizations use WMS to enforce change in their supply chains?

  • Integrate WMS with Transportation and Freight Management
  • Track your carriers and suppliers
  • Remove bottlenecks

ERP, WMS and FMS systems are critical for managing your supply chain. Learn about more ways that Admiral Consulting Group can help your inventory-centric business.

http://www.sdcexec.com/article/10449287/wms-the-fulcrum-of-supply-chain-excellence

Leave A Comment, Written on February 21st, 2012 , Admiral Tags:

Admiral Consulting GroupAdmiral Consulting Group often meets with organizations who have heard that ERP can be too costly, difficult or complicated. While a customer’s unique style of business is their competitive advantage, a combination of standard practices and unique business often delivers the balance customers need.

How can manufacturing companies configure ERP for each user?
How can you deploy ERP within budget?
How can customers maintain their competitive edge?

Learn more of these techniques in the Food Manufacturing article by Jeff Reinke.

http://www.foodmanufacturing.com/articles/2012/01/social-cues-simplify-erp

For more information contact Admiral Consulting Group at 1.888.737.5725
or info@admiral-usa.com

Leave A Comment, Written on February 17th, 2012 , Microsoft, Microsoft Dynamics Tags:

Admiral Consulting Group is on @Manta. Check out our profile.

Leave A Comment, Written on February 13th, 2012 , Dynamics SL

If your business has outgrown its current EDI system or your organization has encountered numerous EDI problems, it might be time to implement a new system. Step through some of the common problems associated with managing EDI customers, such as, large retailers, and find out how to avoid these issues.

This white paper explores:

  • 9 problems companies encounter when they’ve outgrown their current EDI system:
  • Key questions to help you find the right EDI solution for your business;
  • Common pitfalls to avoid, such as, underestimating the impact of ASN generation on your business;
  • Goals for evaluating a new EDI system.

Download White Paper

To find out more contact Admiral Consulting Group at 1.888.737.5725 or info@admiral-usa.com

Leave A Comment, Written on November 9th, 2011 , Admiral Tags:

Microsoft Office 365Wondering what Exchange Online is and how it impacts your organization? Curious about what role it can play in your employees’ productivity experience?

Come and join us for a fast-paced 60-minute session designed to highlight the most exciting features of Exchange Online. A live instructor showcases a tip or feature every couple of minutes, providing you with a broad and real-world understanding of what the platform can do for your end users.

Topics include:

  • Organizing your Inbox in Outlook 2010
  • Connecting with your contacts
  • Accessing your mail anywhere on virtually any device
  • Keeping track of your day in Outlook 2010

Register now for this event or contact Admiral Consulting Group at 1.888.737.5725 or info@admiral-usa.com to learn more.

Leave A Comment, Written on October 13th, 2011 , Admiral, Microsoft Tags:

Admiral Consulting Group will be showcasing three products at the Microsoft SL User Group conference in Baltimore, MD, from Wednesday, September 14th thru Friday September 16th.

You’ll see how you can bring your Microsoft Dynamics SL data to life with IZON Business with Alerts, an easy to use yet comprehensive application that provides graphical Dashboards, comparative Trends, pivot Analysis and drill down Query. You’ll also learn how you can reduce your corporate credit card data entry by 90% using Admiral’s Xpress S/I.

Finally, you’ll get an in depth look at how you can increase the accuracy of your financial data with Admiral’s Multi-Currency/Inter-Company (MCIC) product. Admiral will present a 30 minute demonstration of MCIC at the conference on Thursday, September 15th from 2:45pm to 3:15pm.

For additional information regarding Admiral Consulting Group’s products or to connect with Admiral at the SL User Group conference, contact us at info@admiral-usa.com

Leave A Comment, Written on September 14th, 2011 , Dynamics SL Tags: , , ,

Microsoft Dynamics NAVMicrosoft has selected its latest poster child for the success of Microsoft Dynamics NAV. Centacare Ballarat, a social service operation, has experienced incredible success since switching to Dynamics NAV – most impressively cutting their time to compile month-end reports by half. The troubles experienced by this company are typical. In 2010, the company employed more than 220, ran 13 offices, organized a $16 million annual budget, and managed 60 cost centers. At the time, Centacare Ballarat was using MYOB accounting software, and found that it just couldn’t keep pace with the company’s growth and daily business.

 “Previously, we had problems with MYOB sessions disappearing, which could happen a couple of times a week, forcing everyone to log out,” Centacare Ballarat Finance Manager Antony Rucco said. “Now, we simply don’t have this application instability occurring, which has saved us a lot of downtime.”

In contrast to annoying delays and frustrating application quirks, Dynamics NAV provides tools to make the reporting process easier and more robust.

“The data and reports in Microsoft Dynamics NAV are very logical and intuitive for finance people and the system has a great search function. It is very easy to export Microsoft Dynamics NAV data to Excel or PDF and it’s simple to manipulate the data,” Rucco said. “We can also easily import and export budgets directly with Microsoft Dynamics NAV which has saved us many hours of manual manipulation and configuration of data. A nice feature is we can do sensitivity analyses – creating ‘what if’ scenarios.”

Of course, this hasn’t touched on the most immediate payoff of the switch.

“Our month-end reporting, which used to take 10-12 days to finalize, is now completed in half this time. This improvement allows us to distribute reports electronically to our Finance committee before their meeting, which gives them time to consider the reports and formulate advice to the board,” Rucco said. “By streamlining processes and saving time keying in data, Microsoft Dynamics NAV has given Finance more time to focus on value-added activities for other people in the organization rather than just count the beans.”

Centacare Ballarat is an excellent example of your run-of-the-mill company with everyday problems. Furthermore, it’s a great example of how Microsoft Dynamics NAV can tackle common business solutions with incredible results.

For more information regarding Microsoft Dynamics NAV contact Admiral Consulting Group at
1-888-737-5725 or info@admiral-usa.com

Microsoft Dynamics GP Case StudyWith all the talk of specific functions and advantages of Microsoft Dynamics GP, it can be hard to imagine how they will solve real-world issues and save real-world money. To remedy that, let’s take a look at Blast Radius – an interactive agency that implements websites and e-commerce solutions for clients. They pull in annual sales of $60 million, but when they were acquired by a larger public company, they had problems merging the existing and new systems. This is a constant problem for companies – pooling resources is all well and good, but how do you truly merge the workforce to really utilize the partnership?

Blast Radius struggled with this for years, but moved from Sage Accpac to Microsoft Dynamics GP in 2003. At the time, they were forced to manually reconcile accounting just due to the complexity of inter-office transactions. Pulling financial data at the end of every month took weeks, which had a drastic effect on turnaround time and data analysis. They needed a way to automate this procedure, and they found it in Microsoft Dynamics GP.

Dynamics GP with SmartConnect and the Extender module gave Blast Radius everything they needed to work out the kinks. SmartConnect opens up Dynamics GP to talk to any third party system, while Extender allowed them to customize GP to meet their unique business needs. The aforementioned wait for monthly financial data was cut by an astounding 85 percent. Now Blast Radius gets monthly reports in two days instead of two weeks. That frees up valuable time, which in turn increased employee productivity by an incredible 40 percent.

And here’s where the numbers really stack up. Dynamics GP allowed Blast Radius to move lots of its customization projects in-house, which saved travel costs and time. In travel alone, Blast Radius saved $800,000, which is not even accounting for the man hours saved and the headaches of arranging external projects. This will yield dividends on down the line – every project Blast Radius takes on for Dynamics GP will be cheaper, faster, and yield better results. Bear in mind, this is just hitting the high points. Companies facing any number of real-world problems, merging with another company included, can find easy and robust solutions with Microsoft Dynamics GP.

For more information regarding Microsoft Dynamics GP contact Admiral Consulting Group
at 1-888-737-5725 or info@admiral-usa.com

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