Choosing a partner for order management is not a decision to take lightly. Order management and warehouse management is the lifeblood of customer satisfaction and also affects the daily working environment for your warehouse and operations employees. A poor choice in order management can eat into revenue and cost valuable dollars re-hashing and re-working to get orders out the door without causing customer service nightmares.
Whether you are evaluating to move from a homegrown system, or looking to switch partners. There are many moving parts to the platform decision. But there's less discussion surrounding the partner choice. What do you look for?
Industry Expertise
Who is there team? What is their motivation? Finding a partner that is an industry expert before they are a business person can help ensure that your OMS partner truly understand the critical business challenges your company is facing. Seeking out information on the company's industry experience through articles, their blog and their website information information is good first touchpoint. But integrating your technical and operations teams early in the conversation with your potential partner can ensure that everyone has the same goals and vision for success.
An experienced team means a smooth transition and on-boarding process, and a successful, timely project completion.
The Product
So you've accepted a demo. What are the critical things to ask and look for when first evaluating a partner in the scope of their product? First, evaluate how the company has tailored their demo for you. Did they take care to understand your industry and product, and ask questions to discover information about how you work? A team that is willing to flex to your requirements and tailors their solutions to your unique business needs is critical to long-term success. There's no one-size-fits-all solution for these advanced operations. A great technology partner will be willing to become an extension of your business.
The Focus
It's not a bad thing to offer multiple products across verticals, many large companies do it, and some do it very well. But does your potential OMS partner seem to have their hat in many rings? That could signal shifting priorities and investments in their technology product. Ensuring that your partner is constantly working to improve their product you are evaluating to keep up with changing trends and technologies is an important ROI consideration. With an enterprise platform being a considerable investment for a company to make, knowing that this is not a back-burner sale can give your team, and the C-suite, peace of mind when planning a migration project.
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