Your annual software maintenance allows SAP to constantly improve the quality and performance of the software.  Think of it like changing the oil in your car, or replacing the spark plugs at the recommended intervals. Here are the top 5 reasons why you should keep your SAP Business One maintenance up-to-date in 2012:

1. Risk Mitigation
   Like annual maintenance for your software, these car maintenance costs are not FREE, but it does protect your system from harm and extends its life meaning that you invest less money in the long run.
2. New Features
   Did you know that since 8.8 was first released there have been over 50 new features added to SAP Business One?  Most of which have been asked for and recommended by users of SAP Business One.  These new features offer greater convenience for end users, adding instant value to the software that benefits your business and your business partners.
3. Personal and Employee Satisfaction
   When you invested in SAP Business One it was a difficult decision and a strategic investment in the future of your business. Keeping your maintenance up to date and upgrading your system to the latest release and patch sets you up to take advantage of all the powerful new functionality and helps validate that inital investment. The sense of personal satisfaction is significant and can help everyone in your company to experience greater confidence in your ERP and increase their job satisfaction.
4. Doing More Faster
   Many of the new features are designed to help you accomplish more and do it with less manual effort. There are countless ways that the latest version of SAP Business One will save time, for example the simple little things like the ability to copy an address, create recurring invoices, negative line items, negative documents – all speed up daily procedures.  In addition, many parts of SAP Business One have been re-architected to be faster, lose less memory, and perform at a higher level.  Most customers notice a performance increase in the latest version of SAP Business One.
5. Add New Business Processes
   New business processes have been added to SAP Business One.  Maybe your business can benefit from Dashboards, Purchase Order Requisitions, Campaign Management, a revitalized MRP, Blanket Agreements, Business Intelligence (BI) On Demand, or even drag and drop Outlook email integration.  There is something new that can add value to virtually every company running SAP Business One.

Want to learn more about SAP Business One 8.81 or the upcoming release SAP Business One 8.82? Click here for details and contact Vision33 today!

Businesses of all sizes are moving toward on-demand business software (also known as Software as a Service or SaaS), but how do you know if it’s right for you?

It can be a daunting move.

Despite the many advantages, it still means adopting a new approach to IT – with the servers and system located outside your data center. The upside of local has always been control, but these days, it makes more sense to focus on reliability and results.

If you’re thinking about moving to an on-demand model, take a look at the four points below. They’ll help you get a sense of whether this approach is right for you:

1. Your IT resources are limited

If you have a small IT department or rely on outside consultants to manage your technology for you, on-demand can help you reduce your costs and complexity. On-demand is ideal for businesses that do not want or cannot afford a large IT footprint in their organizations.

2. Reliability cannot be compromised

For smaller businesses, system reliability can be a challenge. Downtime translates to lost revenue and degraded employee productivity, not to mention the costs associated with getting your systems back up.

3. Implementation has to be fast and smooth

You need a new system – and you need it now. At the same time, you can’t afford to disrupt your business operations and distract your employees from the job at hand. On-demand software has no infrastructure component, which drastically reduces implementation time and consumes fewer IT department resources. As a result, your business users experience minimal support and project disruption.

4. Cost predictability is crucial

Aggressive hiring, mergers and acquisitions, a spike in sales, or a new product line can result in a surge in system utilization. In addition to purchasing new equipment to support the increased load, you’ll need to integrate the equipment into your data center and adjust your software solution – all of which will keep your IT department busy. On-demand business software keeps these additional expenses from creeping up on you, with fees based on system use (seat licenses, for example), making your costs predictable and easy to manage.

Software on-demand can alleviate the burden on your IT department and your budget. To learn more about SaaS business software and the opportunities that it can open up, please contact us – we’d be happy to discuss your needs.

Photo credit: akakumo

Like so many small to midsized businesses, you finally make that big leap of faith – trading in your XL spreadsheets or small accounting software package for an integrated business software solution. It’s time to play with the big kids. Things are coming together – your employees are buying in and for the first time ever you are getting an accurate picture of your balance sheet, speeding inventory returns and improving margins on your products and services. Then – you get the news – a new version of the software is being released.

So many growing businesses are making that initial investment in business software and then struggling with the decision to upgrade when a new version is later released. Point in case – SAP recently released its latest version of SAP Business One 8.8. The latest version brings a host of new features like Crystal Reports integration, Data archiving, remote support platform and on and on. But if you don’t feel that new product features alone are relevant enough or beneficial enough to your daily operations to warrant the upgrade, the bigger question to ask your software provider is ‘Why or how will this upgrade benefit my business?’

After working with hundreds of SMBs through business software upgrades, myself and the rest of the Vision33 team have had the opportunity to help customers find the value in upgrading that is ‘unique’ to them. Many have come back to myself and our Consultants weeks and months later saying they understand firsthand now why they needed to take that step. So – at a strategic level, here are the key benefits we hear.

1. Higher ROI and TCO
There is an initial investment in business management software and a continued commitment to annual software maintenance.  Only by being committed will you really achieve a strong ROI and see your TCO decrease.

2. Things last longer and work more efficiently when routine maintenance is performed
If software were a car, an upgrade would be an oil change. Being committed to maintenance/upgrades ensures a long-life and highly productive investment. It keeps your investment in top operating shape.

3. Minimizes changes and disruptions to your business
Technology is changing faster than ever. Believe it or not – keeping up to date a little at a time through an upgrade will protect you from the paralysis of having to implement something brand new. Waiting too long between versions can put your software on an unreachable island.

4. Learning in steps is easier than starting from scratch
New features bring new value to business. The latest features can be the easiest to learn because as a user you become smarter and more skilled. It’s simply a new destination to arrive at.

5. Builds confidence
Employees love working for businesses that use the most up to date tools, as it gives them a sense of security in the business owner’s commitment to the company growth. It helps them do the best at their job and communicate that confidence to customers on a daily basis.

Have you recently upgraded your business software or are currently thinking about it? What are your thoughts?