ERP: Definition, Types, Features, and Benefits for Enterprises

All business companies have many separate departments that are responsible for a particular range of tasks. However, it is still the one company that needs to stay united and share data about all updates inside the organization.

Each department needs to have access to the data from the other department. The absence of a single system for the whole company complicates and prolongs many work processes and makes them slow and not efficient. To avoid these awkward situations, your company needs smart business software solutions that can sync the work of departments. ERP is this kind of solution.

In this article, we will discuss the details of ERP functions, types, and implementation in your company environment.

What is Enterprise Resource Planning?

ERP or Enterprise Resource Planning unites all company departments in the system and gives access to data for all employees. This system helps to accomplish all daily tasks on time without any difficulties with the search for the required information.

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is the integrated management of main business processes, often in real time and mediated by software and technology.

Wikipedia.org

Of course, here comes the need for different levels of access. It is important to connect those departments that work directly with each other on a daily basis.

So, ERP is a software solution that manages the company’s data, providing its optimization and accessibility for the departments of the enterprise. Implementing ERP has many benefits for your enterprise as it makes the workflow more efficient. So ERP optimizes the following work processes:

API access
employee info and updates
HR
payment gateways
receipts
project management
expense management
asset management

We will talk about more ERP advantages later in this article.

Types of ERP systems

ERP by industry

ERP systems can be used in all business areas. However, there are some industries that have a special need for the only system and stable connections between departments or even organizations. Among them are:

Healthcare
Hospitality
Construction
Manufacturing and Distribution
Food and Beverage Delivery
Education
Professional Services
Agriculture and Farming
Retail
Technology and Electronics
Nonprofit Organizations

ERP is a flexible system that can be easily customized for a particular industry. Adding the needed functions gives the ability to automate more work processes and make them faster and easier.

Company needs

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ERP types by the implementation

Besides different business areas, ERP systems have different types of integration into your company according to the size of the organization and its requirements. Mainly, there three of them:

cloud-based
on-premise
hybrid

Cloud-based integration

Cloud-based integration is considered to be the most popular type of ERP implementation. It works like that – business companies choose the ERP systems from third-party vendors that maintain them during a particular period of time. It decreases some costs as the companies don’t need to hire IT specialists for maintaining the systems. Also, it is critical to find a reliable vendor as you need to give full access to your organization data. So this type of integration is the cheapest one and can meet the demands of small companies with few employees.

On-premise integration

This type of integration is the opposite of cloud-base. ERP system is inserted in an in-house data center and you need to hire IT specialists to maintain it. So ERP is installed inside the organization only so you have full control of this system as you have a license. Also, you need to keep an eye on updates and constantly improve your ERP according to the new technologies. This type of integration suits large business companies and controls every aspect of work processes.

Hybrid integration

A hybrid type of integration combines the two other types – cloud-based and on-premise. It mostly suits a particular business niche and large companies. This type provides recording data on the company’s computers as well as clouds. Mostly, it is used when the company has started as a small organization and is growing on a constant basis. Therefore you will need more space for organization data. As you may understand, the types of implementation that suit your company depend only on the demands and needs of your company, its size, and the speed of growing.

Main Features of Enterprise Resource Planning

ERP options

The ERP system brings a lot of benefits to your organization. It automates workflow, structure, and updates all data that needs to be saved. We defined the main features of ERP integration that explain how your company can profit using this system. They are the following:

Enterprise-wide integration

Company work processes are flowing end to end between all departments. It is important to adjust and automate the workflow step-by-step with no possibility for errors.

Real-time operations

As the operations go through several departments to be done and it takes several seconds, a key feature is to check the data quickly and accurately to reveal possible problems and fix them.

Database

Usually, the database includes data that should be defined and recognized by all departments with the same definition. Splitting the physical data can be implemented for performance improvement.

Consistency

A consistent user interface is considered to be a more professional software solution. This way of creating UI design reduces costs as there is a need to create only a small number of reusable templates for the pages.e.

ERP features

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Benefits of ERP for enterprises

Competition

ERP, like any other software solution for business, needs investments and time for integration. If you think that this is too expensive and not really rationally, we would like to show you why investing in ERP is worthy. As you may know, many enterprises still keep the old standards and don’t care about the technology implemented in their organizations. They tend to trust all work processes to human resources that crash more often than technologies. ERP takes your company to a higher level and keeps you ahead of your competitors. Implementing this system reduces the number of mistakes made by employees as some processes become automated. This will keep the highest rank on the market.

Process Efficiency

As we mentioned before, human resources tend to make mistakes much more often than technological systems. ERP optimizes and automates some work processes to make them faster and more efficient. Also, this system eliminates the possibility of errors and inaccurate data delivery that can cause critical problems for the business. ERP is a kind of additional assistant for the employees that helps to track all business processes.

Forecasting

Forecasting is an important feature for all business areas. Predictions help to define the needs for investment, sales, or sales down, or any other financial activities. Also, ERP helps to forecast as accurately as it is possible, update with every new change, and thoroughly plan the following strategy and actions. Forecasting decreases the possibility of spending unnecessary costs and saving the company’s money.

Department connection

Despite the number of departments, the organization needs to be united. It is important to keep the collaboration between different departments. It is a critical business need as often projects involve several departments simultaneously and they need to work unitedly. It means uninterrupted sharing information. communication and collaboration. ERP helps to update the data in real-time to avoid mistakes between the different departments and make the work processes accurate.

Scalable resource

ERP systems grow together with your company. the bigger your organization becomes, the more requirements ERP gets. New employees mean new users and new data records. It is important to cover all amounts of new information and structure it. So you need to be sure that your ERP can be expanded with time and meet all your demands in the future.

Integrated information

The main purpose of ERP implementation is to gather, manage, and maintain all information inside the company. Business projects, customer orders, employee data, daily operations, policies have to be recorded and saved in case of need. Also, ERP not just keeps this data safe but gathers and shows it in a single place.

Cost savings

Making mistakes that cost a lot of money can cause serious problems for your business. ERP system helps to reduce costs and optimize budget as it replaces human resources in some work processes. Therefore, you can spend saved money on other urgent needs for your business. ERP helps to be smarter and predict unnecessary spendings. All you have to do it is to implement the system your organization really needs.

Custom reports

ERP systems work accurately and make customized reports. How can it help your business? With accurate and improved reports, your company can respond to complex data requests much more easily. Generally, it improves the efficiency of work processes and makes them faster.

Higher productivity

Automation of some work processes with ERP gives more free time for employees to cope with other tasks. They can perform them more accurately, sensitively, and scrupulous. the more attention workers pay to tasks and their details, the higher quality of the services you get. So with ERP, you can focus on other processes that matter instead of coping with numerous tasks with no enthusiasm.

Customer service

Easy and fast access to customer information makes customer service improved and more productive. As ERP always updated the data, you will avoid mistakes and inaccuracies in the information. Also, ERP systems can have additional features like lead scoring that helps to search for good leads and track the status of marketing campaigns. All in all, ERP makes the relationships between your company and customers much better and efficient.

Data reliability

The main advantage of ERP is access to information from different locations and devices, for example, in the case of cloud-based integration. Users will always be informed about the latest data updates and know the current situation. As ERP improves data consistency, you can be sure that it is safe and has no errors. If you want to make it even more secure, you can set different levels of data access for different departments and add built-in protection resources. This decreases the risk of your data being announced to third parties.

How to implement ERP successfully?

The implementation of ERP to your company is not a complex process. Before the start of integration, you need to go through crucial steps on the way to successful ERP work in your business organization. We prepared a list of the main tips towards accurate implementation:

The first and main is to define your business goals and needs, and then to build the strategy on how to reach all of them.
Don’t ruin the old work processes from the beginning – the integration should flow easily and softly for the workers.
Build the right business plan and describe all work processes that can be automated
It is important to choose a suitable ERP type for your organization and maintain well.
ERP system should be integrated into all departments with no exception to making the workflow more productive
Choose the key employees that will be responsible for integration in every department
Make sure that all your employees are well informed about the new system and its functions
Choose experienced specialists to manage data and maintain your ERP system.

Our expertise in ERP development

ERP for aircraft selling company

GBKSOFT developed the website for an aircraft selling company. Before contacting us, they had an old version of the website that wasn’t productive enough and had a poor design. Besides the providing of renewed design with colors, and patterns suitable for their industry, we developed a complex ERP system. So what features made the website gain after our work?

Search for aircraft by filters – price, model, manufacturer, size;
Comparing the chosen model to other existing on the platform;
Ability to know the approximate price of the airplane and perform a range mapping.

Moreover, customers can find a detailed description of every model of airplanes like weights, operating costs, cabin interior, performance. So all required information by customers can be found on their websites, so the owners don’t need to spend many costs to contact every customer personally.

ERP for service transport

Our team faced the challenges of automating the process of creating the lists of needed parts of vehicles in order as they used to do it manually – a new list for every new order with detailed descriptions. The main aim of ERP for this company was to make this process easier and more accurate. After implementing the ERP system, customers can make the order and employees receive this order with the list of parts needed and send the full order to the car supplier. It reduces the risk of mixing app details and orders and helps to avoid misunderstandings with customers.

How much does an ERP development cost?

Like all software solutions for businesses, ERP systems have a particular range of functions and features that suit the chosen business industry and the company’s needs. You can discuss the requirements you would like to implement into your company with our Business Analyst and find out the necessary functions and their estimation. Our experienced developer Evgen Bryl made an approximate estimation of ERP system development.

Dev stages	Dev hours	Total cost
Business Analyst	130	$4160
Admin	32	$704
Designer	120	$4680
CSS\HTML	150	$3750
PHP backend	600	$16200
JS frontend	400	$10800
QA	360	$6120
Scrum master	270	$6210

Conclusion

ERP offers numerous benefits to businesses and it is hard to underestimate them. Implementation of technologies in the business process makes the work of the whole company faster, easier, and more productive. Human resources can cope with all amounts of new information accurately. That’s why you need to automate some work processes to avoid serious mistakes during work with customers.

If you don’t know where to start, you just need to contact a Business Analyst for a professional consultation and defining the requirements of your company and the function of a custom ERP system. Choosing the right direction is a key step in the successful implementation of ERP.

ERP implement

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✔️ What is the best type of ERP to implement?

The most scalable type of ERP system is considered to be cloud-based integration. Besides the vendor takes part in your company performance, cloud-based integration suits for large companies and small that are going to expand. There is an endless database for all information to be saved and to share it between different locations easily. However, the type of implementation depends on the needs of your organization and should be discussed with the Business Analyst.

✔️ What is the difference between CRM and ERP?

CRM systems are implemented to manage customer services and experience. ERP systems are used to automate and optimize business processes and department collaboration.

✔️ What is the cost of implementing of ERP in my company?

The total cost of implementing an ERP system varies and depends on the range of functions it will have. To choose these features, you need to define your company`s requirements and build the right strategy of integration ERP in the work processes accurately. You need to contact an experienced Business Analyst to set the goals for your organization and create the strategy of aiming. In general, the price starts at $52000.

One comment

Adam Golightly

Feb 02, 2021 at 2:17 AM

I can understand how a business could really benefit from getting the right planning for its resources in order to be more effective. Making sure that they can get some help from a professional could allow them to be more effective with the right solution. It was interesting to learn about how departments that work together on a daily basis, and an ERP system can allow their system to be more accessible to all of them.