Lightwell Business Technology Blog

On this final day of 2015, many of us are making resolutions for the coming year and fitness is often at the top of our lists. It's no suprise that technology is now available to help motivate and keep us moving, so we can increase our chances of being in the measely 8% of people who successfully achieve their New Year's resolutions (Statistic Brain Research Institute).

Fit What?

Even if you aren't counting your steps on a Fitbit (I'm only at 3059 at this writing), chances are you’ve heard of the company and how its products are literally disrupting the world. Just six years after launching the first fitness tracker online, the company has become the epitome of a successful startup, shipping millions of units to 54 countries around the globe. But Fitbit couldn’t maintain that level of achievement without a whole lot of infrastructure. Again, technology to the rescue. One of the ways Fitbit has managed its complex B2C and B2B omnichannel operations is with the NetSuite ERP solution.

Within the last few years, there has been a massive shift toward cloud-based business management systems. There are considerable advantages to transitioning from an on-premise environment to one accessed solely via the Web, especially when it comes to enterprise resource planning. 

Study shows B2B suppliers are investing more in omni-channel commerce

According to the recent Forrester report “Building the B2B Omni-Channel Commerce Platform of the Future,” investments in omni-channel e-commerce solutions by B2B manufacturers have considerably risen recently.

Accenture and Forrester Consulting, which carried out the research, noted that more than half - 52 percent - of enterprise buyers plan to make many of their purchases through online platforms in the next three years. What's more is that currently, 49 percent of B2B buyers prefer to carry out their enterprise transactions online. In response to this shift toward online platforms, 83 percent of B2B retailers are upgrading and building out their omni-channel e-commerce resources, or have plans to do so within the next six months.

According to the report, there are several features buyers expect when connecting with their B2B retailers through an e-commerce platform, including:

With the new year just around the corner, many people are making goals for 2015, and businesses are no different. A main aim of many enterprises is to improve their order management systems and processes in order to ensure that customers receive the best services possible. This is essential for all companies, but particularly important for those that have omni-channel commerce strategies in place.

Companies today are constantly dealing with the changes that come with a growing enterprise. One of the biggest challenges that goes along with an expanding business's lifecycle is selecting the best technology that can shift alongside the organization. For this reason, many decision-makers are looking toward the cloud for a range of software-based capabilities, including enterprise resource planning.

As the reliably hilarious comedian Steve Martin once said: "Some people have a way with words, and other people...oh, uh, not have way." Point being, there's a right way to say something - and a whole lot of wrong ways. This is especially true in the business world, and particularly pertinent for customer interactions. A deft description or articulate message can sway a customer toward your product or presentation, while even one word out of place can lead to head-scratching - or worse, irritation. It's important to understand how the words we use have a profound effect on the way customers perceive brand strategies, and that there needs to be real meaning communicated in everything - from an email subject line to product descriptions and the fine print. 

The Internet was abuzz recently with the curious tale of the Union Street Guest House, a small, vintage hotel in upstate New York that generated a firestorm of negative consumer attention with a policy that allegedly charged guests $500 for posting a negative review. The spot, a popular destination for wedding participants, reportedly sent a statement to guests reading, in part, that "every negative review placed on any internet site by anyone in your party," according to The Independent. Needless to say, people were upset, and responded by driving down the hotel's Yelp rating and leaving comments encouraging future guests to look elsewhere.