When launching your business, finding the best tool to manage your activities is one of your first concerns. And that's perfectly normal!
Optimal management software helps you with invoicing, managing expenses, project tracking, optimizing customer relationships, and automating time-consuming tasks. This aims to improve your productivity and that of your teams.
But one key question remains: how to choose between the many tools available on the market ? To start: by checking the 6 criteria listed by our partner Axonaut, below!
1. A top-notch CRM feature!
The good management of your company goes through effective tracking of your prospects and customers. It's the key to optimizing customer satisfaction, improving your marketing campaigns and commercial offers.
Before choosing management software, check that it offers a comprehensive and efficient CRM that allows you to:
- Define and track your sales cycles
- Track tasks and business relationships
- Track outreach statistics, sales opportunities and revenue
- Segment your email campaigns
2. Tools to improve your customer relationships
CRM isn't everything in customer relations! A powerful management tool provides a true portal for your consumers. The goal is to enable them, through a dedicated and secure space, to check their order status and contact you with ease.
On the back-office side, this portal shows you invoices (by client), ongoing tasks, support tickets, as well as shared projects.
Features that you will find on Axonaut.com, among others. The latter even offers a collaborative after-sales space where your teams share and comment on ideas to improve your services.
3. An accurate invoicing module
Invoicing your services is an essential part of running your business. Your management software should therefore make this task easy for you.
From creating quotes to converting them into invoices, it's essential to streamline the process to save time. The best part? Doing this in one click and applying your electronic signature. It avoids paper and makes sending to the client faster.
Another important feature: managing deposit invoices, progress invoices and final balances. All of this in multiple languages to ease your work with international partners.
Of course, for a professional brand image, it's important to be able to customize your invoices by adding your company logo, your specific terms and VAT. All in compliance with the 2018 billing law.
In addition to these features, with Axonaut, you can generate purchase orders and delivery notes in one click. The platform also offers the ability to pay their invoices by bank transfer or credit card securely. Not to mention the automatic dunning function for unpaid invoices via emails and letters.
4. Optimized inventory management
Well-managed inventory prevents lost orders, unexpected stockouts, while optimizing storage costs. The goal is to fulfill your orders as well as possible to satisfy your customers.
With powerful management software, you track the orders placed by your company, the deliveries made and the evolution of stock. If you have a workshop or a manufacturing plant, opt for a tool that allows you to track product manufacturing, stock value and orders placed to the warehouse.
Some management software can help a company determine the most cost-effective option to execute an order based on available stock and the buyer's location. This can be via a store, a warehouse or a third‑party fulfillment partner, for example. Also remember to check this criterion if you have multiple points of sale, subsidiaries or storage locations!
5. Easier project management
Managing a team, scheduling tasks, meeting deadlines… These are challenges to tackle for your company's growth! Among the key criteria of good management software, you'll find options concerning project management. Especially if you operate in a sector where the jobs are long and complex.
Make sure a project management module is attached to the tool, so you can enjoy a real-time overview of your project's progress, as well as the expenses incurred to stay within budget.
If it offers the ability to schedule tasks for your collaborators and to track the time spent at each stage, that's even better!
6. An option for human resources management
Human resources management is a real headache when launching a business. Between partners, employees and freelancers, the human factor isn't always the easiest to manage… Except with the right tool!
When choosing your management software, make sure it has intuitive HR features. It should allow you to record all employee data via a staff register (a kind of CRM for your team!).
With a tool like the one offered by Axonaut, for example, in addition to saving information about your employees and contractors, you can record performance evaluations, track hours worked, manage leave/absences/sick leave, and handle social contributions.
Conclusion
You can have specialized tools for each of these criteria. However, that doesn’t improve the responsiveness you’re looking for! Not to mention the risk of errors and duplicates, as well as the financial burden of using multiple solutions.
Axonaut It brings all these features together in one tool to simplify running your business. So, if you can only choose one, you know which one to turn to…
