5 Precursors of An Obsolete OMS
Non-perishable segment is one of the most dynamic and competitive segments of the retail industry. Even in the current challenging economic environment retailers continue to strengthen their customer propositions by investing in multi-channel initiatives, expanding choice, developing both ranges and services, enhancing product presentation in stores and online and delivering value to the customer. These initiatives have objectives of building successful businesses that bring unrivalled convenience and value to customers' everyday lives, whether shopping at home or on the move, and, for IT, reducing the number of applications by a factor of 3 or 4. Fragmented custom build systems are becoming barriers to the growth. The limitations of such systems are driving retailers to search for a streamlined, end to end order management solution that will play a pivotal role in transforming their business.
The benefits of an Order Management system are numerous, including increased sales and market share; reduced order processing costs; increased visibility of your customers' buying behavior; quicker execution of pricing and promotion strategies to specific target market segments and so on.
Retailers are deciding to replace their existing OMS for a variety of reasons. The cost of replacing existing OMS is quiet high. Hence, it is important to decide the time of changing existing OMS. At the most elemental level, the question is whether your current system strengthens your ability to execute business strategies that will help you build competitive advantage, respond to constant change, and grow your business. If the answer to this question is negative, then you need to replace existing OMS sooner than later. In this blog I am listing down five signs of an obsolete order management system.
1. Your OMS offers limited functions
Does your OMS allow your business to pursue continuous improvement initiatives? This often involves the addition of related functions such as fraud management, broken promise management, customer correspondence, return and exchange management. These types of add-on functionality help to improve customer satisfaction. You rely on your OMS vendor to closely monitor the market and its customer base as part of its product development process. Many smaller product vendors lack a defined road map for improving and expanding product functionality. Your OMS vendor may not have upgrade plans due to lack of domain expertise, funding or other problems. If so, you may be trapped with a functionally stagnant system while market requirements continue to evolve around you.
You should also consider your use of functional workarounds. If you are creating workarounds for new business requirements that the system cannot support you should consider replacing it. The more processes you handle outside OMS, the more difficult it will be to track them and maintain the accuracy of the data.
2. Supporting your current OMS is becoming expensive
If you have bespoke in-house built OMS, expertise of the application is limited to in-house staff that may leave the company, taking with them irreplaceable technical know-how. The cost of retaining such employees could be exorbitant. Losing key employees who possess all the knowledge required to operate your system can be a big setbacks to your business.
Delay in upgrading your OMS may force you to maintain older versions of related infrastructure such as databases, operating systems and other software. In some cases, support for older infrastructure is transferred from the original provider to a third-party vendor, who can then charge a premium to support organizations that elect to maintain older software and infrastructure components. This is could consume a large chunk of IT budget and hurt your ability to add new functionality or modules. Finally, running on an outdated OMS decreases the level and quality of support you receive from your vendors.
3. External factors are making your current OMS obsolete.
Ever rising external requirements and compliance issues affecting your business may have become too forceful for you to ignore. This is especially true if your business is undergoing changes due to increased globalization of your supplier network and customer base. Many in-house and legacy OMS may be prove incompetent when faced with unforeseen mandates. Larger suppliers and government agencies may impose regulations (like PCI compliance) that require technology your OMS cannot support. If you are unable to comply, you may be subjected to significant penalty fees, raising your supply chain costs. If OMS does not allow you to observe the latest industry policies, you may be compelled to replace your business systems.
4. Rigid OMS is stopping you to respond to change
A Key weakness of many legacy OMS is the tendency toward rigid enforcement of predefined business processes. This does not allow your business to implement the unique processes that are likely a source of competitive differentiation. Your OMS should have a more modular approach and architecture that supports an evolutionary process in line with your business practices.
A lot of existing OMS have some shortcomings which can only be overcome by the addition of inflexible custom coding which doesn't carry forward with an upgrade. This custom code may have been added during the original system implementation to bridge the gap between the standard product and your company's particular needs. In some situations, it reaches an extreme where so many changes have been made that even minor modifications become a major task; thus paralyzing the system's ability to be altered at all. For retailer this could mean a never-ending process resulting in loss of competitive advantage and irreparable damage to key customer relationships.
5. The UI in your current OMS is difficult to use and responds slowly
Bespoke legacy OMS sometimes have outdated user interfaces and menu structures which make it difficult and time-consuming to complete tasks and access data. User-friendly design benefits both the company and the end user. Increased usability of the OMS increases productivity and job satisfaction while decreasing customer support needs.
Another key indicator may be a slowdown in response times of existing user interface. Do you find yourself sitting around waiting for a "hanging" system, especially when call center representative is in call with customer? Slow systems can lead to considerable declines in productivity, efficiency, and order processing time.
Continuing with obsolete order management systems can be a huge burden. This is because your customers are not going to slow down to accommodate your outdated systems. Customers will continue to demand better products, more visibility, and faster delivery.
