Stop the Inventory Madness

April 11, 2013 By Leave a Comment

 

inventory management

There are many distributors that have far more inventory than they care to have. Many of the companies that we talk with do not have a good inventory management system to control inventory levels. The systems being used are good, for the most part, for tracking current inventory and knowing current stock levels, but where many of the systems fall short is in the area of replenishing. Answers to questions such as when to buy, how much to buy, and how often to buy often rely on methods that are not accurate.

For accurate inventory levels, consider a system that has an inventory replenishment process that will not only take history into account, but will also consider other variables such seasonable items, shipping time, and vendor criteria (minimums or discounts).

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Document Management Increases Security

October 9, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Security starts with what prying eyes can’t see.

You may consider your company pretty safe. You shred important documents before you dispose of them. You have a firewall and have taken other security measures to make sure that your system can’t be accessed from people outside of the company. All of those security measures are great and keep your company’s information mostly secure.

What about the printed documents? The physical  reports, memos, and other types of documents that might be sitting on your employees desks, out in plain view.

Now suppose that you have someone other than your employees that visit your company or, say, a maintenance service that comes in the evening hours. Do you really want all of that information sitting out in plain view for these people?

Practice extra security by digitizing your documents (digital images such as PDF files) and sharing them with your employees that way, rather than printing them out for distribution.

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Reasons Why Distributors Should Have a Google+ Page

April 16, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Google+ wordmark

In the current publication of The Distributor’s Link magazine, I came across an article titled Sure Thing: Why Every Fastener Distributor Needs To Grab A Page On Google+.

While it makes sense for the fastener distributor, it also makes sense for any distributor who wants added exposure to their business; in other words, every distributor.

The unique benefits from having a Google+ page include improved search engine rankings, more exposure for your company, another way to communicate to your customers and potential customers, and hangouts.

Let’s start off with improved search engine ranking. Let’s face it, Google wants very badly for Google+ to succeed. Google also happens to have the largest search engine, or at least the most widely used one. Google plays very friendly with its own products and indexes Google+ business pages, as well as personal pages for it’s search engine. This can give your business a higher search ranking and add more exposure to your company. As people like your content, they can “+1″ it (this is somewhat the equivalent of “liking” something through Facebook, if your familiar with that concept). Getting a “+1″ is like getting someone’s stamp of approval, and weighs well with Google search.

Another good use for your Google+ page is to use it as another means of communication with your customers and potential customers. Unlike a newsletter, it allows for two way communication and sharing between you and your customers. If your company runs regular specials or promotions, Google+ is an instant way to communicate this to your customers and other that you would like to have as customers.

The other thing that I previously mentioned was “hangouts”. Google hangouts are a video or voice conferencing service. Presently, there can be up to ten people in a hangout. Hangouts could be used for educating your customers, or another way for customers to contact you for customer service related issues. Granted, it isn’t natural for people to call using their webcam, but it is also becoming more common than it was even a couple of years ago.

Best of all, it does not take much effort to get a Google+ page up and going.

 

 

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