Some form of cloud technology is used by 69% of businesses according to a study by the International Data Group. Much of today’s business operations depend on the power of cloud solutions. More and more SMBs are adopting cloud ERP to handle their business operations due to its fast implementation, increased flexibility, and lower overall cost compared to on-premise ERP. But what kind of ROI (return on investment) are these businesses seeing from cloud ERP?
According to a report by Nucleus Research, cloud technology delivers 4.01 times the ROI as on-premise. That’s significant. Below we’ll explore the key benefits cloud ERP provides for SMBs and how these benefits translate to ROI.
Key benefits that achieve ROI for small and midsize businesses
Nucleus Research studied over one hundred small and mid-size companies that deployed cloud ERP solutions. They reported ROI increases as high as 589%. What was perhaps more impressive was that the lowest ROI for cloud ERP was still 73%. More than 50% of the companies reported a 150% hike in ROI.
The use of cloud ERP can result in immediate returns for your company. The ROI of cloud ERP solutions in Nucleus’ study was as fast as 2 months with the longest at 1.9 years. Here are the main benefits of these findings.
IT cost reductions
Cloud ERP lowers IT costs of hardware, maintenance, and human resources. It replaces outdated disparate systems that are the responsibility of IT to maintain. As a result, fewer IT staff are needed.
Companies with multiple locations use hardware and software at each location. That is costly due to upkeep, integration, and redundancy. With cloud ERP, staff can access information from any location via the internet. Cloud ERP doesn’t require hardware to be purchased. And, upgrades and maintenance are handled by the vendor. It is also less expensive to buy but provides all the functionality needed for growth.
Improved insights
Cloud ERP provides deep and integrated analytics to help businesses foresee trends and predict changes. It helps them plan for growth with the technology to forecast for the short and the long term. Dashboards provide intuitive, real-time KPI information to see what is happening with the business.
With cloud ERP there is instant visibility to financial and operational data. Managers can make faster and smarter decisions by having information at their fingertips. Custom reports can be easily created for stakeholders. It’s simple to drill down to look at specific information. With deeper insight management can discover business opportunities and revenue-generating activities.
Increased productivity
Manual entry of data is error-prone, time-consuming, and undesirable for employees. Cloud ERP automates processes to eliminate manual entry so employees have time to focus on more significant activities. Employees can access cloud ERP on mobile devices or their laptops. That improves efficiency by allowing staff to work on the move.
Information gets accessed and processed faster. Customer data is readily available to provide better service. Sales and service staff can answer customer questions in the field and handle other work-related transactions such as expense reports. Accounting can process the month-end close more efficiently and do away with consolidating data in spreadsheets.
Better customer satisfaction
Having all information in one database lets everyone work from the same information for a single source of the truth. Sales and marketing can better target customer needs with easy access to their data. Sales can make informed decisions by reviewing customers’ financial status, order history, and payments.
The Nucleus Research report noted with cloud ERP customer service personnel spent less time handling customer requests. That resulted in a 30–60% reduction in the total time spent to resolve issues. Customer history can be seen without having to go to different areas of the company to get information on orders, sales, or shipments. Cloud ERP lets businesses achieve greater growth with less staff.
Improved accuracy
Cloud ERP removes business dependence on paper, spreadsheets, and accounting software. It accelerates collections, reduces the quote-to-cash time, and increases billing accuracy. Financial closings and statements are completed fast and without errors. All banking processes are tracked and its use of GAAP ensures financials are compliant with standards. With cloud ERP automation, manual errors are eliminated across the business.
Conclusion
All these benefits raise the ROI of cloud ERP for small and midsize businesses. And these are just the major benefits it provides for small and midsize businesses to help them grow and prosper. There are many other gains cloud ERP provides that also help SMBs be more competitive and profitable.
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