Enterprise Software: The Ultimate Guide & 7 Tools You Need in 2022

In the business world, needs are met when there is a demand.

Here are the main advantages of investing in enterprise software before delving into the various types that might change the way you do business in 2022.

Enterprise Software: 5 Key Benefits Explained

It Can Save You Money

Fact: Investing in corporate software requires a sizable initial financial commitment. An Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software system can cost a mid-sized firm anywhere between $150,000 and $750,000, according to a survey.

It’s also true that, with careful planning, deliberate strategy, and effective execution, the long-term savings you will realize will surpass the original investment. An actual case study of a manufacturing business utilizing ERP software decreased yearly operating costs by 23% and administrative costs by 22%.

Given that the average lifespan of enterprise software is 15 years, it can eventually pay for itself through a sizable return on investment in addition to your initial capital expenditure.

It Saves You Time

Time savings are closely related to cost savings since, in business, time is equivalent to money.

Automation is a defining feature of corporate software. The amount of time and human capital required to complete tasks, processes, and systems that were formerly manually operated may now be completed from start to finish in a vastly shorter amount of time.

Your whole organization will profit from the elimination of tiresome and time-consuming manual operations, not just your IT department. The following is a comment from a production manager to an interview with employees from several departments of a customer that Strategic Systems Group conducts: “I gained my time back since I can now identify possible machine faults, prevent downtime, and boost product quality.

It Reduces Human Error

As the saying goes, human error is common.

Even the most careful employee occasionally makes mistakes. Your processes may be affected, there may be inconsistencies, and your performance may be negatively impacted if mistakes accumulate and occur frequently enough.

Data loss, for instance, is one of the human blunders that organizations suffer with the most. According to the majority of research, human error accounts for 25% of all data loss occurrences on average, proving the classic IT quip that “issues reside between a keyboard and a chair” to be true.

Enterprise software can help with this. The chance of human mistake is reduced because there aren’t many moving parts that require human interaction.

It Gives You Scalability and Flexibility

You eventually consolidate your business activities into physical sites. The next day, a pandemic compels you and your colleagues to do business entirely from your homes.

Whatever size or scale your business may currently have, chances are it won’t remain the same in the future, which emphasizes the value of flexibility and scalability. Reduced downtime is also a result of the capacity to adapt to shifting business demands, whether they are internal or external. This is significant because each wasteful second equates to lost opportunities and, more significantly, lost income.

Amazon had a 45-minute downtime in 2013, which cost it $5 million. Today, Amazon would lose more than $10 million if the same disruption occurred.

It Boosts Security

In full transparency, corporate software has the potential to both enhance security and act as a gateway for online crimes and data breaches.

System complexity, access permissions, delayed updates, compliance problems, inherent dangers associated with using the cloud, system authorization, and single-factor authentication are just a few of the security flaws that open doors for hackers and data thieves both internal and external.

The secret is to make sure that every corporate software deployment prioritizes security. Today, all business software must have at the very least safeguards like role-based access, two-factor authentication, day zero attack detection, VPN limitation, and authorization protocols.

Enterprise software may act as a fortress to defend your company from hacking and breaches when it is implemented in accordance with the industry’s highest standards for data security.

10 Types of Enterprise Software

Enterprise software investment provides short-, mid-, and long-term advantages. Here are the 10 sorts of enterprise software that growth-oriented firms should take into account in 2022. They may be divided into a variety of categories.

1. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)

This phrase, “one program to govern them all,” encapsulates what an ERP is.

The automatic response is to invest in new tools and applications as businesses expand. Businesses eventually find themselves entangled in a maze of isolated and segmented platforms, making it challenging for team members, decision-makers, and stakeholders to integrate all the moving parts of an organization’s daily operations.

Due to the sluggish decision-making, fragmented efforts, disparate data sets, and general inconsistencies that result, consumers and clients may not only experience service or product delivery issues but also experience internal end-user friction. This lack of consistency hinders growth, lowers revenue, and lowers productivity.

2. Customer Relationships Management (CRM)

According to digital marketing specialist Ryan Deiss, those that can afford to spend more money on client acquisition succeed.

Regardless of size, sector, or specialization, customer and client acquisition, retention, and management are the lifeblood of all organizations. A CRM platform should be your top choice if you have a little IT budget and must choose which enterprise software to prioritize.

Businesses that use CRM solutions benefit from higher sales productivity and outcomes, more accountable and successful marketing campaigns, and more comprehensive customer care and support.

Fortunately, CRM is one of the most developed categories in the whole software industry, so depending on your present demands and budget, you may select from a variety of options.

3. Business Intelligence (BI)

Do you know where to go for the data if we ask you to develop revenue projection models for your company based on internal and external cohorts? And if you do know where to get the data, how long do you think it will take you to compile everything and turn the raw data into insights that can be put into practice?

By the time you’re done, the situation will have changed once more, and the information that was pertinent a few weeks ago could already be outdated. Software for business intelligence is essential in this situation.

Data shows that businesses who utilize BI tools are 5 times more likely than those that don’t to make choices more quickly.

4. Supply Chain Management (SCM)

Revlon, a popular cosmetics company, recently made headlines when it filed for bankruptcy. Sales are down, but the business blamed supply chain and logistical problems for making it difficult to satisfy client requests.

This tragic outcome emphasizes the need of effective supply chain management for all manufacturing-related organizations. You have little control over external causes like the recent COVID-19 outbreak that disrupted supply chains throughout the world, thus there is nothing you can do about them. According to estimates, the pandemic severely disrupted the supply chain for 14% of shops worldwide.

The last thing you want, though, is for badly run supply chain management rules to increase the consequences of these external circumstances.

5. Human Resources Management (HRM)

You can have the most cutting-edge technology available, but if your staff is unmotivated, underproductive, and inept, all of your expenditures will be for nothing.

Because of this, a comprehensive corporate software installation has to include human resources management software. HRM should never be disregarded even if it most likely lacks the bells and whistles of systems like an ERP, CRM, or even marketing automation.

Businesses are, after all, organizations run by people to service other people, or at least that’s how we still perceive them.

Due to the talent scarcity that many industrialized nations are currently experiencing, the significance of HRM software has lately come to light.

6. Marketing Automation

Your past marketing strategies will eventually stop working as your company grows, and you’ll need to use technology to both invent new strategies and maintain your current ones.

For instance, it was probably typical for you to interact with each lead and speak with your clients when you first started. However, as your database of leads and customers increases from 100 to 100,000, it becomes impractical to continue using your outdated marketing strategies.

Marketing automation software boasts the greatest acceptance rate and is still growing, with 63 percent of firms wanting to raise their marketing automation expenditure this year. Marketing is a vital company function and a growth engine for huge corporations as well as startups.

7. Business Process Management (BPM)

Take a mental trip back in time to when you were a rank-and-file worker looking for reimbursement for costs you spent for a specific filing period that were authorized by the firm. To begin, you must locate the appropriate form, or if the accounting department is out, print one.

Then you must obtain the permission of the finance department, the boss’ signature, the department head’s signature, and all the other minute details. Before you know it, this one boring task has taken up half of your whole shift.

At the end of the day, you only learn that you have to start over because the final authorizing officer demands that you list your costs in a certain way.