Tags: IT Excellence

We are actually in the middle of looking at features of Point of Sales software, having covered the online sales point last week. However, this week I want to discuss something entirely different, although related to software.

Process maps! Why bother? This is for big corporates with 200 staff doing the same boring function over and over again you might think. Think again.

Tags: Process maps, workflow, Procedures

The internet and specifically the world wide web continues its march into every household relentlessly.

With this in mind it does make sense to think about putting ones product offering on the web and allow customers to shop whenever they want. Very often the banks are the leaders in this field, with a host of banking services now being offered over the web and on mobile devices.

Setting up a web presence however is normally costly in terms of building the site, but also to put in place the service infrastructure to deal with the additional demand received via the web.

Tags: webshop

Brought to you by Immo Böhm from Afresh Consult.
www.afreshconsult.com
info@afreshconsult.com

I hope you had a good holiday and a good rest, and that your energy levels are up again for the new year! It is going to be an exciting year for Africa. Not only because of the world cup in South Africa, but also because I believe this is going to be Africa’s decade.

I discussed two books in my last column last year. Books that really made a difference to how I view life and work.

The third book that struck me is from Vijay Mahajan: “Africa Rising”. Mahajan has traditionally researched fast growing markets in Asia, and during his recent studies on Africa he says he found much of the same signs in the economy that were visible during the economic rise of America, the Asian Tiger states and China. Africa is the last big market to tap, and although its not always easy to do business in Africa, the time is definitely right to start planning for it.

There are over 900 million consumers in Africa. It is true that many of these are not part of the formal economy - yet! It is also true that many of these consumers are now moving into the formal economy, into what Mahajan calls “Africa Two”. These are all consumers that do have some cash to spend, mostly on basic commodities and basic telecommunication needs. And with a growing African diaspora, there is a lot of investment into Africa, much more than one would think.

Also, Africa is richer than one tends to think. Africa is richer than India on the basis of gross national income (GNI) per capita, and a dozen African countries have a higher GNI per capita than China. It is also true that in Africa you are not dealing with a single market, but rather with many of them, which complicates things. However, many African nations are opening up their markets and making it easier to invest and conduct business. Business in turn builds democracy and stability, and hence I believe Africa is going to be a huge opportunity. Well, actually it already is!

Many of our customers are planning to expand into our neighboring markets this year. With HansaWorld working so well over WAN, this is easy for them to do. Many have already done so. Our company has expanded to Botswana and Zimbabwe last year, and we did some major deals in Kenya. So I can vouch for the findings of Mr. Mahajan. Have a look at “Africa Rising”. You will start to see a lot of opportunities opening up in Africa.

This also became evident when I visited Kenya recently, and the Uhuru Highway was packed with trucks fully laden with construction material and construction equipment, bound for Uganda. Some of the economies in Africa are the fastest growing in the world, and most have escaped the world economic crisis due to the protected nature of their economies.

“Well, what does all this have to do with software?” you might ask. A lot! If your company is now running on a run of the mill accounting package and a couple of spreadsheets, then you are in danger of not being able to face the onslaught of new competition. With Africa being the last big market, expect a rush of businesses moving into Africa, and this includes your market as well. If those business have better systems and processes in place, then they will be more competitive. Your knowledge of the local market will only protect you to an extent. And why not invest in systems and processes that not only keep competition at bay, but also allows you to compete in the markets that are now opening up?

I see this as a huge opportunity that is not to be missed.

Until next time, and remember……keep it (A)FRESH!


About the writer: Immo Böhm

Immo has extensive experience in business management systems implementation. His experience spans the retail, logistics, hospitality and agriculture industries. He holds a BSc Degree from the University of Stellenbosch and an MBA from the University of Luton in the UK.

Tags: Vijay Mahajan, , africa,

Very likely you are already in a holiday mood and in a rush to get the Christmas shopping done. This reminds me of one of my favorite Christmas quotes that I found on the web: Oh, for the good old days when people would stop Christmas shopping when they ran out of money.  ~Author Unknown.

And how true it is. Modern Point of Sale systems make it easy to overspend, fueled by Credit Cards with Budget Facility, Store Cards, Loyalty schemes and Cash Reward schemes, and the popular invention of paying installments, and only starting to pay in April of next year. Does the consumer not realize that they are paying interest until April? There is no such thing as a free lunch. But lets not dwell on this now, we can look at these sales tactics later.

Today we will explore peripheral devices used in Point of Sale operations. Typical peripherals include receipt printers, barcode scanners, cash drawers and customer pole displays. Sophisticated systems will connect to more complex peripherals such as scales, fuel pumps, Digitot digital liquor tot metering systems or any kind of billing system.

Tags: Point of Sale, Barcode Scanner, Peripherals

We are in the middle of discussing Point of Sale systems. Just yesterday evening we had a discussion about this here at the HansaWorld partner conference at Didimala Lodge in South Africa.

The central theme that every HansaWorld partner here mentions with all the Point of Sale systems they support is security. As I mentioned last time, a POS sales point is an easy target for fraud and theft. This is simply so because this is the point where stock leaves the shop anyway, where cash is handled anyway, and it is thus difficult to control.

Tags: camera surveillance

Right, over the last few articles we covered Sales Orders processing in more detail. This time we will explore the other big avenue of sales - Point of Sales.

A very easy definition of a Point of Sales system is a system that is used to transact a sale while the customer is standing in front of the sales person. This scenario you typically find in retail stores, supermarkets, bars and restaurants. You also find such systems in Hospitals, Hotel Receptions, Airline Ticket Counters etc.

Tags: Point of Sale

Today its back to my original schedule. Over the last few articles I have drifted off my plan to talk more about Sales Orders. We have nearly covered all core functionality typically associated with a best of breed Sales Order processing system, but we have not looked at reporting yet.

So let us look at that today. In a good Sales Order processing system, you will have a couple of reports that make your life easier. I will discuss a few reports available in HansaWorld Enterprise, since this is the system I know best. Other advanced systems might have similar reports by different names.

“Deliverable List Report” - Running this report for all your warehouses, or only for a selection will list all the sales orders where you can at least deliver

Tags: Sales Orders, HansaWorld

Last week I was invited to speak at the Annual Logistics Workshop held in Walvisbay. This workshop is held by the Namibian German Centre for Logistics, which is affiliated with the Polytechnic of Namibia, and is dedicated to building skills in the logistics sector in Namibia.

I was asked to discuss the rationale for implementing ERP, or integrated business management systems. Obviously I have a lot of reasons in my mind, but I did some research on the internet anyway, just to be sure. So I came across a list of symptoms that you might identify in your business. If you find any of these in your business, you should consider investing in an integrated business system:

Tags: Intergation

As you can see, the list of INCOTERMS is quite long, but rest assured that in this article we cover the rest of them.

CPT (Carriage Paid To) In CPT transactions the shipper/seller has the same obligations found with CIF, with the addition that the seller has to buy cargo insurance, naming the buyer as the insured while the goods are in transit.

Tags: Incoterms