http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/Blogs http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_28/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_28/ Successful Business Plans If you are looking to develop a marketing plan then you must be a business owner or marketing manager or you could be a beginner or pragmatic do-it-yourself kind of a person. Either way, the main goal in developing the business plans is to develop these plans in a logical way so you can accomplish your goals. The essential contents of any marketing or business plan are its standard components. Every business plan must have a specific situation and the need to fit the situation, then it must possess a marketing strategy, sales forecast and expense budget. A SWOT analysis that includes strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats as well competitive analysis. For example, for years, Apple Computers used its proprietary operating system as a competitive edge while on the other hand, Microsoft used its market share and market dominance to suppress Apple's earlier performance and advantage as a market leader. But these essentials are not the ideal components but just the minimum requirement. The competitive edge can be different from other competitors and you don't have to be a competitive edge to be a successful business rather hard work, integrity and customer satisfaction can substitute for it. The most important successfull business planning can start with a customer need because your whole marketing strategy revolves around this phenomenon starting from product development to fulfilling customer need better than the existing competitors. Sat, 13 Oct 2007 04:10:43 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_27/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_27/ Computer technology is improving and changing at an astonishing age and now the computers are getting more powerful with each passing year. Despite all their current and future technological capabilities, computers owe their power and usefulness to people for their organizational needs. It is becoming more difficult for the computer professionals to keep up with the business processes and technological developments. Therefore the computer programmers and system analyst bridges the gap between business users and computer programmers. Information systems belong to the end users who will benefit from these information systems. Generally speaking, these phases should be completed in sequence but these phases can overlap. Most software development lifecycle consist of phases and these are as follows: System analysis The software development lifecycle begin with a preliminary investigation of project scope and feasibility. It determines whether or not, a particular resource should be related and committed to other phases of the software lifecycle. During the research and survey phase, the scope of the project are discussed and evaluated including all end users, perceived problems and opportunities, business and technical issues and constraints, perceived overall project goals and possible solutions. System design Given by the selection or analysis phase, the approved and feasible solution, the structural design of the system is started. The computer outputs are designed first to evaluate what the end user is going to see that can affect the overall design of the input, files and methods of the proposed project. Next step is the construction of the new system which is the principal activity of structural design and construction of any information system. This phase includes the installation and modification of purchased software packages. System implementation In this phase, the new system is implemented and becomes operational. Therefore the system analyst must provide for a smooth transition from the old system to the new system and helps the end users to cope up with the normal start up problems. This phase also involves training and writing of technical documentation of the new information system. Evaluation Phase Once the system is implemented and placed into operation, the analyst’s role changes from developmental process to support level. This may include the periodic evaluation of the new system and reviews and he responds to maintenance and improvement requests submitted by the end users. Most errors are software bugs that were not caught and fixed during the developmental process or coding phase. Well maintained technical documentations significantly accelerate the study phase when the system is due for overhaul. Fri, 12 Oct 2007 17:10:11 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_26/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_26/ Social interactions and corporate activities in organizations never correspond perfectly to official prescriptions and organizational roles and sub-groups can be replaced or changed and the new organizational forms can change to meet the changing and internal and external conditions of the organizations. The organizational internal culture is affected by the internal phenomenon such as Information technology, the prevailing economy, and the socio-cultural of the existing organization where they exist. As according to Blau (1968) “ a theory of organization should not only establish the prevailing relationships between the staff and management and organizational features but also elucidate them in terms of underlying processed of that produce them(Blau, 1968). Meetings that both start and end well and complete their business, require both excellent management and excellent team members as well. As when the CEOs are asked why they intend to acquire another firm, the management responses are as follows: 1. The management intend to gain market share by eliminating a competitor in the same line of business 2.The Management intends to expand into other relatively related fields such as IT and marketing where they can capitalize on one of their strengths. 3. The new management needs to diversify into other fields where more opportunities for growth exist. These diversified strategies can be achieved through related, concentric, vertical and unrelated mergers of organization. Although CEOs with a corporate view of operations have sound strategic reasons for acquiring firms and can justify the merger in broad strategic strokes. The mergers provide the managers and employees of both firms the opportunity to interact as the more personal interaction takes place, the higher the probability of conflict and organizational culture clashes. During the merger, the managers and executives strive to complete the deal as soon as possible so the implementation of management strategies can take place.Each merger has a different type of profitability associated with it and some types are relatively more profitable than the others. And each type of merger strategy has a certain level of inherent risk associated with it that must be justified with higher returns. Fri, 12 Oct 2007 17:10:57 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_24/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_24/ [strong]Think like an Entrepreneur[/strong] I's all in the mind! And indeed, it’s all in the mind when it comes to managing a uccessful business. You just don’t need a brilliant idea, but you also need the brains to convert that idea into a reality to taste success. In other words, for a successful entrepreneur, you need to think like an entrepreneur before you act in your entrepreneurial capacity. Thinking like an entrepreneur is all about seeing what others can’t, not in physical sense of the term, but as a metaphysical reality. You need to show some kind of intuitiveness, a kind of sixth sense, and a kind of transcendental vision to sense the opportunities and avoid the unforeseen pitfalls. This might seem a much-advanced stage of evolution of mankind, but it’s a reality. Some people are born with it and some might develop these instincts with experience. But you can vouch for the fact that every successful entrepreneur is successful first in mind and then in fact. Self-belief is the strongest weapon of a successful entrepreneur. If you are firm in your convictions, the others will follow you. You can sell your idea only when you are confident about it. Nothing will work if you don’t exude confidence in your own product or service. A successful entrepreneur is not a special person from an alien world. He is made of similar flesh and blood as all of us are. The only difference is the level of thinking. The successful entrepreneurs are not easily bogged down by failures. Their strong convictions and self-belief will keep them afloat even in the toughest of times. Success and failure doesn’t matter if you think like an entrepreneur because you have achieved that level of understanding where you realize that failure is momentary and has to give way to success sooner or later, and success needs to be leveraged big time to achieve higher goals. Thu, 11 Oct 2007 23:10:23 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_12/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_12/ Internet activity soared in the late 90’s. Many joined the bandwagon of cyber technologies in their enterprises. For this reason, internet growth is impeccable resulting to the emergence of internet revolution. Then, Web 1.0 was introduced within the commercial sites and eventually, web business prospered. Web business owners later realized that putting up a business online is more than just putting up a website. With the growing need in sustaining the customers’ online needs, eCommerce has been introduced, a new word that became so popular these days. E-Commerce depicts the vast market available in the World Wide Web (www). It’s unstoppable and is being innovated everyday. If you’re into venturing business and you see that online business is good for you, learn E-Commerce. Understand that e-commerce carries anything and the web is such a complex market, yet money is involved in each online transaction. However, it’s important to know that similar to a typical business, there may be some mishaps happening in the long run. Unless you take note of your business needs and aim for a profitable goal, you can never tell what would happen the next day. Online Business Success is e-commerceHow does one become successful online? Successful stories from the Web 1.0 phenomenon also abound and these successful businesses in their electronic commerce ventures are surprisingly alive and well in the Web 2.0 context. How can one be successful in their e-commerce? There are certain pointers that can prove to be helpful in e-commerce. These are applied by the most successful merchants online. 1. Consumers use the web to do their homework i.e. compare prices of products, look into reviews, etc. however, most people prefer directly going to their local retailers because of its immediacy. This should be a pointer to consider in setting up an ecommerce, namely, how do you turn site visitors (the potential buyers of your product) to actual buyers of your product?2. Most websites are overly decorated. Simplicity is beautiful when we are talking about the website’s loading time. Painstakingly slow loading time kills the website. If it takes a lot of time to load, site visitors will move on to the next site. The general rule is to limit your load time from 2-10 seconds. 3. There is a huge disparity between the emphasis to advertising and the process involved in nailing a deal or closing a sell. Web-based enterprises usually focus on the hype that advertising gives. Letting people into your site is one thing, but if they cannot navigate within the site properly, they will eventually give up trying to figure it out. The information architecture of the site should be as good as the advertising and the hype. The web site of your business should be intuitively designed. Shopping and looking for items on display should be as easy as going to the mall or grocery. 4. Many firms focus on fancy nitty-gritties such as sounds, flash animation and graphics without coherence with the e-commerce process of searching, reviewing, buying, etc. Find ways so that buyers can shop in a breeze.  5. Immediacy is important. Most sites do not have a feedback mechanism that is speedy and tangible. The customer should be given that assurance. Nowadays firms have call center hotlines to call, yet surprisingly, most e-commerce sites do not even list their phone numbers, leaving the prospective buyer to emails and online forms.If you are serious with your e-business, then finding solutions to these most basic of online problems is a must. Remember that people would not come if the site is not sound and stable, and they won’t buy if they are not satisfied. Fri, 28 Sep 2007 13:09:12 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_11/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_11/ Starting a new business entails a lot of risks. For instance, you will have to consider your capabilities and resources because if they fall short, your business might not be as successful. To minimize risks, some people choose to partner with established business entities. This is what is referred to as business joint ventures. Basically, this will involve the merging of two or even more businesses to achieve a specific business goal.  It is only expected that all resources and capabilities will be pooled. There are several benefits offered by business joint ventures. Some of these benefits include financial support, more potential for expansion, ability to develop new products and more efficient marketing and advertising. Before you think of entering into a business joint venture, it would only be wise if you consider certain factors. Here are some tips that could help you when forming joint ventures.Looking for PartnersWhen searching for potential partners, you must first have a comprehensive business plan that you will discuss with your shortlist of candidates. This would allow you to screen out businesses whose goals are not the same as yours. It is also important that you check the business’s credentials. You can always speak to a third party regarding the business reputation of your potential partners. This is actually considered a good business practice. It would also be smart to include in your business joint venture a detailed “terms of dissolution.” This can be a part of your exit strategy in case your potential partner does not deliver or fulfill their part of the bargain. Creating a Legal AgreementAfter successfully finding a business joint venture partner, the next step is coming up with a legal agreement. This agreement should cover the structure of the business, the objectives and goals of the joint venture, intellectual property right’s ownership, financial contributions of each partner, control and management of the responsibilities, sharing of liabilities, losses and profits, resolving disputes and of course, dissolution of agreement.  In most instances, confidentiality and non-disclosure clauses are also included. Making Business Joint Ventures WorkAfter outlining the agreement between you and your business joint venture partners, you should try your best to make the partnership work. Communication is an integral part of the success of the joint venture. Meetings and conferences are good venues to discuss issues and other concerns. You should also make an effort to share all information related to the business, especially financial matters. Building trust will ensure a more successful business relationship. Lastly, it is also important to be flexible. Setting realistic business targets and looking for ways to improve the system will benefit the business well.  For disputes, look for solutions that will create a win-win situation.  Forming business joint ventures entails all these things and more. You must always be ready for unexpected situations and know how to utilize available facts and resources. It will initially be difficult, with all the adjustments, but if you try hard enough, then you will surely reap the rewards of all your hard work. Fri, 28 Sep 2007 13:09:19 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_10/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_10/ What's Personal Branding? "[em]Personal Branding is the concept of influencing the way people percept onself -by employing a disciplined image and self-marketing strategy."[/em]Wikipedia's Definition for Personal Branding: [em]Personal branding is the process whereby people and their careers are marketed as brands. It has been noted that while previous self-help management techniques were about self-improvement, the personal branding concept suggests instead that success comes from self-packaging. The term is thought to have been first used and discussed in an 1997 article by Tom Peters. [/em] Wikipedia's Personal Branding website. Personal Branding is simply the art of Standing out! Adobting this technique requires setting up your own strategy and having a high degree of self-motivation and discipline. Planning of self-marketing strategies usually starts with evaluating oneself and one's situation -what you are and what you stand for. It's all about you! Try to find out what others think of you and how they percept you. Choose a couple of charachters from the different areas in your private and professional life and try to see yourself through their eyes. Consider the following points in your "survey": - Values- Positioning and Perception- Class- Image- DistinctionTry to repeat this "self-check" regularly to find key issues that may influence success and failure in your branding, take feedbacks and critics seriously. Here's a short list of recommendations:Dig deep to unearth who you are: Who are you and why?Define your dreams and put them into action: If you don’t know where you are going, you will end up somewhere else.Go after your target audience with a vengeance: Knowing your brand is just as important as knowing who you are going to sell your product to.Don’t crash and burn –figure out what is stopping you: Be aware of internal /psychological & environmental barriers that hinder your progress.Recruit a squad of brand cheer leaders: You’ve got to have friends!Learn the secrets to packaging your brand: Appearances count big time! A package communicates the essential stuff of the product at a glance. It is not a disguise.Get comfortable in your own skin: Style is all about personal presence, that which frames your personality: James Earl Jones’ voice (Verizon/This is CNN) –solid, authoritative;Devise a plan and get on with it: Being good is not enough. We have to roll up our sleeves and work at it.Successful Personal Branding requires continuous improvement and focused efforts. Therefore, you should be aware of your public presence and "maneuvers", and pay attention to all aspects that might affect your brand. Remember, the central idea underlying personal branding is the positive, powerful image and making a "bella figura". Personal Branding is not that any different than major other marketing strategies -it can get tough and requires much self discipline. Thu, 27 Sep 2007 16:09:23 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_9/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_9/ Welcome to Bizzy24 Blog. This blog provides business news and updates, business articles, information about special business events, and latest news and alerts from Bizzy24 team.Read latest blog entry by Bizzy24: 09/27/2007 Personal Branding09/28/2007 Successful E-Commerce09/28/2007 Forming Business Joint VenturesYou can also visit our Business and Marketing Forums.Not yet a member? JOIN US! It's free. Thu, 27 Sep 2007 14:09:30 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_8/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_8/ Given the increasing competition in the market today, maintaining and improving good customer relationship has become essential in ensuring that your business is always leading the pack. To be ahead of the competitive market, now is the time to make use of an excellent customer relationship management (CRM) strategy in your business.  But what exactly is this strategy all about?  This strategy is primarily employed to further gain knowledge about your customers’ behaviors and needs, enabling you to build up a stronger relationship with them.  With an excellent customer relationship, your company will surely succeed.  You can employ technological components to meet your customers’ needs, while boosting your bottom line at the same time.  Just keep in mind that the success of a CRM strategy mainly depends on your ability to bring together your customers’ data and market trends, paving the way for you to effectively market your products and services.What CRM aspects should you employ? Depending on your type of business and the need to improve your customer relationship, you can choose from three main CRM aspects to implement in your business.  These aspects can be put into practice independently. 0 The three aspects to choose from include:(1) Analytical CRM primarily involves customer data analysis to optimize your company’s marketing effectiveness through the use of predictive analytics.(2) Collaborative CRM is all about your direct communication and interaction with your clients.  This usually involves the use of e-mails, web pages, SMS or automated voice response (AVR).  Your goals depend on whether you want to reduce cost or improve your services.(3) Operational CRM entails the use of customer relationship support processes or automation (use of different CRM software packages) including the services of your marketing, service or sales representatives.  This aspect mainly gives support to your front-of-house business processes. What should be your CRM goals?Once you have chosen which aspect of the CRM strategy to use to improve your customer relationship, it is a good idea to have your business goals complement with your new strategy. Since this strategy uses human resources and technological components, your goals should enhance your company’s overall performance in the market, effectively increasing your revenues.With a CRM strategy, your business should be able to: (1) Efficiently provide products and services which specifically meet what your target market wants and needs;(2) Offer enhanced customer services; (3) Maintain as well as expand your market share as a result of your improved customer relationship;(4) More effectively cross sell your products and services; and(5) Professionally assisting your sales team in closing deals faster. Holistically improving your customer relationship You may be sidetracked and think that by just incorporating CRM software in your daily business operations, you can effectively enhance your customer relationship. This is not usually the case.  CRM is not all about employing technological advancements into your business.  This strategy is all about matching the right aspect of CRM with your business goals.   You must take a holistic approach by taking into consideration your company’s customer relationship philosophy vis-à-vis your situation and clients’ expectations and needs. Wed, 26 Sep 2007 11:09:15 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_7/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_7/ Small businesses and start-ups face almost identical teething problems. Mostly, the financial limitations are aggravated by lack of proper marketing skills possessed by these organizations. However, without serious and effective marketing, most of these organizations perish before they can make their presence felt. Here are some useful tips for small business and start-ups that will surely help them in marketing their products and/or services effectively and affordably:1. Brand Identity: Having a brand identity right from the inception stage brings lots of brownie points from the prospective customers or clients. With a unique logo and a trademarked name of your organization, you have just taken the first step towards an effective marketing campaign for your business. And don’t forget to put the logo on every business card and literature. This will serve the dual purpose of information dissemination about your business and free marketing. The importance of brand identity can be realized from the simple swoosh sign or “Just Do It!” of Nike that is sufficient to identify the brand of the product.2. Budget Allocation: The best approach towards marketing with limited budget is to earmark certain percentage of expenditure for the first 3-6 months on marketing. And also allocate certain percentage from monthly revenues towards promotion of the organization. This will not only ensure optimum utilization of limited resources but also help in consistent marketing of the business, which is extremely vital for a start-up.3. Hire a cheap yet good PR Firm: Entrusting your marketing requirements to a cheap yet effective PR Firm is not a bad idea. A good PR Firm with solid credentials can work wonders for your organization in online as well as offline business world. Just let them know about your marketing budget and seek out the best deal you can extract from the PR Firm. Tue, 25 Sep 2007 10:09:04 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_6/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_6/ Marketing, if not done diligently or done without the application basic conversational etiquettes, can have a counterproductive effect. An effective marketing strategy encapsulates every aspect that tends to establish a relationship with the prospects. Unlike a general marketing campaign aimed at the world at large, the effective marketing strategy should be people-oriented and highly personalized campaign. Here are a few tips that’ll help you in launching an effective personalized business marketing campaign:1. Salutation: While addressing an existing customer or a prospect in any kind of correspondence, always use his or her name instead of general “Dear Customer”. Preferably use the first name or depending on the prevailing customs in your country, you may use either the full name or the surname preceded by Mr./Miss/Mrs. This simple practice immediately establishes a personal bond with the recipient, which is extremely vital in establishing business relationship. After all, establishing relationships is the prime objective of every marketing technique.2. Greetings: Whenever a customer or client buys your product or service, invariably, you collect certain personal data directly from him/her. Date of Birth is one such record you should always ask from the customers/clients while selling them your products/services. Just follow it up by sending a “Greetings!” message either through email or by post on their birthday. You can also send personalized Greeting Cards on special occasions, like Christmas or New Year.3. Personalized Gifts: Most business houses indulge in distributing freebies and gifts on purchases or to the existing customers in order to market their products or services. If you are planning similar exercise for your organization, always remember that the choice and presentation of the gift will decide the effectiveness of this marketing strategy. The gifts should be personalized preferably with handwritten notes instead of mechanically printed ones. The choice of gift should represent the market goodwill of your organization, i.e., it should neither be too expensive nor too cheap, but ideal enough to showcase your personalized touch. Tue, 25 Sep 2007 10:09:28 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_5/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_5/ In business terminology, an Elevator Pitch, or Elevator Speech, is a quick (around) 30-seconds intro about the product, or service, or individual, or a business. Basically, an Elevator Pitch is the first impression you give to the prospects about your business. There are different perceptions about the nature of content an Elevator Pitch should contain. Some think that it should be just an intro, while others advocate that it should be descriptive to some extent about the product or service. But one thing that these two views converge upon is that it should be aimed at pushing the prospect towards the product or service by several notches, just like you’d like to hop several steps on an elevator to reach the destination quickly. Here, the destination is the sale of product or service. The importance of an Elevator Pitch to a business can never be overemphasized. It’s the first impression the prospect gets at the potential of your product or service. Most entrepreneurs tend to take Elevator Pitch lightly because they consider the time limit to be too tight to showcase their products or services in a cogent manner. However, the tight time limit is the X-factor of an Elevator Pitch. If you are able to impress the prospect within 30 seconds, he will be yours for 30 years provided you play your cards astutely! Here are some of the characteristics that an Elevator Pitch for your business must have:1. It should be clear and devoid of any ambiguous terms or phrases that can have two meanings under the similar circumstances.2. It should be focused on the products and/or services you offer.3. It should stress on the benefits that the prospect can derive from the products/services on offer.4. It should be devoid of any verbose and difficult words that are not easily understood by an average person.5. It should be compelling enough to generate the initial interest in the minds of the prospects. Tue, 25 Sep 2007 10:09:44 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_4/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_4/ Finally, you’ve decided to take a plunge on the Internet and establish an online business presence. However, before starting an online business venture, consider this simple fact – a vast majority of Web startups wind up in no time due to multifarious reasons. If you don’t want your web venture to meet a similar fate, read on. Here are some tips that’ll ensure your Web startup overcomes the teething problems with flying colors: Focus on Niche segment: For a web startup, it’s always safe if you focus on a niche market rather than providing a whole lot of products and services to several different segments of customers/clients. Simply, narrow down your focus to start with. Having built a considerable goodwill in cyberspace, you can easily diversify with more products/services. Unique Product/Service: You can virtually find any product/service on sale on the Internet. Thus, it becomes tough to lend the ‘uniqueness’ factor in your business. Just explore all the websites offering similar product/service and try to offer a little add-on to sound ‘unique’ on your web pages. And make sure you promote this add-on like your life depends on it! Because it’s your unique identity among hordes of other similar web ventures. Avoid Jargon: All your web pages are targeted towards readers with average reading ability. Therefore, for maximum readability of your website, avoid the use technical words that are not readily understood by an average reader. If the use of jargon seems inevitable, try to explain it in few simple words. If the content is too difficult to understand, no one will stay on your website for more than a couple of minutes. Easily accessible and maneuverable website: Your website should possess basic features of easy accessibility and maneuverability for maximum enhancement of user experience. If the user likes your website’s overall look and feel and loading time, chances are that he’ll visit it again and again. High Sales Pitch: Your website should contain maximum sales pitch (with correct English and Grammar!) in order to compel the visitors to make an online purchase. You can easily hire a professional copywriter to write you a good sales-pitch content for your website. Aggressive Marketing: No web startup churns dollars overnight without aggressive marketing strategy in place. Promote your products/services online with whatever budget you have for better results. Tue, 25 Sep 2007 10:09:52 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_3/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_3/ If you segregate the phrase ‘Business Networking’, its meaning becomes easy to decipher. Simply put, ‘Business Networking’ means networking undertaken to solicit business. The networking may be with any individual or organization but the purpose of networking remains constant, i.e., soliciting business.  The business network may involve employers, employees, colleagues, suppliers, and sales people etc. – basically, anyone within and without the organization. The premise of business networking is that everyone has some contacts that can be used to solicit business. It’s always better to approach a prospective business with some referral rather than a cold-calling to strangers.  Business networking is not just about exchanging business cards. It’s much bigger than mere mechanical gestures. In fact, an effective business network involves tremendous social skills to charm people in a relatively short period of time. The exchange of business cards should be seen more as an afterthought (but a vital afterthought!). The stress should be on building a relationship by getting to know each other. A pleasant conversation leaves an indelible mark on a stranger and invariably, a business opportunity is round the corner with this simple exercise.  Another premise of business networking is mutual benefit. Both the parties stand to gain by establishing a business network with each other’s organization. In an ever-shrinking e-world, geographical and political boundaries have been rendered impotent. The businesses are getting closer by the minute. And thanks to business networking, the scope of businesses has grown by leaps and bounds. The national businesses have gone multinational and the multinationals have assumed cult status. And do you think, this is achieved overnight? As a matter of fact, it is the result of “Business Networking in progress” for the past several years.  The concept of online business networking websites, though of recent origin, has assumed gigantic proportions and has redefined the entire global approach towards business networking. In the changing times, no business can afford to overlook its presence on these Business Networking websites. Tue, 25 Sep 2007 10:09:47 -0500 http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_1/ http://www.bizzy24.com/rss/link_blogs/id_1/ Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) vs. Enterprise Systems (ES)  ERP is an enterprise-wide set of management tools that balances demand and supply, containing the ability to link customers and suppliers into a complete supply chain, employing proven business processes for decision-making, and providing high degrees of cross-functional integration among sales, marketing, manufacturing, operations, logistics, purchasing, finance, new product development, and human resources, thereby enabling people to run their business with high levels of customer service and productivity, and simultaneously lower costs and inventories; and providing the foundation for effective e-commerce. There’s a lot of sloppy terminology flying around today in the business press, and one misnomer is to label enterprise-wide transaction processing software systems as ERP. These software packages support effective resource planning and make much of it feasible, but they don’t truly do it. Plus these packages contain many business processes other than resource planning.Therefore, we need to trot out another acronym that does refer to software: ES. This stands for Enterprise System or Enterprise Software. A general and widely used definition for an enterprise systems is: packages of computer applications that support many, even most, aspects of a company’s information needs. That makes sense to us. Now for another distinction: Not all ERP business functions are contained in the typical Enterprise Software (ES) suite. Similarly, the typical ES contains software support for business processes that are not a part of ERP. In Figure 1-1, we can see that distinction graphically. Please note the three areas on that diagram.The rightmost part of the figure refers to those functions contained within a typical ES that are not part of ERP; the leftmost area is for those ERP functions not normally supported by an ES; the area of overlap in the center references those ERP functions typically supported by Enterprise Software. Now let’s take a look at just what this ERP thing is all about. Enterprise Resource PlanningThe fundamentals of ERP are the same as with MRP II (Manufacturing Resource Planning). However, thanks in large measure to enterprise software, ERP as a set of business processes is broader in scope, and more effective in dealing with multiple business units. Financial integration is even stronger. Supply chain tools, supporting business across company boundaries, are more robust. For a graphical view of ERP, see Figure 1-2. Let’s now look at a complete definition of ERP, based on the description we saw a few pages back:ENTERPRISE RESOURCE PLANNING (ERP) predicts and balances demand and supply. It is an enterprise-wide set of forecasting, planning, and scheduling tools, which: • links customers and suppliers into a complete supply chain,• employs proven processes for decision-making, and• coordinates sales, marketing, operations, logistics,purchasing, finance, product development, and human resources. Figure 1 - 2 Its goals include high levels of customer service, productivity, cost reduction, and inventory turnover, and it provides the foundation for effective supply chain management and e-commerce. It does this by developing plans and schedules so that the right resources —manpower, materials, machinery, and money—are available in the right amount when needed.Enterprise Resource Planning is a direct outgrowth and extension of Manufacturing Resource Planning and, as such, includes all of MRP II’s capabilities. ERP is more powerful in that it: a) applies a single set of resource planning tools across the entire enterprise, b) provides real-time integration of sales, operating, and financial data, and c) connects resource planning approaches to the extended supply chain of customers and suppliers.The primary purpose of implementing Enterprise Resource Planning is to run the business, in a rapidly changing and highly competitive environment, far better than before. Author, Related References and LiteratureERP Making It Happen, John Whiley and Sons.Mission Critical, Thomas H. Davenport   Fri, 25 May 2007 22:05:30 -0500