Inventory Management Software: Key Features and Benefits
For any business dealing with physical goods (be it selling or manufacturing them), inventory is a vital part of the operation. Whether it's stocking ready-made products to be shipped to customers or maintaining an inventory of raw materials to make products, both scenarios require establishing efficient inventory workflow practices to keep the operations running smoothly.
And as automation and smart manufacturing are taking over many of the manual aspects of the inventory management processes, it is becoming virtually impossible to manage inventories without software. In this blog, we explain the key features and benefits of inventory management software as well as briefly discuss the difference between custom and out-of-the-box inventory management systems.
What Is The Key Function Of Inventory Management Software?
As the name suggests, the software is used for effective management of all inventory-related operations. The key role of inventory software is to optimize inventory management processes and efficiently track stock levels, reducing the costs and improving the bottom line.
What Are The Key Features Of Inventory Management Software?
As you will learn further in this blog, there are two common types of inventory management systems: custom built and out-of-the-box. Regardless of the type, there are key features (or modules) a software development company must incorporate into their inventory software in order to satisfy the most common inventory management requirements. These modules are as follows:
- Inventory tracking
Inventory tracking is the key feature for effective inventory management. It includes tracking the inventory movement, tracking the expiration dates and alerts and real-time updates on the stock levels.
- Orders management
Customer order management feature helps create sales orders and track their status. It also automatically generates invoices and package slips.
- Reporting & Analytics
This feature allows managers to generate reports and use them to analyze inventory performance, identify deadstock items, and track inventory trends. Inventory reporting & analytics software is a must-have for any enterprise who manage multiple warehouses.
- Inventory Forecasting
This module helps businesses optimize their stock levels, predict demand and lead times and reduce stockouts and overstocks through the use of historical data.
The above-provided inventory management features are non-exhaustive. Every software development company incorporates different functions into their ready-made solutions depending on the industry they serve and the client they cater to.
Custom vs. Ready-made Inventory Management Software
The number of inventory management software providers is growing exponentially, and the majority of them are offering features that are more or less similar. But when it comes to choosing the right software solution, many businesses find that they don’t use 100% of the features offered by the ready-made software. This is due to the fact that every business has different inventory management routines that are difficult to integrate with a pre-packaged software solution. Thus, many businesses revert to custom inventory management software solutions to get the maximum value of their investment.
The main feature that makes custom inventory management software unique from its out-of-the-box counterpart is the fact that the system is fully customized to the business' unique requirements.
Unlike with the ready-made system, the development of custom inventory management software goes through a number of stages that are collectively called software development lifecycle. They include requirement analysis, software architecture design, implementation, testing and deployment of the software. At every of these stages, the software is tested to ensure that each feature functions as intended.
Benefits of Custom Inventory Management Software
Custom inventory software is a powerful automation tool that optimizes and streamlines inventory management operations, reducing costs and increasing productivity. Because a custom inventory system is built from scratch, it can be tailored to meet the exact needs of the business. Some of the benefits of using custom inventory software are:
- Optimized inventory management operations
- Optimized order management and fulfillment
- Real-time inventory visibility and data access
- Multi-warehouse management
- Increased productivity and profitability of the business
Choose Vestra Inet As Your Custom Inventory Management Software Provider
Vestra Inet is a premier custom software development company based in Toronto, offering custom software solutions to businesses in the industrial domain. For over 20 years of experience in custom software development, we have delivered over 500 successful custom software solutions to clients in the manufacturing and distribution sectors. Contact us to discuss your inventory management requirements, and let us devise a system that will change the way you manage your inventory forever.