Like any business owner or top-level executive, you think twice about the investments you make. You want to be wise and focus on growing revenue, reducing cost, improving processes and optimizing your human resources. That’s even more important when growing globally. The bar is high, and you elevate to it.
More and more successful companies are deciding to go beyond their local markets and look for ways to expand to new markets outside of their country. Pursuing these new markets, and going global, can be challenging. It requires big investment, knowledge and understanding of the new market, and the ability to communicate not just in a different language but also to understand local behavior and culture.
While the cross-border cultural challenges are not insignificant, often it is the operational needs that make the process of globalization overly complex and expensive. For this reason, many distribution and manufacturing companies feel that operational challenges can often be a barrier to growth.
Business owners ask questions like this when growing globally:
How do I follow and maintain different government rules and changing legal and accounting requirements?
How can I get visibility on results, performance and reports from their systems in a way I can understand as we grow?
How can I integrate all of this information with the information and the systems I already have in place?
You are right not to underestimate the challenge of integrating different systems between different countries. Generally, it requires a lot of initial effort and a lot of maintenance, and many companies find themselves with a team of developers, bookkeepers and various subcontractors to be able to support this structure. But there is a better way.
What if one platform could manage all of the above? And, is that platform available and affordable for small and mid-sized businesses that want to go global? The answer is yes.
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems offer you the ability to operationalize your global growth. When the systems sing together, you and your team grow together.
SAP® Business One is an example of a robust ERP solution that assists scaling a company’s growth across borders. Just think of how efficient it would be to have every market use one platform that will support almost any country’s accounting and business requirements. Business One helps you move faster, innovate, create a competitive advantage, drive efficiencies and empower the employees. Most importantly, it is a completely unified platform that runs all of your business.
Tens of thousands of businesses worldwide recognize the benefits of using the SAP® Business One application. It was designed specifically for small and mid-sized businesses; the software lets you integrate all the critical functions you need to run your entire business — from sales and customer relationships to financials and operations. It enables you to make decisions based on the most updated information, streamlines processes and accelerates profitable growth.
Whether you choose SAP® Business One or another ERP system, it is important that you and your team scale your business effectively as you grow overseas.
Oren Tabib is the founder and CEO of Pioneer B1.
