One Integration, Many Benefits: A Case Story on
Magento and Microsoft Dynamics GP integration

“Someone said ‘good that you are having problems, it means your business is growing!’ I took some time to process what he meant by that and then it occurs to me that as we grow in business, the problems evolve with them too. The problems that I faced when I started my business a few years back are gone now and a new breed of problems emerged and although many of them are taken care of, there are more than we are and will face in the coming days.

Having said that, I observed that while I took care of the biggest problem with the help of Magento and Microsoft Dynamics GP integration, I also enhanced my web store’s performance with the integration in the process!

You could be facing the problems I faced. Similarly, the benefits that I enjoyed while taking care of the challenges with Magento and Microsoft Dynamics GP integration can also be reaped by you as well.

In this article, I will share with you how the integration of Magento and Dynamics GP helped and how it can help you as well. By the time, you finish reading the article you will not just know how the integration can help you in solving the problems but also how it can take your business to a new height!

Let’s begin with understanding the basics.

Magento and Microsoft Dynamics GP: Everything you should know!

I decided to try the integration of Magento and Dynamics GP after realizing that tens of thousands of organizations are running successfully with i95Dev’s integration for many years. Before that, I decided to understand first how they can benefit my business and how trustworthy they are.

As I read about integration, I realized that it is trusted in almost every kind of business – distribution, manufacturing, human resource, service management, project management, inventory management, retail and eCommerce, financial management, warehouse management, and business intelligence.

While Magento takes care of your eCommerce store, Dynamics GP helps you in running core processes for your business, like job accounting, project management and accounting, supply chain management, field service management, inventory, procurement, business reporting as well as intelligence, and financial management.

Now that I knew the benefits of Dynamics GP, I thought that it can complement any eCommerce store. Why should I integrate Dynamics GP with Magento?

When I did a little research on the leading eCommerce platform providers, I realized that Magento offers some of the best features.
For instance, Magento is a self-hosted solution, which will allow me to customize my web store, have a responsive checkout option, offers more than 5000 add-on extensions (including free extensions), and most importantly, even I can work with it being a non-coder!

Whereas the other option seemed much rigid, where I can’t customize except for fonts and color, and they take cuts from the revenue that can go up to 2%!

Further, I found out that Magento 2 websites can perform up to 56% faster! In today’s time, when customers are demanding, slow loading websites drive them away, therefore, the website’s loading speed and performance become very important.

The answer was loud and clear for me – I have to go with the best eCommerce platform and the most trusted ERP system. Now that I chose the integration of Magento and Microsoft Dynamics GP, I had to identify the root problem that was causing so much damage and how it can create more problems in the coming days.

Let’s see what I identified as the main problem and how it was pulling my business down.

Where are my products?
Yes, that was a problem and I found myself saying that to myself a lot of times! But relax, I didn’t mean it literally.
There were irregularities in my web store when it came to the products – for example, my web store showed a certain number of items available, but in reality, there were less in numbers in my inventory.

Sooner than I realize, it leads to many problems, like agitated customers, poor reviews, and a negative effect on my sales. To make it worse, it didn’t stop here! It eventually started to affect my accounts as well. It was then when I decided to hire helping hands that will make sure that the stocks are kept up-to-date and the irregularities are eliminated. It helped but it was also expensive. In addition to that, there were cases of irregularities again.

How Magento and Microsoft Dynamics GP solved it!
When I had Microsoft Dynamics GP and Magento integrated, the first thing it solved was the problem of data mismatch, incorrect inventories, and irregularities in the stock. Further, it is a proven fact that when you integrate your ERP with your eCommerce store, it will get your business rid of all the data mismatch and help you get a perfect and updated inventory and stock information. Now, I knew that the stock is correct and accurate and the best part was – it was much cheaper than hiring a team.

But more benefits followed. It only got better!

Better order processing
As I mentioned earlier, the Magento and Dynamics GP didn’t just solve my problems, it also helped in enhancing my web store’s overall performance. This is one such example:
The integration didn’t just take care of the irregularities and mismatch in my stock but also helped in the entire order processing. It supports my entire eCommerce order cycle by managing purchase orders, shipping notices, invoices, payments, and every order that comes to my business today.

Improved inventory management
I don’t have my warehouse; I work with a third party warehouse and with the integration of Magento and Dynamics GP integration, I can upload bulk data. It is another advantage of the integration – it accepts every kind of inventory information from many sources and at the same time, it will reflect on your web store or website in real-time.

Do a lot in the future too!
In its core, it was meant to be much like, in layman’s term: “establishing co-ordination between my store and my warehouse!” However, it became more than that and I hope it will continue to be. I started with a small-scale business and I grew. I give a lot of credit to the integration of Magento and Microsoft Dynamics GP.

Having talked about how the integration helped me achieve better results, let me tell you how the Magento and GP integration is going to ensure a good future for my web store.

Customer support
As I hope to grow my business, I also hope to reach more and more customers. Therefore, it is going to be very important that my customers get their queries and problems attended. Not only it will help me get them to trust me and my business more, but it will also help me in gaining their confidence in the long run.

Transparency
When you talk about building a relationship of trust with your customers, it is not just about talking to them and be available to them. Transparency means a lot in today’s business world and it cannot be just maintained with just one function – a dedicated customer care system or a tracking system on your web store!

It’s a process and it has to be with every process. A customer should feel confident and trust your business. Thankfully, the integration of Magento and Dynamics GP helped; you will get certain features that will ensure reasonable transparency between you and your customers, such as real-time tracking updates, 24X7 customer service support, and a web store that runs 24X7!

Let me talk a little about the last part when I said a 24X7 web store. We all want that but how do you ensure that? It’s simple: Eliminate the dependency on humans and make the entire process automated with the integration of Magento and GP! Not only the work will be reduced but it will be error-free too!

Cost-effective
It is an obvious point, but needs a gentle reminder!

When you don’t have to rely on a team of people who will have to do all the work manually, you will have to pay them and there will be other expenses related to that too. However, when you make the entire process automated, it will be cost-effective and most importantly, error-free!

Having an error-free process is not just important, it will also help in saving your money. Imagine, there’s an error in the books and that will result in a mismatch, which will affect the entire process. Further, if it’s not taken care of, it may affect your entire stock and inventory.
When you realize it, you will agree that with the integration of Magento and eCommerce you will make sure that you don’t end up spending just to right the wrong!

Get as big as you want!
Let me confess something: When I used to dream of going big with my business, I assumed that I will also have to review my employees’ abilities and skills. Are they capable enough? Can they cope up with such changes?

However, it was a time before I even considered the integration; now I don’t have to worry about that. The reason is simple, the integration of Magento and Dynamics GP reduced the dependency on people exponentially. Not only the integration automated the entire process but it also proved that it can take care of bigger numbers and transactions.

In addition to that, there are other versions as well that are designed for larger businesses. To make it easier, you can get in touch with i95Dev. They are a team of experts who will make sure that you get the best integration without you having to even break a sweat!

Finally
Larry Page, the co-founder of Google once said, ‘Always deliver more than expected’ I believe that is today’s mantra. When you deliver more than you expect, you will be able to satisfy your customers.

Remember, your customers have more options than you think and user-experience is one of the main factors that will ensure customer satisfaction. Companies like Amazon rose to heights with their impeccable customer service.

The integration of Magento and Dynamics GP will make sure that your customers don’t get annoyed with any kind of delayed response or incorrect information. Further, with the integration, you can have a dedicated customer service system.

Customer service is one of the many benefits that the integration of Magento and GP will offer, which are discussed in the article.
All the best!”

The writer of this blog is an old customer of i95Dev, who uses Magento 2 with Dynamics GP for his operations. The writer of this blog heads the operations wing of the eCommerce business. For more information on our integration products, contact us.