Order to Fulfillment
The order to fulfillment phases include all processes from the time the customer places an order through delivery and sometimes beyond if a customer returns an item. While the experience may be seamless to the customer, there are many activities to track behind the scenes at the seller’s facility.
These processes may be simple or chaotic – organized or disorganized – depending on the way systems are setup at each business. Obviously, the goal is to improve organization to save time and money. SOS Inventory was designed to manage and track all the workflows, costs, and details for every element of the transaction between the sales order and fulfillment to make businesses more profitable and better able to keep customers satisfied.
What are order fulfillment processes?
Once your business receives an order from a customer, whether that occurs as an online transaction on an ecommerce platform or in a brick-and-mortar store, that item must be available in inventory to provide it immediately to the customer. When that is the case, the sales order will be sent to the fulfillment department to pick and pack, create a shipping label and mail out to the customer. Once the order is sent, a notification goes to the customer indicating, sometimes providing a tracking number. Shipment will also trigger the removal of the product from inventory and indicate to sales that the order is complete. Recording the cost of the product and the sale price relay important information to the finance department. When a specified number of these items are sold, inventory may be depleted to the reorder point, when a purchase order is triggered to order more inventory. If the item is not in inventory, it may put on backorder and your sales interface will communicate an anticipated shipment date.
Order fulfillment means different steps for different businesses, whether it be a made-to-order model, distributor, or reseller; however, all types of businesses need to track inventory counts, costs, labor, overhead, waste, etc. for accurate accounting and planning. That’s where SOS Inventory comes in.
Order to Fulfillment for Different Types of Manufacturers
When manufacturers react to sales orders, they replenish sold items by producing new ones and that entails ordering more materials or ingredients from their suppliers to produce more products.
The benefit of using an order fulfillment software like SOS Inventory is that many of the repetitive functions can be automated to ensure sold products are continuously replaced. The sales order can trigger production or a purchase order, ensuring that inventory is replenished at the rate it is sold. This steady flow of information transmitted by shared data across all company departments maintains a rhythm for consistent production to meet demand, the goal to optimize inventory levels so they never exceed what the business can sell nor underestimate incoming sales.
When inventory shipments are received, inventory counts can be updated by barcode or RFID which will enter the receipt on your books, too. Inventory items may then be stored or processed, but you will always know where they are located when you track them in SOS Inventory.
The made-to-order business model functions by keeping inventory levels at a minimum, and only placing purchase orders when the sales order is received. SOS Inventory keeps this process seamless, no matter the method of execution, making it the ideal order fulfillment system for any type of manufacturer.
If you’re looking for ecommerce fulfillment software functionality, SOS Inventory can connect to your existing platform by API, Zapier or EDI to consolidate inventory actions and automate repetitive functions to save you time and ensure consistency.
For complete control from order to fulfillment, your business needs the reliability of a proven order management software like SOS Inventory.
