6 questions to ask yourself when choosing an inventory management solution

Posted on March 31 2023

Reading time: 4 minutes

If you’re in the market for a new inventory management solution, you need to ask yourself a few questions before making a decision. How can you evaluate your options to ensure you’re getting the best tool possible?

Here are the 6 questions to ask yourself when choosing an inventory management solution:

Important question for an inventory solution

1.What is your budget?

Inventory management software ensures that your materials/inventory are available so that your employees can be equipped to do their jobs well.

But before you start looking at the different options, it is important to determine the budget you want to spend on this solution. It is important to take the time to evaluate the cost of the solutions, and their benefits to your business.

Investing in an inventory management system may represent an additional expense, but in the end you should also think about the return on investment it can bring. Some examples to consider:

  1. Loss / theft of equipment
  2. Purchase / Repurchase of duplicate material
  3. Loss of productivity due to lack of material / stock
  4. Time spent searching for material on non-adapted solutions (Excel)

Consider that the loss / theft of a single piece of equipment can already pay for a year’s worth of licensing with Hector. Test it yourself on our ROI Calculator.

2.Is it easy to use?

An inventory management system can increase your productivity and streamline your operations, which ultimately impacts profitability.

The best inventory management solution is one that reduces your team’s time searching for materials, and makes their day-to-day work easier. In other words, you want your team to be able to easily and intuitively access the inventory management solution you have chosen.

In addition, it is important to deal with an inventory management company that is responsive and offers support in implementing the solution. Don’t forget to train your teams so that they can better adopt your project!

3.Who’s responsible for what?

Define who is responsible for inventory management

Before choosing an inventory management solution, it is important to set up an effective organizational structure. It is essential that you know the responsibilities of each member of your team. Are you responsible for all inventory management operations? Or are some aspects outside your scope of work?

The goal is to have a solution with a personalized view of each user’s actions, and especially a collaborative solution! Avoid sharing licenses between collaborators, and favor solutions with unlimited licenses.

computer-hector-software

Free 15 day trial

With Hector, choose a collaborative solution!

Looking for an inventory management solution? Think Hector.

Automated, flexible, user-friendly and quick to execute, these are some of the features offered by Hector inventory software. If you are looking for the perfect solution for your inventory management projects, you have the chance to try our software for free for 15 days.

Try it now

4.Does the solution integrate with other systems?

Most companies use more than one type of software; for example, you may have accounting software, reporting solutions and data analysis (Power BI).Then it’s important to make sure your inventory management software integrates with the other systems in your company.

Integration can also help reduce errors by preventing the creation of duplicate entries throughout your solution. For example, if an item is ordered from one system, received in another, and finally released in a third, you need to have communication from start to finish. Your accounting department will appreciate the tracking of fixed assets and depreciation.

Overall, when choosing inventory management software for your business, make sure any potential solution can integrate seamlessly with existing applications to avoid any issues.

5.Is your inventory management solution optimized for your company?

You need to make sure that the inventory management system you are using is suitable or adaptable to your business. This is a fairly simple concept, but it is often overlooked. If you are using software that is not tailored to your business process or uses, it will eventually become unused by your employees. For example, Excel is not a collaborative tool and does not trigger alerts, your workbook will quickly become outdated, and the information will be wrong.

Another example, a library management software is too formatted for books, and is not flexible enough to add tools, computers or audiovisual material.

Make sure that the software you choose really meets your needs, depending on the sector in which you operate.

6.What features should you be looking for in your inventory management solution?

There are many features you can look for in your inventory management solution. In addition to ease of use and compatibility with other systems within your organization, there are two other things you should pay particular attention to:

Security

Is your data protected against cyber threats and other attacks? Does the software include virus protection? How does it handle passwords? Are unauthorized users able to access sensitive information?
These are all questions you should ask yourself and your team before making the decision to purchase the inventory management solution you want.

Accuracy

How accurate is the software in tracking your inventory data? Does it keep track of all your products, or just some of them? (barcoding, tagging, scanning…) Are there ways in which it could cause inaccuracies?

Conclusion

The inventory management solution you choose must be compatible and adaptable to your current business processes.

Don’t put off your inventory management project, the status quo is your enemy in improving your processes. Take the time to establish your requirements and meet with our team to validate your inventory management project!

Meet with our team to discuss how Hector can help you with your project here.