ERP Integration

Nowadays, consumers are looking for more and more customization in their online shopping experiences. Businesses not only need to offer great shipping and return policies, but customer service and customization are key. That’s why adding product configurators to your website is critical to helping you grow your online sales.

Product configurators provide customers with the ability to customize their products at the touch of their fingertips. You are helping them to purchase a product exactly how they want it. What exactly are the benefits of having a product configurator on your website, and how does it help you increase your revenue. We’ll be answering those questions and more in this article.

What are Product Configurators

A product configurator is an interactive software that allows the customer to choose certain product features defined by the business. The product configurator then validates it and enables the customer to move onto the next step.

A product configurator takes a collection of parameters, characteristics, and rules determined by the business. Though it seems simple, it’s a complex software full of regulations that the product configurator will use to validate whether this selection is allowed before allowing the customer to put their choice into the cart. This form of customization allows the user to purchase the item exactly how they want it, but it also helps your business in many different ways.

Benefits of Product Configurators

Reduce Lead Times

When you allow customers to build a product themselves, it will be unique and designed exactly how they want. This will help move the customer through the buyer’s journey faster and allow your sales reps to sell quicker. It will help your sales representatives have all the information they need to send out quotes faster and send orders to the manufacturing team.

Increased Customer Satisfaction

Providing customers with a product designed precisely to their liking automatically helps to increase customer satisfaction. Due to the simplicity and the ability to have a custom product, it increases customer retention and satisfaction. Customers are more likely to return to a business that they had a good experience with versus one they didn’t.

Ensures Correct Orders

How many times have you purchased something, and it’s been incorrect or missing key components? Probably too many times to count. When you have a product configurator, it helps ensure that orders are fulfilled correctly and on time because the invoice is directly sent to the manufacturing team. This will also help to increase customer satisfaction instantly.

Are you Ready?

Are you ready to take your business to the next level? Treefrog has a roadmap and team to get you there. Through our process, we will learn about your goals to help build a time-based, realistic, results-oriented system complete with training and deployment for your team. We are here, guiding you through every step of the way. Our process works with you – to make you and your business better, smarter, and faster.

Give us a call at 905-836-4442; our team of experts is ready to help!

ERP integration connects your ERP (the system that runs inventory, pricing, orders and invoicing) to your website or online store so data moves between them automatically. Customers see live stock, their own pricing and their order history online, and your team stops re-keying web orders into the ERP. It works with most ERPs, including SAP, Epicor and SYSPRO, and with older, legacy systems.

This guide covers how ERP integration works, what it does for your customers and your team, how a project runs, how to prepare your people and what it costs.

What is ERP integration?

Your ERP holds the facts about your business: products, stock levels, customer accounts, pricing, orders and invoices. Your website is where customers look for those facts. Without integration, the two are kept in step by hand, or not at all.

Integration takes the data from both systems and combines it into a single source of truth. That data is then synced back to each system, so what customers see on the website always matches what the ERP says. The same combined data can then drive reporting, automation and better service.

What can you connect between your ERP and your website?

• Inventory and availability: live stock levels, restock dates for out-of-stock items and accurate delivery estimates by warehouse.
• Pricing: list prices, customer-specific pricing and time-limited promotional pricing, changed once in the ERP.
• Orders and quotes: web orders and quote requests flow straight into the ERP, with no re-keying.
• Customer accounts: invoices, order status, order history and one-click re-orders in a customer portal.
• Product information: specifications and photos that stay accurate everywhere they appear.
• CRM data: contacts, buying patterns and service tickets alongside order history.

What are the benefits of integrating your ERP with your website?

Customers get accurate stock and delivery dates

Few things lose a customer faster than checking out, then learning the item is on backorder for months. With an integrated ERP, the website shows when stock is low or gone, picks the right warehouse at checkout and gives a realistic delivery date. Customers can plan and order on their own schedule, whether you sell B2B or B2C.

Pricing changes once, everywhere

Change a price in the ERP and it changes on the website. Customer-specific pricing, down to individual products, becomes manageable through logins and portals, and you can run time-based pricing for a customer group during a campaign or season.

Your team stops re-keying orders

If people are typing web orders or quote requests into the ERP, they are compensating for systems that can’t talk to each other. That manual work invites errors, slows invoicing and fulfilment, and makes it harder to capture clean customer data. Automating it frees your best people for work that needs their judgment, which matters when key roles are hard to fill.

Customers serve themselves

A customer portal lets buyers see invoices and order status, re-order past items without picking the wrong part, and update their own account details. That takes routine questions off your sales and service teams.

You can notify customers about what matters to them

Ask your customers what they want to hear about in real time: back-in-stock alerts, shipping updates, price changes, quote responses, new products. Any change that exists in your ERP or web data can trigger a message, and the same data powers personalized product suggestions, customer-specific promo codes and abandoned-cart emails.

You see what happened, and what’s coming

With web and ERP data in one place, monthly, quarterly and annual revenue reporting is current and accurate, and you can tie it to quoting and browsing activity. When customers use your quoting tools to quote their own customers, you also get an early view of demand further down the channel, which makes forecasting more reliable.

B2B customers can quote their own customers

In B2B, one of the most useful things you can do is help your customers serve theirs. An integrated platform can let a dealer or contractor take your quote, add their own materials, labour and markup, and send it on, which speeds up their turnaround and keeps your products in the deal.

You can grow without adding admin

Once routine processes are automated and customers have the information they need, you can add sales channels, product lines or new markets without a matching rise in order entry and data wrangling. A clean, combined data set is also the foundation for analytics and AI tools later.

Should you connect your ERP to your CRM as well?

Often, yes. A CRM on its own shows contacts and the sales conversation. Linked with your ERP, it also shows what each customer browses, buys together, searches for and can’t find. That fuller picture helps sales guide buyers, tailor product suggestions and spot gaps in your range.

Why spreadsheets aren’t a substitute for integration

Many businesses bridge the gap between the ERP and the website with spreadsheets. It works at small scale, then breaks. Versions multiply as files are passed around, nobody can see changes as they happen, each sheet is built around one person’s logic, and a single slip of the hand can alter critical figures without anyone noticing. Integration replaces that copy-and-paste layer with a system that updates itself, controls who can change what and keeps one version of the truth.

Which ERP systems and web platforms can be integrated?

Treefrog’s process is platform-agnostic on both sides. We have integrated ERPs such as SAP, Epicor and SYSPRO with web platforms such as Shopify, Magento and WordPress, and in many cases we already have modules built that shorten the project. If you’re still choosing an ERP, our Epicor vs SAP comparison is a good place to start, and for the store side see Shopify vs Magento.

How does an ERP integration project work?

Every project is different, but the steps are consistent:

1. Scope. We document what data needs to move, between which systems, and why. The scoping document is yours to keep.
2. Platform review. We look at the systems holding the data and decide the best way to move it in and out.
3. Data analysis. We check the format, completeness and accuracy of your data. Some of it usually needs cleaning first.
4. Solution design. We design what customers and staff will actually use, such as a price list, a quote request tool or a customer portal, so it works well and looks right.
5. Build, train and launch. We build in phases, train your team before go-live and keep improving after launch.

How do you prepare your team for an ERP integration?

New systems change people’s day-to-day work: processes, responsibilities and how they deal with customers. Adoption can’t be left to chance. Four things make the biggest difference:

1. Get leadership aligned first. Every leader should back the project before it’s announced, so the message is consistent across the business.
2. Find internal champions early. They don’t have to be on the project team. They need to be people others listen to.
3. Share the benefits for end users early. Short updates at team huddles or town halls build understanding before launch day.
4. Build training into the schedule. Plan it, don’t assume it. Hands-on practice in a test environment builds confidence, and regular check-ins after launch catch what needs improving.

Can an older ERP or website be integrated?

An older ERP can usually be integrated. Legacy systems and databases still hold valuable data; they just make it harder to reach. Integration puts that data to work now, without the cost and disruption of an ERP upgrade, and buys you time to plan the upgrade properly when you’re ready.

An outdated website is a bigger obstacle. If it isn’t collecting useful data and isn’t easy to use, integration won’t fix that, so the website may need work first. A modern, usable site is a prerequisite for getting value from the integration.

How much does ERP integration cost?

Cost depends on the systems, the data and what you want customers to be able to do, so it’s set during scoping. Large projects can be phased: start with the module that pays back fastest, then use the return to help fund the next phase. Phasing keeps each step affordable and lowers the risk.

Frequently asked questions about ERP integration

Talk to Treefrog about ERP integration

If you’re not sure where to start, we’ll help you find the gaps between your ERP and your website and the integration that will pay back first. Contact us or call 905-836-4442.