How to Successfully Manage Inventory for Small Businesses Using Inventory Software

Small businesses rely on precision and careful planning in order to remain profitable. Running a small business smoothly means anticipating business needs and fulfilling the expectations of clients and customers to keep them returning again and again. Regardless of industry, one of the key elements to running a successful small business is effective inventory management. Small businesses can improve operational efficiency, reduce costs, and enhance customer satisfaction by leveraging inventory management software. 

Importance of Inventory Management for Small Businesses

Whether you own an independent dental practice or a service business, managing your inventory in a manner that is predictable and reliable is crucial. Poorly-managed inventory can lead to a wounded reputation, lost sales, and limited cash flow. Efficient inventory management for small businesses ensures that the right products and supplies are available when your staff and consumers need them. Well-managed inventory allows you to dependably meet customer demands and provide a positive experience time after time. 

Efficient inventory management solutions allow small businesses to:

1. Avoid stockouts: By accurately tracking inventory levels, businesses can prevent stockouts that lead to lost sales and dissatisfied customers.
2. Minimize overstocking: Keeping too much inventory on hand can tie up capital and increase storage costs and clutter. With a precise inventory management system, small businesses can keep overstocking to a minimum. 
3. Streamline operations: Proper inventory management enables businesses to optimize their operational processes. With accurate data on hand and dependable processes to follow, they can plan production, allocate resources efficiently, and avoid bottlenecks or delays.

Overall, inventory management plays a huge role in every small business’s bottom line and reputation.

Cutting Down Inventory Costs

By avoiding both stockouts and overstocking, small businesses can cut down on their inventory costs. The best way to do so is by using effective inventory management software. Inventory management software for small businesses, such as eTurns TrackStock, helps small businesses identify slow-moving or obsolete items, reduce storage expenses (or annual carrying costs), and free up capital for other business needs, all without running out of inventory. Using this software, small businesses can employ strategies for cutting down inventory costs such as:

1. Reduce purchase order costs by 90% by digitizing them: The eTurns mobile app lets you scan QR codes to order or cycle count and send digital orders directly to any supplier. Our easy mobile scanning app is 10x faster than replenishing with a clipboard or an ecommerce website. 
2. Do cycle counts with a mobile scanning app that helps automate replenishment: When you do cycle counts with TrackStock, the helpful prompts ensure you don’t forget to scan and count an item. Then it sends auto-replenishment orders based on min/max levels to any supplier. 
3. Ask your distributor to do consigned inventory: If you make volume purchases from your distributor they may be willing to offer you consigned inventory. TrackStock makes tracking consignment inventory simple and gives buyers and distributors real-time visibility to inventory as well as accurate consolidated invoices.
4. Use just-in-time inventory methods to reduce carrying costs: Small businesses can reduce carrying costs and the risk of inventory obsolescence by receiving inventory as close as possible to the time it is needed for customer orders. 
5. Optimize inventory with min/max inventory levels: eTurns TrackStock allows users to tune minimum and maximum inventory levels to help trigger replenishment orders and perform cycle counts. 

Without accurate data and reliable inventory management systems, strategies like these are not available to small businesses. Spreadsheets and clipboards do not provide the real-time visibility needed to cut down inventory costs through these precise strategies. 

Inventory Management Solution: eTurns TrackStock

For simple, streamlined, reliable inventory management software for small businesses, eTurns TrackStock is the top solution. This cloud-based inventory management software offers a range of features designed to streamline operations and improve efficiency. eTurns TrackStock allows small businesses to:

• Do daily cycle counts with no human labor and manage inventory remotely using  SensorBins - an IoT weight sensor solution
• Optimize inventory with min-max analytics and data-rich reports
• Place replenishment orders to any supplier or distributor, all from one app
• Place orders faster with quick scans of QR codes and labels
• Perform cycle counts
• Decrease shrinkage by tracking usage
• Choose inventory management solutions that work best for space constrained locations,  like eLabels 
• Automate replenishment, eliminating clunky clipboards and manual errors

With a variety of different plans built to accommodate every business, eTurns TrackStock offers a wealth of products and features to choose from.

Benefits of Using Inventory Management Software

Choosing the right inventory management software for your small business can drastically shift your bottom line. On top of cutting down inventory costs by reducing stockouts and carrying costs, leveraging reliable inventory management software means less wasted time and money on manual inventory management processes. 

eTurns TrackStock facilitates an inventory management workflow that is ten times faster than eCommerce or spreadsheets. Eliminate the constant back and forth and the human error inherent in tracking inventory with clipboards and spreadsheets. Allocate your workforce hours to more meaningful tasks while the eTurns TrackStock software provides accurate inventory counts and real-time data you can trust.

Instead of relying on chance or a thin staff to keep your inventory where it needs to be, leverage eTurns TrackStock to ensure that you’ve always got the products your customers need. Minimize overstocking and reduce carrying costs through heightened visibility and fast reordering. Contact us to learn more!