30 Stein Am Rhein Ct; Units J & K
Redwood City, CA 94063
U.S.A.
Tel: 650-298-8548
Fax: 650-364-1299
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| NetSuite Small Business and Yahoo! Store have done no less than revolutionize the way we sell wine |
| Manu Rekhi, Marketing Director WineGlobe |
The Results: An Integrated Whole
Bottom line cost savings of implementing NetSuite Small Business and Yahoo! has ranged between $100,000 to $120,000. The easy-to-use interface and streamlined financial processes has allowed WineGlobe to reduce its in-house IT staff to part time, saving $75,000. WineGlobe also saves $1,500 in monthly hosting fees.
Marketing Director Manu Rekhi conservatively estimates WineGlobe has saved at least 20 man hours per week — or $20,800 a year. "That number is probably double if we took into account the intangible benefits that having one integrated application provides," he says.
The Situation: Off the Beaten Track
An online retailer of high-end wines, WineGlobe knew its range of vintages would make any sommelier proud. The problem? Only a portion of its target market was aware of its inventory.
"We were using Annuncio's Web site solution - a sophisticated application that provided functionality on a par with Amazon and other user friendly Web sites," Rekhi recounts. However the platform did not drive traffic to the fledgling Web site. Also, the system was very high maintenance and several times a month WineGlobe's Web site would be down for one reason or another, according to Rekhi. "I lost track of how many times I found myself up at 2 in the morning trying to figure out why the Web site had crashed yet again," he says. Then there was the opportunity cost of lost sales because the site was not accessible. "It was very unprofessional."
Meanwhile a disconnect between its back-end system and sales and customer facing processes was causing WineGlobe to lose potentially lucrative cross sale and upsell opportunities, not to mention needlessly taking up a large portion of its employees' time.
Order tracking was done through a SQL database system. Customer service was basically a phone-based operation with queries answered on an ad hoc basis, and account management and other accounting functions were largely manual processes, augmented with Excel and Quickbooks.
"We were wasting a lot of man hours on these tasks," Rekhi says.
The First Solution: A Love Affair
WineGlobe made two separate IT investments — Yahoo! Store and NetSuite Small Business — that once integrated, provided huge efficiencies in its back end operations, not to mention a substantial jump in revenues.
Rekhi's "love affair" as he puts it with Yahoo! first began when he sought to address WineGlobe's lack of traffic and Web site problems. "We were looking for a partner that would not only help us sell but also provide us with a platform for selling. Yahoo! with its vast network and built in traffic flows was the obvious choice." Besides the cache of its brand name, Yahoo! helped WineGlobe develop relationships with partner sites as well as steer shoppers to its Web site from their searches on engines such as Google. It also provided some very sophisticated order management and tracking functionality.
As delighted as WineGlobe was with its relationship with Yahoo!, there were still gaps in its back end functionality that needed addressing. "The problem was that while Yahoo! had a good order management system and front end that we were able to customize, it didn't allow us to hook into an accounting system," Rekhi says. "That quickly became an issue." Because there wasn't a seamless information flow between the order management system and back end financial processes, WineGlobe was having difficulty reconciling its bank statements with the customer activity generated through Yahoo!
The Second Solution: A Marriage Made In Heaven
So WineGlobe began to search for an accounting system that would be able to easily integrate into Yahoo!'s front end. After searching for four months, WineGlobe decided upon NetSuite Small Business. "It stood out because not only did it provide the accounting modules we needed, but its customer relationship management functionality also helped integrate the sales team and expense management system," Rekhi says. "All those disparate features are built into the same application, and allowed us to get rid of some of the other legacy systems we were using."
With the two systems implemented, WineGlobe's was able to reconcile its accounting and financials much faster and more accurately, according to Rekhi. Indeed he cites NetSuite Small Business's reporting capabilities as having delivered the greatest return on investment.
"It is extremely important because it provides a snapshot of the entire company and has allowed me to make more informed decisions and react to business events faster," he says.
That was expected, of course. Over time, though, WineGlobe was pleasantly surprised by some unexpected benefits it derived from its Yahoo!-NetSuite investment that ranged from more efficient and user-friendly customer service to a transparent and comprehensive view of its entire business operation.
For example, appropriate links and e-mail addresses — an NetSuite Small Business feature — facilitated WineGlobe's customer service operations. "Customers are more satisfied because they are able to contact us at any time and there is a trail for each case."
Order management became even more integrated, with customers able to reorder products using their own interfaces. Furthermore, NetSuite Small Business's sales force automation module provided its sales staff far more information about customer accounts than it had access to before, including such granular details as most profitable customers.
"We've been able to change our business processes, freeing up our sales team to concentrate on growing accounts, cherry picking the most lucrative leads and turning them into repeat customers."
Bottom line cost savings of implementing NetSuite Small Business and Yahoo! has ranged between $100,000 to $120,000. The easy-to-use interface and streamlined financial processes has allowed WineGlobe to reduce its in-house IT staff to part time, saving $75,000. WineGlobe also saves $1,500 in monthly hosting fees.
Marketing Director Manu Rekhi conservatively estimates WineGlobe has saved at least 20 man hours per week — or $20,800 a year. "That number is probably double if we took into account the intangible benefits that having one integrated application provides," he says.
The Situation: Off the Beaten Track
An online retailer of high-end wines, WineGlobe knew its range of vintages would make any sommelier proud. The problem? Only a portion of its target market was aware of its inventory.
"We were using Annuncio's Web site solution - a sophisticated application that provided functionality on a par with Amazon and other user friendly Web sites," Rekhi recounts. However the platform did not drive traffic to the fledgling Web site. Also, the system was very high maintenance and several times a month WineGlobe's Web site would be down for one reason or another, according to Rekhi. "I lost track of how many times I found myself up at 2 in the morning trying to figure out why the Web site had crashed yet again," he says. Then there was the opportunity cost of lost sales because the site was not accessible. "It was very unprofessional."
Meanwhile a disconnect between its back-end system and sales and customer facing processes was causing WineGlobe to lose potentially lucrative cross sale and upsell opportunities, not to mention needlessly taking up a large portion of its employees' time.
Order tracking was done through a SQL database system. Customer service was basically a phone-based operation with queries answered on an ad hoc basis, and account management and other accounting functions were largely manual processes, augmented with Excel and Quickbooks.
"We were wasting a lot of man hours on these tasks," Rekhi says.
The First Solution: A Love Affair
WineGlobe made two separate IT investments — Yahoo! Store and NetSuite Small Business — that once integrated, provided huge efficiencies in its back end operations, not to mention a substantial jump in revenues.
Rekhi's "love affair" as he puts it with Yahoo! first began when he sought to address WineGlobe's lack of traffic and Web site problems. "We were looking for a partner that would not only help us sell but also provide us with a platform for selling. Yahoo! with its vast network and built in traffic flows was the obvious choice." Besides the cache of its brand name, Yahoo! helped WineGlobe develop relationships with partner sites as well as steer shoppers to its Web site from their searches on engines such as Google. It also provided some very sophisticated order management and tracking functionality.
As delighted as WineGlobe was with its relationship with Yahoo!, there were still gaps in its back end functionality that needed addressing. "The problem was that while Yahoo! had a good order management system and front end that we were able to customize, it didn't allow us to hook into an accounting system," Rekhi says. "That quickly became an issue." Because there wasn't a seamless information flow between the order management system and back end financial processes, WineGlobe was having difficulty reconciling its bank statements with the customer activity generated through Yahoo!
The Second Solution: A Marriage Made In Heaven
So WineGlobe began to search for an accounting system that would be able to easily integrate into Yahoo!'s front end. After searching for four months, WineGlobe decided upon NetSuite Small Business. "It stood out because not only did it provide the accounting modules we needed, but its customer relationship management functionality also helped integrate the sales team and expense management system," Rekhi says. "All those disparate features are built into the same application, and allowed us to get rid of some of the other legacy systems we were using."
With the two systems implemented, WineGlobe's was able to reconcile its accounting and financials much faster and more accurately, according to Rekhi. Indeed he cites NetSuite Small Business's reporting capabilities as having delivered the greatest return on investment.
"It is extremely important because it provides a snapshot of the entire company and has allowed me to make more informed decisions and react to business events faster," he says.
That was expected, of course. Over time, though, WineGlobe was pleasantly surprised by some unexpected benefits it derived from its Yahoo!-NetSuite investment that ranged from more efficient and user-friendly customer service to a transparent and comprehensive view of its entire business operation.
For example, appropriate links and e-mail addresses — an NetSuite Small Business feature — facilitated WineGlobe's customer service operations. "Customers are more satisfied because they are able to contact us at any time and there is a trail for each case."
Order management became even more integrated, with customers able to reorder products using their own interfaces. Furthermore, NetSuite Small Business's sales force automation module provided its sales staff far more information about customer accounts than it had access to before, including such granular details as most profitable customers.
"We've been able to change our business processes, freeing up our sales team to concentrate on growing accounts, cherry picking the most lucrative leads and turning them into repeat customers."
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