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Category : Certified Zoho Consultants

Zoho Implementations for Tech and SaaS

Streamline Your Tech or SaaS Business with Zoho and ZBrains

As one of the largest SaaS companies in the world, we like to think that Zoho knows a thing or two about making software systems for this segment. If you’re in the market for a new system, or starting your research here, this article will help you understand the capabilities of Zoho for SaaS and tech companies. And we’ll share details about what it’s like to work with ZBrains on your Zoho implementation.

This is your bread and butter, so you know that the details – KPI’s, clean data, and seamless integration – are paramount for most businesses, but are especially important for Tech & SaaS. 

[caption id="attachment_5119" align="alignright" width="450"]Zoho Implementations for SaaS Zoho is one of the world’s largest SaaS companies, and serves over 60 million users worldwide with their solutions.[/caption]

Before we get into it, ask yourself: What would your business look like if you could integrate your solutions for managing subscriptions, keeping an active CRM, giving internal and external customers an easy to use service ticket system, and being able to keep your accounting accurate and streamlined in order to maximize customer retention?

You need to keep a pulse 24/7 on all the numbers to ensure profitability and customer satisfaction. This is where the power of Zoho implementation and its integrations become very apparent. 

Are you already using several applications to keep your operations in line?  If you’re considering a new implembentation, or improving what you’ve got with greater integration, having the right system and partners in place can make a world of difference. Here’s our advice and insight on the process needed to make it happen.

Begin by Evaluating Your Inputs

A single source of truth is invaluable, so maybe it’s time to stop using siloed data, and multiple systems that don’t quite ‘talk to each other.’ Believe it or not, you can get a true picture of profitability, costs, and almost any other meaningful KPI with the help of a well-appointed Zoho implementation.

You know what data is needed, so let ZBrains assist in getting you up and running in a system that brings everything together. The ZBrains process is key to ensuring your success, and we’ve spent every year since 2012 steadily improving our business as Zoho Certified Consultants. This process is the heart of what keeps us – and you after implementation – running smoothly.  Let’s take a closer look at the ‘what,’ ‘why,’ and ‘how’ of the importance of integrated software, including subscription billing, CRM, service tickets, and the other applications from Zoho to keep your Tech or SaaS business running effortlessly.

 

Why should you consider a Zoho Implementation?

In a SaaS or tech company, like almost any other business, an  software is meant to help maintain operations, make them run smoothly, and provide visibility to your most important metrics. When you have organizational efficiency and combine it with the ability to keep your fingers on the pulse of your most important KPI’s is where the true power of an integrated software is recognized.

We like to ask clients this question: “How would your business change if you were able to keep subscriptions, product data, and financial data in the same system? What about the ability to centralize your operations including everything from insight into customers, quotes, sales orders and invoices, to product inventory, work orders and process automation?”

Your business, and oftentimes your clients, will require you to have easy access to this information. Without it, your customer service suffers, user experience can be a miss, and  inevitably your subscriptions dwindle and profits suffer.  Are you sure that all of your KPI’s are accounted for and are you able to measure them and benefit from the results of knowing what’s working and what’s not? Software is the key to organizing processes, people, and data you need to make sure you can.

Business Process Management On a New Level

Take a moment and imagine having a system in place that can offer you:

“a disciplined approach to identify, design, execute, document, measure, monitor, and control both automated and non-automated business processes to achieve consistent, targeted results” that are aligned with your strategic goals. 

When you are finally able to align consistency with your business goals, every little step in that direction adds up, and gets you one step closer to success. Does this idea intrigue and energize you? If so, keep reading. 

 

Can good business processes really solve problems?

How do the aspects of the definition above apply to common activities you do in your business like: quoting, time tracking, equipment tracking, job costing, inventory management, scheduling, invoice and expense tracking, customer service, and subscriptions management? Do you currently have a way to achieve each of these points?

  • Is the process simple to see data and share between teams and/or departments? Or is the data siloed?
  • Does it take more than one hand to count how many software systems you’re using?
  • Are your associates able to seamlessly handoff projects from one department or process to another?
  • Does information get lost in the shuffle or is never considered at a global level?
  • Can you see which associates are working, where they are, and how effective they are in a given project? 
  • Is your subscription management process automated, including dunning management?

You’ve come to the right place if implementing solutions for any of these problems feels like a good next step for your business. You can achieve streamlined operations and processes with Zoho, but first let’s discuss some benefits of standardized processes.

 

6 Ways Standardized Processes Help Tech or SaaS Organizations

Which of these points could benefit your business the most? 

1) Increase Your Productivity 

Imagine a solution that could give you access to your service team status and location immediately, or that would allow you to create a quote faster. Or what if resources spent less time with double-data entry? And document handling was all digital? What if you could automate some of your routines? How could this affect your productivity factor?

2) Quality Control & Customer Experience

[caption id="attachment_5120" align="alignleft" width="450"]Zoho Customer Management Zoho’s subscription lifecycle management tools include features that can improve customer experience, helping you retain more subscribers than ever.[/caption]

When reviewing your NPS or customer feedback, does it say that some customer experiences are perfect while others fall short? Standardization makes your business, project planning, and deliverables executions more straightforward. This data also means you can streamline the training/onboarding process. Subscription lifecycle management features an also improve customer experience including:

    • Recurring payments and accounting features that ensure payments come on time and can facilitate payments through multiple methods.
    • Subscription metrics & reports help you stay up to date on your subscription business metrics and provide comprehensive reports
    • Even subscription automation that allows you to automate billing and subscription related tasks with the help of workflow rules and webhooks.

3) Bring Teams & Customers Together with Easier Collaboration

A well-provisioned system allows for more meaningful collaboration across teams because it helps to remove siloed information. Transparency in your organization helps your teams identify best practices, remove redundancies, and share expertise across departments more easily. Additionally, a good solution for your organization could include a customer portal where they can view invoices, make payments, or connect with an agent via a ticketing system to solve technical issues or request work.

4) Reduce Operational Costs

This can take many forms from being able to accurately quote and job cost, to giving clients self-serve options and giving your employees the tools needed to easily track time and materials in order to avoid overages or oversights. We’re just scratching the surface of how effective software helps reduce costs. Now imagine a system that can offer recurring billing and invoicing, and even dunning management to deal with payment failures and declines. The system can automatically initiate a recovery process which will save time in your financial department and reduce churn rate!

5) Give Yourself More Time for Innovation & Beat the Competition

Combining your entrepreneurial business instinct with the data an integrated system like Zoho One can capture is almost like a superpower. Put experience to work, plan and implement your innovations, and then use metrics you’ve captured to measure the results. With the power of data behind you, you are able to make accurate and incremental changes often and quickly. When you continually add automation to the mix, you’ll be giving yourself more time for innovation. Using the time you’ve saved to innovate, you’ll  be well on the way to being able to beat your competition.

How much time do you spend wrangling data? Checking multiple sources, and rechecking? What time is lost chasing invoices, customer data, and subscription information? When you are spending less time searching for data, managing individuals, and chasing processes, you can spend more time working in your business. With this gain in time you can focus on the innovations that move your business ahead of your competition! 

6) A Single Source of Truth to Rule Them All 

After points one through five, you can easily recognize how standardized processes can improve business operations beyond the basics. Zoho can help you bring your data to one ecosystem, and provide you with a single source of truth. Imagine a single sign-on that lets you access Zoho apps to operate every department, and gives peace of mind with security protocols that more than 60 million users rely on every day at work.

Have the scenarios we’ve shared about how Zoho can help your Tech or SaaS business been resonating with you? If so, you’re likely a serious candidate for implementing Zoho. And maybe you’re also convinced that ZBrains is the certified Zoho Partner to assist in your implementation. Let’s keep the conversation going!

 

What’s the ZBrains Business Process Analysis?  And how does it impact my Zoho implementation?

Every new engagement with ZBrains begins with a Business Process Analysis or BPA. Using what we know about all of the reasoning we shared above, we’ve developed a process that applies the same principles to our assessments. This is what is looks like:

Starting a BPA with ZBrains

The business process analysis is integral to all ZBrains consulting projects and Zoho implementations. As with any planning effort, it ensures a successful project plan is in place that fits with your business processes. We always start by getting to know you and your business.The best way we can solve your business problems is to first completely understand your current state.

Here’s what we do:

  • First we analyze expectations and identify any existing performance gaps in your business processes. 
  • Next, we examine your business from a wider industry perspective. What makes you the same and differentiates your business from others?
  • Then, ZBrains Certified Zoho consultants evaluate opportunities for improvement. 
  • Lastly, we decide which methods need to be introduced to positively impact the business.

We start by meeting with your team to thoroughly discuss and review your processes. This means taking time with sales, marketing, accounting, customer service, finance, and your operations teams to ensure every requirement is captured, and that we fully understand your existing systems. We’ll identify the best way to consolidate your operations into a centralized platform with Zoho as the hub.

After the BPA is finished, you receive expert recommendations on changes, augmentations or implementations from our team that are needed to meet your goals. We share a project timeline, deliverables, and an outline of targets so that you’ll always know project status. The strategy you receive can be executed with precision to create a successful business plan for the upcoming quarters and beyond.

 

How we work with Technology and SaaS Businesses

Zoho and ZBrains are both in this industry, and because of it we believe we’re uniquely positioned to offer our expertise here. And ZBrains specializes in small to medium businesses, just like yours. Here’s what a Business Process Analysis with ZBrains looks like for you:

Most often, we work with a champion from your company, normally a President, VP, or another C-level representative. We’ll talk about your executive dashboards, and business analysis tools, areas for improvement, and overall company goals with a new Zoho system.

Also, we ask to include members from teams across your organization in the intake sessions. This means representatives from all teams who will be using the software. We like to include SME’s from your Sales, Estimating, Marketing teams, Customer Service teams, and other Service or Resource Management representatives, and of course, Finance. This ensures that we get a global perspective of the business in our  intake, and we find that it encourages greater user adoption later on!

 

What information does ZBrains gather during a BPA?

During our sessions with each of your various team representatives, ZBrains will collect detailed information about their daily/weekly/monthly processes. We’ll see what’s working for them, what isn’t, and what improvements are needed. Discussions with your teams will often include the following:

[caption id="attachment_5121" align="alignright" width="450"]ZBrains assessment Process for Tech Businesses ZBrains collects detailed information about all your business processes. We’ll see what’s working, what isn’t, and what improvements are needed.[/caption]

Sales and Estimating

We’ll review and discuss all points of your sales process. Then, we look at if and how your quotes or estimates are created and shared with clients. What other documents are required and will they be managed digitally? We’ll dive into how new leads are addressed, and how is existing business managed? How do you measure success – what are your critical Sales KPI’s?

Finance & Subscription Management

We’ll drill down to completely understand what information is required from your front office to back office. We include review of documents for customers, all the way through to which data is required in order to generate executive reports. We’ll also dive into how you’re managing subscriptions, reporting on churn, and ensuring that payments are received. What information are you capturing from usage stats in order to segment and serve (or market to) your clients?

Customer Service & Support Teams

Keeping any hard-earned client happy is almost always less expensive than onboarding a new lead. For this reason, we’ll look at all of your CRM data and service ticket processes for service requests, including options like live chat for support. Do your current systems integrate? Do you want them to? We’ll also discuss document requirements.

Project Management Teams

What are your current project management tools? Who is using them? Are you taking advantage of features such as: task automation, team collaboration, issue  & time tracking, and mobile project management options?

Production & Installation

Are you a SaaS or Tech business that also sells product, like an IaaS or IOT as a Service org? If so, how do you procure goods? Are you purchasing parts or equipment? Do you have composite items and  a need for CPQ? What is your current process for handling bill of materials, work orders, and routing? How are you handling time tracking? We also get into your potential needs for planning capacity, and on-site maintenance, to name a few. 

Additionally, how are your installation teams scheduled and dispatched? Are factors like crew size, availability, proximity, or skill set taken into consideration?  How is time tracking addressed? Are your production or field/on-site service teams tracking their own inventory, and assets? What about work orders, scheduling, and routing?

Inventory Management

If you are stocking products, we go into detail about your inventory management processes including current and desired states. Do you have multiple warehouses, mobile warehouses? How are you handling order fulfillment? What about installation or service components? Are you ordering the same components from multiple vendors depending on lead time, price, and other factors?  Do you need to track reorder levels for items you keep in stock?

Other Zoho Integrations

Finally, we’ll look at your current integrations to determine compatibility with Zoho. We can also help identify any new integrations that might benefit your business processes. Some of the Zoho integrations commonly used by Tech and SaaS organizations include:

    • ShipStation,
    • TaxJar,
    • Avalara,
    • QuickBooks (Online and Desktop),
    • Xero,
    • Ecommerce solutions like Shopify or Magento,
    • SMS solutions like Twilio,
    • And many, many, others.

 

Considerations for Budgeting and Timeline for Zoho Implementation

As we mentioned earlier, Zoho is uniquely positioned for the SMB. For example, Zoho One includes more than 40 integrated applications in a single ecosystem. You’ll be hard pressed to find a solution that isn’t included, and when you can’t or you have a preferred tool, you can almost always integrate. 

A major software implementation for a large business can be as high as six-figures to implement, plus another five figures for the service costs. These incredibly robust enterprise tools are really powerful, but for a small or medium business like yours, they’re oftentimes out of reach. You shouldn’t dismiss the functionality just because the big names are cost prohibitive. Upon inspecting more closely, we think you’ll see that these big-name-solutions themselves are more often than not complete overkill. This is another reason how a BPA can help any small or medium sized business identify the actual tools they will need and utilize.

Incase you need more talking points: Why Zoho is a Solid Choice

  • You deserve a solution that is also robust in functionality and nuanced for your business! 
  • More often than not, Zoho is less expensive to implement and has a lower total cost of ownership than competing solutions.
  • Zoho applications are built to suit your business, and customization is possible using rapid development platforms like Zoho Creator.
  • Zoho is accessible. Built and designed with the SMB in mind, and you don’t need a dev at every turn. Simply add custom fields or new reports. Customize dashboards. Drag and drop functions make it easy to do this work in house, without sacrificing enterprise functionality. 

As a fellow in our industry, you probably already know how common it is for technology implementations to end in low user adoption. They can be too complicated and cumbersome for users and they become bogged down. Sometimes the new apps are placed, but don’t fit into the workflow. However, when you take the time to address the business needs, then build your system to solve for nuances of your business – and you get insight users in every department – you get better user adoption and a higher chance of success. As you can imagine, with so many variables, the budget and timeline for your Zoho implementation will not be exactly like any other. (However, you can get a price range using our instant quote tool.)

Thanks for reading through, and learning about the ZBrains process. We hope it’s been useful. If you’re interested in the next steps or have any questions, our Zoho Certified Consultants are ready to help you get started with your implementation or new integration – just get in touch!

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implementing field services ERP

The Power of ERP Software for Construction & Field Services

Are you researching FieldTech, Salesforce Field Service, Service Titan, or Oracle as an option for field services software? Whether you’re just beginning research about scheduling software, or looking for a change, this article’s for you.

It’s no secret that in large part the success of your contracting business is based on accuracy, from bidding and job costing, to capacity planning and reporting.

For both for Field Services and Construction, it’s essential to have a handle on all the numbers to ensure profitability and customer satisfaction. If you don’t already use an ERP software to keep your operations in line, or it’s a slice of business you’re looking to improve, having the right applications in place can make a world of difference. What function does a Construction ERP software or Field Services ERP serve?

[caption id="attachment_5038" align="alignleft" width="400"]Contractors ERP Software options from Zoho It might be time to let technology help you scale your contracting business for the 21st century. ERP solutions from Zoho might be the answer.[/caption]

Start with the Right Steps

Stop doing back-of-the-napkin estimates that sometimes happen in your business, and start getting a look at the true data you need. Put losses in productivity and profit behind you.

Zoho ERP solutions can be the keystone to simply and successfully capturing the details of your contracting for field services business. And we’ll show you the best ways to utilize data once the Zoho implementation for your teams are in place. We’re going to give you all the details about what it means to work with ZBrains, including our process – the heart of what keeps us and you – running smoothly.  Let’s take a closer look at the ‘what,’ ‘why,’ and ‘how’ of the importance of ERP software, including field service scheduling software.

Ready to Revolutionize Construction? How Does ERP Help?

Fundamentally, an ERP like a field services software is meant to help you ensure operations are running smoothly, but that’s just one aspect. This organizational efficiency coupled with the ability to keep your fingers on the pulse of your most important KPI’s is where the true power of ERP software is recognized.

Take a moment for this quick exercise, and ask yourself: “How would my business change if I could sync inventory, order management and financial data? What about the ability to centralize my operations including everything from insight into customers, quotes, sales orders and invoices, to product inventory, work orders and process automation?”

Construction, field services, and contracting in general require precision. Without it, your service quality suffers, workmanship can fail, and  inevitably your customers and profits suffer.  Do you have all of your KPI’s accounted for and are you able to measure them and benefit from the results? ERP software is the key to organizing process, people, and data you need to make sure you can.

Why does Business Process Management matter?

Before you read further, take another moment and imagine having:

“a disciplined approach to identify, design, execute, document, measure, monitor, and control both automated and non-automated business processes to achieve consistent, targeted results” that are aligned with your strategic goals. 

[caption id="attachment_5037" align="alignright" width="400"]Construction workers review plans ERP software helps your business integrate functions such as quoting, time tracking, equipment tracking, job costing, inventory management, and more.[/caption]

This consistency, when aligned with business goals, is how some of the most successful businesses you already know are getting great results. Does this idea intrigue and energize you? If so, keep reading. 

Does good business processes actually solve problems?

Consider how the aspects of the definition above applies to common activities you do in your business like: quoting, time tracking, equipment tracking, job costing, inventory management, scheduling, invoice and expense tracking, commission tracking, and returns management. Do you currently have a way to achieve each of these points?

  • Can you easily access data and share between teams and/or departments? Or is it siloed?
  • Does it take more than one hand to count how many software systems you’re using?
  • Is the handoff from one department or process to another seamless?
  • Does information get lost in the shuffle or is never considered at a global level?
  • Is is easy to see who’s working, where they are, and how effective they are in a given project? 

You’re on the right path if implementing solutions for any of these problems is making sense for you. There are a lot of ways to achieve streamlined operations and processes, but let’s talk about some of the benefits first.

 

7 Benefits Of Standardized Processes for Field Services or Construction

Which of these 7 benefits could help you improve your business the most? 

1) Increase Productivity 

Imagine a solution that could give you access to your service team status and location immediately, or that would allow you to create a quote faster. Or what if resources spent less time with double-data entry? How could this affect your productivity factor?

2) Quality Control

Does your customer feedback say that some of your projects are perfect while others fall short? Standardization makes your business and project planning more straightforward. This includes scheduling, and ensuring you have the correct resources and materials for the job. Additionally, with this data you can streamline the training/onboarding process. 

3) Easier Collaboration

A well-provisioned ERP allows for more meaningful collaboration across teams because it helps to remove siloed information. Transparency in your organization helps your teams identify best practices, remove redundancies, and share expertise across departments more easily.

4) Reduce Costs

Accurate job costing that’s visible from a centralized dashboard will help you identify areas of material and labor waste that might have previously gone unseen for ages. Employees can easily track time and materials on a a job, giving you direct insight into job and company profitability.  This is just one facet of how an ERP helps reduce costs, now imagine data for equipment tracking, scheduling, inventory, and more all in one place.

5) Innovation & Adaptation

You don’t have to operate your business on gut feeling, but instead rely on instinct PLUS data together! Use your experience to plan your changes, implement them, and then use metrics you’ve captured to measure the results. When you have the data in hand, create incremental changes toward improvement! All of this is possible with the right contracting ERP or field services software.

6) Beat the Competition

When you are spending less time searching for data, managing individuals, and chasing processes, and more time working in your business, you actually gain productive time. With more productive time, you can focus on the innovations that move your business ahead of your competition! 

7) Single Source of Truth 

Speaking to many of the points above, standardized processes help in business operations beyond the basics. In order to scale comfortably, Zoho can help you tie everything together with a single source of truth. Solutions from Zoho take pride in security protocols for their softwares, but this translates to your business overall.

Now, if you’ve made it this far, you’re likely a serious candidate for Zoho’s field services ERP software. And maybe you’re also convinced that ZBrains is the certified Zoho Partner to assist in your implementation. Let’s keep the conversation going!

 

How does the ZBrains Business Process Analysis work for ERP and  field service scheduling software solutions from Zoho?

Let’s talk about how an engagement with ZBrains begins – with a Business Process Analysis. We take all the reasoning and research described above, and apply the same principles to our own assessments. Here’s what it looks like: 

This is a BPA with ZBrains

The BPA, or business process analysis, is integral to all ZBrains consulting projects. Just like any other planning effort, it ensures a successful implementation that fits with your business processes. It’s always our goal to begin solving your business problems by first fully understanding your current state.

Here’s what we do:

    • We start  by analyzing expectations and performance gaps in your business processes. 
    • Then, we examine your business from a wider industry perspective. 
    • Next, our consultants evaluate the opportunities for improvement. 
    • Finally, we decide which methods need to be introduced to positively impact the business.

This happens when we meet with your team and thoroughly review processes. It includes sitting with your sales, marketing, operations, and accounting representatives to make sure we understand all requirements and current systems. The goal here is to consolidate your business operations into a centralized platform with Zoho as the hub. 

When the BPA is complete, you receive our expert recommendations on changes, augmentations or implementations needed to meet your goals. You get to see a timeline, the goals, and and outline of targets. You receive a strategy that can be executed with precision to create a successful business plan for the upcoming quarters and beyond.

 

This is how we work with Field Services, Construction, and other Contractors

A lot of our clients are in these industries, so much so that we built a software called FieldTech just for you and businesses like you! Our work specializes in small to medium businesses, just like yours. Here’s what a Business Process Analysis with ZBrains looks like for you:

We often work with a single champion, normally a President, VP, or another C-level representative of the company. We include members from teams across your organization in the intake sessions. Anyone who will be using the ERP software. We include your Sales, Estimating, and Marketing teams, Field Services or Construction Teams, Inventory Management representatives, and Finance. It’s important to include input from the people who will be using the system. The reason is to ensure that we get a global perspective of the business, and we find that this also encourages user adoption later on!

What information does ZBrains gather during a BPA?

During our sessions with each department or team representative, we collect a lot of detailed information about their processes. Discussions with your teams will often include the following:

Sales and Estimating

We ask about your sales process. Then, we look at how your quotes or estimates are created and shared. How are you handling new leads, and how is existing business addressed? How do you measure success? And finally, what are the important KPI’s here?

Field Teams

How are teams scheduled and dispatched? Do you consider factors like crew size, availability, proximity ,or skill set? How is time tracking addressed? Are field teams tracking their own inventory, and assets? What about work orders, scheduling, and routing? 

Production

How do you procure goods? Are you purchasing or manufacturing parts? Do you have composite items and  a need for CPQ? What is your current process for handling bill of materials, work orders, and routing? How are you handling time tracking? We also get into your potential needs for planning capacity, batch/lot tracking, and on-site maintenance, to name a few.

Inventory Management

We go into detail about your inventory management processes including current and desired states. Do you have multiple warehouses, mobile warehouses? How are you handling order fulfillment? What about installation or service components?  Do you order the same components from multiple vendors depending on lead time, price, and other factors?  Do you need to track reorder levels for items you keep in stock?

Finance

We’ll drill down to completely understand what information is required from your front office to back office. We include review of documents for customers, all the way through to which data is required in order to  generate executive reports. 

Other Integrations

During consultation, we’ll also ask about your current integrations to determine compatibility and to see if any new integrations could benefit your business processes. Some of the Zoho integrations commonly used by manufacturing and distribution organizations include:

      • ShipStation,
      • TaxJar,
      • Avalara,
      • QuickBooks (Online and Desktop),
      • and Xero for example.

Budgeting and Timeline for Field Services and Construction ERP Software Implementation

[caption id="attachment_5039" align="alignright" width="400"]Solar panel installation contractor Major software implementation doesn’t have to be a six-figure proposition. Zoho is is less expensive to implement and has a lower total cost of ownership than many other solutions.[/caption]

Major software implementation for a large contractor’s business can be as high as a six-figure implementation cost, in addition to another five figures for the service costs. These incredibly robust enterprise tools are really powerful, but for a small or medium business like yours, they’re oftentimes out of reach. Projects like this can be extremely cost prohibitive. The solutions themselves are more often than not complete overkill in terms of what a small or medium sized business will need and utilize.

Why Zoho is a Solid Choice

  • You deserve a solution that is also robust in functionality and nuanced for your business, because you do! For SMB’s like you, Zoho is a great solution. 
  • This solution is less expensive to implement and has a lower total cost of ownership.
  • Customization using rapid development platforms like Zoho Creator means the applications are built to suit your business.
  • Zoho is accessible. It is built and designed with the SMB in mind. Custom fields and new reports couldn’t be simpler. Drag and drop functions make it easy to use and customize for yourself, all with enterprise functionality. 

In our industry, it’s common to hear that many technology implementations end in low user adoption. Overly complicated and cumbersome software solutions cause users to become bogged down. They don’t fit into the workflow. However, when you build your system to address the nuances of your business – and you consider users from every department in the build – you get better user adoption and a higher chance of success. For this reason, and many of the points discussed above, your budget and timeline will depend on the complexity of your requirements and depth of need. 

 

This is the long way to say, this is why we utilize the Business Process Analysis. We hope that an in depth look at business process management and field services software or ERP solutions  for contractors like you has been useful. If you’re interested in the next steps or have any questions, our Zoho Certified Consultants are ready to help – just get in touch!

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Zoho Updates June 2021

Zoho Updates, New Features, and Issues | June 2021

Welcome back to your Zoho Updates June 2021. Lots of action the past month across Zoho applications. In this digest you’ll find information on Zoho’s pricing updates, the application that’s changed its name, and some great new enhancements to CRM and Zoho finance applications.

Keep reading for the What’s New, Zoho Updates June 2021. 

General Zoho Ecosystem Updates

** Important information from Zoho regarding price changes can be found here. If you have questions about this change or wish to schedule a consultation to discuss, please contact us using the form at the end of this article.

About the Zoho changes to MarketingHub: “Effective May 21, 2021, we are renaming Zoho MarketingHub to Zoho Marketing Automation. This change will not affect any features or functionality of the product. You can continue to use the product as you usually do.” Learn more 

New Features from Zoho

Zoho CRM

  • Zoho announced the release of SalesIQ 2.0! If you haven’t already seen it, the release features a new user interface, and features for: Codeless bot, Resources, Answer bot, B2B Relationship, Profanity library, and several others. Take a look here.

 

Zoho Books & Inventory

  • Zoho finance including Books and Inventory teams shared a handful of updates this month, most notable is that now you can record payments while creating an invoice.
    • For example, if you received a payment before issuing their invoice, you don’t have to create a draft invoice and record a payment for it later. Simply mark the “I have received the payment” option while creating the invoice, it automatically creates a payment. Invoices are created as a “Paid” status, and the payment for it is created with the “Invoice Date.” This option is available if your user role allows “Customer Payments”, and if Sales Approval is disabled.
    • To enable: Go to Invoices > Create an invoice and select the customer > Scroll down and mark the “I have received the payment” option.
  • They have also added a new template called “Retail-Premium” found in the Retail category in templates. This template accommodates almost all the information that can be included on other templates, and fits it in a compact design between 3 and 4 inches wide.

 

ZOHO UPDATESApplication Updates from Zoho

Zoho CRM 

Zoho CRM updates and improvements this month include the following:

  • You can now use a scheduled action to automatically create a record through a workflow rule. (This was previously an instance action only.)
  • You’ll now find a common holiday list that is applied to all users in an organization. This is called “Business Holidays.”

Zoho Creator

  • This month Zoho Creator team shared, “We have rolled out a set of default character length for form fields. This will help in effectively using the available space. For instance, you might have fields with large values that contain too many characters. These can be substituted with values of fewer characters. This in turn facilitates the form to include more fields. Users will be able to modify the default length for Single Line, Email, Dropdown, and Radio button fields.”
  • Blueprints are now available in Creator. This allows you to replicate your business processes online and enjoy the benefits of streamlining process management. Why is that important? Zoho says it best, “The blueprint enables you to customize every detail of every process you design in your Creator application.”

Zoho Books

  • Advanced Search in Zoho Books introduces filtering options, and now also includes Zia Search so you can search for “any information across different Zoho apps from within Zoho Books.” See all new updates from Books.

 

Zoho BugsIssues Notices from Zoho

 Zoho Creator

Creator bug fixes recently implemented include: timezone in audit export and admin username in account setup.

 

Need more answers or have a question we didn’t answer here?  If you have questions or would like to connect with one of our consultants, schedule below. We’re also available by phone, just call our offices at (888) 207-4111.

 

Connect with a Consultant

 

ERP Implementation for Manufacturing

Implementing the Best Manufacturing ERP Software: Achieving Excellence

Does your organization use manufacturing ERP software like Oracle, Sage100, or Netsuite? If not, or it’s time for a change, this article is for you.

You already know that manufacturing requires precision in almost every single case. Without your attention to precision, parts from the manufacturing floor will lack quality. Then, your supply chain will be disrupted, and eventually your end customers downstream and profits will suffer. 

For this very reason, it’s quite likely that your manufacturing operation uses and benefits from some type of process management – maybe you’re even using a manufacturing ERP software to keep operations in line.   

But if your process is currently a little soft or ambiguous, consider the losses in productivity and margin that are mounting with every passing day.

Is it time to reign in operations and get control of your business?

We’re here to help you understand how Zoho ERP solutions can be the keystone to smoothly and successfully capturing the details of your manufacturing and/or distribution business. Furthermore, we want to show you how to take advantage of the data you’ll have with a Zoho implementation fit for manufacturing and distribution organizations.

In this article we’ll break down the process of working with ZBrains to implement a software solution that can give organizational visibility, and foster success. Let’s take a closer look at the ‘what,’ ‘why,’ and ‘how’ of the importance of Manufacturing ERP software.

What function does Manufacturing ERP software serve?

Keeping operations running smoothly is just one aspect of an ERP, but from the top down, you could say it’s a foremost consideration. This organizational efficiency coupled with the ability to keep your fingers on the pulse of your most important KPI’s is where the true power of ERP software is recognized.

“Manufacturing ERP refers to Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software and systems used to plan, manage and deliver specific functionalities that support manufacturers and manufacturing business operations.”   – qad.com

[caption id="attachment_4950" align="alignright" width="450"]ERP software supports precision in manufacturing Manufacturing requires precision. Without it, product quality suffers, supply chain is disrupted, and customers downstream and profits suffer. [/caption]

What is Business Process Management?

To start – and this is probably already a known for you if you’re in the manufacturing industry – we’re sharing a high-level definition of business process management:

“The Association of Business Process Management Professionals defines BPM as:

Business process management (BPM) is a disciplined approach to identify, design, execute, document, measure, monitor, and control both automated and non-automated business processes to achieve consistent, targeted results aligned with an organization’s strategic goals.” – wikipedia 


What types of problems can good business processes solve?

It’s clear even in this short definition how an accurate, and smartly implemented business process is important. However, now you consider the phases – identify, design, execute, document, measure, monitor, and control – apply them to the departments responsible for each facet in your own organization, and ask:

  • Are you sharing data between departments? Or is it siloed?
  • How many software systems are you using currently? 
  • Is the handoff from one department or process to another seamless?
  • Is some of your information getting lost or not considered at a global level?
  • Can your software solution help you make the most of your available resources?

If you’re considering the progress you could make by implementing solutions for any of the above questions, you’re right on track. 

What are the Benefits Of Standardized Processes?
Here are 8 of them. 

1) Increased productivity is a given. 

Imagine a solution that could speed up order times, allowing you to fulfill faster. Or what if resources spent less time with double-data entry. What would this do to your org’s productivity factor?

2) Standardization equals quality control. 

Standardization makes your business planning more straightforward. Furthermore, the extrapolated benefits include a more streamlined training/onboarding process.

[caption id="attachment_4949" align="alignleft" width="450"]Zoho ERP fosters internal collaboration Transparency in your organization help your teams identify best-in-class best practices, remove redundancies, and share expertise across departments more easily.[/caption]

3) Make internal collaboration simpler.

When an ERP helps to eliminate siloed information, your teams can begin to collaborate on a deeper level. Transparency in your organization helps your teams identify best-in-class best practices, remove redundancies, and share expertise across departments more easily. 

4) You can reduce costs. 

Insight into your manufacturing and distribution data can help you identify and eliminate redundancy, and find areas of material and labor waste.

5) Did you realize you can also gain insight into your customer through analyzing your business processes?  

Find the places where processes might require modifications to better support your customers. As a result, they are more satisfied and you have created return business. And for most businesses, it’s less expensive to keep the customer you have than it is to find a new one.

6) It can help you adapt to changing times.

You don’t have to operate your business on gut feeling, but instead rely on instinct and data together! Plan your changes, implement them, and use metrics you’ve captured to measure the results. Then with the data in mind, create incremental changes toward improvement! All of this is possible with the right manufacturing ERP.

7) Stay ahead of your competition. 

When you are spending less time chasing processes, and more time working, you actually gain productive time. With more productive time, you can focus on the innovations that move your business ahead of your competition. 

8) Utilize a single source of truth for compliance, security, and safety. 

Speaking to many of the points above, standardized processes help in business operations beyond the manufacturing process, and Zoho can help tie everything together with a single source of truth. Solutions from Zoho take pride in security protocols for their softwares, but this translates to your business overall.

Now, if you’ve made it this far, you’re likely a serious candidate for Zoho’s manufacturing ERP solution. And maybe you’re also convinced that ZBrains is the certified Zoho Partner to assist in your implementation. Let’s keep the conversation going!

What is a ZBrains Business Process Analysis for Manufacturing and Distribution ERP solutions from Zoho?

Let’s talk about how an engagement with ZBrains begins – with a Business Process Analysis. We take all the reasoning and research described above, and have applied those same principles to our own assessments. Here’s what that looks like:

This is a BPA with ZBrains

The BPA, or business process analysis, is integral to all ZBrains consulting projects. Just like any other planning effort, it ensures a successful implementation that fits with your business processes.

You also know that the best way to solve a problem is to first fully understand the way a business runs. We start this by analyzing expectations and performance gaps in your business process. Next, we examine your business from the perspective of the world at large. Then, our experts determine what is working, what is not.  Finally, we decide which methods need to be introduced to change the fabric of your company.

We sit with your team to thoroughly review your sales, marketing, operations, and accounting processes to make sure we understand all requirements and current systems. The goal here is to consolidate your business operations into a centralized platform with Zoho as the hub. 

After the BPA, you receive expert recommendations on changes, augmentations or implementations required to meet your goals. We share a timeline, goals, and outline targets. You receive a strategy that can be executed with precision to create a successful business plan for the upcoming quarters and beyond.

This is how we work with Manufacturers and Distributors

Many of our clients are in manufacturing and distribution industries, and our speciality is small to medium businesses, just like yours. Here’s what a Business Process Analysis with ZBrains looks like for you:

We often work with a single champion, normally a President, Vice President, or other C-level representative of the company. And when we begin our intake sessions of a BPA, it’s of the utmost importance to bring in – and hear from – everyone in the organization who will be using the new manufacturing ERP software from Zoho. That includes: Sales and Estimating teams, Production, Inventory Management representatives, and Finance. 

The reason is to ensure that we get a global perspective of the business, and we find that this also encourages user adoption later on!

What information do we gather during a BPA?

During these sessions with each department or team representative, we collect a lot of detailed information about their processes. Discussions with your teams will often include the following:

[caption id="attachment_4951" align="alignright" width="450"]ZBrains BPA for manufacturing ERP Business process analysis is integral to all ZBrains consulting projects, and ensures a successful implementation that fits with your business processes.[/caption]

Sales and Estimating

We ask about your sales process. Then, we look at how your quotes or estimates are created and shared. How are you handling new leads, and how is existing business addressed? How do you measure success? And finally, what are the important KPI’s here?

Production

How do you procure goods? Are you purchasing or manufacturing parts? Do you have composite items and  a need for CPQ? What does is your current process for handling bill of materials, work orders,  and routing? How are you handling time tracking? We also get into your potential needs for planning capacity, batch/lot tracking, and on site maintenance, to name a few.

Inventory Management

We go into detail about your inventory management processes including current and desired states. Do you have multiple warehouses, mobile warehouses? How are you handling order fulfillment? What about installation or service components?

Finance

We’ll drill down to completely understand what information is required from your front office to back office. We include review of documents for customers, all the way through to which data is required in order to  generate executive reports. 

Other Integrations

During consultation, we’ll also ask about your current integrations to determine compatibility and to see if any new integrations could benefit your business processes. Some of the Zoho integrations commonly used by manufacturing and distribution organizations include: ShipStation, TaxJar, Avalara, QuickBooks (Online and Desktop), and Xero for example. 

Establishing Budget and Timeline for Manufacturing and Distribution ERP Software Implementation

[caption id="attachment_4952" align="alignleft" width="450"]Zoho ERP for manufacturing SMB Zoho is built and designed for SMB (Small and Medium-Sized Businesses). Lower total cost of ownership and an accessible startup cost make it a clear choice.[/caption]

A large business who is taking on system implementation for major softwares, can often anticipate a six-figure implementation cost, along with another five figures for service costs. And that’s because these softwares are incredibly robust, and very powerful enterprise tools. We understand that for a small or medium business like yours, this is simply out of the question. These projects can be extremely cost prohibitive, and the solutions themselves are more often than not complete overkill in terms of your needs.

  • Not to say you don’t deserve a solution that is also robust in functionality and nuanced for your business, because you do! For SMB’s like you, Zoho is a great solution. 
  • It’s less expensive to implement and has a lower total cost of ownership.
  • Zoho applications are built to suit your business through customization using rapid development platforms like Zoho Creator.
  • Zoho is accessible. They built and designed it with the SMB in mind. Need a custom field? A new report? Drag and drop functions make it easy to use and customize for yourself, all with enterprise functionality. 

In our industry, it’s known that a large portion of technology projects have a low user adoption. Users become bogged down because the projects are overly complicated. When you can build your system to address nuances of your business  – and consider user feedback in the build – you get better user adoption and a higher chance of success. For this reason, and many of the points discussed above, your budget and timeline will depend on the complexity of your requirements and depth of need. 

This is why we utilize the Business Process Analysis. Hopefully, this in depth look at business process management and manufacturing ERP softwares has been useful. If you’re interested in the next steps or have any questions, our Zoho Certified Consultants are ready to help – just get in touch!

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Zoho Monthly Updates from ZBrains

Zoho Updates, New Features, and Issues | May 2021

It’s been another busy month at ZBrains, and a number of Zoho updates May 2021 along with new features were shared with us from Zoho Corp. We’ve done our best to condense it all to the need-to-know basics.

Most notably this month, beginning May 1, 2021, all functions that use authtokens while making calls to other Zoho services will fail. (More details in the article below.) Hopefully, you’re already prepared, but remember that the ZBrains team is here to support you – just let us know how we can help.

Keep reading for the What’s New, Zoho Updates May 2021. 

 

New Features from Zoho

Zoho CRM

  1. “Automatic transitions in blueprint: Use automatic transition to prevent delays and discontinuity of a process. The automatic transition will ensure that records move to the destination state after a specified Wait time has elapsed.”
  2. “Blueprints now supports widgets: Perform custom actions, such as locating an address on a map, blocking a date on a calendar and more via Blueprint using Widgets. Widgets can be used in the During Transition settings.”
  3. “Multi-user and multi-select lookup fields supported in blueprints: During Transition you can use multi-select lookup fields as well as multi-user fields. These fields can be mandated but cannot be validated.”

 

Zoho Books

This month, we’ve seen two notable improvements in Zoho Books that now allow you to do the following: 

  1. Beyond invoices, now you can execute an advanced search for all transactions.
  2. In the Banking modules, you are now able to add comments and view transaction history

 

Zoho Inventory

The Zoho Inventory team shared some great news for online sellers and drop shippers with the new third party billing feature for UPS users. It’s available for all editions and all subscription plans. The Zoho team says, “This feature is targeted at drop-shippers who work with other vendors to supply goods to end customers.”

 

ZOHO UPDATESApplication Updates from Zoho

General Zoho Ecosystem Updates

We’ve shared about the OAuth authentication upgrade, and deprecation of authtokens across all Zoho systems the past few months. Beginning May 1, 2021, all functions that use authtokens while making calls to other Zoho services will fail.

If you’ve noticed system issues, and require support, please contact us. You can schedule any time that works for you here Connect with a Consultant

What is OAuth2.0? This industry-standard protocol specification that enables third-party applications (clients) to gain delegated access to protected resources in Zoho via an API. 

OAuth 2.0 is a benefit for these reasons and more:

    •  Increased security and easier user/credentials management,
    • Improvement to industry standard protocol for easier communications between Zoho apps,
    • Access tokens expire, limiting data exposure in the instance of a security breach.

 

Zoho CRM 

Two alternate solutions provided for CRM Plug-in for Microsoft Office are:

 

Zoho BugsIssues Notices from Zoho

 Zoho Creator

Zoho Creator has published messages about a few improvements and fixes this month, including to the iOS app.

    1. “The record owner property that was previously available in the user’s field properties section is now moved to form properties. You can find it in Form Properties under Role Hierarchy section. Added user will be the default setting for record owner. The dropdown list will display the list of user fields for you to select from.”source 
    2. The iOS v 2.5.2 of customer portal quick filter in maps is repaired, in addition there have been some overall performance improvements and minor fixes for version 5.26.13 of Creator iOS app.

 

Finding what you need in these updates?  Or are you looking for something additional? Drop a line in the comments to let us know what info helps you most! 


 

If you have questions or would like to connect with one of our consultants, schedule below. We’re also available by phone, just call our offices at (888) 207-4111.

 

Connect with a Consultant

 

Learn about Zoho Support from ZBrains

What You Should Know About Zoho Support Plans

When you decide to invest in Zoho support, whether that’s an ongoing, monthly support contract or hourly support agreement, your business gets timely, professional service for software updates, break/fixes, bug fixes, new feature development, and a lot more. From right-the-first-time answers for ‘quick questions’ to assistance with long-term Zoho ecosystem planning and support to meet your business goals, we’re talking today about all the things you should know about software support plans from ZBrains.

What is software support?

Zoho support plans typically take one of two forms; long term support and incident-based help. We like this simple definition as a starting point:

“Software support services are generally technical support or break/fix services that are delivered for specific software products. These services include revenue derived from long-term technical-support contracts or pay-as-you-go, incident-based support. Software support services typically include remote troubleshooting capabilities, installation (implementation) assistance and basic usability assistance.” 

gartner.com

It’s easy to see the scenarios in your business where a support plan for Zoho CRM, Zoho One, or your custom Zoho solution could come in handy; however, have you considered all the possible ways that investing in Zoho Support can benefit your organization?

What do Zoho support services at ZBrains include?

 

[caption id="attachment_4906" align="alignleft" width="400"] If you are already using Zoho, ask yourself if now is the time to start using your support plan to further your business initiatives.[/caption]

1) New product implementation services

If you are already using Zoho, ask yourself if any of these scenarios sound familiar:

    • Is now the time for phase 2 or phase 3 of diminishing siloed data in your organization? You can implement those solutions through your support plan
    • Is it time to reduce double data entry by integrating your CRM and financial software solution?

    • Or perhaps you need to cut down on double data entry from your e-commerce solution? We offer a full range of 3rd party integrations, and can even build a custom integration to suit your needs! We integrate Zoho and Shopify as one example.

2) Zoho product updates

Maybe you have an associate or in-house resource who’s in charge of keeping IT solutions operating seamlessly, but Zoho or your customized Zoho application like FieldTech is just a little outside their wheelhouse. Stay on top of update installations and just email or call the ZBrains Support Team whenever you need help in this area. We’ll help you keep running smoothly through every, numerous, Zoho update!

3) Proactive, not just reactive services

We believe proactive planning is one of the greatest functions of any ongoing support plan. We like to plan quarterly sessions with our clients. This ensures that we know your current business goals. Then your Zoho ecosystem is charged and ready to take on success! Your business won’t miss a beat.

Because we’re a Certified Zoho Partner, we have great insight to what’s coming up  from Zoho that you could potentially use, too. This takes the guesswork out of what you ‘could do’ and helps maximize the value of your Zoho purchase.

And don’t forget, you’re getting a personalized level of support in any situation. 

4) Support for custom applications

Maybe you’re using a custom application that doesn’t work well with Zoho, or you’ve already optimized for your custom needs with a  Zoho Solution. Support services can help you keep them always running optimally. 

Whether we built it, or are inheriting a solution built by others, our support team can solve complex problems in applications that might not be working optimally for you now.

5) Product or feature implementation 

Current ZBrains clients know this because they’ve been through the Business Process Analysis with us. And because we use this process with each client, we understand your business, we know your business, and we can advise on best practices of how a Zoho feature can be applied to what you do and how. 

Software support contract pricing with ZBrains

[caption id="attachment_4904" align="alignleft" width="400"] Why would you want hourly support and a monthly support plan from ZBrains? Having control over your costs is just the start![/caption]

We make it really easy with two options, an hourly support contract, or a monthly one. We offer these options to give you the best solution for your business. 

Many clients opt for both and here’s why:

Their monthly plan gives them access for break-and-fix when they don’t have a dedicated in-house resource, and then they use the ad hoc hourly service to optimize, take advantage of new features, or plan future initiatives.

Let’s talk about the benefits to each, and you’ll see how they can fold together for the best coverage and control of expenses.


Hourly Zoho Support Plans

At ZBrains, our hourly support contracts include the availability of consulting services for your projects that require additional Zoho customization, integrations with other software systems, even our proprietary integrations for software like QuickBooks!

We recommend this service for experienced Zoho users. Also, for businesses that already have a dedicated resource for Zoho needs, but might need occasional assistance with highly technical aspects of Zoho. Additionally, we recommend this for very small businesses with  simplified systems that are not heavily customized. You can use hourly support as needed. Support hours are sold in blocks of 8 hours, and expire one year from purchase. With your Zoho Support Hours from ZBrains, you can:

    • Dedicate some of your hours to education/training to stay on top of the ever-changing and improving Zoho experience.
    • Use your hours for quarterly planning and support your business growth plan.
    • Earmark some of your hours to new implementations and take them bit by bit for better user adoption.
    • Plan to use some hours to break fixes. Now, your teams aren’t left hanging when something isn’t working quite right.

You can be proactive with hourly support! It gives dedicated time toward understanding and implementing best practices, and lets your optimizations become incremental instead of large projects that need more time. Take time now, and complete more, smaller work items over time, and next thing you know, you’re more agile.


Monthly Zoho Support Plans

We recommend this plan for clients with no in-house resources, highly customized solutions, and/or who have a lot of Zoho-to-Zoho integrations. 

    • The greatest benefit to investing in monthly support is stability: you control and anticipate the expense of break-and-fix service, and ensure your Zoho system is always primed for peak performance with no surprises. 

Both of these options help with reaching your business goals in a measured manner. They keep you aligned with a budget, and keep you on top of the game in terms of your Zoho ecosystem and business operations. Still unsure what the best approach is? Our team is always here to talk through it with you – just let us know!


ZBrains makes Zoho support straightforward and accessible

Zoho Support, Zoho CRM Support, and more are all just an email away. At ZBrains, our Zoho Certified Consultants and Developers are US-based, and with a simple email to our Support team, your ticket (via Zoho Desk, of course!) gets routed directly to the person or people who can help. 

We hope this article has been helpful in understanding what Zoho Support with ZBrains can do for your organization. If you’re already on a plan and have questions – let us know. Or if you’re new to Zoho Support from ZBrains – get in touch today!

GET ZOHO SUPPORT FROM ZBRAINS

What's new at Zoho April 2021

Zoho Updates, New Features, and Issues | April 2021

The past month marked 25 years of Zoho! Did you realize they’ve been around this long? Founder, Sridhar Vembu posted a great retrospective sharing “25 Years of Zoho,” the story of how Zoho grew these past many years. Don’t miss the video at the end featuring some of Zoho’s longest employees, and maybe some familiar faces. Congratulations, Zoho Corp, on 25 years! 


On to what’s new – in the past month, Zoho Creator team has shared a number of updates, bug fixes, and improvements including Zoho Creator On Premise solution. We also saw a Zoho CRM release for V2.

Keep reading for the What’s New, Zoho Updates April 2021. 

 

New Features from Zoho

Zoho Creator

  • Zoho Creator On-premise has been released. It shares many similarities with the cloud version, allowing you to manage data, create reports, track events, collaborate, and more. It also boasts security in terms of data privacy compliance.
  • You can learn about the differences between on-premise vs cloud instances of Zoho  Creator in this article. 
  • In response to the release of Microsoft Power BI Desktop version 2, Zoho Creator will be upgrading the connector to this version.

ZOHO UPDATESApplication Updates from Zoho

Zoho CRM 

  • Seven new APIs have been released in Zoho CRM version 2.1. This includes: pipeline, assignment rules, send mail, download fields’ attachments in a module, records’ count in a module, wizards, and templates for email and inventory.
  • Additionally, there are updates to existing APIs for records, blueprints, tags and more. 
  • Get all of the details for Zoho CRM V2.1 updates here

Zoho Creator Updates

  • You can now publish to multiple clients and remain unaffected by gaps in versions.
  • Changes to Creator’s Account Setup module include:
    • A new section for integrations to be used in managing Zoho Directory and Connections. 
    • A Marketplace section is now included where custom apps and extensions are featured.
    • General settings is the new location for Workspace management.
  • Creator applications listed under Backup and Restore module now use the app name instead of the app link. 

Zoho BugsIssues Notices from Zoho

Zoho Creator

  • The Creator Android version 6.4.0 fixed a few bugs and improved applications stability. 
  • Version 6.4.1 of Creator Android also had multiple bug fixes to enhance the overall application performance.
  • Many additional bug fix details are available on the Creator release notes

Are these updates helpful for you?  Want to see something more or different? Let us know in the comments!


If you have any questions or would like to schedule assistance around any of these updates please contact our consultants or call our offices at (888) 207-4111.

Connect with a Consultant

Zoho Project planning

Zoho Project Success: Understanding ZBrains’ Implementation Process

When you’re in the process of researching partners for your next Zoho project, CRM implementation, or Zoho integration, it’s important to understand how your selected partner works. You’ll want to understand how much involvement is required from you and your team, and what to expect at each stage. ZBrains believes in transparency and partnership throughout our project process, working with you and your team from the start to ensure good outcomes. We want to be sure that your business can meet its goals again and again with the help of systems from Zoho, and this method has proven successful.

Let’s dive into the process, and don’t miss the infographic outline at the end of this article!

The ZBrains Business Process Analysis and Project Approach

Zoho project meetingFirst, we start with our Business Process Analysis [BPA]. We will sit with your team, and over several hours we review your business process together. This includes your wants and needs, and current systems. This gives us the best view of how you are currently working and what opportunities exist to do better.

With this information the ZBrains team spends a few more hours on our own analyzing what we’ve learned to determine the best Zoho solutions and an implementation approach that suits your business.

When you’ve reviewed and accepted the project proposal, we’ll start the work. Here’s how a ZBrains Zoho project comes to life!

• Zoho Project Specification

“Measure twice, cut once” applies here because before anything is built, we make a spec doc based on all your input and our findings during the BPA. It houses all the details that our developers will use going forward.

• ZBrains Implementation Blueprint

Next, we build a draft, or a sort of blueprint of your Zoho implementation. This includes all of the inputs, or places to house the data you need your system to capture in order to effectively operate your business.

Once the inputs are in place, ZBrains begins to build all of the outputs you need. This includes reports, documents, pages, and the rest of the things you require to communicate the work that your Zoho system does.

ZBrains Implementation Process

• Project Integration

Then it’s time to put all of the pieces together! We create all of the wiring needed to integrate your solution, including workflow automation and business logic.

The integration part of your solution is where you gain efficiencies and can potentially simplify or automate rote work.

• Zoho Project Implementation

When your build is complete, next up is implementation:

  • We work through user acceptance testing (UAT) to ensure that your requirements are met.
  • Your team gets involved with training, so they’re ready to use the new system.
  • Your experience will uncover needs and inform change management, so we can get everything just right.
  • When that is set, ZBrains migrates your up-to-date data to the new system.
  • We plan a launch, and your Zoho system goes live!

The good news is that after implementation, you’re not left on your own. ZBrains stays connected for support and post-care so that your Zoho implementation is successful for the long haul!

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Click to download a pdf
Zoho Project Implementation Process
Zoho Updates March 2021

Zoho Updates, New Features, and Issues | March 2021

Have you noticed the continued improvements and user interface changes in Zoho CRM lately? There have been more in the past month to make small tasks simpler and more straightforward, and there have been continued improvements to security in the app.  Zoho Creator also had a few bug fixes and Zoho Updates March 2021 that we note below. 

Is there other information would you like to see about Zoho each month? Let us know in the comments.

Here are your What’s New, Zoho Updates March 2021. 

 

New Features from Zoho

Zoho CRM

  • Enjoy a few new feature perks in the Zoho CRM Module views. These UI improvements allow you to expand or collapse the smart filter in both Kanban and list views. You can also select whether to wrap or clip text within fields. Lastly, the “create and import record” buttons are grouped together in a dropdown-style button.
  • CRM improvements for remote work management were released in February. If you’re not already using Zoho Cliq and Zoho Meeting, or have a subscription to them, the bundle is available and will allow your teams to: “Share a record, report, dashboard, send workflow notification and activity reminders. Conduct online meetings with your team or clients from CRM meetings. Use audio or video conferencing and screen sharing features to give live demonstrations and quickly resolve support issues. Read more about Zoho Meetings.” Take a look at it here or contact us anytime to get your subscription started!
  • When adding multiple currencies, system-defined fields for Currency and Exchange Rate can be removed if needed. You can learn more about managing multiple currencies in Zoho CRM here.

 

ZOHO UPDATESApplication Updates from Zoho

Zoho CRM

  • Continued security improvements to Zoho CRM include introduction of the feature to configure which IP’s are allowed to access CRM. This means you can ensure your data in Zoho CRM is not accessed only from secure networks. This Security Policy can be applied to individual users, specific roles, or to a group. Find it in Zoho CRM Setup> Zoho Directory > Security Policies > Allowed IP’s.
  • CRM allows you to now edit a portal tab for your customers. Select from modules and layouts that you want your portal user to access, then define their level of access and permissions. Now your clients can enter information into their CRM records! Learn more about that set up or contact us anytime for support.

Zoho Creator Updates

  • Introducing Mobile SDK “We are introducing the Zoho Creator Software Development Kit for your Android and iOS apps. This will equip you to build custom Android and iOS apps with multiple features and functionalities. You will also be able to design your app’s UI with autonomy, wherein you can incorporate your organization’s internal style guide. Please refer to our Android and iOS help guides for more details.” 
  • Once again, Zoho Creator V1 integration deprecation is pushed out. You’ll have a bit more time through the month of March to complete these updates. This is a great time to schedule your migration support, if you still need it. Please don’t hesitate to contact us for support.

 

Zoho IssuesIssues Notices from Zoho

 Zoho Creator

  • Zoho Creator app updates this month for both Android and iOS. Be sure to update if you’re using these. iOS Update 5.26.7 of Creator fixed a bug related to adding records from the previous version of Zoho Creator. There are some nice updates in Version 6.3.7 of the Creator Android app, including the ability to switch between workspaces, and file upload now allows up to 50 MB making work on the mobile app even easier.
  • Effective February 16, 2021 WorldPay support as a connection in Zoho Creator has been deprecated.
  • Additionally, fixes are now in place for subform field columns in detail view of report. Version 3.4.6 of Customer Portal app fixes bugs related to feedback logs in Zoho Creator.

 

Are these updates helpful for you?  Want to see something more or different? Let us know in the comments!

 


 

If you have any questions or would like to schedule assistance around any of these updates please contact our consultants or call our offices at (888) 207-4111.

 

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Read about Zoho Updates for February 2021

Zoho Updates, New Features, and Issues | February 2021

This month’s updates section includes some very important changes in Zoho CRM and Zoho Finance applications like Zoho Books, Zoho Expense, Zoho Inventory, Zoho Invoice, and Zoho Subscriptions. We recommend taking a look to see if your system could be impacted, and as always – we’re here to support and answer any questions you may have. 

What other updates or information would you like to see each month? Let us know in the comments.

Here are your What’s New, Zoho Updates February 2021. 

 

New Features from Zoho

Zoho CRM

  • CRM Products is seeing some nice enhancements and now you can customize the Product Line Item in Inventory module. What does this mean for you? First off, the release of this feature will be in phases, so you may already see it available. When it is available to you, you can now add or remove fields, modify field properties, change existing formula expressions, and inset aggregate and formula fields. Lastly, the number of fields that can be added has increased to 10 for subforms and aggregate fields.
    If you have any questions about this change, or are interested in taking full advantage of Products in your Zoho CRM, our Zoho Certified Consultants are ready to help.

ZOHO UPDATESApplication Updates from Zoho

 

Zoho CRM

  • UPDATE 2/12/21: Zoho Corp has decided to “postpone the inclusion of the integration tasks in API credits to May 31, 2021.”  And  API Limit notifications will be sent to admins when the APIs’ daily limit reaches 80, 90, and 100%. 
  • Changes to integration tasks beginning February 15th, 2021 include that these tasks will begin to consume API credits on that date. First announced three months ago, you can view more information here
  • If you have reached the API credit limit for your organization, Zoho CRM will send an email with the subject “Attention: Your API credit limit reached 100%.” Zoho subject matter experts anticipate that the existing “API limit” will be sufficient for most users. However, if your system has many integrations, especially those using third party applications, you may wish to take a deeper look and see if any optimization is available to improve and avoid additional API call charges. Contact us any time.

Zoho Finance Applications

  • Updates to improve security across Zoho Finance products will impact Zoho Books, Zoho Expense, Zoho Inventory, Zoho Invoice, and Zoho Subscriptions. Authtokens are being deprecated March 1, 2021 in favor or OAuth 2.0 for the benefits of:
    •  Increased security and easier user/credentials management,
    • Improvement to industry standard protocol for easier communications between Zoho apps,
    • Access tokens expire, limiting data exposure in the instance of a security breach.

If you’re using any of the applications mentioned here, you are potentially impacted. Schedule a support consultation with our team today – just use the contact us button at the end of this article.

Zoho Creator

  • We’ve been talking about changes in Zoho Creator and updates to it for quite some time now. Effective February 3, 2021 the V2 APIs are in place and V1 integration tasks are deprecated. If you’re finding yourself experiencing issues with any custom applications using Zoho Creator, and missed our previous messages, please don’t hesitate to contact us for support.

Zoho BugsIssues Notices from Zoho

 Zoho Creator

  • Using Creator iOS app? Be sure you update to 5.25.5, this month rolled out several fixes to minor issues that you might have noticed.

Finding the updates helpful?  Let us know in the comments if there’s anything else we can do to help provide you with the latest from Zoho and make your day easier.


If you have any questions or would like to schedule assistance around any of these updates please contact our consultants or call our offices at (888) 207-4111.

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