Microsoft Great Plains & CRM in Transportation & Logistics ? Overview

Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains and MS CRM (client relation management system) are very popular in various industries and market niches. In previous article we described Microsoft Great Plains implementation for transportation & logistics company. Having more material, we would like to share with you how you can leverage Microsoft Business Solutions products to automate your business. We'll try to be both technical and business processes specific and be laconic to comply the rules of tiny article.

? Cargo/Shipment Tracking System. Transportation & Logistics industry is pretty mature and you more likely have industry standard (like Efreight) or custom system. So, if you plan to implement new ERP ? it should be tightly integrated with your cargo tracking system.

? Customer Base. This is the question of the core application. If you have to sell to a large number of prospects and track their relatively small shipments ? you should first consider Microsoft CRM, which has Sales and Service modules. In this case ? you should enable shipment status lookup from MS CRM screens. In the case when you ship to limited number of large customers ? you are focusing on the profitability of the shipments and looking at Great Plains as the core system.

? Agent Settlement. This seems to be logistics industry feature. You use agents and settle their AR/AP invoices on the monthly or weekly basis. In Great Plains you should use customer/vendor consolidation, available for Great Plains Professional version. Plus you will need Great Plains Dexterity or .Net customization to link SOP and POP invoices in the settlement process.

? eConnect. Each logistics business has unique business processes and this is why we see software developers in staff plus strong IT department. This makes eConnect (Microsoft Great Plains SDK) very popular among logistics companies. You can create Great Plains objects: Customers, Invoices, Purchase Orders, etc. Plus it allows you to eliminate GP licenses cost ? you can have users work with Great Plains through web forms

? Integration Technology. In the case of both Great Plains and Microsoft CRM you use MS SQL Server linked server technology. Then you deploy MS CRM SDK, Dexterity, Heterogeneous Stored Procedures.

? Programming Tools. You use Visual Studio.Net to program MS CRM lookups, in some cases you can use WebMatrix, but we do not recommend tools, which do not have rich debugging features.

? Reporting. Crystal Reports is the tool of choice. You should create heterogeneous SQL view and base you Crystal Report on this view. Microsoft CRM security suggests you to use MS CRM SDK or built-in Crystal Reports Enterprise to comply.

? MS CRM Messaging. Microsoft CRM Exchange connector has relatively straightforward mechanism ? GUID in the message header. If you need advanced messaging ? capturing emails, based on contact email or domain ? you main consider advanced connector, developed and supported by Alba Spectrum Technologies. In some cases you would like to use Lotus Notes Domino as email server ? this is also possible.

You can always have us help you, give us a call: 1-630-961-5918 or 1-866-528-0577, help@albaspectrum.com

Andrew Karasev is consultant and CTO in Alba Spectrum Technologies ( http://www.albaspectrum.com ) ? Microsoft Business Solutions partner, serving clients in Illinois, New York, California, Florida, Georgia, Texas, Arizona, Virginia, Minnesota, Canada, UK, Europe, Australia, Asia, Russia. He is Microsoft Great Plains certified master, Great Plains Dexterity, Microsoft CRM SDK C#.Net, Crystal Repots developer.

---

Microsoft Great Plains eCommerce: overview for developer

Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains was designed back in the... Read More

Microsoft CRM Integration With Microsoft Office Documents ? Overview For System Integrator

Microsoft CRM is CRM application, maintained and supported by Microsoft... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains: Dexterity vs. eConnect ? FAQ

Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains, former Great Plains Software Dynamics/eEnterprise... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains Integrations - Tips for Developer

In this short FAQ style article we would like to... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains Security Setup - Overview For Consultant

Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains is very good fit for... Read More

Partitioning, Formatting and Reinstalling in Windows 98

Formatting and reinstalling windows 98 is very easy if you... Read More

Microsoft Business Solutions Partner ? How to Launch New IT Consulting Practice

In the new era of internet marketing the problem of... Read More

Best Spyware Removers

Finding the best spyware removers to detect and remove spyware... Read More

Protect Your Computer...and Your Business!

We all take the computer for granted. I mean, all... Read More

Microsoft C# vs. VB.Net

Hi, Guys,I believe a lot of programmers are trying to... Read More

How To Make Good Use of Spreadsheets

Most computer users use spreadsheets software such as Microsoft Excel... Read More

Groupware and Online Collaboration: Collaboration Series #4

This article is the fourth of a series of articles... Read More

Where to Find Free Fleet Maintenance Software

Costs of fleet maintenance software can vary widely. It is... Read More

How Do I Get Rid Of That Darn Spyware?

Ad-Aware and Spybot are probably the two most well known... Read More

Will Adobe Manage to Replace Industry Work Horse Quark Express by Giving Adobe InDesign for Free?

And kill the best layout software in the process of... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains Customization and Development ? Overview for Programmer

When Great Plains Software was designing and developing Great Plains... Read More

Will Adobe Manage to Replace Industry Work Horse Quark Express by Giving Adobe InDesign for Free?

Heard about the Quark "killer"?Adobe InDesign CS2. Will it really... Read More

Dont Choose Adobe When Working With PDF

While Adobe is the most known maker of PDF tools,... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains in Construction & Building ? Implementation & Customization Highlights

Microsoft Great Plains could be tuned and setup to fit... Read More

MSN Messenger Is A Sweet Way To Communicate

MSN messenger is a pretty cool invention. I mean I'm... Read More

Who Is Minding Your Sensitive Data?

Stealing company information used to be the specialty of spies... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains BR: Bank Reconciliation

Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains is marketed for mid-size companies... Read More

Microsoft CRM Integration with Lotus Notes Domino: Messaging Connector ? Future Directions

IBM Lotus Notes Domino and Microsoft CRM (Client Relation Management)... Read More

Microsoft CRM: Implementation, Customization, Support ? Consultant Overview

Microsoft Business Solutions CRM is present several years on the... Read More

Start Developing Your Own Software

Learning how to program software seems like a daunting task... Read More

Unwanted Files

A LOT OF UNWANTED FILES.When you uninstall an item of... Read More

The Death of Windows

I have always regretted how Microsoft price gouges and rips... Read More

Off The Record - Tips For Picking Recording Software

Need software to record your voice, streaming audio or musical... Read More

Managing Stress in the Computer Industry - Five Steps to a Stress-free Life

It would be easy to think, like most people apparently... Read More

40/sec to 500/sec

IntroductionSurprised, by the title? well, this is a tour of... Read More

C++ Function Templates

C++ Function templates are those functions which can handle different... Read More

Microsoft Great Plains Subcontracting ? Overview for Microsoft Business Solutions Partner

Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains is very popular ERP/MRP applications... Read More

Spyware, Adware, etc. -- Terms and Common Sense

When reading an article where some term is used often,... Read More