What is an ERP system?

ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) is a system that brings a company’s operations together in one place: inventory, orders, purchases from suppliers, purchase prices, and accounting. The online store is then one of the channels that uses this dataset, rather than a separate entity with its own version of the truth about how much of each item is in stock.

For online sales, the most important factor is what the ERP system knows about availability. When the store sells a product, the ERP system removes it from inventory; when a delivery or return comes in, the inventory is replenished. Without this synchronization, the store will sooner or later sell something it doesn’t have, and the customer will find out only after paying.

The line between their responsibilities can be confusing, because the ERP system and the store often describe the same product. The store is responsible for the presentation and what the customer sees, while the ERP system handles what the company actually has in stock and how much it cost. Problems arise when the online store handles something the ERP system cannot map - for example, when it sells bundles consisting of several products, while the ERP system only recognizes individual items. In such cases, you must decide which system will manage this information before launching your first campaign.