​With each passing day and for Brands of all stages, Amazon is becoming increasingly important as a sales and marketing channel. As Brands seek to answer the “Amazon Question” themselves, one of the first considerations is “Where does Amazon fit within the Organization?”

If you find yourself in this situation, or perhaps are simply revisiting your approach, I would stress that the ‘Where It Fits’ is less important than ‘How You Serve’. Amazon will not fit perfectly within any traditional silo in your organization, and understanding the web of dependencies that stretch across your organization is the key consideration as you build out your Amazon Business Unit and support network. 
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There is a lot to answering the ‘Amazon Question’, but in an attempt to make it more approachable, let’s first level-set on the dynamics of what we call ‘Operational Marketing’.
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• Amazon is more than just another sales channel
• Amazon requirements are unique, with dependencies across your organization
• Facilitating cross-functional communication is critical to your success
• Every functional area must have an understanding of the platform to ensure proper decision making

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​ In my last post I discussed ‘The Amazon Game’ where I touched upon the concept of ‘Operational Marketing’. 
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A quick recap: Your Amazon Search Ranking is inexorably linked to any type of conversion (paid or organic). Any fall-off in conversions, for whatever reason, are quickly punished by Amazon’s algorithms. Thus, all functions that have influence on a customer’s ability or willingness to purchase must be in harmony in supporting the channel.  We call this paradigm ‘Operational Marketing’. 
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​We define Operational Marketing as:

 “A state in which your operational functions inform and affect your marketing efforts, while your marketing efforts inform and affect your operations”

It could be argued that this maxim has always been true, but it has taken the emergence of Amazon to clearly demonstrate its importance. 

I have been around long enough to remember when e-commerce wasn’t a thing.  In the early 2000’s, I had the opportunity to launch a Fortune 200 Company’s first Direct-to-Consumer channel, and saw first-hand the organizational inertia that had to be overcome. 
Times certainly have changed but to say that the problem has been addressed would be an overstatement.  Amazon, and e-commerce generally, require a specific focus especially as organizational processes have historically been built around the needs of Brick & Mortar channels. 

For Amazon, inventory needs to be allocated, marketing purposefully designed, packaging reworked, and derivative models developed to improve the economics of the channel. And unlike the rest of your channels, where there is a buyer to please and floor spots for which to compete, Amazon leaves merchants largely to their own devices (outside of those dreaded chargebacks). There is no squeaky wheel to keep you on top of your game.

And less apparent, there are many decisions made in an organization that at first glance seem unrelated to Amazon but can come back to bite you. This can include decisions such as how you utilize distribution and structure contracts, the pricing and programs you offer across channels and regions, and how you and your trade partners manage SKU obsolescence and floor changeovers.  If you don’t know where your products are from cradle to grave, and at what cost they were procured, you run the risk of derailing your Amazon business.
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It is for this reason I recommend your entire organization have an understanding of Amazon and frame any decision-making with your Amazon presence in mind… regardless of where it ranks in your sales mix.
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​Having worked with hundreds of brands over the years, I have seen many achieve stellar success with Amazon, but have also witnessed the many ways in which things can go wrong. Covering them all is not feasible, but for the sake of this discussion consider the following baseline goals for the platform:

1. Win the Buy Box
2. Never Stock Out
3. Eliminate Resellers
4. Price Competitively
5. Build Strong Reviews (Product and Seller)
6. Tightly Manage End-of-Life
7. Grow Search Relevancy

To give you a sense of the interconnectedness of the Amazon channel, let us first start with this (over) simplified org chart, found in many consumer products brands. 
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For the sake of this discussion I’ve placed Amazon within the Sales Channel, though have also seen it roll-up through Marketing or eCommerce, with the work possibly outsourced in part or in whole.

Structured by function, each column supports the others in achieving those baseline goals, but otherwise operate within their own silo. And within each silo, the underlying teams may not have full visibility into the activities of the others in their department.
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To add some color, take this simple example. A brick and mortar sales executive’s primary concerns are in hitting their specific channel targets.  And though the negotiations may ultimately impact the Amazon team, it is not at the forefront of their mind… at least no more than is usually considered in managing cross-channel conflict.
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​Zooming in on the Amazon team and mapping the underlying ‘AMAZON REQUIREMENTS’, you can see it is much more than just a sales channel.  And while similar functional support may be needed for the rest of your trade partners, I would argue that only two areas (Demand Forecasting and Warranty) can be transferred wholesale. And in the case of Advertising, Amazon is truly unique. 
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Taking it one step further, I have mapped the ‘SUPPORT FUNCTIONS’ against the ‘AMAZON REQUIREMENTS’ so you can see just how broadly Amazon stretches across your organization. 

The broad requirements of Amazon present a challenge to those who are not living it every day. To be successful on the platform you need quality reviews, polished and purposeful content, and efficient operations and inventory support… all with the distinct Amazon twist. And on-platform advertising, which has become a must-have, is highly dependent on all of the above if you hope to spend efficiently and drive search relevancy (see The Amazon Game). 
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Across all functions there is a virtuous cycle of data and information that needs to be shared across the organization, and with any external support teams.  If you are not circulating the learnings from your customer feedback, sales trends, financial performance, and advertising and operational data, your stakeholders will be blind to important context that can help guide and influence decision making.
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Organizations that treat Amazon as a bolt-on business under their current infrastructure are not only missing an opportunity to build a successful new sales channel, but also on all that can be learned about your customers, your products, and your industry. The channel has unique requirements, and requires cross-functional understanding and support.
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Before you make the call on ‘Where It Fits’, consider first ‘How You Serve’ through breaking down traditional silos and facilitating the lines of communication.  There is gold to be found in your Amazon data, but if you don’t have a means for getting it, reading it, and communicating it across internal and external stakeholders, performance will suffer. Every party has a role to play, and broad organizational buy-in is critical to your success.  
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​As an Amazon software provider working with Brands and Agencies around the world, we at dash / APPLICATIONS have been afforded a unique perspective on the impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on the retail sector. 

It has been a challenging time for businesses small and large, with far-reaching impacts to individuals and families. It has also been an inspiring time, as companies, people, and networks pull together to offer a helping hand to those in need.  And, while we are just a small firm with our own struggles, we wanted to do “what we can, where we can” in the hopes of helping others weather the storm.
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The economic impact of this pandemic may take years to shake out, and while we do have experience working inside Amazon, and across retail and brands generally, the opinions expressed here are ours alone. We hope that these insights, in some small part, help you as you navigate back to normalcy.

​Amazon is positioned better than most in the Retail Sector to come out on top. As customers stay-at-home, Brick & Mortar retailers close their doors (some permanently), and customers migrate online, the ‘everything store’ has become the go-to-option.  The initial rush has passed, with some of it being pull-ahead demand, but the question moving forward will be “has this been a ‘level-up’ event for Amazon as a whole?”. We’re anticipating that indeed it has.

Some of the demand spikes are situational, the run on puzzles for example is a byproduct of people being stuck in their homes and looking for alternative forms of entertainment. Structurally, however, we expect market dynamics to change.

1. If consumers did not have Prime before, they likely do now. Driving Prime Subscriptions has always been core to Amazon’s decision making.  Getting customers into the Amazon ecosystem feeds the flywheel, with Amazon banking on the Life Time Value of Prime Subscribers justifying massive investments with multi-year payoffs. The COVID-19 pandemic will drive subscriptions, with Amazon realizing the benefit moving forward.
2. Categories that have been slow to migrate online (such as grocery and consumables), are getting an unprecedented demand-side pull.  There’s friction to moving grocery online; if you have ever had someone else shop for your produce, you get the point.  But for all those customers who have been hesitant to try it, many now have, and some will continue using the service moving forward.  For this point, Amazon will be one of many to expand in the space, with other established players scaling up their delivery and pick-up services (and keep an eye on the growth of ‘micro-delivery’).

​Brick & Mortar stores will retract, pushing more customers on-line.  This trend has been coming for some time, but the pandemic will accelerate it as underperforming stores shutter, and some businesses fail altogether.  Large Retail outlets will seize upon the opportunity, making deeper cuts now, knowing that the political fallout will be less now than at any point previously.  Small retail outlets, lacking the cash reserves, will be especially hard hit.

If you have shopped on Amazon these last few weeks, you will have seen first-hand the disruption on the platform… stockouts, dated-out delivery promises, and random rules around which items are deemed essential.  If you are a seller or vendor, you may be experiencing a drop off in your PO’s, Inbound Shipping delays, wild swings in sales, or new policies rolling out every day about pricing rules or storage costs. Most would assume it will eventually return to normal, and there is no reason we would believe otherwise but if you are curious what is going on within the walls of Amazon… here is our perspective.

Amazon has been on a constant push towards streamlining their operations while they scale their offering and distribution footprint.  Forecasting, Buying, Receiving, Distributing, and Fulfilling the tens of millions of ASINs is no easy task, and beginning in 2013 they began pushing towards true ‘automation’ of these business functions.

The models have continually improved since then, but still were never built to handle volatility like this.  Further, there is no longer the institutional knowledge to put “hands back on the wheel”, which means it is falling to the operations technology teams, and not the retail teams, to work through the disruption.  In some ways this is better; the scale of Amazon’s operations is such that humans would be crushed under weight of the challenge.  The downside is that ‘exceptions’ are hard to come by.  If you need to talk to someone to get your receiving prioritized, good luck… it is possible, but you will need to find your way to the right person, with the right authority, who still retains the ability to influence the automated operations.
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In terms of what is actually happening behind the scenes as a result of the pandemic, you have likely read about steps Amazon is taking at their fulfillment centers, and maybe about their remote working policy at Corporate… but perhaps not on what is happening on the systems side.  I will spare you the ‘inside baseball’, but the most important takeaway is that demand signals are completely unreliable, and Amazon will struggle for months to return to their normal levels of efficiency.  The data from March through May (at the least) is ‘corrupt’ and will require causals and dampening to limit the impact to the models going forward.  

​Consumers will make do, and may not even notice once normal shipping speed is restored.  Vendors however should expect that the Amazon purchasing volatility will continue long after the world has returned to normal (new normal).  For Sellers, capturing and interpreting your operational and advertising data during this time is critically important.  You will need it when time comes to forecast sales, plan your inventory and replenishment, and build your financial forecasts, etc. 

​As we at dash APPLICATIONS oversee massive amounts of advertising data, we can say with certainty that these times are not normal.  We will share a bit of what we are seeing here.

So, the good news, for Brands that are ‘winning’ on the platform now, it will be a ‘level-up’ event like Q4. Strong conversion rates, across both paid and organic, will build search relevancy and increase sales moving forward. Maintaining ‘in-stock status’ with Amazon’s inbound capacity constraints will be a challenge, but for those that can weather the storm, they will benefit once on the other side. Generally, Performance Metrics have been degrading since the initial rush, and we are interpreting this to be driven as much by the macro economic factors, as by Amazon’s internal reactionary measures.  Still, we see Amazon as customer’s ‘preferred’ e-Commerce retailer, but are not expecting Amazon will be fully immune once we look back on Q2. 
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Advertising, similarly, is offering plenty of opportunities, but staying ahead of the volatility will be an ongoing challenge. We can see in the data how dynamic this environment is, and the platform performance you saw last week will be different from what you’re experiencing now.  With Amazon’s extended attribution window, assessing ‘real-time trends’ is difficult in the best of circumstances, so consider putting more weight on secondary metrics (e.g. Impressions, Clicks, Click-through-rates) as early indicators of performance. 

​With our dash/DATA STUDIO product we are pulling data across hundreds of brands, spanning eight (8) marketplaces and containing time series data for many millions of Search Terms. While by no means a perfect sample, at aggregate levels we are getting a read on the macro platform trends. To avoid distorting the trends, we have segmented the data for just the US Marketplace YTD.

Two (2) points jump out off the page when looking at Spend, Sales, and Advertising Cost of Spend (“ACoS”).

The first, Advertising Spend has largely continued to trend upward throughout the pandemic with peak spend occurring on 3/22 followed by 10 days of softness, then rebounding to the trendline by 4/7.  There is nothing in our data that would indicate a significant disruption to Amazon’s Q1 Ad Revenue.
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Second, ACoS has had significant volatility as customer purchase behavior has swung wildly these past four (4) weeks with the first spike occurring after the initial rush had past, and the second we are experiencing now as customers hunker down and take a tighter grip on their credit cards. 

Layering Impressions data over Spend, Customer purchase behavior, and the reaction of Advertisers, becomes clearer. 
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Amazon was flooded with shoppers starting around 3/13, with Peak Impressions coming on 3/19.  For the initial peak, spend lagged behind Impressions by about 3 days, but once Advertisers recognized how volatile the environment was, they took tighter reins on budgets and drove better alignment between Impressions and Spend during the second spike starting on 4/2. 

Bringing Conversion Rates into view further illustrates the changes in customer purchase behavior these last four (4) weeks.
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Conversion Rates are generally fairly stable in aggregate, with normal ‘day-of-week’ volatility.  But starting on 3/11, over a week before peak traffic, customers began converting at a higher rate.  Conversion Rates actually dropped to normal levels on the day of peak traffic, before settling in at twenty-five percent (25%) below normal levels from 3/22 forward.  Over the past few days, conversion rates have slipped further, which can be understated due to the lookback window, but otherwise stockouts and dated deliveries are taking a heavy toll.

For those who make their livelihood on Amazon, be prepared for a bumpy ride.  It’ll never be more important for synchronized ‘Operational Marketing’ across all stakeholders.

For Advertisers, optimizing to ACoS either directly, or through an ‘automated’ software solution, will not provide sufficient signals to manage through the volatility. The extended attribution window makes this difficult in the best of times.  We recommend paying closer attention to your Impression’s trends at the keyword level, in parallel with your Cost per Clicks (“CPCs”), to monitor for changes in traffic and the competitiveness of the auction.

Staying in-tune with your inventory availability and the promise status of your products should be a daily exercise.  If you are seeing your products with long shipping delays, it will impact your conversion rates. You may want to consider rerouting spend to prioritize other ASINs, or all else fails, pausing your campaigns until your products ‘operations’ have improved. 

If you are a Seller and managing your cash-flows tightly (who isn’t), Amazon pays you after your product has shipped, however you pay for your Ad clicks on an entirely different cycle.  So, if you are experiencing shipping delays on your products, keep a close eye on your Ad budget management to ensure you are not fronting Ad dollars without the sales revenue to support.
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For our dash users, we recommend taking full advantage of our bridging engine. Running daily, day-over-day bridges will pinpoint what is driving changes in performance, and where in your catalog/account to go first. Also, bridge comparisons of your recent performance versus the platform inflection points noted above, may bring you additional optimization insights.

If you found these insights useful, we would love to hear from you.  Our primary focus has been building software solutions, but in these volatile times if we can help shed light on macro trends for the broader benefit, we may do this more often. 
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You can contact us directly through our website, www.dashapplications.com or through email at hello@dashapplications.com.

And if you are struggling with your Amazon performance, we work with Amazon Agencies around the globe, with services ranging from Full-Chanel Management and Distribution, to Advertising and Content specialists.  These agencies are all users of our platform, and thus are highly data-driven and armed to navigate this complex market. 
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For Brands with in-house management teams, our Analytics and Data Management solutions may be of interest.  As we noted, capturing your detailed advertising data will be critically important during this time… before you lose it forever.  And if you are struggling, we also offer training on ‘Operational Marketing’ to help you make the most of the platform.  

Read on to get a quick overview of the main API’s (application programming interfaces) Amazon currently makes available to retrieve and use your data for Amazon marketplace management. We all know Amazon is a beast but the use of these API’s can improve the efficiency and scale of your marketplace management processes…and just maybe prevent you and your team from getting eaten alive.
From a high level, the below Amazon API data sets include Seller Central, inventory and orders management for Seller Central, advertising data for Vendor Central (Amazon Marketing Services) and Seller Central, purchase order management for Vendor Central, affiliate promotion info, and other data points you might need to manage the Amazon channel.
If you’re looking for simple and scalable access to the API’s and related data referenced in this article, please send us a note. Dash currently provides data to agencies and brands from the Amazon Advertising API via our dash/DATA STUDIO solution. And, we’re grinding away to do the same for Marketplace Web Services (MWS) API data, stay tuned!
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The MWS API is your go-to API for Amazon marketplace management if you are a 3P seller of products on the Seller Central platform. This is also the API that many software developers leverage to build tools related to Amazon channel management — from listing content feeds to inventory and orders management, MWS contains a ton of useful information for 3P sellers. Because of that, Dash Applications is currently incorporating this data into our customers’ databases as an addition to advertising data provided via our dash/DATA STUDIO solution.

​​​​From Amazon: Amazon MWS enables programmatic data exchange for listings, orders, payments, reports, and more. By using Amazon MWS, sellers can increase selling efficiency, reduce labor requirements, and improve response time to customers. To use Amazon MWS you must have an Amazon MWS-eligible professional selling account.
Platform: Seller Central

Who can access the MWS API: Per the message from Amazon above, you must have an Amazon Professional Selling Account on Amazon’s Seller Central platform to gain access to the MWS API. You do not necessarily have to sell products on Amazon, but you have to pay the $39.99 monthly fee to maintain a Seller account with access to the MWS API.

How to get access to the MWS API: If you follow the link above, you will see a “Register as a developer” button. You will need to have an eligible Seller Central selling account login already available to log in and complete the application process.

Amazon MWS API registration: https://developer.amazonservices.com/

What is in the MWS API: Amazon breaks the MWS API data sets out into 13 different “APIs” or endpoints within the cumulative API, all with their own url endpoints and protocol/parameter oddities. Summarily, the MWS API includes endpoints for Feeds, Finances, Fulfillment Inbound Shipment, Fulfillment Inventory, Fulfillment Outbound Shipment, Merchant Fulfillment, Orders, Products, Recommendations, Reports, Sellers, Subscriptions, and Push Notifications.

Amazon MWS API documentation: MWS API Developer documentation

Why you might need the MWS API: The MWS API data enables Seller Central merchants, or 3P sellers, to manage their Amazon presence including FBA inventory, order fulfillment, finances, order history and revenue, listing content, price monitoring, and Buy Box monitoring to name a few.
Common applications include utilizing Orders information for reporting dashboards, connecting a Seller Central product listings to a content feed for realtime listing monitoring and content updates, monitoring Buy Box and pricing to ensure resellers are not usurping sales, and managing inventory fulfillment and stock levels to ensure inventory availability in Amazon FBA centers.
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The Amazon Advertising API provides advertising data and management capabilities for both Seller Central and Vendor Central (formerly Amazon Marketing Services) advertising accounts. Dash uses the Amazon Advertising API extensively for our DATA STUDIO and ADVERTISING STUDIO solutions. Our solutions are built specifically to provide agencies and brands with their own Amazon ad data straight from the API, along with an analytics and management platform that helps you explore and use your data right out of the box.

From Amazon: The Amazon Advertising API provides a way to automate, scale, and optimize advertising. Campaign and performance data for Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Display are available through the API, enabling programmatic access for campaign management and reporting.

The API enables users to develop flexible solutions that meet their needs and goals, and to integrate more deeply with Amazon Advertising. The API offers most of the functionality of the advertising console while enabling programmatic management, allowing advertisers to manage ads or ad groups based on pre-defined conditions.

Platform: Seller Central & Vendor Central (Seller Central Advertising Console and Amazon Marketing Services or AMS)

Who can access the Amazon Advertising API: Only those granted access by Amazon can utilize the Amazon Advertising API.

How to get access to the Amazon Advertising API: Amazon Advertising API access is gated and you must apply for access per the link below.

Amazon Advertising API registration form: https://advertising.amazon.com/about-api

What’s in the Amazon Advertising API: Your Amazon advertising data and related management functionality is included via the Amazon Advertising API. This encompasses information for advertising Profiles, Portfolios, Sponsored Brands, Sponsored Products, Sponsored Display ads. With access to the API, you are able to retrieve data for, and modify elements of, campaigns, ad groups, product ads, reports, targeting, and negative targeting dimensions.

Amazon Advertising API documentation: https://advertising.amazon.com/API/docs/en-us/get-started/overview

Why you might need the Amazon Advertising API: Typically, Sellers and Vendors, along with the agencies that may be managing the Amazon channel, use the available data for ad reporting, management, and analytics purposes as they look to scale Amazon advertising operations. Stable access to this data on an ongoing basis is an important element of scaling operations for both brands and agencies alike.
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As of June 2020, Amazon finally beta released the much talked about Vendor Central Selling Partners API. Excited about the prospect of getting more VC reporting data out of Amazon? So were we but were sorely disappointed when we finally got a glimpse at the API documentation for this new API. The API is basically just the EDI (described below) updated for modern-day applications with a RESTful structure. You won’t find any performance reporting such as Amazon orders, sessions, pageviews, Buy Box, etc.; but rather can manage purchase order procurement and fulfillment. If you’re curious about what is included in the API, check out Sam Gonzales’s article here: AMZ Group on Selling Partners API

Although not technically an API, the EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) found in Amazon’s Vendor Central is the main option, aside from unstable scraping technologies, for Vendors, or 1P brands, to pull and push data for Vendor Central management. Dash does not currently work with the EDI connection due to its limited data set and accessibility but we will explore further when the Direct Fulfillment API is released this year per the below from Amazon.

From Amazon: Electronic integration with Amazon enables you to improve and maintain your performance and grow your Direct Fulfillment business with us. However, we recommend waiting until the launch of API self-service setup via Vendor Central (similar to EDI self-service setup) coming in summer 2020, which will make integration easier.

Platform: Vendor Central

Who can access the Vendor Central EDI: Only those with a valid Amazon Vendor Central account can access the EDI and its related capabilities.

How to get access to the Vendor Central EDI: If you have a Vendor Central account, you can access the EDI endpoints directly from your account per the screenshot shown above.

What’s in the Vendor Central EDI: The Selling Partners API will be organized in three different sections of Inventory Management, Order Fulfillment, Payment Management, and Transaction Management. For now, the self serve section of the EDI includes options to connect to Global Settings, Purchase Orders, Advance Shipment Notifications, Invoices, Cost and Inventory feeds, Sales reports, Purchase order changes, and Purchase order change acknowledgements.

Why you might need the Vendor Central EDI: Integrating your processes with EDI information enables a 1P Amazon vendor to manage Vendor Central PO management and fulfillment, along with general Vendor Central performance monitoring. A common application of EDI information is incorporating PO information into an ERP system so the Vendor can process orders within the ERP instead of through the Vendor Central portal. Other applications include fulfilling orders to Amazon, synchronizing inventory, submitting invoices to Amazon, and managing API transactions.
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One of the more obscure Amazon API’s, the Product Advertising API was originally designed for affiliates of Amazon who are part of the Amazon Associates program. Basically, the intent of the API is to allow affiliates to pull Amazon product listing details to display and promote products on their own sites. However, because software developers used the Product Advertising API to build Amazon listing and rank tracking software, Amazon has severely restricted access to, and usage of, this API.

From Amazon: As a developer, you can build Product Advertising API applications that leverage this robust, scalable, and reliable technology. You get access to a lot of the data used by Amazon including the items for sale, customer reviews, seller reviews, as well as most of the functionality you see on Amazon.com, such as finding items, displaying customer reviews, and product promotions. Product Advertising API operations open the doors to Amazon’s databases so that you can take advantage of Amazon’s sophisticated e-commerce data and functionality. Build your own web store to sell Amazon items or your own items.

Platform: Seller Central & Vendor Central (Seller Central Advertising Console and Amazon Marketing Services or AMS)

Who can access the Product Advertising API: Amazon Associates who have been accepted into the program.

How to get access to the Product Advertising API: First, apply to be an Amazon Associate. Once accepted, you can apply for access to the Product Advertising API via the Associates console.

Amazon Associates sign up: https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/

What’s in the Product Advertising API: The Product Advertising API allows affiliates to find Amazon listing items, find out more about specific items, create a shopping cart, and navigate the Amazon browse tree nodes.

Product Advertising API documentation: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSECommerceService/latest/DG/Welcome.html

Why you might need the Product Advertising API: If you’re looking to promote Amazon-listed products on your own website, this is the API for you. A common application of the Product Advertising API data is to display specific Amazon product listing content on your high-traffic site to generate additional website revenue via affiliate payouts from Amazon.

Summary
There are a number of different Amazon API’s available that can make the marketplace just a little bit easier to manage, and to create scale in your team’s processes so the beast doesn’t end up eating you.
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As always, please feel free to reach out to the dash APPLICATIONS team with any questions, thank you!

​This featured article provides guidance and instruction on how to implement software, including best practices.  It focuses on the three core tenets which are the foundation for a successful implementation, concepts that can be applied to all business critical software implementations, especially inventory planning software.  As the need to quickly engage and serve your customers is more important than ever, it is essential to take the right steps when implementing software so your business remains manageable, scalable and traceable.

​There are a number of considerations when evaluating what is the best way to implement business critical software, like inventory planning.  Similar to resolving any problem, know what your issues and challenges are before you tackle the solution.  When implementing a software, the biggest challenges you need to overcome are solution ownership, change management, and user adoption.   In fact, these challenges can be applied to almost any business process implementation, not just software implementations.

From the onset of an implementation, take ownership of the software you have purchased.  After all, it is yours, you bought it, so own it and the implementation of it.  Keep your team informed of all major decisions so the transition from old to new business processes supported by a new system is well received.  Lastly, make sure the software is available to users throughout the implementation so user adoption is seamless. 

So, how do you proactively address these challenges and take ownership?  The answer is simple, apply the three core tenets.  The three simple principle that will help you implement your software solution are (1.) selecting the correct project approach, (2.) choosing the right team, and (3.) setting a realistic timeline.  Understanding and applying these project fundamentals will prevent typical software implementation challenges from becoming bottlenecks.

​There are many tactics for successful implementations, but what is really the best software implementation approach?  Regardless of the project management style, focus needs to be on the best way to initiate, plan and execute the implementation.  Typically, an implementation is grouped by major phases, which are segmented by milestones, which are further detailed by tasks.  Our best practice approach to your software implementation revolves around a simple, four-phased approach: Plan the Work, Work the Plan, Rollout, and Follow Through.  It is a simpler doctrine than other methodologies such as Waterfall, Agile or RASCI models.  The underlying premise of our four-phased approach is based on the KISS principle, “Keep it Simple Stupid”, developed by the U.S. Navy in 1960.  In other words, most projects and implementations work best if they are kept simple rather than made complicated, such is our software implementation best practice emphasis.

In our software implementation approach, it should be noted that the first two phases, Plan the Work and Work the Plan, have an emphasis on planning.  Proper planning from the onset of an implementation pays dividends throughout the project.  Lewis Carroll once said, “If you do not know where you are going any road will take you there”.   You want to, therefore, make sure that during the implementation kick-off, you discuss and document implementation goals, scope, risks, budget, timeline, resources, roles, responsibilities, constraints, and assumptions.  All of these key elements constitute the implementation charter and need to be addressed and acknowledged.  Remember, better to plan now so you are not reacting later as “a lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on someone else”. 

Your software implementation approach also needs to address the following software implementation anatomy – Manage, Design, Build, Test, Release, Support, or some variation thereof.  Often times these are referenced or used as project phases since they have been carried over from the days when software would be developed for customers rather than simply implementing a packaged product.  In our four-phase best practice implementation approach, these parts are divvied up and conveyed as major milestones but not explicitly referenced so as to distinguish between a packaged-product implementation versus a software development project - an important differentiation and a red flag.

​All implementation milestones should have a clear path to success.  That path is a list of tasks.  Each task should be assigned to someone and have a clear deliverable and due date.  As you complete each task, you need to be able to check it off.  Think of it as a check list.  Ultimately, your entire implementation should be a large checklist consisting of tasks that you check off.  If you can not do this, do not start the software implementation no matter how convincingly someone tells you that it is not possible to have a checklist - they are either inexperienced or do not want the accountability.
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Lastly, it is important to identify red flags with implementation approaches, especially for packaged-product implementations.  If a vendor tries to do the design before you have been trained on the software, beware you may have been duped on just how packaged and easy to use the product actually is.  This is a red flag that means they either need to build what you require or configure it for you because it is too difficult for you to do. Either way, this is not the packaged software you may have thought you purchased.   Training on the software should always come before the design and represent an out-of-the-box version of the software.  How else will you know what you want if you do not know exactly what you have.  Get trained first so you are apart of the design and can take ownership early on in the implementation.  ​

We have all heard that the right people can make or break a project so selecting the right software implementation team is critical.  I would go so far as to say it is the most important aspect of the implementation.  There are generally two teams of people that need to be assembled.  The Leadership Committee and the Implementation Team.

The Leadership Committee responsibilities include forming the project team, developing business objectives, defining the scope of the project, approving the project budget, and committing resources to the project.  The committee also monitors project status and resolves high-level project issues.  Leadership Committee meetings usually occur once a month.  It is not uncommon for the Implementation Team to participate and contribute to the stated Leadership Committee responsibilities, which include:

• Business process change approval (i.e., scope creep management)
• Conflict resolution
• Change management
• Quality control
• Personnel changes

Your software provider should (and better) assign a Lead Consultant to work with the Leadership Committee, especially for an enterprise-level implementation.  The Lead Consultant will monitor the progress of the project and advise the Leadership Committee if the project appears to be off track.  The Lead Consultant may recommend additional resources to be added to the project to stay on schedule, either internal employees or additional consulting resources.

Implementation Team member’s responsibilities include defining existing policies and procedures, and developing new procedures and business processes.  The Implementation Team must also develop the project plan and requirements, determine the appropriate system(s) preparation, and oversee the proper and timely completion of the implementation phases and underlying tasks.  Time requirements vary throughout the implementation.  Members become more active as their areas of knowledge and specialty are required.  The Implementation Team typically consists of a Project Manager, Team Leads, and Functional Leads.  Ultimately, the Implementation Team is responsible for the success of the implementation that includes the following key activities:

• Designing the new business process (after they have been trained)
• Facilitating inter-team communication
• Learning the planning software
• Testing and validating the processes
• Participating in weekly meetings

As experts, we love checklists, so here is a simple checklist to use to help identify whether or not you have the right resources and skills to implement a software solution:

Do you have a Project Manager who:

• has knowledge of senior management's goals and objectives, and is thoroughly familiar with the business champion’s decision on the scope of the project?
• will manage the Implementation Team consisting of a Business Lead and Technical Lead and any supporting functional leads?
• will manage the overall project, and will be the main contact between the Implementation Team and the software provider (us)?
• will audit the user’s knowledge of the software system to assure that the project is ready for the next phase?
• will assure that the business solution processes are ready for implementation and are well documented?
• will advise the Implementation Team of any areas where the project may be in jeopardy of not succeeding?
• can dedicate 90% of their time to the success of the implementation?

Do you have Business Lead(s) who:

• will aid the Implementation Team and Project Manager throughout the implementation?
• will execute the project plan and requirements?
• Will become the resident expert on the software system as well as the driving force and champion of the project?
• will determine and prepare the appropriate sample data to support the business processes?
• will oversee the proper and timely completion of the business processes along with supporting documentation?
• will manage the software education and training of end-users?
• will manage and oversee any functional leads supporting the development and documentation of the new business processes and the implementation of the related software modules?
• can dedicated 60% of their time to the success of the implementation?

Do you have Technical Lead(s) who?

• will aid the Implementation Team and Project Manager throughout the implementation?
• will execute the project plan and requirements?
• is extremely technical and knowledgeable of the current systems and infrastructure (e.g., ERP)?
• will be responsible for the extraction, transformation and loading (ETL) of data as it relates to implementing the software around the new business processes?
• will address any current system (e.g., ERP) modifications or configurations required to support the software data requirements?
• will manage and oversee any functional leads supporting ETL development and documentation related to the implementation of the software?
• can dedicated 80% of their time to the success of the implementation?

If you find you are in a situation where you or your team is not in a position to manage and control the implementation, take your time to assemble the right people with the right talent.  If, on the other hand, you do have the right team, however your software provider wants to perform all the configuration, get you up and running, train your team after the design, and turn it over to you right before their planned go live, then this is a huge red flag that the software is either immature or not user friendly enough to manage on your own.  Chances are, you are going to have extenuating consulting costs associated with implementing and maintaining the system.  You and your team need to perform the implementation and take ownership of the software you purchased so by the time you go live, you are not dependent upon the vendor for any of the training, setup, configuration, and/or maintenance.  Further, the vendor you select should be pushing this model, if they are not, keep away unless you like large consulting bills.

Understanding the core trade-offs when setting your software implementation timeline is the first stepping stone to setting a realistic target to go live.  Scope, budget (or cost), timeline (or schedule), and resources (or team) are the four, fundamental project variables sharing the elastic property – if one changes, so does at least one other. 
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Visualize, for example, each constant as the side of a square.  And, the area of the square they create a representation of the project quality or performance.  Should you change the scope, budget, timeline and/or resources, thereby lengthening or shortening the side of the square, at least one other variable or side of the square would be lengthened or shortened.  Similarly, the quality of the project may have been impacted, since you no longer have your perfect square.  We call these factors the four pillars of success.

​It is important to manage the interdependence of these pillars as they are often competing against each other.  Timeline refers to the amount of time needed to complete a project.  Budget refers to the planned cost of the project.  Scope refers to what must be done to produce the project's successful outcome.  Finally, resources refer to the people needed to work on the project.  Increasing scope will typically mean an increase in both time and cost.  A tight timeline generally means more resources and reduced scope, and so on.  Knowing the four pillars and how they compete, you will be able to manage them for a successful software implementation. 

When setting your software implementation timeline and targeting a go live date, it is not the software providers’s job to tell you that a go live date is or is not feasible.  It is their job to tell you everything that needs to be done to achieve your go live target.  It is up to you to determine whether it is possible by understanding the four project pillars.  For example, you know your team better than they ever will.  Make sure you communicate their strengths, commitment and weaknesses so an accurate timeline can be achieved.  Remember, software providers and consultants can and will do anything for time and money.   You need to determine, for example, whether your team can commit the time and resources needed while still performing their current duties.  If they can not, what impact will that have on your timeline for a successful software implementation?

​Implementing software is simple, right?  Well it is if you embrace the three basic tenets discussed here.  They are the foundation of best practices when implementing software. It is what we preach and practice when working with you to successfully implement YOUR software, not ours.