Proper golf inventory management takes a careful balance of looking ahead, looking back, identifying patterns and allocating warehouse space. Missteps are easy to make unless you have access to robust – and easily accessible – insights driven by real business data. As such, your golf car inventory management software should provide:
- Smart forecasts
- Historical trends
- Simple seasonal adjustments
- Detailed inventory metrics
- Insights from CRM data
Speaking of CRM systems, ASPEN has an integrated CRM functionality with the tools to optimize customer relationships and avoid inventory disasters. Here are three golf car inventory management mistakes you’ll dodge with the help of ASPEN’s built-in CRM.
1) Blind Spots from Poor Forecasting
Dealer principals are constantly looking ahead to decide how many cars to stock, which models will be in demand, the size of each order and which locations will need them. Without proper forecasting methods, this comes down to hunches and anecdotal evidence.
ASPEN’s integrated CRM can track, classify and report on many business areas that support purchasing forecasts, including:
- Customer purchase histories
- Sales lifecycles
- Active quotes
- Equipment metrics
- Work orders
- And more!
These insights are especially critical to forecasting the performance of new golf car models. Our sophisticated CRM can supply you with sales histories of similar models and input from other departments (sales, marketing, accounting) on upcoming trends – all as relates to their interactions with a standard and shared database of customers.
2) A Narrow View of the Customer
We believe that improving communication between departments is critical to improving golf car inventory management (and customer satisfaction!). ASPEN’s CRM provides you with a “360 view” of customer data across all departments so that you can be more responsive to the customer’s needs with your inventory. Golf inventory management can only succeed if you know how your customers interact with your business: when, where and why.
ASPEN provides you with:
- A log of all customer visits and interactions
- Cross-department data on sales and service trends
- Indicators for your top customers and growth opportunities
- Records of all incidents, complaints, requests and questions (to ensure follow-up)
Taken together, the information in the contact management database paints a clear picture of your ideal customers, why they use your services and how that has changed over time.
3) An Inefficient, Manual System
Excel spreadsheets and other old, inefficient manual processes will waste your time and energy on paper-pushing and rectifying errors – one at a time. It’s also common for manual orders, based on human instincts, to be too high; people naturally lean on a “better safe than sorry” mindset that results in overstocking and excessive overhead.
Automation can help control inventory through data-driven analysis and streamlined tracking processes. Don’t engage with unnecessary, outdated methods like manually counting inventory in the warehouse each day when ASPEN’s barcode inventory management system can keep accurate data with every scan.
Our CRM is also mobile-enabled so that staff can access and log purchase information, parts lists and customer communications from the field. Altogether, an automated digital system will prevent duplications of effort by putting all of the data in one place, accessible anywhere, to automate processes and streamline workflow.
When you rely on ASPEN for golf car inventory management, you’ll get a complete picture of the costs and profits for every unit you stock. The best part is that with a fully integrated CRM, you won’t continue to bloat your IT infrastructure with too many disconnected software tools that complicate dealership inventory management. ASPEN has everything you need to operate cohesively, intuitively, and quickly.