The benefits of e-procurement software within the business ecosystem are endless

Introduction

Does your procurement system require a piece of paper to record your procurement details? Do you think your manual approach is efficient enough to compete in the cut-throat competitive market in this digitally evolved era? If you are using a legacy procurement system, it’s time to switch to electronic procurement software. Considering an e-procurement software to your workflow will help your business set the right trajectory towards spending and save your enterprise’s time and money.

Statista’s report predicts that the global procurement software market will register a constant annual growth rate (CAGR) of 4.1 percent from 2021 to 2025. This article will give you a quick walkthrough of the various e-procurement benefits a business can leverage by establishing it.

Benefits of establishing an e-procurement process

An e-procurement system gives business owners centralised access to their spending and supply data. Using its dashboard, owners can also track invoices, purchase metadata, and spend analytics to stay aligned with business goals & budgets. Here is a list of benefits electronic procurement software can bring to the market.

1. Increase visibility: Many enterprises are shifting to a centralised procurement function for better visibility. Since all the data resides in a centralised e-procurement application powered by cloud storage, tracking a PO or other purchase details becomes easy for procurement teams. Centralising the procurement records reduces unnecessary costs, increases visibility where approvals take a long time, and better negotiation visibility with suppliers. With the increased visibility of the spend-flow, it becomes easy for business owners to allot budgets for different items.

2. Significantly reduce procurement risks: If a business wants to minimise procurement risks, it should move from traditional procurement systems to automated procure-to-pay solutions provided by tech companies. Such electronic procurement systems reduce various risks involved with finances, supply chains, compliance, etc. It also speeds up the processing time, reduces the overall cost, and frees the in-house procurement team to concentrate more on their core human-centric duties.

3. Enable automation: In the legacy procurement system, human errors & doing repetitive manual tasks are two common problems that eat-up unnecessary time. Capturing incorrect data into the spreadsheet is a common issue faced by such procurement systems. If a person goes on a vacation or becomes ill and does not authorise the purchase order, it delays the overall procurement tasks. Modern e-procurement benefits the organisation by automating numerous operations such as PO generation, supplier’s invoice template creation, generating a catalogue, etc. Since modern procurement software runs online, professionals can also remotely approve a purchase order without global boundaries.

4. Eliminate dark spending and purchasing: Rogue spending and dark purchasing are significant issues for many organisations. Such practice reigns when organisations use disparate or outdated procurement software. With a traditional paper-based procurement system & easy-accessible spreadsheets, it becomes easy to conceal or mask a rogue purchase. But with e-procurement systems, it is not feasible to show purchases from unapproved vendors or establish practices like repetitious or unnecessary purchases. This software provides an electronic audit trail that is nearly impossible to delete or modify without proper access privileges. Business owners can easily track down purchases and amounts spent in various sources.

5. Breaking down data silos: Most procurement procedures revolve around business executives, owners, procurement leaders, and stakeholders. Disconnected and scattered data silos impact the procurement processes and decision-making, dragging in a lack of clarity to the top-level executives. Such unclear data silos can lead to maverick spending, missed negotiation opportunities, and long procurement cycles. However, with e-procurementsoftware, all communication, transactions, purchase data, and critical collaboration remain under one procurement system. Modern electronic procurement software comes with data analytics solutions that help business leaders easily visualise insights about purchases and expenses.

Organisations can also enjoy other benefits because of electronic procurement systems, such as strategising budgets based on insights and not instincts, unlimited data storage, entrusting suppliers with self-service, easy vendor management, etc.

Conclusion

E-procurement software can pave the way to seamless B2B transactions through digital transformation. If your business wants to switch from legacy procurement systems to modern e-procurement tools and leverage all such benefits, tap Procol for next-gen procurement software.

Procol is an e-procurement software provider with all the mentioned benefits. Through Procol, you can digitise all the procurement processes by increasing the visibility via analytics and breaking down the data silos. Schedule a demo from here.