At Smart Software Advice (SSA), we don’t develop or sell software. Our primary goal is to help you save time and money by reviewing some top software solutions for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
Our team is focused on understanding your unique business requirements, so we can make the correct software recommendations. As a bonus, our resource center provides useful information to help you make the best small business software decision possible.
Here is a quick overview of our small business software categories:
Small Business Accounting Software
Using the right accounting software, you will be able to record profit and loss and improve your ability to manage your cash flow. You will be using accounting software literally every day, so it’s important that it is easy to use, easy to implement, and within your budget. Most SMEs just want simple software that works as it should; they don’t want to pay for custom software that requires you to make some changes. But some businesses may be looking for something very complex that requires a high level of customization.
There are hundreds of different accounting software solutions out there today, so which one is right for you? You will probably need to run various financial reports, create invoices, or track down and pay off any previous due balances. People at your business may need to keep track of a variety of financial and human factors, including your industry and the number of employees.
We’ve done a thorough study of a number of accounting software systems and put together a list of our top choices.
Inventory Management Software
Knowing what you have in your warehouse or on the shelves of your retail store is only the beginning of what inventory management software can do for your business. It will help you manage your inventory accurately and efficiently, and help you plan your business activities. If your inventory management system is right, it will help you know what parts can be combined with other items, coordinate with your supply chain partners to ensure that you always have stock, and notify your customers of the items that are available for them in order to give them the most up to date shipping estimates.
Having accurate, up-to-date inventory management software is critical for businesses to be successful, because it can help you minimize inventory errors, improve your capacity to meet client demands, and reduce your operational costs. Inventory management software allows you to keep track of the inventory that your company creates, buys, stores or sells. Inventory management software enables you to accurately price products and ensure that you always have the right supply of those products. It also helps you to ensure that you have the right amount of stock available to sell.
Understanding the various features and capabilities that inventory management software offers is the first step towards making the right decision. We’ve done a thorough analysis of several different inventory management software options and come up with a list of what we think are the best inventory management software options for your SME.
Nonprofit Accounting Software
Not-for-profit organizations do not sell products or services to earn money; they focus on doing things that benefit the public or a specific group of people. The laws governing tax-exempt organizations such as nonprofits require that they have special accounting software. Nonprofit accounting software tracks money that comes from grants, donations, gifts, or contributions from members of the organization.
The right nonprofit accounting software helps you manage your organization’s finances transparently, so donors know exactly how their contributions are used. There are regulations that require organizations to submit financial reports for grant applications.
Software that manages the financial aspects of not-for-profit organizations should be integrated with other software that nonprofits use to manage donations and gifts, such as donor management software or nonprofit CRM software.
To be considered for inclusion in the Software for Nonprofits category, a product must meet the following criteria:
- Track the money that donors pay them for the things that they donate or grant, and assign it to the appropriate program or cause.
- It should be compatible with not-for-profit accounting standards.
- Manage other types of transactions such as sales that do not go through, or refunds that are not made, and sales that are cancelled.
- Help accounting professionals demonstrate their financial capability to the board of directors.
- Generate reports to show that not-for-profit organizations are achieving their financial goals.
Smart Software Advice provides unbiased reviews of some of the best nonprofit accounting software to help you meet your financial goals and maintain your tax exempt status.
Payroll Software
Payroll software will help you pay your employees properly and on time. It makes it easy to calculate wages, pay employees via a preferred method, such as a check that goes to their account or a direct deposit, and handle other tasks such as filing taxes.
Small and medium businesses understand that running payroll is a necessary part of running their business. It’s no wonder that almost 40% of small businesses spend at least 1.5 hours per week on payroll. It’s easy to see why they want to get some automation via payroll software. There are so many different solutions that differ based on their price, ease of use, available tax documents, and state requirements. That makes it challenging to know which one will work for your business.
To help you find the right solution, we’ve conducted extensive research and put together this list of top payroll software picks for SMEs.
Software Maintenance Management Systems (CMMS) Software
As an enterprise that invests heavily in its equipment, ensuring that your assets are reliable is one of your key business success factors. It’s critical that you manage and reduce the total cost of your enterprise maintenance while improving your business productivity through equipment availability. Software Maintenance Management Systems (CMMS) are one way to manage maintenance work and provide you with many benefits.
We’ve researched and reviewed some of the best maintenance management software options for you and your business and the benefits that it can provide.
Construction Management Software
Construction management software (CMS) can help contractors manage their finances and provide them with operational and financial accounting tools that help them plan their operations better and create better estimates. Our software experts have compiled a list of the best construction management software for building projects, whether they involve residential, commercial, or industrial work. Using the right construction software for your project will allow you to plan and accomplish tasks more efficiently, produce better estimates, and better control of your project costs.
There are a number of different types of construction management software available, and it can be confusing to decide which one is right for you. Since construction managers want to spend time managing projects rather than doing product research and comparisons, we have put together this list of the best construction software products that we think you should consider.
Property Management Software
The best property management software tracks rent, schedules repairs and maintenance, screens potential tenants, and pays vendors. The right software can help you manage the income and expenses associated with managing residential and commercial properties.
With the property management industry making the United States nearly $88.4 billion in revenue every year, it’s important for landlords, investors, and property managers organize their finances and manage the day to day operations of their rental units.
Our skilled software experts have done thorough research and put together this list of top property management software to consider.
Enterprise Resource Management (ERP) Software
Enterprise Resource Management (ERP) software is an integrated system that automates many different software applications to streamline your organization’s back-office functions, such as financials, sales, and operations.
Best ERP software is probably what you use the most; it will enable you to make your employees more productive, your business more efficient, and your reports more accurate. There are many different ERP software programs available for you to choose from, and we’re here to help you select one that will be perfect for your organization.
Manufacturing Execution System (MES) Software
Manufacturing Execution System (MES) is a unique type of production-oriented software that monitors, manages, and synchronizes the process of executing real-time physical processes of transforming raw materials into finished goods. MES also coordinates the execution of work orders with production scheduling and enterprise-level systems such as ERP and product life cycle management (PLM) where necessary.
Additionally, MES applications provide real-time process performance monitoring and process automation and can support material and component level traceability and integration with process history as required. Typically, these capabilities extend from enabling the creation of products and processes (PLM) and the release of work orders (ERP) to completing the manufacturing process.
However, MES does not include other types of production automation software (e.g., SCADA, DCS, or programmable logic controllers) or PLCs (programmable logic processors). Our team has pieced together this comprehensive list of the best MES software solutions that could suit your enterprise.
Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRP) Software
MRP, which is an acronym for Manufacturing Resource Planning, is the process of judiciously planning, executing the manufacturing process and predicting the final product based on different input combinations.
MRP enables companies to get the most out of their available human and/or material resources by focusing their efforts on planning and executing processes that use all the available human and/or material resources in an effective and efficient manner, which results in achieving the highest productivity.
Our team has pieced together this list of top MRP systems that help you plan and execute the manufacturing processes and provide tools that allow you to project the final output.
Contact Smart Software Advice for Expert Recommendations!
At Smart Software Advice, our ultimate goal is to help you with the difficult part of the small business software evaluation process, which results in less time spent on assessing the solution and better results in terms of user acceptance and satisfaction.
So, if you’re ready to make strategic decisions about your software solution, get in touch with us for free expert guidance!