ERP, Commerce and CRM for Retail

What problems does an ERP solve for a retailer?

Retail pain shows up at the till and in the stockroom. Stock levels differ between the store, the web shop and the warehouse, so online orders are accepted for items that sold out yesterday. Prices and promotions are keyed into three systems and one of them is always wrong. Store takings, card settlements and returns are reconciled by hand at month end. Buyers reorder from last year's spreadsheet, and the customer who shops in the store and online looks like two strangers in the data.

Those pains map to modules. Inventory, purchasing and planning give one stock picture and reorder suggestions. Sales pricing and discounts hold a price once. Finance posts store and online sales to the general ledger from the same documents. In Business Central that is one product for small and mid-sized retailers, with the till and web shop integrated through APIs. For larger chains, Dynamics 365 Commerce runs the retail channel on the finance and operations apps, with Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain Management behind it. The customer side, loyalty, segments and campaigns, belongs in Customer Insights.

Business Central or Dynamics 365 Commerce: which fits your retail business?

Retailers usually frame this as a product choice. It is really a size and complexity choice. A retailer with one legal entity, a handful of stores and a web shop rarely needs a full retail suite: Business Central with integrated till and e-commerce software keeps the project and the running change manageable. A chain with many stores, several countries or legal entities, central merchandising and its own warehouses is where Dynamics 365 Commerce on Finance and Operations earns its place. The table is the rule of thumb we check against your store count, transaction volumes and assortment in a fit workshop.

How does customer data reach marketing and the stores?

A retailer's customer data is split by channel: loyalty in one place, web accounts in another, store receipts in the ERP. Customer Insights is where Solzet joins them into one profile for segments and campaigns, and Dataverse is the bridge to the ERP. Business Central connects to Dataverse through the Dataverse connection, and Finance and Operations uses dual-write for near-real-time, two-way sync, so a customer created at the till and a customer created online can be matched instead of duplicated. Service teams handling returns and complaints in Dynamics 365 Customer Service see the same orders. For the integration design itself, see CRM and ERP integration.

Who is this for, and who is it not for?

This page is for retailers that sell through stores, a web shop or both and hold their own stock: fashion, electronics, home goods, groceries, pharmacy chains and specialist retail. Business Central fits small and mid-sized retailers that want finance, inventory and purchasing in one cloud system with their existing till and web shop connected. Finance and Operations fits larger organizations with several legal entities, deep supply chain needs or retail operations on Commerce. If you also run Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement, both connect to it through Dataverse.

If most of what you sell goes to business customers from a warehouse, start with ERP and CRM for distribution and wholesale. If you run SAP, Oracle, Odoo or 1C today, Solzet implements Microsoft ERP and migrates retailers from those systems to Business Central or Finance and Operations. Back to all industries.

How does a retail ERP project run?

Retail projects are won or lost on master data and cutover timing, so both are planned first. A fit workshop takes your store count, transaction volumes, assortment, promotions and returns rules and decides between Business Central and Dynamics 365 Commerce. The design fixes items, variants, price lists, promotions, locations and the posting of store takings. Integration comes next: the till and web shop for Business Central, or the Commerce channel set-up for Finance and Operations, plus card settlements and the customer link to Dataverse. Migration brings items, stock balances, customers and open orders across, and cutover avoids peak trading weeks. After go-live Solzet supports the system, and if you already run Business Central or Finance and Operations, we can audit your existing project and give you a stabilisation plan.