1. A Synopsis of Back Office Systems 

Your ability to be effective, efficient, and productive at work can be drastically changed by selecting, maintaining, and implementing the proper software, procedures, and systems. 

This manual provides a summary of best practices for creating and overseeing a solid plan for implementing efficient back office systems in your company. It is assumed that you have a basic understanding of the various back office systems that are available and how they are used in the workplace.

This guide should give you the information you need to evaluate and compare various offerings from various providers, as well as help you understand how to choose, test, and implement particular types of back office systems.

See our entry-level guide to digitize your business processes for more information on the subjects covered in the first section of this guide. 

Comprehending Back Office Systems 
Software or services that assist you in managing your business are referred to as "back office" systems. They are crucial because they provide structured, effective, and repeatable support for particular business processes. Consistently stored customer and business data can be a very effective tool for enhancing your company since it can be analyzed and manipulated to provide answers to questions you may have about your company, your clients, and your working methods.

Models of Business 
Generally, there are three primary categories of back office systems: 

Software that is packaged: Traditionally, software is "boxed" and installed directly on a single device, though in reality, it is frequently downloaded instead of delivered in physical boxes. This type of software does not require an online component and is typically targeted at smaller businesses. 
Software as a Service (SaaS) subscription services are online programs that are typically accessed through a web browser and are paid for on a monthly, annual, or per-user basis. Small business users can test out new services without committing to a paid service by using the free tier of user accounts that some software offers. 
Hybrid services: More and more services will combine the flexibility and strength of an online component with the security and assurance of local storage and backup of your user data. It might only be used to confirm your license and send updates, or it might allow you to store and share your data online with coworkers. 
There are significant benefits and drawbacks to each of these. While online subscription and hybrid services can offer tremendous flexibility and growth potential at the expense of security and longevity, traditional "boxed" software may be more reliable, secure, and not require a continuous internet connection. 

Investigating and Selecting Back Office Software 
The key to choosing a good back office system for your company is conducting thorough research and approaching most claims of functionality and advantages with a healthy dose of skepticism. Start by looking through third-party listings and unbiased reviews of software in a specific category. Then, look through the forums and support documentation for options you want to learn more about.

Next, you should create a shortlist of software that you want to learn more about. Then, you should check the software's system requirements, planned roadmap of new features, and suitability for your organization's future growth. Finally, you should look for demos, free downloads, or possibly a sales team that can show you a product. Before committing to a product, make sure it will address the particular business problem you are attempting to resolve. 

2. Planning for Enterprise Resources 

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software refers to specialized database and user-client tools that enable a business to monitor and manage its assets, systems, personnel, stock, finances, and other resources. 

ERP Software: What Is It?
In essence, the term ERP refers to any software program that aids in the comprehension and administration of your company. Numerous ERP suites are available, including some "modular" packages that claim to offer tools for managing almost any part of a company, from warehouse management to HR procedures. Large-scale ERP software, which includes companies like SAP, Oracle, Siebel, and Microsoft, frequently requires a great deal of integration and customization work. For small to medium-sized businesses, this is typically not the best option because purchasing individual off-the-shelf software or services may be more flexible and less expensive.

Take into account the following when evaluating ERP software for your company:

Is it single-purpose or modular? Is this program a component of a sizable, cohesive software system, such as SAP or Oracle? Are you trying to meet a specific need, or do you think you'll need to use other aspects in the future?
Is integration necessary for this? Numerous off-the-shelf, single-purpose ERP systems (like eCommerce or invoicing software) can be used with little modification and without hiring a third party to assist with system setup. Nonetheless, the advantages of having a customized interface that integrates with other systems you may use can justify this type of effort.
Support and usage: Find out how long a specific company has been in business and read product reviews. The software market is constantly evolving, so it's critical to comprehend the potential trade-offs between future security and dependability when deciding between an established ERP system and a specialized or more recent single-purpose ERP system. 
Factors, Advantages, and Illustrations 
The main advantage of integrated ERP software is the visibility and detail it can offer to a variety of users throughout your company, particularly management personnel who can base decisions on detailed reporting data. 

An ERP system set up in a mid-sized manufacturing company could serve as an illustration. The system's various modules will provide valuable information to various teams within the organization. For instance, warehouse employees may be able to monitor and control resources as they are added to or removed from overall stocks with the help of a stock management system.

The HR team could handle understaffing or overstaffing by using timesheet software to track and manage employee attendance. Sales and marketing teams would be able to monitor orders and special offers from the moment the offer is made to the customer (for example, through email) until the product is shipped out thanks to e-commerce or marketing modules. 

Single-purpose ERP software or particular modules of larger systems may be helpful on a case-by-case basis, but a fully integrated ERP system that uses every module offered by a particular vendor may typically only be suitable for large businesses. 
 

3. Software for Productivity 

Nowadays, a lot of productivity suites, like Adobe Creative Suite and Microsoft Office, are switching to online subscription models. 

These enable you to add users as needed or decrease your software licenses as necessary, as well as update your software more frequently and take advantage of new features faster. 

Productivity Software: What Is It?
Spreadsheets, presentation software, word processing, desktop publishing, certain graphics, and database software are examples of general-purpose business packages that fall under the category of productivity software. The majority of office-based workforces probably understand and use it because it is so prevalent. 

Benefits Over Conventional Boxed Software 
The significance of future compatibility (i.e., whether you need to be able to open older or newer documents from clients) and the dependability of your internet connection should be taken into account when evaluating a productivity suite option. This is because you will need a consistent and stable connection to verify that you have the license to use your productivity software. 

The primary benefit of a subscription model is that you will typically always have access to the most recent version of a particular package. In certain situations, like with the Adobe Suite, you will also have the option to select which components of the product package you want to use. This can be an economical method of giving your employees access to particular tools (for instance, some users in your organization may be given Photoshop, while others use other components of the Adobe suite).

Factors, Advantages, and Illustrations 
Programs like Microsoft Office, Adobe Creative Suite, and Apple's iWork suite are examples of productivity software that enable users to create and manage a vast array of work. 

Because they enable more frequent updates, online document backups, mobile device access, and integration with other products like email and calendaring, online and subscription-based versions of these products are rapidly emerging as the market's future.

Although the majority of individual productivity products have free alternatives, Microsoft Office and related programs are considered the industry standard. As more people use increasingly similar versions of important software and more recent document standards like DOCX and XLSX become more widely used, subscription-based services like Office365 will likely increase this de facto standardization.

Compare the cost per seat of a subscription-based productivity suite for your office to the time and support expenses of utilizing outdated, non-standard, or unsupported software. As your company expands, a subscription model might provide substantial advantages, but you should carefully weigh this against your actual needs.
 

4. Relationship Management for Customers 

One of the most popular stand-alone back office solutions that companies start looking at when they want to enhance customer support and service is Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software. It enables you to monitor and control your client information and comprehend your interactions with them. 

CRM Software: What Is It?
In its most basic form, this could be a straightforward customer database that is maintained in a desktop program like Microsoft Access or Excel. 

A more sophisticated CRM system, on the other hand, can assist you in understanding who your customers are, how frequently they contact you, and how you might be able to improve customer service and increase sales if you are interacting with them online, through emails, or over the phone.

Factors, Advantages, and Illustrations 
When thinking about a CRM system, you ought to consider:

Requirements for access: Do you only need to use desktop computers in your office to access your customer data? Or do some of your staff members require access on laptops or mobile devices? If the latter, you ought to think about subscription-based or online services that provide access via a phone, tablet, or web browser. 
Integration with website and phone systems: If you communicate with your customers via a website or phone system, you may need to think about whether all of your interactions will be manually entered into your CRM system or if there is a chance to automate some of the process (for instance, if someone uses your website's contact form, will it be automatically added to your CRM system?). 
Business procedures and training: A lot of CRM systems will either directly or indirectly support specific business structures or methods of operation. You should think about whether the system you are thinking about will work with the way you currently operate or if your staff and business plan are adaptable enough to pick up new skills and implement more effective procedures. 
CRM is a feature of many large-scale ERP software packages that use a "modular" approach to business software. However, if you are not planning to use other features of ERP software, you should carefully consider whether a standalone or single-purpose CRM package might be better in the short or medium term.

Understanding and actionable data about your customers can be greatly enhanced by using CRM software, which enables you to spot chances to enhance your offerings and increase sales. A good CRM system, for instance, could alert you when a customer is thinking about making a purchase and assist you in reaching out to them at the appropriate moment with the appropriate information in order to convert a lead into a sale.
 

You should choose a system that can expand with you and take into account your likely future needs. When properly designed, trained, and utilized, CRM software can frequently become a business-critical tool that provides your employees with access to information that they would not have had before. This implies that your company may eventually become dependent on CRM systems as a tool, making it difficult, expensive, and time-consuming to move to a new service or provider if you later discover that you made a mistake. 

Seek out systems that provide the aforementioned data exports, as well as strong support, tiers of user features that are optional, and the capacity to add new users and data sets over time. 
 

5. Software for Email and Marketing 

Email newsletters, offers, and reminders are effective ways for many businesses to market directly to their customers. You can create and send personalized HTML emails, store and manage sizable customer data sets, and monitor the effectiveness of your emails with a good email management system. 

Email and Marketing Software: What Is It?
By compiling email addresses and other customer information from various sources, email management systems enable you to build customer databases for marketing objectives. After that, they let you compose and send emails, monitor their effectiveness, and automate tasks like reminders and thank-you emails.

Factors, Advantages, and Illustrations 
Because most major email providers recognize systems like Campaign Monitor and Mailchimp, your business emails are less likely to be flagged as spam. In order to help you develop and send more effective email campaigns and increase the return on your investment, they also provide excellent customer support, forums, and online guidance. 

More sophisticated features like lead identification, user tracking across campaigns, and customized content might be available in other marketing software packages. When deciding between a more complex and a simpler email marketing service, it is crucial to evaluate and test these features and their suitability for the type of customer contacts you want to establish.

Many systems also provide flexible payment options, like paying for each campaign you send or sending to smaller mailing lists with "unlimited" tiers. In many situations, you can also use automation to send a customer an email automatically when they complete a task (like downloading a product). You can also use so-called A/B testing to test out different subject lines and content, which will send emails to your entire list automatically based on test samples.

One important factor to take into account when using marketing software is data protection. Always make sure that customers have expressly consented to receive email communications from you when you collect their information, and search for systems that will handle spam complaints and unsubscribes automatically.

Since most email marketing programs are made to import large amounts of data in formats like Excel, text, and CSV files, keep in mind that data can typically be transferred between them. Therefore, it might be wise to begin with a more basic piece of software and switch to a more comprehensive marketing solution when your strategy calls for it.
 

6. Benefits and Risks 

It is important to carefully consider the advantages and disadvantages of a new back office system before choosing, testing, and deploying it.

These risks and benefits often involve trade-offs, depending on the software you want to use, the provider's business model, and the computing and regulatory environment your company operates in. 

Security and Storage of Data 
Where and how your data will be stored is the first and most crucial factor you should evaluate. Many online services will, by definition, store their data in "cloud" services, which frequently store, copy, and communicate with data in other nations. For instance, Amazon Web Services (AWS), which offers affordable cloud storage for online businesses, is used by many small startup companies that offer specialized back office systems. Amazon is ultimately in charge of the AWS servers, which are spread out across the globe. 

The majority of businesses that provide authentic and legitimate services will be transparent about how they store your data as well as that of your clients. Check out their support forums and frequently asked questions for more information. 

Additionally, you should search for services that provide a secure connection (through HTTPS) and, ideally, that use two-factor authentication, which requires users to enter a special code—either via text message or a companion app—to verify that they are authentic users when logging in from a new location or device. 

Client "Lock-In" 
When you're thinking about joining a service, it's important to think about your options for leaving it. To avoid becoming reliant on a service that might alter or be discontinued in the future, look for proof that it provides data exports in widely accepted formats. 

You should be able to extract your data from the system if you can import it using basic formats like text files, Excel documents, or CSV files.

You should still have a plan in place for switching to a different provider, even though the time and expense involved will increase as you use a service more frequently. Giving a third-party service the vital information you require to operate your company without considering how you might retrieve it later is a bad idea. 

Costs of Training and User Interface Stability 
The primary draw of many contemporary web-based or subscription services is that they eliminate the need for in-depth training because they are typically easier for your employees to understand and use. They also lack extensive specialized interfaces and complex structures because they are designed with a wide range of business types in mind and are frequently not heavily customized for a specific business. Small businesses in particular stand to gain greatly from this, as they can easily modify their business procedures to suit a specific piece of software. 

But as the businesses that produce them aim to increase their market share and offer greater value, these services are also evolving more frequently. Since features grow over time, the majority of this change is for the better. In fact, as a business owner, you might have the chance to make suggestions or comments that ultimately affect the goods and services you utilize. 

However, in certain instances, features that you rely on may be eliminated or changed. For example, when it comes to data security and export, using a web-based or subscription service puts you at risk of changes over which you have little control. It's critical to stay up to date on changes in the product categories you utilize and to avoid becoming overly reliant on any one solution. 
 

7. Execution 

For the majority of business software and systems, you should think about a number of factors when figuring out how to implement them in your company, even though some implementations will be as easy as setting up an account on your preferred service and starting to use it. A brief summary of the factors to take into account when examining a new software package can be found below.

Evaluation of Business Processes 
Understanding your own business procedures and the problem you are attempting to resolve with a specific software program is the most crucial first step. Try listing the tasks you would anticipate performing with a CRM system, for instance, if you are thinking about utilizing one (e.g., creating a record for a customer, updating that record when you speak with them, reporting on multiple customer records). In contrast, think about your current workflow and whether it would require any significant adjustments to be compatible with the software you are evaluating. If there are employees in your company who would be heavily involved in using a new piece of software, talk to them about how frustrated they are with the way you currently do things and think about ways to prevent transferring existing issues to the new software. 

You will have a better idea of what you are truly attempting to accomplish and a good benchmark to use when determining whether each service or product will be appropriate for you once you have a list of the business processes you wish to incorporate into your use of it, along with the important individuals in your company who will use it. 

Integration of Email, Calendar, and Phone 
If the software you are considering can integrate with any or all of those features, your choice of provider for your phone, calendar, and email services may be a crucial factor. For instance, since the integration will probably be easier if you use Microsoft Outlook for email, you might be more likely to think about using their CRM software. A more focused, lightweight piece of software might be made to directly integrate with Gmail and Google Calendar if you use Google Apps for Business or another email/calendar provider. 

In any case, you should think about it because the advantages of email notifications, calendar updates, and possibly even phone/text messages from a system could be significant. This is especially true for systems that are about communicating with your customers, like CRM systems and marketing software. 

Data Migration and Syncing 
You might have been manually managing data on shared network drives or other ad hoc systems, or you might be coming from an existing system. A high-level audit of the data you intend to use with a particular system, such as customer lists, projects, accounts, and so forth, should be your first step.

You can summarize all the various fields and kinds of information you wish to store and use once you have a general understanding of the range of data and the variations among various sources. This can then be used to verify that the services you are thinking about will support your company's data. 

Configuring the System and Providing Users 
Once you have decided on a system, you should draw up a list of the users in your business you will need to create accounts for and work through support documentation to understand what you need to do in order to set up and customize your system. In many cases, a few changes from the default settings can make your system much easier to use for your own users (such as adding your company logo, setting default addresses, and so on). Also consider establishing a process for adding new users and assigning them appropriate permissions so they can see the information they need in order to do their job. 

User Training and Engagement 
You should consider whether different users in your business will need specific training to understand and use effectively the system you are considering. In general, your staff will always use what seems the easiest, which will tend to be things they are familiar with, unless they can see a clear benefit to using a new system. It is essential, therefore, that you communicate clearly with your staff, explain the benefits of using a new system, and enforce its use rigorously.

Interoperability and Collaboration 
Many systems offer a range of plugins and integrations that will allow you to easily move data back and forth between different systems. For example, you may be able to take a contact in your CRM system and use it to generate a task in an associated project management system, or take data from a timesheet system and use it to generate an invoice. 

If you have ways of working that do this manually or other systems you are already using, it is worth looking at this up-front as part of your selection process, specifically checking support documentation for plugins and interoperability. 

As you add further back office systems, this may influence your choices further. You may choose to use a specific ‘ecosystem’ of related software products (such as Microsoft or Oracle systems), or you may use unrelated applications and software that are integrated by means of third-party plugins.

Safety 
When you implement a new back office system, you should consider the data security and system security aspects discussed earlier in this document.

However, you should also consider security during your system setup, user account creation, and internal training processes. If possible, you should adjust security settings to ensure users are creating and updating secure passwords, as well as educating your users on the importance of safeguarding customer data and accessing the systems they use securely. 
 

8. Developing a Back Office Strategy 

The implementation processes noted above would apply whenever you were considering a specific business need. However, as your business grows and you begin to add more systems and processes, it is useful to have an overall strategy for how you manage your business software needs. 

Assessing Your Business Needs 
As previously mentioned, defining the entire process of achieving specific business goals, including data, staff interactions, customer experience, and final outputs, can be highly beneficial. However, this process should not be done in isolation for each business process.

Before committing to any specific back office system, you should first work on understanding and mapping out all of your business processes and how they interact with each other. You may have done this, in whole or in part, in the past, but it is a good exercise to carry out once or twice a year as your business grows, changes, and evolves.

When you are considering a new back office system, this overview of everything you do will make it easier to understand whether a specific service will meet your needs. The high-level overview can also be used as the basis for a more detailed breakdown of requirements for a specific business process. So, for example, you could follow the process of a customer order from start to finish at a high level and then break down the individual steps required to take a payment from your online store if you were considering a new online store system.

Comparing Costs, Benefits and Risks 
Our entry-level guide to digitizing your business processes explains in detail the main differences between different kinds of back office systems. 

This guide also includes key things you should consider for each back office system you are looking at. Overall, though, you should consider writing a guide to what risks and costs your business is prepared to accept overall. You may wish to rule out using services that do not have EEA data storage guaranteed, for example, or you may wish to make clear that you cannot work with web-based services or those that require the use of Java applets.

Creating this guide will help you to consistently assess and compare different systems and will effectively narrow your options to those that will suit your organization's appetite for risk and toleration for change. 

Selecting, Buying and Managing Back Office Systems 
Make sure to take note of the dates and costs that you incur when you subscribe or purchase a software package or service so that you are aware of when items are coming up for renewal and how long you have committed to something.

You may also wish to appoint individuals in your business that you trust to act as administrators on given systems so they can manage things like new users, duplicate or incorrect data, and so on. 

Finally, set time aside regularly to monitor and address any issues that arise with your back office systems. If bad user habits, data issues, or security problems are identified early, then the confidence of your users in the system will be maintained, and you can often resolve problems before they begin to adversely affect your business. 

Changing Needs and Priorities 
Finally, remember to be open to change and to continue investigating alternative options for your business-critical data and processes. IT hardware, internet connections, and the software market as a whole are constantly evolving, opening up new possibilities and making previous ways of working obsolete. Sticking rigidly to older processes and software may deny your business key competitive advantages and, in the worst cases, result in security and data integrity issues.

However, implementing and working with systems and processes does require commitment and proper training for your team, so it is also unwise to be constantly changing which software or service you use. It is a good idea to work on a three-year basis—consider what you did last year, what you are doing this year, and what you will be doing a year in the future. This will help you to identify what is critical to your work now, what is less important as your business changes, and what your current system may not allow you to do in the future. When the list of things you are missing out on or risks you are encountering grows longer than the benefits of the existing system to your workflow, it may be time to consider migrating to a new system.
 

9. Glossary 

Accessibility 
An approach to web design and digital services that seeks to ensure that users using assistive technology such as screen screenreaders can use your website or service. 

Automation (Marketing or Service) 
Systems that will do things for you without intervention, based on rules you set up, such as sending an email to a customer when they sign up for your mailing list. 

Back End 
The interface of a system is seen by internal users, as opposed to the front end seen by the general public. 

Back Office 
Administrative and operational activities that are carried out in order to deliver business products or services.

Cache 
Files stored by your web browser to speed up reloading of an already accessed page. 

Client 
A software application that communicates with a server to allow users to work with back office systems. This may be a thin client, which is essentially 

a specialized web browser and usually cannot function without an active internet connection. Alternatively, it may be a thick client that has the ability to download and store data for offline work. 

Cloud Computing 
Delivery of software and services over the internet, from a server to a web browser. 

Cookie 
A file stored on a user’s device to help identify them. Commonly used to manage access to the front end and back end of a back office system. 

CMS 
Content Management System—any back office system that allows the content of a website or online store to be managed by non-expert users. 

CRM 
Customer Relationship Management. Often used to refer to a database or contact management system used to track and plan interactions with the customers of your business. 

Database 
A store of information in a format that allows it to be manipulated by a given system. Some database types are proprietary and will only work with a given type of software, while others are open source or are a de facto standard and will work with multiple types of systems. 

DNS 
Domain Name System. The worldwide network of specialized servers that translate human-readable web addresses (such as www.google.com) into machine-readable IP addresses. Changes to DNS allow websites to change IP location but keep the same URL.

Domain 
Part of a URL, which allows users to find a website or online tool. Top Level Domains (TLDs) such as .com, co.uk and so on are used to group websites and online resources.

eCommerce 
Buying and selling products and services online, including online shop hosting, sales processing, order fulfillment, inventory management, and tracking. 

Encryption 
A security measure that allows two or more computers or servers to communicate with each other securely. 

ERP 
Enterprise Resource Planning—a category of business processes and associated software that helps businesses to organize and run themselves more efficiently. 

Firewall 
A security measure that monitors and prevents unauthorized access to servers and systems inside the firewall. 

Front End 
The interface that an end user/member of the public sees when interacting with your website or online service. 

FTP 
File Transfer Protocol—a method of uploading, downloading, and sharing files directly over the internet. 

Intranet 
A limited access network between computers and servers without your organization. 

Integration 
The process of tailoring software for specific business needs, including creating interfaces and plugins for specific sources of data and specialist applications. Custom integrated systems can be heavily adapted for the requirements of your organization but require ongoing support and maintenance relative to the degree of customization. 

KPI 
Key Performance Indicator—something you choose to measure in order to gauge the effectiveness of a business process or attainment of a goal. This is relevant when working with third-party online services, as agreed KPIs will form part of how you specify and measure the usefulness of back office systems. 

LAN 
Local Area Network—physical hardware that allows your intra-office systems to communicate with each other. 

OTS 
Off The Shelf—a description of back office systems that are usable with minimal customization or setup. Off-the-shelf systems tend to be less flexible but are usually cheaper to run and manage compared to custom integrations. Some OTS systems can also be integrated and customized. 

Open Source 
Open-source software is any software whose source code can be viewed by anyone who wishes to improve on or supplement the software. Note that open source does not always mean free; some commercial software is open source but still a commercial product. The open-source nature of the product usually has benefits in the availability of plugins and the reduced likelihood of undetected security issues. 

Plugin 
A small, usually optional addition to a software product or service, which typically allows it to be connected to other services or offers a particular piece of functionality. For example, an eCommerce service might have the option of a plugin for managing different shipping rates to different parts of the country. 

Proprietary 
Systems, formats, or data that are owned by an entity and not available for development or use (except under license) by other organizations. Proprietary systems can offer specific benefits but often involve a degree of lock-in.

QA 
Quality Assurance—the process of testing and confirming whether a new product or service is working and is suitable for the requirements of an organization. 

Requirements Gathering 
A step in the usual process of integration or setup of an OTS system, where the things an organization wants to achieve using a back office system are recorded, prioritized, and agreed upon. This is a necessary prelude to effective customization and integration work.

SaaS 
Software as a Service—a category of software that is primarily delivered via a web browser or via thin client software. SaaS vendors primarily offer their products and services on a subscription basis. 

Server 
A computer connected to the internet serves files on demand, which are usually used to display webpages and other online content. 

Session 
An active visit or use of a website or online tool by a single user. Relevant for back office systems, as a user session often corresponds to a specific set of actions by a user, such as logging in and creating a new item in the system. 

Source Code 
The computer code is used to deliver a piece of software, whether it is on desktop or online. Not usually available to non-expert users, but may be available if the software is open source.

SLA 
Service Level Agreement—an agreed minimum for a specific aspect of a service offered by you or a third-party supplier. SLAs should be defined and enforced by a contract in most cases. Examples might be the time that your system should be available (known as ‘uptime’) or the time until customer support tickets are normally resolved (for example, responding within 24 hours, resolving within 72 hours). 

SSL 
Secure Socket Layer—a type of encryption that allows webpages to be delivered securely. When you access a webpage whose URL begins with ‘https://,’ you are accessing a page secured with SSL.

UAT 
User Acceptance Testing—a period where genuine end users of a back office system are given the opportunity to extensively test a back office system and confirm that it meets their requirements. 

URL 
Uniform Resource Locator—a human-readable web address that allows a customer or staff member to reach a website or other online tool.