Enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems control various business-critical processes — like accounting and order processing — which makes them a single source of truth for key data throughout the company.
That’s why integrating your Magento store with an ERP can bring massive benefits like:
If you don’t already have an ERP, or you are looking for a more modern solution, this guide will help you:
However, choosing the right ERP solution and integrating it with your Magento site is difficult.
The process requires careful preparation, as well as technical skills and an in-depth understanding of the Magento and Adobe Commerce platforms.
There’s also the issue of maintenance; even successful ERP integrations require ongoing maintenance work, so you need someone with the technical expertise to manage site integrations in the long term.
That’s why, in the second part of this article, we’ll show you how IronPlane — our team of certified Magento developers, Solutions Specialists, and UX designers — can help you find and integrate the right Magento ERP (or improve your current integration).
You can also schedule a free consultation and code audit with our team to evaluate the best ERP integrations for your business.
Before we start exploring each option, a quick note:
There’s no all-around best ERP software, and there are many more than those listed here. It all depends on your use cases, business needs, and budget. We advise you to evaluate each option based on your individual circumstances or work with an expert who can analyze your business processes and recommend the right ERP. In some cases, highly industry- or product-specific ERP solutions are required, but even these are worth integrating with your Magento or Adobe Commerce platform.
Finally, note that each of these ERPs can be integrated with your Magento store in different ways, with variables such as data volume, transmission approach, triggers, and frequency. From old-school export / import of a .csv file to real-time APIs connections, each ERP integration with Magento is unique and requires thoughtful design and implementation.
Integrating your ERP and Magento store requires:
ERPs coordinate the data flows in your business. That’s why a successful integration relies on you properly defining what data must be shared between your Magento store and ERP.
Each business is different, so it’s impossible to provide an exhaustive list here. However, sharing the following data can be a good starting point for most eCommerce businesses:
Once you know what data should be shared, you need to define the source (or sources) of that data.
This can be very tricky if you’re using lots of disconnected systems, like a CRM, an accounting tool, and warehouse management software, for example. If you’re already using an ERP, this step might be easier as most of that data is likely inside the ERP platform.
Regardless of the specifics, make sure to spend enough time finding and documenting where the relevant data is stored. This will prevent you from missing key information and having to re-do the integration after it’s complete.
In theory, you could sync data between your Magento store and ERP all the time. In practice, having data constantly sent back and forth can induce a heavy load on your site, resulting in slow load times and a poor customer experience.
That’s why finding the right time to share different data is essential.
For example, things like product descriptions aren’t time-sensitive, so syncing them once a week may be enough. However, information regarding new sales orders and pricing changes has to be updated in real-time.
There are three ways to sync the data between your Magento store and ERP systems once you’ve selected the right frequency:
IronPlane is an eCommerce development agency, specializing in Magento Open Source and Adobe Commerce.
Our team of certified Magento developers, Solution Specialists, and UX experts has helped dozens of B2B and B2C brands:
We also offer a host of additional services like Magento-optimized hosting, site security, and performance monitoring.
Our work is based on a highly-individualized approach to each client’s circumstances.
That’s why we start each client engagement with a free consultation and a detailed discovery phase. (You can schedule a consultation with our team here.)
During this preparation, we dive deep into:
We offer three different audits at this stage:
This extensive research and preparation process ensures our team can make the best possible recommendations for your business needs.
For example, during this early stage, we can help you:
When working with IronPlane, you also get a dedicated Solutions Specialist to act as a strategic partner between you and our development team. Specifically, your Solutions Specialist:
We also give you access to our project management tools and dashboards, so you can track what we’re working on, how much time each task takes, and how you’re being charged.
In the next sections, we’ll take a look at three past projects where we integrated our clients’ Magento sites with ERP systems, so you can get a better feel for our approach.
Barbecues Galore is the largest specialty retailer of grills and outdoor living products in the U.S., with stores in California, Nevada, Arizona, and Texas.
They also have a Magento 2 site where customers can find and buy these products. In order to improve the online shopping experience, Barbecues Galore’s team wanted to make some upgrades to their site and internal processes, like:
They also wanted to integrate Oracle ERP and M2E Pro with their new Magento setup.
This was a complex project, so they contacted our team to help prioritize and execute the necessary tasks.
After our audits and project planning, we got to work using the Colibri foundation — a design and development foundation that improves coding efficiency and reduces the time, labor, and cost of implementing Magento updates and security patches.
Our team was able to meet all of Barbecue Galore’s requirements, including:
Here are the result of these improvements:
Check out the full Barbecues Galore case study here.
Bosca has been in the business of manufacturing and selling high-quality leather goods since 1911.
Before contacting us, they sold their products online through a Magento 1 store. However, Adobe would soon discontinue its support for Magento 1, so Bosca had to migrate its online business to Magento 2.
We have lots of experience with Magento migrations, which made us a natural choice for Bosca’s team. There was just one caveat — the migration, as well as additional improvements to the site and an ERP synchronization, had to be done within six weeks.
Our Solutions Specialists got to work immediately on creating a plan that would ensure an on-time launch. Based on that plan, we migrated Bosca’s site to Magento 2 and made key improvements to it, including:
Thanks to our understanding of the c2 dexore business needs and a detailed plan, the initial project was completed within the six-week timeframe.
After that, we continued to work with Bosca. Our team identified further areas for improvement that quickly boosted the site’s load times and conversion rates.
Here are the results five months after the launch of Bosca’s Magento 2 store:
Check out the full Bosca case study here.
Yardstore is a global aircraft supply business. They’ve operated out of Wichita, Kansas since 1946 and have become one of the leading providers of aircraft sheet metal tools and aircraft pneumatic tool repair in the world.
Yardstore wanted to improve the overall shopping experience, implement elastic search, and have the ability to manage payment rules for their different buyer personas. Plus, they needed to keep their integrations with Counterpoint (their ERP) and Avatax (their domestic tax calculator) intact while making these improvements.
However, their site was built on the older Magento 1, which limited their options. That’s why they contacted our team to help them migrate to a newer version and implement various improvements.
After our initial audit and planning, we started the migration process from Magento 1 to Magento 2.4.4. We used the open-source Alpaca theme to speed up the implementation and set a good foundation for future integrations with Yardstore’s ERP and tax tools.
We also reworked the site’s navigation. We used visual levels of navigation and implemented elastic search and quick order to help shoppers easily find and buy the products they need, without getting confused by the hundreds of product categories.
Thanks to the migration and improvements, Yardstore now has an updated site with a better UX and faster load times. Their integration with Counterpoint ERP also makes product information easily available to shoppers, and order information easily available to their team.
Check out the full Yardstore case study here.
Our team of senior Magento developers, UX professionals, and Solutions Specialists can help you achieve website goals — whether that’s integrating with an ERP or another business-critical system, building custom pages, improving site speed, increasing conversions, tightening site security, and making any other frontend or backend improvements.
Schedule a free consultation and site audit today so our team can help you choose the right ERP for your business or analyze your current ERP integration.
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