Community Enablement & Management

Many organizations have felt the sting of poorly executed electronic initiatives within their supply chain. Unfortunately, the results of many enablement efforts have been low vendor adoption, disruption to business operations, upset vendors, and wasted money on technology and staffing. Even with the obvious, quick return on investment (ROI) of extending or deepening the electronic flow of information between you and your vendor community, the risks associated with a poorly executed enablement effort keep many organizations from moving forward.

Fortunately, SPS Commerce has developed a successful formula for performing community enablement and management that emphasizes best practices rather than just technology. The goal of each of our proven programs is to maximize adoption rates while minimizing disruptions to both you and your vendors.

SPS Commerce has years of experience running successful community enablement and management initiatives on behalf of numerous large enterprises. At SPS Commerce, we view supply chain integration as a strategic journey with your vendor community, rather than a one-time event. Therefore, we have pre-built processes and programs that span a multitude of initiatives with your vendor community including:

Tier I Vendor Enablement For companies just getting started on the integration journey, SPS Commerce has a tailored program that helps make it easy for your larger vendors to quickly test their existing EDI/XML or Catalog service with your back-end systems.

Tier II & III Vendor Enablement For companies looking to extend their existing integration platform to small and mid-sized enterprises (SMEs).

Multiple Order Management Models For companies wanting to extend their existing integration platform across multiple order management models, including Ship-to-Store, Ship-to-Consumer, Ship-to-Distribution Center, Vendor Managed Inventory and Private Label.

Deeper Integration For companies looking to deepen the level of integration by adding more electronic data interchange (EDI) transactions, XML documents, collaborative business processes or item maintenance capabilities to vendors with whom you already have an electronic relationship with you.

Ad-Hoc Enablement For new suppliers that make up the standard monthly “churn” of suppliers that retailers and distributors realize as part of their standard business processes.

SPS Commerce works on your behalf to help electronically integrate your vendor community through various supply chain initiatives. The process includes three key phases:

Planning & Development Phase

Without a doubt, the most important phase of any enablement process is upfront planning and development. SPS Commerce ensures this is done thoroughly before rolling out any enablement effort to your vendor community. The process is designed to ensure that not only the details of the program are finalized ahead of time, but also that the key groups within your organization are engaged to ensure a successful roll-out.

Specifically, SPS Commerce works with you to develop:

Program Messaging SPS Commerce works on behalf of the buying organization to properly communicate to the vendors why the program exists, what it is and how the program is going to operate.

Rollout Plan SPS Commerce works with the buying organization to help identify a target list of vendors. The plan is designed with a campaign and schedule that considers each vendor’s relationship with you, the method of contact, their priority for being contacted, and any unique considerations or requirements.

Management Tools SPS Commerce provides an online vendor management system that is accessible to your key staff. This system includes a complete vendor database with contact information, schedules, as well as real-time access to their status relative to the plan. Finally, you have access to record detail of each contact between SPS Commerce and your vendor community.

Supplier Technology SPS Commerce has a complete suite of technology options to make it easy for hundreds or thousands of diverse vendors to quickly meet your electronic guidelines. Our hosted testing services makes it easy for vendors to certify their existing solution with your back-end systems. In addition, SPS Commerce offers a complete suite of easy to set up, low-priced service solutions that allow high, medium and low volume vendors to make a painless decision based on their company’s unique business environment.