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Press Release: Ron Ketterling Of Business Automation Specialists Of Minnesota Is Named To Microsoft Partner Advisory Council

For Immediate Release

Contact:
Ron Ketterling
Business Automation Specialists of Minnesota, Inc.
(763) 571-8580
ronk@bautomation.com

Minneapolis, Minnesota – November 9, 2011 – Business Automation Specialists of Minnesota, Inc. (BASM), a leading professional services firm and authorized Silver Certified reseller of Microsoft Dynamics NAV, announced that company President, Ron Ketterling, has been invited to participate on the exclusive Microsoft Partner Advisory Council (PAC).

The Microsoft Dynamics PAC program is comprised of an invitation-only partner membership and meets on a regular basis to gather and disseminate top partner input on Microsoft product direction and opportunities, developing business models, competitive environments, go-to-market strategies and Microsoft programs.

“We are honored to have been selected as a member of the PAC,” said Ron Ketterling, BASM President. “Our
participation in the PAC demonstrates and validates our strong commitment and delivery of Microsoft’s programs and solutions. We welcome the opportunity to collaborate and share our industry expertise and experience through this venue.”

The Microsoft Dynamics Partner Advisory Council (PAC) was formed to promote a collaborative effort between Microsoft and its leading Microsoft Dynamics partners. As a relative newcomer to the Microsoft family, BASM already plays a key role in that effort, and was also recently selected to participate in the elite Microsoft Managed Partner Program.

Through collaborative efforts and meetings, PAC members and the Microsoft Dynamics leadership team work together to ensure that Microsoft Dynamics partners are enabled with the tools and technologies required to be a successful Microsoft Dynamics business.

About Business Automation Specialists
Business Automation Specialists leverages 26 years of practical business experience with software technology to help mid-sized manufacturers and distributors capitalize on their unique business strengths. BASM has built the business by helping their clients build theirs; enabling them to become better, faster and stronger through improved management controls, cash flow and profitability. In addition to Microsoft Dynamics NAV, BASM is an authorized reseller of Sage Accpac ERP, Sage CRM, and Sage Pro ERP. For more information on Business Automation Specialists of Minnesota, Inc., please call (763) 571-8580 or visit BASM’s website at www.bautomation.com.

Press Release: Business Automation Specialists OF MINNESOTA Attains Microsoft Managed Partner Status

Minneapolis, Minnesota – October 11, 2011 - Business Automation Specialists of Minnesota, Inc. (BASM), a leading professional services firm and authorized Silver Certified reseller of Microsoft Dynamics NAV, announced that Microsoft Corporation has elevated the company to Managed Partner status as an emerging partner.

Microsoft chooses its elite Managed Partners based on criteria including revenue potential, revenue growth, and an established track record of providing unique solutions using cutting-edge technologies. With this program, Microsoft and partners gain mutual benefits in product direction, sales, and marketing. Less than 5% of Microsoft partners are included in the Managed Partner program.  This program makes available Microsoft resources aimed at helping BASM accelerate the adoption of its solutions in the marketplace.

“We’re honored to be recognized by Microsoft for our commitment to our clients’ success,” said Ron Ketterling, President at BASM. “This clearly acknowledges the serious investment we have made in Microsoft and a result of our team’s outstanding contributions in helping our clients adopt Microsoft Technology.”

Microsoft allocates dedicated headcount to help only a select group of partners grow their business.  As part of being a Managed Partner, BASM will have inside connections and insights directly with Dynamics NAV group within Microsoft. “This is a huge advantage for BASM clients,” offers Ketterling.

About Business Automation Specialists

Business Automation Specialists leverages 26 years of practical business experience with software technology to help mid-sized manufacturers and distributors capitalize on their unique business strengths.  BASM has built the business by helping their clients build theirs; enabling them to become better, faster and stronger through improved management controls, cash flow and profitability. In addition to Microsoft Dynamics NAV, BASM is an authorized reseller of Sage Accpac ERP, Sage CRM, and Sage Pro ERP.  For more information on Business Automation Specialists of Minnesota, Inc., please call (763) 571-8580 or visit BASM’s website at www.bautomation.com.

5 Ways to Accelerate and Improve Your Companys Cash Flow

The average collection time for a small to medium sized business is 19 days. According to CashEdge’s recent 2011 Small business Payables and Receivables survey, the majority of the 405 businesses surveyed indicated that they wanted to reduce the time to collect by 50%. How can your business achieve this lofty goal? ERP systems have a series of powerful tools that can aid the collection process. Here are five easy ways to utilize existing tools with your ERP system to increase cash flow:

Inventory Management Systems

When is the right time to invest?

Any business, regardless of their industry, has the need to manage their inventory on some level. If you are manually entering inventory data into your accounting system, you may be limiting your ability to achieve the rewards of a solid inventory control process. If you have: long physical count times, over staffing, shipping errors, delayed receiving, or error-prone data entry it might be time to look at a barcoding solution. Adding barcode data capture can dramatically increase efficiency, yet many businesses mistakenly believe that this is outside their ability or budget.

Advanced Inventory Webinars Available Online!

Did you miss any of our Advanced Inventory Webinars? You can now view them on-demand by clicking here.

Lead Your Business to Higher Profits:

Through Business Intelligence

Businesses must react faster to changing profitability and customer trends, and to do that you need the ability to access and analyze critical data about your business quickly. You need up‐to‐the‐minute information about your income, costs, and customers in order to make the best possible decisions. In many businesses, collecting and analyzing this information is challenging because different departments store the data in non‐integrated systems and provide varying levels of reporting. In order to get the information you need, you must rely on the IT department to sort out the data you need, or ask individual employees in each business unit to create reports. If IT is busy or employees are unavailable, you don’t receive reports.

Tips & Tricks

One of my favorite tricks in Microsoft Dynamics NAV is CTRL E. Before I learned this trick I frequently reentered numbers in a spreadsheet or keyed them in a calculator. Of course, I frequently made mistakes (my 10 Key skills aren’t great). CTRL E to the rescue. Simply press CTRL E in NAV to send the current document or ledger to Excel. Now you’re ready to add, sort, analyze or review your data immediately. What a great tool. Click here to learn more about NAV 2009 Enhancements.

Empower Your Sales and Marketing Teams

Ten Things You Can Learn about your Sales and Marketing Efforts from Your CRM System

Customer relationship management (CRM) vendors often claim that their software can do practically anything, from revealing which leads work (and which don’t) to who your best customers are; to which products are the most or least profitable. But what do business owners have to say? To find out if CRM systems really deliver on what they promise, dozens of business owners and managers were asked what they can learn from their CRM systems. Here are the top 10 responses:

Lean Manufacturing – Part 4

Value Stream Mapping

Value Stream Mapping is a snapshot of the current state of a segment of the business at a 20,000 foot view. It helps to visually see where to tackle your next project improvements and challenges the paradigm of every member of your team. Part 4 of our Lean Manufacturing Series will help to address the basics of Value Stream Mapping so that you can fully understand how this powerful exercise can benefit your organization.

Lessons Learned from the Amazon Outage

The primary concerns over Cloud Computing have revolved around privacy, security, and reliability issues. Last month’s Amazon outage brought the reliability issue front and center, and brought it home for some Sage SalesLogix Cloud customers. With service down for 4 business days, the initial reaction was to question the feasibility of Cloud Computing. However, we have a different take on it and feel that Cloud Computing, as a whole, will be stronger for it. There are also lessons that can be learned from the Amazon outage for any company – on the Cloud or not.

Remote support is only available when initiated by BASM staff

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Questions to ask yourself about your business - right now:

Let BASM help you evaluate the health of your business system and confirm if your current automation system is on par with current technology. Take our free Online Business Systems Health Test© to get viable answers to these and other questions today.

We designed this test to help you quantify and dispel the painful feeling that something is wrong with your business system. While this is not a functional assessment, your results will give you two grades on your current automation.

Take the test now so you can see where your business currently stands and get:

While you may be doing well overall, you can never be too sure if there is an area of your business that you can improve. Our free assessment can assist you in taking your business to the next level, and provides you with a brief recap and the recommendations you need to consider if changes are required.

You have nothing to lose and your business has all to gain!

We highly encourage you to get multiple people from your company take this test. You will find each person will have different rankings and objectivity when looking at your system. For example, employees in Customer Service will have a varying perspective compared to your employees in Accounting.

By having multiple people in various departments take the test, you will gain a larger overview, as well as validate your own assessment.