1. Automation Topic Presenter Barney Stone, Barney Stone Software Steve Cisick, Technology Copilot, LLC CommCon 2015

2. Automation Q: How can you compete and still be profitable? A: You have to be more efficient! How? Use automation to reduce personnel costs. CommCon 2015

3. Automation Find your chokepoints: boring, repetitive and error-prone tasks. Find ways to automate them: Built-in Stone Edge processes 3 rd party offerings Custom code CommCon 2015

4. Today’s Agenda Why Automate? Barriers to Automation Automation Examples Do You Have Examples of Your Own? Questions CommCon 2015

5. Why Automate? Do things faster and cheaper Achieve predictable results in your business Reduce reliance on people for these tasks Reduce errors due to manual operations Re-purpose employees to higher value activities Improve employee job satisfaction Improve customer satisfaction, grow sales CommCon 2015

6. Barriers to Automation Fear (Unknown / or gone horribly wrong in the past) Recklessness Too comfortable with manual operations Assume it can’t be done or cost prohibitive. Fuzzy processes Overly complicated processes Data accessibility issues Lack of vision CommCon 2015

7. Built in Automation Problem Manual processes always used, but Order Manager has free built in automation Solution Approval rules to automatically approve imported orders that can be fulfilled immediately. Auto drop shipping at order import Multi Order View to batch process orders Batch fill backorders. Automated PO Creation Batch label printing for approved orders. Integrated packing slips to eliminate collation of packing slips/labels CommCon 2015

8. Auto Importer Problem Current SEOM is lacking straight forward way to automate some routine activities. Solution Auto Importer can automate the following: Order import Process tracking numbers Batch printing Batch send quantity on hand Product importing Drop ship tracking number processing Backorder filling And more CommCon 2015

9. Auto Importer Benefits Quantity on hand more current on sales channels. Order changes requested by customer can already be in Stone Edge. Packing slips ready to process immediately. Tracking emails get into the hands of the customer sooner. No need to wait for long imports to finish to start processing orders. No need to manually import orders at odd hours to prevent massive morning import. Other mundane tasks can be done off hours instead of needing to tie up system during day. Can be customized to maximize its benefit. CommCon 2015

10. Drop Ship Tracking Automation Problem No easy way to get drop ship tracking numbers into Stone Edge Customers don’t get their tracking numbers in a timely matter (if at all) Drop ship purchase orders in Stone Edge stay open and are never marked as shipped. Solution Imports drop ship tracking numbers into Stone Edge directly from supplier tracking emails. ◦Tracking numbers imported ◦Purchase orders are closed ◦Order marked as shipped For 3 rd party shipping, import tracking numbers directly from UPS ◦Autoload program automatically downloads Quantum view data. ◦Automation platform can pick this up and auto process the tracking. CommCon 2015

11. Cycle Count Utility Problem Stone Edge doesn’t currently have a way to facilitate real time cycle counting. Solution Real time quantity updates. Organizes what gets counted and the timeframe it needs to be counted. Use with or without scanner. Single or multi-user capable. Organizes list to be counted by sales velocity or location. CommCon 2015

12. Order Fulfillment Automation Problem Stone Edge doesn’t easily integrate with 3 rd party logistics providers for order fulfillment. Solution Different methods used depending on the situation. 3PL runs Stone Edge ◦3PL runs Stone Edge over remote desktop and performs all shipping functions using Stone Edge. ◦This works well only if the 3PL is open to it. Text file exchange ◦Exchange text files (order fulfillment, tracking, and quantity on hand) ◦Easy but doesn’t offer real time benefits for error detection, etc. API integration ◦Most complex way of integrating ◦Near real time, typically the way 3PLs would rather integrate. CommCon 2015

13. PO Import / PO Export Problem No way to import or export standard purchase orders from / to a text file. Solution PO Import tool which takes information from text file and imports them as purchase orders PO Export which enables text file export of purchase orders as a new ‘send method’ CommCon 2015

14. Multi-Warehouse Automation Problem Stone Edge currently doesn’t support multiple warehouses for the same SKU. Solution Treat warehouses like drop ship suppliers from main Stone Edge Auto pick the warehouse to send the item from based on custom business rules. Main warehouse (who imports orders) sends drop ship requests via text file over drop box. Secondary warehouse pick up orders file and import and process orders. Secondary warehouses send tracking back to main warehouse who send out tracking emails. Secondary warehouse send quantity on hand information back to main warehouse who can display / act on the quantity information. CommCon 2015

15. Drop Ship Supplier QOH Automation Problem Stone Edge doesn’t support drop ship supplier quantity on hand import / export to shopping cart. Solution Take supplier feeds, automate import of quantities into Stone Edge. ◦Email ◦Web Service ◦Text files Feeds QOH to shopping cart either inside or outside of Stone Edge. CommCon 2015

16. Stack Monitor Problem The shared stack sucks Solution Proactively monitor stack Set alert levels Alerts sent until stack levels shrink below alert level CommCon 2015

17. Content Synchronization Problem There isn’t an easy way for Stone Edge to synchronize content across multiple sales channels. Solution Created methods to synchronize content from Stone Edge. ◦Google ◦MyBuys CommCon 2015

18. Do You Have Examples Of Your Own? CommCon 2015

19. Q & A CommCon 2015