The economic landscape in South Africa as we know has changed dramatically in recent years: from a buoyant economic climate with an abundant availability of credit, SMEs now find themselves challenged in ways they least expected. They face obstacles such as tighter budgets, reduced access to credit, and a technology landscape more complex than ever. It has become more essential for small businesses in today‘s competitive environment to take a strategic approach to the important information needed if they wish to develop and ultimately remain competitive.

Organisations more than ever have no alternative now but to be more flexible and quick to respond to constantly changing business conditions. To do so, timely intelligence of the organisation, its processes, and its business partners must be available allowing more informed decisions with actions that achieve or maintain a competitive advantage in the marketplace. Even with regard to available assistance from trusted parties, for example to interpret financial data; these business owners might prefer to be able to do this for themselves and on a more regular basis.

Bad decisions often stem from a lack of reliable information or an unwillingness or inability to understand and interpret the available information. Systems that support decision-making in organisations are therefore an important component in organisational information dissemination and have the potential to impact positively on performance and competitiveness.  So, making informed decisions is important for any organisation, but is especially crucial for SMEs as valuable time and money cannot be wasted on incorrect decisions when economic belts are already tightened.
Business intelligence (BI) is the most recent development of systems that support organisational decision-making. For example, a business owner may want to know not only the revenue generated per client but also how profitable each client is to decide which clients to target for future sales and marketing efforts.

Simplicity underpins any software solution and we as a recognised service provider strive to create systems that make life easier. There literally is no end to the information that we could potentially provide with respect to our services but if the objective is simplicity then selecting the relevant BI amongst the data is paramount. Easy to understand information that you can access and utilise whenever and wherever you need it. 

So, our question to you, our customer, is what timely intelligence could we provide to you that would significantly inform the decisions that impact your financial world? What information would you like to see on our reports? On our portal? Please feel free to email us with your thoughts.