NetSuite: A Comprehensive ERP Solution For Consulting Firms And Service Companies
NetSuite has been in the market since 1998 and is now one of the most popular ERP solutions for small and mid sized businesses. It offers a suite of integrated business management tools that are designed to help you manage your entire company from sales, marketing, accounting, finance, inventory control, customer service, project management and more.
The best part about NetSuite ERP is that it is cloud based which means you don’t have to worry about installing software on each computer or server at your office. All the data is stored online so you can access it anywhere there’s an internet connection.
NetSuite For Consulting Firms And Service Companies
Consulting firm and service based companies need strong tools to manage the projects, track time and measure business performance. Generally professional services company would use a separate tool to manage their finance and a separate tool to manage their project and timesheets. This leads to a lot of business challenges like billing errors and losses are prominent in many companies. The time to bill and collect money also increases as a result of to separate systems being used.
With NetSuite, services team can use one single system and have a complete picture of the project execution, time tracking and financial reporting in real time for their key business processes. Since every thing is connected the billing department can get automatic reminders once the milestones are completed and the project team is well informed of the payment status giving them better visibility and control over the project.
NetSuites’ Project Management feature helps consultants keep track of all activities related to a particular project. It keeps a record of all tasks performed by different people and provides a detailed overview of what’s happening with the project.
A survey done by Infoclutch clearly shows that NetSuite dominates the Computer Software and Information Technology and Services market. 38.7% of Oracle NetSuite’s customers are Computer Software companies and 14% are Information Technology and Professional Services Organization.
NetSuite is best professional services firm‘s, Financial services companies, and consulting services companies.
Features Of NetSuite For Consulting Firms And Professional Services Organizations
Oracle NetSuite Cloud ERP provides end to end functionality for companies who want to manage financials, time tracking, project management and resource management. Once NetSuite is implemented companies immediately start realising improvement in profit margins and and can better control costs.
Whether you are a financial services company, a professional services organization or a company which provides consulting services NetSuite has you covered with its integrated suite of applications.
NetSuite professional services automation provides the following features for service based companies and consulting firms.
Features Of NetSuite for Service Based Companies
- Customer relationship management (CRM)
- Invoicing & billing
- Accounts receivables and accounts Payables
- Financial management
- Revenue recognition
- Project accounting
- Expense allocation
- Budgeting
- Milestone based billing
- Timesheet based billing
- Rule based billing
- Project management
- Project planning
- Work breakdown structure (WBS)
- Project profitability and project budgeting
- Resource management and allocation
- Resource skill matrix
- Multi-currency and multi-subsidiary management
- Real-time visibility on project progress
- Real-time business analytics
Most Common Modules Of NetSuite Used By Professional Services Organization’s And Consulting Firms
If you are a consulting company or a services company, you would need these modules of Oracle NetSuite Cloud solutions:
NetSuite Mid-Market Edition(Base Module): This covers the basic financial accounting software and the customer relationship management. This module is priced at $2499 per month.
NetSuite SuiteProjects Cloud Services (Add-on Module): SuiteProjects is an integrated professional services automation solution natively built on the world’s leading ERP system, NetSuite. This module includes 3 separate features.
- Project Management: This module enables project managers and team members who are collaborating on projects to communicate effectively and efficiently. It allows them to keep track of their progress and manage any issues that may arise.
- Project Accounting: Connections between project activities and company financials help ensure accurate accounting and billing for projects throughout their lifecycles and streamline time and expense management while offering extensive project profitability reporting.
- Resource Management: Project managers can optimize staff and resource utilization by minimizing bench time, ensuring that qualified resources are assigned to the right projects, and making sure that they’re not doing unnecessary work.
Suite Projects module for service based companies is billed at $799 per month by NetSuite
You can access the data sheet for this module HERE.
NetSuite Financial Management Cloud Services (Add-on Module): This module is helps you with expense allocation, multiple budgets, amortization and Milestone based billing when coupled with the Suite Projects module. The module is priced at $599 per month.
You can access the data sheet for this module HERE.
NetSuite Revenue Management Cloud Services (Add-on Module): NetSuit’s revenue management is used to record revenue in a timely and accurate manner. It can help with automate Unbilled revenue recording, revenue policy automation, Revenue forecasting and much more. This module is priced by NetSuite at $1699 per month.
You can access the data sheet for this module HERE.
NetSuite License Pricing For Consulting Firms And Service Companies
When we consider Consulting firms and professional services companies the users can be categorised into 2 types.
- Full access users: Users who perform invoicing, billing, project management activities and reporting activities are considered as full users in NetSuite.
- Employee Self Service (ESS) users: Users who would only do timesheet entries for the tasks assigned to them or enter expense reports like travel expense would be considered as ESS users.
The license price of full access user for NetSuite is $99 per month and the license prices of ESS users is $99 for pack of 5 users (NetSuite sells its ESS users in incremental pack of 5).
Apart from the license cost of users you will have to pay for the base edition and the add-on modules.
Example Of NetSuite License Price Calculation For Services Company
We are assuming that a company has 100 employees with the below user split:
- 6 Finance users
- 10 Project managers
- 4 CXO level users
- 80 Timesheet only users
In this case we will need 20 full access users (6+10+4) and 80 ESS users (80/5 = 16 packs as 1 pack includes 5 users)
The company will also need the following add-on modules:
- Financial Management Cloud Services
- SuiteProjects cloud services
- Revenue management Cloud Services
In totality the bill of material for NetSuite licenses would be:
NetSuite Mid-market Edition – $2499 per month
Financial Management Cloud Services – $599 per month
SuiteProjects Cloud Services – $799 per month
Revenue Management Cloud Services – $1699 per month
20 Full Access Users – $1980 per month ($99 per user * 20 users)
16 Packs ESS Users – $1584 per month ($99 per pack * 16 packs)
The total NetSuite license price for services company is $7461 per month. The NetSuite license price per year for service company is $89532.
You can expect 50% to 60% discount on the above price from NetSuite on the total NetSuite license price.
Cost Of NetSuite Implementation Services For Consulting Firms And Service Companies
NetSuite Implementation cost for Service based companies depends on which NetSuite partner or consultant you work with. You would need to ensure that the NetSuite consultants are well experienced.
The cost to implement NetSuite for a service based company is between $30000 to $50000. This is considering that the NetSuite services would be delivered remotely and there will be no customizations or integrations.
The partner or consultant will bill you separately for their customization or integration services.
NetSuite Videos For Service Companies
NetSuite SuiteSuccess for Services: Resource Management
NetSuite Cloud SRP for Services Companies
Effective Resource Planning in a Hybrid Business Model
NetSuite Review for Service Companies
NetSuite is very well known to have all the features needed by service and consulting companies.
Here are some of the reviews from Gartner specific to service companies using NetSuite.
The reviews seem to be very positive and most of the users like NetSuite for the functionality it offers and the scalability it provides. Some users also like NetSuite ERP for the fact that there was no IT support staff needed to maintain the ERP system.
Conclusion:
NetSuite cloud ERP is one of the best ERP for service based companies as it gives you complete solution for your business. The powerful features of project accounting, project management, resource planning, financial accounting and revenue management helps you manage your business in a single system.
The license price of NetSuite for service based company is $2499 per month for the base module and $99 per month for full access user. You will get 5 ESS users for $99per month and each addon module will cost you separately.