ECI Software Solutions offers e-automate, an ERP for office technology companies to automate business workflows and increase contract profitability.
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MethodCRM
Score 9.2 out of 10
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Method:crm is a QuickBooks-integrated, cloud-based CRM platform.
$35
per month per user
Splunk AI Assistant for SPL
Score 7.3 out of 10
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Splunk AI Assistant for SPL uses generative AI to improve enterprises' digital resilience with the Splunk Cloud platform. It uses natural language prompts to generate SPL, so it can perform a variety of IT tasks.
If you need a system to place and track sales quotes, sales orders, purchase orders, and service calls then E-Automate is perfect. However, if you want to be able to easily bulk upload customers and contracts or if you want to be able to quickly and easily track contract profitability, customer costs, etc, then you'll likely want/need a secondary or different system to do so.
Method[:CRM] is well suited when you have a large company that needs to keep track of customers. It also connects with Quickbooks and that has really been nice for our organization. Our company is small so this really helps us stay on track and build our data base of customers.
Splunk AI Assistant for SPL is well suited for people wanting to code on splunk but have limited or few knowledge on SPL requests. It can be good for people learning and training but also for business applying their own business case thanks to the AI, good for simple case scenario. However, for more complex scenario, involving for example multiple dashboard linked with workflow (get/post) and treillis, leading to other dashboard etc.. AI can be limited to the memory it can hold in.
Sending Invoices out to customers via email or printing.
Keep track of ordering and inventory.
Sales Tax reporting.
Monitoring customer payment activity/setting up and removing credit holds.
Calculating payments to process each cycle.
Excellent aging reports.
I like the fact that when I am looking at one item, such as an invoice, I have the capability to switch to the customer menu rather than having to exit out of invoices and then enter into customers.
I love the flexibility of the search menus - being able to sort on several factors at once.
Make sales invoices not require serial numbers, or be more flexible with it.
Make contract invoices have some sort of flexibility in terms of editing. Our end users complain that QuickBooks made it very easy to edit invoices, and in e-automate, for them, it is practically impossible. (I do personally understand why it has to be as it is myself, I'm just forwarding their observation.)
Make the API actually useful. I spent days looking at the functions and the functions available are not really useful.
Its really the only option for the industry that does enough of what we need for it to function . I'm not sure if there were better options out there if we would have to renew our subscription. With the addition of AI, hopefully something will be able to become more useful.
The things Method does well - QuickBooks data integration and extreme customization - it does very, very well. If you are looking for a CRM product or any business process automation software that integrates with QuickBooks, you have to look at Method CRM
The user interface may be slightly outdated, but it is very intuitive and easy to navigate. Once you have learned one module within the system it is very easy to apply that knowledge to any other module. It makes using the system much easier, and it makes training another person on the system quick and efficient.
Method has a great overall "usability". Once we started using the software; it did not take long before we were able to start editing our own web lead forms, email templates, etc. I think there is a learning curve however the learning curve is not bad. Anyone looking for a cloud CRM should start here
Splunk AI Assistant for SPL is good tool, as I said, it is really useful for educational purpose, taking in its hands small and simple tasks (ex:small query dashboard,...), but it's not a ten because the contextual memory for complex issues/dashboarding/reports etc can be limited, and can sometime suggets none optimized query which are not always checked by teammates and can cause issue on the long term.
Reports are the struggle the most with the information being extracted in a way that you need to copy and paste it into a new document so some of the information is not covered
Sometimes when you need answers quickly, a voice on the phone is far better than having to wait for email support or a callback. I have found this to have delays and feel ECI e-automate should invest more in its support infrastructure.
The Customer Support of this app is fantastic. If you ever have any questions they are there to answer you or fix whatever issue that you are having. The FAQ pages are also extremely helpful when you want to learn about the more in-depth qualities this program has to offer.
Be available to learn! There is a huge learning curve to this program. You have to be willing to take it all in. Be available to the Method expert and be patient.
E-automate is much better at understanding the needs of the office equipment industry and provide the necessary tools. SAP Business One has limited features specific to the office equipment industry and includes things that are not useful. E-automate is also priced much better and provides the best value for your investment.
We chose Method:CRM for the QuickBooks integration. It was important for us to have integrations that allowed us to view payments, organize our contacts, and manage our sales force. There were some learning curves, however, such as creating activities, leads, customers and making sure our payments were being logged appropriately. I do wish that payments would be added to the calendar automatically so that the sales rep could view and make a phone call letting them know their invoice is due.
CoPilot AI and ChatGPT I think lacks context so compared to Splunk AI Assistant for SPL they almost always answer something that do not work. Gemini is better than those two but Splunk AI Assistant for SPL still have the most knowledge for SPL and suggets SPL query that always works but performance can be limited on some of these.
The e-automate will stop working if we stop paying each year. We chose not to go to the cloud and buy the software. QuickBooks and other software are a one-time fee.
E-automate has very few outside vendors for add-on modules.
