In the ever-evolving landscape of the SaaS industry, staying ahead means having the right tools at your disposal. As they grow, SaaS companies have several components to consider, such as controlling customer attrition, tracking metrics and analytics, subscription billing, and recurring revenue recognition.
NetSuite ERP is the ideal solution if you’re a SaaS company searching for a robust tool to streamline and scale your operations. NetSuite is the best ERP system for SAAS companies, designed to grow with you, regardless of whether you plan deployment or migrate from another ERP system.
In recent research, Gartner designated NetSuite a leader in MQ for Cloud Core Financial Management for Large, Midsize, and International Businesses. Not only this, IDC Marketplace recognized NetSuite ERP as a SAAS and cloud finance leader in 2023.
Established in 1998, Oracle NetSuite is the top cloud ERP product worldwide. In more than 200 countries and territories, the system has 37,000+ users. In this blog, let’s explore why enterprise SAAS companies love NetSuite ERP, breaking down in top 10 reasons to choose NetSuite for SAAS businesses :
1. Robust Financial Reporting
The primary goal of financial reporting is simple: to assist companies in keeping track of their cash inflows and outflows. Enterprise SAAS companies have unique requirements when it comes to financial reporting. These include:
- Customer Renewal and Subscription Metrics:
The core value of SAAS companies depends on recurring revenue. This becomes a reason why these companies need a tool to track and manage customer renewals and subscriptions with the help of various metrics like MRR, ARR, and churn rate.
The NetSuite SAAS Metrics Dashboard provides a simple view of essential key metrics and a 12-month forecast that will project revenue for your current customer base.
- Need for Revenue Recognition:
Subscription SAAS companies need to adhere to the revenue recognition guidelines outlined in ASC606. Businesses can customize a chart of accounts in NetSuite ERP to meet organizational needs. SAAS companies with NetSuite ERP have the flexibility to create accounts and sub-accounts that precisely represent cost centers, expenses, and revenue streams.
- Attracting Investors and Raising Funds:
A lot of SAAS companies are expected to have solid financial grounds to attract investors. NetSuite for SAAS companies facilitates the seamless generation of customizable financial reports. All the reports, profit and loss statements, balance sheets, cash flow statements, and many more are customizable according to the needs of your business.
2. Automated Subscription Billing
One of the biggest pain points is taking a contract document and manually entering its terms into an invoice. You can simply manage your recurring revenue streams and facilitate customer invoicing with NetSuite’s subscription billing feature.
You can trust NetSuite’s automated subscription billing feature and focus on other core aspects. SuiteBilling, NetSuite’s standard billing engine, and the advanced ZoneBilling SuiteApp (for even more flexibility) can handle simple to complex billing scenarios, including various pricing models, tiers, and subscription terms.
3. Accurate Revenue Management
NetSuite’s Advanced Revenue Management (ARM) guarantees you streamlined revenue management with special features and will ensure compliance with revenue standards. This will help SAAS businesses reduce accounting costs, improve decision-making, and simplify financial close.
Salient Features of NetSuite’s ARM Module Include:
- Adhering to Accounting rules:
The module assists companies in making sure they adhere to accounting rules like IFRS 15 and ASC 606. It provides the tools and functionalities required to accurately recognize income by the principles provided in these standards.
- Managing Complicated Revenue Situations:
NetSuite ARM can manage complicated revenue scenarios such as multi-element arrangements, subscription-based revenue, usage-based revenue, and revenue based on uncertain factors. It enables companies to establish unique guidelines and estimates for every situation.
- Automate Revenue Allocation:
The module allocates revenue among multiple products, services, and performance responsibilities under a contract. It allows companies to allocate revenue based on relative fair values or standalone selling prices. This results in accurate and optimal revenue allocation.
NetSuite ARM offers full reporting tools for generating revenue-related data. SAAS companies may quickly examine and analyze revenue data, track revenue trends, and prepare financial statements that meet accounting requirements.
4. Seamless Integrations
Oracle’s ERP uses an open API. This will allow SAAS businesses to easily integrate with core systems that they already have in place. You can link anything to the standard NetSuite through an API. This will help you use NetSuite as your single source of truth for all of your operational systems. A seamless NetSuite integration will ensure to manage data flows and thereby improve the efficiency of businesses.
5. Flexible Pricing Models
As NetSuite is a modular platform, its pricing is dynamic and can vary based on your requirements. NetSuite has flexible pricing models based on different features SAAS company needs:
- Tiered Rates per Tier
- Tiered Rates
- Max Rate
- Flat Rates
- Blended rates
- Amount Thresholds as an Option
6. Simplified Cash Flow Management
You can get a real-time view of SAAS company’s cash position with NetSuite Cash 360. It enables you to manage your cash flow with the ability to generate quick and precise forecasts.
On the cash management dashboard of the SuiteApp, you can perform the following tasks:
- Examine cash projections in real-time with the help of graphs and charts.
- View the current payables, receivables, and transaction balances.
- See the pie charts for the ageing summary of A/P and A/R.
- View each subsidiary’s cash forecasts.
- View the consolidated subsidiaries’ cash projections.
- Export financial data to a CSV file.
7. Advanced Inventory Optimization
Oracle NetSuite ERP established inventory management to assist organizations maximize their profitability. Inventory optimization allows you to track and get related information on the incoming and outgoing items in the SAAS business.
You can get the updated information in real-time simultaneously across all the channels. This will allow your customers to understand the stock status of your products, remaining quantities, and accompanying promotions before making a purchase decision.
8. Customizable Platform
NetSuite provides a range of cloud customization options to enable the development and implementation of complex procedures and integrations in companies.
SuiteScript is one such option. SuiteScript is a JavaScript-based platform that will fully automate and customize SAAS company’s processes. You can also create NetSuite functions, processes, and entire applications with NetSuite SuiteScript.
If a company wishes to integrate NetSuite with a range of on-premise and cloud environments, SuiteTalk will simplify the process of improving, expanding, and integrating third-party and legacy systems for businesses.
You can use SuiteBuilder to alter elements that regulate how users interact with NetSuite. You can use a straightforward point-and-click interface to create field forms, record types, and transaction types in NetSuite to customize them to the specific needs and processes of SAAS companies.
Cloud SAAS companies can package and deploy customizations from a development environment to a production environment using SuiteBundler.
9. Enhanced CRM
NetSuite provides a centralized platform to efficiently monitor and manage your relationships with clients, partners, and suppliers. From sales force automation to creating automated case management for customers, NetSuite CRM is an optimal enterprise SAAS solution.
10. Powerful Business Intelligence
Large volumes of big, small, and intermediate data have a lot of business information that is yet to be discovered and examined. Powerful business intelligence will open the door to an improved customer experience, data-driven forecasting, and streamlined products for enterprise SAAS companies.
NetSuite SuiteAnalytics has integrated analytics, built-in reporting, and dashboard functionality that provides actionable insights about business performance. It helps you track KPIs essential for decision-making in SAAS companies. You can directly get configurable dashboards of the KPIs in real-time. Some of SuiteAnalytic’s features include savable, shareable, and reusable workbooks with pivoting and charting capabilities. You can also save the search; it will provide access to the filtered data and get matched to a particular set of criteria.
Conclusion
As digitalization progresses, businesses and activities will increasingly migrate to the cloud, propelling SaaS to the forefront. SAAS industry contributes to roughly one-third of the total software market, with advantages like lower total cost of ownership (TCO), easier implementation models, and a reduction in the need for IT infrastructure, human resources, servers, and other components required for on-premise software models.
Choose Netsuite with VNMT to ensure access to unparalleled expertise, seamless integration, and robust support. Our NetSuite Consulting Services make innovation and growth easy for businesses.
