Because at the end of the day it’s how profitable you run your business that truly makes the difference. Those individuals which understand that both top line revenue and bottom line profits are equally important in every business, truly separates great leaders from mediocre ones when it comes to running a profit driven organization.

Cost reduction is important in business because it directly impacts the bottom line at no cost to an organization. (Unlike sales, which has direct material, labor, facilities, marketing, commissions, management, and administrative costs). By reducing costs, a company can increase its profitability and improve its financial health. This is especially important in times of economic uncertainty or when facing increased competition. 

Additionally, cost reduction can help a company become more efficient and agile, allowing it to respond more quickly to changes in the market. While top line revenue is important for growth, it is not sustainable if costs are not managed effectively. To draw an analogy, simply put “why would you place water into a leaky bucket?”

Therefore, a true balance between revenue growth and cost reduction is necessary for increase valuation and long-term success. 

billingoptimization#, costreduction#, expensereduction#, 3rdpartyvendormanagement#

Why are we trying to do everything in-house, and when do we start looking outside to experts who are better suited to improve our bottom line.

Here are some key considerations your company should be looking for as you determine if an outsourced managed service solution will create value for your company:

Does outsourcing align with our internal resource needs?

As you evaluate your internal staffing, resource roadmap, and internal processes, does a managed services solution allow you to unburden your staff so they can handle other business-critical activities?   Will a fully managed solution deliver the improvements better than we can internally?

Are their experts better than ours?

You need to ensure the VMS provider is designed and resourced by a team of subject matter experts that are focused on cost reduction and have the appropriate industry expertise to provide you with the required improvements to your organization.

Is our process proven to provide results?

Do you have a cost reduction strategy?  A proven process that begins with assessing the current state of your vendor agreements and contracts, resulting in demonstrated savings should be a prerequisite.  

Scalable and Reliable Service Level Performance

Can the provider meet your unexpected demands (higher number of new vendor diligence than you anticipated) and align with your growth plans to scale with your accordingly?

Are You Ready for Outsourcing?

If you are unclear if outsourcing makes sense for you, consider the following as objectives that outsourcing some or all of your Vendor Management Program is something you should be considering:

• Lowering Costs
• Streamlining Operations
• Implementing Best Practices 

In the end, outsourcing your Vendor Management function can make sense on many fronts.  It can send a message to your staff, executives, board members, and investors that your take seriously the responsibilities to mitigate third-party risk, optimize your operating costs, ensure regulatory compliance and strive for excellence.

Ask yourself these questions…

• Do you know how many assets your organization has and needs to track?
• How many users need to have access?
• Where are the assets located?
• Is the asset being used?

The benefits of asset management

Keeping track of the assets of the company is an important task that can save companies money and time. Asset management is the process of maximizing the assets of the company to provide the best returns to stakeholders. It can tell where the assets are located, how they are used, and when changes were made to them.

Here are a few examples

• Demonstrated compliance with the requirements and wishes of your stakeholders
• Better financial results because of better ROI and/or cost reduction
• Informed decisions from multiple angles, such as performance, profit and costs, risks and opportunities
• Risks managed when necessary and knowingly existent when acceptable
• Higher customer satisfaction
• Decisions also based on entire life cycle of assets (also when this exceeds the duration of other plans)
• Stability of the production in the long term
• Improved reputation towards your stakeholders
• Demonstrated compliance with regulation and legislation
• Traceability of decisions
• Improved knowledge management
• Increased attractiveness for shareholders

Vendor Management offers substantial assistance in the management of assets. Asset tracking lets organizations and individuals catalogue, track, organize, audit and manage information about assets of all types, from information technology assets to office equipment and company vehicles.

Added benefits of Asset Management 

• Good Business Practice
• More Meaningful Financial Reporting
• Improved Regulatory Compliance
• Improved Reliability
• Long Term System Integrity
• Cost Savings

Using a Vendor Management Solution to track assets

It is almost impossible to track assets properly without a vendor management solution that incorporates asset management into your cost reduction strategy. Systems like the one that is part of our flagship vendor management solution, VMS Platinum, are typically part of a fully managed service that enables businesses to not only cut costs but also: control expenses, drive service excellence and mitigate risks.  Our solution at Limitless Technology Cost Reduction Services also provides increased visibility and value from their vendors. We leverage our proprietary on-line software, giving you absolute visibility into your vendors and spend. No matter what the vendor or the services that our clients provide – they have a comprehensive view into their: services, contracts, rates, terms, conditions and spends through this sophisticated web-based solution.

Limitless Technology, LLC has been managing complex indirect spend and vendor documentation since 2006 for some of the largest companies in the USA saving them millions in costs.

Through our Billing Optimization and Vendor Management Solutions proprietary platforms, we utilize technology, processes, expertise, time, and resources to improve our client’s bottom line.

Limitless Technology manages your vendors, so you can manage and grow your business.

The Limitless Technology logo was designed to reflect the value and services we provide our customers. Can you tell us what each of the 6 elements represents? The first 5 people to guess correctly, or come closest will win a $50 Visa Gift Card from our CEO, Todd Larsen.

We will notify those who have won gift cards within the next few days.

Click on the image below for a Holiday message from Todd Larsen.

The vendor selection process is a critical step that happens early in the vendor relationship. By being diligent during vendor onboarding, you will prevent a lot of problems down the road. Every potential vendor should be subject to a vetting process that will assist with the selection of the best partner for an organization. Let us review what the process entails.

9 Steps to Onboard a New Vendor

At a minimum, your onboarding process should consist of the nine steps listed below. The process should be more rigorous for vendors with a higher level of criticality. Let’s examine the process further:

1. Do your Research 

Make sure you’re aware of all the vendor options available to you by researching online, listening to sales pitches and asking business counterparts for recommendations.

2. Issue a Request for Proposal (RFP)

This document should be referenceable by both your organization and any potential vendor to clarify exactly what product or service is being quoted. It is recommended to send out an RFP to the top 3-5 vendors you have identified. Within the RFP, outline your organization’s business objectives and technical requirements. Make what you want to accomplish clear to the vendors, and request that they formally respond to every point in the RFP with a confirmation stating that they can meet each requirement.

3. Compare Proposals

It is a good idea to list out the features and functions that have been included in the RFP. You will be better prepared to draft a pros and cons list of each vendor if you create a comparison tool, including details such as where each vendor excels or any critical requirements that may be lacking.

4. Complete a Vendor Risk Assessment 

This crucial step will determine if the vendor is high, moderate or low risk to your organization, as well as whether they’re critical or non-critical. The results of this assessment will factor into the due diligence you will collect.

5. Collect Due Diligence

Do your homework. The due diligence requirements are going to vary depending on the criticality and risk level of the vendor. The more critical or risky the vendor, the more detailed your process should be. The list below provides you a set of guidelines that should ALWAYS be followed:

• Mutual Non-Disclosure Agreement (MNDA) or Confidentiality Agreement
• Basic Information (i.e., full legal name, address, all physical locations, Website URL)
• Ownership structure and affiliated companies
• Tax ID
• State of Incorporation
• Articles of Incorporation
• Secretary of State Check
• Business License
• Certificate of Good Standing
• Credit Report
• OFAC/PEP Checks
• Any “doing business as” or “also/previously known as”
• Dun & Bradstreet (D&B) Report
• Research online complaints and customer reviews
• Vendor negative news search findings
• List of subcontractors
• Picture or Google map view of the facility (if required)
• Check the CFPB Complaint Database and/or Better Business Bureau rating

6. Obtain References

After narrowing down your list of preferred vendors, ask them for professional references or case study/customer success story documentation. It is always a best practice to learn about the customer’s firsthand experience by speaking to someone or reading more about the product/service.

7. Develop an Exit Strategy 

Now that you have compared vendors and completed your due diligence, it is time to sign the contract. 

One important thing many people overlook is an exit strategy. You need to consider a backup plan if the vendor relationship strays off course. This should be done before you ever sign the contract. You never know what may happen in the future, and a second source may be the best solution, even if it means sharing the volume between 2 vendors.

In the event you need to move on from a particular vendor, you’ll want to know some important things:

• How will your data be returned to you or destroyed?
• How quickly you can replace the vendor or bring the product/service in-house?
• Who is your backup vendor?

8. Keep Senior Management and the Board Informed 

Throughout the entire onboarding process keep senior management and the board updated. Be sure to present them with a summary of the due diligence, risk assessment, your planned ongoing monitoring and the proposed contract prior to signing on the dotted line.

9. Perform External Vendor Audits

While your staff is incredibly talented, there are certain competitive and cross-industry-related benchmark analytics and analysis tools that most do not possess internally. Because these capabilities are missing you should seek external expertise to review, analyze, recover and optimize spending and contractual terms related to your vendors. This exercise alone can save 10’s, 100’s even millions of dollars if enough spend categories are looked at on a monthly or at minimum* annual basis. (*NOTE: Often times contractual clauses restrict you from going past 90 or 180 days for recoveries on misappropriated billings. These too must be looked at and corrected when found, if they are determined to be a contractual risk element. Best to seek external expertise to assist in this process.)

These 9 steps will save you from contracting with the wrong provider. Doing your due diligence right away helps guarantee that you are selecting the best vendor in the space and the best fit for your organization.

Limitless Technology, LLC has been managing complex indirect spend and vendor documentation since 2006 for some of the largest companies in the USA saving them millions in costs.

Through our Billing Optimization and Vendor Management Solutions proprietary platforms, we utilize technology, processes, expertise, time, and resources to improve our client’s bottom line.

Limitless Technology manages your vendors, so you can manage and grow your business.

For Additional Information Contact us at 407.330.4466

Operational staff and process owners don’t always understand the complexities of the initial contract. It is signed and filed – end of the story. However, the question remains… is the contract still measured for performance, ensuring nothing which is critical during the life of the contract has been overlooked or omitted?

Management teams can deal with hundreds of contracts at once, so it is easy for a contract term, condition, or renewal to slip through the cracks.

Here’s the nightmare. Imagine working months or years, ushering a deal through the process, only to miss the renewal and miss out on the revenue reduction that comes with it. That revenue has been forecasted from the beginning of the contract cycle, so now operations and finance need to go back and adjust their numbers to reflect the loss. This is not only time-consuming but also carries no guarantee the vendor will honor the rate reduction now or in the future.

On a day-to-day basis, your managers oversee all aspects in relation to your company’s contracts. With so many moving parts in your fast-growing organization, managing these contracts can become a real problem if you are not equipped with the right tools.

Many companies ARE getting ahead of this problem by finding a partner with the tools and expertise to manage the details, as it relates to local, regional, or even national service-related costs. They need a partner they can trust, that will do the benchmark analysis on every single vendor, ensure bills get paid on time and services providers aren’t taking advantage of you, and actively renegotiate for lower pricing and better T&Cs, ultimately resulting in the elimination of “spend fat” and more strategic use of budgets.

A fully managed vendor management solution simplifies contract management lifecycles, making it easier on your staff, compliance team, and legal department. This IS what our team at Limitless does All Day and Every Day. We take this burden off of your people so they can focus on the bigger problems. Plus, we partner with each member of your team, so they feel confident that they can maintain the overall control and don’t lose the vendor relationships they value but DO gain the critical support they need to make better decisions. The support we provide allows your team to focus on the more important work of ensuring occupancy rates, delivering exceptional resident experiences, and growing their business and market share.

Limitless Technology, LLC has been managing complex indirect spend and vendor documentation since 2006 for some of the largest companies in the USA saving them millions in costs.

Through our Billing Optimization and Vendor Management Solutions proprietary platforms, we utilize technology, processes, expertise, time, and resources to improve our client’s bottom line.

Limitless Technology manages your vendors, so you can manage and grow your business.

For Additional Information Contact us at 407.330.4466

Your company starts to grow, and you need more technology to keep up with additional staff, customers and to help improve the process. You are aware of the efficiencies and cost savings made possible by new technologies and are upgrading their infrastructures as a result.

But are you aware of How Purchasing more Technology can lead to Cost Creep?

Every CFO knows about “cost creep”; the slow build-up over time in the cost/revenue ratio. In today’s marketplace, there is an increasing number of service providers who can deliver more efficient solutions, giving end-users more options than ever.

In the beginning, new suppliers are on their very best behavior, cutting deals and slashing costs. The client will enjoy some pretty large cost savings during the first couple of years.

However, as the contract matures and becomes less visible to the client, costs begin to slowly creep up until, if unchecked, they can accelerate way beyond the initially agreed-upon amount.

When you purchase more services, your plans may mutate, creating new contracts that incur additional charges. Over time, small ancillary charges can appear but are not questioned, increasing your bills slowly. This “creep” may leave you paying for services you do not need and may not even understand.

Because data is at the heart of every business and it plays a crucial role in businesses staying connected, technology bills are perceived as a necessary fixed expense and are often overlooked even when the initial cost has increased yet services have not changed.

Companies, Organizations, and Businesses can easily incur monthly expenses ranging from thousands to tens of thousands of dollars each month. Managing the financial component of vendors can be a nightmare! Looking at just telecom you have: Multiple carriers, multiple contracts, introductory offers, equipment, and different locations. Just these factors can lead to poor financial management and procurement processes.

Learn how to improve vendor management processes and improve your bottom line! #stopcostcreep #reducecostcreep

With a Vendor Management Solution, contract experts can negotiate a fixed rate for a particular service. The contract terms must be met ensuring that both parties are aware of what is expected and any variances will be flagged and the vendor will be held accountable for any charges and changes outside of the agreed terms.

If you have questions about any of our VMS benefits contact us today at 866-504-4050 to learn more about our Vendor Management Solutions.

Opportunity Cost

Often, organizations choose the path of least resistance. Contract renewals are no exception, especially when a previous contract/agreement with an auto-renewal clause has already been approved by leadership. In fairness, leaders and managers don’t have the time or resources to research each vendor agreement and vet for better opportunities with a new vendor partner. However, each time an auto-renewed contract is set into action losses can occur. A better solution would be outsourcing this process to a trusted vendor management consultant who can personally manage and negotiate each contract to make sure your organization is receiving the best and most cost-effective vendor solution.

Penalty Costs

Many organizations have compliance measures that surround their agreements. Not verifying these vendors meet those compliances can lead to higher costs or worse yet severe legal repercussions to the organization. Additionally, mismanaging the terms of vendors’ contracts can lead to additional penalties for the organization. VMS consultants can focus on compliances making sure your agreements comply with all state, local, and federal regulations.

Future Savings/Costs

Often, when a vendor is pursuing an agreement with a new client, they focus on cost-saving measures which can reduce a company’s overall bottom-line. This is an attractive pitch to organizations, which are always looking for new ways to be more efficient and cost-effective. However, a company’s internal teams are usually not fully briefed on their part of the process. Additionally, these internal teams are usually not fully trained in the steps of managing the new agreement process. When internal teams don’t effectively manage the new cost-saving measures in agreements, Company’s end up losing big potential savings.

Managing the contract is also important when significant costs are associated with delaying outlined timelines. Making sure vendors stay accountable for the timelines agreed upon could save large cost implications for the organization. Conversely, an outsourced vendor management team can cost-saving solutions are implemented and are continually monitored to guarantee promised results.

Redundancy Costs

When contracts are not managed effectively, significant redundant charges can be missed in annual reviews. Double charges and billing discrepancies are often missed when resources are not continually monitoring to audit vendor agreements. A VMS consultant can take a breadth of billing statements and thoroughly review inconsistencies to reduce redundant costs. In addition, they will monitor future billing to ensure similar redundancies don’t emerge months later.

These costs are something every company experiences but are completely avoidable. All that is needed is expertise in the auditing and management of your business’s current agreements. Limitless-CRS has a proven vendor management solution that eliminates these costs and returns that revenue to your organization. Click here to reach an explanation of our VMS process to understand how these costs can be reduced.

Limitless Technology, LLC has been managing complex indirect spend and vendor documentation since 2006 for some of the largest companies in the USA saving them millions in costs.

Through our Billing Optimization and Vendor Management Solutions proprietary platforms, we utilize technology, processes, expertise, time, and resources to improve our client’s bottom line.

Limitless Technology manages your vendors, so you can manage and grow your business.

For Additional Information Contact us at 407.330.4466

Vendor management is a core competence in successful business. In a competitive marketplace, businesses must look at creative ways to extract more value from providers, while reducing risk and upholding quality.

Simply beating suppliers down on price year after year is not a sustainable strategy!

Limitless Technology, LLC has been managing complex indirect spend and vendor documentation since 2006 for some of the largest companies in the USA saving them millions in costs.

Through our Billing Optimization and Vendor Management Solutions proprietary platforms, we utilize technology, processes, expertise, time, and resources to improve our client’s bottom line.

Limitless Technology manages your vendors, so you can manage and grow your business.

For Additional Information Contact us at 407.330.4466