Meeting multi-site needs
Organizations with multiple locations can be a challenge to manage. Successful groups are built on three elements – clear internal communications, consistent operating procedures, and confidence in the data. Good tech provides the platform for you to be financially successful with a strong corporate culture and excellent customer service.
Beyond financials
Knowing what’s going on inside a business is critical to its success. Tracking and analyzing the numbers enables managers to identify growth opportunities, highlight looming deficits, and make informed decisions.
Finance teams are usually all over income and expenditure reporting, but operational information delivers the detail. It explains the ‘why’. Auditable data on your customers, their boats and the services you sell them will support short- and long-term planning.
Consistency counts
To be consistent, each location or profit centre must capture and report on data in the same way. It is all too easy for silos to develop – ‘this is how we do it here’. But the numbers are skewed if, for example, one marina includes transients in occupancy reports while others don’t. You can’t compare apples with pears.
Consistency is delivered when all sites follow standard procedures – capturing the same data at identical points in the process. It is easy if your marina management system is an integrated part of your day-to-day, aligning people processes and data capture.
All-user access doesn’t mean that the database is a free-for-all – restrict access to functionality and reporting by assigning a role to each user, so managers have more visibility and rights than dock hands, for example. (As an aside, we don’t charge per user, so there’s no extra cost for everyone to have a unique login).
“If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.”
Data confidence
Group-wide real-time reporting and KPI tracking are possible with standardized processes and access for everyone to the central database. Unique user IDs, role permissions and time-stamped actions deliver transparency and increase confidence in the system.
You can see who took the order, when the customer opened the email and how the order was paid. It is easy to drill down on recurring errors and identify who needs a bit of extra training.
Access to information
Marina Assist has over fifty standard reports covering debtors, payments, sales leads and orders, credit notes, deferred revenue, renewals, compliance, licensing, occupancy and operations. Plus user-generated Smart Lists for customer segmentation and insights. Managers have all the information they need right out of the box.
Restrict reporting to the locality or facilitate internal benchmarking by giving managers access to global reporting.
Simplified systems
It’s all too easy for multiple systems to proliferate in large organizations (and even in some small ones). A comprehensive marina management system can sweep away duplicate systems for maintenance, sales and marketing.
Reducing the number of systems in use saves time and money. Not just in the cost of subscriptions, but also by eliminating rekeying of data, reducing the admin burden of report creation and shortening information flows.
Group growth
Open any marine trade newsletter, and you’ll read about marina mergers, acquisitions, and the growth of management companies. Consolidation has accelerated with the post-Covid boom in boating, as waterside businesses become ever-more attractive to investors.
While we’re known in North America as Marina Assist, we work with market-leading operators worldwide under our Harbour Assist brand. We’ve helped acquisitive groups to incorporate new locations in a couple of weeks with zero downtime – our customers can build their businesses knowing that we’re there to support their growth.
If you want more from your marina management system, take a look at Marina Assist.
Interested? Call us on (410) 834-0559 or email [email protected] and let’s talk about how we can help your marina team to work smarter and connect with customers.
