Telco Accessories customer case
“The amount of time saved from manual work has been most impressive.”
ERP system: Business Central 13 on-premise
E-commerce platform: Shopify
Telco Accessories has been a Tinx-IT customer since February of 2021. Telco Accessories mainly uses the Shopify connector as a hub. Several marketplaces are linked to their Shopify environment, which in turn is linked to their Business Central environment.
In this extensive interview with Wessel Nagtegaal, Information Analyst at Telco Accessories, we take a closer look at the integration. What does their order flow look like? What were the requirements before the integration? How do they experience the integration and the Shopify connector? What are their objectives for the coming years?
Can you introduce yourself? What’s your position, and for how long?
“Of course! My name is Wessel Nagtegaal, and I am responsible for IT & Data at Telco. I have been at this job for 3 years now. I started as an Account Manager and rolled into the IT side. My job duties are quite varied, but mainly I am involved in mapping out what the wishes are within the functional areas at Telco. It is then up to me to translate these wishes into requests of our external companies. Though I am not very technical, I have some affinity with IT and like to map out the various processes at our company. The actual implementation of the requests is up to the external companies, with whom we work a lot.”
Could you please describe Telco Accessories as a company?
“The Telco group’s strategy is to offer our customers a wide range of products. The number of brands we sell has expanded quite considerably in recent years. We started with Xtorm and, a while later, Gecko Covers. Now we have many more, such as Just In Case, Njord and Linq. Following this strategy means that more employees are added to the company. More than 35 employees now work at the Telco group.”
What products do you sell?
“We sell accessories for mobile devices to wholesalers and retail partners. We do so without operating in any physical stores of our own. Each brand has its own specialization. For example: Xtorm focuses on power accessories such as power banks, adapters and charging cables. This brand, therefore, targets higher-end customers by providing them with #MoreEnergy wherever they go. Another example would be Gecko Covers, which sells covers for mobile devices such as iPad and mid-market e-readers. An important USP of Gecko Covers is the level of quality of finish they give you for a modest price.”
In which countries do you sell your products?
“As far as B2B sales are concerned, we are mainly active in the Benelux. The sales in Germany, Switzerland and Austria are growing rather rapidly. In Eastern Europe, the countries of Poland and the Czech Republic have grown their sales explosively in the last year. In Scandinavia, we sell many of the Njord and Linq brands, which are based there. To us, we see the rest of the countries we service as ‘global’. For example, we also sell in the United States, however, the distribution plan there is a bit of a challenge.”
“B2C orders are mostly focused on the Benelux region. Slowly we are spreading to the DACH region as well, that is, Germany, Switzerland and Austria. For this, we use a Shopify webshop that is set up per region. This means that Germany has a .DE domain, and ‘global’ has an .EU domain. We initially use this as a backend to channel all orders from the various marketplaces and then synchronize these orders in our ERP system Business Central 13.”
How did you first discover Tinx-IT?
“Through a Google search, really. After finding the Tinx-IT website, I reached out to our ERP partner, Blisss. I wanted to make sure that everyone was aware of a possible collaboration in order to ensure a smooth process. Tinx-IT had a clear webpage with the exact information I needed, and it seemed just the solution we were looking for. After a conversation with your colleague Bob van der Lelie, we received a clear explanation about the possibilities, and he gave us the confidence that what we wanted was possible.”
“Reliability is also essential. We can really rely on the connector!”
What exactly did you want to achieve using the Shopify connector? What was the need?
“Our needs were quite broad. We were just started using e-commerce, and we were very much data-driven. As we wanted to automate things as much as possible, our main need was to automatically have webshop orders of various platforms be entered into BC without any form of manual work. The order flow was still to be determined in combination with the track and trace that had to be pushed from BC to the Shopify environment.”
“We manage the products in combination with the stock data in Shopify via the Channable app. By means of a unique tag in the order, it is linked to the correct debtor. To process the orders, the shipping lines from 1 line must be automatically converted into 3 lines so that the order flow runs smoothly. Thanks to the good cooperation between Blisss, Tinx-IT and Telco, this was successful!”
We wouldn’t have started using the Shopify webshop if the link between the webshop and BC couldn’t be made with your Shopify connector.”
How do you experience the Tinx-IT connector?
“The amount of time saved from manual work has been most impressive. That was also our main requirement. We wouldn’t have started using the Shopify webshop if the link between the webshop and BC couldn’t be made. When we went wild with e-commerce, it was essential that all orders were correctly converted into our ERP, BC, so that we only had to do a check to release the orders for shipment. We don’t have the manpower to place every order separately into BC. Besides, this is no longer something of this time!”
“I also really like that the Shopify connector has been installed into the Business Central environment because of the look and feel that I was already used to. What also helped a lot was having sessions with the Tinx consultant, Sam Weel, going over the connector and possibilities. We went over things such as “How to download orders?”, “What exactly is in the queue?” and “What still needs to be processed?” This allows me now to basically troubleshoot myself, without needing to ask Tinx-IT for help whenever an issue arises.”
“Reliability is also essential. We can really rely on the connector! It sometimes happens that there is an error in the BC log. This is caused by us since we try to push too many characters in a certain field in BC. BC doesn’t accept this, hence the error. I can now check this in the synchronization log and try to fix it. Besides this, we very rarely have any connection issues because of Tinx. If this does happen, Tinx is quick to offer a solution immediately.”
“Another key feature for us is that your product is very scalable. If we want to connect more marketplaces, this can be done quite easily.”
What is your main goal for the coming years?
“We continue to connect marketplaces in surrounding regions and want to expand the number of orders for the current connector. Where the first connection started with three to four order links, we now have 10. We started with Bol.com Netherlands and Belgium, and Amazon. We have now added a 2nd Amazon. We also have our own Shopify webshop linked to BC and a MediaMarkt/Saturn marketplace. In short, we will continue to expand this.”
“I am very satisfied with the collaboration and hope to continue it for years to come!”
If someone reaches out to you and asks about Tinx-IT, what would you tell them?
“They’re dependable, and tailor-made requests, using the input of multiple colleagues, are possible. What I also appreciated a lot was having a dedicated consultant of Tinx help us out during the duration of the project. Even now, as we continuously develop, I can reach out to Sam (our Tinx consultant), tell him what we need, and we quickly find a solution. As he’s previously worked with us, I do not have to explain everything again, which would be the case if the consultants kept rotating.”
Any suggestions for Tinx-IT to better their service?
“The structure at Tinx is set up in such a way that after the initial phase of the project is done, and we’re live, communication is done mainly through the Tinx support desk. In the past, I have noticed that I first had to explain what I would like to achieve and that sometimes takes quite a bit of time. I really enjoy working with a permanent consultant. I would prefer to do this via a message directly to the Consultant.”
Any remaining questions?
“Not really, no. I am very satisfied with the collaboration and hope to continue it for years to come!”
Solution provided
Tinx-IT E-commerce Shopify connector
