Transforming Your Shipping with AI and Software Integrations | Episode 31

Hey, everybody. It's Patrick Escolas with another episode of Banyan Technology’s Tire Tracks podcast. Today, I got a special episode. I've got two people from two separate organizations. I've got Mark Hamblin from Insight Works and Bill Gaustad from SPS. Sorry, there's another part to SPS, Bill. Hit me with it. 

SPS Commerce. 

SPS Commerce, yes. 

Yes, [inaudible 00:00:36]. 

Business, money going back. How do I forget that? I'm a terrible salesperson. No, but thank you for that, Bill. What I always like to do after, of course, I pre-interviewed you guys. So you guys would find me funny and laugh at all my jokes. But, Mark, give me a quick breakdown of who you are and why we're talking logistics today. Where did you get into that? How'd that come? Then, Bill, just a quick heads up, I'm going to do the same to you after. Mark, you go first. 

Sure. I'm not exactly sure why you want to talk to me specifically because most people try to avoid that. But Insight Works, in general, we do a lot in Business Central for shipping. What I mean by that is right within the ERP system, being able to package things up, build your pallet, all those sorts of things, get the shipping rates via Banyan’s and the ASNs via SPS Commerce. We're sort of that hub within Business Central that allows people to define what they're shipping, how they're shipping it, those sorts of things, and get it out the door. 

We work. We've got a WMS and we work in manufacturing and all those sorts of things. Anything Business Central-related, the business dynamics, Microsoft Dynamics, Business Central ERP solution, that's what we do. That's basically it. 

From that, and I'll go back into more on the Insight Works, but you, have you been a technical background coming into more the logistics place? Or tell me a little bit about yourself because one thing that within I'm – and I know that might be painful, but talk to a lot of logistics industry people. But one of the things that has become very clear is that up until about the past five years, technology and logistics have not always been synonymous with each other. There's been a lot of manual entry and with this kind of growth or this push towards getting things automated, getting things integrated. That's why I'm curious about you because, obviously, you come from, I would assume, a tech background. When did you start having to deal with anything that involves supply chain?

Yes. Well, interesting. I actually started out as a mechanic, and then I moved into parts. I was automotive, well, motorcycle parts manager for a number of years and operations manager in manufacturing before I really got into sort of the technology side of it. It’s really bringing what I would want as somebody in that role into the technical world, right? Being able to use the computer systems to be able to effectively package things, effectively get things out the door, and all of those sorts of things. Yes, my background in the last 20 years or so and which is weird because I'm only 29 or something but –

You look great for a 29-year-old. I’ll tell you. You’ve got more hair than I do, and I'm 35, so you know. 

Yes. The last 20 years or so. Insight Works has been around for just over 10 years but taking that that knowledge, not just my own. A lot of the people here have that sort SME background and bringing it into the digital world, if you will, and automating some of those laborious manual processes. 

I love that because I talked to a lot of tech people who are tech people for tech people's sake. But you have a little bit of the big picture coming from where you're at before, so you understand why the ones and zeros are supposed to line up. They are for that end result. That's sometimes more rare than it should be. But I'm leaving Bill out here for a second. 

Bill, SPS Commerce, where do you come from? How did you get involved in this crazy thing? What made you lucky enough to be on this podcast viewed and listened to by seven and a half people? 

It’s the first podcast I'm on, so I feel honored. No, I appreciate it. My name is Bill Gaustad. I lead our partnerships team here at SPS Commerce. For those who don't know, I know Mark's very familiar, SPS Commerce, we're a full-service retail supply chain organization. What is that actually? What does that mean? 

There are words in there and [inaudible 00:04:50] the words. 

They mean something kind of. No, we – essentially, the customers we work with are buying orgs, so think of retailers that the three of us could go out to Costco, Walgreens. You name it. Suppliers that sell into those retailers, whether that being into their store, online, direct to consumer, and then logistics partners. All of which that kind of some of the things that Mark mentioned earlier, we work across that fold, typically, automating data. For those in the simplest terms, typically what's called EDI. It’s been in the industry for about 30 years. 

Yes. If you don't know EDI and you're listening to this, you're probably not at the right podcast. 

I would tend to agree with you on that or you were given something like, “I need to do this now. Where do I start?” Either way, everyone's at a different point within their journey. But my background, I mean, a little different from Mark, but I come from a technical background. I've been in SPS for about five years. But I started in the industry more on the ERP side of the fence, so working really as a VAR, a value-added reseller; reselling ERP, deploying ERP. 

I'm sure we'll talk about it here today because Mark mentioned D365 Business Central is a lot of is intertwined with logistics, EDI, shipping. That's how I came to the fold and how I've met Mark. 

Is there anything ERPs aren't intertwined with, right? Is there anything they won't touch into, and how much fun is it working directly for an ERP? I would imagine it's never like a, “No, we don't do that.” It's a, “Yes, give me a week, and we'll find somebody that can figure that out.” 

Yes. I would say when I first started, I'm like, “I don't know what I'm doing and why you hired me.” I would say that was probably the first thing. 

That was a hell of a sales pitch. Was that on the resume? 

I appreciate it because actually my first job out of college was with SPS, and that's how I get linked up with that particular ERP reseller. But, no, you learn a lot. You learn a lot really fast, and you typically learn it via failure if that resonates or makes –

It’s the fastest, and I think I said this yesterday. It was jokingly in the office. But you got to have a little trauma or else the scar. You learn better from the scars than you do from the gold stars, right?

Totally. I'm happy. It's 15 years now fast forward. I'm a much happier and healthier individual, I think. 

Perception is important. As long as you believe it. 

Yes, exactly. But, no, I think where – because you were exposed to so many different types of customers. I think that's number one. Take away what our software does or what we sell for. It's like what are the business problems these customers are having to go through, and then what type of solution is needed to solve for that? Is it us? Is it a partner, at that point in time, like an Insight Works, like an SPS, my developers’ in-house? What is it to essentially solve the customer’s business problem for scalability? That was super interesting. I couldn't – where I'm at now is because of those experiences. 

I would just say it's got to keep you busy, and you probably don't know how each day is going to go then. There's no monotony to it, at least up in the first few years I would imagine. 

Totally, yes. 

No. Then kind of going back to a point where I'd say probably both you made is we're talking about WMS, ERPs, kind of this D365 and all of that. There's been a push. Like I said, logistics and technology haven't always really been a synonymous term. But lately, at least from the clients I speak to and work with, as well as some of the prospects, there's been a giant push towards integration across the board. I'm wondering if that's what – I mean, you guys are living that because it's just inherently a core part of what you do for me. My Banyan exists both places as a standalone and as a completely tied-in thing. But is that – are you seeing a big hop in automation and plugging in as many things as to one box as possible? Or is that just a perception I have maybe because of the post-COVID?

No. I think you're right, and I think COVID had a lot to do with it, really cementing, I think, what consumers want. When I say consumers, that's also the people that are running logistics departments. They're consumers in their personal. What they're used to is going in and saying, “I want this.” Having the ability to have that integration with the carriers and say, “Oh, it's going to cost me X amount to deliver this, and I hit a button, and I get it, right?

The people on the other side figuring out how they're going to provide that same level of standard in sort of higher volume logistics or LTL or FTL, things like that. That's where the push is coming from, right? People know that it's possible to hit a button, get their delivery dates, get their rates, get the stuff delivered quickly and easily. Well, they're like, “If I can do that in my personal life, why can't I do that in my business?” 

Yes. It’s not a Sci-Fi novel. You're doing it on a phone over to the side and then going into a POS from Windows 95, and it's telling you, “Sorry, I can't do that.” 

Yes, exactly. I think that and COVID because everybody shifted to a large degree of online shopping. That helps cement the fact that, hey, this stuff is possible. Why can't I do this with my freight shipments, right? I think that expectation of being able to do everything electronically now is much more prevalent and is driving a lot of these discussions that we're having. 

With that, Bill, I would imagine that because you are retail-centric, even at least maybe one to two-thirds of kind of the description you gave me, that's got to be a big deal because some of these players now have to play at an e-commerce pace that they weren't before, and then also probably diversifying their functionality as you talk about some of the warehousing. What does that look like in either pre-COVID, towards post-COVID, or now from your perspective, kind of from a finger pulse check of what's going on there?

Yes. We're fortunate enough because we – and you hear the term omnichannel a lot, right? You're going back to what I – it could mean –

Does that mean one channel?

Yes, right. 

Because I'm not smart. Okay, I haven't it. 

The way I describe it is are you selling through multiple channels and through multiple customers. 

Got you. 

Because we have about 50,000 customers globally, all at different stages in their life cycle, all running different systems, all those different things. I'll get to that on integration here in a second because that definitely impacted but –

It sounds like a really fun topic by itself. Yes. 

Yes. Where we – I'll touch on kind of where the spike came out of and where companies. What type of companies were most successful is, hey, they're able to say yes to – well, I was shipping to a distribution center and customer – individuals like us three were buying it in store. That wasn't happening for 12 or 18 months. So organizations who were smart and nimble and maybe the last part which is were able to say yes were ones that, hey, I was shipping into a store, DC. But now, I have my own website through Shopify or BigCommerce. Or I'm selling through an Amazon Marketplace. 

They’re, one, able to recognize I need to shift. But then, two, they're actually able to do that from a technology perspective. That's where we were able to assist organizations. It's like, all right, I can check that box. I can get the information flowing into my source of truth. Again, ERP, WMS, TMS, and then with partners like SPS and Insight Works. I'm able to get those out the door and fulfill those. That wasn't like – all right, that happened in grocery specifically. That happened in – it was literally across the board. Then you saw the organizations that were literally able to say yes and take technology as a – technology wasn't a barrier for them to be able to accomplish that. 

Got you. Got you. I know that there's an EDI-centric aspect to SPS. Is that still a really prominent part of the integrations? Or is it kind of – is there other channels within those integrations? Well, just because I know we use API here, there are some file drops and some exports and flat files and webhooks. But EDI is by definition a very standardized language back and forth. Does that – well, yes. Ideally until somebody starts messing with the code and then it's very unstandardized. But is that still a great effective tool to get systems to talk to each other?

Yes. I'm not just saying that because I work for an EDI. 

No, no, no. Which is the first good answer, by the way. 

Well, maybe I'll say this. Because we as a provider of EDI, whether that be compliancy or automation, we're not driving the need for it. We're just solving the need for it. Who's driving it are the retailers, so retailers – if you want to do business with us, you have to do EDI. Until that changes, whether there's better technology out there or whatever the case may be, that adoption won't happen. We follow – I'm saying that in terms of it's – because if you hear anecdotally, EDI is going away. It's not. It's really not. 

People in logistics have been saying that for at least 30 years, and I'm still getting, “Hey, can you get me EDI hooked up to these guys?” Like, “Yes, yes.” 

Totally. 

[inaudible 00:14:41], too, and everything along those line. It’s much easier to say something is dead and get a news article on it and get people to click it than the real story, right?

Totally. Then that's not to say and I'm not as technical as I used to be. There's maybe more automated technical solutions out there per se. Again, it's all about adoption, until that happens. We follow retailers. Wherever retailers go, that's our model because suppliers need to follow and same with logistic partners because they're serving those suppliers selling into those retailers. 

I mean, that's a fair point, too, is if that's what they're using, that's what you're giving them and making sure works for them. 

Totally, yes. Yes. 

Really, I mean, the standards may change, but the EDI being electronic data interchange, I mean, you're always going to have that electronic data interchange. Even though maybe the underlying transmission mechanisms and standards may change, you're still going to have to send data back and forth. That's never going ever. 

Right. It's just how it's going to happen. No, I agree. 

It’s like to your point, we see articles, “Oh, barcodes are dead. Barcodes are going away.” Then the article is, “Well, they're going to use data matrix codes,” which is basically a barcode. It’s not going away. Some of the technology and concepts may change, but it's not going away. 

Then one of the biggest things I like to or question I have and maybe it's just a change of how you're describing it, so we use WMS or Warehouse Management System and ERP. Oh, God, Electronic Resource Platform. God, do I even know what an ERP –

[inaudible 00:16:15], but yes. 

Okay. There it was. There it was. What's the key difference there? Do you guys – is there a defining line or – like we talked about before, there are some blurred lines where if your ERP is doing a certain level of supply chain automation, it becomes a WMS. Or are you bolting a WMS into an ERP? Where is that line defined if at all?

Yes. Any and all of that really. Some ERP solutions include WMS or portions of that capability in there. Others you need to bolt it on. Some are – and that line shifts, depending on which system you're working with. I mean, the one we're focused on is the Microsoft Business Central platform, and that has some good core structure for WMS in there. But you really need to bolt something on like ours to make it effective. It’s a little bit of both, right? Yes, that's really what it is. ERP, obviously, holds all the master data for inventory and those sorts of things. WMS is actually how you execute on that information in the warehouse, right?

Okay, I got you. I got you. It’s not – they're not really competing with each other. They're using each other's functions to really get whatever the process needs to be done. Now, within that, Bill, you talked about you started as a VAR. I know that Insight Works uses VARs. What is that like for – I'm a salesperson for my organization directly, and there might be some partner conversations, Insight Works being one of them and whatnot. But is there a different level of value that VARs bring to the table and talk to me? 

I've never had to interact one with one from a consumer side or going like, “Hey, I'm interested in ERP or WMS. I'm going to go talk to a few VARs and see what they bring to the table.” But I'm very curious as to where the value is in that and how that might be a little different than having per se your own direct sales force. 

Mark, do you want to answer that? Do you want me to take that?I think we’ll both answer different ways but very similar. 

I want both answers. 

You answer it, and I'll answer it the opposite way, just to keep things –

Fair enough. 

I like that.

Fair enough. 

Little checks and balances here. 

Yes. Well, maybe I'll answer this from kind of where I stand now because SPS, we're – it's funny. We use all these different acronyms in this world; WMS, ERP, VAR, ISV. SPS, we're a third-party independent software. I'm saying this intentionally. Independent software vendor, meaning we add additional functionality on top of an ERP, WMS, or TMS that that system does not do within itself naturally or foundationally. 

You're like Shelby Motors compared to the Ford Mustang. 

Yes. There you go. Exactly, yes. We’re adding functionality on top of those systems that they don't necessarily have and more importantly they don't want to have. That's the blessing and the curse of what we specifically solve for and what we do. But coming from like this is my team's role and this is actually a huge emphasis for SPS as a business because we have about 2,500 employees globally, most of which here in the Twin Cities, Minneapolis area. A lot of those are individuals going out and engaging our customers or potential customers. I don't like to say directly but on behalf of other go-to market strategies that SPS has. 

For example, we'll partner with retailers. Retailer is like, “I don't want to engage these suppliers, SPS, all of those things.” As you can imagine, those retailers are like, “Hey, this is ERP or a system they're using to run their business, and this is their VAR that they're working with.” They don't have that data. 

Go tell me how that's going to work and then write it up for me. Yes. 

As you can imagine, we're calling into these customers, and we're also working. A huge component of our business is working with those ecosystems, so not only the VARs. I should say technology ecosystems. [inaudible 00:20:23] saying that. Not only the value out of resellers but also the publishers directly. 

In Mark's case, we work with him a ton in the Microsoft D365 space, where we have alignment with Microsoft directly but also the value out of reseller. Our goal is to make sure are we solving – one, do you understand what we do, number one, and how we solve for it and what type of customers we work with? There's a lot of things that overlap when they're implementing a new ERP, which those value-added resellers do. 

They're working with these organizations typically at a much larger capacity outside of what we just saw for because they're the trusted advisor from a technology perspective ideally with those types of customers. We're engaging not only our customer community, but we spend a lot of time engaging our VAR partners on what we do, what the benefits are partnering with SPS, and at the simplest level like when do engage us. 

Yes. A lot of kind of education within that, too. That makes sense. Or updating them on, “Hey, here's the newest.” Okay. I got to give – that's a good eight points on the answer. What's Mark got on the opposite? 

I can't answer the opposite. So, yes, the VAR, the value-added reseller, really they're typically – we refer to them as the partners, right? So the customer has a partner which is their VAR. That VAR, ideally, their role is to understand the customer's business and how the software is going to help them with that business like the ERP software as an example. As part of that, the ERP doesn't do everything, right, as said. They're going to have to reach out to other organizations like Insight Works or SPS Commerce to figure out where are we going to fill some of these gaps that are needs in the customer’s environment.

We're not going to be able to do that ourselves. We do 300 and some projects a year on our own, plus the ones our resellers do. We just don't have the time to go in there and figure out, okay, learn the customer's business and figure out what's going to fit. The VARs are on there ideally engaged with that customer. They understand the problems, they understand their business, and they're going to be able to appropriately select the tools that are going to help fill those gaps. That's the value from the customer’s perspective of the VAR. 

From us, your question, I think, was a little bit why would we sell direct versus through a VAR specifically for that, right? We can do sort of broad-based selling and hire a bunch of salespeople. We don't actually have any salespeople. It's me which is a pretty sad testament to things. But anyway –

Don't be so down on yourself, Mark. 

I don't actually sell. Our sales processes, that's what it looks like. If you like it, call me. Otherwise, you'll never hear from me again.

I love that. That's always my favorite. 

Yes. Those VARs are our sales team effectively, and they're going to come to us if they find a problem at a customer’s site that our solutions will address, right? Then what we do is then we reach out to Banyan and SPS Commerce to go in and say, “Okay. Well, we're going to address this core set of functionality.” There are things, like Bill said, that we just don't want to do. I don't want to do EDI. That's dumb. I don't want to go connect to all these carriers. It's dumb, too. You guys do the dumbest things. 

I love that. 

You guys [crosstalk 00:23:56]. 

That's going to be the title of this podcast. Doing dumb – making other people do dumb stuff. No. It’s very professional. It sounds like VARs get to be more of almost a consultant with kind of a bigger – it’s problem solution finders with a bigger tool set than they might have if they only sold one product or worked with one organization. One of the, as you guys were going through, great answers on both sides – again, I'm not a judge here. I'm learning as much as I am also trying to make the conversation go in a way where I can seem smart. You have to – you talked about this, not wanting to do things and not do dumb stuff. It's interesting to me. 

You got to go talk to Microsoft about certain things. Is that – for certain – the platforms that you're working on, is that a, “Hey, we're going to go do this. Is that possible?” Or they go, “Yes, it's possible. We just didn't feel like supporting it.” What does that look like? What do those conversations look like as you're talking with that? I don't know if even parent company or a platform owner would look like. 

Yes. Well, from our perspective, I mean, what we're doing is responding to the market demand. We really don't go to Microsoft and say, “Hey, we're going to do this.” It's more like Microsoft saying, “Hey, I noticed you did this. We're going to do it now, and you're screwed.” Luckily, for us, that doesn't happen much. But they can actually decide, “Oh, I like what you did there. I'm going to do that.” Then you're kind of screwed. 

We have pretty mature and significant functionality that I think we're safe there. Really, it's more Microsoft looking at what we're doing and what aspects of the market we're addressing, and should they pull some of that functionality within the ERP so that – because their goal is to sell the ERP solution. They want as many checkboxes in in that list as possible. Oh, yes, we can do shipping. Oh, yes, we can do EDI, which, honestly, they have. If you go and ask Microsoft, “Hey, can Business Central do LTL? Can it do EDI,” they'll say, “It sure can.” Really, it –

Is it, “It sure can. Here's the people they go talk to and make it work.”?

That's what it ends up being. But that –

Here’s Mark. Here's Bill. Here’s Banyan. They'll make it all do those things. But, yes, it can. Don't ask us about the technicals. That's somebody else's job. 

Exactly, exactly. SPS will be probably a little different than us. But from our perspective, we're just kind of doing our own thing. We're addressing the needs of the market. If Microsoft wants to copy us, that's their prerogative. But we don't worry about it too much. We don't really talk to Microsoft and say, “Hey, we want to do this,” and away we go. No. On the AI side, which is not really part of this conversation, but on the AI side, we're doing more of that. 

Where is AI not part of the conversation right now, right?

Yes. We do have some stuff on the shipping side for AI that's out there already. But anyway, we'll leave that for later. 

That's right. Got to leave them wanting for more. We got to have a follow-up episode, right? Bill, do you have something to – on my flawed question of talking to Microsoft that Mark said he doesn't do the way I thought. 

I think maybe Mark mentioned it. We're fortunate. It's a blessing and a curse. What we do, some publishers have tried like Microsoft. Maybe not specifically but like examples of. For what we do, it's so niche that they realize it's not just about the, like you mentioned, integration earlier around automation. It’s not just the integration into that system. There's a whole other aspect of it outside of the system around compliancy with retailers, suppliers, and logistics partners. 

You can't marry those two if you're so focused on the system and/or focused on the network, if you will. You got to really marry that. That's where we're fairly unique in the sense, where we have that network expertise. Actually, that's where our business was built on was a retailer came to us saying, “Hey, we don't want to engage our suppliers and onboard them via EDI. We don't want to do that. We want to hire you.” 

That's actually – so we just came in. We didn't really have any sort of integration per se like, “We'll build your specs, and we'll go engage your suppliers, and we'll give them a tool to be compliant.” Then that was 25 years ago. Now, today, we sit. Now, we can offer integrations into leading ERPs that we own and operate and the network. It’s evolved. But to Mark's point, we align with the publisher more so around compatibility. Because as you probably know, they go through enhancements and upgrades very frequently throughout the year. We want to make sure we're very much ahead of that, so as that does happen and our customer’s processes don't break. 

Yes. Warn before, so you put it in your Dev cycle and, “By the way, we changed something today. Good luck.” 

Yes. Yes, totally. Or what else are you doing in the next three to five years that we need to be aware of that could make the customer experience much more positive? Again, that way, we're not playing it. We have a very specific partnership strategy around do we feel strong about the publisher engagement in alignment, and do we feel really strongly about the ecosystem alignment? 

What I mean – again, going back to the value, the partners that Mark mentioned, consulting firms, what have you. Those two can be separate and in a lot of cases are. But we try to marry those two to make sure over our training by market, we position ourselves well and have a strong product for our customers. 

Now, I could honestly probably talk to you guys for about another hour because so much of what you do is stuff I don't touch every day, as well as I haven't talked – you guys aren't another 3PL or you're not another giving me industry on parcel that I've had two or three times. Nothing against it. I love talking parcel, but I love not knowing what someone's going to say even more because I'm only as smart as my last conversation with someone that knows more than me. 

With that, and I think Mark had a great point, Microsoft could say, “Hey, we like what you did there. We want to take it,” which leads me to a great opportunity. What's something that both on the Insight Works and the SPS Commerce that you guys are doing now and are really proud of or is right around the corner that you'd either like to promote or just say, “Hey, this is something that's hot and new, and I want to know about it and an opportunity to talk to.” Like I said, seven and a half, I think maybe eight people now, they gave me – there's a whole half more person that's going to be listening this week. Who wants to go first?

Sure. We mentioned the AI. I think that that's really the kind of cool new interesting stuff. We've got a lot because we've got a pretty broad product range across manufacturing, shipping, those sorts of things. 

What would the AI be used for in that, just in the decision logic? Is it in some of helping you guys code or plug in some of the integrations? Or is it everywhere you can fit it?

Pretty much, yes. There's a few different ways we use it. One is sort of the internal efficiencies where it helps us code and things like that. But from a productivity perspective for the end customer, some of the things are things like carrier invoice reconciliations and things like that, right? Ours is a multi-shipper system where they might use 20 different carriers and being – and we hold all the codes and everything, and we can get the invoices through the ERP, and we can reconcile those. So things like that. Using AI makes it actually effective. 

When you're receiving goods, we've been talking about shipping a lot, but the flip side of that is receiving, similar types of things. As we're receiving, we can use AI to streamline that receiving process and handle serial numbers and lot numbers and things like that more effectively than sort of the old manual approach. Lots of good ease on the AI side coming on. I'd be surprised if you didn't, and that's – I like hearing a lot of those, especially with – I'm a person who just started using an AI note-taker for some of my meetings because it's hard to engage, while at the same time actively taking notes. I know that's made my life easier. I can only imagine what some of the backend softwares and platforms can able to be with it. 

I'm excited to see that – Bill, not to steal any your thunder. If you're not using AI, that's okay. I'm not using any AI other than just the note-taking. But what about SPS? What do you guys have that you're really proud of right now or that's coming out down the road that you want to talk about?

Well, maybe I'll probably speak on behalf of Mark who attends a lot of the same events that I do. If you're going to some sort of industry event, ERP, you're going to hear about AI. [inaudible 00:32:55]. 

We probably already heard about it for a year. We’ll probably hear about it for another two years. 

I don't know. I'm a simple man. By simple, maybe it's too good. But what does that actually look like in theory? You can talk about these grandiose ideas. I mean, maybe like – what we're – how we're looking at that at SPS is how do we streamline the customer experience. There's a lot of things behind the scenes. Again, going back to EDI is painful. It really is. 

It’s like some more of that – doing more with one page in front of you. 

Doing more, automating what can take someone weeks or months down to hours or days as an example. That, to us, is one thing that we are heavily focused on. How do we – because maybe to kind of look at it at a macro level, SPS, we're a public org. All this is public. We have –

Tell us your secrets. 

Yes, right. We have ambitions to be a billion-dollar company by 2026. That's going to take organic growth through existing customers, which if they're happier, they typically acquire more – 

Send more money. Yes. 

Consume more and see more value out of it. This will answer your question around excitement is, all right, what are other adjacent markets that we could either acquire and/or partner with. I mean, that's one of the reasons why we partner with Mark and his team because we solve something for the same customer just – solve a similar business problem but different. We don't want to be in each other's links. We're highly, highly complementary of each other, which is like those are the best partnerships. They really are. 

That's exactly it. I’m never going to build a WMS. He doesn't want to go out to all the LTL carriers and get their API. Yes, it's easier to work together to grow together. 

Totally. It’s like how do you streamline that. I won't share on this podcast, but we're doing some things even with our own partnership to streamline the customer and partner experience. That’s in motion now. It’s like things that – it's the old way. We even have new leadership within SPS. All this is happening now. All right, how are we taking it to the next level to make sure, hey, the customer – because if the customers aren't happy, you're going to see it. You're going to feel it. 

You’re going to hear about it. They’re going to churn. 

Yes. How you continue that and continue that scale? That, to me, is – again, that's a very – it can be a fairly generic answer, but that's what I'm most excited about because, one, for me personally, it's going to stretch me quite a bit. But, two, if we don't do it, it will probably have some pretty negative implications on our ambitions and the business in general. 

Good reasons. Yes. No, that makes a lot of sense to me. Like I said, I'm more on the sales side, so all of that growth and figuring out where to grow naturally scalably and while using the partners and the tools at your disposal that already work while keeping the customer happy. Always the best one because it's great to make sales. It's even better when people aren't yelling at you after you make the sales. 

It’s not about that one. It's about the 9 or 10 following. It’s the referral. You’re typically doing something right in that. 

Exactly, exactly. All right. We're coming to an end here. You guys won't have to listen anymore. I know you guys are busy doing actual stuff instead of just pretending to be a podcast host. With that, I always like to leave kind of with the outro with this platform. If you had one message, whether that's from you personally, Insight Works, or SPS, or even from the industry you're at or looking into, what's something as a kind of a final shout out either what we talked on here or what you're seeing out into the audience or just to have for archived recording one day to look back on?

Well, I'm going to say this because, hopefully, there's partners listening. 

Yes, that's always the hope. 

We love our partners. We do. We're heavily partners. Without them, we would not be successful, even with other go-to market strategies at SPS House. It's critical for what we do. Going back to the ambitions, it's critical for us to scale. If we're not doing it through partners, it's not going to happen. I'd say that. 

Maybe to those – going back to the beginning of this conversation of organizations that either are here that are like, “I'm doing it today, and it's really painful, or my sales team just got us a contract with Target, as an example. I have to do EDI. What does that mean?” I would say that you need to figure out the way like what makes best sense for your business to handle it because there are a couple ways.

I would say the SPS’s model, and just very directly, is we look at ourselves as a full-service provider, meaning instead of a 3PL supplier or retailer saying, “Hey, I'm going to hire 10 people. I'm going to buy the technology and go run my own EDI initiative,” that typically fails unless you, one, have been through it before or you – it’s all [inaudible 00:37:40]. 

It doesn't seem feasible for most people or most organizations. 

In most cases, no. Yes, especially in the midmarket and really the 3PL space, too. What I would say is where SPS comes into play is we handle that on behalf of our customers and partners. Our whole value prop is we'll handle a tech and the resourcing behind it, so you don't have to. If you came to me saying, “No, I want to own it,” we're typically not – we're actually not a good fit. Going back to Mark's question there on sales, we’re not a good fit. 

There you go. 

I want to say just really think about how you want to manage it, just like other aspects of your tech stack. Is this something you want to own? Or is this something that you would prefer to outsource? It's a little bit of a plug, but I think it's important to talk about. 

Part of that is exactly for you to be able to plug. That's part of why this podcast exists, so go ahead, Mark. You're up. 

Yes. Well, that's a tough one to follow but [inaudible 00:38:33] thoughts on sort of the partner relationships but also for anybody, the seven and a half people out there listening, as you said, probably more than that. But if you're looking for a technology platform or want to move to one, looking at Business Central is a good place to start. It’s a plug for Microsoft there. But mostly because that's what we run on, and that's what jointly we will all run on if a customer goes to Business Central. 

If you're looking for something, Business Central is the way to go, and then, of course, Insight Works where all of our solutions will plug in there. Then hook up to SPS and Banyan and just make the world a better place. 

Well, guys, thank you so much. Kind as a last wrap-up here, you heard it from Mark and Bill from Insight Works, from SPS Commerce and from Banyan Technology. You don't have to do it alone, especially when it comes to technology, integration, automation. Make sure you're doing it with a partner. If you don't have the resource to do it yourself, make sure it's a good fit and make sure that what you're doing is big picture, ideal workflow. 

What you wanted to do with is little manual work as you can because at a certain point, we all have turnover that we're going through. We all have changing initiatives where we're all trying to do a lot more with the tools that we have or even less tools. It just makes sense to lean into some of those partners or some of those organizations that have already been doing something really well in their specialization or niche and tying that into what you're doing. I know that's where Insight Works and Banyan, and I know that SPS and Insight Works have really kind of made a really organic and beneficial partnership and relationship. 

Thank you guys both very much. I appreciate the time from Mark and Bill and Insight Works and SPS Commerce. Everybody watching, stay tuned for some more podcasts. Appreciate the time. I hope you learned something. I hope you had some fun. Yes, this is Patrick Escolas for Banyan Technology’s Tire Tracks. We'll see you next time. Thanks, guys.