Channel integration software is used by the retailers to ensure that customers see the same price and have the same experience of their products regardless of the channel they use, such as printed media, the internet, and direct mailing. Organizations use the software to manage end-to-end sales orders across multiple sales channels, which results in simplifying customers' buying process and making it easier for companies to manage orders, fulfillment, inventory, and returns. The software also enables retailers to list their products on multiple digital marketplaces, including Amazon, Walmart, and eBay, through integration. These marketplaces offer an opportunity for businesses to sell their products to a larger market, as the customer base for these marketplaces is already wide. Some of the typical users of the software are large retailers, consumer brands, eCommerce, automotive, apparel and fashion, sporting goods businesses, and more.
Gartner defines distributed order management (DOM) as the software that orchestrates and optimizes the order fulfillment process. DOM utilizes inventory throughout the supply chain network to deliver targeted service levels for order fill rate, and provides optimal on-time, cost-effective order fulfillment. Order orchestration is based on the configuration of business rules in a hierarchical manner that provides flexibility in the optimization by channels, consumers, geographies and other criteria as needed by the business. Additionally, the software utilizes inventory levels for both available-to-promise and available-to-ship, and tracks order status throughout the supply chain.