Driving Digital Success Together: A Q&A with Nolan and Onetrail

Nolan Business Solutions and Onetrail have enjoyed a strong partnership for many years, helping IT resellers save hours of administrative work and significantly improve operational efficiency. We recently sat down with Colin Smith, our Technical Director and Founder, along with Cor Zijlstra from Onetrail, to discuss the partnership and the benefits our solution delivers.

The relationship between Nolan Business Solutions and Onetrail goes back many years, why did the two companies get together?

Colin: Both organisations have strong ties to the hightech distribution industry and a shared focus on automation and streamlining the purchasing process with the supply chain. Onetrail’s expertise working with the distribution channel and Nolan’s expertise working with resellers ERP systems made a powerful alliance.

Cor: Both companies focus on streamlining and digitising the IT reseller supply chain. Nolan’s eInteract solution connects NetSuite with the IT VAR ecosystem, and Onetrail provides the real time data backbone between resellers and distributors. Together, we saw an opportunity to automate large parts of the quote to delivery process, reduce cost per transaction, and bring industry specific ERP functionality directly into NetSuite.

How does Onetrail integrate with NetSuite?

Colin: Nolan Business Solutions has created a platform within NetSuite which is called eInteract. The platform provides the link between the data and connectivity in Onetrail and the customers’ sales, purchase and stock processes to provide end-to-end automation

Onetrail provides a normalised product catalogue bringing in data from multiple distributors. This catalogue is loaded into NetSuite and is updated daily with prices and stock availability through eInteract. An online real-time stock and availability lookup feature is also available in NetSuite through eInteract.

Purchase Orders can be sent electronically to distribution from NetSuite via the eInteract and Onetrail APIs

eInteract is then able to talk to Onetrail to receive Order Acknowledgements, Order Responses, Despatch Advices and Supplier Invoices electronically from distribution and update purchase orders and create receipts, fulfilments and bills in NetSuite. Additional information such as delivery tracking numbers and serial numbers are available from Onetrail. 

How does eInteract and Onetrail, reduce manual effort in NetSuite?

Colin: Using automation and the connectivity with distribution, eInteract and Onetrail can remove manual effort from the whole sales to purchase process.

As the sales order is saved on NetSuite, intelligent eInteract modules called Purchasing Assistant and Purchase Planner are able to identify the best supplier to purchase from, raise the purchase order and send it electronically via Onetrail to the supplier.  When the supplier dispatches the goods to the customer, an item fulfilment or Item receipt will be created in NetSuite which means that intelligent automation in NetSuite can raise the invoice for the customer. Finally, the supplier invoice is automatically received into NetSuite and linked to the purchase order. All of these processes can be automated and require no manual effort.

What common IT reseller pain points does the eInteract and Onetrail integration resolve?

Colin: Keeping the product catalogue up to date and knowing who to purchase from is always a challenge with IT resellers. Once the purchase order is raised tracking changes to the order and knowing when it has been despatched is important. Communication with the customer about when their goods will be delivered and providing tracking references can take a lot of sales people valuable time that they can use for selling and finally time spent by the Accounts Payable team with matching incoming invoices to purchase orders is also a pain point. So eInteract and Onetrail resolves pain points and increases efficiency across the whole organisation.

Cor: The integration addresses well know pain points faced by IT resellers, such as time-consuming order processing, manual data rekeying, and the complexity of sourcing across multiple distributors. By providing real-time visibility into pricing and stock, it eliminates inefficiencies that drive up transaction costs and lead to errors. Automated workflows streamline dispatch notifications, tracking updates, and invoicing, reducing operational overhead while improving accuracy. This transformation not only accelerates processes but also empowers resellers to deliver a more reliable and cost-effective service to their customers.

What benefits/ improvements have IT resellers seen from implementing eInteract and Onetrail into their business?

Colin: Sales people have more visibility of the product catalogue and stock levels and prices enabling them to price more effectively. The time taken in the creation and sending of purchase orders is reduced, which is a huge benefit for IT resellers where the salespeople also speak to suppliers and place purchase orders as it frees up time for selling.

Customers can get quicker and better experience, especially using eInteract and Onetrail alongside the standard features in NetSuite for communicating automatically with information about expected delivery dates, tracking references and raising and emailing invoices

Cor: Resellers who adopt eInteract with Onetrail benefit from significantly improved operational efficiency, experiencing up to 80% faster quote-to-delivery cycle times and up to 60% full automation in purchasing workflows. This leads to reduced cost per transaction, real-time customer notifications, and enhanced service levels. Additionally, consolidated distributor data enables better sourcing decisions, while increased sales productivity is achieved through less administrative burden.

Why is the Nolan Business Solutions and Onetrail partnership valuable within the IT reseller industry?

Colin: The partnership is valuable as the two companies have different specialisms and combined, Nolan and Onetrail offer amazing benefits to IT resellers.

Working with companies who know each other well and who work as a team simplifies communication and resolution when something does go wrong.

Cor: This partnership is valuable because it provides a purpose‑built, proven, end‑to‑end supply chain automation solution directly inside NetSuite. Together with Onetrail and Nolan Business Solutions, IT resellers are able to operate faster and more accurately with fewer manual steps.

Would you have a final quote to sum up the relationship with Onetrail and Nolan Business Solutions?

Colin: You won’t find a better tools and partnership to help your IT reseller company succeed in the area of Sales/Purchase automation.

Cor: “Our partnership with Nolan brings together deep ERP expertise and unmatched supply‑chain connectivity. By combining eInteract with Onetrail’s real‑time data services, we help IT resellers automate their operations, reduce costs, and deliver a consistently better customer experience — all directly within NetSuite.”

 

If you would like to learn more about eInteract, you can read our free eBook on the solution here!

For more information on how we can help you solve your current business problems, get in touch with our expert team today!