Streamlining Business Processes: Integrating Dynamics 365 Business Central with Dynamics 365 Sales

Effective data sharing and process automation have become crucial for organisations seeking to optimise their operations and stay competitive.

Integrating Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central with Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales offers an enhanced approach to manage sales, streamline operations, and gain real-time insights across departments.

This integration brings together the comprehensive ERP capabilities of Business Central with the powerful customer engagement tools of D365 Sales, ensuring a seamless lead-to-cash process and robust backend management.

Why Integrate Business Central and Dynamics 365 Sales?

• Enhanced Sales Management: D365 Sales handles customer engagement and complex sales activities, while Business Central manages backend operations like inventory, order processing, and financials.
• Unified Data Flow: Through integration, data can be synchronised between both systems, ensuring that sales and operational information is always up to date. This helps improve collaboration between sales and operations teams, reducing duplication and errors.
• Improved Customer Experience: Sales teams can access real-time data about product availability, customer credit limits, and pricing from Business Central directly within D365 Sales, leading to faster responses and more informed interactions with customers.

Setting Up the Integration with Microsoft Dataverse

At the core of the integration between Business Central and Sales is Microsoft Dataverse—Microsoft’s secure data platform that enables different applications to share data seamlessly.

Using Dataverse, businesses can establish a two-way sync between the two systems, enabling smooth data exchange and alignment across platforms.

The Integration Process

Use the Assisted Setup Guide:

Business Central provides an assisted setup guide to help connect with D365 Sales. During this process, you can configure the data to be synchronised, such as customers, contacts, items, and sales orders.

This setup includes coupling records between Business Central and D365 Sales to ensure that data like customer accounts, sales orders, and invoices match across both systems.

Coupling Records:

Once the initial setup is complete, you can further refine synchronisation by coupling specific records.

For example, you can link an account in D365 Sales with a customer in Business Central.

This allows data updates in one system to reflect in the other, maintaining consistency across records.

• For instance, if you want to see accounts in D365 Sales as customers in Business Central, you must couple the two types of records. You can do this by using the Set Up Coupling action on the Customers list page in Business Central.

Full Synchronisation:

After configuring the integration, you can initiate a full synchronisation. This action ensures that all records in Business Central are aligned with the corresponding records in D365 Sales.

The process runs in the background, allowing you to continue working while it synchronises.

Custom Data Mapping:

You can map data fields between the two systems to ensure precise synchronisation. This is particularly useful for aligning custom fields and ensuring that business-specific data points are properly synced.

Key Benefits of Integrating Business Central with Dynamics 365 Sales

Integrating these systems offers a variety of benefits, including:

1. Streamlined Order Processing and Inventory Management

With integration in place, salespeople using D365 Sales can access Business Central’s price lists and real-time inventory levels when creating sales orders. This enables accurate quoting and better management of customer expectations.

For example, when a salesperson creates a sales order in D365 Sales, they can view the availability of products directly from Business Central. This information helps prevent stockouts and ensures that orders are processed accurately.

Additionally, order processors in Business Central can handle sales orders transferred from D365 Sales. They can manage these orders, process them, and even post sales order lines for items entered in D365 Sales.

2. Improved Sales Automation and Quoting

Sales automation tools within D365 Sales, such as opportunity management, lead scoring, and advanced quoting, help sales teams work more efficiently.

With the integration, quotes created in Sales can be automatically processed into Business Central, ensuring that sales data flows smoothly into the backend for further action.

• Activated sales quotes from D365 Sales can be transferred automatically to Business Central if you enable the Automatically Process Quotes option. Alternatively, users can manually convert quotes by using the Process in Business Central action.

This process ensures that sales quotes remain consistent across both systems and that previous versions are archived as new revisions are processed, maintaining a clear history of customer interactions.

3. Bi-Directional Data Synchronisation

With Dataverse as the integration backbone, Business Central and D365 Sales achieve real-time, bi-directional synchronisation.

This means that changes or updates made in one system reflect immediately in the other, ensuring data consistency. Key data points that can be synchronised include:

• Customer and contact information
• Inventory levels and product availability
• Sales quotes, orders, and invoices
• Pricing and discount structures

This level of integration allows businesses to maintain a unified system where sales and operational teams access the same information, reducing duplication and improving decision-making.

4. Enhanced Customer Experience

Integrating Business Central with D365 Sales enables businesses to offer a more personalised and responsive customer experience.

By accessing up-to-date information on inventory, pricing, and customer history, sales teams can provide faster responses and better solutions tailored to each customer’s needs.

For example, customer service teams can access complete sales histories and previous interactions, ensuring that issues are resolved quickly and effectively.

5. Simplified Sales Order Handling and Invoicing

Sales orders submitted in D365 Sales can be automatically converted into orders within Business Central, allowing for streamlined order processing.

Business Central users can then handle fulfilment and invoicing directly within their ERP system, maintaining a smooth transition from sales to delivery.

Additionally, sales invoices created in Business Central can be transferred back to D365 Sales, where they are tracked as billed invoices.

This synchronisation ensures that sales teams have visibility into the status of customer accounts, including paid or partially paid invoices.

Example Use Case: Managing Sales and Operations for a Manufacturing Organisation

Consider a manufacturing company looking to enhance its sales processes while ensuring efficient backend operations.

They want to streamline their sales activities, from lead management to customer engagement, while maintaining a centralised approach for managing production, inventory, and finances.

Business Central’s Integration with Dynamics 365 Sales becomes the ideal solution for them in this scenario.

It allows them to manage their sales pipelines and customer relationships through D365 Sales while seamlessly handling production planning, inventory tracking, and financial management through Business Central.

Is This Integration Right for Your Business?

The integration between Business Central and D365 Sales is ideal for businesses looking to streamline complex sales processes while maintaining strong control over backend operations. It suits companies looking to:

• Improve collaboration between sales and operational teams
• Enhance data visibility and synchronization across departments
• Automate routine sales and order processing tasks
• Provide better customer service through a unified view of customer data

Whether you are in manufacturing, insurance, retail, sports, or another industry, this integration can help you create a more connected, efficient, and responsive business environment.

Ready to Streamline Your Operations?

Integrating Business Central with D365 Sales opens up a new level of efficiency and collaboration for businesses. By leveraging the power of both systems and the seamless integration provided by Dataverse—you can simplify your processes, enhance customer relationships, and drive growth.

If you’re ready to explore how this integration can benefit your business, reach out to Mercurius IT for a tailored solution that meets your unique needs. Please get in touch using the contact form below to start your digital transformation.