How to use modern technology to leverage procurement best practices

Procurement leaders face a daunting mix of daily challenges, from controlling costs to building strong supplier relationships to staying on top of compliance. It’s a balancing act that demands precision, strategy, and flexibility. 

As global supply chains get more complex, procurement’s role as a key business function grows even more important. When done right, procurement can cut risk, improve efficiency, and drive growth over the long haul. But to truly tap into its potential, you need to embrace the latest best practices and tools to keep up with today’s fast-paced business world.

These 10 procurement best practices, along with digital procurement tools, can help your team modernize, reduce risk, and make the most of your budget.

10 procurement best practices to improve efficiency and cost control

Most procurement professionals recognize their need for optimized procurement operations. According to the 2025 State of Procurement Data report, 64% of decision-makers and 73% of senior leaders emphasize the importance of data, insights, and AI-powered analytics to drive growth and resilience.

However, when evaluating your current operations, how can you identify key areas for improvement? These 10 best practices are a good place to start:

1. Align procurement goals with your business strategy

Successful procurement strategies don’t operate in a silo. When you align your procurement goals with your organization’s broader objectives, your purchases actively support growth, efficiency, and sustainability. By making procurement part of your strategic planning, you can cut costs, reduce risk, and strengthen your supply chain at the same time.

For example, if an organization prioritizes sustainability, its procurement team should look for suppliers with strong environmental policies and opt for more sustainable products. Aligning procurement with business objectives also helps the team streamline budgeting and forecasting so spending supports important initiatives rather than creating unnecessary expenses.

2. Standardize and automate procurement workflows

If each department handles procurement differently, it can quickly become a mess. That’s why standardizing and centralizing your workflow makes a difference. It ensures purchasing practices align with organizational policies, reduces mistakes, and helps teams move faster with fewer manual steps.

Using automation tools across all purchasing activities, not just strategic or high-value categories, further strengthens the process. Automating routine tasks like purchase approvals, order tracking, and vendor communication allows procurement teams to spend less time on administrative work and more time driving value. This includes automating tail spend, which often flies under the radar but adds up quickly. Our smart business buying solutions support this through built-in controls and analytics for both tail and managed spend, along with integrations that connect seamlessly with leading ERP and finance systems.

In fact, Supply & Demand Chain Executive reported in 2024 that 59% of procurement teams budgeted for automation and AI. For nearly half (42%) of procurement leaders, automating non-strategic spending was their top priority, with projected savings of 10–15% as a result.

E-procurement systems are a proven way to automate the end-to-end purchasing process. These platforms digitize everything from supplier selection to invoice management and ensure consistent policy enforcement at scale. When paired with integrations that bring procurement into a centralized system of record, organizations can boost efficiency, enforce compliance, and create smarter, more resilient workflows.

3. Strengthen supplier relationship management

Building strong relationships with your suppliers means better pricing, quicker service, and a more reliable supply chain. To make that happen, procurement teams need to focus on creating long-term partnerships with key vendors, keeping communication clear, negotiating transparently, and regularly reviewing performance.

Working closely with suppliers to optimize delivery schedules or consolidate shipments can lower costs and reduce your environmental impact. Companies that actively involve suppliers in their strategy also get priority access to in-demand materials to avoid supply chain disruptions.

You can also use supplier evaluation tools to assess supplier performance based on key metrics like cost, quality, compliance, and risk exposure. With AI-driven insights, organizations can identify potential disruptions early and ensure long-term supplier reliability.

4. Improve cost control through bulk purchasing and strategic sourcing

Buying in bulk and sourcing strategically are two smart ways to lower procurement costs and improve supply chain efficiency. When you purchase in larger quantities, it’s easier to negotiate better rates and bring down per-unit costs. At the same time, strategic sourcing—which involves looking at factors like cost, quality, and reliability—helps you get the best overall value from your suppliers.

5. Implement data-driven decision-making

Using data analytics in procurement helps you find cost-saving opportunities, spot inefficiencies, and improve how you manage supplier performance. When you track spending trends and supplier reliability, you can make smarter purchasing decisions.

For instance, looking at past purchase data can reveal seasonal trends so you know the best times to buy essential materials at the lowest cost. Companies that embrace data-driven procurement also catch maverick spend and can take action to keep procurement on track with budget goals.

You can also use spend analysis tools, which aggregates and analyzes procurement data for visibility into spending patterns, cost-saving opportunities, and compliance gaps.

6. Ensure compliance and risk mitigation

Staying compliant and managing risk are crucial in procurement, especially for companies that deal with sensitive data or operate in highly regulated industries. Additionally, aligning your purchases with organization policies and external regulations helps you avoid financial penalties and protects your reputation.

Our compliance management tools can help by setting purchasing guardrails, limiting unauthorized spending, and providing audit trails. Companies with strong compliance strategies also reduce supply chain risks by keeping an eye on vendor reliability and potential geopolitical issues.

7. Optimize inventory management and reduce waste

If you don’t proactively manage your inventory, you could end up with too much stock that may go unused and incur higher carrying costs. By optimizing your inventory levels, you can keep the right amount on hand without overbuying or running short.

Tools like just-in-time inventory and demand forecasting make it easier to cut down on waste and keep your cash flow healthy. When you layer in digital procurement solutions, tracking inventory becomes even simpler—and also supports your sustainability goals.  Tools for smart business buying can also streamline your operations, reduce costs, and mitigate risks.

8. Foster cross-department collaboration

Procurement is most effective when all departments are on the same page. Encouraging collaboration between finance, IT, operations, and procurement functions leads to improved budgeting, supplier selection, and purchasing efficiency.

For example, working closely with your IT department can help you align software and hardware purchases with your organization’s security policies. Open communication across teams also prevents duplicate purchases, coordinates spending with organization priorities, and enhances overall efficiency.

9. Leverage AI and automation for smarter procurement

Bringing AI into your procurement process can take a lot of the manual work off your plate. It helps you streamline approval workflows, automate invoice processing, and even catch fraudulent transactions before they become a problem. With AI-powered tools and smarter supply chain management, you’ll get the insights you need to make faster, more informed purchasing decisions.

And while AI can accelerate processes or make them more efficient, they are only as effective as the teams that operate them. Our AI Leadership Guide for Procurement, developed in partnership with Spend Matters Research, found that “orchestrators of value focus on standardizing policies, processes, systems, and data more heavily than peers. They are also two times more likely to focus on flexible automation tools and methods.” In other words, they focus more on freeing procurement teams from repetitive, transactional tasks and allowing them to focus on strategic initiatives instead.

10. Continuously assess and improve procurement strategies

Procurement requires regular check-ins and tweaks. That means keeping an eye on supplier performance, spending habits, and workflow functioning.

Tools like supplier scorecards and performance tracking can give you the data you need to adjust your strategy as the market shifts. When you commit to continuous improvement, your procurement process stays agile, cost-effective, and in sync with your business goals.

Common procurement challenges and how to overcome them

Even after implementing these best practices, procurement teams are under immense pressure to manage costs, reduce risks, and maintain efficiency. Plus, they’re juggling multiple suppliers, stakeholders, and ever-changing market conditions. Needless to say, that’s a lot to take on, and you’ll need support to do so.

Here are three major procurement challenges and how to tackle them head on:

Managing decentralized procurement across multiple locations

If your organization has multiple offices or global operations, streamlining procurement processes, along with keeping your procurement data transparent and accurate, can be difficult. Allowing different teams to develop siloed systems, vendors, and approval workflows can result in inefficiencies, blind spots, and uncontrolled spending. These in turn lead to inaccurate reports and higher compliance risk, especially when mistakes and missed opportunities start piling up.

How to overcome this:

• Standardize your procurement process with centralized purchasing policies that all locations follow.

• Use a cloud-based procurement system as a single source of truth to track spending and approvals across teams in real time, and automate data entry and validation to reduce errors.

• Implement category management strategies to consolidate suppliers and negotiate better deals. Use a procurement solution that can ensure your teams can get what they need when and where they need it.

• Leverage real-time reporting to make data-driven purchasing decisions.

   

Reducing procurement fraud and unauthorized spending

Procurement fraud is a growing issue—PwC’s 2024 Global Economic Crime Survey ranks it “among the top three most disruptive economic crimes” worldwide, alongside cybercrime and corruption. Lack of oversight, weak internal controls, and unmanaged tail spend all create opportunities for fraud and unauthorized spending.

How to overcome this:

• Strengthen approval workflows to run all purchases through a verified process.

• Use AI-driven analytics to detect unusual spending patterns or suspicious transactions.

• Regularly audit procurement activities to identify and close potential loopholes.

• Manage tail spend proactively to prevent unchecked small purchases from adding up and creating opportunities for fraud.

   

Mitigating supply chain risk and volatility

Global supply chains are more unpredictable now than ever—disruptions from geopolitical conflicts, natural disasters, and economic instability often throw operations off track. In fact, nearly 80% of global supply chains experienced disruptions in 2024.

How to overcome this:

• Diversify your supplier base to avoid over-reliance on one region.

• Use predictive analytics to anticipate risks and plan for contingencies.

• Strengthen supplier relationships for better collaboration during disruptions.

Despite these challenges, if you use best practices to create your procurement strategy, you’ll be on your way to success.

Sport Clips successfully implements procurement best practices

Roadblocks and challenges are inevitable, but they’re not unconquerable, as Sport Clips proved by partnering with Amazon Business.

As the largest United States franchise dedicated to men’s and boys’ haircuts, Sport Clips faced significant operational challenges in the post-pandemic landscape. The organization needed to decentralize purchasing while maintaining strong oversight on spending across nearly 1,900 locations in the US and Canada.

To address these challenges, Sport Clips worked to implement strategic procurement solutions that enhanced efficiency, reduced costs, and simplified store operations.

Challenges:

• Decentralized purchasing inefficiencies: Prior to Amazon Business, Sport Clips area leaders manually delivered products to each store, which created logistical inefficiencies.

• Complex financial reconciliation: Its accounts payable team struggled with disorganized invoices from various suppliers.

• Lack of visibility into spending: Without centralized reporting, controlling costs and ensuring policy adherence was difficult.

   

Solutions:

• Guided buying and approval workflows: Sport Clips introduced pre-approved product lists and automated approval processes so stores only purchased necessary, cost-effective items.

• Consolidated invoicing and spend analytics: Each store received individual invoices, which simplified accounting reconciliation. Reporting tools also identified cost-saving opportunities by restricting unnecessary purchases.

• Faster procurement: With Business Prime, stores received supplies faster, which reduced downtime.

   

Results:

• Time and cost savings: Eliminating manual product deliveries saved Sport Clips’ leaders significant time and resources.

• Financial efficiency: Consolidated invoices streamlined accounting and reduced administrative workload.

• Operational continuity: Fewer stock shortages allowed for smoother day-to-day operations.

“Before Amazon Business, our area leaders were having to deliver product to each of their stores,” says Brandy Owens, Sport Clips’ organization store operations specialist. “Taking the savings we now see on Amazon Business out of it, we are already saving time and money by not running products to each store ourselves.”

Integrating smart procurement tools helped Sport Clips not only improve its purchasing efficiency but also lay the groundwork for future expansion and innovation. By adopting the Associated Accounts Program, it further amplified savings across its franchise network and reinforced the power of digital procurement in modern business operations.

Turn procurement into a powerhouse 

Modern procurement is about keeping operations running while driving real impact across your organization. When you align purchasing with broader business goals and tap into tools like AI-driven insights, procurement becomes a strategic advantage rather than a bottleneck.

Our tools, automation, and data-driven insights make the purchasing process simpler, smarter, and more efficient. Whether you’re buying in bulk, analyzing spend, or managing compliance, we’ve built solutions that help you stay in control while netting more value from every purchase.

Ready to level up your procurement strategy with fast, free shipping and exclusive perks? Connect with one of our experts to explore solutions that keep your needs in mind.