Once you are decided to make the move to Salesforce for CRM. Or possibly you’re already using Salesforce CRM but are looking to take further advantage of the system to generate required ROI. The next big step is figuring out the best way to implement it. Choosing the right business partner is not just about making the implementation process as smooth as possible; Continue reading “5 Steps to choose Salesforce consulting partner” »
In a challenging business environment, it’s critical to stay connected at all times. That’s why you need access to real-time customer data to get the right information at the right time. This reminds me of one of the Salesforce.com CRM implementations that I was involved in for a leading travel management client.
The company was encumbered with incongruent business processes, hampering efficiency and agility. They needed to improve their sales processes and bring in transparency into the sales performance cycle.
There was a need for a systematic framework for revenue inflow from various vertical businesses, and a centralized sales automation system to track accurate sales data. Inadequate real time analytics and sales forecasting was a challenge that was hampering their business growth.
To resolve these challenges we have implemented Salesforce.com that addresses several of these business challenges faced by the Travel businesses. With this implementation it became easy for them to view key actions right from customer visits to closing the sales deal. Also, viewing lead reports based on regions and verticals is no more a hurdle.
With Salesforce.com they have been provided with unique features like Customer profitability evaluation pre-offer customized on various parameters for each business verticals and enabled complete transparency in contractual agreements/approvals and opportunities won. Additionally, Salesforce.com enabled a 360 degree view of actual and estimated contracted value recorded in the form of figures and graph.
Our client experienced many benefits after this implementation as they are now equipped with centralized sales automation repository that provides more accurate and consistent sales data. There was an improved communication and collaboration between sales reps across regions. Region and industry specific reporting and analytics helped our client in taking proactive decisions.
This implementation was a very interesting learning experience for me. It has given me another opportunity to resolve our client’s challenges with a single solution.
Hope you enjoyed reading my experience. If you would like to share your experience, write to us at [email protected]. I look forward to reading about your experiences & challenges.
Most industry analysts today predict that the adoption of cloud has granted greater responsibilities and muscle to business leaders and the role of IT is narrowing down to technology evaluation and selection.
This is true to a large extent – cloud is breaking the status quo. But if you look at this with a broader lens, cloud empowers business users to be accountable for their processes and IT can actually focus on innovation and address the core technology needs of the firm.
Traditionally, most organizations who envisioned standardizing and improving business processes had made an obvious choice of deploying an ERP, CRM or similar enterprise applications. Operational efficiency was the need of the hour and that also provided a competitive advantage. But today, most organizations have deployed the same set of applications and best practices. Now, the question is “How do organizations differentiate themselves”? Operational efficiency is required for business but does not provide competitive advantage.
The current wave of competitive advantage is moving towards enhancing business agility and making better business decisions. This involves increasing the speed of business, providing greater visibility into hidden business data and empowering business users so they can make informed, data-driven decisions. Organizations desiring to achieve this are embracing Cloud, Analytics and Big Data.
Although a majority of use cases for cloud, analytics and big data are targeted towards business users, IT can be a beneficiary of this adoption as well. This is a fantastic opportunity for IT teams to stay abreast of latest technologies and recommend alternatives to business that help them accelerate processes and deliver greater value.
IT teams can evolve and provide significant value back to business in the following manner:
At the outset, these appear to be simple and tactical activities performed by an IT team, but in reality this is a great responsibility and can directly influence the growth of an organization.
As a trusted IT partner to several organizations, we have been fortunate to receive numerous opportunities for playing the role of an Advisor to large and small IT organizations. While Bodhtree’s Cloud, Analytics and Big Data solutions aim to empower business users, we also enable IT teams to become key contributors for business growth.
Indian Pharmaceutical enterprises have made rapid growth in the last 10 years. Today 70% of the market share is commanded by 250 companies, out of the total 10,000+ enterprises in the business of API, formulations, generics, bulk drugs etc. Indian MNC’s have won several accolades from Global companies for drug innovation, new molecular formulas and meeting the world’s most stringent regulatory authority, USFDA norms. They had entered into strategic partnerships with Global entities, which resulted in expanding its footprints in developed and emerging markets. After all, USA accounts for 30 per cent of India’s pharmaceutical exports of $ 3 billion, this is growing at 18-20 per cent per annum.”
Today, they stand at crossroads facing a new set of challenges like Government regulations, price control and demand to innovate new drugs to meet doctor/ patient expectations. Sales and marketing are the blood line of any size of pharmaceutical enterprises; sales leaders are facing mounting pressure to improve sales, win new deals and stay ahead of the competition. In the entire eco-system customer relationship management plays a vital role to accelerate Production, drug innovation and operations.
To put behind the age old approach to sales and marketing automation, Salesforce CRM is reengineering sales process automation in the Cloud for numerous pharmaceutical enterprises. For few CIO’s, this is the first swab with a Cloud computing model to achieve tactical customer relationship management objectives. Sales reps play an important role in the sales lifecycle and tracking their each activity will determine future decision making. What happens to the data related to no of field visits, meeting notes and sampling stocks? In the present day sales reps carry a mobile version of Salesforce CRM to maintain data integrity, updating on the move, track all the meeting notes, sampling data and much more. At the higher level of the sales pyramid unifying sales data, tracking region specific sales and visibility was still a challenge with the entire army of sales reps generating tons of sales data on a daily basis. Salesforce’s Cloud CRM unifies region specific sales units across the continents, end to end sales tracking and sales funnel analysis. Enterprises are experiencing the power of Cloud CRM, marking the end of the age old methods for sales reps. Salesforce CRM not only re-engineering sales process automation but redefined the way customers are tracked on social platforms, collaboration within and outside an enterprise and integration with several applications. Enhanced sales, improved profits, winning more deals improves market and brand share of branded drugs. Just think of 1970 Ferrari 365 GTB and the latest Ferrari F12 Berlinetta, which one do you prefer? You always needed a car that takes off 0-100 Km/hr in 3.2 sec on F1 track; similarly you need the speed and nimbleness in sales automation to win the race.