Improving After Sales and Customer Service processes in manufacturing thanks to Salesforce

Efficient customer care and after sales services, in the era of remote commercial relationships and sales finalized on the digital channel, represent an even greater competitive advantage, both in the B2B and B2C sector.

Customer service has become digital and omnichannel: while many customers still prefer to resolve customer service problems over the phone or in person, a growing number are looking for a company that can satisfy them on all digital channels, from the company’s own site to social media channels, such as Facebook or Twitter. This means that there are many potential interactions with customer care in a given day and it can be complicated for the teams to respond to them in a timely and satisfactory manner.

In order to improve customer satisfaction and reduce the management costs, customer solutions must focus on the speed with which customer requests are taken on and dealt with; this is where Case Management represents the backbone of Salesforce Service Cloud, centralizing customer interactions in a single location and allowing access with a single, complete view of each customer. Automatically tracking and categorizing customer requests and feedbacks given by customer service from each channel, also identifying high-priority cases, allows customer service to be guaranteed 24/7.

A customized support service with omni-channel assistance which allows for timely responses on all touchpoints, from more traditional ones, such as email and telephone, to social media-based ones.

Customer support not only involves customer service teams, but also necessarily includes sales, after sales and operations teams, and is therefore necessary to supervise the entire process in order to be sure that the customer’s problem is logged and dealt with correctly.

Creating and tracking work orders and appointments in real time, monitoring the position and inventory of materials and spare parts required for the support to be provided, maintenance activities, including via mobile, is essential for an efficient support service. Salesforce Field Service permits the automation of resource allocation, generation of reports on the service to keep clients informed on the state of progress of the service, and implementation of predictive maintenance and support plans, anticipating client requirements and organizing the work in a more efficient manner. The mobile app, which is also accessible offline, significantly facilitates the work of technicians who are always on the move between customer sites, allowing them to find the correct response quickly and easily.

Optimizing and streamlining the CRM already in use and providing for centralized management of customer care and after-sales activities is the challenge of our client, a company with a long history in the manufacturing sector which produces equipment for the hospitality sector, whose priority was to plan and monitor technical maintenance work in the area, in order to improve customer retention and the performance of its internal team.

Thanks to the integration of Salesforce Service Cloud and Field service, the Lutech team implemented a centralized and multi-channel Case Management solution, which allowed immediate improvements in scheduling of appointments and work on the basis of employee resource availability, route and intervention time, thanks to the connection with the Dispatcher function. By making use of the dynamic map and a customizable Gantt chart view of appointments and active team members, operatives significantly improve their productivity and time management.

The system has been configured to have a global view of the machinery requiring similar work in a given time period within a given distance, with a view to best managing the scheduled maintenance contract, in terms of duration and number of support appointments which can be planned.  In the same manner, the Salesforce Service Cloud and Field service functions, which are integrated with the ERP, providing access from the CRM to the technical and invoicing data required for the continuation of the after-sales processes, allow for optimization of the support and warranty contract for clients, both in terms of duration and services, and allow the information for the technical reports (work details, results and materials used) to be recorded. All functions are accessible via mobile app, including offline, to allow the problem to be correctly resolved remotely even without connectivity.

The response and resolution times for support have been significantly reduced, benefiting customer satisfaction and loyalty.