Sales Force Automation
Sales Force Automation
With increasing technology and consumer empowerment, consumer demands are changing frequently and this calls for real-time capturing of this consumer data especially at the retail level.
Moreover, the success of any business requires consumer foresight and making informed decisions in time to meet the ever changing demands of their customers.
Most manufacturing companies which have indirect sales be it FMCG, Pharma, Home appliance, Mobile and Cellular, among others are utilizing EPRs to collect primary or direct sales data to distributors or stockists. However this data excludes the sales data at the retail level where the end user(customer) is. This data at the retail level paradoxically is the most important and can be used to provide real value in streamlining the sales activities for the success of the company.
Typically a company that wants to promote a new product, wants to know how its existing products are selling in various outlets, want to test the demand of a new a new product in a new area is likely to contact a marketing agency or organize a campaign for the product where, a campaign manager organizes agents to go to various outlets known to him and record sales while promoting the product via pen and paper then present the results at the end of the campaign day to the manager to collate the results into reports to present to the management.
This process is both logistically and financially expensive and time consuming as the campaign manager has to manually arrange for the dispatchment of the agents to various outlets and sometimes employ an extra supervisor to ensure the agents report to work and work all the expected time, the process of capturing sales data is error prone from typos to cooked data when an agent just uses previous data to come up with estimations that are wrong and skive showing up at the outlet.
Further the data capture is not flexible and only takes in few metrics into consideration. The transmission process and the paperwork involved takes a lot of time reducing the time put into interaction of agents with customers and managers making decisions to streamline sales instead of collating data from paperwork, whatsapp and email.
Besides, the disruptions in the buying and distribution channels like the inclusion of online markets like Jumia, multiple vendors and in store demonstrators, has disrupted the traditional uni-directional (manufacturer >stockist >distributor > retailer ) channel. In this diversified distribution chain identifying loopholes with data from your direct sales or via the traditional sales agency campaigns can be futile or lead to wrong market insight.
If the inventory in retail outlets is stagnant, obsolete or slow-moving, obtaining real-time relevant sales data via Customer Sales Management CRM can enable you solve this problems and give you a comparative advantage to keep you ahead of the game. With this CRM you get this advantages;
1. A pre mapping feature that allows you to upload all your regions within the market, add outlets and pre map new areas in the market.
A geo-tagging and time stamping feature that enables foolproof entry of sales data and offers tracking for sales team discipline and attendance for payroll management.
Versatile, easily customizable mobile workflows that automate most of the sales team’s tasks freeing them to focus more on interacting with the retailers and customers and managers and supervisors focusing more on core correction of strategic decisions rather than collating data from paperwork, email and whatsapp.
With the real-time transmission of data and powerful analytics management can anticipate stock-outs and critical stock information hence plan optimized distribution logistics, lucrative schemes for distributors in relation to their performance, this enables quick replenishment of stocks.
Interactive dashboards which offer quick a snapshot of the sales team performance, monthly sales performance across outlets enabling various stakeholders to make vital decisions in time.
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