Loews Selects Siebel Sales

Loews Cineplex is one of the largest theatre companies in the world, serving hundreds of thousands of customers every day. The Special Products Group at Loews Cineplex sells special discounted tickets to more than 16,000 companies in North America. The movie industry has expanded significantly in the past ten years, and Loews Special Products group is no exception. Over the past few years, their sales have grown up to 15 percent per year - an extremely fast pace for their sales teams - not to mention their software and hardware - to keep up with.

Loews had previously managed its sales functions with a standard but slightly customized software application that was more of an inventory database than a project management solution. Their system lacked reporting and forecasting functions, was not centralized or accessible remotely, and did not allow managers to monitor sales pipelines or see current activity. Individual sales representatives each had their own "system" of keeping track of their clients, using various formats such as Excel, Word, and Outlook as well as handwritten calendars, making it impossible for managers to get an overview of what was going on. Each team member handled a high volume of accounts, and since there were no automated reminders, and opportunities were continually slipping through the cracks. The "special attention" that Loews wanted to provide each of their high profile Special Products clients was becoming more and more difficult to maintain without a centralized, automated system that would allow immediate and accurate information sharing, particularly when sales reps were out of the office.

The Special Products Group hired a consultant to conduct a detailed analysis of their needs and help them choose the appropriate software. Loews chose a Sales Force Automation solution to help them standardize and centralize their sales processes: Siebel Sales. Siebel Sales was fully customized and implemented in only three months, and Loews saw immediate results. Account managers averaged 20 percent improvement in productivity, largely due to the ability to access information remotely, and Loews saw more than 15 percent sales growth in the high profile accounts in the first year. In addition to increased efficiency in the sales process, clients reported significant improvement in customer service. Read more >
Additional Siebel Success Stories here.

Sovereign Bank Selects Salesnet’s Sales Solution

Sovereign Bancorp, Inc. is one of the 25 largest banks in the United States, with thousands of employees in offices along the east coast. As it grew, Sovereign did not establish any formal or standardized sales processes, and sales representatives were generally focused on acquiring the next deal rather than on managing current relationships. Sales managers had centralized no system in place for finding, assigning, and managing their growing leads lists, and representatives were contacting potential clients multiple times. Customer service response times were also lagging ?a big issue in an increasingly competitive market. In order to keep up with their growth and create an efficient, singular process for managing their sales pipelines, Sovereign decided to look into an automated system for managing leads, contacts, and accounts in order to improve not only sales efficiency but also customer relationships. After an intensive review of their needs and restrictions with the help of an independent consulting firm, Sovereign Bank chose to implement Salesnet's sales solution ?a straightforward but customizable web-based interface that provides access to accurate, up-to-date client and sales information. Salesnet’s solution was implemented quickly, and immediately unified the sales processes company-wide and greatly increased sales productivity and customer satisfaction. Not only did new client acquisitions increase, but one of the most significant results was also that, due to increased ability of the sales staff to accurately track client accounts, which resulted in more effective up- and cross-selling processes, the average existing client expanded their accounts to include more than twice as many products with Sovereign Bank. Read more >

ABC Bus Upgrades SalesLogix Sales Software to Include Configuration Engine

ABC Bus, a manufacturer of high-end, customized motorcoaches, was already using SalesLogix SFA software for it’s sales processes, but wanted to further upgrade and customize the solution to include a complex, automated ordering system. The available options for a customized motorcoach can number in the hundreds, with many hardware compatibility concerns and restrictions, not to mention design preferences. ABC was using a manual quoting and ordering system ?printed order forms - to submit each order, which was then physically transported to a central office where a quote specialist would then produce the numbers, which sometimes took almost a week before getting back to the customer. Sales representatives were becoming overwhelmed trying to remember correct clients and specifications without a centralized database, having to keep track a briefcase full of papers everywhere they went. Working remotely was difficult at best, and orders were prone to errors and inefficiencies, some significantly costly. With custom-made orders, customer satisfaction was ABC’s prime concern.

To resolve these issues, ABC upgraded its existing SalesLogix software to include Configuration Engine from their partner Best Software. This product uses customized grids of hardware data and restrictions to accurately determine the combinations of customization options available, as well as provide a visual representation of the product groupings. This allows sales representatives to quickly, efficiently and accurately provide the best information to customers on customization options as well as an immediate quote. The quotes and specifications were then tied into the sales pipeline as well as customer records, all automatically. As well, the sales data was also integrated into their inventory and enterprise-wide management systems, ensuring that sales information is accurately captured in the overall company management processes. What was formerly a time-consuming, paper-based, error prone sales process is now automated, uniform, efficient, and integrated, which has resulted in double-digit annual growth and significant increases in repeat customers. Read more >

Norwell Dairy Systems Implements Customized Interprise Remote Ordering System

Norwell Dairy Systems is a Canadian supplies dairy processing equipment and accessories to directly to farmers. Most of Norwell’s customer transactions are done on-site and in-person, with the truck drivers doubling in function as sales representatives and order fulfillers. Drivers would take orders, prepare invoices, and receive payments all on the farms. That information then had to be taken back to the central office, and the accounting department would manually re-enter it into their systems, and it would be re-entered a second time in the inventory logs.

This process was time-consuming and resulted in order, delivery, accounting, and inventory mistakes on a regular basis, as well as made it nearly impossible for management to get an accurate or timely overall picture of the organization, sales pipeline, and financial status of the company. Due to the remote nature of the customer transactions, efficiently managing the associated data and centralizing it for financial reporting, review, and forecasting was an increasing challenge.

Norwell’s management and sales executives knew that with all the new remote technology, there had to be a solution to their paper-based and cumbersome process. One unique requirement, however, was that the system had to not only be remotely accessible, but also physically handy and convenient for the drivers, who spent a lot of time on the road and on farms. Norwell researched the available cost-effective options, including SFA vendors as well as hardware providers, and found that Interprise could develop a customized solution that could be easily accessed and managed using Palm Pilots ?the perfect solution.

Working with Interprise, Norwell’s team designed a centralized electronic product catalogue and customer database that could be integrated with a centralized accounting system. With the use of Palm technology, each driver/salesperson now had all the information needed to produce accurate quotes, answer ordering and inventory question, and complete sales on-site. Combining this with portable wireless printers, they could also produce invoices and receipts and fully complete transactions with little or no paperwork while on the road.

Once returning to the office, drivers simply needed to upload sales and order data into the centralized Interprise solution, while at the same time downloading inventory updates and other customer information. What was previously a cumbersome, manual paper process was now a wireless, automatic transaction that took only minutes a day, saving drivers time and allowing them to focus on sales and service instead of paperwork.

In addition to greatly improving the sales transaction process, more uniform customer, inventory and financial data were being reported and contributed to the centralized system, allowing managers to easily produce detailed automated sales, inventory and financial reports, which improved planning company-wide. This resulted in increased sales efficiencies, revenues, and customer satisfaction for Norwell Dairy Systems almost immediately from day one. Read more >

The next section provides a directory of vendors where you can learn more about available SFA solutions. Read on >