A professional CRM for CRM professionals
The six divisions of group buw offer a network of in-depth relationship management skills. Indeed, buw, which was founded in 1993, is something of a shooting star in the branch. At its offices in Munich, Münster and Halle and its headquarters at Osnabrück, 1500 employees work at the success of such prestigious clients as BMW, Debitel and Miele. The six buw divisions provide a full palette of relationship management services, from consulting and planning right through to training and advanced workshops for customer service managers in the buw customer care academy. To get a better handle on relationships with its own clients, buw decided to implement a powerful CRM solution. After a detailed analysis, one solution came out tops: the Selligent CRM system.
Mark BothornCRM project manager
“We have observed two major areas of success due to the Selligent system: quite simply, we win more projects, thanks to our high quality client relationships; and the CRM system helps us to measure our success better.”
“The potential growth path buw has in mind requires a Web platform and an ASP version, both of which are already possible with Selligent.”
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Looking after customer relationships
“With Selligent, we are doing everything a CRM should do.” Thus Mark Bothorn, CRM project leader, about the extensive use made of the CRM solution. All outside contacts are managed through the new, powerful and future-oriented Selligent solution. Mail shots and e-mails and even telephone campaigns are all planned and executed on the basis of the CRM solution. They target clients, prospects, partners, as well as suppliers. “The system manages and documents our communications. That way, we have full control of communications and we are able to provide our partners with optimum service,” explains Bothorn. Business cards are collected by employees and then centralised so that all contact data are available to everyone. As a result, employees have to access the CRM system when they are looking for contact information. And, by dint of working this way, the information is always up to date, too.
One step ahead, thanks to the Selligent system
As an expert in customer relationship management, buw not only deals with CRM every day, but it is obliged to be one step ahead of its clients in its speciality. This need, plus the complexity of customer relationships, persuaded the company in 2002 to implement a powerful, future-oriented CRM solution. The spread of services provided by buw through its six divisions demanded a solution that was both flexible and customisable. “Among the key objectives was an improvement in forecasting for Human Resource planning,” Bothorn explains. “But campaign management was also a crucial item, because we know that without the help of CRM it was simply impossible to be better than our clients.” The search for a powerful solution sprang from the need for a new address management system. “But we soon realised that in fact we needed a much more extensive information management system.” First, 25 CRM systems underwent an initial review. From them, buw made a short list of systems of differing scope and asked the suppliers to come and present them. “An outside consultant also attended the presentations,” Bothorn adds. They were then assessed based on a detailed matrix of exactly 100 points. The people participating in the selection process carried out their assessment independently of each other. At the end of the day, the Selligent CRM solution was rated the best by all of them – and by far.
The best solution from every point of view
Buw took nine months to complete the whole selection process. Bothorn thinks it was well worth the investment, “because you learn an awful lot during the process. A full up-front investigation is doubtless the key success item of a forthcoming project.” Although buw was already using the SAP ERP, for their CRM they preferred Selligent over SAP a well as over all the other offerings on the market. For a whole series of tangible advantages: – To obtain German certification for information systems security awarded by the BSI*, the CRM solution had to run on an Oracle database. No problem for Selligent, but for some competitors, the road stopped there. – The Selligent CRM solution comes complete with facilities for customisation that were extremely easy to implement. And that enables buw to make lots of individual modifi- cations in house without having to call on outside service providers. – A lot of routine tasks could be automated, which made the Selligent solution particu- larly efficient. And according to Bothorn, “it offered optimum price performance – the best we could get.” Two other criteria caused competitors to drop out. On the one hand, the Selligent system is future-safe, since the potential growth path buw has in mind requires a Web platform and an ASP version, both of which are already possible with Selligent. And on the other hand, buw was impressed by the availability of the system developer. “We wanted a CRM provider who could reassure us that it would be around for the long haul, and we are completely satisfied with our co-operation with Selligent.”
From top management to the sales representatives
Naturally, the sales force uses the CRM system. But so do the consultants and project managers at buw clients. One of the key success factors of the solution and its adoption by the users was top management’s commitment. For Bothorn, it would be “a really serious mistake” if top management did not actively support a CRM project. He stresses that, “here, management sets the example for the rest of the company.” Above all, management leverages the CRM solution to actively lead the whole team. As a result, it is constantly up to date on plans and completed actions, on the advancement of projects and the quality of the work. But management’s exemplary involvement was not the only decisive factor in the massive user take-up. All the employees were aware of the advantages of the CRM solution. And since it has been implemented in all six divisions, the client contacts and the detailed data stored in the system give rise to plenty of cross-selling opportunities, which of course are exploited to the full. Actively using the information compiled in the CRM system is the absolute duty of all buw employees. “To sum up the results of our experience, we have observed two major areas of success due to the Selligent system,” Bothorn points out. “Quite simply, we win more projects, thanks to our high quality customer relationships; and the CRM system helps us to measure our success better.” At buw, the implementation process was also very carefully thought through. They wanted to completely finalise each stage before introducing a new component. The gradual implementation, both horizontally (the different CRM modules from Selligent) and vertically (in the different divisions) was completed in November 2004, that is, about one year after the company’s sales department was equipped. It goes without saying that the Selligent solution continues to evolve at buw. Other teams are added to the project one by one, as well as specialised departments such as administration and IS. Introducing the Web solution is also planned, as is the migration to ASP, for which buw has not yet decided between in-house or external hosting. Bothorn is convinced that it will bring nothing but benefits and is in no doubt about reliability and growth outlook. “At each version change, the Selligent solution is even better. It’s absolutely fantastic. Everything has gone without a hitch. The system’s flexibility gives us total freedom of action for our future evolution.”
