Tag: Sales Force Automation

  • Using an avant-garde Software For Tracking Sales is Planning or Spying?

    Using an avant-garde Software For Tracking Sales is Planning or Spying?

    A few years ago, salesmen breaking-into a house used to be a threat to the public. The advent of technology has given birth to softwares for tracking sales people and field force employees across diverse industries – FMCG, Ecommerce, Health Care & Pharma, Finance and Local Services. A source from SalesForce states that 71% of Sales Reps / Field Sales Employees spend ample time on data entry. The field sales management found the automation process expedient to both team management and customer experience. Organizations have been deploying online real-time GPS trackers to administer the field force employees’. The method has been effective resulting in happy customers and a productive team. 

    When we say real-time employee tracking, it leaves any field sales executive with a fear of doubt that he/she is spied upon by the application from their management. 

    So, let’s probe into the details of employee location tracking – planning or spying?

    Industries that demand employee / sales force tracking 

    Considering the present COVID situation, customer safety has been paramount to all businesses offering door-to-door delivery services. Thereby, a sales tracking software or system has become the need of the hour for such service providers. Some of the industries that are getting benefited from this are:

    -FMCG

    -Ecommerce

    -Healthcare & Pharma

    -Financial services

    -Local Services

    Are they spying on their sales or field force employees or the management is seeing this as an act of resource planning? To answer this question, let’s try to understand what a Field Service Management Software can do. 

    Realtime Location for Customer Visits

    A sales personnel who belongs to the field force is provided with an online real-time location/GPS tracking application to understand his customers are demarcated based on territories. 

    By implementing this:

    -The job of a sales person becomes easier in locating the customer. 

    -He/she gets visibility to nearby customers so that their focus is shifted to more new customers to expand their company’s business. 

    -The number of customer visits done by a salesperson contributes to the monthly target that measures their performance. 

    -The performance of each field force / salesperson is being monitored by this application. 

    -The application can also track where the salesperson is spending his working hours. This can help the management in cross-validation in case of any discrepancies. 

    Would a sales force tracker that can do all of the above interest you? 

    It doesn’t stop here and there’s more to it. 

    Attendance Tracking

    What if a field sales person claims that he was present on a particular day at the customer’s place but he was not? How does a conventional attendance tracking system help in boosting your sales team’s productivity?

    If these have been your pain points with field sales or sales force management, then your eye-opener is here!

    While there are numerous employee tracking systems and android applications available in the market, what are the features you can expect from one such software to upgrade your sales team?

    -Login and Logout time Administration

    Enabled with an online real-time GPS tracker, Sales Employee Tracking App should be capable of tracking both logins and logouts times of an employee seamlessly. Apart from this, an attendance tracking application should also be able to clock the number of hours spent by each sales employee. This shall aid the management in measuring the productivity of the employee, and analyze the time that goes into each activity carried out by the employee throughout his working hours. 

    In cases where the employee has lost possession of his mobile phone, the application should still be able to track the last login or logout time so that tracking the employee’s working hours is not affected. 

    -Leave Management

    Do it with ease by both managers and employees – a leave management module in any online employee tracking app can benefit both in terms of planning and management of resources across the organization.

    Workflow and Task Management

    The best Field Service Software gives you the ease of usability with workflow and task management. While choosing one such application for your sales, the following features can save time and increase the productivity of the team as a whole. 

    -Creation of Tasks

    -Assignment of Tasks

    -Delegation of Pending Tasks and Responsibilities 

    -Data collection of completed tasks like customer visits and documents. 

    -Supporting features like chat and voice notes to ease inter-team communication

    If you are looking for a tool for your local services business, then there are some of the features that can help you in field force management. Read on to get an understanding of how this can work!

    • A field force employee is mapped to a particular territory (a locality in this case).
    • He takes charge of customer visits and service with this particular territory. When (s)he completes their day’s target with this territory, the pending visits in the nearby territory can be allocated to the employee. 
    • Further, the employee can also store the customer documents – photographs of a particular complaint with a local service availed by them and share it with the management. The management can take immediate responsibility and help the customer resolve the problem. 
    • In case of any issues, chat and voice note options are available for the employee to communicate the customer issues to the management. 

    By doing this, you increase the chances of customer satisfaction, retention and service. 

    Document Upload and Data Security

    What would a customer fear for when your organization is using such employee tracking applications? With no second thoughts, it’s their data. 

    All your customer data is in the hands of your field sales. To quote an example, a field force employee who works with a financial institution has access to customer data like Bank Statements, Aadhar Card, PAN Card and Signatures when there is a customer request for a Loan Account. This data requires a secured spot to be uploaded and stored. 

    Choose an online employee tracking application that can be compatible with both android and IOS mobiles offering complete security to your customer data. 

    Added to this, the customer data misuse could be easily tracked if it happens when you deploy cutting-edge field tracking software which is best in the market. 

    Happisales promises utmost secrecy of data and is trusted by 100+ businesses and customers for data security. Read more about the app here!

    Leaderboard for Performance Measurement 

    Sales appraisals can never happen without a performance measurement system. A leaderboard module in field force management is not only advantageous for performance analysis but also motivates the peers with achieving targets. Of the teams in an organization, the sales teams are said to have the most remunerative benefits in the form of bonuses. In some organizations, this happens frictionlessly with managers not being partial towards their team members. 

    Are you encountering such situations in your organization? It’s high time you switch to a software for tracking your sales team and their performance. 

    Summing up: The features like real time location tracking and attendance tracking might throw an impression that an employee is being spied on by the managers. But, deriving benefits from a sales tracking software for your teams testifies the following. 

    -Happenings in the field

    -Cross-validate the field sales team in case of any discrepancies

    -Areas where the sales personnel spend most of their time – Time spent with existing and new customers. 

    This can help the management team to plan the activities of the field sales, instructing them to spend more time with the new customers in order to increase sales and revenue. Therefore, an employee tracking app used by the field sales personnel is righteously being used by the management for planning and not spying. 

  • Is Your Current Sales Force Automation Failing? Here’s Why!

    Is Your Current Sales Force Automation Failing? Here’s Why!

    We all know that sales force automation is the usage of software for automating sales-related tasks, including sales activities, customer management, sales force management, and information sharing. This is frequently a component of a system that connects and integrates sales activities with the rest of the organization’s operations. So the success of the sales force as well as the overall organization depends on it. Upon implementation, these systems are seen to fail to deliver the expected benefits and can be attributed to several factors. Let us delve into the reasons as to why the current sales force automation is failing. Here are 13 reasons. 

    1. Lack of long term vision 

    The reason for implementing field sales reporting should be well and clearly defined, with a clear objective and vision of what it should achieve in the short and long term. One cannot create a technology roadmap simply because everyone else is doing it. Your teams may be doing well with manual processes and meeting your targets, but the automation of the process should be made clear to everyone, right from the top management to the employees, on how it can help you further optimize your sales processes and team performance. 

    1. Lack of commitment from management 

    Even if management decides to implement a field sales reporting system and commit significant resources to the effort, the system may not be successfully marketed internally. This is frequently misinterpreted by the sales force as a lack of support from the management for the system to be implemented. This can lead to a careless attitude among salespeople. Senior management commitment is thus critical to the success of any software implementation project. 

    1. Non-alignment of expectations between management and salespeople

    When implementing field service software, we can see two types of expectations – one for effort and the other for performance. Effort represents the user’s view of the amount of work required to use the system effectively. The perceived cost of using the system rises as effort expectancy rises. Performance expectancy, on the other hand, represents how the system’s benefits are perceived. If the imagined costs outweigh the benefits, the system is far less likely to be used. Compared to salespeople, the management tends to underestimate the effort required for a salesperson to use the system and overestimate the performance benefits. This brings about a mismatch in expectations.  

    1. Setting unrealistic goals/objectives

    Adoption and implementation of field sales reporting in existing business modules serve specific goals. Deployment of an automation process does not necessarily mean that it is not a complete one-size-fits-all solution. A module integrated with CRM has specific goals and should not be expected to generate exponential results or perform micromanagement on its own. For example, the automation software can assist you in improving team performance by engaging them, providing real-time performance visibility, public recognition, and rewarding them for their efforts. However, you cannot control attrition because there are numerous other intangible factors at play.

    1. Implementing field sales reporting but without delegating the responsibilities

    The automation journey cannot begin without defining the roles and responsibilities – Who will be the eventual users, who will be reviewing the data, the role of MIS teams, training and abidance of sales teams. All of these questions are extremely important. Otherwise, you’ll just be circling the wagons without actually implementing and adopting sales force automation. The well-communicated value proposition provides a sense of ease of work, improved output, and, most importantly, more time to explore more productive opportunities.

    1. . Lack of proper training

    The system’s complexity results from a lack of information/training or from only having theoretical knowledge of the subject. Companies must recognize the value of investing time in end-user training. More interactive, on-the-job, case-based, practical, and inclusive training is required. Ascertain that your end-users and sales representatives understand the fundamental concepts of automation and automated factors. The training goal should be to change the way people think and not be afraid to use it. 

    1. Improper implementation of multiple workflows

    It is a known fact that improper implementation of anything will affect all workflows. So, when implementing Field Service Management Software, it should be carefully planned and scheduled – steps such as installation, training, and go-live date can be worked out. Adequate time should be allowed for each stage of implementation. This saves all participants from the hassles of deployment and network integration, among other things. It will be a good idea to get help from experts for deployment of the automation process with minimal hitches. 

    1. Poor data management

    Sales Force Tracker is entirely data-driven. It has been found that more than 50% of implementation failures were because of poor data quality. The master data must be structured and sorted per the KPIs and parameters (product hierarchy, attributes, retailer data, contract dates, etc.). This data must be clean, correct, and relevant. It is also necessary to have a thorough understanding of business processes, customers, distributors, etc, to integrate functionalities into your solution. Poor quality data also leads to a loss in revenue

    1. Poor customer service

    Lousy customer service results in an irate customer, thus losing them. Regardless of your process/business size, ensure that you provide exceptional customer service at any point in time – be it before or during or after deployment. A 24/7 customer service line has become a prominent and undeniable differentiator for almost every product/service and should never be overlooked. 

    1. Complex functionalities

    Most automation systems attempt to be jacks of all trades, which leads to increased complexity. Instead of assisting sales representatives in entering meaningful data and making reporting tasks easier, these feature complexities make reporting difficult. Adoption becomes difficult if reporting, planning, and other basic functionalities are not intuitive. Excessive data fields and repetitive entries also add to the complexity.

    1. Unnecessary inconvenient additional functions 

    Sales force automation systems have become more multifunctional in recent years, and there are some that include marketing functions and integrated analysis tools. However, if these functions do not match the objectives of your system, even if there are many of them, they will be useless for your company, and you will end up with a difficult-to-use system.

    1. System integrations

    A sales tracking software solution is not a stand-alone system. It must be integrated with existing platforms such as CRM, ERPs, accounting software, and legacy systems. When it is not financially or technically feasible to integrate into these systems, it becomes difficult to utilize the solution’s potential fully. Keeping data and operations separate is not the best way to maximize its benefits. The success of the solution is also determined by the training provided to its users. 

    1. Lack of end-user interest

    What good is a sales force automation solution if its intended users are unwilling to use it? No matter how much money you invest in it, getting the actual users on board is critical. User acceptance determines the success or failure of a setup. User resistance can be overcome by training and knowledge sharing. It is also a good idea to learn about their challenges before implementation to address them through automation. 

    If you are interested in exploring implementing field force automation for your business, do get in touch with us today. Click here to get all your queries related to automation answered. Happisales is all set to implement sales force software in your field.

  • Best Sales Force Tracker App Features for Smarter Sales

    Best Sales Force Tracker App Features for Smarter Sales

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    Sales force automation is the way forward. Businesses are taking advantage of the sales force tracker apps and were able to see viable results while streamlining their sales crew. Much has been spoken about the various benefits of implementing one such into the business, and it comes with no surprise that businesses are trying to jump on them at the first opportunity. A majority of the businesses that have implemented a sales force tracker app have cited its success during the pandemic whilst working remotely. With that said, many anew to the revolution may be wondering what exactly is a Field Force Automation Solution and why would a business need it. 

    WHAT IS A SALES FORCE TRACKER APP AND WHY WOULD YOU NEED IT?

    If you are hearing a lot about the sales force tracker app and are yet to know what it does, here is a quick brief about them. A sales force tracker app provides accurate and in-depth information on the team’s performance, overall well-being and productivity, efficiency, effectiveness, and value. The app is your one-stop solution for your Field Sales Reporting needs.

    But hey, there are so many sales force tracker apps in the market. How would one be able to choose the best out of the lot? This would be the first question that lingers in the minds of anyone who would want to implement sales force automation. Leaving aside the service and the brand, here are the key features that you should consider in your sales force tracker!

    CUSTOMER ARCHIVES

    One of the prime benefits of sales force automation is its potential to keep track of all customer data. Data as simple as customer contact information to the complete history of the customer right from the first moment of meet up to date is all made available under a single tab. Invoices raised to, Bills paid by, quantity sold to, sales personnel tagged in, queries raised and attended to can all be streamlined and kept safe for all customers served to date through the Field Service Software. This would help the management understand customers better and help identify bottlenecks and address any discrepancies efficiently.

    SCHEDULING

    Scheduling everyday tasks and customers intel to the sales crew is of utmost importance. With that said, field sales tracking is a hugely time-consuming task especially when it comes to handling a huge team with a large dossier of clientele to serve to. Field force automation helps cut down the complexity of such a task with one-click solutions. The sales force tracker app helps to manage the team better through automating the scheduling of tasks, customers, objectives to the entire sales crew without having to break a sweat. Automated scheduling at times does it for you.

    For instance, A requirement raised by an existing customer Liam would be automatically assigned to John who has been handling the client from Day 01 based on the data collected in the sales force Tracker App. 

    AUTOMATED FIELD SALES TRACKING

    It is often believed that an efficient sales team spends predominant of its time on the field. Considering the aforementioned belief, it would be quite a contradiction if they were to spend time in briefing rooms for task meets, objective allocations, client intel, reports, etc. This is where sales force automation keeps the “Sales belief” in check. One of the salient features of the Field Staff Tracking Software India (from the perspective of the sales crew) is to update and check on his field sales reporting in real-time. For instance: Tom, a Sales Rep would be able to update his meeting with Mr.Ferguson, the client, add details and required reports as necessary right outside from the customer’s location and his reporting manager would be able to keep track of it in real-time!

     ONE-STOP DESTINATION FOR REPORTS

    Meanwhile, on the other hand, the management would be able to keep track of all the field sales reporting of their sales crew through sales force automation. The people on the higher levels of hierarchy would have a clear understanding of the key contributors, the sales revenue generated, the productivity, and the efficiency down to every single individual in the team. Tracking such progressions in the team could be a key indicator to expand, or cut short the crew as and when required. The sales force tracker app also helps cut down attrition while identifying key players in the crew, allowing the management to incentivize them. A happy employee is an efficient employee after all!

    PRIVACY

    It may not sound like a beneficial feature in your sales force automation plans, but privacy is as important as any of the aforementioned. Any sales force tracking app should provide rights to privacy to and for any business registered for it. The data and information collected by these apps are highly confidential and sensitive to the core of any business. Any breach in such matters would not only result in a compromise of data but could be fatal for the operation and functionality of the business. As mentioned earlier, this might not have anything to do with the progression and evolution of your business, but is an important feature to look into while! 

    Hope that helped you with what you were searching for. There are many more features that would define a complete sales force tracking app. Such applications from different vendors have additional sets of features that may differ from one another but these are the major few essentials that you would need to look for in one. Sales force automation has been touted to be the next step in the evolution of businesses and if you already are sharing the same thought, visit us at happisales – your one stop destination for all your sales force automation needs. Drop us an inquiry and we would be happy to show you a demo which could potentially be what you were looking for in the market.

     

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  • How to improve your selling through salesforce automation amidst Covid – 19

    How to improve your selling through salesforce automation amidst Covid – 19

    [vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Ever since Covid -19 announced itself, the world as we knew it has never been the same. With ample time passing by, and with lockdown restrictions imposed, people and businesses alike have taken to a new way of life, not only surviving but have also shown signs of prevalence in these dark times. How did they do it? How did businesses adapt to a new world and improve selling through Field Force Automation Tool?   

    Impact of COVID 19 

    Trade and Commerce came to a standstill with counties around the world shutting down their borders. Businesses were shut down to bare bones creating shockwaves disrupting the supply chains. As per a statement issued by Nomura India Business Resumption Index, the economic activity fell from 82.9 to 44.7 and the nation saw a spike in unemployment rates, rising from 6.7% to 26%, all in a matter of 21 days! Close to 140 million people in the working class fell victim to job cuts or had taken salary cuts due to the pandemic. Close to 47% of the businesses were shut down costing the country almost 32,000crores in loss with results showing a 40% dip in the country’s GDP when compared to the last year.

    Why is reinventing your sales force important 

    Most of the companies that were at the heart of the crisis were predominantly companies that thrived on sales. With their sales force completely taken down of its functionality, businesses were unable to gather leads and convert prospects into acquisitions. But as a wise quote was once foretold – Life always finds its way!. As the pandemic restrictions loosened up, organisations found themselves adapting to new ways, innovating ideas to keep themselves not only afloat but also thrive in these hard times. Just as companies found their sales force ineffective during the lockdown, the optimistic few found ways to evolve their field sales into something more different, in ways that were in need of the hour. Those who were successful found their footing once again and had relatively better numbers on their financials to put a big smile on their face.

    Ways to keep your sales team upbeat

    A case of “searching for the keys to an open door”. The success mantra is not very complex or something that has been invented. It is an instance of refinding the simple things that were often ignored or assumed a non-aggressive strategy for. Here are the five ways to keep your field sales team at their optimal best in these times. 

    Sales Force Automation

    There has been a paradigm shift in the way companies have taken to their field sales activities. field force automation has already been adhered to by several businesses even before Covid 19. The ability to guide your sales force with such a mobile sales app has been proven to be time effective and also, helps the crew to stay focused without having to scatter around all over the place. Planning and managing an entire crew remotely through a remote and field staff management app is a prime way to keep your people attend to their sales responsibilities even while working from home.

    Streamlining the Sales Pipeline

    One of the biggest challenges your field sales force faces is the bottleneck in the pipeline. The crew would have more than the optimal number of objectives to work on every day and that would only halter their efficiency. Understanding the priorities, requirements and streamlining the tasks of the day through an integrated sales tracking software would help both the management and the sales team to manage their work efficiently and securely. This would help them reduce time on the field while still having a good turnaround time on their goals!

    Keeping tabs on Data-based sales objectives

    Businesses have learnt to function remotely, connecting through the internet, gathering updates and assigning tasks at a push of a button. The ability to keep track of data through field sales app have proven beneficial to push beyond new horizons of inter-departmental functionality. Data collected field assist app such as location of the customer and the location of the employee would help delegate work to the team better. For instance, it would only be right to assign a task on 6th Cross Street to Tom from 5th Cross Street rather than to assign it to Harry from 18th Cross Street. Such details help to manage resources efficiently and simmer downtime constraints to a maximum possible extent.

    Adapt to your ever-changing customer needs

    Customers are every business’s primary importance. The very soul of a successful business is to tend to its customer’s needs and keep them at comfort at all times. A happy customer is a sales agent by his right. Having a check on your customers through a field sales app would not only help manage them better but also help serve them in better ways. It may not be an tiresome task, but something as simple as answering their queries, responding to their emails on the most minuscule of things would go a long way in generating a referral lead that might prove to be rich dividends for your time spent. 

    Look for new opportunities arising in these times

    The final piece of the puzzle – Always be on the lookout for opportunities. The key to success (not only for a business entity) is to be conscious of the possibilities of an opportunity lying in every nook and corner of any given situation. Things may look grim, but the seeds sown today are the fruit-bearing trees of tomorrow. Give a shot at everything that matches the services provided by you. It may be something you and your field sales team would probably know, but just thought a friendly reminder would help you rekindle your thoughts again!.

    A Way Forward – Future of sales

     As per reports about 39% of the businesses (mostly small scale) have no intention in going back to old ways of functionality having found the new way forward. 

    If you had asked someone prior to 2019, there would have been no one who would have told you that the world was going to change the way it has today.  Businesses would have been working towards their 5 year plans as usual treating the upcoming years just as the same as any other year. But to have the ability to adapt to such dire situations through Sales Employee Tracking App and to overcome it is a symbol of flexibility, an evolution of sorts.

    If you are looking to jump on the bandwagon before it’s too late, try visiting Happisales –  A solution to all your sales force automation needs![/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

  • 10 Reasons Why You Must Invest in a Sales Force Automation App

    10 Reasons Why You Must Invest in a Sales Force Automation App

    Presently, the Field Sales Mobile App finds its place in various sectors which include Retail, Healthcare, BSFI, Logistics, and others. The organization has to put more effort to effectively manage its inventory, invoice, payments, customer relations, etc. Sales Force Automation helps in facilitating better work culture, improves sales targets, reduces redundancy of tasks, and achieves better sales targets. If you are a small company or a global enterprise, this app can increase your productivity as a sales agent, which in turn improves the ROI for your company.

    What is a Sales Force Automation app?

    Field Force Manager is a type of software that is designed to monitor, automate, and streamline various key business areas like sales activity, management, payroll management, attendance management, sales pipeline management, sales team performance evaluation, account management, and expense management. This software can be customized based on your business needs, and it also provides actionable insights that will help you in tracking, managing, and improving your sales team.

    Benefits 

    Let us review some of the benefits of the Sales Force Automation App

    • This app helps your sales workforce to perform effectively on the field by using call and chat options for sharing information. If there is a need to get any important information they can call and chat with their sales manager immediately.
    • You can easily track the attendance and manage the resources digitally with the inbuilt attendance tracking system. You can make use of the automatic scheduling of jobs to the right employee to avoid wastage of time.
    • Using this app, you can track the expenses and claims of your employees which makes the claim process easier for you and your accounts team.
    • This app helps you to track the location and routing of your technicians, which will help to avoid delays and accidental breakdowns in real-time; where unnecessary delays are avoided.
    • Through this app, it’ll be easier for you to deal with invoicing and payment follow-ups, and also you can set up reminders regarding your next payment follow up task.

    10 Reasons why you should Invest in Sales Force Automation App

    Let us discuss the top 10 reasons why you should invest in the Sales Force Automation app –

    1. The sales force automation app helps the sales managers to make better decisions by making use of the different reports that helps them to analyze the sales trends and performance of their field sales employees.
    2. You should know that field force automation software will not replace the sales department; rather it is considered important to effectively manage the sales teams and help them to implement the right strategies to perform better.
    3. Using this app, the management can track expenses, pending payment follow-ups, and boost sales productivity.
    4. Sales managers can assign monthly sales targets to their sales team through this app and as a result, they can view their team’s progress.
    5. Some of the Important reports of your employees such as attendance, location tracking, working hours, distance traveled, payments, and collections can be viewed in the app.
    6. The management team can view the product wise sales reports and improve sales productivity. This app helps in measuring the performance of the salesman and also provides all the details of the overall activity of a particular salesperson.
    7. With a field service management App, it is very helpful to manage and approve the expenses of your field sales employees, you can assign sales targets within the app for your team, and you can check the sales team’s progress.
    8. This app provides notifications of the payments; you can also set reminders for collecting the payments and tracking their progress. Also, your sales team can take pictures from the field and upload them to the app so that the sales manager can have a look at them.
    9. One of the main objectives of a sales force automation app is to assist the field sales force team to complete their sales target and help them to assess their performance to complete the targets.
    10. The sales process can be restructured effectively, which makes the sales process more efficient. If your team members forget to send a report, using the inbuilt features offered by the app, this can be rectified.

    Final Words

    The benefits of using Sales force automation are numerous. It provides several features to help the sales manager and the management to track, monitor, and also to improve the sales team’s performance. To tackle competition, salespeople should be eager to provide solutions to customer needs which helps them to retain the customer. Recent research shows that Field Service Software has been adopted by several companies across India; their ROI has increased 25% on an average, after using this app. Since the economy is moving towards digitization, adopting sales force management software is the best move.

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  • Find Out How Sales Force Automation Application is Key to Retail Success

    Find Out How Sales Force Automation Application is Key to Retail Success

    Sales force automation (SFA) is becoming popular and has been accepted widely by global sales organizations; the emergence of mobile phones has paved the way for deploying the services across industries. The sales funnel has undergone a massive change over the last decade and the usage of mobile applications in the field of Salesforce automation has been widely accepted by retailers. One of the major challenges which we face today is deploying SFA in the retail sector. Using Salesforce automation software removes the time-consuming process; but it allows the necessary tasks that are associated with selling by freeing the sales reps time from repetitive, redundant chores by enabling them to concentrate on the sales.

    What is sales force automation?

    SFA can be considered as an automated process that incorporates several parts of the business process starting from contacting the client to handling sales estimates and many more. In simple words, field force automation connects every component of business and allows a constant flow of information through various channels that would require conceptualization with different levels. Salesforce Automation in business can be used for the effective functioning of the organization.

    What are the current challenges in the Retail industry?

    Let us look at the few challenges that are faced by the retail Industry –

    1. If you take the traditional retail organization, there won’t be any adequate data available to them, when you want to analyze trends or events to forecast sales strategies.

    2.One of the major challenges of sales organizations is that if it fails to adjust to the latest technologies, it cannot compete in the long-term.

    3. As per recent research, it states that 81% of organizations are not satisfied with their sales targets and revenue. These findings show that several factors are a hindrance and block the companies from achieving success.

    4. The traditional method used by businesses lacks innovation and promotional goals because of the lack of using advanced tools in the business. Just 3% of retailers are actively using digital tools.

    Importance of Sales Force Automation apps for Retail / FMCG Industry

    Let us find out how Sales Force Automation can benefit the retail / FMCG Industry

    • Salesforce automation is deployed by retail companies to automate and streamline their sales activity like inventory management, sales monitoring, order processing, which helps in maximizing sales.
    • Using SFA, retail companies can identify sales tasks and activities related to sales. This can be used by the retail sales team or FMCG companies to achieve better sales targets.
    • You need to have a clear strategy to put the right product at the right time and in the right place. Suffice to say, a company using SFA empowers the sales team and helps them in preparing the task objectives and promotions that will improve sales growth.

    Why should the Retailers need to go for SFA?

    SFA software can be used to manage sales forecasting, maintaining, and streamlining the business. Retailers can integrate the SFA software in their business in several ways; Field sales tracking software helps the retailers to deliver multiple benefits along with good ROI.

    Let us review a few features of SFA and its services to retailers that helps them to increase revenue generation –

    • Boosts revenue

    By automating lead generation and its conversion, it enhances the productivity levels. SFA automation software decreases manual operations and helps in increasing revenue generation. 

    • Offers Lead resources

    SFA software offers a full set of visual and graphic tools that helps in data analysis. The software provides accuracy in market trends and in turn gives the retailers precise forecasting solutions that are needed in critical decision making. Simply put, SFA software can offer retailers genuine leads and resources for their marketing campaign.

    • Enables custom notification system

    By implementing SFA software, the retailers need not worry about stock and inventory management as it provides a custom notification system, just in case the stock and inventory levels fall below the critical values. It helps in expediting automated solutions among distributors, retailers, and stakeholders.

    • Boosts Marketing campaigns

    SFA serves as an important point for aggressive sales marketing campaigns. After deploying the SFA software, there is no need for retailers to use any manual or external efforts to boost the campaign. The software offers various levels of automation in inventory, customer data, and data entry, which in turn ensures higher profits and sales.

    • Improves customer satisfaction

    SFA software helps in handling higher customer satisfaction levels which help in customer retention. It removes delivery delays or wrong deliveries; also it helps the retailers to manage their customer queries in a very effective manner. The ultimate goal is to provide the best class service to improve customer satisfaction.

    • Easy access to Data

    Sales force tracker helps effectively to keep work-related emails in a centralized location; by doing this, it helps in accessing any data related to transactions or products anytime. It also provides easy tracking solutions regarding the business workflow; aside from this SFA software offers easy management of modules and passwords, which in turn increases the overall productivity levels of the retailers.

    • Precise and Accurate Report Generation

    With the implementation of Field Service software, you can get detailed reports in terms of opportunities, sales figures, customer complaints, sales activities, metrics, etc. In simple words, we can say that SFA helps the retailer by offering the required statistics and reports in real-time. These real-time reports will surely help the retailers in improving their sales and revenue.

    Final words

    Using new tools and technology like sales force automation software in an organization ensures high productivity in sales and offers real-time sales data which enables the organizations to make faster business decisions. SFA provides real-time and accurate sales updates, which helps the retailers to boost their sales productivity and their revenues. 

  • How Sales Force Automation Software Will Transform Your Small Business

    How Sales Force Automation Software Will Transform Your Small Business

    Salesforce automation software (SFA) has been used by organizations for their sales teams to optimize sales strategies by providing powerful automation for streamlining the sales process. It is helpful for the businesses to maximize the workflows which improve the sales process and increases sales conversions, which in turn optimize better customer relations. When the sales agents are offered tools, they can entirely focus on offering their best experience to convert the prospects into clients. These tools that are used by the sales agents are referred to as sales force automation software.

    What is Salesforce?

    • Sales force automation software is also known by another name – customer relationship management software (CRM) which provides the company to track and manage interactions between the sales team and their clients.
    • By creating a system of records with sales force management software, organizations can manage all their data regarding sales and their customers. This software helps them to make informed decisions regarding the sales process.
    • Field Force Automation tool makes sure that the interactions between the sales team can be seen by the sales manager, between the sales team, and the top-level management. It integrates different categories and includes software for marketing, finance, sales, and more.

    Sales Force Automation Features

    • Helps in handling large Workloads

    Several people think that sales force automation software is specifically designed for large businesses because of its cost, but it is not true. It offers several benefits for small businesses as well. Particularly, small businesses can benefit from SFA because this tool makes it easier for the small teams to handle larger workloads thereby making it easier for them to concentrate on every aspect of sales.

    • Chatbots

    Chatbots are used by sales teams when a prospect comes to the website or to social media to enquire about their services or their product. Currently, it is powered by artificial intelligence which makes them more helpful in clarifying the queries of the clients; chatbots can direct the prospects to an agent for streamlining the sales process. As per statistics, placing a call to a new prospect within the first minute increases the chance of conversion by 391%.

    • Follow-ups

    It is important to maintain cordial customer relationships because it saves a lot of money and builds a strong Foundation for repeat customers. The cost of generating leads is higher than maintaining current customers.  Field Assist App comes with automated follow-ups which makes the sales process easy for agents which include setting specific parameters like scheduling an email and the follow-up period.

    • Affordability

    Some of the major issues that concern SMBs are whether sales force automation software is affordable for their business. Even though the prices are high, several field service software providers are providing pricing plans that can be customized for SMBs, which makes them affordable.

    • Workflow Management

    Work Flow is one of the important features of this software. Workflow management and creation are more focused on sales agents and their day to day task, this helps them to view how much sales have been achieved by the sales team. This software helps the sales managers to delegate tasks to the sales agents more effectively and ensure that the work is allotted to the team members.

    Sales Force Automation for Small Business

    If you want to understand how the sales force automation software can help to improve your business by taking it to the next level, we have given below the three steps SMBs can leverage on sales automation for brand awareness and higher revenues. 

    • Increase Productivity

    When a prospect enters a sales funnel, it is important to make sure the sales team gets back to them as quickly as possible. One of the fastest ways to accomplish this is by automation.  If the prospects are passed over to the sales team at the right time, and if they act on it faster, potential customers become clients to the company.

    • Top of the Sales Funnel

    Sales funnel is the foundation of your entire sales process; if there is no awareness about it, you cannot generate more leads and the company does not generate any sales; it runs the risk of losing its prospects. 27% of the leads from the sales funnel are converted to potential customers and 44% of the leads goes beyond the first follow up. Using the sales employee tracking app, you can track leads when they enter the sales funnel and the customers can be sorted out as per the requirements. 

    • Improved Customer Relations

    Customer support plays a very important factor in making purchase decisions; sometimes clients proceed with an agreement with your company because of efficient relationship management, otherwise, they move to your competitor if there is no remarkable customer support.

    Advantages of SFA

    1. SFA is a good software for small businesses for managing their existing customers.
    2. Using SFA tools makes the job easier for Small businesses to find new customers.
    3. The small businesses can manage sales and customer support with SFA without any hindrance.
    4. If you are using SFA, you don’t need to install any additional software; cloud access enables the user to access real-time customer data.
    5. Organizations can track their employee’s sales activities easily like calls made, emails sent, and tasks completed. 

    Final Thoughts

    Through the Field Service Management Software, whether if you are a small or a large business, it can offer better customer relationship management and provides vital account details that can be accessed immediately. In the present scenario, Sales force automation has become one of the biggest tools that small businesses should add to their business. SFA will add value to the business if it is added to their marketing mix to increase sales. These tools help to achieve your business goals and improve your sales team’s targets.