Full speed ahead with Salesforce - Amazon S3 we quickly realized that we needed some professional...
Transcript of Full speed ahead with Salesforce - Amazon S3 we quickly realized that we needed some professional...
r2p Full speed ahead with Salesforce r2p GmbH, a German technology company, develops and distributes intelligent and integrated system solutions in the area of public transport. For the fast-growing company to meet its target – of becoming an international market leader in the area of mobile video surveillance and telematics, and bringing about sustainable improvements in the world of local public transportation (LPT) – r2p relies on the Salesforce platform and PARX. Salesforce not only enables them to efficiently manage their sales pipeline, but helps them make a success of their overall new sales culture. Profitability and sustainability are more than just targets to meet for the innovative
company, which was founded in 2009 and is based on the Flensburg Firth. Local public
transportation (LPT) is constantly faced with a growing number of both challenges and
opportunities. With regard to sustainable development requirements, LPT is only able to
compete with motorized private transport if it is attractive and environmentally friendly.
The broad portfolio, which mainly comprises mobile video surveillance software and
hardware for rail and road vehicles, ranges from video protection technology, passenger
counting and information systems, through to fleet management with real-time data
transmission. r2p was one of Germany’s most innovative medium-sized companies in 2015
and has now set itself the ambitious goals of sustainably changing LPT and expanding
globally. Thanks to the multi-million-euro investment from Swedish private equity firm
Alder AB and its acquisition of north-Danish telematics company r2p tracking in 2013, the
r2p group is now a successful, established company with a variety of subsidiaries
worldwide.
«Given our rapid growth and the requirements for a professional pipeline management system, we quickly realized that we needed some professional key account management software.» Flemming H. Kaer, Sales & Marketing Director and shareholder of r2p
Badenerstrasse 125 CH-8004 Zurich T +41 43 500 97 00 www.parx.com
From Excel to professional key account management with Salesforce
The way in which the development, production and distribution of system
solutions interact is a key success factor for the company. «Given our rapid
growth and the requirements for a professional pipeline management
system, we quickly realized that we needed some professional key account
management software», explains Flemming H. Kaer, Sales & Marketing
Director and shareholder of r2p. In previous years, the company had used
Microsoft Excel and Outlook for its sales activities; however, all the while
the volumes of data were becoming ever larger and more complex. The
customer structure and all the relevant associated order and customer data
had been entered by employees in an Excel spreadsheet. The increased
complexity of the data resulted in a lack of transparency and made
managing customer data an extremely laborious process. The consequences
of this were a loss of time, a poor understanding of the data, and projects
that were difficult to manage.
It was no longer possible to work professionally using the previous system.
The search for the right sales software ultimately led r2p to PARX. Fleming
H. Kaer reminisces: «We were looking for the right CRM software which met
our requirements. We then heard about Salesforce and PARX, who came to
us highly recommended.» The most important thing for the north-German
technology company was having an overview and better understanding of
their sales data so that they could manage their projects more efficiently.
Following a presentation of the software with all its possibilities and
functions, r2p was immediately convinced that Salesforce was the right
choice, and the company then also opted for PARX.
Real-time pipeline management and project controlling improves quality throughout the value chain
The project kicked off with a two-day workshop to collect, scrutinize and
specify all of r2p’s requirements. Initially the aim was to implement the
Salesforce Sales Cloud and connect the existing ERP system based on
Microsoft Dynamics NAV (Navision). In addition, an individual cash flow
management system was to be integrated directly into Salesforce. This
included, for example, all resource requests and elements from the pipeline
planning, such as sales opportunities, sales cycles, orders and all related
key figures in the CRM system. To bring together these values with the
payment flows from the sales pipelines to create a forward-looking pipeline
management system, PARX developed and implemented special objects
within the space of just six months. This made it possible to digitalize all the
data and processes impacted by the changes and to make them available to
users. Projects that had been won and the resulting opportunities can now
easily be processed and set up. This has resulted in far higher levels of
efficiency and quality in the company’s daily business. By segregating the
payments that are expect to be received and thanks to the reporting by
Salesforce, r2p is now able to implement a professional scheduling system.
Areas of application - Account management
- Opportunity management
- Case management
- Cash flow management
- Pipeline management
- Project management
- Marketing
- Procurement
- Partner Community
- Quality management
PARX services
- Consultancy / Business
analysis / Requirements
engineering
- Technical design / System
architecture
- Specification
- Project management
- Configuration
- Development
- Implementation
- Integration
- Migration
- Support
Products used
- Salesforce Sales Cloud
- Salesforce Plaform
- Salesforce Chatter
- PARX DynaDoc
- Partner Community
- Knowledge
Industry - Transportation
Number of users
- 27 users
- 25-30 licenses
Links
- http://www.r2protec.de
- www.parx.com
- www.salesforce.com
Badenerstrasse 125 CH-8004 Zurich T +41 43 500 97 00 www.parx.com
A key topic for any innovative company is also project controlling and risk management. By
carrying out configurations and individual adjustments in Salesforce, for example, it is
possible to set up milestone planning, which captures all the important events that are key in
achieving the project goals. Management, order processing staff and project managers can
now instantly access the data they require.
In the area of marketing, PARX introduced ways to enter and follow up on leads in Salesforce
and to carry out customer satisfaction surveys. The Chatter collaboration tool has improved
internal cross-divisional communication and cooperation between the sites in Flensburg and
Viborg. A number of individual modifications were also made during the project, for example
the automated offer generator in the complaints process using PARX DynaDoc. Thanks to the
DynaDoc tool, which was developed in-house at PARX, it is possible to query complex data
structures in Salesforce and then use the results to create documents in MS Word or PDF.
Flemming H. Kaer explains: «If we receive a complaint about a defective device, an offer is
automatically generated that is individually tailored to the customer. This not only makes our
day-to-day business easier, it also means our internal quality management process is more
professional.»
Given its growth, r2p also provides sales support to its partners and joint ventures abroad;
here it makes frequent use of the Salesforce Partner Community as a knowledge platform.
Partners can independently create opportunities and they can access product articles and
documentation, such as schematics, handbooks and similar.
«What is more, our whole sales culture and way of thinking about our customer relationships has been changed for the long term. And we are extremely thankful for this.» Flemming H. Kaer, Sales & Marketing Director and shareholder of r2p
Badenerstrasse 125 CH-8004 Zurich T +41 43 500 97 00 www.parx.com
Sustainable change for the entire sales culture
The team from the north-German company likes to work with the latest technologies and is
extremely committed to moving a step closer to their goals each and every day. Thanks to its
proximity to Denmark, being able to work on an inter-departmental basis and transparency
are not only extremely important for the German-Danish team – they are a fundamental
requirement. «Our employees are all-rounders, who deliver first-rate work each and every
day. On being rolled out, Salesforce did not represent a major obstacle for our team and was
accepted straightaway», explains Flemming Kaer.
Salesforce is now used by more than 30 users from the sales, order processing, and now
project management departments. With average growth of 25–45% per year at r2p,
Salesforce has proven to be a profitable CRM tool. Sales pipeline reviews, which evaluate the
current sales opportunities, can be carried out immediately and from anywhere. Dashboards
are also used to help build up knowledge and create transparency between the various
departments.
Flemming H. Kaer summarizes: «Previously our team spent time formatting and typing
numbers into Excel sheets. Now thanks to Salesforce and the excellent cooperation with
PARX, we can work in a flexible, targeted manner, which in turn gives us flexible,
transparent processes and saves us time. What is more, our whole sales culture and way
of thinking about our customer relationships has been changed for the long term. And we
are extremely thankful for this.»
Given its strong global structure, r2p will in future aim to make even greater use of the
possibilities offered by Salesforce. Firstly, sales support for partners and joint ventures is
to be expanded and additional material, such as product catalogs. Secondly, Salesforce,
with its possibilities for project management, marketing and customer service, still offers
further development potential for the company based on the banks of the Flensburg
Firth.