For all. ”In the long run, we can transfer the history of our doors to our crm system. This could then be used by both our sales and our service organization”, says Göran Peterson, IT manager at Albany Door Systems.

CUSTOMER MANAGEMENT Industrial door manufacturer Albany Doors wants to revolutionize work for its sales force. By linking the sales representative’s laptop to a crm solution, an advanced product configurator and the company’s business system, the sales representative can spend more time in the field.

By: Karl-Johan Byttner
Translated by: Anders Lotsson

So far, pilot operations involving ten salespeople are running in Sweden. Soon, according to plans, 14 salespeople in Germany will be doing the same thing.

The sales process is planned to proceed in several steps. First, the sales representative connects, using his or her laptop, to Intentia’s sales quotations module and initiates a quotation for a customer. Then the salesperson, using the product configurator from Tacton, enters all facts about the door.

When the port is fully configured and the sales representative has a price to quote, the system sends a sales quotation to the customer. This information is then entered into Intentia’s customer support system, Movex SMS.

Already out there
When the customer sends his order, the information is entered into Albany Doors Systems’ American business system, MFG/Pro. This all happens while the sales representative is still in the field.

”We’ve just had the Intentia and Tacton system in operation for a month. So far, the sales representatives only use the crm part in the field. The rest of the work involving quotations and configuration is done at the office. But the idea is that the salesperson will also give quotations directly while seeing the customer,” says Göran Peterson, IT manager at Albany Door Systems:

”The result will be that we’ll have one single process for our entire sales organization. Not only do we avoid double entries, we also minimize the manual work of the salesman. And the information will be transparent for the entire organization.”

Today, the company has operations in Sweden, Norway, France, Holland and in the USA.

Albany Systems in Europe employs about 500 people, including 45 field sales representatives and about 25 in-house sales representatives, 100 service technicians, the rest being administrative staff and product developers.

Acceptance imperative
The longer perspective requires that the company’s service technicians be provided with a mobile service solution. All included, Albany Door Systems is investing 800,000 euros in the project.

On portable computers Albany Door Systems is a merger of three companies in the industrial doors business: Swedish Nofama, German Schieffer and German Jansen. In September, Albany Door Systems implemented Intentia’s crm solution, Movex SMS, and the Tacton product configurator. The solution has been rolled out in German, Swedish, Norwegian and French operations. During the first quarter 2005, the solution will also be implemented in American operations. The choice of future hardware is still not definitive. So far, the solution runs on portable computers.

”The great challenge is to get the salespersons to accept the solution. It’s got to work 100 percent from the start when the salesperson is with a customer. In the office, providing support for the user is much easier,” says Göran Peterson.

Tacton’s representative for Sweden and Norway, Anders Israelsson, believes a ”mobile” business system has great advantages.

”It used to be that companies in this industry worked hard to reduce their production costs, but they didn’t look very much at sales and order processes. So there’s a lot to be gained by speeding up sales processes,” he says. He’s supported by Henrik Frimodig, a KPMG consultant:

”This means great advantages for sales representatives, service technicians and consultants.”