Highland Motor Parts provides a highly valued motor parts/delivery service to a dispersed customer base throughout the Highlands of Scotland, stocking an extensive range of brakes, exhausts, batteries, filters service and repair items. Its sales team of just three people serve an area stretching 150 miles to the north and south, which means staff can be out of the office for days at a time. Says sales director David Cooper, “They clock up huge mileage and the roads aren’t great – typically B-roads. This means they could go out on a Monday and we might not see them until Wednesday or Thursday. They are on the road about 90% of the time.”
It was this interruption in communication that prompted Highland Motor Parts to subscribe to sales-i, a comprehensive yet very-easy-to-use sales and customer relationship management (CRM) tool which is made available online via a software-as-a-service (SaaS) delivery model. Because the facilitating technology is hosted remotely, the company does not have to worry about how it all works. Highland Motor Parts simply pays a modest monthly service fee to gain instant access to the information it needs, wherever the sales staff are.
Previously, the sales team had relied on hand-written notes as their records of sales calls. “Nothing was automated so I wouldn’t see the results, and was therefore unable to react to them, until the end of the week,” David explains. “This meant I couldn’t direct activity, which could mean an unhappy customer if our priorities weren’t aligned.”
With the over-reliance on manual call sheets, the company wouldn’t know if a customer hadn’t been visited, or if there had been an issue with a depot or a component being unavailable,” David says. “A lot got lost in translation, or we’d find out too late. If we had been able to spot issues as they arose and monitor recurring problems we would have been able to take action, for example sourcing an alternative supplier.”
“Our aim is to treat every customer the same and give them the attention they deserve. Having sales-i on the iPad is very handy: at the click of a button I can see all activity over the last six months, and check whether customer queries have been dealt with,” David continues.
The main business driver has been to raise customer satisfaction levels. “We’ve seen a dramatic increase in customer satisfaction because we’re now able to nip any problems in the bud,” he notes. “I can see at a glance whether calls have been done or missed, or if they have not been managed efficiently.”
He has been particularly pleased at how quickly and enthusiastically the sales team has embraced sales-i given that they belong to an older generation that doesn’t naturally adapt to technology. “The usability of sales-i has been a strong factor in its success here, ensuring willing adoption. Both the tool itself and the ability to use it on a phone or iPad have been a significant factor here.”
Now that Highland Motor Parts manage all sales calls through sales-i CRM, it is reaping the benefits of automated sales call cycles, and the ability to record call and meeting information remotely. Next, the company plans to roll out additional sales intelligence, allowing the field sales team to see at a glance the products being bought (or not) by its clients, as a means of identifying missed or lost opportunities and increasing sales.
“We’re very pleased with sales-i,” David concludes. “It is a very good working tool, and we get good back up from sales-i as a company. They always respond immediately if we need anything.”
About sales-i
sales-i© is a sales and customer intelligence service for frontline sales people. Through sales-i, sales professionals are equipped with customer buying behavior alerts which are delivered by email and text messaging, empowering them to make better informed, personalized and faster decisions which maximize repeat sales and reduce customer slippage.
sales-i is a true Software-as-a-Service solution charged on a per-user, per-month, basis.
Sales and marketing organizations rely on sales-i to maximize their sales intelligence. This delivers protected customer share, better margins, visible cross-sell and up-sell opportunities and increased customer buying behavior know-how resulting in more intelligent, profitable selling.
sales-i is a privately held company with offices in Chicago, USA and Solihull, UK. For more information about sales-i visit www.sales-i.com or email tellmemore@sales-i.com
About Highland Motor Parts
Highland Motor Parts Ltd, based in Inverness, Scotland, is a home-grown company which opened its doors in 2002. Started by a group of local people with many years’ experience in the motor trade, it provides a motor parts/delivery service to a dispersed customer base throughout the Highlands of Scotland, and stocks a comprehensive range of brakes, exhausts, batteries, filters service and repair items.
For more information, please visit www.highlandmotorparts.co.uk.
