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Achieving real time customer service and customer contact solutions with Microsoft CRM

Q3's global sourcing model gives the maximum benefit to customers in terms of cost savings, improved quality, access to highly talented professionals, flexibility of operations and reduced time to market.

Company Profile

• Client is the leading supplier of Internet browser and webserver based life science desktop software, enterprise solutions, chemical databases and consulting services to the biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and chemical industries.
• Client’s partnerships with recognized scientific information providers make a rich array of databases and sources available to customers. Information publishers include Merck, Wolters Kluwer, Organic Syntheses, Derwent and ISI (Thomson), and InfoChem (Springer Verlag/Candover & Cinven).

Business Situation

When a company executive describes his critical software as a mixed bag, it may be time to upgrade. And in fact, that’s the issue our client found itself facing recently. The company’s previous customer relationship management (CRM) efforts centered on a hodgepodge of software, including Talisma, contact management functions within Microsoft Outlook, and several call-tracking systems. As the company grew to more than 600,000 customers, it found a need for a formal CRM solution that could integrate sales and service capabilities, improve sales forecasting and pipeline, and be accessed remotely. Equally important, the solution had to be something that the salespeople and service people would see as valuable to them, and not as a Big Brother-type tool. Finally, because of the rapid pace of business in this industry, the solution had to be implemented quickly.

Solution

Client selected Microsoft CRM for many reasons, including its compatibility with the company’s business Solutions. Because of previous experience with a different CRM solution client wasn’t sure what to expect from the implementation. We approached it with trepidation. The process took less than a month and was even more affordable than client had envisioned. Equally important, Microsoft CRM required little customization to meet the company’s specific needs. About 90% of what we needed came right out of the box.

• Q3 set up a dedicated team consisting of a team lead and customer support personnel with internal program managers to monitor and guide the client-vendor partnership.
• Huge volume of customer newsletters and updates are mailed regularly without single miss and customer responses for sales or otherwise are efficiently handled.
• The support model was devised to integrate client and Q3 teams for hierarchy based escalation process and responsibility focus.

Benefits

• Less time in meetings and more time in front of customers
  Now, with Microsoft CRM, everyone has the data live. Salespeople have more time to pursue new accounts and serve existing customers.
• Increased success of channel partners
  Client is able to make the sales channel more productive.
• Improvements to sales, service, and products
  Microsoft CRM allows uncovering the reasons behind service calls. That information makes us more proactive, so we can do preventive work to keep calls from coming in.
• Critical assistance in corporate-management activities
  It’s helped to better manage the company with more timely and accurate information.
• Major Cost Savings
  Complete system was achieved in a very cost effective solution on account of being able to cut down resource costs from average $90,000 to approximately $30,000 per resource.