Customer Relationship Management Software, widely referred to as CRM software, is playing a vital role today across enterprises of various sizes. By aggregating and managing customer data, Salesforce CRM enables enterprises to manage a wide range of key business functions such as lead generation and conversion, sales and marketing, tracking customer engagement and automating workflows. As enterprises are able to streamline their business processes with CRM software, each of these individually separate functions and activities are now better streamlines and integrated, resulting in higher levels of customer satisfaction. Implementing a Salesforce CRM within your organization can be a bit of a challenge. Although Salesforce CRM is the world’s most advanced and innovative CRM platform, there are always implementation and migrations challenges associated with working with a new system, as your team migrates key information to the new platform and adapts to work with it. This transition however, can be simplified significantly if you have a dedicated Salesforce Consultant to help your teams adapt to this new system. What is a Salesforce consultant? A Salesforce Consultant can help you overcome limitations, unlock the Salesforce CRM platform’s full potential, and augment Salesforce’s out-of-the-box functionality. A Salesforce consultant is an experienced professional with significant expertise implementing the Salesforce CRM platform. And because this is their area of expertise, they would be more than likely to stay up-to-date with the latest product updates and tools, to enable them to deliver agile implementation and drive productivity. Salesforce Consulting goes beyond the basic implementation of the Salesforce CRM platform. Third party integrations, creating custom apps, and leveraging the platform’s full capabilities and driving adoption of your users are also some of their key responsibilities. Almost any business in any industry can take advantage of these customizations, from nonprofits to manufacturing, financial services to healthcare, and more. Why should you hire a Salesforce consultant? Hiring a Salesforce consultant can help you maximise the potential of the CRM platform. You would be able to connect with and understand your customers better, and deliver personalized experiences for your clients and prospects. As an organization, you’ll also be better prepared to provide agile support to your customers. And you will be able to track the entire customer experience and improve further. Before we go into what are the roles of a Salesforce Consultant, let us understand some of the constraints they have to work with. Salesforce CRM implementation is a resource-dependent process. Therefore, the consultant must address the resource needs associated with is before going ahead with implementing a solution. 1. Workforce Constraints The Salesforce consultant needs to be aware of the workforce constraints that exist in the organization. The organization and the consultant must arrive at a common understanding or how much of the organizational workforce can be used to implement the solution. Conversely, the solution has to be designed keeping the workforce size in mind. The consultant needs to understand the work responsibilities of each staff member so that an optimum solution can be developed. Workforce availability constraints must also be considered during the implementation, training, and go-live processes. 2. Time Constraint Every technology solution is designed for under a specified timeline and for a specific purpose that must be fulfilled at the earliest. The CRM solution has to be designed based on the established timeline with all checks and balances in place to address any schedule deviations at key milestones. One of the key challenges for the consultant is to stick to the timelines so that the implementation is relevant and useful. The implementation should not add delays to the existing schedules. In fact, it should optimize the existing schedules to augment efficiency. 3. Skill Constraints The Salesforce Consultant needs to have a good understanding of the gap between the desired skill set and the existing skill set of the workforce. Not only should the CRM solution be usable by the workforce, but it should also trim the gaps in sills for better productivity. Th user experience should be such that it is easy and effective. Roles of a Salesforce Consultant The Salesforce CRM platform is a suite of complex tools and features and tools if properly implemented can maximum profits. It comes with a high degree of flexibility to ensure alignment with almost any business requirement. It is the prerogative of a Salesforce Consultant to be aware of the scope of customization so that the implementation is smooth and effective. Having said that, the organization needs to first identify which of its business processes it wants to customise and/or optimize in Salesforce. Here are some of the key roles and responsibilities of a Salesforce Consultant for an effective CRM implementation. 1. Relationship Management The Salesforce Consultant has a key role to play in the client company equation. The Salesforce consultant brings a certain value to the organization that can potentially be extended to their clients. Salesforce Consulting can help evolve the sales process and affect the clients for the better. Clients are the key touchpoints for an organization since they generate revenues. The relationship between the organization and its clients is a make-or-break deal. It is vital to create and maintain a relationship of mutual trust and business ethics for long term growth. A Salesforce Consultant can utilise specific features of the Salesforce CRM platform to generate more sales opportunities. One of the key responsibilities of the Salesforce consultant is to develop a deep understanding of the client-company relationships and advise the company on how to augment that relationship further. With the powerful Salesforce CRM platform, the Salesforce consultant creates more efficient business process to drive productivity. It allows the client to feel that he is an equal partner in the process of change. In fact, in several cases, the Salesforce consultant is the first point of contact for customers. 2. Organize meetings and keeping the teams updated The Salesforce consulting partner is a key contact point for clients and client companies. Even though organizations prefer automation and intelligent, innovative, feature-rich systems, they want to meet and discuss with someone who has a good understanding of what all the CRM platform can do and how those features can be extended to its users. The Salesforce Consultant should organize meetings with clients and share status updates of how the implementation and adoption is going. While it is easy to provide status updates on multiple projects in a single dashboard, a consultant ensures accurate, consistent and periodic sharing of updates with the users. 3. Building and deploying Salesforce The primary role of a Salesforce consultant is to build and deploy a Salesforce CRM solution that is customized for the company and its clients.  The Salesforce Consultant has to ensure that all business processes that have been discussed and agreed upon by the company have been implemented. 4. Providing training and support Like any other enterprise platform, Salesforce updates its platform thrice a year to make it more available to its users. However, most businesses find it a daunting task to keep up with these upgrades, or they don’t know which upgrades will have deliver the greatest benefits to them. A Salesforce Consultant will help you with that. They will help you in understanding which updates will benefit your organization the most and boost productivity based on your unique needs. This assistance also needs to extend to your staff. Not only do you need a user friendly and efficient system, but you also want your staff to know how to access the information they need to fulfil their work responsibilities. They should feel fully capable to navigate and use the CRM platform. Your consultant will provide the necessary training to boost user adoption and productivity on the platform, empowering them to close deals faster and also acquire more customers. A thorough Salesforce implementation, training and adoption program across your organization is the foundation of a customer-centric business. Finally, you will discover that greater the support you get from your consultant, the lesser the number of queries you have about the platform. The consultant can provide you with the necessary help and support, which means having to submit lesser help tickets. You have your own in-house expert who can all answer your questions related to the CRM platform and provide the necessary training as and when problems arise. Hiring a qualified Salesforce consultant creates a more seamless experience for everyone in your organization. If your business could do with more customers, working with a Certified Salesforce consultant might be the key to tapping into that potential market. Turn to Girikon to implement a solution that can help you drive growth for you. With a large pool of certified professionals, and a global delivery model, Girikon makes it easy for you to focus on what you want to do – deliver customer delight.

In today’s business landscape, a successful enterprise must adopt a system that seamlessly integrates all departments and their respective business processes to enable them to interact and collaborate effortlessly. This is where Salesforce has established itself as the market leader in the CRM space.  Salesforce CRM sometimes popularly referred to as the Customer 360 platform, is a user-friendly solution with virtually limitless flexibility that connects teams across departments in an organization and drives growth. As a result, companies that use Salesforce see improvements in growth and efficiency. But to get the most out of what Salesforce CRM has to you need professional expertise. While most of the Salesforce products are centred around sales and customer service, Salesforce can be used for almost anything. And while the key Salesforce functions haven’t changed much – consultant, administrator, architect and developer, the specializations required based on the unique business needs of an organization have become quite apparent. One needs to have specialization on some of the key aspects of Salesforce to make the implementation count. Consultants don’t just bring in the necessary skills and experience for implementing the CRM platform. They also add significant value in being able to understand the customer. Not only in terms of business processes within the organization but also outside of that realm, such as the people who drive those processes. And they are an intrinsic part of the customer’s growth journey onwards of implementation. While businesses can provide the Salesforce implementation team with data and insight, certain things can only be understood by a specialist. This is where the Salesforce consultant role becomes important. They are trained with skills like attention to detail, analytical thinking and problem-solving along with hands on expertise on the platform. Why Is Salesforce so Popular? Salesforce upgrades its product offering three times a year. Which means every year they add new features and functionality to help existing and new business innovate rapidly. Salesforce is founded on a Customer-360 vision and promotes a collaborative work culture that brings people together and promotes productivity. The Salesforce online community provides help and support to the entire developer community to solve any business challenge The Salesforce platform has virtually limitless flexibility and businesses can create any number and kind of custom apps and integrations to support their business Salesforce allows you to automate routine business processes which frees up employee time to focus on core tasks. Salesforce is powered by an advanced AI engine which delivers qualified analytics on Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of your business. Here's where Salesforce Consultants add value across various phases As Part of an Implementation Team CRM implementation is a time-consuming effort and requires coordinated team effort. It would be a wise decision for a business to hire a specialist with extensive experience in Salesforce implementation since the Salesforce platform is complex and offers virtually limitless customization possibilities. Consequently, Salesforce consultants are in high demand across businesses that need the Salesforce CRM implementation. Here are the phases that require the services of a Salesforce Consultant: The Pre-Implementation Phase Before preparing a draft of the Salesforce implementation plan, a Salesforce consultant needs valuable insight from within the company. Information on the type and number of employees, the working structure of the company, regular business processes and workflows, are all important to understand how the organization works and what are its vital parts. The consultant needs to work closely with the business leaders within the organization to understand goals and expectations and current challenges and workflow bottlenecks During the Implementation Consultants play a vital role during the implementation phase as well. They are the link between the technical team – architects, administrators and developers who install and configure the platform and build and deploy custom apps, and the company. Their role is to maintain good communication between the two groups and ensure everything is well captured. After the Implementation The implementation is not over until the customer starts seeing results. After all, the technical implementation is just side of it. Once the technical tasks are completed, the implementation team also needs to train the users on the platform. Typically, this is another key responsibility area of a Salesforce consultant. It requires good communication skills, teamwork and leadership skills. Businesses are evolving continuously. And the software that they use needs to keep pace with it. Businesses need to add and upgrade their apps and workflows on an ongoing basis to stay ahead of the curve. If you are already using Salesforce in your organization, the presence of a Salesforce Consultant will help you to upgrade rapidly by building and deploying apps in an agile framework. And do to that you need a strong team of specialists. Moreover, just like every other complex platform, Salesforce also requires maintenance time to time. This is another key responsibility area of a consultant. As part of the organization Salesforce consultants also work in organizations that don’t do implementation for others. They just have enough in house needs. These are regular businesses that use the Salesforce platform and a small team of consultants to oversee the implementation, upgrades and maintenance activities. In this context, a Salesforce Consultant’s function is to make sure system performs perfectly and the users are able to use it easily. On top of that, they also discover methods to further enhance the customer experience through the use of the platform and make sure teams continue to communicate with each other. Shortage of Salesforce Professionals Currently, there just aren’t enough people trained in Salesforce to meet growing demands of this ecosystem. One of the key reasons is that Salesforce isn’t your run-of-the-mill software. It’s a specialised and complex product and unless you're a service provider or you are a part of an organization that uses Salesforce, it’s unlikely that you know much about it. Many of the Fortune 100 companies use Salesforce. IDC published an article in October 2017 saying that over 3 million jobs are expected to be there in the Salesforce ecosystem by end of 2022 through its network of partners. Salesforce has been growing at a brisk pace year on year, and so are their customers, consequently driving up the demand for Salesforce professionals to support that growth. And the skills one acquires as a Salesforce professional are highly transferable in case one wants to switch over to another industry. Developing Salesforce Skills Irrespective of your available budget, there are multiple options available to help one get familiar with Salesforce and develop skills in a certain are: Developer organisations— Sign up immediately for a free developer licence and start practising Trailhead, which is a Salesforce powered only community where one can get hands-on exposure to Salesforce and learn the technical and business skills one needs to succeed from anywhere for free. Girikon is a dedicated Gold Certified Salesforce Partner. Our relentless focus on understanding the unique needs of our customers combined with our rich expertise and experience on the Salesforce platform allows us to deliver value driven solutions to our clients. Contact us today to know more.

Before we dive into how SMS from Salesforce can drive hiring, let us understand how SMS works and what can do it to engage prospects and customers. What is SMS marketing? In general, SMS marketing or text marketing, implies an opt-in stage for customers to choose how they wish to be contacted. This is where users either leave their phone number on a web form to choose how they wish to be contacted or send an SMS message or short text to an automated system to receive future updates, discount coupons, or any other information they have chosen to receive directly on their mobile device. When the customer leaves a phone number or sends the initial message, an automated marketing software solution saves the customer’s phone number in a database. Marketers use an automated SMS marketing system to send relevant marketing information to these users as and when they choose. Users of course retain the right to opt out of these marketing messages at any time. What benefits does SMS marketing offer? One of the biggest benefits of SMS marketing is that people are more willing to trust text over any other type of marketing channel. SMS or text messages are non-intrusive and do not pose any security threat. SMS marketing messages have a very high open rate when compared to email marketing making it one of the most effective marketing methods available. Another key advantage of SMS marketing is that it enables you to engage with prospects or customers quickly. Response times to SMS messages can be less than a few minutes, compared to several hours or even days that it takes in the case of email. Industry research suggests that people have their phones with them most of the day, which means it is very likely they will see a text message within a few minutes of receiving it. How can businesses utilize SMS marketing? SMS marketing is not just about sending text messages. It can be interactive in nature and if you want to tap into new prospects or upsell to existing customers, there are some best practices that you can follow. Deliver value Text messaging is non-intrusive and personal. Generally speaking, most people exchange text messages with friends, colleagues and relatives. So, if they have chosen you to be a part of that circle, then you need to make your interaction with them worthy of that invitation. Segment your audience based on relevant parameters such as prospects or customers,  geography and age groups, build your messaging content and send only relevant messages. When your audience sees a text from you, they will be inclined to open it. Similarly, deliver exclusive messaging content for the deals and information you provide. If your audience gets the same messaging content in your emails, ads, or your website, the text messages lose their value. Ensure that opting in makes sense to your audience. Pay attention to timing When is the best time to reach out to your prospects and customers? Probably not during regular working hours, especially if your business isn’t even operational during those times. And you are not operational on weekends, then the same rule applies for those off days. Track the periods when your users are most active on your mobile app or site to establish the ideal times to send messages for pushing promotions and other information. Moreover, ensure that when users opt in for your text alerts and notifications, your system sends an immediate acknowledgement. If customers opt in and but don’t hear from you for long periods, they are more likely to lose interest. Track results and act upon them If you want your SMS marketing campaigns to be effective, you need to keep track of how it’s doing. Track how many customers opt-out with every incoming message and use that to ascertain what type of content generates the best results. Applying SMS Marketing in Salesforce to hiring On many occasions, manpower requirements in organizations are sporadic and immediate. Hiring of a qualified workforce in a brief period of time is one of the most challenging tasks that HR managers have to deal with. To fulfil these imminent requirements, organizations and recruitment firms need to have a quick and effective recruitment process in place to close job openings within a fixed period. This is where SMS Salesforce for recruitment can be a game-changer and transform the entire recruitment process. Here’s how businesses and recruitment firms can incorporate SMS messaging in their recruitment process and fast track it. SMS Salesforce for recruitment Check Job Status of Prospective Candidates with SMS Salesforce for recruitment Before reaching out to any prospective candidate, it’s important to be aware of their job status. This would help prevent unnecessary expenses incurred in reaching out to irrelevant candidates. With bulk SMS messaging, organizations can send text messages to millions in one go and check if a prospective candidate is looking for a job or job change. This is just one of the ways to use SMS Salesforce for recruitments at scale. Run Surveys to Deliver Relevant Job Postings to Prospects The more you know about your prospective candidates, the more effective your outbound campaigns would be to hire the relevant candidates. It allows you to send relevant job openings to your prospects. With SMS Salesforce you can run an automated campaign of a series of text messages to run surveys and automate the process of candidate profiling. Moreover, you can segment prospective candidates based on parameters such as years of experience, annual remuneration, work profile and location and create targeted lists. And you can send the most relevant job openings to the candidates on these lists. Schedule Interviews with URLs Once candidates evince interest in the job openings, you can request for their resumes for screening. Following that, using automated SMS messaging from Salesforce, you can send regular status updates about their job application. And to add to this outbound messaging, you can send a web URL to schedule interviews. Send Confirmation Texts By sending URLs in your SMS messages for scheduling calls or interviews, you give the necessary convenience to your candidates to apply at their convenience and trim the time and effort associated with repetitive manual calling. Once a prospect provides a convenient date and time, you can automatically send a confirmation message and avoid any confusion later. Send Reminders and cut down on No-Shows No-shows for scheduled interviews lead to wastage of time and effort of HR managers, recruitment firms and interviewers. Salesforce SMS APP for recruitment can help in reducing candidate no-shows. Automated reminder text messages can be sent to remind candidates of their upcoming interviews. Share Results of Interviews Once an interview is over, candidates are eager to know the result. Recruiters and managers are inundated with calls and messages from candidates to share results. SMS from Salesforce allows recruiters to trigger SMS texts to send out the results automatically as the status of candidates changes from interviewed to selected. This saves a significant amount of manual work and time for recruiters. Collect Documentation for Onboarding Not only SMS, but now even WhatsApp has also become an important channel for effective communication. Now recruiters can collect all relevant documents through WhatsApp. This allows them to simplify the process of document collection and complete the onboarding. Accelerate your hiring process and close job openings with SMS from Saslesforce Recruitment is a time bound activity. And needs a fast and efficient process for being effective. SMS Salesforce for recruitment empowers recruiters to connect with candidates faster at every stage of the hiring process. They also cut back on calls and emails normally associated with the recruitment process. Moreover, it allows recruitment firms to close the open job openings within specified timelines. To know more about how Girikon can utilise the power of SMS Salesforce to accelerate your recruitments, talk to one of our experts today.

What is a subscription-based business model? Subscription business models are those where customers pay recurringly for continuous access to a product or service. Subscription business models can accelerate growth by virtue of creating recurring revenue. This means as a business owner you get revenue again and again over predictable intervals such as monthly or annually as and when your customers renew their subscriptions. What are the benefits of subscription-based business models? Subscription business models protect you during circumstances created by economic uncertainties. They create a stream of predictable revenue from a stable base of returning customers allowing you to plan for longer into the future. Here is some further detailing of the benefits. Fast Tracked revenue. As your business attracts more customers, recurring revenue from subscriptions grow exponentially. It’s always more convenient to manage existing customer than to attract and retain new ones. Subscription results in better retention drives revenue growth more efficiently and easily. Predictable revenue. You don’t need to plan quarter to quarter. Businesses who offer subscriptions, more often than not, start each quarter with a predictable expected revenue closer to the preceding quarter and then build on top of that. Business agility. Once you establish long-term relationships with your customers, you get access to valuable continuous data that will help you to get a better understanding of your customers, and consequently empower you to server them better as you go. Armed with aggregated customer data of their past interactions with you, you can learn about them faster and respond with new appropriate offerings. And the more this happens, the more efficient and unique your offerings will become. What are the different kinds of subscription business models? There are several kinds of subscription business models, but essentially, they all mean the same thing which is, you charge for access to products instead of charging for the products themselves. Here’s a look at three of the most popular ones: Subscription model: Revenue is set for each subscription cycle which could be weekly, monthly or annual. The charges payable are predetermined and based on a fixed date cycle. For example: a fixed monthly subscription fee for a music or video service. Consumption model: In this case, revenue is variable. The amount that is chargeable and when it is due is based on usage. For example, a cab service. Hybrid model: In this model, customers are offered a mix of subscription and usage. In this case revenue has both fixed as well as variable components. For example: over usage data fees on your internet usage on top of a fixed monthly service fee for a fixed data usage cap. How can I implement a subscription-based model for my business? To implement a subscription model, you need to adopt tools and processes that allow you to create a consistent buying journey, while knowing that customers move through different channels and make modifications to their subscriptions with each of them over time. Once you create a consistent journey, track new metrics to ensure you are on the right path. Here’s how you can get there: 1. Empower customers to subscribe and pay over any channel With a subscription-based revenue model, you are constantly interacting with your customers, and they are not always available for a conversation. And in today’s pandemic reality, they increasingly want to engage on their own term. In fact, recent research suggests that they now prefer digital self-service and remote customer service rather than face-to-face interactions. Businesses need to make it possible for customers to renew and/or upgrade their subscriptions and pay instantly on the channels of their choice. This could translate to having a website or a mobile app, to enable that service. It’s a known fact in today’s digital business context, customers don’t just want to choose digital channels for interaction. They want to be able to cross them.   As a business, you want to know how you can deliver a seamless and consistent journey across channels. For instance, a customer might initiate a purchase on your online store, but then being routed to a sales rep when they stall or hesitate at checkout. A good subscription management mechanism can help. It combines customer relationship management tools, and along with the power of self-service, provides access to the same data to all teams. Once they have that, they can pick up customer conversations from where they left off. As a business, you want every touchpoint with the customer to be amazing. And in order to deliver an exceptional journey, you need to integrate all customer data for a compete view of your customer. Subscription management provides a mechanism way to connect customer data that delivers a seamless journey and provides a great customer experience at every touchpoint. 2. Deliver value to customers Subscriptions don’t mean much if they are delivering value to your customers at every step. You’re consistently asking them to renew and pay for their subscriptions. IF there is no value in the offering, customer won’t renew their subscriptions. Consequently, they’ll fall through the cracks and your growth will hit a roadblock. There needs to be a paradigm shift in your thinking from delivering products to delivering value. How can you consistently deliver value-as-a-service to your customers? For instance, Spotify doesn’t sell music. They offer entertainment-as-a-service. Likewise, an e-retailer doesn’t just deliver great products. They deliver an exceptional buying and customer service experience-as-a-service. Value is unlocked as customer’s access and use the product. This brings customer service teams into focus, who will need to ensure sure adoption and customer satisfaction is high to the point of being delightful. A customer relationship management system that provides complete visibility of data and a certain level of automation is vital. Visibility helps you keep an eye on and act on adoption and usage patterns. And you can jump is to support and assist a customer to fix an issue early before it becomes a nuisance. For instance, with automation you can make it easy and fast for customers to start using new products or services they’ve purchased. 3. Understand recurring revenue with new metrics Customer acquisition is a thing of the past. It doesn’t hold the key anymore. Customer value, which leads to customer retention, which eventually drives recurring revenue, are the key metrics now. How will you improve customer retention without measuring it? Let us first look at customer value metrics. You can measure customer value by tracking exactly how much your customers are using your subscription offering. One of the key metrics is to track is average revenue per user, which is as simple as it sounds. Gross revenue divided by number of users. As your business evolves, with more processes and automation in place, you will become more and more effective at targeting customers with the appropriate offerings, all while retaining them and getting them to renew their subscriptions. And once that happens you will see an improvement in the average revenue per customer. To measure growth in top-line revenue, you need to monitor monthly and annual recurring revenue. These are significant since increasing them translates to your revenue streams becoming more and more predictable and that allows you to plan ahead. Ready to open new paths to revenue growth? A subscription-based business model is today’s new reality of a digital-first approach for business. However, it can only succeed if its authentic. Customers are smart. And you can’t fake value to them.  They will renew only when they get real, consistent value for their money. It’s both a challenge and an opportunity to get close to your customers, not just know them better but understand them better, and offer what they want in the way they want it. Girikon is a Certified Salesforce Consulting Partner and can help you to re-imagine your offerings and envision a whole new customer journey. Contact us today to learn how a subscription-based revenue model can deliver value to your customers and drive revenue and agility for your business.

At the peak of COVID-19, merchants were making decisions in haste to provide the products and services that customers needed. Today, when the world is far more at ease, these makeshift solutions are now intensifying as shoppers have a plethora of options driving expectations to an all new high. Additionally, their patience is very limited now. In fact, research data across over 2000 retailers suggests that 80% of shoppers are very likely to abandon them after three bad experiences. Merchants need deeper the insights into customer behaviour to scale up their business. Here are top 4 trends that have been observed across the world on how the retail landscape is changing. Trend 1: Shopping journeys get more complex During the 2 years of COVID, three types of digital channels grew their transaction share by almost 40%: brand websites, retailer websites and apps, and online marketplaces. This of course includes transactions through their apps as well. In the process, associated channels like delivery apps, social media, and messaging platforms have also become prominent players in the digital commerce eco system, with a growth of over 20%. As the range of shopping channels continues to expand, shopping journeys have got more and more complex. The purchasing journey has become fragmented and complex. It is imperative for brands and merchants to develop a one-on-one relationship with customers across platforms namely social media, messaging platforms, and video to stay relevant. Social media, influencers, and messaging apps have become hugely popular today for product discovery. For making a purchase, social media, digital wallets and email are the leading digital destinations. And when buyers need customer support, they mostly turn to chatbots and social media. Trend 2: The store goes digital Although transactions through brick-and-mortar stores decreased significantly during the pandemic, the physical store still plays an important role in the shopping journey. In fact, reports indicate that over 80% of the global merchandise sales happened at physical stores in 2020. The primary reasons shoppers prefer to visit a physical store are firstly, to touch and feel the product, secondly one gets immediate delivery of the merchandise and finally to avoid logistics costs. However, shoppers today are blurring the lines between digital and physical channels while they are in the store. Many shoppers today research about a product on the retailer’s app while still being in the sore before making a purchase. To compliment this trend, brands and retailers are connecting the in-store experience with an increasing number of digital touchpoints. The role of the store associate is growing as well. At the peak of COVID, store associates evolved from the routine scanning and bagging to becoming customer service reps, product recommenders, and brand influencers. And these roles are more than likely to stay, which makes the role of the store associate in the customer journey far more intriguing. Trend 3: The loyalty game has gone a few notches up Loyalty programs are continuously evolving based on shopper expectations. Although a points-based loyalty program is still the most preferred method today, data indicates that younger generations are seeking a more experience-based journey that establishes a deeper connection with the brand. Millennials today value exclusive access to limited products and richer experiences far more than ever when it comes to loyalty programs. Shoppers are also seeking rewards for their transactions. They are willing to take a further step such as downloading an app or writing an online review and sharing personal information like their birthday or phone number for a more personalized experience and loyalty benefits. Trend 4: Brands and Retailers and brands fast track unified shopping experiences Most customers expect brands and retailers to recognise their unique needs and expectations, but only a portion of them have the capability to turn data into personalized offerings in real time across channels and touchpoints. To address this customer expectation, and to address the challenges associated with delivering that expectation, retailers and brands are adopting a threefold approach: HIRING MORE DATA SCIENTISTS Retailers are actively working to hire more data scientists. And this trend is expected to grow further into 2023. This trend that brands and retailers have the opportunity to overhaul their loyalty programs to meet the rising customer expectations and their openness to share personal data. ADOPTING A UNIFIED ENGAGEMENT PLATFORM Many retailers and brands today are already in the planning stage for such a platform, which allows them to access and monetise customer data by engaging with them at a deeper level. UPGRADING POINT-OF-SALE TECHNOLOGY Going forward, the pint of sale (POS) will become a critical part of a unified customer engagement platform. In fact, new retailers are already adopting this approach and are moving to a cloud solution. The in-store digital experience is key for engaging with customers and driving sales. Here are some tips on now to enhance customer experience. Empower associates with the tools that drive sales As we mentioned before, store associates are adopting extended functional roles such as customer service, ecommerce, and social media experts to engage with shoppers. To be able to wear multiple hats successfully, store associates need access to customer data along with user friendly digital tools. This is where a CRM platform like Salesforce comes into play. Associates can access complete customer profile with information on purchase history, buying preferences, demographic data, customer satisfaction score, and more. To get associates up to speed quickly, Salesforce provides digital learning platforms like myTrailhead that bring associates up to speed on how to handle every aspect of digital and physical transactions. Brands and retailers can reskill associates for routine store tasks such as picking, sorting, packing, and shipping to support the fulfilment journey. Store managers can learn to use digital tools to analyze data, access insights and act on them faster than ever. Maintain real time inventory levels The greatest enemy of customer satisfaction is out-of-stock inventory.  Most shoppers are interested in pre-ordering new or out-of-stock items. This is especially true for fast moving items. Stores can manage inventory levels with a flexible and robust order management system. The order management system connects data across your warehouses and stores to give associates the most accurate status of current inventory. That translates to happy customers. Offer multiple digital payment options Customers need more payment options, period. Having just a credit card machine won’t do. In the era of digital, stores need payment types that are minimally invasive and streamline checkout for customers. Level up store fulfilment During the peak of the pandemic, there was a scramble to buy online or pick up in store. In fact, some retailers even turned some of their stores to micro-fulfilment centers. Make sure to: Clearly communicate important details to customers, such as where to pick up their items from and when. Clearly communicate to customers what identification they need to provide to pick up their orders  Establish a seamless connect with customer service channels so that shoppers can easily chat with an agent to resolve any issues Offer personalized product recommendations to customers based on their purchase Augment customer service across channels with a personal touch Customers love the physical experience, personal touch and immediacy that is intrinsic to in-store shopping. It will be wise extend that experience to your customer service channels. And one of the best ways to achieve this is to train associates by having them help out customer service agents during peak season. Another important consideration is to encourage self-service for customers. Keep your help centre up to date for customers to find their way around. Integrate workflows that guide customers through tasks like how to initiate a return to a nearby store. Use AI-powered chatbots to scale support during sales or holiday seasons. Lastly, adopt asynchronous modes of communication like messaging apps. They keep the conversation going and provide a history of past interactions. Train associates and empower them to resolve customer issues over digital channels and incorporate customer feedback to evolve the experience. Develop a loyal customer base, especially in the era of vibrant social media. Girikon is a Gold Certified Salesforce Consultant and can help you set up a strategy to connect with your customers like never before. Questions? We’ll guide you to the right path CONTACT AN EXPERT

Customers are now digital first. And that’s great news because now you can more with every moment your customer has with your brand. The key is connecting these moments and making them count. That’s what it takes to build real lasting relationships. To build an enterprise that customers trust and love. But to get there you need data. You need to unify al the data customers have entrusted with you down to the last detail. Then put that data to use. So every interaction feels more relevant and human and personalised. Drive digital experiences across sales commerce and customer service. Salesforce Marketing Cloud puts data at the center of the relationship and that starts with knowing your customers. Marketing Cloud combines all your data from all your siloed data sources creating a single source of truth for every customer giving you a three-dimensional view of who they are and what they want in the moment even as their needs change.  So now you can humanise every moment whether it’s a welcome email and they become a new customer, an ad for a product they might like, an opportunity for their business, a text resolving their shipping delay, of a special offer at checkout for being a loyal customer. And because it’s powered by Einstein AI, the heavy lifting is done for you. Marketing Cloud helps you optimise your impact too giving you actionable analytics, budget and business goals in real time so you are always making your campaigns more personal, more valuable, more resonant. And with Slack as your digital HQ, you can adapt with agility thanks to your teams, tools and partners being more connected and insights more accessible. With Marketing Cloud you can make every moment count. Do more with your marketing initiatives at every touchpoint. Marketing Cloud Engagement automates pervasive customer journeys with engaging and personalised experiences across channels. Meet them on mobile. Engage customers with personalised communication on their preferred mobile channels. Engage them with email. Deliver targeted scalable messaging and content such as offers and promotions and optimize engagement. Give them compelling content. Leverage prospect data for targeted and personalized advertising across channels and ad affiliate networks. Deliver engaging journeys with simple east to use tools. Make every moment count. Use customer data to predict preferences and automate outreach messaging for pervasive, relevant, effective customer interactions. Connect experiences with ease. Boost productivity by creating automated customer journeys using simple click-and-drag tools. Adapt to anything. Automate recommendations and actions on the go as customers engage with your brand, analyse results in real time and optimize performance. Make marketing engagement effective — and easy. Create seamless customer journeys. Acquire new customers and engage existing ones with relevant, connected journeys. Engage in the inbox and acquire subscribers. Create and automate personalized outreach email campaigns. Keep in touch with mobile messaging. Push relevant content to your customer’s preferred channel and device. Reduce costs by delivering highly targeted advertising. Activate data to suppress customers that don’t need content and personalize advertising across channels. Boost engagement and save time with AI. Boost marketing campaign efficiency by taking advantage of AI-powered insights to push the relevant message at the right time. Optimize all your campaigns in one place. Get a unified view of campaign performance with pre-configured and customisable dashboards for journeys across channels Marketing Cloud Advertising The Marketing Cloud first arty advertising engine allows brands to harness their own customer data to create targeted and relevant audiences for advertising campaigns. Whether you want to acquire new customers, engage brand new email subscribers, re-engage customers or supress ads for customers who aren’t relevant for a campaign, Marketing Cloud can help you find success. All by prioritising data security, trust and scalability. With Marketing Cloud advertising, brands can send their target audiences to Google, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin, Pinterest and Snapchat. The cool things about Marketing Cloud is that the data your customers have already shared with you is the only ingredient you need to create audiences for all your use cases. Security and scalability are top of mind for marketers. That’s why all the first party data stored in Salesforce never leaves the secure environment of Marketing Cloud advertising. Without being securely hashed. Al you have to do is choose existing lists or data extensions in Salesforce to create your audience. No more manually uploading data using unsecure formats. You can even have you data refreshed automatically with a single click. Whether the goal is to acquire new customers, increase RoI, re engage customer or all the above, Marketing Cloud Advertising will help you create personalised advertising moments for your customers. Here are 7 New Features in the Latest Release of Marketing Cloud 1. Salesforce CDP (Customer Data Platform) enhancements With Salesforce CDP, you can get a holistic view of every individual in your database and then use that data to deliver a whole new level of personalization. Upgrades include: Salesforce CDP Integration with Interaction Studio: Target your customers with unified insights and cross-platform data to enhance real-time decision-making. Salesforce CDP Connector with Commerce Cloud : Augment customer profiles with commerce data such as catalogue and order data and provide personalized experiences based on buying history. Calculated Insights enhancements: Utilise new, advanced analytical functions in the Calculated Insights feature, which lets derive the benefits of multi-dimensional metrics in Salesforce CDP. Now, you can make use of ranking, segmenting, and manipulate date and time related functions such as days since the last transaction. You’ll also have access to a built-in function library, be able to edit names of formulae, and the freedom to enable or disable Calculated Insights. 2. Datorama Reports Advanced for Marketing Cloud Datorama Reports for Marketing Cloud takes you beyond out-of-the-box analytics. It is a precluded reporting and analytics tool for Journey Builder, Marketing Cloud Email Studio and Mobile Studio. With the advanced features of Datorama Reports, you can turbocharge your journey analytics across channels and devices with new dashboard tools. 3. Datorama Connector with CDP Now you can automatically convert raw data into powerful insights and improve your marketing RoI by accessing CDP from within Datorama. Datorama will also support an out-of-the box CDP app to give you instant access to your CDP data. With just a few clicks you will get all the insights you need to have a deeper understand of your audience, how they’re engaging with your brand, and their potential value to your business. 4. Google Analytics 4 tagging and reporting It is extremely easy now to connect Google Analytics data with Marketing Cloud. Also, with the new release of Google Analytics, you can access robust analytics for mobile and email content as well and automatically tag with Journey Builder. Google Analytics 4 metrics are seamlessly integrated into the Journey Analytics dashboard and accessible to all Journey Builder users 5. Einstein for Email Marketing enhancements Marketers often ask – when is the right time to launch a targeted email campaign? What kind of subject line will attract the deepest and highest engagement? The B2B marketing automation platform Pardot, when coupled with Marketing Cloud, offers two new ways to provide to answer those questions and improve your email engagement rates with data-centric insights. 6. Pardot Accounts as Campaign Members Organizations are increasingly adopting an account-based marketing approach to grow their business and retaining customers. Hence, account level campaign creation is now more important than ever. This feature can be used to execute prospecting campaigns with sales reps to identify the relevant buyers in each target account. This is a unique and possibly game changing feature that will allow sales reps to help marketing target the relevant buyers for any upcoming campaign. 7. Advertising Studio enhancements Advertising Studio is a powerful tool designed for data-driven advertising. It offers two new features to help you expand to new channels and access vital insights: Snapchat for Advertising Studio: Now you can use your first-party data in Salesforce to build targeted, personalized advertising audiences for the Snapchat platform. Find new customers that are similar to your loyal customers, re-engage inactive customers, augment customer experience, and boost your RoI. Datorama Audience Insights for the Advertising Studio app: This new app allows you to connect and synchronize your data from Advertising Studio in Datorama to improve your cross-channel audience strategy. Deliver meaningful moments to your industry. Communications and Media Turn engagement into a main event. Reach new audiences and acquire new subscribers with smart, AI based, data-driven marketing. Deliver compelling content to drive usage from broadcasts to recommendations and beyond. Boost productivity by automating campaigns at scale across channels and devices. Financial Services Personalize the customer experience across every touch point in their financial journey. Engage throughout the lifecycle for customers in real time with personalized omnichannel journeys. Personalize journeys with data that reveals buyer preferences and interests like investments and more. Healthcare Keep a track of your customers and patients. Foster trusted and lasting Patient, Member and Healthcare Provider relationships at every point of their digital journey across your business. Engage them with personalized messaging on their channel of choice in real time and optimize campaigns on the go. Life Sciences Develop lasting customer relationships at every step. Consumers now want deeper understanding, more self-service options, and consistent, one-on-one interactions at every touch point of their journey. By delivering a digital-first health care provider personalised journeys across their customers’ preferred choice of channel and device, you can nurture lasting and trusted relationships. Tech Deliver state-of-the-art marketing in the right moment. Boost your sales pipeline. Engage customers and prospects with one-to-one messaging across all touchpoints. With AI based analytics and insights, you can optimize campaigns to deliver relevant, engaging and pervasive content at the right time in the purchasing process. Manufacturing Assemble engaging customer journeys. Foster stronger, more impactful customer relationships. Deliver personalized, digital-first interactions along every touchpoint of the customer’s journey. Engage prospects and cultivate leads with the right messaging, on the right medium, at the right time, and with the right regularity and consistency for service updates, order modifications, new offers, and more. Retail and Consumer Goods Acquire and engage loyal customers. As customers move more and more into the digital ecosystem, brands must utilise a unified view of their customers to deliver cohesive, personalized, pervasive experiences with moments that matter. Girikon is a Gold Certified Salesforce Consulting Partner and can help you unlock the real power of Marketing Cloud for your business Contact one of our experts today.

Salesforce Energy and Utilities Cloud gives energy and Utilities providers a digital interaction platform to personalize customer engagements. Utilities can meet new customer expectations by delivering great experiences like easily guiding customers through enrolment, transfer and activation of services through a self-service website. And using out of the box drag and drop tools, to configure complex processes. With data integration with existing back-end CIS and MDM systems, to ensure a streamlines service experience. A utility has a comprehensive profile view of each customer to deliver a highly personalized and predictive experience. Like sharing special offers for programs or new rates for products. Digital tools are available to tailor customer experiences and help customers make informed decisions. With chatbots for the first level of customer support, accessible at anytime from anywhere. So service agents can pick up the case for the right level of assistance when needed. Agents have a thorough view of each customer account and can navigate between multiple residential or commercial accounts. With all the information they need like full chronological history, account and billing information, usage and more. And all data can be consolidated from back end systems so agents always have access to a single source of truth. Agents can also see into process and actions initiated on other channels and can use that information to better serve customers from finalizing a purchase to liaise scheduling field service appointments. Utilities now have insight through interactive dash board to real time data to keep customers at the core of their business. And can provide developers a library with hundreds of pre built business processes and integrations to accelerate time to value and digital transformation. Chart a new course for the future of energy by streamlining your business! Meet the needs of all energy eco-system stakeholders -customers, suppliers, partners and employees with a platform that fosters agile innovation across your entire business lifecycle. Adapt and cater to rising customer expectations. Adopt a digital first approach and scale fast with easy integration with your existing systems. Deliver customer first service to your customer community. Streamline your Oil and Gas business and prepare for the future of energy. Connect stakeholders and assets across the service journey and collaborate in real-time. Drive on field decision-making with on-th-go access to vital data and information. ENERGY AND UTILITIES CLOUD Drive customer service and engagement on a single, connected flexible and scalable platform. Be the trendsetter, transition to energy & utilities cloud in Salesforce with centralized customer data, and on-time, personalized, pro-active service from anywhere, from any device. Energy and Utilities Cloud delivers a scalable, digital and secure energy solution that adapts and scales for future energy needs. Get access to a process repository of more than 100 preconfigured and extendable best practices Easily connect to back office utility Billing and Customer Information Systems (CIS) with easy, drag and drop integrations Utilise a data model with access to more than 350 extended objects specifically designed for the utility industry With Energy and Utilities Cloud, you can take advantage of purpose-built innovations designed for an dynamic and evolving energy landscape. Transform agents into advisors and deliver a whole new way of customer engagement. Empower service agents with the resources they need – tools, analytics, and AI based insights, to deliver personalized customer service anytime, anywhere, from any device. Deliver personalized customer service on a digital-first platform. Support the entire spectrum of customers, ranging from residential customers to large commercial customers. Get a single, scalable and secure solution that delivers connected journeys and promotes self-service. Turn customer freedom into a competitive advantage. Offer quotes and tariffs faster than ever, by quickly processing current market pricing and customer information with a 360-view of the customer and data-driven tools. Improve acquisition and trim churn. Easily generate complex, multi-locational and multi-product quotes to acquire customers faster. Retain customers longer with personalized offerings. POWER AND UTILITIES Adapt and thrive in a dynamically evolving Power & Utilities industry. Easily navigate the intricate utility landscape with seamless and powerful digital transformation. Revolutionise the Utility customer experience. Embrace digitalization and drive into future of energy transformation with a customer first approach. Make advisors out of agents by giving them the tools that deliver a customer-360 view. Encourage self-service and engage customers across the journey with AI, and offer multi-channel personalized service Deliver next generation service operations and customer experience by going beyond the contact center. Service customer needs faster in the Retail sector. Deliver a more connected experience for customers by bringing existing systems on a single platform. Deliver quotes and tariffs faster than competitors with data-driven tools and easily navigate multi-locational, multi-account structures. Evolve offerings, accelerate customer acquisition, and improve customer retention by designing competitive products and services with just a few clicks. Boost customer experience with personalised engagements and streamlined field service operations. Become the trendsetter in sustainability. Get ahead of your competition with innovative digital transformation that drives your business during the energy transition. Drive energy efficiency program adoption and help customers reach their energy goals. Educate customers and partner with them to adopt sustainable offerings and services that foster new revenue streams Go beyond commoditization and stay current with new offerings OIL AND GAS Connect stakeholders and assets across every touchpoint throughout the Oil & Gas value chain. Optimize your organization for the new era of energy transformation. Drive digital optimization across the upstream ecosystem. Optimise communication and engagement with stakeholders across the value chain. Seamlessly connect landowners, suppliers, customers, shareholders, and the relevant compliance organizations. Augment staff safety with tools that empower you to attract, retain, upgrade, and engage the dynamic workforce. Reduce costs with analytics and AI to drive smarter connections across the energy lifecycle. Boost on-site efficiency and safety. Optimise commercial processes and deliver better service Empower teams with digital tools that drive safety Streamline operations and optimise asset digitization Transform downstream enterprises. Increase customer retention with a platform that drives personalization and growth Optimise stakeholder relationships across all distribution channels Lower maintenance costs, boost plant efficiency and reduce less downtimes Remodel and enhance oilfield equipment and services. Personalize contracts, quotes and bids and win high-margin deals Operationalize existing investments in IoT with analytics and AI to drive business intelligence and reduce costs Deliver value to customers with simplicity and transparency by investing in digital transformation strategies. Develop and execute an actionable sustainability strategy. Scale Social, Environmental, and Governance excellence to boost stakeholder engagement Fast track progress towards achieving your sustainability goals with optimized greenhouse gas emission tracking and accounting across all your assets and locations. Get ready for a sustainable future with a unified agile platform that allows you to pivot quickly, fast track business models, and adapts to new processes, workflows and integrations. Common questions that we get asked often. Here are the answers. Who can use Energy & Utilities Cloud? Energy & Utilities Cloud is for any energy and utilities provider who wish to revolutionise the customer experience and connect the customer journey across every touchpoint. Irrespective of what type of business model you have, whether a regulated energy company or a retail energy provider, Energy & Utilities Cloud can help you deliver connected engaging, personalized digital-first experiences across the customer lifecycle. How do I use Energy & Utilities Cloud with my current Customer Information and billing systems? Energy & Utilities Cloud is not a replacement for billing or CIS systems.  However, you can easily integrate your existing utility enterprise systems with Energy & Utilities Cloud using out-of-the-box integration solutions driven by utility-specific data models and a repository of pre-built processes to fast track your digital transformation. How is Energy & Utilities Cloud different from competing products? Energy & Utilities Cloud is founded on the design methodology that built the world’s #1 CRM platform. It has been developed specifically for the energy industry.  Now you get faster time to value with data models, custom industry specific apps, and out-of-the-box integrations. Build on the experience of our industry leaders for click based implementation and guidance throughout your digital transformation journey. How so other Salesforce products work with Energy & Utilities Cloud? Energy & Utilities Cloud plugs in easily with Marketing Cloud Experience Cloud, Service Cloud, and more. Now you can innovate faster than ever, with the full power of the Native Salesforce Customer 360 platform. Girikon is a Gold Certified Salesforce Implementation Partner that can help you deliver an engaging digital transformation journey to your customers. Contact us today! Questions? Our reps have answers. CONTACT AN EXPERT