Field Service Through Your ERP: Drive Satisfaction & Reduce Costs
Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is designed to support business management, and this includes field service. Utilizing a suite of integrated applications— a company uses ERP to store and manage data from every stage of the business, and then to apply this information to improve specific results – such as customer satisfaction.
Management of the many layers of systems – like field service, or customer satisfaction – becomes much simpler when accessing applications designed to support the best possible planning for these specific kinds of resources.
The advantages of having a real-time view of the core-business processes for your whole enterprise make it simpler to adjust and manage these database systems efficiently as they operate.
Field Service Can Be Focused: Drive Satisfaction – Reduce Support Costs
Because ERP facilitates information flow between every business function, and manages multiple connections to outside stakeholders – it can also support field service in a much more profitable manner.
Today ERP systems have integrated industry best-practices. This means the software reflects your vendor’s ideas of the most effective ways for performing every business process. They can usually be easily modified.
Findings have shown that companies implementing industry best-practices have significantly reduced time-constraints for project tasks. Some of these include:
- Configuration
- Documentation
- Testing
- Training
- Service
- Repair
ERP best-practices have reduced risk by 71% compared to other software implementations. Best-practices also reduce compliance issues with standard mandatory requirements.
Customer and field service have long played an important role in an organization’s ability to generate and expand income and revenue. With this perspective, field and customer service should always be included as part of an overall strategy to increase consistent systematic improvement.
A single negative customer service experience has changed entire perceptions a customer has had of the organization.
The Who, What, Where of Field Service: How This Drives Customer Satisfaction
There are secrets to optimizing your field service for better customer experiences. Field service technicians are usually the only representative that sets foot on a customer’s site to better-support customer service activities.
Most of the time the quality of service delivered or information communicated by your customer care field technicians – is the best way for customers to truly measure company credibility, effectiveness, integrity and overall brand-promise from the servicing company.
The result, is a great field service experience that can make all the difference in determining your customer’s ongoing commitment (loyalty and trust) as well as future spending plans.
We clearly understand that satisfied customers help drive retention and profitability. Aberdeen’s State of Service Management: Outlook for 2013 research (January 2013) reported that:
“Organizations that reached a 90%+customer satisfaction have an annual 6.1% growth in service revenue, 3.7% growth in overall revenue, and an 89% current level of customer retention.”
Satisfy the customer and enjoy those benefits – it sounds simple – yet many enterprises focus only on scheduling the closest technician for the field service job, without ensuring the right technician for a specific customer.
Aberdeen’s research also revealed a clear link between effective field service work and customer satisfaction and customer loyalty to an organization’s products and services.
Some argue quality and levels of customer service have decreased in recent years. This has been attributed to a lack of support or understanding at the executive and middle-management levels.
Many organizations now employ a variety of methods to improve their customer satisfaction levels, and other key performance indicators.
Customer support includes a variety of customer field services supported by ERP applications. Designed to better-assist customers in making cost-effective and correct-use of products – it includes support for trouble shooting, maintenance, planning, installation, training, upgrading, and/or disposal of a product.