Can an argument be made that your customers are the greatest assets your company has? In order to answer this question, think of what a customer means to your business. First, customers provide your company with profit. Second, they justify the purchase of inventory and investment in additional warehousing space. Third, they provide a means to grow market share and further increase revenue. Fourth, they are the reason your company finances its future expansion. Fifth, they are the impetus you need to improve your product and service offering. This list could go on and on. The point is that everything begins and ends with your customers. Consider this a constant feedback loop. Happy customers buy more, which in turn increases your revenue, and allows you to grow your business. This is the reason your customers are your greatest asset and it is ultimately why your sales, marketing, customer service, and field service technicians, must have rugged mobile devices. It is these devices that allow them to better manage these customer assets.
Rarely do companies take the time to define the importance of their customer base. These are the companies that seem to go day-to-day, solving one crisis after another, never fully capable of charting their own path. These are also the entities that run their inventory and operations via manual excel sheets. However, there are other companies who truly understand their value proposition. These are the ones that define success by how engaged their customer base is. These are the ones that focus on improving customer retention. These are the companies who understand that their customers are their greatest asset, and that the greatest way to service these customers is to provide them with essential information. Manual processes can’t do that, but enterprise mobility solutions can. So can handheld computers help your company better manage its customer base? More importantly, can rugged mobile devices allow your business development team to better manage your customers as assets? Absolutely and here’s why!
- Enterprise Mobility Hardware Reduces Costs: Manual processes are prone to errors. It’s these errors that increase your company’s costs, and it’s these rising costs that erode your gross profit on sales. If your company wants to manage its customers as assets, then reducing the impact of these costs is essential to improving returns. Gross profit on sales comes from taking your sell price and deducting your product’s “COGS” (cost of goods sold). Those COGS are made up of a number of different factors. However, one of the most important factors is your company’s freight costs on finished goods. Buying too much, or too little, has a direct impact on COGS, which means your company’s gross profit on sales is adversely affected. Enterprise mobility solutions help to reduce these costs by improving accuracy when purchasing inventory.
- Enterprise Mobility Solutions Improves Inventory Management: Your customers are the reason you invest so heavily in inventory. In essence, they justify your investment in purchasing raw materials, parts and finished goods. Your product’s COGS are directly impacted by your costs of holding inventory. Manual processes often lead to having too much or too little in stock. Too much and your COGS increase and your gross profit decreases. Too little and your company misses out on sales. Does either of these scenarios impact your ability to manage your customers as assets? Of course it does! Will upgrading from manual inventory processes to enterprise mobility hardware help improve how your company manages inventory, and consequently, how it manages its greatest assets? Absolutely!
- Enterprise Mobility Solutions Improve Sales: Bottom line, your sales team are your front line soldiers. They are responsible for winning business, retaining more customers, and further lowering your company’s costs of customer acquisition. Most importantly, they are the ones tasked with managing these aforementioned assets. Closing more sales and managing customer expectations is contingent upon having the best tools. When you upgrade your sales force with the latest rugged handheld computers, they are instantly able to improve how they manage their customers. Regardless of where they are, they can gain instant access to the type of vital information so essential to servicing your customers properly. The best way to manage customers is to have a live, continuously updated system, one that keeps track of the most recent transactions and one that allows your sales to provide your customer base with timely data.
Granted, there are a number of reasons why moving away from manual processes makes sense. However, the most important reason is because it helps your company better manage its customer base. Managing that customer is the single most important part of business success. If you agree that everything begins and ends with your customers, then giving them the best possible service is what truly makes a difference. That comes from mobile devices, not cumbersome, inaccurate manual processes.