Transforming Consumer Experience with Salesforce Community Cloud

The client is a leading innovator and provider of advanced, high-quality air conditioning solutions for residential, commercial and industrial units globally with a strong presence in Australia and New Zealand. With more than 5 decades of history in the ANZ region, the company is hailed for its innovative technologies in the Heating, Ventilation & Air Conditioning (HVAC) industry.

Project Background

With a large percentage of the client’s B2C sales being dealer led, the client needed a direct channel of engagement with their consumers, to have better control of the sales and after-sales consumer experiences. While a mobile app allowed consumers to explore the product catalogue and help them decide on the right product(s), the ability to have their consumers buy the product(s) directly from them and also manage the after-sale installation was missing. Below is a summary of the outcomes the client wished to achieve with this engagement :

Expected Outcomes

• Direct to consumer sales channel – As mentioned above, the client needed a direct channel of engagement with the end consumer, allowing them control over every aspect of the buying and the post-sale cycle, while the fulfilment and installation would still be dealer driven.
• Drive better dealer accountability – With complete visibility and control on the entire consumer journey, the engagement should allow them to drive improved levels of accountability with their dealers.
• Improve consumer experience – Improved transparency and real time info of where the consumer is in their buying journey should allow them significantly improve their experience.

Solution

CRMIT through a combination of a consumer portal built using Salesforce Community Cloud and through new integrations, connecting all systems and stakeholders, addressed the above expectations.

The portal integrates with the mobile app and now allows the client to continue the journey with the consumer, driving the entire sales cycle and also the installation of products bought.

With the new portal,

• Consumers after selecting products on the existing mobile app, can now review an auto-generated online quote on the portal and place an order by making a partial payment. Payments were facilitated through integrating an AppExchange connector to a payment gateway.
• Orders are captured in Salesforce CRM and the nearest dealer is automatically assigned to fulfil the order.
• The dealer can edit the order through an existing dealer portal – the product model, adding extra accessories to order if needed to better suit the consumer needs. The consumer is kept informed of these modifications in real-time and has an option to cancel the order if needed.
• The dealer completes the installation and settles the pending payment on the spot with the consumer directly. The final settlement with the dealer happens through the existing invoicing channel which existed.