A sales portal for a Nordic telecom company

Client challenge

Simplify the sales processes via digital services.

Technologies

Java, Spring Boot, React, TypeScript, Microservices

Complicated sales processes and tools required streamlining

Our client is a top Nordic telecom that provides a large variety of services to an extensive customer base, from consumers to large businesses.

Many outdated and complex tools were used to provide these services to consumer customers, which made the in-store sales process more convenient and quick. Small companies often don’t need business products and prefer consumer offerings, so there was no simple way to offer consumer services to small businesses.
The first goal was to speed sales flows and make them easier. The salespeople used several different systems for selling services. Each system had a steep learning curve and sometimes even required the use of a pen and paper. Sales agents also had to remember several different sets of business rules. The best sales tools were needed to streamline these processes.

The second goal was to offer a variety of automated customer—and sales agent-specific offers and campaigns. This was difficult to do manually since information about a customer’s eligibility had to be gathered from various data sources. Accurate customer data was essential for personalizing these offers and improving customer satisfaction.

The third goal was to free salespeople from tedious manual work that could be automated. Sales productivity tools were essential for automating these tasks and enhancing efficiency.

The solution was to build a web-based application used in telco shops that consolidates, automates, digitalizes, and simplifies the sales process by providing a full overview of products and services that the customer owns. Based on that data, it could also build specific offers and campaigns, including address-specific broadband technologies and IPTV services.

A web-based app to sell all the telecom company’s offerings from one place

Proekspert was trusted to build a web-based application that gathered all different offerings into a single page. Address-specific broadband technologies and IPTV services had to be provisioned differently from mobile and data packages, incorporating customer relationship management to enhance customer interactions and optimize sales processes. In addition, devices like phones and tablets and value-adding services like VPN and firewall packages needed to be offered.

The tools were outdated and not user-friendly, so they aimed to create something that offered all of the above (with their product-specific requirements) but was intuitive and easy to use without extensive training. The application also featured a digital sales room to centralize relevant information and accelerate the sales cycle. The sales tool had to guide the user from the initial selection of products until the end of the sales flow, including the customer’s final signature, utilizing various sales tools to improve efficiency and effectiveness.

Business rules had to be built into offerings so that sales personnel wouldn’t have to remember what they could or could not offer in certain situations. There are also differences between consumer and business clients, for which different requirements and sales flows must be used.

Using data to offer more value

However, there are pitfalls to ordering products if we don’t know what a customer already has or what they can have. Understanding metrics like customer lifetime value is crucial when evaluating and selecting sales analytics software options. The sales tool had to know about a customer’s existing products, benefits they were eligible for, technical limitations of the infrastructure at their residence, and so forth. There were also different rules governing salespeople and what they could sell. The sales tool was built to check everything before deciding which new products and offerings to show a specific customer. The tool had to know if the customer had used free trials already or if they should be offered one now. Were they a consumer or a small business? Salespeople in the physical stores also had different options from phone sales, which had to be considered when showing an available list of products.

Simplifying the work of salespeople

To smooth the customer experience, the sales rep must know what interactions other salespeople have had with the same customer. Making note of these interactions had previously been manual work, which was easily forgotten on busy days. To remedy this, the new sales tool needed to record the gist of customer interactions after each sale – who sold what to whom. Sales managers utilize these tools to track performance and gain insights, thus optimizing sales strategies. It demonstrates customer care when salespeople do not begin a customer interaction with questions about previous meetings. The sales tool provided that information in an easy-to-read format.

Sales teams also needed a way to view previous orders. We built a dealer-specific order history, complete with contracts and cart contents. Customer care agents could also view logs and interactions, as they often needed to trace a customer’s history to provide service. Sometimes, agents also needed to act on behalf of other salespeople, for which a customer care role with more privileges was added to the sales tool.

Impact on the customer´s business

Our client achieved their goal of simplifying the consumer sales process. Sales and marketing teams have benefited from enhanced collaboration through advanced analytics and customizable features.

• The time required to service one client was reduced. Customer care can now service four times more clients in a single day.
• The need for specialized in-house training teams was eliminated since training new employees is now faster and easier.
• Business rules are followed more easily. This resulted in 80 percent fewer mistakes in sales prices and fewer inconveniences for both the client and the customer.
• There is now less work for customer care personnel due to eliminating human error.