As a sponsor of this year’s INTERLOG Summer, Progistix had a first-hand opportunity to discuss the challenges and trends shaping leading post-sales service organizations. Three major trends have emerged of late: a holistic approach to service, using technology to effectively manage mobile workforces and optimize service parts deployment and, working with partners for their parts-logistics support. Companies committed to operating their service organization as a market differentiator have adopted these strategies and they report on average first-call resolution rates in excess of 90%. They also realize greater than 85% customer retention. Likewise, adopting these practices has OEMs and retailers driving greater operating margins from their post-sales support activities. Let’s take a closer look at each of these trends.
The evolution of consumer support is marked by the growing commoditization of products accompanied by a more holistic approach to customer service. The job no longer hinges on a ’break & fix’ mentality where basic product service requirements are satisfied by dispatching a skilled technician to the site and ensuring the coordinated delivery of service parts. Although customers may not notice good service, broken calls leave a lasting impact. Best-in-class service organizations have transformed their post-sales service into a rewarding customer experience. These organizations stand in their customers’ shoes and solve real customer problems; they do more than just fix a defective product. Each service call becomes an opportunity for contextual selling and for customer advocacy. This transformation of the service organization has led to technology investment and more importantly to “people skills” investments. The greater challenge is complementing the technical skills of a company’s mobile workforce with a proactive approach to solving their customers’ problems.
Adopting an attitude of sales at the point of service is a significant cultural challenge. Field service technicians also need greater access to customer account data and product information to turn around their service organization. Outfitting field technicians with mobile technology (PDAs, laptops, smart phones, GPS devices) bridges the chasm between the field and the back office. Mobile applications assist field technicians in several areas: managing service contracts and warranty entitlement, customer billing, asset lifecycle management and spare parts management. These technologies allow a mobile workforce to increase the number of completed work orders per day, boost first-call resolution rates, and service call response time. Delivering up-to-date customer and work order information to a technician dramatically reduces the need for costly and time-consuming interaction with the service support desk and dispatchers. As a result, leading companies have seen mobile workforce productivity improvements while increasing service revenues.
Post-sales service offers an additional layer of complexity to the common tasks of managing facilities, inventory, people and information within a manufacturing and retail environment. Spare parts delivery and logistics execution are only two of the many hurdles faced by service organizations. Excessive service parts inventories, inefficient warehouse network, and poor service levels resulting from on-time delivery issues and visibility gaps are the common complaints. Best-in-class companies work with partners for their parts-logistics support. Logistics Service Providers, like Progistix-Solutions have the delivery reach, logistics services and information technologies to integrate seamlessly within a company’s service management framework. Leading organizations focus on their core capabilities and employ logistics outsourcing as part of an overall winning strategy.