PRISM How is digitalization changing the demands on sales staff?
HUFNAGEL Demands on our sales people are constantly going up: the lighting market will become more transparent and therefore more comparable. This also has an impact on price and the pressure from competition. Our sales staff needs to be better informed and respond quicker to customers – but also recognize market trends early, ideally even before the customer. That’s where the new CRM system can be of big help.
PRISM What are the benefits of the CRM tool for each individual sales employee?
HUFNAGEL Faster and easier access to relevant data – about their customers as well as specific information that simplifies interaction with the customer. They should then be able to display this 360-degree knowledge about their customers using visualization tools and dashboards and compare it with their sales targets.
PRISM Are we soon only going to be busy maintaining and evaluating data?
HUFNAGEL No, definitely not! However, we will have to take a first big step to increase our data quality and consistency and to make better use of relevant data. We can benefit from that in many places – not only in sales, but also in marketing, customer service, the supply chain and other customer-related support functions. We need to change our way of thinking from individual knowledge to team knowledge. Once that is achieved , it will be easier in many places.