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Press Release: Kirby Risk Electrical Supply selects Tour de Force CRM

FINDLAY, OH – Tour de Force CRM, Inc. has formally announced that Kirby Risk Electrical Supply has selected Tour de Force CRM for their CRM, sales force automation (SFA), and business intelligence (BI) needs.

Over the course of the past 5 years, Kirby Risk Electrical Supply has implemented multiple CRM and SFA solutions including Sales Management Plus (SMP) and an internally developed web based solution. Tour de Force CRM was able to meet their needs by providing extensive integration with Kirby Risk’s primary business operation system, Epicor Eclipse, as well as extensive integration with Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Exchange Server.

After researching the various solutions that were available to Kirby Risk, the committee responsible for selecting a CRM system felt that the features offered in the Tour de Force CRM software, as well as the company’s knowledge of the distribution industry, were the best fit for Kirby Risk. As part of the due diligence process, Tour de Force CRM installed a proof of concept environment for Kirby Risk in March 2011. This environment included integration with their Epicor Eclipse ERP system so that various teams within the organization could evaluate the ease of use and functional feature set of Tour de Force CRM. After several months of testing, the team at Kirby Risk validated their interest in Tour de Force CRM and made the decision to proceed with a complete roll-out of Tour de Force CRM to over 300 members of their sales team.system, Epicor Eclipse, as well as extensive integration with Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Exchange Server.

The implementation project at Kirby Risk began in July 2011, and Tour de Force CRM went live for a Phase 1 group of 50 users in September 2011. By November 2011, Phase 2 had commenced with the remaining group of users going live on Tour de Force CRM. According to Mike Hauberg, Area Sales Manager -Industrial, “The implementation of Tour de Force CRM at Kirby Risk was one of the smoothest I have ever experienced. The ability of our account managers to start entering data with minimal training is an indication that Tour de Force CRM was designed with the user in mind.”

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Kirby Risk Corporation is a multi-faceted company, dedicated to understanding and meeting their business partners’ needs with innovative, effective solutions. Their experience and network of resources provide customers with reliable technical assistance, logistics management, communications systems and quality products that not only meet their requirements, but also enhance their competitive position. Kirby Risk Electrical Supply provides high-quality, state-of-the-art electrical, automation, lighting and power distribution solutions to people responsible for maintenance, design and installation of electrical systems.

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Tour de Force CRM is a customer relationship management (CRM), sales force automation (SFA), and business intelligence (BI) software solution that provides an organization with the tools they need to be more efficient and more effective. While Tour de Force CRM was developed specifically for the distribution industry, it’s an ideal fit for any organization that operates in a B2B selling environment, and is currently being utilized in the Distribution, Manufacturing, Construction, Furniture Dealer, and Technology industries. To learn more about Tour de Force CRM, including our full integration with Microsoft Outlook and most ERP systems, visit www.TourdeForceCRM.com.

Download the Press Release - Kirby Risk selects Tour de Force CRM.

Upcoming Events!

Here at Tour de Force CRM we have a very busy spring ahead of us. We will be attending the following events and hope to see you there!

April 20^th-21^st – NAHAD Annual Meeting & Convention

NAHAD’S 28^thAnnual Meeting is April 18^th-April 22^nd 2012 and is being held at The Venetian/Palazzo Hotel & Resort in Las Vegas, NV.

Tour de Force CRM will be exhibiting at Booth # 123 during the NAHAD Showcase on Fri. 4/20 and Sat. 4/21.

April 23^rd-24^th – ISA Product Show & Conference

ISA’s 2012 Product Show & Conference is April 21^st-24^th and is being held at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center in San Antonio, TX.

Tour de Force CRM will be exhibiting at Booth #457 during the ISA Product Show on Mon. 4/23 and Tues. 4/24.

May 6^th-9^th – Epicor Insights

Epicor’s 2012 Customer Conference, Epicor Insights, is May 6^th-9^th and is being held at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, NV.

Tour de Force CRM will be exhibiting at Booth #144 in the Solutions Pavilion Sun. 5/6 through Wed. 5/9.

Matt Hartman, President/CEO of Tour de Force CRM, will also be presenting a session titled “Why Tour de Force CRM?” on Tues. May 8^th from 4:35pm-5:25pm (location TBA).

Guide to selecting a CRM Solution for your Distribution Business: Part 6 – Implementation Services

With so many CRM and Sales Force Automation (SFA) software packages available today, it can be a daunting task to figure out which one is right for your distribution business.

Whether you and your company are brand new to CRM or you’re an experienced user who is unsatisfied with your current product, this guide will help you during your selection and review process. It covers six important areas to consider when looking at CRM providers and supplies questions to ask when interviewing or reviewing different CRM offerings, in order to ensure that you select the right CRM for distributors and the distribution business.

Today we will review the 6^th and final area to consider when selecting a CRM solution.

Area 6: Implementation Services

How can we be sure that the company we partner with has the capability to successfully implement our CRM system and professionally train our staff?

Selecting a CRM system for a distribution company is serious business. Almost all phases of your company business will interface with the system, including sales, sales management, marketing, customer service and support, corporate management, IT, and often credit/ collections as well. The process requires thorough planning and committed corporate leadership. It also requires a CRM partner that is experienced with and committed to the distribution industry.

Customer retention rates are an excellent indicator of how satisfied companies are with their CRM suppliers. You might be surprised by the high rate of unsuccessful implementations there are industry-wide. How can you know if the companies you are evaluating are truly capable of successfully implementing a professional CRM for the distribution business?

CRM Interview – Ask these questions to determine if the CRM provider has a proven history of successful CRM implementations in the distribution industry:

What is your retention rate for distribution clients over a five year rolling average?

Can you provide us with a written implementation process which includes the various roles our staff will play and the roles your team members will play in preparation for and during implementation and training?

Will you provide us with several contact referrals that are using your product and our specific ERP system? We would like to contact them regarding their experience.

Will your company be performing the integration to our ERP system or will we need to work through a third party integrator?

If we will need to work though an integrator, can we speak with several clients in the distribution industry that have been using your system for several years?

Download the full Guide to Selecting a CRM for your Distribution Business.

Guide to selecting a CRM Solution for your Distribution Business: Part 5 – Reporting

With so many CRM and Sales Force Automation (SFA) software packages available today, it can be a daunting task to figure out which one is right for your distribution business.

Whether you and your company are brand new to CRM or you’re an experienced user who is unsatisfied with your current product, this guide will help you during your selection and review process. It will cover six important areas to consider when looking at CRM providers and supplies questions to ask when interviewing or reviewing different CRM offerings, in order to ensure that you select the right CRM for distributors and the distribution industry.

Today we will review the 5th area to consider when selecting a CRM solution.

Area 5: Ease of Reporting

How will the CRM system help to improve our reporting, and will it help us to eliminate our many pushed Excel reports with live, quick access reports that are available company-wide?

Providing your sales force with access to current, relevant data is one of the single most effective ways to drive sales and margins higher. Access to this data also increases CRM adoption during the early stages of implementation, as your sales team can immediately see for themselves the benefits of using the system.

With accurate sales data, sales managers can coach their teams more constructively and effectively. Marketing Managers can target the most productive areas for campaign dollars and promotions. Corporate management can make the effective profit driven decisions they need in evaluating their Sales Managers and vendor partner performance to goal.

The CRM system you chose should have a robust capability for easily viewing all sales data and executing Actions on customer and vendor sales data as well as specific Opportunity pipeline data and Account/ Contact data.

Having to search in many locations of the CRM system is a major turnoff for sales people and other employees, and dramatically decreases the user adoption of your system. It is important that you ensure that all data be available from a single, easily accessible portal.

CRM Interview – Ask these questions to determine if the CRM system provides comprehensive and effective Reporting capabilities:

Will we have a central screen/ tool that opens from the Outlook toolbar area that will allow us to see all of the following segments of our business – in a format that we can set up globally for all our various types of employees (sales, customer service, regional managers, corporate managers, marketing, etc.)?

Sales History

Sales Performance to Goal

Accounts

Contacts

Opportunities (pipeline)

Activities (Appointments, Tasks, Call Log Details, etc.)

All Account & Contact correspondence, including emails and other forms of documentation in a safely stored format.

Can we easily change the various columns to the size and order of appearance we want to view?

Do we have to know or be able to write code to accomplish this?

Will we be able to sort on any fields from within our ERP business system, for example, booked orders, credit status, etc.?

Can we provide the ability for our individual employees to sort and save data views in any manner they want if they feel they could more effectively use data viewed the way they want to see it?

Will we have the ability to easily export to Excel should we want to?

Can the various Report Views be saved and shared on a company-wide basis by company management for easy recall at a later time without having to build reports again?

Download the full Guide to Selecting a CRM for your Distribution Business.

Industrial Distributors Looking to be More Efficient and Effective

“CRM Analytics For Sales Benchmarking” | Published on Industrial Distribution by Mike Schmidt, Associate Editor

Using this solution as a framework can helps industrial distributors better target and control sales opportunities.

Maximizing the effectiveness of the salesforce is a critical goal for industrial distributors of all types and sizes. In order to provide their sales representatives with the necessary information to sell effectively in an incredibly competitive marketplace, some industrial distributors have turned to customer relationship management software (CRM).

But it simply isn’t enough to invest in just any software offering. Every distributor is a unique outfit, and each faces unique challenges and opportunities. Those that choose to invest in CRM solutions must tailor them to meet the needs and goals of their respective companies, and they must also try to maximize the return on investment. This is no easy task.
“Distributors deal with lots of different vendors, lots of different product groups, and the knowledge and intelligence is golden,” says Matt Hartman, President and CEO of Tour De Force Solutions. “Everything a customer is buying from you is an indicator to identify what they are not buying and you should be selling.”

Building Relationships That Last

According to Robert Sinfield, Product Marketing Manager, Senior, at Epicor, a CRM solution offers many key benefits to a distribution operation. First and foremost, it allows salespeople to effectively control interactions with their customers… Continue Article…

Published on Industrial Distribution by Mike Schmidt, Associate Editor

 (http://www.inddist.com)

Industrial Supply’s Cover Story – “Touched by Technology”

Cover Story by Johnston Supply Industrial

Johnston Industrial Supply makes wise technology investments to boost profitability!

Very few companies want to be on the “bleeding edge” when it comes to trying new technologies. Adopting a technology before it has been thoroughly tested – or before customers or employees are ready to use it – can be a costly mistake.

But smart business owners understand that applying the right technology can make a major impact on bottom-line profitability. Johnston Industrial Supply has discovered that wise investments in technology make good business sense.

“Technology touches every department in our company. We’ve been able to utilize it and reduce our workforce, yet continue to grow sales,” says company president Susie Johnston. “It has enabled us to be flexible enough to serve our customers and still give
them personalized service.”

Continue Reading…

via Industrial Supply Magazine by Rich Vurva

2012 Tribute Users Group Meeting

Join us for the 2012 Tribute Users Group Meeting at the Cleveland Renaissance Hotel.

This year’s Tribute Users Group Meeting will take place on June 12-14 and will be located at the beautiful Renaissance Cleveland Hotel in Cleveland, Ohio. This historic downtown hotel is connected to shopping and restaurants and a short walk from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, a brand new casino, and many more attractions. We’ll enjoy elegant meeting and reception spaces and newly remodeled guest rooms.

via blog.tribute.com

Create an Effective Business Intelligence Strategy with Tour de Force CRM

Any business intelligence (BI) strategy should have 2 key goals:

1. Uncover trends that can be used to drive sales and revenues.
2. Allow the user to act on those trends and drive sales and revenues.

All BI software programs have the first goal covered. They offer a wide range of reports and analytics that can be used to uncover trends, identify top accounts and at risk accounts, top product lines, top vendors, etc.

The problem with many business intelligence software programs is the second goal – actually acting on that data. Most BI programs are standalone applications that require data to be imported and exported, making it difficult to take any sort of structured action on the results.

Tour de Force CRM integrates with Microsoft Outlook and your ERP system, allowing you to efficiently and effectively achieve both goals. There is no manual importing required, as your sales data from your ERP system is automatically synched to Tour de Force CRM. There is no exporting required, as you are already connected with Microsoft Outlook and can easily create structured mass email campaigns or direct mail campaigns, create and assign tasks or appointments, re-assign account managers, or create custom groupings of your customers.

With Tour de Force CRM, not only does your sales management team have access to these capabilities, but so does your sales force. This allows you to provide your individual sales people with the ability to gain these same actionable insights from whichever sales data you decide to give them access to.

To learn more about Tour de Force CRM and Business Intelligence, please join us for an upcoming webinar:

Tues. March 13, 2012 2:00p-3:00p EDT Why Tour de Force CRM?

Tues. March 20, 2012 2:00p-3:00p EDT Business Intelligence with Tour de Force CRM

Guide to selecting a CRM Solution for your Distribution Business: Part 4 – Gap Analysis

With so many CRM and Sales Force Automation (SFA) software packages available today, it can be a daunting task to figure out which one is right for your distribution business.

Whether you and your company are brand new to CRM or you’re an experienced user who is unsatisfied with your current product, this guide will help you during your selection and review process. It will cover six important areas to consider when looking at CRM providers and supplies questions to ask when interviewing or reviewing different CRM offerings, in order to ensure that you select the right CRM for distributors and the distribution industry.

Today we will review the 4th area to consider when selecting a CRM solution.

Area 4: Gap Analysis

What’s the importance of Gap Analysis, and how can I determine that the CRM system can provide it effectively?

The distribution business is all about maximizing penetration at existing and new accounts. You may have some of the business but what about the business you are not currently enjoying? How do you put together sales plans for addressing that missing business? How do you develop marketing campaigns to gain additional market share faster?

Gap Analysis is the process of being able to look at customer purchase history and determine what they should be purchasing based on what is currently being purchased. A CRM with Gap Analysis should allow for easy lookup of sales by type & quantity of specific product purchased. For example, the customer has purchased products A and B, but not product C. Your knowledge shows that these customers are great targets for product C.

With Gap Analysis in your CRM you should be able to quickly run a report to “Show me all customers in X territory that have purchased product A & B but not product C in the last 18 months”. With this data you should be able to overlay other criteria for specific marketing campaigns such as “Select all contacts with engineer in their title”. Now you can launch an email campaign from your CRM system targeting all customers that have purchased product A & B but not product C in the last 18 months and send it to all contacts in the database (or territory, or zip code, etc.) with engineer in their title. This is the kind of targeted sales and marketing that a CRM with Gap Analysis will allow you to do.

CRM Interview – Ask these questions to determine if the CRM system provides effective Gap Analysis:

Can you show me specific examples of your Gap Analysis tools and how they can segment by specific types of products that have been purchased?

Can you show me how your system can sort all customers who have purchased, for example, products X & Y but not product Z – over some defined period of time?

Can I directly create an email or direct mail campaign to the specific contacts within these accounts (that meet the product X, Y & Z above) that have a specific job title such Purchasing, Engineer, Manager, or any other job title that we’d like to specify?

Can you show me how I could run a Gap Analysis for the following scenario?

I have a specific family of products that are being obsoleted for more current products. How you would sort for all of item codes in that product family and the associated sales history over the last 24 months, so that we could send an e-mail marketing campaign introducing the replacement products with associated information and links to our website to anyone who had purchased from that product family in the last 24 months?

Download the full Guide to Selecting a CRM for your Distribution Business.

Guide to selecting a CRM Solution for your Distribution Business: Part 3 – Mobile CRM

With so many CRM and Sales Force Automation (SFA) software packages available today, it can be a daunting task to figure out which one is right for your distribution business.

Whether you and your company are brand new to CRM or you’re an experienced user who is unsatisfied with your current product, this guide will help you during your selection and review process. It will cover six important areas to consider when looking at CRM providers and supplies questions to ask when interviewing or reviewing different CRM offerings, in order to ensure that you select the right CRM for distributors and the distribution industry.

Today we will review the 3rd area to consider when selecting a CRM solution.

Area 3: Mobile CRM

What’s the importance of mobile access to CRM data, and how can I ensure that my sales team will be able to access the key information they need while in the field?

Time is money. In today’s hectic world, your sales team needs to be able to take advantage of mobile technologies to arm themselves with the data they need to close more sales in a shorter time span.

Most CRM systems provide basic mobile CRM capabilities such Account and Contact information for your mobile devices. They may also provide Opportunity Pipeline information. The real question is whether the systems you are looking at will provide your sales and sales management teams with live customer sales data, allowing them to maximize their effectiveness and compress your sales cycles.

To gain maximum effectiveness from their mobile devices, sales should be able to quickly look up an Account, see the customer’s sales history, and determine the specific areas where they are not getting business. The mobile CRM should then allow them to look up the appropriate Contacts that handle that portion of their business, call or schedule Appointments, enter tasks and expenses, and review past communications with that Contact.

CRM Interview – Ask these questions to determine if the CRM system provides mobile access to the key data your sales team needs:

Does the CRM system provide complete sales data directly from the ERP system to our mobile devices?

Will sales be able to quickly see what has been ordered in the last few days, months, or years, saving them the need to tie up inside sales representatives with these questions?

Can sales easily see each unique customer Opportunity, the sales stage it is currently at, and launch a next action from their mobile device?

Can the sales call Activity be quickly logged into the mobile device of Field Salespeople when they come out of the call?

Can new Outlook Appointments or Tasks be scheduled directly from the customer Opportunity within the mobile device?

Can Sales perform a quick Stock Check of available inventory from their mobile device while standing in front of the customer?

Download the full Guide to Selecting a CRM for your Distribution Business.

Press Release: Kirby Risk Electrical Supply selects Tour de Force CRM

Upcoming Events!

April 20^th-21^st – NAHAD Annual Meeting & Convention