Melvin Marsh International is a world-class flavoured tea manufacturer based in Kenya. The Melvin’s tea brand was the first flavoured tea brand in the Kenyan market. Since its launch in 1995, the brand has become a household name and is widely appreciated for its range of products.
Operational Challenges
Their field sales representatives’ interface with local distributors across the country to take orders, collect feedback on company products, develop a strong business relationship with the distributors, and to gain an understanding of their competition. Though the sales representatives were required to continuously check-in, the sales managers still needed to ensure their reps were visiting the customers. They also needed to have up to date customer information (e.g., customer location) available on record.
As Melvin’s tea customer base expanded, keeping in touch with each customer on a consistent basis was becoming tedious. Some customers were being visited more frequently than others and this was affecting certain business relationships. The staff also received customer sales orders late, and this increased the delivery time.
How SENRI improved operations
1.Tracking of Sales Representatives
With the SENRI software, the managers use the Real-Time GPS Tracking Function to keep tabs on the location of their field representatives; they know when they are on-site and the route they take while visiting the customers. SENRI works in areas with poor internet connectivity, which comes in handy when the representatives are traveling to more remote areas within the country. This way the managers are aware of the representatives working the required number of hours per day. Using the Schedule Function, the manager can be able to track whether the field staffs are meeting the daily targets of outlets set per day. Using the Target Management Function, the managers can set targets for their teams remotely.
The team can also create real-time reports quickly and receive feedback from managers while on-site using the Visit Report Function. This way the managers know the customers being visited, the number of visits per month, customers’ feedback on the products, and useful information on the competitors’ products. The monthly reports generated with this information also help the team to readjust marketing strategies and generate sales forecast analysis. It also helps the sales managers in making decisions because they have all the information they need at their fingertips.
2.Contact Management & Customer Satisfaction
The staff can easily sort through large amounts of customer information on the SENRI software. Important information on the customers is automatically updated on the system so the team always has access to customer location and other contact details. The onboarding of new customers has also been made easy with SENRI.
3.Opportunity Management
Using the location of the customers, SENRI is able to provide a map of customer distribution. This way the Melvin Marsh can identify areas being covered and places with no coverage. They have been able to expand their customer base and increase product sales with this information. With the information collected from the Visit Report Questionnaire, the company is able to group its customers into primary and secondary customers and evaluate them separately. This way they know who their primary customers are servicing, manage their pipelines and adjust their services to suit their customers.
The Transaction functions track market trends, consumer behaviour, and collect valuable information for generating a sales forecast analysis. The Product Report function is used to identify the company products the most customers prefer and to get important information on their competitors (e.g., the prices of similar products).
Conclusion
In conclusion, Melvin Marsh International, has seen improvements in the productivity of its sales staff and helps them in doing better market analysis and report generation.