The Intuit Advantage - Case Study Example

Their big breakthrough came in 1997 when they designed a software system known as COSMOS which would totally focus on the customer's needs. This system had various advantages. One of them is that the customers organized it (Plunkett 27). This had several reimbursements. Through this system, it was easy for intuit to know who are its most loyal profitable customers. This system kept a record of every customer, and with this, the company would easily identify the profitability drivers. Therefore, this was very advantageous as it developed a greater understanding of Intuits customers.

An added advantage is that it enabled the sales agents to be well informed when dealing with customers. This is because all the customer information was accessible to them as they could see it in the customer's file. The advantage of this is that it created an efficient way of working with customers, for example, those customers that had special requests. Decisions made on how to deal with these customers could be supported by having information on the customer's specifications, and his or her past transactions.

COSMOS also developed a system that automates data entry. This was of great significance as it helped reduce errors and decrease call length. In 1999, Intuit integrated a new phone system technology into COSMOS (Plunkett 120). The system performed in a way that it identified the customer who was calling, and brought his or her records regarding any transaction made in the past. This enabled FSG to track its high-value customers and direct them to highly skilled and trained special agents for the provision of optimum services.

As much as there were several advantages the company faced as a result of becoming online intermediaries, there were also a number of challenges faced. The company faced the challenge of the company changing its mindset from being a product-driven company to an online servicing company (Plunkett 45). According to Redmond, the companys CEO, the switch of the business from physical distributorship to online servicing would be a difficult task as this would entail a 24/7 watch, as opposed to the ‘ship products and go party mentality which employees were familiar with.

The other disadvantage they faced was that it required a lot of effort to clean and restructure the data of the company into a new format. Lee emphasized the magnitude of having a clean database in the web industry (Plunkett 67). He added that the tolerance people had for bad data on an internet site was much lower than that people had for a call centre. In 1999, the company made a move to start electronic ordering and distribution. This move had several advantages such as reduced calling costs.

This was advantageous to customers who prefer calling services. Secondly, the cost of goods sold reduced significantly as shipping costs were eliminated. However, there were a number of limitations regarding this method. It was very difficult to predict the nature of demand. ESG had to double its server capacity after there was a very high demand for web download in 1998 December (Plunkett 167). This was a disadvantage as they could not tell the level of demand concentration throughout the week. Secondly, the amount of effort required in dealing with database issues was also unanticipated.

Therefore, this was another challenge they faced as it took intuit twice as long as they anticipated replicating their party database. Even though physical distribution continues to be a significant part of the business, Intuit continues to make moves that embrace the internet even with the challenges they are facing.