The Concept of Sales Force Automation - Assignment Example

1) What is Sales force Automation? Answer Competition among business entities has increased tremendously in the globalised world and entrepreneurs have been facing new challenges. In fact, the owners have to adopt new practices and use tools and techniques that could help maximising business productivity, internal efficiency, performance and effectiveness. Undoubtedly, the focus of today’s organisations is on product and process innovations, differentiation and positioning to ensure survival, growth and business sustainability (Hartman, 2010). The concept of Sales force automation has also been embraced by business professionals that pay special attention on internal improvements to reduce total costs of doing business. Sales force automation could be defined as a computer software (an information system) that has special sales – related tools that facilitate in keeping sales records in an organised manner, helps sales personnel in decision – making, order tracking and processing, analysing market scenario, evaluating sales performance and meeting customer product needs in an effective manner. For instance, the sales department could fasten the supply process because of reduced number manual processes and could save time involved in meeting business formalities manually. In this way, the customer service could be improved that may surely help in increasing satisfaction level and loyalty. In simple words, the process helps the company in retaining old customers as well as enticing new customers who demand better services and timely supply of products (Beginners Guide – 2, n.d). However, it should be pointed out that implementation of new process involves economic and financial costs. Implementation of Sales force automation is not free as well. Any company interested in using this new technology should first estimate the economic costs such as time consumed in communication with employees and making their mindset about use of new automated system for better sales performance. Other economic costs include workers’ resistance to the change and possibility of conflicts of employers with employees who fear job insecurity after induction of new system. In addition, the time and money involved in training of employees to adjust to new system, data losses or system breakdowns are also some of the major economic costs. Next, the financial costs are the purchase of software, its implementation and maintenance to secure data, avoid misuse and prevent system failure. It should be noted that short run costs are significantly higher but the benefits received in the long run will exceed these costs. Finally, the sales and supply chain network becomes efficient; hence costs are minimised and profit margins are increased. 2) How does the company do it? Answer 2: It should be recalled that Sales force automation is a business software that facilitate entire sales / distribution / supply chain network. The system has tools that are capable for helping a company in keeping inventory records, tracking leads, processing the orders, analysing customer’s feedback, making sales forecasts and evaluating performance over a certain time period. The automation of sales process is a time – consuming task, which is approved after thorough research by firm’s R & D personnel and top executives. Any business company first identifies its present business needs and perceived challenges that could be faced in near future. In addition, the company officials are also responsible for analysing competitor’s strategies, performance and business efficiency so that they could compare the state of their own organisation. After analysing the internal needs, a business firm makes four different types of feasibilities such as economic, organisational, operational and technical feasibility. Economic feasibility refers to economic costs and benefits that a business will receive from acquisition and implementation of the new system. Organisational feasibility refers to the fact a business could be able to meet all its needs after induction of new system. Technical feasibility refers to the internal problems that may arise after replacement of existing system from the new computer software. Finally, the operational feasibility refers to the willingness of employees towards the new system (Tech Target, 2010). In simple words, a company identifies the functional requirements and technical specifications to the software development company, which analyses company’s business needs and develops a system. In the next stage, the old system is replaced with the new system for testing purpose so that any weaknesses or programming errors could be resolved. In the midst, the workers from sales department are also provided training through discussion sessions, practical classes, tutorials, video tapes and handbooks so that they could learn the functioning of new system. In the next step, the improved version of Sales force Automation System is used and sales officials provide their feedback over the success of automated processes. Based on this, further improvements are made and new tools are added for betterment. (Beginners Guide – 2, n.d) 3) Explain Advantage and Disadvantages WITH examples? Answer 3: Indeed, every research tool and novel strategy has some positive outcomes and negativities. Some of the perceived advantages and disadvantages of Sales force Automation are as under: Advantages: The first major advantage of Sales force automation is that it enables the business enterprises to reveal the changes in external business environment. In fact, the software analyses these changes and identify the recent ‘market trends’ followed by an evaluation of existing competitors’ strategies. The top management could, therefore, make inferences about sectors with greater growth potential and make proactive plans about future challenges. In this way, a business entity gets a competitive edge over rival firms in the industry as it could formulate and implement policies to retain existing customers and to attract new buyers towards company’s products. The next advantage of this tool is that it automates the sales process and supply chain network through use of a management information system. In this way, the precious time spent on existing manual procedures and operations could be secured and spent on other productive jobs in a corporate setting. For instance, the new process enables the company to improve 2 - way communication process with clients, analyse feedback, maintain client records, improve order processing, and evaluate the workability of currently implemented sales techniques and workers’ performance. The third advantage of sales force automation is that it facilitates information sharing among sales, distribution and supply chain members at distant locations. The team work, efficiency and performance improve because of better collaboration and coordination. In fact, the automation process also enables to secure and deal with large quantities of data in an appropriate manner. The fourth merit is that it also facilitates training of existing and new sales related employees. For instance, the software introduces new techniques, chapters and situations that may help improving analytical and critical thinking skills of sales personnel. Another possible advantage is that it assists in performance appraisal, judgment and evaluation of sales personnel through use of ‘monitoring and control software tools’. The record management enables the evaluators to determine the underlying weaknesses and drawbacks (red marks) in present sales network, which are then overcome through amendments in existing policies and implemented procedures. Finally, the defined objectives could be accomplished after use of new strategies (Hartman, 2010) & (Sousa, n.d). Disadvantages: The first major demerit is the costs incurred during acquisition and implementation / replacement of Sales force Automation System. Obviously, the short – term costs are higher because an organisation takes time to fully adjust to new (either from old to new system or from manual to automated) system. The next disadvantage is the resistance from existing sales workers, who do not want to switch from old to new process, and therefore retaliate against this change within an organisational setting. This could be observed when a firm shifts from manual to automated process, when a specific group of rigid employees resist to these upgrading because of lack of sufficient skills, abilities and knowledge. Also, some workers fear that they could lose jobs because of their backwardness, hence they find appropriate to resist automation process. For instance, some employees become unhappy because of additional work load in first few months of implementation of new system, because they have to add previous business data in the new system to smoothly conduct future automated operations. The next demerit of this process is that entire sales chain operations could come to a halt if software observes any failure or breakdown. In addition, the inputting of some data and technical system errors negatively affects decision – making and problem – solving. The problem is further intensified if system observes frequent data losses due to programming mistakes (Beginners Guide – 1, n.d). References: Hartman, Dennis “What Are the Benefits of Salesforce Automation?” eHow.com, January 17, 2010 [Online] Available at http://www.ehow.com/list_6635938_benefits-salesforce-automation_.html Sousa, Manny “The Main Advantages Involved in Salesforce Automation” Ezine Articles [Online] Available at http://ezinearticles.com/?The-Main-Advantages-Involved-in-Salesforce-Automation&id=4564860 Tech Target “Sales force automation” Techtarget.com, June 9, 2010 [Online] Available at http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/0,,sid9_gci350521,00.html Beginners Guide - 1 “Are there potential disadvantages to Sales Force Automation?” Beginnersguide.com, (n.d) [Online] Available at http://www.beginnersguide.com/management/sales-force-automation/are-there-potential-disadvantages-to-sales-force-automation.php Beginners Guide - 2 “What is Sales Force Automation?” Beginnersguide.com, (n.d) [Online] Available at http://www.beginnersguide.com/management/sales-force-automation/what-is-sales-force-automation.php Read More