Managing sales activity to improve success

How good are we at selling? Is our response timing right? Do we deserve to win business? 

Analysing day-to-day sales activity can be difficult for any team and often leads to a presumption that we are effective sellers, who win some and lose some. 

At Clarity Software we aim to give you ultimate efficiency using fact not fiction, which means you should have all the relevant information at your disposal to evaluate your sales activity and see if your efforts are yielding the results they should be.

Activity module in Clarity Professional v4.2

With the Activity function in the new v4.2 Sales Module you can look closely at the number of campaigns, calls, meetings, quotes and orders you have created from your sales and marketing activities and drill directly into each one for further detail from within the report.

The results are displayed in text and graph column formats, showing conversion metrics and key KPI measurements including:

- The number of new contacts added to Clarity within a specified date range

- The marketing campaigns or ‘touch points’ required to create the lead

- The number of calls, meetings and quotes involved in developing the opportunity

- Definitive metrics on deal success such as quotes per order and meetings per order

From this information you can unzip your activities and evaluate at a glance some golden trends and headlines. For example, you can formulate answers to:

- Are we responding to enquiries quick enough?

- Do we really need to visit the client more than once?

- Which campaign activities convert to order most frequently?

- Do we communicate with our clients enough during our negotiations?

- Are we wasting too much time producing quote revisions?

- Is there an argument to stage regional seminars rather than individual client visits?

Be polished sales professionals

To be the best deal-winners in the business you need to be honed, drilled and ready for increased capacity with a constant supply of qualified leads coming into your sales funnel. 

By utilising the Activity feature you can get your sales process right and see an immediate increase in net profit.

Come On, Let's Get On With It!

Here's a thought - try working out how many times a month you say to yourself in business:

"We really need to start doing this."

It's a fair few, isn't it? 

Proactive marketing is a prerequisite for business growth and yet many of us never have the time to invest in it.

Why?!!

It's crazy to think that in 2012 business will come to you purely because you want it to. It's not going to happen.

In this clinging recession it's MANDATORY to increase your profile, generate opportunities and race ahead of your competitors. 

Come on, let's DO this

We need to proactively get marketing to our customers and prospects NOW.  No more putting it off until we have a bit more time on our hands. That time will never come.

GET MARKETING NOW! 
 
Your competitors have been getting away with it for too long. Don't lose business because you couldn't find the time. You'll never forgive yourself. 

Remember, procrastination is the thief of time - and BUSINESS.

E-Marketing Just Got Easier with Clarity Marketing

Clarity Marketing

OFFICIAL PRESS RELEASE

Clarity Software has launched a brand new online product designed to make it easy to manage and deliver successful online marketing campaigns.

Clarity Marketing, a trading division of Clarity Software, is a fun and enjoyable software system based purely ‘in the cloud’ at www.clarity-marketing.com and is available to anyone; regardless of whether they have a Clarity MIS system installed.

Low Cost Marketing with Incredible Results
With prices starting from just £10 per month, Clarity Marketeers can use the simple designer to publish branded and personalised bulk email messages to users. The system tracks the open, click-through and forward rates, and creates graphical charts and graphs to present detailed reports in an easy, quick-glance view.

At Last! An Effective Tool to Segregate Your Data
Many businesses find it hard to segregate and organise their contacts and end up with a messy database which is hard to manage. This was a key factor in the system’s development - led by Product Developer David Moxon – which resulted in a superb drag and drop interface to add unique tags to contacts and enable users to build highly targeted lists to optimise success.

Helping Everyone Benefit from E-Marketing
Clarity Marketing aims remove the technical obstacles of internet marketing, making it easy to increase revenues and improve customer service.

Clarity Marketing Product Director Emerson Welch explains: “E-marketing is one of the most cost-effective strategies currently available to businesses, and we wanted to give SMEs the best chance of reaping the benefits of it, irrespective of their knowledge and proficiency.”

“Our online system helps you organise your contact data, find your ideal target audience and tailor messages to trigger the best possible campaign responses. It can be used for sales generation or to improve customer service with proactive and reactive messages, and even allows you to manage offline campaigns alongside online ones.”

Emerson continues: “We’ve made it as simple as possible with an educational marketing workflow, whilst retaining powerful flexibility for impressive brand creative design under a supportive campaign infrastructure.”

“This is such an exciting product and we have a huge road map of features to come, including social media integration, website integration, geo-location and powerful fully-automated response mechanisms.”

An Immediate Impact in the Marketplace
Customers Beta trialling the system have already chosen to invest, and the official launch at the recent Clarity Software User Group Meeting generated an overwhelming response, with many attendees activating their free 30-day trial the same day.

Without doubt Clarity Marketing looks set to change the way SMEs carry out their online sales generation and service communications.

Watch the New Clarity Videos on our YouTube Channel or Website

One of the best ways to tutor and share Clarity features with you is via short product videos which you can watch at a time that suits you.

Over the last couple of weeks we have been busy in the studio producing the first handful of videos for you to interact with and these are now live on our YouTube Channel  and on the Clarity Website.

Product Tutorials
It is our aim to produce as many product snippets as possible, with each one demonstrating a key benefit of Clarity and how it can save you time and money, whilst organising your workflow. These are tailored towards general job-based companies, along with functionality directed towards key industries such as the digital print and sign making sectors.

Testimonials
Our customers are always willing to share their Clarity experiences with you, either via a written case study or even more personally via a recorded video testimonial. These are a great way for you to understand how Clarity makes a real difference in your business on a day-to-day basis, delivering measurable return on investment.



Website Tours and Walk-Throughs
Our new website at clarity-software.com advances our customer service to another level. For example, you can now log support queries directly through our website at any time of the day and they will automatically be accepted into our call logging system, sending you a confirmation email by reply.

As soon as our Support Team are available they will pick the query up, allocate a reference number to it and make contact with you via phone or email to service your needs. Throughout the query you will have complete visibility of the progress through to completion on the website, along with any historic queries you have logged previously.

To make it easy for you to use this superb new service quickly and efficiently we have created a video walk-through, which can be viewed directly on our YouTube Channel here.

Share Your Feedback
It's important that our videos are focused on the right areas, so please share your thoughts with us on what you'd like to see or would benefit from. Share your comments below or email us directly.


YouTube Channel   clarity-software.com/videos   Brochures, White Papers, Case Studies 

Data Image Group Ltd Understands MIS. Do You?

 By Emerson Welch of Clarity Software

Data Image Group Ltd - Large Format Digital Print Experts
Founded in 1991 and based in Narborough, Leicester, Data Image Group Ltd provides large format graphic and point of sale services to industries including cosmetics, fashion, retail and automotive.

Led by Directors Robert and Alan Farfort, Data Image has successfully grown into a 30-employee, £3m turnover digital and screen print company and has attributed much of its success to the implementation of cutting-edge IT software and print system technologies.

Computerised Management Information Systems (MIS) are now an essential part of any business searching for optimised profit and efficiency. The MIS trend gathered significant momentum at the turn of the millennium when many of the UK’s largest companies implemented new systems and started the downward chain of adoption towards SMEs and start-ups.

But many companies will still argue the toss on whether IT systems can really help their business. ‘Won’t it cause disruption and slow us down?’ ‘Will anyone actually use it?’ This was certainly not the opinion of Data Image. Not by a long shot.

They believed in the ‘leap of faith’, knowing that the returns were huge and instantly measurable across a number of key business Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). They knew, as long as they followed a few fundamental rules and afforded 100% commitment to the project on implementation, they were destined for long term rewards.

The Dark Days Before MIS

Imagine you are walking around your premises blindfolded with only the voices of your staff to guide the way. Each estimator gives you a piece of paper with their own quote for a specific job on it. They’re miles apart. The phone rings and it’s a customer venting his anger due to an order not arriving as promised. You ask out loud for help but everyone has gone quiet, as they each have a different specification and deadline for the job. And the job bag has gone missing.

It may sound theatrical, but this is a stark reality in SME businesses that cannot be ignored. However, as Data Image is fully aware, it can be solved, through the implementation of a suitable Management Information System such as Clarity Professional from Clarity Software.

Let There Be Light

Clarity Professional MIS, launched in 2001, was selected by Data Image in May 2006 after an investigation into a short list of software options. Clarity addresses a myriad of business-wide issues, providing a centralised job centre for all users to access, and bringing confidence and reliability to sales and operational processes. It removes the business blindfold and integrates the staff.

“Clarity is not only a superb tailored MIS for digital print but is the glue that holds the company together,” Robert Farfort explains. “It allows us to introduce other systems and technologies into our infrastructure such as workflow and nesting software, making us even more efficient. We couldn’t do this without Clarity acting as our central brain. The business simply couldn’t survive without it as there are so many components that rely on it.”

Utilising features such as customised price lists, promotional price breaks, browser-based workflow estimations and delivery schedules, Robert and the team are making informed decisions on when to take on or refuse new jobs, knowing exactly what their true costs are.

Quotes are faster and more accurate, margins are protected, customer service is improved and delivery deadlines are met. This yields a more profitable and efficient organisation with clear visibility for everyone and the software is easy to use for both new and advanced users.

Robert continues “We recently took on a fourth estimator who was inexperienced in using MIS, having previously relied upon paper and spread sheets to produce his documents. Within a week he was up and running on Clarity and was sending out quotes that were wholly consistent with the other estimators and our margin guidelines. This quick adoption is testament to Clarity’s well thought out user interface and natural user experience.”

Quantifying The Returns…Accurately
The return on investment through MIS is easy to generalise, with all departments gaining in efficiency and simplicity once the migration is complete. But the true scale of return becomes apparent when values and figures are placed upon each KPI to quantify the reductions or increases generated by the system. This is where the benefits of MIS are really understood.

Data Image has analysed its performance since implementation, producing an astonishing set of statistics. You won’t need a team of scientists to interpret them:

- Administration errors reduced by 45%
- Savings of £6k per year through paperless working

- Minimised material wastage, saving an average £15k per month (£180k pa)

- Job fulfilment time reduced by 55%

- Turnover has increased by an average of 46% pa since implementation 

- 50% productivity increase in raising quotation
- Surplus stock holding reduced by 40%

And perhaps the best short term statistic of all:

- After the first year the system had already paid for itself twice over

The Power Of MIS
It seems illogical for anyone to challenge the value of MIS after such an overwhelming set of results is shared. The large format digital print sector has exploded into MIS investment over the last 12 months, but having installed Clarity in 2006 and paid for the system many times over in ROI, Data Image Group Ltd is now profiting from the system ad infinitum. Wouldn’t you like to be in their position?

Am I Ready for the Impact of MIS?

      by Emerson Welch, Marketing Manager

Prepare for Immediate Benefits!

System software, along with product and staff development, is one of the most recognised means to improve business efficiency and facilitate managed growth within the business. Companies who adopt MIS within their businesses will almost always testify to its immediate positive influence on their bottom line profit.

Integrated MIS software gives you increased quotation confidence, organisation within the workplace, centralisation of all data and improved communications. Accurate costing of materials and labour leads to more profit from every job. You will know what your minimum price is and, importantly, when to take on, or walk away from an opportunity.

Digital printers, sign makers and other job-based manufacturers rely on accurate quoting, precise shop floor manufacturing and prompt customer delivery to grow their businesses. This is why a joined up, automated system with access for everyone is so critical to success, as it reduces error margins and improves customer service.

Properly Trained Staff Increases Success

Training on most MIS solutions should be fairly quick and easy with minimal disruption to your business. With a sensible measure of time management and temporary re-allocation of duties, a timetable can be drawn up to reduce the impact on your daily operation.

It is important, however, that the priority of system training is not relegated, as it will shape the future use of your system by your team and will allow you to draw the best possible return from your investment.

Good training means a happy workforce and a smooth transition from your existing work processes, and should never be underestimated.

Similarly, the importance of taking out a service level agreement (SLA) or support contract with your provider shouldn’t be lightly dismissed. Having experts available to fix and solve issues with you from the start will save countless headaches and potential staff negativity towards your new processes.

Embrace the Change
There is no doubt that MIS will change the way your business operates. It is change after all, and will mean that your staff and operational processes will need to be adjusted to suit your new system.

This will take some thoughtful planning and, in some instances, may require a restructuring of your workforce based on the time and labour savings you will experience.

The business ‘cost’ of change is one of the biggest fears that Clarity Software encounters when speaking to companies interested in adopting MIS. Many companies will be reticent to this level of change and will, therefore, decide against investing in a solution due to the perceived risk. Back to square one.

Do be mindful of the change though, as it can often cause some apathy or anxiety amongst certain members of staff or in certain departments, which needs to be managed carefully.

Many of our Clarity customers choose to adopt a ‘super user’ or ‘product champion’ strategy, which involves designating increased responsibility to chosen staff members to increase their buy-in on the new system. This helps eliminate their fear of change, reduces a potential negative influence amongst staff and instills a positive attitude towards the software throughout your company.

Return On Investment

It is understandable that the financial investment of any business in new system technology will always be under scrutiny, as it could potentially be perceived as a ‘nice to have’ rather than a ‘need to have’.

Your return on investment (ROI) can easily be quantified from go-live and will be driven by a number of pre-defined key performance indicators (KPIs) and reporting measurements. Wouldn’t you like to be reporting figures such as these from your MIS system:

- Administration errors reduced by 45%
- Savings of £6,000 per year through paperless working
- Job fulfilment time reduced by 55%
- 50% productivity increase in raising quotations
- The system paid for itself inside 12 months

MIS Works

In our most recent survey, 100% of respondents said their business was performing more efficiently since implementing Clarity MIS. Our 2,500 users now rely on the software to manage and streamline their operations, whilst using it as the central brain to bolt on other modern pieces of software for even more efficiency gains.

The investment case is compelling for MIS, both from a staff satisfaction and business profit point of view. It would be illogical to ignore it. But are you ready for it...? Those who took the leap of faith are reaping the rewards...

Read more about MIS in our free white paper An Introduction to MIS

A Superb FESPA Digital 2011 in Hamburg

 

 

The Hamburg Messe in North Germany played host to this year's premier digital print exhibition FESPA Digital from 24th - 27th May.

With over 18,000 visits to the show, Clarity Software's stand was bustling with activity, with free trials and demonstrations being offered on the stand to prospective users and existing customers.

A big thank you to everyone who came to visit us and we look forward to seeing you again soon.

Richard Gamlin (MD) and Saf Ahmed (Sales Manager) at the entrance to FESPA Digital

Wowed by Calc-Wizards
 

Stand visitors were hugely impressed by our powerful Calc-Wizards in particular, which are specifically designed to enable digital printers and sign makers to estimate their jobs incredibly accurately.

 

Screenshots of our detailed Calc-Wizards that give you the ultimate in quoting power

Calc-Wizards drill down to every last detail and take into account the performance of your shop floor machinery. This empowers you to produce a reliable quote and protects your margins on each job you undertake.

If you would like to find out more about our unique Calc-Wizards, which include Direct to Sheet, Roll Feed, Screenprint and Small Format, GO HERE

Saf Ahmed with customers on Stand A2-C41  

Making the Most of the Free Information
 

A popular grab from the stand was our free MIS white paper An Introduction to MIS, which explains in detailed but easy-to-read terms the benefits of a Management Information System (MIS), how to successfully implement it and what returns you can expect to see moving forward.

Also snapped up was our JDF white paper entitled What is JDF?  which explains (without unnecessary jargon!) how Job Definition Format (JDF) files can revolutionise the way your shop floor infrastructure operates, automating your manual processes and simplifying complex procedures. Think of an XML file with extra interactive features and abilities and you are half way to understanding JDF.

Look Out for Our Behind the Scenes Road Trip Report!

Coming soon to this blog is a review of the Clarity road journey from Solihull to Hamburg, with highlights including a hairy encounter in Bruges! More to follow...


Get a Free Trial of Clarity today