Combining CRM and DM to Take On More Complexity
Posted by M-Files admin on Tue, Oct 06, 2009
UK Contractor Beech Builders expands on Customer Relationship Management to include all company documents
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software
is supposed to track all dealings with your clients from initial inquiry to the
follow-up after final delivery.
There are a number of CRM alternatives available, but most assume you
have a straightforward workflow. What if your business relationships are more complicated, or your
requirements change from project to project? UK general contractor Beech Builders faced these same
challenges last year.
“Beech Builders is a
specialist building contractor,” says Managing Director Le Roux Cilliers. “We mainly do insurance repair to buildings
damaged by events such as fire, storm, flood, or accident. We work with a high
volume of contracts assigned to us by insurance companies and loss
adjusters. These contracts have
significant requirements for tracking events, like email correspondence and phone
calls, as well as documentation, such as estimates, approval documents, photos,
and so on.”
What makes the workflow
difficult to track in this case is that the company does not serve a single
master per project, but several.
Beech Builders works not only for the property owners but also their
insurance claim agents and loss adjusters, who specify work requirements based
on strict service agreements and determine the bill for the completed work.
Besides that, Cilliers explains,
the company has to manage communication and documents between a varied cast of
suppliers, subcontractors, and local officials. Beech Builders used to handle its digital workflow with a
customer service system called ACT! for Workgroups by SAGE Group PLC. But Beech Builders’ 450,000-document
index did not fit tidily into a prescribed box. The old system could only tie together some of the customer
data.
“We also ran into capacity limitations with ACT, since we receive or
generate 250 to 500 new documents every day as well as a very high volume of
emails,” he explains. “One of the
challenges we often face is we don’t deal with only one insurer. A property might have more than one
policy from different insurers, so we actually have to deal with multiple
claims managers and loss adjusters, each with their own set of requirements to
track. The ACT program lacked the
flexibility to include these kinds of interactions.”
Searching for a CRM solution that includes flexible document management
About 18 months ago, Cilliers
started the search for the replacement of its contact and opportunity
management system. “We looked at
several other CRM packages, but decided that we wanted something more than a
pure CRM system,” he explains. “The solution had to manage not only our
customer activity, but also all of our other business information needs. After an initial investigation and
elimination phase, we decided to give M-files the heads-up, based on its
flexibility. M-Files had powerful
search optimization and the ability to deal with both constantly changing CRM
and DM (document management) requirements.”
M-Files by Motive Systems is a document
management system that associates each document created by Windows applications
with project-appropriate key terms.
Instead of identifying documents by file names and categorized folders
from which they can easily be dislodged, the M-Files keeps project information
solidly organized by storing and retrieving items according to precise database
attributes. The same descriptive
tags can be applied to contacts and relationship events – customers, emails,
faxes, phone calls – turning M-Files into a powerful CRM system. Key-term definitions associate these customer
events with all other project documents, like photos of property damage, CAD
plans, health and safety compliance forms, works estimates, invoices, and so
on.
Motive Systems offers an
optional CRM module built on to the core document and information management
capabilities of M-Files. This
allows Beech Builders to relate all its file content with its lists of
business contacts.
“M-Files document
management software included all our CRM requirements -- the capability to
import all our historic records, opportunities, documents and notes from the
previous system,” says Cilliers. “We have achieved this without writing a
single line of Visual Basic code.”
And unlike other CRM
software, the M-Files system is by its very structure extensible and
scalable. Regardless of the number
of insurance providers, loss adjustors, or suppliers added to the project,
managers can still store and retrieve documents according to these
categories. Beech Builders could
also capture all incoming and outgoing emails in one central location,
searchable through the M-Files vault.
Correspondence no longer gets spread out into multiple personal archives
and local Outlook systems.
“In addition to using M-Files for classic CRM
functions, we also manage the workflow and documents associated with ad hoc
internal initiatives, marketing campaigns, as well as all our accounting and
payroll reports. The adaptability of M-Files provides a platform to do many
things many different ways. You
can manage the entire business document flow from one source.”
A comprehensive and flexible method
of workflow management
Cilliers turned the switch off on the old ACT contact management system midway
through 2009 and is now using M-Files throughout the company fulltime with very
encouraging results. “The
stability and response time in M-Files is significantly better than we have
experienced with ACT in the past.
“Users are getting used to
the new way of working, and we’re figuring out how to adapt more and more of
our workflow through the file management system,” says Cilliers. “They’re constantly exploring the
flexible custom views of data and adapting it for new tasks.
“The unique flexibility
M-files provide means that we can initiate, plan, execute and monitor any
business function quickly and effectively, without changing the system,” says Business
Development Director Elbrie de Kock.
“During this growth period of our company, M-files is the engine that
drives our growth, and nothing needs to be set in stone. We can test, explore and change things
from one day to the next without any impact on the overall processes of the
business.”
Beech Builders have big
plans for expanding the use of M-files in the future. Cilliers wants to continue to refine workflow by adding
customized tags and then create portfolios of responsibility for each of his
work teams. He also sees the
potential for an online customer service centre powered by M-Files, giving
customers direct web access to project status information.
“M-Files is at the heart in
our business. It is by far our most important system,” he says. “I have invested an extraordinary amount
of time to seek out a better CRM/DM system and match it up to our particular
requirements. M-Files stands out
as the optimal solution. To date,
the investment in time and effort is paying off.”
About
Beech Builders
Beech Builders is a recognized insurance-approved contractor
in the South of England covering Hampshire, parts of Surrey, Berkshire and West
Sussex. Beech Builders specializes
in quick and reliable insurance property repairs for damages through fire,
storm, escape of water or accident perils. For more information, please visit: www.beechbuilders.co.uk.