Customer Profile: Consumer Impact Marketing (CIM)
Over 16 years of building connections between Brands, Buyers and Sellers for a wide range of Fortune 500 companies, has turned Consumer Impact Marketing (CIM) into the powerhouse to call upon for clients who want strategic, creative solutions which drive the bottom line. The company’s dedication to its customers and commitment to innovation has led it to become the leading sales and marketing solutions company in Canada. CIM’s attentiveness to providing stakeholders with pioneering solutions is not limited to its customers, but also extends to its managerial practices. For the past ten years, it has been listed as one of Canada’s “50 Best Managed Companies”, and in 2008 and 2009, CIM was also voted as one of the “BEST Places to Work in Canada”.
Situation:
CIM’s recognition in the Sales Management and Marketing Communications sector has earned it the support of prestigious multinational clients that include QTG/Pepsi, Research In Motion, American Express, Bank of Montreal, Mars and Suncor. Its implementation of in-field marketing campaigns include gathering insight from the field, reporting, assisting with product launches and conducting customer surveys at the point of sale. The industry is heavily time sensitive and demands reliability and accuracy - many customers require a daily or even hourly reporting schedule in order to accurately assess and forecast product demand. CIM employs thousands of field representatives who provide clients with full-spectrum in-field marketing and sales management support where timeliness and efficiency of information is crucial.
Implementation Scenario
CIM’s Studio Entertainment Team (SET) has been working with leading motion picture distribution companies for the past three and a half years to provide sales and merchandising solutions for Walmart and Zellers. SET is responsible for assessing the success of movie releases and predicting sales for replenishment orders. In an industry where timing is crucial and new releases must be delivered to stores on a particular day, it is vital that CIM’s field teams are able to work with accuracy within short lead times.
CIM’s field representatives utilize iCAN, a salesforce automation tool developed by CIM to provide in-field direction and gather and collect store conditions. Within this particular program, iCAN needed to be deployed and managed on 200 mobile devices to be used by field representatives across Canada. As is the case with many of its customers, iCAN also needed to be customized to suit SET’s particular requirements.
Challenges To be Addressed
CIM manages thousands of field representatives with devices that need to be individually configured in order to enable each representative to complete tasks with efficiency and accuracy. Meeting industry requirements for business agility demands solution flexibility and on-the-fly customization capabilities. New software releases must be deployed with urgency and the most innovative technologies harnessed.
A major challenge for CIM lay in finding a long-term partner able to deliver all these functionalities while addressing any issues that may be likely to stand in the way of delivering a high level of service. A number of issues required attention;
- Traditionally, the staging process had involved hiring extra manpower, it was often stressful, costly and time consuming with up to half an hour spent on staging each device.
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Troubleshooting involved sending the troublesome device back to CIM head office for the in-house IT team to work on, rendering the device and representative temporarily out of action.
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Making any changes to the application required that the device be sent back to CIM head office for manual upgrade.
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Field representatives often had to carry and manage multiple devices in the field, thereby reducing efficiency and speed of response.
With an upcoming campaign with SET as well as the implementation of a new release of iCAN, CIM was seeking to enhance efficiency in the roll-out process, and migrate to a new mobile device with enhanced functionalities to meet their long-term needs. To deliver on the challenge, CIM sought a trusted advisor and respected partner for their future mobility initiatives.
The Solution
After a great deal of diligence, CIM chose Allegro Mobile Solutions for their expertise and excellent reputation in providing robust end-to-end solutions for some of North America’s largest organizations. Allegro’s expertise includes the development of award-winning software, hardware procurement, infrastructure design and implementation. It is backed by a highly skilled technical and project management team. Allegro’s full-spectrum approach meant that CIM would only need to work with one provider to fulfill all of its requirements. Allegro’s offering also included a range of service packages specifically designed to reduce time to roll out and manage large-scale deployments.
After consulting with the Allegro team and assessing the possibilities, CIM chose the Motorola MC75 as well as Allegro’s AMP-Remote Services as the solution for deployment and device management.
The Tool: AMP-RS.
This device management tool enables rapid staging and provisioning of multiple devices, key to reducing time to roll-out and increasing business responsiveness. The tool also includes advanced capabilities for remote tracking and device management as well as diagnostic and monitoring tools, all through a centralized console. CIM are utilizing AMP-RS in a number of ways;
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Tailored Packaging & Staging - Pre-built packages are installed onto multiple devices over the air with a single push of a button.
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Rapid Device Provisioning - Devices can be upgraded in the field over the air.
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Tracking and Management - During the staging process devices are associated to unique IDs within the AMP-RS system, which allows devices to be tracked and managed while in the field.
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Diagnostics and Monitoring Toolkit - Provides access to real-time intelligence on the status and condition of devices such as software version, memory used and last connect time.
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Troubleshooting - Registry settings and updates can be applied over the air to rapidly remedy troublesome devices.
CIM selected an additional range of services to further support their commitment to meeting customer needs;
Additional Services Selected:
- Kitting Services - Using Allegro’s Kitting services, unique kits were created for each particular field representative complete with accessories. The kits were delivered to CIM ready to use.
- Technical Development - The technical team at Allegro worked with CIM’s team to carefully develop and refine a “golden image” that included configuring and customizing the application for use in SET’s upcoming campaign.
- Tier 2 Support - Emergency support phone line to a dedicated technical analyst ensuring that the best possible resolution is reached for any issues.
- Hardware Procurement – Provision of the most suitable converged rugged device for field representatives.
Results
Implementing the Allegro solution has already led to considerable benefits for CIM; these include a decrease in the use of I.T. department resources for troubleshooting and device management coupled with the key ability to meet the short lead times required by CIM clients. Field representative efficiency has also increased with the decrease in device downtime that AMP-RS offers, in addition, the converged mobile device recommended by Allegro is enabling representatives to receive real-time messages and alerts at the point of action. There has been a significant reduction in shipping costs traditionally spent on troubleshooting, and increased visibility and control over devices.
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