An IDC Manufacturing Insights report has uncovered how important a customer-oriented strategy is for successful manufacturers. The report also discovered just how crucial enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions are in helping all manufacturers improve their customer experience, from those that are only just starting out to those that already have a deep customer-oriented culture in place. In the respective white paper for manufacturers, entitled "Get Customers Inspired: How Modern ERP Can Support Greater Customer Experience," IDC Manufacturing Insights surveyed over 460 enterprises across multiple sectors including industrial machinery and equipment, high-tech and metal fabrication, covering 13 countries worldwide. "The research revealed that many manufacturers have an immature understanding of how a customer-oriented strategy can be implemented within an organization," said Pierfrancesco Manenti, head of IDC Manufacturing Insights research practice in Europe, Middle East & Africa. "Manufacturers need to move along the spectrum for maturity in order to continue to stay competitive. This is especially important in more mature or developed markets where relationships and service levels have now become crucial differentiators. We advise manufacturers with less than inspiring customer service to take a good look at how their systems and processes can be improved to better support a customer-oriented strategy."

1. Modern ERP
is Essential to
Better Customer
Experience
How can you improve
the customer experience?
Why should I care?
When asked, manufacturers listed the
following top 3 perceived benefits:
Do you have a
defined customer
experience strategy?
Did you know there is
a correlation between
customer experience
maturity and the
degree of ERP
deployment?
Are you reactive?
Or are you at the
other end of the
spectrum—you have a
culture that is
centered around the
customer experience?
1. Retain existing clients
2. Differentiate from competition
3. Improve sales force effectiveness
Many fail to grasp that delivering
a good customer experience
can positively impact:
Profitability Revenue
growth
Attraction of
new clients
Purchasers are from Mars
and Sellers from Venus
Sellers rate experience offered
at more than 4 out of 5.
Why the disconnect?
Purchasers rate experience
offered at 3 out of 5.
Service represents less than 40% of our reason to buy,
yet is 90% of our perceived sales process value.
Where are you on the customer
experience maturity model?
25%
Understanding
the client 60%
Features and
functions
Today’s
level of
maturity
T i m e
4
Customer
experience is
related to
analysing past
customer
interaction and
gaining better
insights into the
marketplace.
5
Create a
customer-oriented
culture and
process workflows
to make sure
clients find it
easier to deal
with us than with
our competitors
at all times.
3
Customer
experience is
essentially
defined by
physical product
or service features
and functions
associated
with the
customer's need.
ERP is crucial to improving
customer experience.
85%
100% Reactive
No customer
experience
2
Endeavour to
serve the client
better when
requested by
them, in addition
to meeting their
product and
service needs.
1
Customer
experience is
defined entirely
by the customer,
not the solution
provider.
The top 5 customer enablers are all helped by ERP:
1. Adapt your IT to react and serve customers better
2. Improve visibility of accurate and timely information along the value chain
3. Speed up decision/making capability
4. Analyse past customer interaction data
5. Simplify or automate business processes
Nearly 75% of large
manufacturers with 5,000 employees
or more
indicated that their ERP is a vital platform for
delivering a good customer experience as it
connects the back and front office operations.
An Opportunity for SMB
Nearly 40% of manufacturers
with 100-1,000 employees
indicated they have homegrown systems or no
ERP. This creates a lack of timely information as
data is stored in too many different IT systems
that are loosely connected, making it difficult to
influence customer satisfaction even at the most
basic level.
M a t u r i t y
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