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Why is Effective Sales Force Automation App Critical for FMCG Brands?

future of field sales app

Rapid evolution of the sale process is ever accelerating and ever improving with every technological advancement. The digital transformation has evidently played a significant factor in shaping up sales force management. Fast moving consumer goods companies had already adapted field sales automation integrated with the traditional sales approach. However, it is not only about digitization and automation right now, its beyond. New age sales force automation for FMCG includes AI, machine learning, image recognition and more that gives leverage against competitors. The call of the hour is to bring your stakeholders in one common platform and bridge it with harmonious collaboration.

What is New in Field Sales automation?

The concept of field sales automation was initially all about just tracking field activities a few years ago. Nowadays, field sales applications have evolved into something more than just a sales rep tracking gimmick. In order to deal with the challenges such as market coverage, revenue per store, footfall conversion etc. They aim at improving the efficiency of field sales management, especially in consumer goods industry.

Now, Field sales app serves as an effective tool for sales personas. You can integrate your SFA with your distribution management system. One stop CRM SFA DMS integration is a model that is attracting FMCG sales leaders in the world. It boosts the harmony of your sales components and gives micro-grip of your business.

New Perspective of Building Sales Force Automation Software

Field sales automation for FMCG serves as an excellent instrument to boost holistic business goal in the following ways:

1. Boosts SFA and CRM together

Merging of SFA and CRM in a single platform is the major highlight of the sales force advancement. These are two stages of sales operations, former focuses on the sales velocity and volume while CRM focuses on customer relationship and retention. When both grows hand in hand, your business pushes valuable sales and your brand names is lifted up.

2. Build effective SFA with Digital CRM for Customer

New features in SFA software is useful but turning it for concrete action is effective. Instead of focusing on the medium any business uses to grow their sales, new age business is all about building trust with your client. Digital CRM plays a major role in reaching out existing customers and managing them according to their needs.

3. Enable better market penetration and expansion together

In the coming years, SFA software is going to get better features for market penetration and expansion. Reach within your territory effectively with greater ease. Also, reach beyond by expanding your territory to potential customers. Innovative customer profiling with accurate filtered data is integrated features to look forward for.

4. Building an ecosystem for all stakeholders

Goal-driven sales approach is the crux of our customers success stories. Build your sales team, retailers and distribution management system to achieve the common goal of your business. This requires all these stakeholders to come on a single platform and collaborate for greater output.

What functionality does Sales Force Automation software offer?

Sales force automation for FMCG provides several useful functionality for the sales reps as well as for the company. While a cheap software may hang you with just sales tracking, new-age solutions can evidently add value to your business. The following features can be stated as exclusive functionality of an effective field sales software.

  • Accurate store profiling & segmentation: Gaining essential visibility of the retail landscape is important for creating overall go to market strategy, segmented actions plan, deploying resources etc. The collected data acts as the starting point for any sales and marketing engagement a consumer good brand wants to have with its retailers, channel partners and influencers.
  • Visibility of secondary sales execution: Secondary sales data are usually provided by distributors. While the traditional way takes weeks or even a month, this software offers real-time visibility of the secondary sales execution. This also provides the company insights about utilization of schemes and offers and also insights about pain points of distributors.
  • Stock management: FMCG brands must position their products appropriately to drive sales. Stock outs or over stocking can lead to significant commercial loss, particularly in modern trade or large format stores where brands go to the length of deploying product promoters.

  • Establish Relationship: To understand the pain points of key customers, it is essential to establish relationships with the B2B partners. Comprehensive software solutions provides an integrated CRM component for lead Management and post-conversion relationship management (Including Documentation, Feedback Capturing, Raising Tickets etc) in a single interface.

More integrated features

  • Order Taking & Maximization: A consumer goods company aims to maximize returns by elevating order volume by the use of lucrative offers and schemes. But less than 50% of trade and promotional offers or schemes are utilised, that too by only 20% of the top performing sales reps  Field sales automation software helps sales reps sell more at a retail store through order recommendation and auto application of schemes and offers to ensure optimal order size from POS. 

  • Draw insights from data-driven analysis: Advanced platforms with automated analytics not only detect underlying problems. Through data-driven analysis but also initiate intelligent nudges alerting sales managers of the actionable steps required to resolve the issue.
  • Visual Merchandising Audit: Retail-oriented brands invest hefty in visual merchandising as well as ensuring it’s compliance. AI driven audits can cut down the cost of your compliance just by ensuring quick VM analysis through visual feedback uploaded by the sales reps.

Baseline

Sales force automation for FMCG has become a necessity for retail oriented brands to position their product, reach out to a wider target audience and most importantly boost sales. It is an efficient sales force automation platform that provides retail-oriented brands in General Trade,  Modern Trade & B2B/HoReCa with phenomenal field sales management capabilities. With integrated DMS, BeatRoute optimizes not just the sales process but also the supply chain. It serves as a 360 degree field sales automation solution that streamlines and optimizes your entire route to market execution. Request a demo today.

About the Author

Nikhil Chaudhary

Nikhil Chaudhary

Nikhil Chaudhary is a marketing professional with a passion for enterprise SaaS and the role that technology can play in helping businesses succeed. As the head of marketing at BeatRoute, he enjoys sharing his insights and ideas on the subject, particularly in context of the CPG Industry. When he's not working, Nikhil can be found exploring India, trying new beers, and discovering obscure articles on Wikipedia.

About the Author

Nikhil Chaudhary

Nikhil Chaudhary

Nikhil Chaudhary is a marketing professional with a passion for enterprise SaaS and the role that technology can play in helping businesses succeed. As the head of marketing at BeatRoute, he enjoys sharing his insights and ideas on the subject, particularly in context of the CPG Industry. When he's not working, Nikhil can be found exploring India, trying new beers, and discovering obscure articles on Wikipedia.

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