Elevating CX: A Proactive Approach to Order Management & Fulfillment

This Industry Viewpoint was authored by Manoj Krishna Mohan, Technical Architect, Salesforce Practice, Prodapt Solutions

In the highly competitive Connectedness industry, seamless ordering and fulfilment processes are crucial for service providers to build customer loyalty and gain competitive edge. The challenges in order management such as inadequate service assurance, complex order workflows, and the risk of lost orders have significant implications. Implementing a modern and unified Order Management System (OMS) is essential to address these challenges. By leveraging a unified OMS, service providers can enhance revenue, reduce expenses, and improve overall performance while delivering exceptional Customer Experience (CX).

According to Forrester, customers now place equal importance on their experience during the order journey as they do on the product or service. However, traditional OMS solutions often fall short of expectations due to manual processes, generic order journeys, duplicate leads, and inflexible systems that hamper CX.

The Salesforce OMS is a powerful solution to help service providers overcome these challenges. This platform offers a single point of integration with various systems and data sources, providing a comprehensive view of customers and their orders across both online and offline channels. However, it is crucial to approach the implementation of Salesforce OMS strategically to fully harness its benefits.

Salesforce OMS for CX transformation: A strategic implementation approach

Delivering a consistent CX requires a holistic and customer-centric implementation approach that addresses the entire order-to-activate journey from order capture through order fulfilment orchestration. To achieve this, service providers should view the implementation process through three distinct lenses:

Lens 1: Identifying primary shortcomings in the order capturing process and proactively addressing these issues.

Lens 2: Investigating major inefficiencies in the order orchestration stage and implementing effective resolutions.

Lens 3: Analysing and resolving gaps in the customer service stage through automation, ultimately delivering exceptional CX.

By adopting this implementation approach, service providers can effectively tackle challenges and reduce OMS implementation time by up to 40%. This streamlined process accelerates the transformation of the order journey towards a modernized system while significantly enhancing overall customer experience.

 

1)    Identify key gaps in the customer journey and map Salesforce core capabilities to deliver an elevated experience

A traditional OMS poses significant challenges that hinder seamless operations. Firstly, it leads to inaccurate mapping of a lead’s lifecycle during order capture, resulting in duplicated data and unreliable reporting. Secondly, it fails to address the issues of multiple personas utilizing the same order journey, disregarding their unique touchpoint requirements.

Recommendations

• Analyse the current process to gain an understanding of how tasks are currently being executed
• Identify key pain points that need to be addressed in order to improve efficiency & effectiveness
• Analyse the user journey considering different user personas and the time spent across different touchpoints
• Determine remediation by mapping the pain points/gaps with Salesforce OMS capabilities to determine how these can be addressed & resolved
• Leverage the TM Forum Business Process Framework, eTOM, to understand, design, develop, and manage processes involved in the order management journey

 

2)    Orchestrate and fulfil orders using industry-specific building blocks coupled with Salesforce OM capabilities

In the traditional OMS, order orchestration and fulfillment often fall short of expectations, resulting in incomplete service offerings and subpar customer experience. However, by embracing the capabilities of Salesforce OMS, service providers can accelerate service delivery and significantly reduce development time, thanks to the utilization of reusable components.  

Recommendations

• Leverage TM Forum’s SID Model to clearly distinguish between Customer Facing Spec (CFS) and Network Resource Facing Spec (RFS)
• Use Order Decomposition to transform a commercial order into a technical order and generate fulfilment requests, which will be used during the orchestration process
• Use the catalogue to dynamically generate, sequence, and monitor orchestration processes according to the specific context of each order to ensure that the information contained in the order is communicated to the systems that fulfill the order
• Ensure orchestration items or tasks in the workflow are executed in the correct sequence and provide the correct information to each fulfillment system
• Set a technical product attribute as “not assetizable” so that Order Management does not store Personally Identifiable Information (PII) in Order Management’s internal technical inventory

 

3)    Deliver exceptional CX through unified order servicing and automated service processes

Salesforce OMS integrates seamlessly with Salesforce Service Cloud, equipping technicians with accurate data for efficient order servicing. Automating case management and leveraging real-time data for software upgrades, Salesforce OMS transforms customer service and the order management landscape.

Recommendations

• Identify various channels for customer communication and configure them using Salesforce tools such as Email to Case, Web to Case, and CTI Plugin
• Identify touchpoints in the journey requiring specific agent support. Leverage Salesforce skill-based work assignments to allocate work to the right agent who has the skillset for the job
• Use Salesforce Omnichannel configuration to define the effective workload an agent should receive at any point in time
• Use automated service workflows to process cancellations, reshipments, discounts, exchanges, and returns

By implementing the Salesforce OMS, service providers can experience significant benefits, including a 25% reduction in customer service handle time, a 40% reduction in development time using reusable components, a 20% increase in purchases from click & collect services, and enhanced visibility into inventory across various locations. These improvements collectively contribute to an enhanced CX.

I thank my colleague Rohit Karthikeyan (Manager), for contributing to this article.

Author

Manoj Krishna Mohan

Technical Architect, Salesforce Practice, Prodapt Solutions

Manoj is a hands-on technology leader with 14+ years of IT Telecom Delivery, Consulting and Pre-Sales experience. He is a 6x Certified Salesforce professional who enjoys solutioning and maximizing impact for customer in Telecom BSS-OSS domains.

He is passionate about customer conversations that involve overlaps in Telecom domain and Salesforce capabilities. He enjoys building technical accelerator prototypes and implementing next gen solutions that enables Connectedness service providers to scale new value waves in a profitable manner.

Manoj is a Technical Architect at Prodapt. Prodapt is the largest and fastest-growing specialized player in the Connectedness industry. We design, configure, and operate solutions across their digital landscape, network infrastructure, and business operations – and craft experiences that delight their customers. Connecting 1.1 billion people and 5.4 billion devices, our clients are among the largest telecom, media, and internet firms in the world. Prodapt works with Google, Amazon, AT&T, Verizon, Vodafone, Liberty Global, Liberty Latin America, Claro, Lumen, Windstream, Rogers, Telus, KPN, Virgin Media, British Telecom, Deutsche Telekom, Cisco, Adtran, Samsung, & more. Prodapt employs over 6,000 technology and domain experts in 30+ countries across North America, Latin America, Europe, Africa, and Asia.

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Categories: Industry Viewpoint · Software