Improving the Customer Experience: How Order-to-Cash Automation Unites Your Most Strategic Teams

Amy Rees — Tue, 28 Jul 2020 09:30:00 +0000

In 2014, Walker stated that “By the end of 2020, CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE will overtake price and product as the key brand differentiator.” ¹

Now, in 2020, this is certainly the case. Customer experience is the deciding factor for many when choosing whether to renew business with a company. Expectations have changed. Today’s customers simply care more about their experience and the ease with which they can do business with an organisation.

Esker recognises that customer experience is key. Ensuring that customers feel Valued, Understood and Engaged is Esker’s promise to our customers, and our Customer Experience Team was established to carry out this very promise.

There is a real connection between customer experience and company success. Likewise, efficient order-to-cash (O2C) processes are also important. As different teams pursue their own goals and self-interests, what’s best for an organisation as a whole is often put on the back-burner. This is exactly why companies need to rethink traditional O2C processes and focus on the strategic end-goal for all – an improved customer experience. It is important that companies look at the O2C process as a whole (rather than each individual area), so that every team can be a champion of the customer experience. This is starts with having an effective base solution in place.

O2C Automation

O2C automation, spanning processes such as order management and accounts receivable, provides users with a single integrated platform to drive added value and efficiency, allowing:

Reduced operational waste
Enhanced visibility and accuracy
Strengthened business relationships
Improved cash flow

Employees may then focus on customers instead of manual tasks, increase processing speed, have improved job satisfaction and respond quicker to customer issues.

5 Teams That Influence the Customer Experience

Order Management
Accuracy is key – manually keying in data can lead to errors and dissatisfaction. Automation means:

No more manual data entry
Issues resolved quickly and easily
Priority orders can be identified
Resources can be managed based on metrics
Costly errors can be avoided

E-Commerce
In order to effectively and successfully conduct business online, manual processes just won’t work. Automation means:

All order types can be processed
Customer (& company) effort is minimised
Efficiency is increased

Logistics and Distribution
Automation is a welcome addition to any supply chain. Automation means:

Real-time analytics via customisable dashboards
Operational waste reduced
Customer SLAs met
Costly delays are avoided

Accounts Receivable
The billing and collections process has to be right. Automation means:

Enhanced communication with customers
Lost invoices prevented
Priorities managed
Positive cash flow increased
Customisable dashboards to keep a view on company money

Sales
Sales teams not only need to sell to customers, they need to connect with them too, but time is of the essence when using manual processes. Automation means:

More time thanks to instant accessibility
Fewer calls received due to online portal
Valuable customer insight gained
Sales teams can focus on making money

Automation is the key to uniting your organisation and improving the customer experience. Esker are experts in O2C automation. We can help your business to shed the problems that manual processes cause and unite your teams.

To read more, you can download our eBook: Improving The Customer Experience.

Or visit our website for more information about our Order-to-Cash solutions.

Or feel free to contact us; our O2C experts would love to help you to transform your O2C processes.

1 – 2014 Customers 2020. The Future of B to B Customer Experience. Retrieved from http://www.walker.info.com/customers)

Amy Rees

As Digital Marketing Administrator at Esker Northern Europe, Amy spends her time working on the website, writing and publishing blogs and social media content, and publishing collateral. She has been part of the Esker family since 2014.

The Movement of Customer Experience at Esker

Georgina Kershaw — Thu, 04 Oct 2018 10:58:21 +0000

It’s all about Customer Service (CS) and Customer Experience (CX) at the moment, and at Esker, we are firm believers in this. We have just announced that we have created a brand new position and have a new Customer Experience Owner for Europe. So, what does that mean and why do we feel it is a pivotal role at Esker?

A few years ago, Esker decided to focus its efforts on improving the customer experience, and a new department emerged in the US, led by Joe Hanousek. Esker feels the time is now right to scale up this initiative throughout our offices in Europe.

Customer experience is more than a buzzword; it will play a pivotal role in the future of marketing. When we looked at past surveys with our customers about how they wanted to feel after interacting with us, the words valued, understood and engaged kept coming up, so we decided to make these words the core of our CX principles and we now share the VUE:

By investing so much time and effort into CX, by the year 2020, customer experience will overtake price and quality as the key brand differentiator.

Georgina Kershaw