What Exactly is Salesforce Manufacturing Cloud?
Salesforce Manufacturing Cloud was created to address the demand for a comprehensive business interaction layer for manufacturing and other supply chain-related businesses. CRM platforms, including Salesforce, have historically had significant capability gaps, forcing manufacturers to create custom solutions on top of their CRM or rely on unconnected data and processes to run their businesses.
Elements of the Manufacturing Cloud
Manufacturing Cloud is built on top of the fundamental features of Salesforce Sales and Service Cloud; therefore, all existing and soon-to-be-released capabilities of the underlying CRM Clouds are included in the solution.
Salesforce has stepped up to deliver an industry-aligned platform, building on the current top CRM platform, to align to some of the influential demands for manufacturing firms with Salesforce Manufacturing Cloud. The solution, which began with a number of the most core skills, has expanded. It will continue to be a platform that fulfills manufacturers’ most critical and significant requirements.
Manufacturing Cloud Enhances these Capabilities in the Following Areas:
Sales Agreements
In Manufacturing Cloud, Salesforce developed the concepts of “Sales Agreements” to meet the requirement for firms to track and manage business known as “Run-rate,” which is frequently at the heart of manufacturing organizations’ revenue and operations. Clients or partners have committed to buying a specified amount of merchandise over a set time period in a run-rate business model. Although the formality of these agreements varies, in most cases, the idea is for manufacturers to create a baseline expectation for future orders that they can assess and monitor during the contract.
Organizations can use Sales Agreements in Manufacturing Cloud to:
- Manage the agreement lifecycle, which includes collaborating with clients on new agreement volumes and price, current contract revisions, and agreement renewal and expansion for the following period.
- Key agreement metrics, such as planned and actual volumes, product pricing and margins, as well as unique metrics that can be generated to fit particular demands, should all be measured.
- Convert acquired new business possibilities into sales agreements, or create arrangements apart from the new business pipeline.
Account-based Forecasting
Forecasting for run-rate business should incorporate both current scheduled business for a specific account over time and future business prospects for that same account. Other elements, such as past order trends and real-time market and consumer information, should be considered when making a budget estimate.
Organizations can use Manufacturing Cloud’s Account-based Forecasting to:
- Capture a sales estimate for new and run-rate businesses, including expected volumes and income sources.
- Develop and fine-tune commercial projections existing sales, and new business pipeline that may function as the source of validity’ for downstream supply chain and production planning by collaborating across sales, finance, and operations.
- Reduce the time sales or account managers spend developing and monitoring predictions by leveraging data to provide forecast ideas.
- To help operations without burdening sales teams, disaggregate projections to SKU levels.
Manufacturing Analytics
Of course, any CRM is only as valuable as the information it provides. Salesforce has enhanced Tableau CRM capabilities with Manufacturing Cloud to assist manufacturers in gaining insights into critical performance areas such as:
- Product performance – Understand how each product performs in terms of actual revenue or unit quantity and how it compares to the forecast or plan.
- Account health – Assist in tracking income against forecasts and plans for each account.
- Sales agreement insights – View sales agreement insights, such as real monthly income and a specific contract’s total planned vs. actual revenue.
Drive Efficiency with Automated Service Processes
At the beginning of 2022, new declarative tools were unlocked to Manufacturing Cloud, enabling organizations to quickly automate key service processes, such as warranty and returns, parts management, or sample fulfillment. Some of the key capabilities include:
- OmniScripts: offer a guided route for customers/partners/employees to complete a specific business process, including logic branching and responsive design for mobile apps.
- FlexCards: give access to appropriate tasks for the provided data and display contextual information at a glance.
Together with other new process capabilities, these features will enable businesses to digitize operations that span organizational borders and beyond easily.
Rebate Management
Salesforce has developed Rebate Management, a service designed to fulfill the requirements of companies that need to plan, execute, and target cash payback incentives for their channel partners. Organizations can use Rebate Management to create incentive programs in Salesforce that can be shared with channel partners, complete with up-to-date performance data for each program. Rebate management helps enterprises ease the time-consuming administering incentive programs by building on Manufacturing Cloud. Much of the essential data to check eligibility and incentive program attainment already exists.
Enhance your Service Forecasting Accuracy
Salesforce is extending its Manufacturing Cloud forecasting platform, which is currently used to estimate run-rate business, to manage aftermarket service demand. Service Forecasting may assist firms in projecting demand for specific components and field service specialists by using critical data points such as past repair orders, standardized format, and installed assets.
Customers’ Voices Should Be Heard More Often
With Salesforce Feedback Management integrated into Manufacturing Cloud, businesses will elicit and evaluate feedback from customers and partners at crucial touchpoints. Organizations may elevate and incorporate customer feedback into everyday customer and partner interactions by connecting surveys with current commercial processes.
Not Solely for Manufacturers
When a product is given a name, it piques the primary target audience’s interest and demand. Yet, on the other hand, it may cause other potential users to dismiss it as a viable option for their company. Other companies, such as wholesalers, high tech, retail, and so on, may also benefit from Manufacturing Cloud’s characteristics. If your organization has a ‘run-rate’ component, you need to anticipate your ongoing book of business, or you need to monitor and calculate refunds; Manufacturing Cloud is worth investigating further.
