The CRM used by highly effective people

By using Maximizer CRM from Camsoft Solutions, FranklinCovey SA not only raised the bar for high-performance sales, marketing and customer service, but also gained the ability to track transactions and relationships from within a single application with remote access and business process enhancement.

A world leader in the development and delivery of leadership and productivity training and services, FranklinCovey has been in operation since 1993.

FranklinCovey SA is the exclusive representative of FranklinCovey in Southern and East Africa, extending to 17 African and Indian Ocean countries. With a focus on training solutions and intensive customer relationships, FranklinCovey SA relies on effective CRM as a priority business system.

FranklinCovey SA has its head offices in Johannesburg and representatives in Stellenbosch, Hilton and Nairobi, Kenya and is dedicated to providing the local market with effective training services and has a long list of satisfied and regular clients.

The company has adapted its training programmes for the South African market and marketing manager Emma Smallman says the company's workshops deal mainly with change management.

The heavily service-oriented business conducted by FranklinCovey SA requires an effective and flexible CRM solution that can be used to track sales, integrate with the company's accounting solution and provide remote access to representatives.

"And, of course, the primary function of our CRM system is to track relationships with our customers," adds Smallman.

The company has been using Maximizer since the late 1990s, but required an updated CRM solution to accommodate the growth of the organisation, bring its systems up to date and additionally provide integration into its Pastel Accounting application. Remote access tools were also required.

While FranklinCovey SA had already been using Maximizer for some time, the company did not take the decision to upgrade lightly when it was time to move up with enhanced capabilities and carefully analysed competing CRM solutions in the space, including products from Microsoft and Accpac.

"The company did research into the leading CRM products available," affirms Smallman. "A variety of other possible solutions were considered but it was decided that Maximizer CRM offered the best solution. Staff at FranklinCovey SA were satisfied that local Maximizer business partner Camsoft Solutions came to the party and together with Maximizer met all of the CRM requirements we had."

Maximizer CRM flexibility provided by the wide range of modules available for the product meant that FranklinCovey SA could easily acquire the functionality it needed without requiring large amounts of custom development. "There are 28 full time staffers employed at FranklinCovey SA with an additional 10 associates," explains Smallman. "Everyone in the company uses Maximizer on a daily basis."

FranklinCovey SA selected local Maximizer Certified Business Partner Camsoft Solutions in South Africa, to deploy and configure the solution.

Camsoft was also be required to do custom development in integrating Maximizer Enterprise with the Pastel Accounting application used by the company and provide FranklinCovey SA employees with training on the new Maximizer solution.

Part of the implementation was also MaxExchange - a module for Maximizer Enterprise that allows remote access for mobile computer users. According to Smallman, the upgrade and development process went smoothly and everyone was looking forward to using an updated and improved version of Maximizer CRM.

FranklinCovey SA is now able to use Maximizer to trigger business processes. "The company uses Maximizer to track sales and enhance the operations side of our business," she explains. "If one of our sales representatives sells a training programme, management and stock are automatically notified. In this way Maximizer has provided functionality that e-mail was used for in the past, saving the company a lot of time," adds Smallman.

Besides the enhanced sales capabilities, Smallman says Maximizer is also a powerful marketing tool for the company, which FranklinCovey uses to improve products based on customer feedback.

"Thanks to the Pastel integration, it is also possible to track at what stage invoicing and payment processes are with clients," continues Smallman. "This is a powerful sales utilisation of Maximizer which the company did not have before."

FranklinCovey now also uses Maximizer to automatically import and update customer data from Pastel Accounting.

"Information is kept up to date between the two applications and our staff are able to view invoicing information and track transactions from within Maximizer without having to switch applications," says Smallman.

Representatives are also able to connect to Maximizer from anywhere in the world using MaxExchange, saving the company more time as information can be accessed and updated without having to be in the office. Thanks to Maximizer, FranklinCovey SA is saving time and has a range of new functionality available that has significantly enhanced the company's processes.

Camsoft Solutions is giving away a free copy of Stephen R Covey's "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" to businesses wishing to trial Maximizer CRM.

The offer is valid for Maximizer CRM10 only until 30 April 2008 and is limited to software trials for five or more users of the Group, Professional or Enterprise versions.