Many hire companies rely on various fragmented software tools that don’t talk to their hire management solution. This can become a problem when the business wants to take advantage of new opportunities as their processes and workflows are holding them back, causing them to stagnate.
As hire companies grow, so do their demands from their IT system. With a few key integrated software solutions, a hire company can revolutionise their business processes and communications.
We have identified 3 key software integrations that will streamline workflow as well as empower the future growth and expansion of your rental business.
Outlook Integration
Email recording
Email has become an essential tool we take for granted and can no longer live without. Most customer communications are now conducted over email, from quotes and negotiations to invoices. To provide the best customer service you need to track all these interactions that your staff are having. Without an Outlook integration, you are missing a large part of the conversation and you will not be as effective as your competitors who already do.
Being able to track and record all those important client interactions in your hire system is essential so that this key information can be shared with other team members to help you work more cohesively as a team and provide continuous service even when your colleagues are on holiday. If you were to receive any negative feedback, it is vital to pinpoint any actions that need to be addressed, to resolve the issue quickly and efficiently. MCS-rm hire software includes an integrated CRM solution to provide you with that vital audit trail of all customer contacts.
Calendar Appointments
You need to keep your calendar up to date with any activity that you feel is important. That might be an appointment out at a customer site or perhaps a campaign call that you would like to see in your calendar. To save rekeying these dates into two separate systems, MCS-rm simply defines the types of ‘actions’ that you choose to appear in your calendar. Since the Outlook integration refreshes at the time interval you choose, every member of staff is always kept fully informed of their own appointments as well as having the ability to check others colleagues’ schedules.
Mapping Tools
When you have multiple depot locations and you are serving customers with various construction sites, your geographic coverage can be difficult to visualise. With embedded mapping tools in your hire system, you can unlock an array of powerful benefits. The most valuable features of mapping integration include:
More Efficient Transport Routing
Deliveries and collections to and from your customer sites need to be made in the most efficient way. Your Transport Controller will use routing tools to make this happen. Embedding mapping and routing tools in your hire system means that you can allocate jobs to your drivers efficiently at the touch of a button without leaving MCS-rm. You can plan and optimise your routes, reducing wasted time and miles, whilst avoiding any known traffic bottlenecks, making it easier to reach your intended destinations.
Tracking Distance from Depots
When a customer’s site location falls in between two of your depots, it is not always clear which depot is best suited to fulfil that request. Mapping tools are able to calculate the distance between your client’s site and your various depots down to the last mile. This means you can immediately tell which is the closest serving and often the most cost-effective depot for that location. This also means you can apply more realistic transport charges based on accurate mileage when delivering equipment to site, helping make your forecasting more accurate and reliable.
Checking for valid addresses
Your postcode data may not always resolve to a correct address. Mapping your addresses within your hire software solution will highlight any data mistakes caused by human error or show where there is no valid postcode for your customer site. MCS-rm presents you with a list of unmatched addresses, allowing you to resolve any errors or quirks within the data as you go.
By switching into satellite mode, you can modify the address location too. This is particularly useful for the events or construction industry when their site addresses are placed in the middle of a field where there is no postcode available. Simply drag a map pushpin to pinpoint the exact location and click ‘save’ to update the longitude and latitude reference into your site address instead.
Mailchimp
Do you need to send your new customers a welcome pack? Would you like to send a product marketing campaign to a specific group of customers or prospects? Sharing your equipment rental data with Mailchimp (or other email marketing tools) means that you can automate your everyday template emails as well as produce pro-active marketing campaigns to boost your sales.
If your email marketing tool is not fully integrated with your hire software solution, sending emails can be a long and painful process. Picture this.
Your sales and marketing team has decided to run a brand new email campaign. From your CRM database, you export your desired recipient data. As usual, there are lots of blank fields that you need to fix before reimporting the data. Then you finally hit the ‘send’ button and your emails have gone. But it doesn’t stop there…
Now the sales team wants to make follow up calls on the email campaign but they can’t see if the emails were sent or even received. After some digging, you find the bounced back emails and begin resolve the errors. You then will process any unsubscribe data to make sure you are complying with legislation. All this information is fragmented and inaccessible outside of Mailchimp.
Sound familiar? Mailchimp integration with your rental solution is the answer!
Effortless marketing emails and campaigns
MCS-rm rental software works in perfect harmony with its native CRM system. Therefore, MCS-rm and Mailchimp combine to deliver effective results for your rental business ensuring that sending pro-active campaigns remains effortless.
All campaigns begin and end in MCS-rm. Email data is stored and kept well cleansed ready for your next campaign. Simply create your campaign, select and refine your email recipient list and choose the fields you want to use to personalise it. Just pull in your preferred email template from Mailchimp and process the campaign from there. An overview of your campaign results, along with any unsubscribe and bounced emails are automatically updated in MCS-rm.
With all call and email conversations tracked in MCS-rm, you can measure your marketing campaign success and build a better picture of your clients to help improve your customer experience. This enhanced view of how your customers are interacting with you, helps you schedule appropriate follow-up calls and tailor your conversations accordingly, from upselling to solving any pains.
In summary
Having these three powerful software integrations will cut out unnecessary data duplication and streamline your internal workflows. Essentially, you can make it easier for your customers to do business with you and help your teams work better together to meet your shared company goals.