How Leading Manufacturer Gained Insight Through Robust Business Intelligence

A couple of years ago we helped the UK office of Phoenix Contact, a leading German manufacturer of electrical connection and industrial automation equipment, after they were tasked with driving UK Sales and increasing market share. We checked back in with them to see how implementing BI has shaped their future as a growing business.
Martin Potter, Sales and Marketing Director at Phoenix Contact, gives us some insight into how the project went and where they are now.

One of the issues we hear about time and time again from our clients is that their own data is very difficult to both manage as well as access. This not only affects efficiency but it can also affect the bottom line because, without that data, the outgoing costs and incoming revenues can be obscured. What issues led your office to consider implementing a BI solution?

Martin: Information within our company was traditionally hard to access and regarded as confidential. Each department was working hard, but on its own agenda. The new management team wanted to refocus the company on sales and ensure everyone was working towards the same objectives. By increasing access to information, we hoped to transform our culture and energise staff to deliver the results we were looking for.

We have seen situations where a consultant company has come in and basically dictated to their client how they need to do things without regard to their client’s business structure and even their working environment. This is something that we discourage within our own company as it’s important to us that we work in concert with our clients rather than simply telling them what to do. Can you give our readers your thoughts on what it was like working with us on this project?

Martin: DSCallards really listened to our needs, often facilitating discussions we might not have had internally, to get a clear picture of our objectives and where the value lay. They didn’t dictate how we should do business – they simply enabled us to get more value from our data to hit our targets while preserving our uniqueness.”

In the end, the most important thing to us is that the solutions we implement work for our clients and help them create a better business. How has implementing a BI solution helped you meet your goal of increasing your market share and drive sales?

Martin: Key to transforming our performance was exposing what was going on in our business, as this tends to concentrate people’s minds on understanding their own impact and improving their individual or departmental performance…You can see the effect of the numbers on performance in real-time, which has an amazing influence.

Well there you have it. Implementing a robust BI solution helped this business gain insight into what was going on and where they could improve. That’s the kind of thing that can give you an edge over your competitors in this tough market. Want to know more about our project with Phoenix Contact? You can read the entire case study on our website along with several others. Once you are done reading up on how we helped others, feel free to wander around the rest of our website to find out how we can help you.