Cray Improves Visibility into its Pipeline; Streamlines Global Support Operations with Integrated Salesforce

"We have very long sales cycles so the ability to view and track our pipeline over time with customizable reporting—which Salesforce makes possible—empowers us with the intelligence to steer our company toward success. By integrating Salesforce with our sales data, we deliver time-saving efficiencies that only enhances the service we provide our customers."


Challenge
  • Widely known as "the supercomputer company" for its global dominance in high-performance computing, Cray required greater visibility into its pipeline to better manage its recently expanded product line
  • Excel spreadsheets were ill-equipped to handle increased sales activity
  • In the wake of rapid growth, Cray struggled with outdated legacy support software that no longer met its needs
  • The company had implemented a PeopleSoft ERP system for its back-end infrastructure to manage volume increase
  • Because several different departments had customized the aging support system, reps had to contend with a confusing jumble of fields when adding data; it often took months to implement simple changes like adding fields
  • Cray needed an easy-to-use CRM system that could be implemented quickly, drive high user adoption, and accommodate integration and support

Solution
  • Cray selected Salesforce Enterprise Edition and rolled out it to 75 users; the company subsequently implemented Salesforce to 90 service staff and 60 sales, marketing, and management staff around the world
  • The company now uses Salesforce for all external customer-facing transactions in four languages: English, Korean, Japanese, and German
  • Custom dashboards and reports provide a real-time snapshot of the business by product and geography
  • Dashboards also track delinquent cases, automatically alerting senior managers of potential problems
  • Cray implemented 46 assignment rules and 48 escalation rules to better manage and resolve cases
  • Ten cohesive record types consolidate and track customer data, streamlining the former jumble of information fields
  • Fifteen cohesive service record types consolidate and track customer data, streamlining the former jumble of information fields
  • The company has integrated Salesforce with its bug tracking system

Results
  • The company now has improved visibility into its pipeline, with the ability to view long sales cycles over time
  • All users can view and share information across the global sales organizations in real time
  • Custom reports help management gauge progress
  • Field service reps can enter case data as much as four times faster compared to the old system, reducing data-entry time from 10 minutes per case to 2 to 3 minutes per case
  • Cray now enjoys a nearly 100 percent adoption rate with Salesforce, compared with a 50 percent adoption rate with its previous system
  • Streamlined problem reporting allows reps to enter case data only once and to quickly route cases based on issue type
  • Some modifications to Salesforce take less than a minute—and don't require any changes to the code
  • Salesforce's on-demand model eliminated the need to employ additional IT resources
 
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