How Madi International Empowers Sales with Consumer Goods Cloud

Tighter margins. Higher costs. Lower sales. The consumer goods industry is under increased pressure. And that means sales reps need to spend more time on revenue generation and less time on administration. 

Read on to discover how data, AI, and automation can help you maximise sales productivity — with insights and examples from leaders in the professional beauty business, Madi International. 

1. Create a single view of the customer with unified data

From opportunities to orders, sales reps need 360-degree visibility of customers. But how do you achieve this across multiple divisions, regions, and brands? 

This was the challenge facing Madi International, which has exclusive distribution rights for more than 50 global beauty and wellness brands in five Gulf countries. 

The digital transformation team used prebuilt connectors from MuleSoft to share data across its core customer systems. “It took us just an hour to set up a data flow between Salesforce and our ERP platform,” said Haja Maideen, Digital Transformation Manager for Madi International. “Using MuleSoft to integrate our systems helped to cut development time by 50%.” 

Field sales teams can now see orders, opportunities, meeting notes, and invoices in a single CRM record on Consumer Goods Cloud. Data is updated in real time and can be accessed on the move with the Salesforce Mobile App, which means reps can prep for meetings with greater precision. 

2. Place and track customer orders faster with automation.

To ensure the right products are on the right shelves at the right time, your sales teams need to be able to place orders quickly and easily — especially if they are constantly on the road. 

The implementation of Consumer Goods Cloud has significantly streamlined the order process.

• Reps can use mobile apps or tablets instead of laptops for on-the-go order placements. This is complemented by segmented product lists in the app, making it easier to select the relevant products quickly. 
• Enhanced customer profiles within the app provide valuable insights into each customer’s order history and preferences for a more personalised sales approach. 
• Customised alerts and notifications keep reps updated on special promotions or customer milestones, empowering them to respond promptly and effectively to customer needs.

With supply chain difficulties cited as the number one challenge for the consumer goods industry, it’s important to ensure stock issues don’t result in lost sales. 

Madi International has built an automated workflow for missed opportunities, which means reps are alerted when products come back in stock. Reps also have visibility of every order status, which means they don’t have to spend time chasing updates from fulfilment colleagues. 

3. Optimise meeting times and routes with AI.

Planning customer visits is a constant balancing act. 

Your customers want to minimise disruption to their business; you want to maximise selling time. For Madi International, the scheduling challenge is even harder with salon owners only available at specific times. 

Matching schedules, plotting routes, and creating summaries of meeting actions required a big manual lift from sales reps. Thanks to AI-powered workflows, these tasks are now all done automatically. 

Consumer Goods Cloud gives Madi International’s sales reps recommended schedules and routes that help maximise their time and minimise fuel consumption. Meetings can be planned to match both customer preferences and sales priorities. 

Meeting notes from sales teams across every division are now captured centrally, which means reps can unlock richer insights into their accounts and follow up new opportunities more effectively. 

4. Simplify trade promotion management.

Consumer goods companies spend billions on trade promotions. But only 46% are fully satisfied with their promotions returns. Making sure the right promotions are applied at the right times can be a massive challenge for brands and distributors. 

Madi International used to share promotion information for its 20,000 SKUs by email or instant message, which made it difficult for sales reps to keep track of the latest offers and expiry dates. 

With Consumer Goods Cloud, promotion information is shared and updated centrally. Now, Madi International sales reps can quickly and easily apply relevant promotions on their mobile app, which means they don’t have to spend time trawling through their inboxes. 

Centralising trade promotion management also helps consumer goods companies and distributors identify and prioritise the most successful promotions. Making trade promotion investments more effective can boost gross margin percentage by up to 500 base points (5%) – which means more profit.