Amara Raja Energy & Mobility amps up customer and dealer relationships

Amara Raja Energy & Mobility is one of India’s largest manufacturers of lead-acid batteries for industrial and automotive applications. Its brands – including Amaron®, Powerzone, and Quanta® – are exported to over 50 countries, and distributed across India through an extensive sales and service retail network.

Engage more efficiently with dealers and customers

Dealers and distributors are the backbone of Amara Raja’s operations. All sales and service activities are conducted through them. To help these partners prosper, Amara Raja wanted to automate and integrate all dealer and distributor management processes, ranging from visit planning and stock replenishment, to payment integration, campaign management, and even waste battery returns. 

The company also wanted to digitise the complete customer experience, and empower teams with real-time data to serve customers better.

A 360-degree customer view powers frictionless customer experiences

Amara Raja has united all its sales and service teams, including field service agents, call centre, retailers, distributors, and franchisees, on Salesforce. This helps them collaborate across functions and the partner network more easily, scale up faster, and deliver connected customer experiences. 

Every team has a single source of customer truth to enrich customer interactions. 

“With a 360-degree customer view, we’re able to connect with customers 1:1, predict their needs more accurately, and deliver more value across touchpoints,” says Hirani. “Connecting all customer touchpoints on one platform has made customer experiences seamless.”

In Their Own Words…

At Amara Raja Energy & Mobility, better dealer experiences lead to better customer experiences. Watch this video (03:24) to learn how the manufacturer empowers its dealers as well as its internal teams to win customer trust and loyalty.

Automated dealer engagement energises sales

Amara Raja has also streamlined and automated dealer sales management on Salesforce Consumer Goods Cloud. 

All sales planning processes, right up to retail execution, are connected on one platform, improving coordination between internal teams and dealers. Moreover, field sales teams are empowered with the tools and insights needed to do their best work.   

“Better visit management capabilities and instant access to account data have improved field sales efficiency,” says Rajesh Jindal, President & CMO, Amara Raja Energy & Mobility. “Reps can manage their daily tasks with ease, and collaborate on accounts more smoothly.” 

Even dealers’ experiences have improved. They’re able to onboard customers faster and more easily since the entire process has been automated.

Streamlined sales and service boosts customer satisfaction

With Salesforce Manufacturing Cloud, Amara Raja can efficiently track sales agreements with B2B customers.

“Having clear visibility into the sales agreement performance at each of our franchisees will, we believe, enhance our long-term profitability and run rate,” says Jindal. 

 The company has also optimised customer support on Salesforce. With omnichannel capabilities, teams can deliver seamless service across the website, call centre, and WhatsApp. 

As soon as a customer logs a service request, it’s captured on Salesforce, analysed by internal service agents, and assigned to the right franchisees for field service through a dealer portal built on Salesforce Experience Cloud. Over 550 franchisees use Salesforce to deliver timely support.  

Preventive maintenance is also coordinated through the platform to keep customer batteries healthy, and reduce unplanned downtime.  

“Automation and intelligent field resource management have empowered us to resolve issues faster,” says Jindal. “And with self-service capabilities, dealers are delivering seamless customer experiences.”

Even warranty management has been simplified. Through the dealer portal, dealers can easily submit warranty claims which are then validated and adjudicated by Amara Raja teams in a systematic and transparent manner.

Next: Create conversational customer experiences

Amara Raja is now exploring how AI + data can help deepen customer relationships.

“We’re working with our partners, KPMG, to deliver conversational experiences using AI,” says Jindal. “That starts with gathering and consolidating data from all our platforms into a single data cloud. The end goal is to serve both our customers and dealers better.”

Amara Raja’s success in sales and service is largely dependent on its dealers and distributors. By using Salesforce to engage better with dealers, manage their performance more efficiently, and empower them with a 360-degree customer view, Amara Raja is transforming both sales and customer experiences.