Arch Chemicals

Chemical Company Gains Valuable Visibility into Sales and Service with CRM Solution

Arch Chemicals is a global biocides company with manufacturing and customer support facilities worldwide. Due to its diverse portfolio of businesses, the company needed a better way to manage and analyze its sales force and customer service. Through the flexibility and simple integration of Microsoft Dynamics® CRM business software with its existing systems, Arch Chemicals is increasing sales productivity and customer service performance while gaining valuable insight into its business data.

 

Business Needs

Based in Norwalk, Connecticut, Arch Chemicals develops, manufactures, and distributes a variety of chemical products. The company has two core business segments, Treatment Products and Performance Products, which are further divided into six smaller business units.

Each of the company’s six units employs its own sales force to address its particular needs and requirements. “Our Water Products unit sells products for the care and maintenance of swimming pools,” says Al Schmidt, Chief Information Officer at Arch Chemicals. “At the same time, our Performance Product segment sells hydrazine, which is used in rocket propulsion.”

Segment managers needed a unified way to track customer information and sales data across the different business units so that they could improve sales processes and responsiveness to the market. They wanted to deliver sales data to field staff on a user-friendly platform that wouldn’t require the field staff to deal with the complexity of the underlying SAP system. They also wanted access to much more accurate and timely information about contacts with customers.

The company began to look for an easily deployable customer relationship management (CRM) solution that would allow it to use in-house IT skills for configuration, but not require it to develop new software from scratch. Arch Chemicals had used Microsoft® products for its core IT infrastructure for a number of years, and its IT team was familiar with the Microsoft development and integration products and tools. Employees were also familiar with the Microsoft Office system and used many Office programs daily. Finally, due to the diversity of its business portfolio, Schmidt says, “We needed a CRM solution that was flexible and allowed us to customize the product to our needs.”

Solution

Arch Chemicals chose to implement Microsoft Dynamics® CRM business software throughout its Treatment Products segment. “The integration of Microsoft Dynamics CRM with other Microsoft products, such as the Microsoft Office Outlook® messaging and collaboration client, was a compelling factor in our decision,” says Schmidt. Additionally, Microsoft Dynamics CRM has a user interface similar to those in other Microsoft tools that Arch Chemicals employees already use. Third, Microsoft Dynamics CRM makes it easy to exchange data with back-end enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems such as SAP.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM is a very powerful tool for us. We now have the ability to spot and pick up trends in the marketplace and react effectively. Al Schmidt Chief Information Officer, Arch Chemicals

Arch Chemicals first deployed Microsoft Dynamics CRM to the Water Products unit’s two sales forces: mass market and dealer market. The business unit offers call-center support to the customers of both markets and wanted to track and manage calls based on the types of issue raised. The solution was easily configured and customized to meet the needs of the unit’s call center and two unique sales teams. “With Microsoft Dynamics CRM, all of our customer information—3.2 million customer records—is now accessible from any of our consumer call centers,” says Mahesh Thakur, Manager of Application Development for Arch Chemicals.

Next, Microsoft Dynamics CRM was deployed to the Industrial Biocides unit. As with the other business units, security was a concern. Arch Chemicals needed to provide access to local sales teams but not to the entire worldwide Industrial Biocides sales force; at the same time, unit managers needed to have deeper insight into their overall global sales teams. “Through a combination of configuration and customization, we addressed our security concerns for the Industrial Biocides sales teams,” continues Thakur.

The Wood Products unit, the third to deploy Microsoft Dynamics CRM, wanted to be able to pull sales histories for daily reports and allow field staff to review the reports offline. Some of this data was still housed in the SAP system. Again, Microsoft Dynamics CRM was easily configured and customized to retrieve the information and provide the reports to the unit managers.

Currently, Arch has deployed 369 CRM client licenses and is in the process of adding users in other business units as well as users at its international locations.

Benefits

Arch Chemicals has been able to use Microsoft Dynamics CRM to improve the way its Treatment Products segment managers and sales forces run their business. “As a global company that runs 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with multiple business units, we have extremely complex needs,” says Schmidt. “Our managers now focus on the right personnel and products to manage their business better.”

Greater Insight into Business Performance

Segment managers using Microsoft Dynamics CRM have access to detailed information on what accounts were called on and by whom, any issues that may have developed, and how those were resolved. Schmidt comments, “Insight into how a team is tracking towards its revenue and profitability goals is extremely valuable.”

Ease of Use and Integration

Microsoft Dynamics CRM offers a familiar user interface that supports easy adoption by users. “Our employees are very familiar with the user interface of the Microsoft Office system,” says Thakur. “Sales managers and employees find Microsoft Dynamics CRM very easy to use.”

Additionally, the company’s IT team is doing its own implementation and customization. The tool integrates easily with the existing Microsoft network infrastructure, working seamlessly with existing software and systems.

Flexibilty to Meet Diverse Business Needs

Arch Chemicals is taking advantage of the flexibility that Microsoft Dynamics CRM provides to meet the diverse needs of its various business units. “Each of our business units has very different needs for custom reporting,” says Schmidt. “The ability to meet those diverse and changing needs is important to our success.”

Optimization of Chemicals Product Mix

By providing up-to-date sales reporting and information, Arch Chemicals is reacting quickly to changes in its sales market, tracking its most profitable customers and products, and adjusting its sales strategy to take full advantage. “Microsoft Dynamics CRM is a very powerful tool for us,” says Schmidt. “We now have the ability to spot and pick up trends in the marketplace and react effectively.”