Built for the automotive industry, Salesforce Industries’ automotive CRM helps guide customers to the right vehicle and fosters loyalty after purchase. It lets you engage with customers easily across different platforms, like online, mobile, social media, showrooms, and connected vehicles.
In this blog, we will be getting into the benefits of Salesforce Automotive Cloud for the Automotive Industry, features, capabilities, and much more! What is Salesforce Automotive Cloud?
Salesforce Automotive Cloud is a customer relationship management (CRM) tool built for the car industry. It helps dealerships and manufacturers manage everything from sales and service to inventory, all on a single platform. This streamlines operations and allows them to focus on providing a more personalised experience for their customers.
What are the features of Salesforce Automotive Cloud?
The cloud stands as a central hub for all automobile dealerships and manufacturers. Let’s have a quick rundown of its key features:
1. Driver Console:
This Automotive Cloud puts all your customer interactions in one place, online or in person, and sorts everything automatically. This allows you to analyse the complete customer journey and set up custom data alerts. Imagine receiving a notification when a high-value customer hasn’t visited in a while. With this real-time data at your fingertips, your team can personalise communication, build stronger connections, and ultimately drive sales and satisfied customers.
2. Vehicle Console:
Eliminate the tedious process of digging through mountains of paperwork. From vehicle details, warranty information, delivery reports, and many more, all are instantly accessible in one place. Basically, letting your team answer customer inquiries quickly and efficiently, verifying warranties, updating deliveries, and resolving issues in an instant. Faster service translates to happier customers and a smoother customer experience.
3. Household Management:
You can retrieve a customer’s family’s complete car history, all their vehicles, and past purchases. This wealth of information lets you personalise everything, from support to offers. For instance, through personalisation, you can send promotions for a particular kind of car, be it a sedan, SUV, XUV, etc., to a family or household that has a history of purchasing a specific kind of car, which helps you boost customer loyalty and satisfaction.
4. Automotive Lead Management:
Ensuring high-value leads are always prioritised and never overlooked, the automotive cloud uses smart algorithms to identify these leads and route them directly to the dealership closest to the customer’s preference, considering factors like location and brand interest. This smarter routing creates a smoother experience for the customer, leading to happier interactions and ultimately more sales for dealerships.
5. Partner Performance Management:
Take the hassle out of managing retail partners. Track their performance, from sales figures to customer satisfaction, all in one place. You can not only monitor but also collaborate on everything, from site visits to incentive programmes. This clear visibility and easy collaboration strengthen partnerships, motivate your retail network, and ultimately drive sales for everyone.
6. Automotive Data Foundation:
You can also ensure security over customer and vehicle information with the Salesforce Automotive Cloud’s technology and automation, while also ensuring compliance with global regulations. Whether you’re sharing data with partners or authorities, Salesforce allows you to control access, keeping everything secure and compliant. This commitment to data protection helps build trust with your customers, allowing you to focus on sales without worrying about data security.
What are the capabilities of the Salesforce Automotive Cloud?
Here is an overview of the general capabilities:
1. Vehicle Lifecycle Management: Tracks a vehicle’s entire journey, from production to sale, with flexibility for non-linear steps (e.g., pre-selling unbuilt cars). Some configuration is needed for optimal use.
2. Quotes: easy to use if you’re familiar with Salesforce quotes. However, it lacks Configure, Price, and Quote (CPQ) functionality, limiting vehicle configuration and customer data for after-sales service.
3. Inventory Management: Efficiently tracks millions of parts across locations, eliminating manual data entry (great for large dealerships). Uploading bulk data requires file adjustments due to the data model, and there’s a lack of built-in tools for mass updates in this scenario.
Streamline dealerships and personalise customer journeys with its other capabilities, like:
1. Automotive cloud intelligence leverages the power of AI to unlock real-time insights across the entire automotive industry. Imagine having instant data that helps you make smarter decisions, faster!
2. Warranty Lifecycle Management makes creating and managing complex warranties a breeze. No more paperwork nightmares; just a smooth and efficient process.
3. Salesforce Data Cloud and MuleSoft work together to give automakers the tools to personalise the car-buying experience for each customer.
4. Inventory management helps you keep a close eye on sales performance and avoid stock shortages. This means you can have the right cars available when customers are ready to buy.
5. Scheduler for Automotive lets customers schedule test drives, service appointments, and more with just a few clicks. Put an end to long phone calls and hello to a convenient online booking system.
How can your automotive business benefit from the Salesforce Automotive Cloud?
The Salesforce Automotive Cloud is a dealership management system (DMS) designed to improve efficiency, customer engagement, and sales. It automates tasks, tracks customer information, and helps predict future demand. Here are its benefits in detail:
1. Streamlined Operations: The Automotive Cloud automates many connected vehicle sales processes, freeing up time and resources for dealerships to focus on higher-value tasks.
2. Enhanced Customer Engagement: The platform fosters stronger relationships with potential buyers by simplifying communication and allowing dealerships to track orders and payments seamlessly.
3. Data-Driven Decisions: Gain insights into customer behaviour to predict future demand, ensuring dealerships are well-stocked and prepared for growth.
4. Sales Acceleration: By automating tasks like inventory management and demand forecasting, Automotive Cloud empowers dealerships to close deals faster and more efficiently.
What challenges does Salesforce Automotive Cloud address for the automotive industry?
It tackles several key challenges faced by the automotive industry, particularly for dealerships:
1. Inefficient workflows: The cloud automates many tasks involved in selling connected vehicles, freeing up dealership staff and streamlining processes. This saves time and resources that can be allocated to higher-value activities.
2. Weak customer connections: The Automotive Cloud fosters stronger relationships with potential buyers by simplifying communication and allowing dealerships to effortlessly track orders and payments. This builds trust and rapport, leading to improved customer satisfaction.
3. Limited sales insights: The platform provides valuable data on customer behaviour, enabling dealerships to predict future demand for vehicles. This data-driven approach ensures dealerships are well-stocked and prepared for growth opportunities.
4. Sales process bottlenecks: By automating tasks like inventory management and demand forecasting, Automotive Cloud empowers dealerships to close deals faster and more efficiently. This eliminates time-consuming manual processes and accelerates the sales cycle.
Salesforce Automotive Cloud Data Model
It’s data model centres around objects and fields designed to manage various aspects of a dealership’s operations, including:
1. Vehicles: Tracks details about vehicles throughout their lifecycle, from definition and production to sale. This includes information like model year, features, and inventory status.
2. Customers: Stores customer data, including leads, contacts, and account information. This allows dealerships to manage interactions and build relationships with potential and existing customers.
3. Stakeholders: captures information about various stakeholders involved in the automotive sales process, such as dealerships, manufacturers, and suppliers.
4. Financial Relationships: Manages financial aspects of vehicle sales, including opportunities, quotes, and warranties.
Here are some key aspects of the data model:
1. Comprehensiveness: It covers a wide range of objects relevant to dealerships, providing a holistic view of their operations.
2. Flexibility: Milestones in the vehicle lifecycle don’t have to follow a strict order, which is crucial for scenarios like pre-selling unbuilt cars.
3. Scalability: The model can handle large datasets, allowing dealerships with extensive inventory and customer bases to manage information efficiently.
Look into the data model in detail: https://help.salesforce.com/s/articleView?language=en_US&id=sf.auto_data_model.htm&type=5
Salesforce Automotive Cloud Pricing
Here are the different pricing plans from which you can choose one that suits your current business needs:
Comparing both pricing plans:
| Pricing Features | Enterprise $ 325 USD/user/month* | Unlimited $ 500 USD/user/month* |
| Driver Console | ✅︎ | ✅︎ |
| Vehicle Console | ✅︎ | ✅︎ |
| Household Management | ✅︎ | ✅︎ |
| Automotive Lead Management | ✅︎ | ✅︎ |
| Partner Performance Management | ✅︎ | ✅︎ |
| Flow for Automotive | ✅︎ | ✅︎ |
| Automotive Data Foundation | ✅︎ | ✅︎ |
1. Salesforce Automotive Cloud Enterprise Edition:
The Salesforce Automotive Cloud offers an “Enterprise” edition for $325 USD per user per month (billed annually). This edition provides a ready-made automotive CRM built on top of Salesforce’s core Sales Cloud and Service Cloud products.
2. Salesforce Automotive Cloud Unlimited Edition:
The Salesforce Automotive Cloud offers an “Unlimited” edition for $500 USD per user per month (billed annually). This tier provides unrestricted access to features and support specifically designed for the automotive industry, leveraging the functionalities of both the sales cloud and the service cloud.
Salesforce Automotive Cloud Add-ons:
Here are some of the add-ons or other Salesforce products used in the automotive cloud:
1. Sales & Service Cloud: These are the foundations of Automotive Cloud, providing the framework for managing customer data, interactions, and sales processes throughout the vehicle lifecycle.
2. Manufacturing Cloud & Consumer Goods Cloud (potentially): While not explicitly mentioned, elements of these clouds might be included to handle aspects of vehicle production and parts management (if applicable to the dealership’s business model).
3. Retail Solution: This could be integrated to provide features specific to retail sales within the dealership environment.
4. Salesforce Platform: This is the underlying platform that allows customisation and extension of the core functionalities to fit the specific needs of each dealership. View all the add-ons: all-add-ons.pdf (salesforce.com)
Is Your Dealership Stuck in the Slow
Salesforce Automotive Cloud can be the engine that revs your sales and customer satisfaction. But navigating the world of CRM solutions can be tricky.
Cloud Odyssey can be your co-pilot! Our team of Salesforce experts will help you:
· Choose the right Salesforce Automotive Cloud plan for your dealership’s needs.
· Implement the platform smoothly to minimise disruption.
· Unlock the full potential of Automotive Cloud with ongoing support and training.
Take control of the road to success. Get in touch today!
