Questions Every COO Should Ask Before Investing In Technology
Before launching into investing in the latest technology solution, operations managers should ask themselves the following questions.
1. What is the department’s biggest pain right now?
The purpose of this question is to prioritize and address those problems that are crucial for the proper operation of the business. In everyday operations there can be several points that cause friction and do not allow companies to operate as perfectly oiled machines.
In the case of food and beverage, mass consumption and distribution companies, the biggest pain is coordinating all the allies in the supply and distribution chain. The main problem is that this group of people works every day outside of the company’s offices, either driving supplier trucks, making deliveries, transporting products from warehouses and collection centers to points of sale, or even in distribution last mile.
These allies are third parties who do not limit their services to a particular company. Sometimes several companies use the same network of allies to operate.
Being third parties, companies do not invest in developing communication channels with allies and that is where the problems appear. Partners typically only have one hotline to answer questions or receive assistance. This generates delays and a broken phone effect that ends up complicating even more the delivery processes of orders, products, etc.
Suppose the answer to the question is then:
Failures in communication with the supply chain and distributors that delay operations and put at risk the fulfillment of different contracts with customers.
The second question to ask in that case is:
2. What solutions exist to improve communication and regain control of operations?
Currently there are several tools to communicate with allies. The cell phone, however, is a tool that in the last decade had an increase in its adoption and is the most used for personal and work communication around the world.
There are several applications for business communication, some focus on collaboration within organizations such as Slack, Teams, Sales Force, while others focus on business communication with WhatsApp Business API, Telegram, Drift and Instagram clients.
However, these last tools require aggregators and integrations that allow the messaging service to be connected with systems such as CRMs or ERPs at an additional cost.
However, until recently there was a vacuum in the market. There was no solution that would improve communication with allies in the supply chain and suppliers, and that was also flexible enough to be used in communications with the end customer without requiring any aggregator.
To address this corporate pain, we created Twnel.
Through Twnel Messenger, partners can receive assistance from a SuperBot and thus free up the attention of customer service center agents and vendors.
Additionally, conversations can be monitored from a communications panel or “control tower” where it is easy to identify the number of incoming conversations, the waiting time and the topics for which assistance is most frequently requested.
3. How long do I have to implement a solution?
Regardless of which solution is chosen, companies today need fast results more than ever.
Implementing WhatsApp Business API-type solutions with the excuse that all partners already use WhatsApp can be costly in the long run. In addition, the cost of implementing a solution of this type includes the cost of the different suppliers that manufacture the Chatbots, have a control tower to centralize conversations, integrate databases and integrate service channels.
Thus, not only is time invested in acquiring the WhatsApp service, but it is also necessary to investigate which is the best provider for the other services and that the latter are adapted to WhatsApp; without also taking into account the permanent risk that arises when using a free communication tool, provided by a company whose business model is advertising and where the rules of the game can change at any time.
Twnel, being an all-in-one solution, can be implemented in a large company in a matter of days, where in the end, both the allies and the agents who take charge of the control tower are able to start using the tool without requiring more than a little training of less than 30 minutes.
4. What should I do to find the solution that best suits my company?
Explore the different options that exist and once you see that Twnel is the communication solution that increases productivity, improves communications and returns control of operations to the largest companies in the region, call us and speak with one of our experts to see the tool in action for free.
More than 1,000 national and multinational companies are improving communication and processes with their allies using twnel.
Yours may be next.