Listening to Your Customers: The Real Transformation Opportunity

Disruption and digital transformation are the latest buzzwords in this new age of the customer and now seem to be ubiquitous in board rooms across every industry. Apple, Amazon, AirBnB and Uber are some of the most frequently used examples of companies disrupting decades old existing industries and in most cases, overnight.

The four above are all great examples of technology disruptors in a physical goods setting; Amazon over retailers, Apple over old phones, AirBnB over hotels and Uber over taxis.

Why isn’t Salesforce included in this group? I strongly believe they should be and here’s why.

Marc Benioff wanted to make business applications as easy as buying a book on Amazon (back when Amazon primarily sold books). This novel idea transformed the technology industry and gave birth to the entire cloud ecosystem we now rely on each and every day. It included hardware disruption albeit not as easily comparable to the others. Salesforce took the burden of managing hardware internally and shifted it to the cloud.

The difference is in where the impact lies. The disruptors who get the most attention are all consumer-focused whereas Salesforce is business-focused.

What about the businesses using Salesforce? Where do their customers fit into this puzzle? Enter customer web portals.

Core Scientific Precious Metal Refinery is a great example of a company digitally transforming and disrupting another traditional industry using the power of Salesforce’s platform.

Have you been to a jeweler to have something sized? A dentist for a filling? Many of us have. We overlook what happens to the small scraps that are left behind. In most cases, they are precious metals and in large amounts can be quite valuable.

The old way of dealing with those scrap metals is very dated. Someone visits in-person to the jeweler or dental office, weights the scrap and makes a cash offer on the spot. It solves the problem in a convenient way and the provider gets paid and knows the scrap will be turned into something else. Sounds like a simple problem with an existing solution, where’s the disruption opportunity?

This is where Core Scientific steps in.

As a small and tech-savvy company they looked at the traditional model in the new age of the customer and asked themselves how it can be improved upon. Salesforce is their system of engagement from day one and they knew there had to be a path to connect to their customers in a whole new way.

Melissa Stark from Core Scientific describes this stage of the process, “Once we identified our proposed Portal as a key business differentiator and looked through the available options in market, Magentrix stood out for their integration capabilities with Salesforce, ease of configuration and use along with stellar reviews and customer support. It was one of the easiest decisions I’ve made!”

Having the ability to quickly and cost effectively deploy a web portal to extend Salesforce for customers is in itself the definition of digital transformation and disruption. In Core Scientific’s case they needed the ability to make each customer experience unique and more importantly a solution that was future-proof.

The new currency of business is customer success and it moves at lightning speed. They don’t need an expert or third party, and can customize most aspects of the portal themselves. Since everything is tied to their processes and workflows in Salesforce they can innovate and adapt quicker than anyone else in the market. This is now the foundation for Core Scientific’s distinctive competence and differentiates them from the competition.

In the modern age of instant gratification, removing barriers to working with customers is the new normal. Extending Salesforce to customers is a great way to differentiate offerings, reduce costs, and put a platform in place that can grow with the business.

How can you find ways to transform your business? Talking to your customers is the most common approach but the real opportunity is in listening to them. Only by listening can we find the real opportunities to make their lives easier and with the worlds #1 customer success platform in Salesforce, is readily achievable.

Sound interesting? You can read Core Scientific’s case study here, and check out Magentrix Portals for Salesforce on AppExchange.

Peter Ganza heads up marketing at Magentrix and actively writes on technology topics. His passions are anything to do with the outdoors and cars.