SAP Customer Experience or also called SAP C/4HANA is a CRM solution suite that helps you achieve customer excellence. From the first interaction that a customer has with your company to when they decide to purchase your company, SAP Customer Experience helps you with every step in the process. SAP can provide this through numerous integrated solutions. The SAP Customer Experience suite includes solutions for sales, marketing, service, commerce, and customer data.
Times have changed!
Having standalone marketing, sales, and e-commerce solutions used to be good enough for most purposes. However, times have changed, and a simple service request from a customer is now likely to affect multiple departments.
Let us explain by giving some examples.
A new client registers on your website and searches for products. Your customer service team will not know about this, simply because the system used for registering the customer is not connected to the system of your customer service team.
Another example, when your customers agree to their data being processed. They also expect that this data is used for their benefit. Therefore, it is key that as soon as your client has registered, your marketing staff and your customer services team know they have a potential new client so that they can deliver personalized invitations and other offerings based on the collected data.
Nowadays, customers expect to receive relevant content at the right time and through their desired channels.
Customer Relationship Management of the future
Today’s CRM systems are focused on sales. However, customer relationships do not end once a sale is closed. Customer experience has become the top priority in boardrooms across the globe and with this shift in mindset and strategy, the legacy CRM systems no longer comply.
SAP C/4HANA is a “Next-generation CRM” because this solution modernized the legacy CRM solutions. SAP C/4HANA achieved it by encouraging positive customer experience at every stage of the customer journey, providing a consistent experience across all channels, and also real-time data.
This is the foundation for transforming enthusiastic customers into customers for life!
The difference between SAP Customer Experience and classic CRM
Classic CRM’s often contain solutions for sales, customer service, and sometimes even marketing. However, these solutions are rarely integrated. This is where SAP Customer Experience comes in. Because of this integration, the moment your marketing department launches a new marketing campaign, your sales teams will be automatically notified. Also, your sales teams can check whether a product is available, check its price, and the margins even before your customer makes a purchase. By doing this, your sales reps can provide your customers with pre-tailored offers of which they know, are realizable and profitable. SAP Customer Experience fully integrates with your ERP or SAP S/4HANA system and collects all the data needed for your different front office departments. The new SAP Customer Experience solution suite gives your departments the needed 360-degree view of your customers to personalize marketing, offers, and service.
Benefits of connecting your CRM system with your ERP system
With the SAP Customer Experience solutions, your sales reps have immediate real-time access to information such as product availability and the margins for a specific discount. This data is automatically pulled from your ERP system. If the sales rep adjusts the forecast for the next quarter, this information is also instantly shared with your ERP system.
What makes SAP Customer Experience different than its competitors?
The biggest difference between the SAP and its competitors is mainly the offering of all those solutions in one suite. The combination of solutions for Marketing, Sales, Commerce, Service, and Customer Data is unmatched. All the solutions are designed to increase the Customer Experience and the workforce’s productivity. The offline availability of all the solutions and the seamless integration with SAP ERP and all the benefits that come with it such as; reduced licensing costs, predefined integration capabilities, and reduced a TCO, really differentiates SAP Customer Experience from its competition.
How do customers use SAP Customer Experience?
There is not one single answer to this question. How to use SAP customer Experience depends on which solution of the SAP Customer Experience solution suite the customer has chosen to use. Implementation, transferring data, ERP integration, and integration with other solutions are time consuming and technical tasks. Moreover, not every company needs a solution suite. Many customers start with a small number of solutions and then add more during the project.
One option is to start with SAP Commerce Cloud before moving to SAP Data Cloud and SAP Marketing Cloud. Alternatively, customers can start with SAP Sales Cloud and extend with SAP Commerce Cloud and SAP Service Cloud.
The SAP Customer Experience solutions
The SAP Customer Experience solution suite also called SAP C/4HANA includes 5 different solutions; SAP Sales Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Service Cloud, Commerce Cloud, and Customer Data Cloud. All of these solutions are designed to increase customer experience and the workforce’s productivity. Understanding what SAP Customer experience requires a closer look at the different solutions individually.
SAP Marketing Cloud
Understanding your customer will help you determine where to focus your marketing efforts and which channels to use. Also, it will tell you what your customers want and not just what you can offer.
The SAP Marketing Cloud gives you the ability to pull data about your customers from any channel and then present this data in the single unified customer view tool. This data will give you a 360° view of your customers and will help you to determine how to best approach them though personalized targeting. You can then launch automated campaigns pushed through various channels such as e-mail, mobile and social media.
- Single unified customer view
- Target group identifications
- Custom omnichannel experiences
- Multichannel campaigns
SAP Commerce Cloud
The SAP Commerce Cloud helps you to take control of your sales, customer service processes, and communication, across all channels. Therefore, it will help you create the perfect customer experience. Whether online or in-store, your customer is always able to conveniently buy, return, or pick up their products.
- Omni-channel storefront
- Experienced management tool
- Order management solution
SAP Customer Data Cloud
The SAP Customer Data Cloud Allows you to turn anonymous visitors into Customers for life. It helps you build consumer trust and personalized customer relationships based on transparency and personal data control. Moreover, customers nowadays are asking for personalized marketing. To do so, a company must understand its consumer’s behavior. With the C/4HANA Customer data cloud, you can build customer profiles and provide your customers with personalized marketing they so desire.
- Customized registration
- Social Loggins
- Preference management
- User engagement and loyalty
- GDPR Compliant
SAP Sales cloud
The SAP Sales Cloud offers a comprehensive and seamless user experience to help you fully engage with your customers in real-time. With the SAP Sales Cloud, you can quickly turn valuable insights into effective action. Moreover, the solution can help you nurture your customer relationships to give you the best chance of converting your leads.
Most importantly, the SAP Sales cloud enables full integration with your back-office inventory systems or pricing. This ensures a smooth transition between your key business systems. Another great feature is that it allows you to manage and track performance even when you are offline.
- Configure-Price-Quote (CPQ)
- Sales performance management (SPM)
- Sales overviews
- Predictive analytics
SAP Service Cloud
The SAP Service Cloud will help you to provide the service that your customers expect while at the same time, increase your productivity. This is achievable with multiple tools within the SAP Service cloud. Furthermore, it allows the integration of all Service Cloud tools and platforms into one interface. Meaning that your agents no longer have to switch between screens to solve issues or create new orders.
Also, with the SAP Service Cloud, you can provide your customers with an omnichannel service experience. Whether they are on their mobile, tablet, or laptop, they can submit, view, and edit their service tickets. Moreover, with pre-built chat and chat-bot integration that understand customer request, you can automate time-consuming service processes.
Additionally, this solution is working hand-in-hand with the SAP Commerce Cloud to provide a full overview of the customer’s order history. Thus, you can help and provide them with the products and services they need.
- A full overview of the customer’s order history
- Field service management tool
- Self-service capabilities
- Provide omnichannel service experience
Conclusion
In this article, we have explained what is SAP Customer Experience or also called SAP C/4HANA. Next, how it can benefit your company, what sets it apart from other CRM solutions in the market and how to use it. Finally, we have looked at the individual solutions from the SAP Customer Experience suite.
However, please check out our other related articles on the Customer Experience to learn more about SAP C/4HANA, SAP Sales Cloud, SAP Service Cloud, or the differences between Salesforce and SAP.
