Partner Case Study
/ / Egyptian ISP Boosts Sales Revenue with Award-Winning Integrated Customer Relationship
Overview
Country or Region: Egypt
Industry: Internet providers
Customer Profile
LINKdotNET develops, maintains, and promotes Internet solutions and services in the Arab world and North Africa. It employs 570 people in Egypt and the UAE to deliver world class e-solutions to business and home users.
Business Situation
LINKdotNET wanted a new customer relationship management (CRM) solution to help improve customer service and fault monitoring for both connectivity and hosted services for clients in the Middle East.
Solution
Link Egypt, the technical arm of LINKdotNET, implemented Microsoft® Business Solutions CRM integrated with Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 and Microsoft Office SharePoint® Portal Server 2003.
Benefits
n Improved sales revenue
n Proactive fault detection
n Award-winning CRM solution
n Easy integration for add-ins
n Better business performance monitoring / “Management can now make better decisions about the performance of individual sales executives, sales teams, and the whole sales performance in each country where we operate.”
Joseph Sameh CRM Project Manager LINKdotNET
LINKdotNET, one of the largest private Internet service providers (ISPs) in Egypt and the Middle East region, wanted a new customer relationship management (CRM) solution to support business expansion and growth. The ISP needed an integrated solution to improve customer service and fault monitoring of both connectivity and hosted services in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Egypt. Working with Microsoft, Link Egypt, the technical arm of LINKdotNET, implemented Microsoft® Business Solutions CRM integrated with Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 and Microsoft Office SharePoint® Portal Server 2003. Customer service has been improved because LINKdotNET now automatically detects any connectivity or server faults before customers notice them. LINKdotNET’s revenue has increased through better sales-lead conversion ratios and improved customer service and retention. Internally, the ISP is monitoring its key performance indicators (KPIs) better as a business and is benefiting from improved efficiency.
Situation
LINKdotNET is the largest private Internet service provider (ISP) in the Arab world and North Africa, following its formation in 2000 after the merger of InTouch Communications and Link Egypt. Based in Cairo, LINKdotNET is financially backed by Orascom Telecom, the largest integrated telecommunications service provider in Egypt, which serves 20 separate markets in the Middle East and North Africa. With 570 staff in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), LINKdotNET possesses one of the largest Internet bandwidths in the Middle East.
Using LINKdotNET, business customers access the Internet through digital subscriber line (DSL) and leased lines. Ramy Abdallah, Vice President–Sales, LINKdotNET, says: “We provide enterprises with global connectivity, no matter how dispersed their branches and how challenging their requirements.”
In 2004, LINKdotNET decided that it needed a new customer relationship management (CRM) solution to replace its legacy system so as to stay one step ahead of the market as it focuses on integrating technology, knowledge, and people to provide better ISP services.
Joseph Sameh, CRM Project Manager, LINKdotNET, says: “Our principal frustration was the lack of automation within our legacy CRM system. We wanted a CRM system that could automatically generate a ticket for our call centre. Finally, our legacy system was unable to provide an adequate internal service to our 500 internal users. It was unable to integrate add-ins or help our IT administrators keep track of hardware, network, and software infrastructure.”
Solution
Link Egypt, the technical arm of LINKdotNET, has implemented Microsoft® Business Solutions CRM integrated with Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) 2005 and Microsoft Office SharePoint® Portal Server 2003 for 330 users in three countries. LINKdotNET is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner for E-Commerce, and has won several awards for the exceptional work provided by Link Egypt.
Tamer Elhamy, Microsoft Business Solutions (MBS) Manager, Egypt, says: “Microsoft Egypt partners have significantly enhanced their technical level and are competing with other Microsoft partners worldwide. LINKdotNET is one of Microsoft’s premier partners, not only in the Egyptian market, but also in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and the rest of the Middle East. Its success is due to its vast experience in regional markets as well as having a highly qualified team.”
However, the choice of Microsoft CRM was well earned and resulted from close analysis of the business case for change by LINKdotNET and the delivery capacity of Link Egypt. Sameh says: “Naturally, we reviewed various other solutions before opting for Microsoft CRM. What reinforced our decision was our experience in the Microsoft .NET Framework, which is highly scalable and flexible for developers to use.”
Link Egypt put what proved to be pioneering work into integrating Microsoft CRM, MOM 2005, and other software. This involved Internet Protocol (IP) switching for the connectivity, but also integration between Microsoft CRM and MOM 2005 for the hosted services servers.
LINKdotNET has been able to develop integration with other monitoring software to troubleshoot its entire ISP infrastructure. Sameh says: “We can do what we could never manage before because our legacy system was not automatically integrated to our monitoring system. For the past year, we’ve been able to monitor DSL and leased lines as well as servers, and report and fix faults for our customers before they even notice them.”
The ISP has also improved its help-desk service by deploying SharePoint Portal Server 2003 and achieving further integration with Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 for e-mail messaging. Elhamy says: “Employees on the intranet can open new tickets on Microsoft CRM for their IT staff which are routed using the Microsoft CRM for the workflow. Integration between SharePoint Portal Server and Microsoft CRM is done using the object model of Microsoft CRM to ensure security of data and its access.”
Other add-ins include Web Parts for sales management and management summary, which are delivering new efficiencies for the business that is spread across four operating centres—in Cairo, Alexandria, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia.
Benefits
Proactive Interaction with Customers Boosts Sales
LINKdotNET is seeking to achieve its vision of leading the Middle East and Arab world in IT solutions. Abdallah says: “We recognise the value of our customers and we are dedicated to delivering what clients need and expect. We take the time and effort to build long-term relationships that in turn translate into solutions that develop and grow with our clients.”
The CRM solution is giving huge benefits to LINKdotNET’s sales team. Abdallah says: “We now have much reporting and management of the sales funnel whether it is by product, sales division, or region. An increased sales lead conversion ratio is helping us to close more sales by providing better feedback to senior management.
“But, the major reason why we are increasing sales is because we are providing our team with the right information at the right time thanks to Microsoft CRM. Better management of our account managers translates into maximisation of accounts, deals, and sales opportunities.”
Integrated Add-Ins Improve Problem Solving
LINKdotNET is using the solution to monitor all its hardware, network, and software infrastructure covering its offices in Cairo, Alexandria, Dubai, and Saudi Arabia. Elhamy says: “At any point in time you can view all the computer history as we assume that the computer name is the customer at Microsoft CRM. You can store all the information about the desktop, such as passwords, settings, or serial numbers.”
Sameh says: “By using the .NET Framework it was easy for us to extend our monitoring tools to check customers’ lines and servers. Previously, it was a major challenge for us to keep on top of the customer experience, but now tickets are automatically generated for our call centre. If there is a problem, customers are often told before they’ve even noticed it themselves.”
Easier Management of Help-desk Inquiries
Help-desk requests for LINKdotNET’s staff spread across three countries have become easier to manage by using SharePoint Portal Server integrated with Microsoft CRM.
Sameh says: “By using the company intranet our staff can open new tickets on the service model for our IT administrators. An employee will also be able to view the list of all tickers open by users and follow up on their status, know the IT owner, and drill down to view its activities. All this will be done with SharePoint Portal Server as the principal interface and client application.”
IT administrators can now see a list of open tickets through the intranet and SharePoint Portal Server. “When clicking a ticket, all its details are presented to the user and are editable,” says Sameh. “Integration between SharePoint Portal Server and Microsoft CRM takes place on the object layer of Microsoft CRM to ensure data security and access. Finally, IT staff will save time because they do not need to log onto Microsoft CRM once they are logged into SharePoint Portal Server. The integration is done making use of the single sign on.”
Improved Monitoring of Key Performance Indicators
LINKdotNET’s agility as a business has been given a huge boost with the implementation of Microsoft CRM with a number of add-ins aimed at helping management monitor performance. Sameh says: “By using the .NET Framework and development tools we have successfully implemented Web Parts for sales management and management summaries of our business performance as a whole.”
Through Web Parts in SharePoint Portal Server, account managers and sales executives can view their monthly, quarterly, and annual quotas and a list of all open opportunities with their estimated close dates during each time period. When clicking a sales opportunity, all its details are presented to the user who can then edit them.
The senior management uses management summary Web Parts for monitoring of all key performance indicators (KPIs). This helps them to follow up on open tickets in the Microsoft CRM service module and on sales quota achievements using the Microsoft CRM sales module.
Sameh says: “Management can now make better decisions about the performance of individual sales executives, sales teams, and the whole sales performance in each country where we operate.”
Solution Wins Prestigious Award for CRM Integration
LINKdotNET’s project using Microsoft CRM was awarded the accolade for Microsoft Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Integration Innovation–Client Reference Award of the Year 2004. LINKdotNET was best partner for Microsoft Egypt with regards to CRM solutions in 2004.
Hanan Abdel Meguid, Chief Solutions Officer, LINKdotNET, says: “Receiving such an important award from one of the biggest international IT corporations is a great proof that LINKdotNET is moving in the right direction to maintain and increase its leadership in the local market.”
Finally, Microsoft CRM is scalable for future growth in the LINKdotNET business portfolio. Sameh says: “The road map for Microsoft products makes us very happy because they start easy and grow fast, which has been our experience with Microsoft CRM. We see enormous scope for implementing more add-ins in future with the .NET Framework on a cost effective basis to extract more value from our existing investment in Microsoft CRM.”
Microsoft Business Solutions
Microsoft Business Solutions offers a wide range of integrated, end-to-end business applications and services designed to help small, mid-market and corporate businesses become more connected with customers, employees, partners, and suppliers.
For more information about Microsoft Business Solutions, go to:
www.microsoft.com/BusinessSolutions