Before exploring the features of Microsoft Dynamics 365, let’s find out why manufacturing enterprises need to rely on technological advancements to maintain a competitive edge.
Digital transformation is no longer a buzzword, and Industry 4.0 is not a far-fetched future. They have prevailed – changing business dynamics, industrial landscapes, consumers’ expectations, and operational demands.
Manufacturing businesses are also not an exception to these changing dynamics!
Manufacturing businesses face multiple challenges, including the increasing demand for shorter product lifecycles, fierce market competition, a wave of globalization, and the need to be on top of customer services.
Combating all these challenges can become a major hurdle because bringing change, minimizing disruptions, building better customer relationships, and reducing time to market don’t happen without a comprehensive mechanism equipped to address these issues simultaneously.. That’s why businesses need a unified platform with capabilities to cater to all these issues.
However, according to a report by Statista, companies face internal and external barriers to adopting new technologies in the manufacturing industry.
However, Microsoft has tried to remove these barriers with Microsoft Dynamics 365, a unified system with enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM) capabilities.
What is Microsoft Dynamics 365?
Microsoft Dynamics 365 combines the system and data to unfold improved understanding of customer management and lead generation. Moreover, the customer database easily identifies qualified leads and opportunities worth exploring.
Learn How Dynamics 365 Can Transform Your Workflow
Its highly customizable nature with advanced extensions gives it an edge over other CRM systems. But its capabilities are not limited to sales and customer management processes. It also streamlines other business aspects, processes, and operations to ensure efficient performance.
Here are a few benefits of Microsoft Dynamics 365:
These are just a few benefits. Once you add Microsoft Dynamics 365 into your system, your processes and operations take a 360-degree (err… or 365-degree!) change.
Now you know what Microsoft Dynamics 365 is and how it makes a difference for manufacturing businesses. Let’s explore its different features.
Here are a few features of Microsoft Dynamic 365 that can change the fate of manufacturing enterprises for the better:
1: Improve Visibility with the Data
Microsoft Dynamics 365 collects data from different sources, such as production, finance, sales, and customer feedback, and offers meaningful insights through visual representation of data. Visualizing the data cuts the guesswork and gives a clear picture of the situation by decreasing the time-to-market and improving performance. Manufacturing businesses can’t work on ifs and buts; everything should be clear and streamlined. That’s what this Dynamics 365 feature does – it helps to make agile and actionable processes.
2: Enhance Asset Management Capabilities
The asset management feature is the go-to tool for managers because it automates asset management and maintenance jobs. It allows companies to diagnose issues, efficiently carry out maintenance work, and ensure office equipment service is on time.
Real-time insights further facilitate manufacturers to remotely resolve machine issues and optimize equipment lifecycle by reporting the machine’s performance. Moreover, the asset management feature also improves the production process by ensuring 24-hour continuous uptime and minimization of any blockage.
3: Supply Chain Plan Alignment
Supply chain management bridges the gap between people and goods. Let’s agree that taking an order, keeping track of orders, ensuring the availability of products, sourcing them for shipment, and ensuring on-time shipment jumble up to be major hurdles. A single mistake can jam the whole system. Dynamics 365 gives you a predictive supply chain that helps in:
- Designing products accurately and speedily
- Strategically planning with meaningful and actionable insights
- Fulfilling customer expectations with on-time delivery
- Minimizing workforce issues with warehouse automation
4: Client Portal Management
With the client portfolio management tool, it has become a lot easier for manufacturing organizations to monitor the client’s order history, details, and invoices whenever they want. It helps offer seamless customer service, simplify sales, and maintain customer loyalty.
Collect data based on customer’s buying patterns and the driving force behind their purchase, do predictive analysis, and offer them services based on received insights. It will help you give your customers customized services with personalized messaging.
5: Production Planning
Capturing data related to various levels of buying patterns and demand helps in improved production planning and sales estimation. Moreover, it becomes easier to make a robust production plan when you know the specific demands and production needs.
Production planning tools also make customer evaluation and segmentation easier, so the sales team can estimate better sales growth. That, in turn, facilitates making viable sales plans based on insightful data and customer behavioral analysis.
Conclusion
Microsoft Dynamics 365 has appeared as a panacea for businesses looking to survive and thrive in today’s competitive market. It has a solution for all industries, including manufacturing. But your dilemma doesn’t end with hiring a Microsoft Dynamics 365 Consultant. You should stay on top of the latest technological trends to ensure that the CRM implementation team only adds features that you want and stays within the budget. Once you adopt an advanced Microsoft technology, your business changes drastically for all the right reasons. But before you call a CRM solution provider, make sure to be clear of your goals and plans. This will help you go a long way!
