- Joshua Behar
- Reading Time: 5 minutes
In a nutshell, field services are maintenance, installation, and repairs performed by professionals in the field or workplaces and at clients’ facilities and homes. This kind of activity encompasses multiple sectors like IT, transportation, infrastructure, utilities and other businesses. With digitalization in full swing, sustainable excellence is no longer an option. Let’s examine how it can be achieved today.
The Traditional Field Service Scene
First and foremost, it’s important to understand the types of field services customers are expecting to be performed in the best way possible today.- Installations – New customers need this crucial service, which often includes a quick onboarding or training session with the technician. This meeting with the company representative is crucial in establishing brand credibility and trust with the business. There is very little margin for error at this stage. Any kind of delay or miscommunication can create an unsatisfied customer.
- Maintenance – Companies today are putting extra emphasis on corrective and preventive maintenance because fixing broken-down equipment can prove to be costly. The latter involves capturing data from the equipment in real-time and diagnosing the problem before it escalates. This can also include periodic software updates or fine tuning to keep customers happy.
- Internet of Things (IoT) – The COVID-19 pandemic has led to a digitalization spike. The same applies to field equipment, office machinery, and home appliances. While IoT technology is elevating productivity and performance, companies need to invest time and resources in providing adoption services. Simply put, there is a steep learning curve with IoT.
While the aforementioned operations look great on paper, they can get complicated (or impossible to execute) with the increased use of cell phones.
For example, a customer can make a phone call to your field service technician while he is on his way to the service location. In other cases, your support team may be working remotely (OOO) while taking calls. This means that there is no landline recording or iffy Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) recordings due to unstable connectivity. This leads to a blind spots and incomplete service/support loops.
The end result – a no-show (or late visit) by the field service technician and a very frustrated customer due to the poor service (e.g., not showing up with the right tools). But if you think that’s all, you are mistaken. This example can further escalate when you are not available or reachable via mobile to capture and note the customer’s complaint, something that can directly impact your business performance.
Optimize Field Services – Log and Record Cellular Business Communications
Top 3 Main Challenges with Field Services
The miscommunication problem, along with missed service and complaint calls are just “the tip of the iceberg” when it comes to field services and cellular communication mishaps. This former is bound to happen because the dispatcher is the middle-man (and often the phone number exposed to the customers) who is caught in the crossfire when mixups, depalays, and no-shows happen.
- Damaged Team Coordination – Once your organization has difficulties capturing, logging, and documenting all communications between your clients and your field services, repairmen, maintenance staff, and technicians, things go south fast. Lack of information and ad hoc patches can be quite a nightmare, especially when third-party (external) technicians are involved.
Field Technician to Dispatcher: “What’s the client’s number? Nobody’s here?!?”
- Poor Productivity and Lackluster Efficiency – You must not forget that the people in the field are living human beings with feelings. They need a clear schedule and clarity with their day-to-day tasks to be really productive, while being able to improve their performance to claim their work-bonuses. But running late and not showing up to places can have the opposite effect.
Customer to Dispatcher: “What’s the technician’s number?!? He’s not here yet!!!”
- Real-Time Communication Issues – Even after the dots have been connected, you face the challenge of actually updating the end customers that you are stuck in traffic or having problems finding the location and sending them well-prepared. But your worker’s BYOD may be unreachable in many places due to poor connection or your worker being in transit.
Customer to Dispatcher: “What’s the technician’s number?!? He’s not here yet!!!”
Your workers are also probably having trouble separating business and personal calls. Carry two phones? Another ad hoc solution that seriously impacts productivity.
To sum it up, the traditional field services model is flawed and not dynamic enough to be in sync with your CRM platform, not to mention the technicians and professionals in the field. You are basically looking at frequent service delays, increased cases of customer disputes, and elevated worker frustration. This brand damage will eventually start creating accelerated churn and hurt your bottom line.
Mobile2CRM – Revolutionizing Field Services
It’s not all bad news. With Mobile2CRM, you can achieve sustainable excellence in the field. This revolutionary technology basically gives your field service staff a virtual business mobile profile, which runs smoothly on their personal smartphones. Even when they’re off-duty, the system keeps track of calls, logs and records them for later when your field service rep becomes available again so no call is lost.
How does it work? As easy as it sounds.
Besides the aforementioned CRM-integration, the Mobile2CRM SDK can be integrated into your field service management software – such as Dynamics 365 Field Service, Oracle Field Service Cloud, ServiceTitan, Jobber, etc.
The rest takes care of itself, including centralized monitoring, automatically rerouting calls to active technicians, and fully customizing the field technician’s availability windows as per his or her updated work-schedule or availability.
Simply put, there are no more field services issues caused by miscommunications, broken support loops, and reachability problems. You also enjoy:
- Faster (and Better) Training and Onboarding – Full Mobile2CRM integration means nothing falls between the cracks. Your field service workers, regardless of their seniority or position, are all on the same page. They can be updated in real-time and trained to perform their tasks in the best way possible. A huge productivity booster for instant performance spikes.
- Improved Customer Satisfaction (Brand Performance) – Customer satisfaction levels improve from the moment the field services team makes the first appointment. There is no chance of not recording (or missing) the call, text, or WhatsApp communication. The customer gets his desired service with no delays and without encountering any miscommunication.
- Improved Real Time Operational Performance – The results are also evident on the operational side of things. With this enhanced clarity and zero client disputes, you can start focusing on streamlining and prioritization, making field technicians more efficient (less working hours), and eventually also start saving on maintenance work to save investment in hardware/spare parts.
That’s not all. With more business information and customer data being logged into your CRM, you gain the ability to create and act upon BI and AI generated insights.
The Bottom Line
Separating personal and business calls on your service technicians and support teams’ smartphones with Mobile2CRM will improve your bottom line, Dramatically reduce the need for field staff to carry two handsets, reduce disputes, increase customer satisfaction, reduce churn and more.
This CRM mobile communication enabler and service management software enhancer can help you gain the edge by elevating your support and maintenance ops, while also reducing overhead costs and creating streamlined teams with minimal expenses.
Log and Record Cellular Business Communications for Optimized Field Services and Sustainable Business Growth
Joshua Behar
CEO Mobile2CRM
