IN-DEPTH CASE STUDY
How PARI Respiratory Empowered Customers And Eased The Burden On Reps
How do you launch a B2B portal that satisfies customers, reduces the customer service burden, and doesn’t create technical debt?
This was Dale Anderson’s challenge at PARI Respiratory.
PARI Respiratory is a leading manufacturer of respiratory therapy devices. The company produces nebulizer cups, inhalation devices, airway clearance devices, and other essential therapeutic products. Doctors, pharmacists, and patients have trusted the PARI brand for more than 100 years.
THE PROBLEM
Customers Didn’t Enjoy Placing 60% Of Orders Via Phone, Fax, And Email
PARI didn’t have a self-service option for order placement. Consequently, dealers and distributors had to place orders by phone, fax, and email. This process was inconvenient for customers. They had to put together their orders from print or digital product lists, then relay that information to a customer service representative.
Customers wanted a better way to order. They asked PARI to give them a self-service B2B portal for order placement and tracking. Dale Anderson, CFO, worked closely with marketing and sales to find a way forward.
The Burden Of Manual Data Entry Kept CSRs From Doing Higher-Value Tasks
The lack of a B2B portal had internal ramifications too. Dale also needed to free up PARI’s customer service staff from manual data entry. Between rekeying orders into SAP and answering routine inquiries about order status and invoices, customer service reps had no time for proactive support activities.
Clearly, Dale needed to find a B2B portal solution for PARI. The challenge was to get it integrated with SAP ERP. This was the system of record for all business data and logic, from products and pricing to orders and invoices. If PARI was going to move customer interaction to a self-service portal, that portal couldn’t create technical debt by duplicating everything in SAP. It would need a real-time integration.
REQUIREMENTS
Data Harmony And Reduced IT Burden Through SAP Integration
PARI had experimented with an order management website for a large retail pharmacy customer. The site gave prescription patients an easy way to order refills online. However, the site couldn’t talk to SAP ERP. Orders went into a queue, and customer service reps had to type them into SAP. Ultimately, that site was just as inefficient as phone, fax, and email ordering.
Dale knew that SAP integration would be the key. However, PARI’s IT team, based in Germany, didn’t have a lot of bandwidth to dedicate to the project, so a custom SAP integration was out of the question. IT was also concerned about the integrity of SAP data and business processes. The portal couldn’t generate its own set of business data. PARI had tried that with the disconnected portal, and they weren’t doing that again.
“That site was our first attempt at online order management. It gave us a glimpse of what was possible. But we knew that before an order management site could really be successful, it had to be more comprehensive, and it had to connect with SAP.”
—Dale Anderson, CFO
Real-Time SAP Integration For Customer Experience
Dale knew that SAP integration was also important to create personalized customer experiences. If the B2B ordering portal was going to work for dealers and distributors, it had to provide the same personalized data that customers got over the phone. If it didn’t, customers would fall back on phone, fax, and email ordering—even though these processes were frustrating.
A Right-Sized Solution With A Fast Implementation
Dale wasn’t looking for a massive B2B eCommerce project. He needed to move fast, make life easier for customers, and keep SAP as the system of record. Therefore, PARI’s ideal solution would provide only what their dealers and distributors needed. And it would launch quickly under an agile methodology.
Why PARI Chose Corevist
Corevist Commerce Cloud was a perfect fit for PARI. Our prebuilt SAP integration, included in the platform, meant the company could give customers a beautiful B2B portal without duplicating all the value of SAP in another system. Our integration also empowered PARI to offer a high level of personalization within the new B2B portal. With Corevist automatically displaying the right data to each customer, every order would post to SAP without errors.
“Corevist showed us how their cloud-based platform and agile project management process could get us online quickly. They also addressed our concerns about data security and business rule enforcement.”
—Dale Anderson, CFO
THE SOLUTION
Corevist Commerce Cloud For Deep Personalization Through SAP Integration
PARI chose Corevist Commerce Cloud for their new B2B portal. With Corevist’s deep SAP integration, PARI delivered the personalized data their customers needed in a B2B portal. Every experience is governed by the right business rules—every product, every customer, every time. From order tracking and invoices, to credit status and order placement, dealers and distributors get everything they need to do business with PARI.
With Corevist Commerce Cloud, PARI leveraged their existing SAP business data and logic in the portal. This saved them from duplicating and supporting all that complexity in multiple systems. PARI’s IT team didn’t have to worry about the integrity of data or business processes. Because Corevist’s integration is direct and real-time, the B2B portal just “works.” It always shows the right information to each logged-in user, and every order posts flawlessly to SAP. There’s no need for manual callbacks to fix errors.
THE RESULTS
39% Growth In Digital Revenue
With a seamless online ordering experience (plus easy access to orders, line items, shipments, and invoices), PARI’s dealers and distributors got the B2B portal they requested. They’ve thanked PARI with healthy revenue growth and a 10.5% increase in AOV (average order value).
Customer Service Burden Reduced
As more customers came to the B2B portal to learn about products and place orders, they also discovered the easy order tracking capabilities of the portal. No one wants to make phone calls for routine inquiries, and as PARI’s customers discovered this functionality, they placed fewer calls to the customer service department.
Minimal Impact To German IT Team
“Our German SAP group is small and busy,” said Anderson. “They have to support PARI Global, not just the US. So, for this project to be successful, we had to use their time sparingly. Over the course of this project, I think Corevist had fewer than five phone calls with our SAP team. Aside from those calls, we were able to leave them alone so they could focus on other priorities.”
“We are extremely pleased with the outcome of this project. This could have been a story about competing interests and agendas, but it wasn’t. Our customers got the online ordering system they requested. Our customer service reps are now shifting their focus away from manual order entry. And, the entire project was completed with minimal disruption to our German SAP team.”
—Dale Anderson, CFO
SOLUTION USED:
Corevist Commerce Cloud
Your smart path to B2B eCommerce mastery.
Corevist Commerce Cloud offers our most sophisticated capabilities.
- Rich product content in your catalog
- Self-service product configuration
- Credit card payment supported at checkout
- Support for robust third-party integrations
Since Corevist Commerce Cloud is a managed solution with deep, prebuilt SAP integration, your IT team can rest easy—both during the project, and after GoLive.
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