The release of Manufacturing Cloud is a fantastic accomplishment for Salesforce. Manufacturing Cloud takes the current pain points of the industry and turns them into an experience that is flexible in reacting to the customer’s ever-changing demands. In this blog, we are going to share with you the importance of Salesforce’s latest release.
Forecasting
Salesforce knows that the manufacturing industry contains more than just customers. Suppliers, contractors, dealers, service technicians, distributors, and internal warehouse and factory all play a crucial role in the development of your product and the experiences of your customers. Manufacturing Cloud helps users collaborate in real-time across the ecosystem to ensure your forecasts are accurate and updates to your schedules are automatically communicated to warehouse and purchasing departments.
According to Salesforce, “Manufacturers need a clear understanding of all past shipments, current production plans, and future production forecasts.” Forecasting in Manufacturing Cloud is all about taking control and allowing flexible releases to your customers’ needs. Manufacturers often have very different sales and forecasting processes that your supply and chain teams must know when to deliver new items. Manufacturing Cloud gives users the upfront awareness of what you think you’re going to sell, and when you are going to sell it. Having critical insights into the timing of selling your product will make every part of your business sufficient.
Forecasting in Salesforce isn’t just about how you’re going to sell your product on your unique timeline. It’s about knowing how you need to staff your factory: Do I need a second shift, or can I get by with the first shift? Manufacturers always have absurd spikes where their employees are forced to work long hours to get their product out. Forecasting in Manufacturing Cloud gives manufacturers an overview of all their businesses, allowing them to take control and make smarter decisions.
Partner Collaboration
Manufacturing Cloud extends benefits to all your partners to collaborate across the same forecast order and demand data in one single source of truth. For example, the Partner Community allows your vendors and partners to see and engage in real-time updates to your sales forecasts. Additionally, analytics will be tied directly to order data with additional information into the territory, customer, agreement, product line, or product performance. Improving inventory management allows manufacturers the chance to analyze their customer data, and gain insights into every product and territory performance.
A New Era
Manufacturers for far too long have used old proprietary systems that have never been scaled. In addition, these systems are not cloud friendly. Salesforce being able to tie manufacturing into the leader of the cloud is a big deal. The era of using and exporting spreadsheets or pivot tables is over. A new era is emerging for manufacturing, and it allows manufacturers to have complete control over the ability to operate their business in a much more profitable point of view.
Our experience with manufacturing dates back to our Managing Partner, Jack Corrao. Jack has developed numerous operational infrastructures to support hardware and software companies to deliver the best in breed solutions. As our #1 vertical, we are here to help you integrate and train you on best practices involving Manufacturing Cloud.
Over the next couple of weeks, we will be releasing a new blog related to Salesforce’s new Cloud. We’ll cover manufacturing pain points Salesforce solved, our favorite features, and how to integrate Manufacturing Cloud. If you would like to learn more, please contact us.
Sources
https://www.salesforce.com/blog/2019/09/introducing-manufacturing-cloud.html
All Photos can be found here: https://www.salesforce.com/products/manufacturing-cloud/overview/
