6 strategies to boost sales productivity – Microsoft Dynamics 365
Read here How Microsoft Dynamics 365 helps in Sales, Read 6 strategies to boost sales productivity.
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Customer Story : CRANE Worldwide Logistics centralised their sales platform with Microsoft Dynamics 365
As it approached its 10-year anniversary and its first billion in revenue, global logistics and freight company Crane Worldwide Logistics looked for a modern platform that brought all its sales tools into one place. With the Microsoft Relationship Sales solution, which brings together LinkedIn Sales Navigator and Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Sales, its salespeople have the tools to drive more meaningful engagements with customers, convert opportunities faster, and create more revenue. Just by getting the team using the platform, we’ve seen an uplift in activity in all areas. We’ve had record growth since implementing Microsoft Relationship Sales—the last quarter was excellent for us. John Jergens: Vice President of Global Sales Crane Worldwide Logistics A global sales team From a startup created in the risky business climate of the 2008 recession, Crane Worldwide Logistics has become a major player in the global transport and logistics industry, on track to hit USD1 billion in revenue in 2019. Created by former Eagle Global Logistics executives and headquartered in Houston, Texas, Crane Worldwide aims to provide customers with full transparency into its supply chains by coupling talented people with game-changing technology. But with salespeople spread across the globe, Crane Worldwide found itself with a visibility problem. “We weren’t all working on a common platform, so we were lacking in visibility,” says John Jergens, Vice President of Global Sales at Crane Worldwide. “We knew we had a vast sales pipeline out there, but there wasn’t much data available on it—so we couldn’t see how robust it was.” From data silos to connected visibility A key part of the Crane Worldwide ethos is providing customers with meaningful interactions—and that relies on having a customer relationship management (CRM) solution that salespeople can use to build and maintain relationships and convert opportunities more effectively. But, with a seven-year-old siloed CRM system that it had simply outgrown, the company lacked the tools its salespeople needed. “The previous system never had very good adoption,” Jergens adds. “It just wasn’t very functional.” So, the team went looking for a platform that could replace it. With implementation support from Microsoft Partner Network member PowerObjects, Crane Worldwide deployed the Microsoft Relationship Sales solution, a powerful combination of Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Sales and LinkedIn Sales Navigator, to support personalized, meaningful customer engagements. The team was already using LinkedIn Sales Navigator and Microsoft Office 365, so Dynamics 365 for Sales was the ideal addition to the Crane Worldwide ecosystem. “We saw how Microsoft Relationship Sales could help us focus on being easy to work with from a customer’s perspective,” explains Jergens. “So this whole deployment was part and parcel of becoming easier to do business with.” Now, just six months into deployment, Crane Worldwide has 300 Microsoft Relationship Sales users in its ranks, including 150 direct sellers along with employees from its marketing and account management teams. New processes, simpler sales Using the Microsoft Relationship Sales solution, Crane Worldwide salespeople have already changed the way they work. And they’re reaping the benefits of the visibility they’ve gained into the sales pipeline. “Once we rolled out Microsoft Relationship Sales, the overwhelming response was that it’s really easy to use, and it doesn’t take much time,” says Jergens. “We created a very simple weekly routine where our sellers spend about 30 minutes adding new data into Dynamics 365 for Sales. That’s just six minutes a day to keep everything up to date.” With faster processes freeing up more time for the sales team, sellers can focus their energy where it matters most—building the customer relationships that turn into revenue. And, at the end of each week, management can analyze activity through a global dashboard, which combines CRM and customer interaction data into detailed executive reports that show how salespeople are turning relationships into revenue. “With Microsoft Relationship Sales, we can generate KPIs that tell us what a healthy pipeline should look like. We look at the number of prospects and targets, how long the sales cycle takes, and the time from when we close an account to the time it generates revenue,” explains Jergens. “And if the pipeline isn’t where it should be, we can support the sellers with the resources that they need—it’s more productive all around.” A centralized sales platform Because Microsoft Relationship Sales brings together so many sales capabilities, Crane Worldwide sellers have everything they need to do their jobs in one place. Previously, they had to manage a relationship from scoping to sale across disconnected tools and platforms, far from an efficient process. “It’s difficult to put a number on what it’s like to manage 30 or 40 customers with an email folder and a spreadsheet,” says Jergens. “Now, once the salesperson finds a prospect using LinkedIn Sales Navigator, they use Dynamics 365 for Sales to easily track those conversations. Instead of creating and referencing a lot of notes, they can quickly link activities and discussions through Microsoft Relationship Sales.” With LinkedIn Sales Navigator and Dynamics 365 for Sales together, salespeople can start building the context they need to deliver a meaningful interaction before the first contact even occurs. Insight into potential prospects’ roles, connections, and priorities through LinkedIn Sales Navigator is fed straight into Dynamics 365 for Sales—increasing conversion chances from the very start. “It’s had a direct impact on the time it takes to develop customer relationships, because we have true visibility into those opportunities now,” explains Jergens. A built-in assistant also sends prompts to help sellers accelerate the sales cycle, reminding them to contact a lead that might go cold or nudge an opportunity as it approaches its estimated close date. A roadmap for integration In businesses the world over, sales and marketing teams struggle to communicate and collaborate effectively. As the sales team adapts to Microsoft Relationship Sales, Crane Worldwide is already adopting more of the solution’s capabilities to help sales and marketing stay on the same path. “The marketing teams are able to work in tandem with the sales team to help them understand how marketing activities can help nurture their
Dynamics 365: 2020 release wave 2 plan
The Dynamics 365 release plan for the 2020 release wave 2 describes all new features releasing from October 2020 through March 2021. You can either browse the release plan online or download the document as a PDF file. The PDF file also includes information about Power Apps, Power Automate, Power Virtual Agents, Power Platform governance and administration, and Common Data Model and data integration. The Microsoft Power Platform features coming in the 2020 release wave 2 have been summarized in a separate release plan as well as a downloadable PDF. 2020 release wave 2 overview The 2020 release wave 2 for Dynamics 365 brings new innovations that provide you with significant capabilities to transform your business. The release contains hundreds of new features across Dynamics 365 applications including Marketing, Sales, Customer Service, Field Service, Finance, Supply Chain Management, Human Resources, Commerce, Fraud Protection, and Business Central. Marketing Dynamics 365 Marketing improves the customer journey canvas experience and adds integration with Microsoft Teams for virtual events. Segmentation is enhanced with a new natural language experience to create and consume segments, helping eliminate the specialized skills needed to build complex segments. Sales Dynamics 365 Sales continues emphasis on simplified experiences, app integrations, gamification, a new mobile experience for quick access to customer information, and new enhancements to forecasting to natively create and manage bottom-up sales forecast processes. Dynamics 365 Sales Insights continues investments across multiple areas: sales acceleration, conversation intelligence, relationship intelligence, and advanced forecasting and pipeline intelligence with predictive lead and opportunity scoring to help sales teams uncover top deals. Dynamics 365 Product Visualize empowers sellers and accelerates complex sales processes by showcasing and customizing products in their real-world environment. Sellers can place a 3D digital twin of a product in their customer’s environment and make detailed notes about their requirements. Service Dynamics 365 Customer Service expands agent productivity capabilities enabling agents to engage in multiple sessions simultaneously. Omnichannel for Customer Service is enhanced with additional extensibility options to enable integration with mobile applications, Microsoft bot framework, and outbound messaging channels. Dynamics 365 Customer Service Insights adds new capabilities to help agents using similar case suggestions to resolve customer issues quickly and easily. A new analytical view for customer service managers helps them focus on key support areas that need attention. These highlights will also be included directly in the core Customer Service Hub app so that users can get insights in context without having to switch between applications. Dynamics 365 Field Service continues to add intelligence capabilities including a new Field Service dashboard for monitoring key KPIs and work order completion metrics. There are many user experience enhancements to enable proactive service delivery. The Field Service mobile app is enhanced with capabilities such as push notifications and real-time location sharing. This release wave also includes scheduling enhancements such as multiday manual scheduling and enhanced skill-based matching. Dynamics 365 Remote Assist expands its range of scenarios beyond calls, allowing technicians to perform activities such as capture service and repairs data, perform surveys and walk-throughs independently, and derive service insights from their service operations. Finance and Operations Dynamics 365 Finance continues to focus on automating common tasks to reduce the number of manual processes and add insights and intelligence in Finance. Asset leasing enhances the core capabilities of Finance and the global coverage for Finance continues to expand in this release wave. Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management expands planning optimization for Manufacturing to perform supply and production planning in near real time with in-memory services. Enhancements to Product Information Management include engineering change management and product versioning capabilities. Cost Management includes new features that will enable global companies maintain multiple cost accounting ledgers by allowing dual currency and dual valuation. Enhancements to the job card device include a new user experience and a new feature to enable reporting serial numbers. Dynamics 365 Guides is focusing on intelligent workflows in this release wave. By taking advantage of data and AI innovations, work instructions can be configured to adjust on the fly based on operator inputs. In addition, insights will make it easier to use time-tracking data and connect that data to your business. Dynamics 365 Project Operations unifies operational workflows to provide the visibility, collaboration, and insights needed to drive success across teams from sales to finance. Project Operations connects your sales, resourcing, project management, and finance teams within a single application to win more deals, accelerate delivery, empower employees, and maximize profitability. Human Resources Dynamics 365 Human Resources expands leave and absence and benefits management capabilities to transform the employee experience. Employees and managers will be able to manage leave and absence directly from Microsoft Teams. This release wave enables streamlined integrations to recruiting and payroll partners, thereby building a Human Capital Management (HCM) ecosystem. Commerce Dynamics 365 Commerce continues to expand capabilities enabling non-developers to easily design and manage digital commerce experiences. Customers can increase lift online and in store with “Shop similar looks” for recommendations. Customers can discover and deploy third-party services, connectors, modules, and themes from Microsoft AppSource. Dynamics 365 Connected Store adds a number of new capabilities such as integration with Dynamics 365 Commerce, front-line worker task assignment and tracing with Microsoft Teams, integrated workflows with Microsoft Power Platform, intelligent command center, store analytics, and store insights solutions such as anomaly detection, inventory recommendations, and shift management recommendations. Fraud Protection Dynamics 365 Fraud Protection adds integration with Dynamics 365 Commerce and a new “manual review” capability that allows customers to use the Fraud Protection rules experience to flag transactions for review, and then allow expert human agents to consume and adjudicate those transactions. SMB Dynamics 365 Business Central investments for this release wave include service enhancements to meet the demands of a rapidly growing customer base, improved performance, handling of file storage, geographic expansion together with support for Group VAT, top customer-requested features, and deeper integration with Microsoft Teams. Customer data platform Dynamics 365 Customer Insights enables every organization to unify disparate data—be it transactional, observational or behavioral sources—to gain a single view of customers and derive intelligent insights that drive key business processes. Dynamics 365 Product Insights enables organizations to understand their customers’ journey, usage,
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Case Study : Abu Dhabi government builds one-of-a-kind integrated customer service platform using Microsoft Dynamics 365
Established to lead excellence in government services, Abu Dhabi Digital Authority (ADDA) strives to lead the digital future of Abu Dhabi. Taking advantage of Microsoft Dynamics 365, Power BI, and Azure solutions, TAMM integrates Abu Dhabi government services to provide communities and businesses with a seamless, proactive, and personalized customer experience, one that promises to change the way UAE citizens and residents interact with their government for the better. [/vc_column_text][vc_column_text][/vc_column_text][vc_column_text] Abu Dhabi as a digital innovation destination Abu Dhabi Digital Authority (ADDA) has a vision that offers a new way of interacting with the citizens and residents in Abu Dhabi and throughout the world. ADDA’s vision embraces technology that delivers value through innovation and service excellence. ADDA is building a digital hub that integrates Abu Dhabi’s 1,600 government and business services with over 55 entities into one central platform. This modernizing journey toward global competitiveness means citizens can look forward to a smarter, happier future with better quality of life—all thanks to the TAMM integrated services platform. Digital smart government, powered by Microsoft The TAMM integrated service platform is an intelligent customer support center. Taking advantage of Microsoft Dynamics 365, Power BI, and Azure solutions, TAMM unifies Abu Dhabi’s government and business services into 80 integrated journeys. This integration merges a 360-degree view of customers’ information and their interactions across the government into a seamless, proactive, and personalized customer experience. It promises to completely revolutionize the way citizens interact with the government. Dynamics 365 creates a seamless omni-channel experience. The portal provides United Arab Emirates (UAE) citizens, residents, and visitors with a range of government services through one access point. Operating with Azure and AI increases efficiency and improve customer experience through fast, agile responses to citizen information requests. It provides stakeholders and field workers with decision-making capabilities through in-depth business intelligence on customer behavior. “Through Power BI, we are now able to ensure that all government data is viewed, including our services that are unified and user-centric,” explains Fatima Al Obeidli, Director – Contact Center Business Management Department at ADDA. “This drives our commitment to superior customer service. The Power BI unified dashboard replaces the multiple reports of the past, ensuring one-of-a-kind customer service experience.” Microsoft’s customer-first approach has been proven by its profound understanding of ADDA’s vision. “The aim is to establish a unique service model for Abu Dhabi government. Microsoft is a trusted partner, providing us with tools and mechanisms that empower us to lead the digital future of Abu Dhabi,” explains H.E. Saeed Al Mulla, Director, Government Services at ADDA. Powered by innovation, inspired by society “By leading with a modern, reliable, and integrated digital system that serves all walks of life in society, ADDA supports the business environment, attracts more investments into Abu Dhabi, and enhances the Emirate’s global competitiveness,“ says Ali Nimer, Strategy Advisor to the Director General and Head of Digital Excellence Office at ADDA. Through Power BI, we are now able to ensure that all government data is viewed, including our services that are unified and user-centric. This drives our commitment to superior customer service. The Power BI unified dashboard replaces the multiple reports of the past, ensuring one of a kind customer service experience. – Fatima Al Obeidli: Contact Center Business Management Department
Why organizational change projects fail and how to prevent implementation disaster
New IT installations often fail. At least that’s the widespread belief surrounding organizational change initiatives today. One frequently cited study from the 1993 book Reengineering the Corporation goes as far as saying that as many as 70% of the organizations that undertake a reengineering effort do not achieve the dramatic results they intended. A more recent McKinsey survey of more than 1,500 executives who had undertaken a significant change effort in the past five years found that only 38% of respondents said “the transformation was ‘completely’ or ‘mostly’ successful at improving performance. After two decades of hearing about high failure rates related to change, it’s unsurprising that business leaders are wary of organizational change projects. Organizational psychologist Nick Tasler explained that these negative biases can create a toxic self-fulfilling prophecy. “When a change project falls a day behind schedule, if leaders and employees believe that successful change is an unlikely outcome, they will regard this momentary setback as the dead canary in the coalmine of their change initiative. (Never mind the fact that three other initiatives are still on time or ahead of schedule),” he wrote in an article for Harvard Business Review. “Suddenly, employees disengage en masse and then the change engine begins to sputter in both perception and reality.” Yes, change is hard, and complex IT implementation projects, particularly ERP installations, can be particularly challenging. But it doesn’t mean they are doomed to failure. So where do you start? How can you choose the right technology for your retail business, and ensure that the implementation project runs as smoothly as possible and you get the most from your investment? Here are some of the main causes for failure in any organizational change initiative, and how can you prevent them from happening: Mistake #1: Failure to plan Issue: An outdated legacy system is impacting business performance, and it needs replacing quickly. In their rush to get the project going, business management jump straight into the implementation without taking the time to develop a well thought-out organizational change management plan. Solution: Don’t be tempted to cut corners in your planning. Analyze your business, decide what should be prioritized, and understand all the different ways the project will impact your routines at every stage of the process. “Companies should start by analyzing their current and future requirements and processes,” says Gunnar Ingimundarson, Chief Consulting Officer at LS Retail. “How many software solutions are they currently using, and what are they used for? Map out the disparate solutions in the stack, alongside their dependencies and interconnections. The next step is to figure out where they can draw the biggest – or quickest – benefits. Is your POS system not generating the information you need on stock levels and product visibility? Or, are there integrations that repeatedly cause problems or break down? Do you experience missing data? Identify the area(s) where a new system would bring immediate value in terms of savings or returns. That’s where you should start, and that should determine your priorities.” Once the priorities are set, break the project down into manageable chunks, from pilot phase to initial implementation to company-wide rollout. Consider when it’s most appropriate to start each phase of the installation so you won’t place unnecessary strain on your business during busy times. Mistake #2: Key stakeholders aren’t onboard, or have unrealistic expectations Issue: Management want the new technology in place quickly and only focus on the end goals. They get frustrated by how long the project is taking and threaten to pull the plug. Or they wonder why the new software isn’t being adopted widely and successfully when they failed to communicate the changes to everybody in the business and get company-wide buy in. Solution: All stakeholders need to be committed to the project’s success right from the beginning, and to clearly understand the project’s scope and goals. “Internal resistance can kill even the best implementation project,” says Eric Miller, Regional Director for the Americas at LS Retail, building on his 13 years of experience in software implementations. “Get the buy-in from all stakeholders from the start, and make sure that the goals, objectives and expected end results of the project are clear and communicated from you to the stakeholders, and from the stakeholders to all the customer parties involved. It never pays off to sell a dream you can’t deliver on.” Bring together personnel from different departments to understand their requirements and what outcomes they hope to achieve from the implementation. Similarly, they need to understand how much time should be devoted to a project like this and ensure project teams are given sufficient time to carry out the work. Set realistic timeframes from the start, and ensure everyone knows exactly what’s required of them. Mistake #3: Unforeseen changes throw the project off track Issue: Even the best prepared projects encounter hurdles along the way, but if unforeseen issues arise and major milestones are missed, it can be tempting to throw in the towel and deem the entire project a failure. Solution: Know that when you’re dealing with a large-scale IT implementation, it’s hard to plan for every eventuality. Be willing to adapt and take a different approach if it ultimately means the project will be a success. “What was deemed to be the best approach initially may need to change – this might even happen after the pilot is completed. I have seen companies that went through multiple pilots before finding the right balance. It’s a learning process, and it’s never over,” says Miller. It’s worth learning everything you can from the pilot implementation. Instead of rushing on to roll out store #2, take a moment to see how the system is working and to identify any issues that you couldn’t have planned for in your testing environment. Success comes to those who take a considered approach. Mistake #4: Picking the wrong technology partner Issue: It may be tempting to go for the cheapest technology provider, but cheapest upfront may not necessarily deliver the long-term business value you hoped for. You quickly realize they can’t help you achieve your outcomes, because they lack drive,
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Self-Service Kiosks for Restaurants: Why the Line Length Matters More Than You Think
INTRODUCTION Almost three out of four customers at quick-service establishments say they would leave the line if seven people were waiting ahead of them; that figure rises to more than nine out of ten when the queue reaches ten people. This is not merely a minor loss of conversions, but actual revenue vanishing before an order is even placed. Restaurant self-service kiosks exist precisely to eliminate this friction point, and adoption data confirms their effectiveness: McDonald’s rolled out kiosks across its 14,000 U.S. locations and has recorded measurable sales increases directly linked to their use. Kiosks do more than reduce wait times—they also change order size The most interesting effect of self-service ordering isn’t speed. What really matters is that customers order differently when they don’t have someone standing behind them or a cashier waiting for them to make a decision. Concession stands at Dodger Stadium saw a 20% increase in average order size after introducing self-service kiosks; meanwhile, Subway has reported that customers using kiosks are more likely to add extras and spend more per visit than those ordering at the counter. The key lies in removing social pressure from the ordering process: customers can explore options at their own pace, notice add-on items, try new combinations, and avoid rushing to choose their usual or “safe” order simply to avoid holding up the line. The integration choice that determines whether the system truly works Many restaurants add kiosks as a standalone system running its own software, linked to their existing point-of-sale (POS) system. This approach entails managing two systems that require constant integration, updates, and maintenance: every menu change, price update, and new promotion must be implemented twice. A unified restaurant management platform, such as LS Central, avoids this issue by running kiosks on the same POS system already used by cashiers. This is crucial, as most restaurant management systems are too complex to implement on a self-service kiosk without specific staff training—which would defeat the very purpose of self-service. Menu customization becomes a sales tool, not just a display option Since kiosk menus operate on the same system as the POS, changes are applied instantly across all locations, eliminating the need to configure each kiosk individually. This opens up real tactical possibilities: A/B testing menu item presentations to see what actually drives upselling, highlighting high-margin items at the top of the screen, or simplifying options during peak hours to speed up ordering when time is of the essence. It also solves a practical inventory issue. If stock for a specific product runs low, the kiosk menu can update in real time to promote what is actually available—prioritizing chicken over beef or offering milkshakes when the smoothie machine goes down—instead of having to manually cross out items on a physical menu board. The kitchen benefits just as much as the front counter Orders placed at kiosks are automatically sent to a kitchen display system and organized by preparation station, ensuring that items from the same order are ready simultaneously rather than arriving piecemeal. The system can alert staff to orders that have been pending for too long, and front-of-house staff can view order status in real time; this allows customers to know exactly when they will receive their food, so they don’t have to linger near the counter. Is it a passing fad or a permanent shift? Self-service kiosks in quick-service restaurants are not a new idea; For over a decade, the industry has questioned the slow pace of its adoption. What has changed is that the technology has matured enough for major brands to commit to it on a large scale, and customer expectations have evolved accordingly: diners increasingly expect self-service as a standard option, and a significant number clearly prefer it over ordering with a cashier. Are you considering installing self-service kiosks in your restaurant? Talk to Trident about implementing LS Central at your locations.
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Advancing Azure service quality with artificial intelligence: AIOps
INTRO Somewhere on Azure’s infrastructure, a disk was predicted to fail — and your workload was migrated off it before that failure ever happened. That’s not a hypothetical. It’s Azure AIOps, Microsoft’s use of AI and machine learning to detect, predict, and fix infrastructure problems before they become customer-facing outages. For a business evaluating cloud reliability, this matters less as an engineering curiosity and more as a straight answer to a practical question: why does Azure keep improving its uptime numbers year over year? Failures Get Predicted, Not Just Detected Traditional infrastructure monitoring tells you something broke. Azure’s hardware failure prediction model tries to catch it before it does — flagging disks, memory, and networking hardware likely to fail, then automatically live-migrating affected virtual machines to healthy nodes. The customer impact of a hardware failure, in the cases this catches, is zero downtime rather than an outage ticket. Faster VM Provisioning, Powered by Prediction Azure’s pre-provisioning system uses historical deployment patterns to predict what VM configurations customers are likely to request — and creates a pool of them in advance. When a matching request comes in, it’s assigned from that pool instead of built from scratch. The practical effect for a business is faster deployment latency, without needing to know any of the prediction modeling happening behind it. Incidents Get Resolved Before They Escalate Azure tracks incident response against three metrics: time to detect, time to engage, and time to mitigate. AI-driven anomaly detection — built to catch not just obvious spikes but slow-building patterns like memory leaks — feeds directly into routing the right engineering team to an issue immediately, and in some cases triggers automated fixes with no human step at all. For a business running production workloads, that translates to shorter, less frequent disruptions. Safe Rollouts Prevent Widespread Impact Microsoft rolls out infrastructure changes constantly, which creates real risk of a bad change spreading before anyone notices. An internal system (code-named Gandalf) analyzes rollout patterns to catch issues that surface hours or days later, flagging suspicious changes before they propagate further. This is part of why platform-wide incidents from routine updates are rare rather than common. What This Actually Means for Your IT Roadmap None of this requires action on your end — it’s infrastructure Microsoft operates on your behalf. What it does mean is that Azure’s reliability improvements aren’t marketing claims; they’re the output of a systematic prediction-and-automation investment, which is a reasonable thing to weigh when comparing cloud providers on uptime and reliability, not just price. Want to know how Azure’s reliability engineering translates to SLAs for your specific workload? Talk to Trident about your cloud infrastructure options. FAQ What is Azure AIOps?Azure AIOps is Microsoft’s use of AI and machine learning to predict, detect, and resolve infrastructure issues on Azure automatically — including hardware failure prediction, faster VM provisioning, and automated incident response. Does Azure AIOps require any setup from customers?No — it operates at Microsoft’s infrastructure level. Customers benefit from improved reliability and uptime without configuring anything themselves. How does Azure predict hardware failures before they happen?Microsoft Research and Azure built models that analyze disk, memory, and networking behavior to flag components likely to fail, then automatically migrate affected virtual machines to healthy hardware.
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Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management: What You Can’t See Is Costing You Money
INTRO Manufacturers don’t lose money on supply chain problems they can see. They lose it on the ones buried in siloed systems and manual processes — a part sourced from the same supplier out of habit rather than cost, a shipment that could’ve been consolidated but wasn’t flagged in time. Dynamics 365 supply chain management exists to surface exactly those blind spots, connecting sales, supplier, fulfillment, and product data into one system instead of five disconnected ones. IoT Is Where Supply Chain Visibility Starts Real-time visibility into how equipment and parts actually perform begins with connecting them — a single IoT-enabled platform bridging back-office and front-office processes rather than treating shop-floor data as separate from planning data. Digital twin modeling takes this further, letting manufacturers track wear on parts in real time and catch simple inefficiencies that are easy to miss otherwise: sourcing from a familiar supplier by default, for instance, when a comparable part is available elsewhere at lower cost. Analytics Turns Visibility Into Action Visibility alone doesn’t fix anything — it has to feed decisions. Built-in analytics and machine learning let a supply chain system dynamically adjust production and distribution using data most planning tools ignore, like public weather data feeding more accurate delivery forecasts. The same analytics can flag shipment consolidation or expediting opportunities automatically, catching savings a manual review would likely miss — savings that pass through directly to fulfillment cost. Real-Time, Mobile Access Closes the Loop Consolidated data still isn’t useful if the people who need it can’t see it where they’re standing. Decision-makers need the same real-time information whether they’re on the factory floor or at headquarters, with the ability to collaborate across locations without switching systems. This is less about a dashboard and more about removing the extra step of hunting for information before a problem can even be diagnosed. Why Dynamics 365 Specifically Dynamics 365 removes the traditional divide between ERP and CRM, letting employees move between supply chain and customer-facing work without switching systems entirely. Deployment flexibility — cloud, or hybrid combining on-prem and cloud — means a manufacturer can extend existing infrastructure investments rather than replacing them wholesale, which is often the difference between a deployment measured in days versus months. The practical result for a manufacturer: rich analytics, embedded intelligence, and partner-built applications running on one system, rather than reconciling ERP and CRM as two separate sources of truth. Want to see where visibility gaps might be costing your supply chain? Talk to Trident about a Dynamics 365 supply chain assessment.
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AI and AR in Retail: The Return-Rate Problem They’re Actually Solving
INTRODUCTION Each returned item represents a double cost for the retailer: once when shipping it and once when processing its return. AI and augmented reality (AR) in retail largely exist to avoid that round trip in the first place, helping the shopper choose the right product the first time. Virtual try-on technology alone has been shown to significantly increase conversion rates in e-commerce and reduce returns by over 8%; figures that explain why beauty, fashion and home goods retailers were the first to adopt it. Take the fitting room to the client’s living room Opticians were pioneers in this area for an obvious reason: glasses are a product that people do not buy without seeing how they look on their own face. The virtual try-on solved this problem entirely online, and some retailers have gone further by using AI to recommend frame shapes suitable for the customer’s face, rather than forcing them to guess which one will fit them. The same logic applies to any situation where excess options are the true barrier to purchase. A beauty catalog with hundreds of thousands of products is impossible for a human being to explore; However, an AI-based recommendation service can reduce that number to a few relevant options based on the user’s search and purchase history, transforming an overwhelming catalog into a short, personalized selection. Make the “infinite hallway” truly navigable A larger online catalog is only useful if customers can find what fits their tastes. Wayfair’s approach is a clear example: its search algorithm interprets style preferences from a customer’s search history to show furniture that is likely to fit their tastes; Additionally, a visual search feature allows the shopper to photograph an item they like and find matches among millions of products in inventory. Augmented reality expands this concept: it goes from “will I like it?” to “Will it fit in my space?” It allows the buyer to view a digitally recreated piece of furniture in their own room before purchasing it, which goes a long way to explaining why this category has seen measurable improvements in conversion and a reduction in returns. In the fashion sector, the question of sizes works in a similar way. Levi’s uses an AI chatbot that asks for fit, rise and stretch preferences—in addition to the size the customer wears in other brands—to recommend the right size, addressing the leading cause of fashion returns: a garment not fitting as expected. H2: 3. Turn purchasing behavior into better forecasts Turn Shopping Behavior Into Better Forecasts Every interaction with an AI-powered shopping tool—a search, a virtual product try-on, or a completed purchase—generates data that retailers didn’t previously have. Used correctly, this data refines inventory and demand forecasts far beyond what historical sales data alone allows, and facilitates truly relevant follow-up marketing: A shopper who has just purchased kitten supplies is an ideal candidate for a cat food subscription offer, not a mass generic newsletter. This same data allows retailers to target their promotions more precisely, tailoring the discount type and channel to what a specific customer actually responds to based on their history, rather than launching a one-size-fits-all promotion. Keep shelves stocked before customers notice they are empty AI-based forecasting is increasingly used to anticipate not only typical demand, but also disruptions to it; This involves recalculating replenishment quantities and adjusting supply in response to real changes, and not simply historical averages. Some retailers have piloted robots that scan shelves to automatically detect out-of-stocks; Likewise, real-time replenishment signaling systems in selected stores seek to solve a basic but persistent problem: the customer who comes expecting to find an item and finds an empty shelf. What does this mean for retailers who don’t have Wayfair’s budget? None of this requires developing AI and computer vision capabilities internally. ERP platforms for the retail sector increasingly integrate AI-based demand forecasting and customer data unification as standard functionality; This is what really puts personalization and smarter inventory management within reach of a mid-sized retailer, not a multimillion-dollar in-house AI team. Curious what AI-powered forecasting and personalization would look like on your retail platform? Contact Trident to request a demo of your retail ERP.
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Manufacturing’s Biggest Inefficiency Isn’t the Plant Floor — It’s the Gap Between Systems
INTRO A machine on the shop floor and a service technician in the field often work off completely different data — one sees production output, the other sees a support ticket, and neither sees the customer’s purchase history. Dynamics 365 for manufacturing exists to close exactly that gap, by ending the divide between CRM and ERP instead of running them as separate systems that happen to sit on the same network. Here are the six shifts that gap-closing actually produces on the ground. 1. Supply Chain Visibility That Goes Beyond a Dashboard Collecting and visualizing supply chain data across every location does more than create a nicer report — it changes how fast a disruption gets caught. Manufacturers using remote monitoring across distributed installations have shortened time-to-market by catching supply issues before they cascade into production delays, rather than discovering them after a shipment is already late. 2. Asset and Production Management, Consolidated Into One View When production oversight and real-time equipment monitoring sit in one system instead of three, manufacturers stop reacting to breakdowns and start resolving issues remotely before they cause downtime. This is the operational basis for near-continuous uptime models in equipment-heavy manufacturing — and it also opens a second revenue line: monitoring and proactive support sold as an ongoing service, not a one-time sale. 3. Customer Engagement Built on Usage Data, Not Guesswork Personalized service at scale requires predictive analytics and self-service options that are actually relevant to what a specific customer does with the product — not a generic contact form. Manufacturers with a connected sales-through-service platform can flag potential equipment issues before a customer notices a problem, while also tailoring offers based on that customer’s real purchasing and usage pattern. 4. Service Centers as a Profit Center, Not a Cost Center Falling costs for IoT sensors and mobile devices have made remote monitoring and proactive maintenance commercially viable additions to standard break/fix support — not just a premium add-on for enterprise accounts. Combining customer records, technician availability, and inventory into a single mobile-accessible system is what lets a service team actually deliver on that model instead of just theorizing it. The Data Advantage: Better Products, Not Just Better Service IoT-connected parts and equipment feed usage data back to engineering — which components fail early, which are over-built, how products actually get used in the field. That feedback loop is what shortens the cycle between a design flaw and a fix, rather than waiting for failure reports to pile up. 5. Technicians Who See the Full Job, Not Just the Ticket A 360-degree view of a customer’s asset and service history changes what a technician can do on-site — they’re working from context, not just a work order. Paired with machine learning that surfaces similar past cases, this turns troubleshooting into pattern-matching against real precedent instead of starting from zero on every call. 6. One System Connecting the Floor to the Front Office Manufacturers that unify production and project management data with CRM stop treating customer service and customer engagement as separate departments working from separate records. The practical result is service and recommendations grounded in what a customer has actually bought and experienced — not assumptions. Why Dynamics 365 Specifically Dynamics 365 for manufacturing removes the artificial line between CRM and ERP, running both on one system with embedded analytics rather than bolting a reporting layer on top of disconnected tools. For a mid-size manufacturer, this matters less as a technology upgrade and more as an operating model change — supply chain, service, and sales working from the same data instead of reconciling three versions of it. Curious what a unified CRM-ERP model would look like on your production floor? Talk to Trident about a Dynamics 365 manufacturing assessment.