Soluzione

Please describe your company and your position there.

Groups Travel Agency. I am the CO-Founder and Business Operations and CTO.

For what projects/services did your company hire Soluzione IT Services?

All that involves my CRM development and maintance.

What were your goals for this project?

Repair, maintain and increase all functionalities.

How did you select this vendor?

Market research + deep interviews process. First test project and results delivered.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

The services they offer me are maintaince of my Dynamics CRM and development of new projects related to it. It is hard to give details. Anyone working with CRM Dynamics will understand clearly.

What was the team composition?

I work with a project manager + programmer.

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

No, it is very difficut. My CRM is the back bone of my company. And my company has had an increase on sales of about 800k per year, that is around 20% growth per year.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

They proposed Visual Studio tool. That is the key for a perfect project management. Skype at any time is helpfull for quick problem solving.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They delivered complicated projects with almost no errors in the first version. Couple of simple reviews and all was going perfect. It is hard to nail it so close with this kind of developments. Also, my CRM has had too many programmers throughout time and it is a complicated one to deal with.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Sure! Always, all of us need to improve. Sure, they should have more aim for detail. A closer manegement to ongoing processes despite getting long in time due to my lack of time some time. Those are little details.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are a direct marketing company based in West London. We are a media distribution company, delivering leaflets for other businesses in London and the surrounding areas. We started in 2010. We are number one for leaflet distribution in the UK.

I am in charge of distribution and logistics.

What challenge were you trying to address with Soluzione IT?

We use Microsoft Dynamics CRM for our operations and office. We implemented the CRM system in 2012. We bought the license from Microsoft and then Soluzione IT customized it for us.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Soluzione IT helped us get the solution.

How did you come to work with Soluzione IT?

It was my previous colleague; I think he found them online. Basically, I think he took quotes from a few suppliers within the UK and outside the UK. These are the ones he found more reliable and these are the ones who were matching up to our needs, as per the budget.

How much have you invested with Soluzione IT?

Around £10,000. [~$13,000]

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Soluzione IT in March 2012. They are still our service provider because sometimes we have issues and sometimes we want to make some changes or amend some things on the CRM. They are our supplier, so we are in touch with them.

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

When we implemented the CRM, which was customized by Soluzione IT, our processes became streamlined. For example, if a job is booked in our system, all the other departments get notifications and they do their part of the job, for example creating invoices and doing operational stuff regarding distribution. It was very helpful because it just streamlined our business process and it's easier for us to work. If a job had been taking four hours to do, then I would say it has been reduced by 50%.

How did Soluzione IT perform from a project management standpoint?

They were very good in terms of working together. When we need anything, they straightaway look into it for us. Earlier, they didn't have many clients, but now they are busy. They have allocated a specific person for our account. Whenever we have anything, it's resolved pretty quickly, to be honest. For example, if we give them any new tasks or any new projects, it's dealt with straight away for us.

We usually discuss over Skype, by screen sharing and emails.

What did you find most impressive about Soluzione IT?

We have a job portal that's connected to the CRM. For example, the jobs that are going out tomorrow need to be allocated to the staff, and then the staff must be notified that they have been booked for tomorrow's job. The features it supports includes the automatic availability of the people who are on the CRM. Once we've allocated them to the staff, they send notifications through emails to staff automatically, so we don't have to call them.

They give us a timescale but sometimes it happens within that timescale and sometimes it doesn't.

Are there any areas Soluzione IT could improve?

The only thing that they can improve on is delivery time.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I have a finance business where we arrange finance for businesses around Australia. We deal with finance companies, equipment suppliers, and the actual clients who are borrowing the money to buy their equipment. I'm the Managing Director of the company.

What challenge were you trying to address with Soluzione?

Soluzione did two things for me. First, they designed the website around our specific needs with an online calculator. Second, they created an online application that enabled us to merge the data into our CRM [customer relationship management] - the Microsoft Office Dynamics CRM system. They were able to merge them so they work seamlessly together.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They gave me a number of different options on templates. We chose a template that was acceptable to our marketplace as a professional looking template. We filled in the various fields, and integrated the calculator and the application to the system.

I have been using various other CRMs over the years. It was a very significant task to export all the data from the previous CRM system and import it into the new one. We were using an older version of Dynamics when they came on board. They helped to integrate it into the newer version with much more functionality.

How did you come to work with Soluzione?

I was actually referred to them by one of the IT specialists in Australia that we deal with. I was told that they were very professional in what they did, as well as very cost effective and would work within my budget.

How much have you invested with Soluzione?

The CRM work was approximately USD $6,000 and the website was approximately USD $3,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The development was between April and May 2015. Each of the modules has been completed, but we're always building new modules. Also, we're always assessing what we currently have and implementing improvements to it as we go. Many of those improvements are what our marketplace is saying they need, so we need to implement those changes.

How did Soluzione perform from a project management standpoint?

Excellent. I'm very happy with the product. They are always molding to changes that need to happen. They have been amenable to those changes without too many issues at all. I would highly recommend them as a service, and as a product offering in the market place.

They have several different people that I worked with over time. Sonika [Vishwakarma, CEO] was the front for the business and was working with me on a daily basis. She would be the one that I would work with through logic, mapping, finding out why we're requesting specific tasks, and what we were needing from Dynamics for our needs.

Then there are a number of people who would then implement those tasks and come back and report to Sonika. She would then come back to me. The reason we did it that way is obviously because some language barriers do exist. They handled that very well after an initial discussion. It allowed for people with the skill set of the coding to actually do the work and correspond with Sonika, who then spoke to me in more layman's terms.

What did you find most impressive about Soluzione?

They listened. Half of the problem with people who have high intellect is that they think they know what you're saying or what you mean, and then they do their own thing.

Whereas Sonika, in particular, listened, pulled out the information, interpreted it, and let me know what her interpretation was, which we then agreed with. We then would implement it. Their ability to actually listen was incredibly important.

Interpreting and repeating things back to the client to make sure that they have a common understanding of the task is important. Their pricing is excellent. It does help being offshore. For the same products in Australia, I would have paid almost ten times the cost. Although you sometimes have a language barrier and a distance barrier, it is far outweighed by the cost advantages and their ability to work with their clients.

Are there any areas Soluzione could improve?

Some of the communication could improve. If I'm not dealing with Sonika, some of the other people do not have the skill set to deal with the client as well. That can be problematic being in another country.

You can run into that with any business. If you're dealing with one person, you move on to another one. If they're not quite customer focused, then you have the same thing. Overall, I'm very happy.