As one of the nation’s largest distributors of bulk oil, fuel, and lubricants, RelaDyne aimed to enhance its digital customer experience by increasing the percentage of orders placed independently by customers, thereby reducing the cost to serve and increasing profit. Central to this was the ability to anticipate customer needs and provide relevant suggestions to customers as they shopped, based on historical purchases – not just their online orders.
RelaDyne upgraded its customer portal and added Proton’s eCommerce AI to hyper-personalize product recommendations to customers as they shopped, using rich transactional history from all of RelaDyne’s important data sources, including their ERP. Now, customers who access the portal see Proton-generated product recommendations, including new products, products due to reorder, substitution suggestions, and more. Proton has been a time-saver for sales reps, who have started to use the portal to access product recommendations for customers. Since implementation, Proton has increased the number of regular users in the customer portal by 67%.
Before the pandemic, the thought of years of change happening in a matter of months seemed impossible. But as we now know, the pandemic drastically accelerated digital transformation across the globe forcing industries that relied on in-person interactions, such as field sales, to pivot to online solutions.
For Ashley Rickman, the Senior Director of Sales and Marketing Technologies at RelaDyne this meant shifting her company's focus to online customer service. Ashley’s team manages the company’s ecommerce customer portal, where customers can log in to place online orders. When the pandemic emphasized the need for an enhanced online customer experience, Ashley started searching for a tool to provide relevant product recommendations to customers as they browsed. In her search for a solution, she found Proton's eCommerce AI,
“Our main goal is to make the customer experience as good as it can be, and Proton is a huge part of that. The AI-generated product recommendations in the customer portal are a big deal, since they give customers all sorts of helpful info as they check out different products. It’s exactly what we had in mind when we came up with our vision for where we want to take our technology,” said Ashley.
Proton’s online recommendations haven’t just helped customers find everything they need online. RelaDyne’s sales reps have also unlocked a hidden Proton benefit: with Proton powering the customer portal, they have quick access to all the information they need to consult their customers on mobile and desktop without logging in and out of multiple systems. There’s no wasted time searching for product details, tracking down relevant product substitutions for stockouts, or calling the customer service team to ask for product information.
“Before Proton, our reps had to log into multiple systems to get a fraction of the insights Proton provides today. Proton made it super easy by putting everything in one place. Now, the reps don’t have to waste time searching all over the place for information and can focus on selling instead. It’s been a major time-saver for them,” said Ashley.
Ashley fondly recalls a hassle-free implementation of Proton that took just two weeks.
Since implementing Proton, RelaDyne has seen an increase in the number of additional users to their customer portal who log in and use it regularly. In addition, AI-generated product recommendations – such as products due for reorder – have also contributed to the company’s growth over the past year, with over $10M in incremental revenue generated.
“I highly recommend Proton,” said Rickman. “They not only delivered on their proposal, but they went above and beyond to understand our business and help us improve our customer experience.”
.svg)
.svg)
.svg)
.png)