Johannesburg, 20 Jul 2023
Namibia Breweries (NBL) recently took steps to future-proof its business through digital transformation. CloudSmiths, a Dynamic Technologies group company, partnered with Salesforce to successfully drive this transformation. NBL required a high standard of effective and efficient digital services and support be delivered to its customers – no easy task when it comes to such a large-scale organisation.
Part of NBL’s digital transformation journey with CloudSmiths entailed producing a detailed roadmap as well as unlocking new opportunities to better serve the company’s customers. This included a digital portal that would allow customers to access a wider variety of products and promotions. Related support, as well as a universal dashboard and digital assistance for sales representatives, were also requirements.
Legacy systems and technology proved challenging when it came to upgrading and implementing new, more efficient digital channels and customer solutions. A successful transformation would require a combination of quality, efficiency and simplicity provided by a partner ideally suited to understanding NBL’s unique and complex needs.
Namibia Breweries selected CloudSmiths, Salesforce’s largest and most agile partner in Africa, as its collaborator in accelerating the commercial portions of its digital transformation roadmap. CloudSmiths’ knowledge and understanding of Salesforce, paired with the company's experience in building and implementing a variety of custom integrations across different businesses, allowed it to design a bespoke cloud-based solution for Namibia Breweries' internal and external commercial operations.
Namibia Breweries has been brewing beer in Namibia for over 100 years. It is one of the largest beverage manufacturers in the country, holding a significant share of the premium beer market in the region. NBL brands include Windhoek, Hansa Draught, Strongbow cider and Fruitree juices to name a few. Recently, international powerhouse Heineken successfully completed its acquisition of Distell Group Holdings and Namibia Breweries and combined them with Heineken South Africa to create Heineken Beverages.
CloudSmiths implemented several solutions, including Sales Cloud, to effectively manage Namibia Breweries’ digital channels, provide a digital dashboard and present up-to-date insights and reports to help inform business strategies. CloudSmiths also used B2B Commerce Cloud to build a digital storefront (NBL Storefront) in order to increase safe and easy online purchases. Lastly, it enabled the integration for the Aforza Consumer Goods Cloud – built on the Salesforce platform – to allow NBL reps to manage their site visits, task fulfilment, tracking and route planning.
The results speak for themselves. NBL has successfully future-proofed its business operations, consolidated and streamlined its sales activities, expanded its online presence and improved employee productivity. NBL has reported a significant uptake of the digital platform among clients, resulting in an increase of overall sales. This has been achieved while minimising costs to service and improving the customer experience.
Patrick Eriksen, Head of Marketing at CloudSmiths, says: “We're proud to have contributed to NBL’s journey and look forward to supporting them in their ongoing digital transformation. Helping customers use cloud technology to improve reporting, sales activity and customer experience is just where we like to be.”
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