FMCG segment is India’s fourth-largest sector and employs three million-plus people. FMCG is nothing but fast-moving consumer goods – these products are quick to leave the shelves of a store or supermarket as consumers tend to use them frequently. “Fast-Moving” because these products are in high demand and have a short shelf life. They are also called consumer packaged goods for being sold quickly and affordable.
Sales representatives : Your on-field warriors
Sales representatives play a critical role in reaching out to retail stores, refilling stocks, and generating revenues for this industry. Hence it is very important to get the tools in the place which makes tasks easier for this workforce.
With digitalisation touching every possible field, FMCG sales force automation software are making their mark by lending a helping hand for improvised performances. Sales Force Automation or SFA refers to a tool or software which is used by the field sales team to automate its field sales process.
This automation helps in reducing tedious and time consuming tasks and is imperative in the retail FMCG industry. Nonetheless, it also becomes extremely important that this tool is aligned with your expense management software also.
Why does SFA need integration with a Spend Management tool?
Manual entries into their retail SFA system is proved to be very time consuming and also leads to prolonged man hours and reduced productivity. The FMCG sales team usually have very complex hierarchies for approvals and a very stringent set of policies. Mapping of these policies and fields from SFA to expense management tool gives visibility to the sales reps to excel within the organisation’s compliance.
Hence, it is crucial for the FMCG companies to integrate their SFA tools with expense management software as this integration is capable of providing end-to-end visibility focusing on cost-savings and business growth.
If you wish to know more about the alignment between these two softwares can be helpful for your FMCG firm, read our case study here.