Challenge

• NBCUniversal, a leading media and entertainment company, wanted to transform its advertising sales business
• Needed to provide a more effective way for reps to sell non-traditional media buys such as product placements
• Wanted to replace existing solutions with a single, integrated CRM and content management system
• Required cutting-edge technology that would let sales teams focus on their clients
• Needed to support sales of multiple properties and non-traditional media placements, improve coordination between sales and marketing, and facilitate measurement and analysis
• Wanted a solution that could be quickly deployed and easily updated

Solution

Sales Cloud

• Deployed Unlimited Edition in 2 months with help from salesforce.com consulting
• Integrated the Sales Cloud with a proprietary customer database and data warehouse
• Replaced numerous data marts and content repositories with the Salesforce content library, creating a single source of truth across the company
• Installed applications such as Data.com, Hoover’s, Activa RSVP, Xactly, and VerticalResponse from the AppExchange for more functionality
• Created custom tabs to capture and distribute deal opportunities within different properties and communicate non-traditional media opportunities and marketing requests to the correct teams
• Created a custom “My Invoices” workflow that retrieves disputed invoices from downstream billing systems and forwards them to account executives for resolution
• Added mobile access so employees can tap into critical business data from anywhere
• A 6-week training push drove user adoption; employees keep up with best practices through salesforce.com training & certification courses
• Marketing can create new advertising opportunities around product placement and programming content, and quickly provide sales teams with the presentations and materials to sell this inventory; for example, sales pitches can include video clips highlighting new shows, giving advertisers more confidence in what they’re buying
• Marketing analysts provide sales teams with detailed account profiles including data on historic advertising spend; this process lets reps identify and pursue targeted strategies to expand NBCUniversal’s “share of wallet” at key accounts
• Marketing can create, manage, and measure targeted email campaigns with the Sales Cloud
• Data.com’s cloud-sourced business contacts are central to the company’s Master Contact Management strategy

Chatter

• Chatter provides a social fabric—bringing together disparate teams such as creative, marketing, operations, and sales and aligning them around company objectives
• Marketing intelligence and analytics teams with employees located in multiple locations, including some overseas, collaborate on Chatter around NBCUniversal’s top 100 clients, top 10 agencies, and top seven industries
• Employees collaborate on TV commercial spots using Chatter

Results

Sales Cloud

• The Sales Cloud transforms transactional, behind-the-scenes efforts, making it easier for NBCUniversal account executives to identify opportunities across all the company’s platforms
• Increased communication and collaboration make account executives more effective
• Improved visibility lets managers focus on larger, more detailed 360-degree custom marketing projects
• The centralized communications tool lets users share ideas and workflows across the business and maintains the knowledge base over time

Data.com

• Data.com makes it possible to quickly and accurately update marketing lists
• Account executives are conducting the right meetings with the right people at the right account at the right time thanks to the intelligence they gather from Data.com

Chatter

• Chatter puts a human face on technology solutions, increasing adoption
• Chatter enhances sales and marketing opportunities
• Chatter helps NBCUniversal’s commercial operations team collaborate on the correct placement of more than 2 million commercial spots