Smart technology is coming to a factory floor near you, but are you ready?

The advent of remarkable AI use cases in industrial spaces—for everything from security and quality control to supply chain management and robotic assembly lines—is pushing the boundaries of what many industry leaders thought possible for many decades. It’s an exciting prospect for reinvigorating a sometimes stagnant business or addressing problems related to talent retention. 

But none of it will work out if data isn’t in order first to fuel the revolution.

That’s why Salesforce has created Data Cloud to support businesses in every industry with personalized, centralized, usable data for every customer profile your business has. And we’ve identified three primary use cases for Data Cloud particular in the manufacturing space to help leaders better leverage this investment. 

Integrate information more seamlessly for sales opportunities

Salesforce is considered a bonafide Leader for CDP technology, according to Gartner, and it delivers on this promise with Data Cloud, a dynamic product to hyperscale data within your organization. But your sales team needs more than CDP to unlock opportunities in the industrial space. That’s why Data Cloud is the best solution because it goes beyond mere CDP. Data Cloud can highlight what accounts have open opportunities for new or enhanced products and services from your organization, generate the most optimal pricing strategy for sales cycles, track inventory and demand to support quotes, and support manufacturing sales reps planning for the long-term with account planning insights and forecasts.

Managing run rate business and increasing revenue

Data Cloud’s comprehensive view of each customer extends to sales operations, or, for manufacturing, those tasked with managing run rate business and revenue streams. Plan v actuals, product revenue over time, and account-based forecasting all play a role in painting a true picture of run rate dollars, and Data Cloud can deliver on all these needs when implemented correctly within your overall tech stack. Drawing on information from every relevant system and connector, Data Cloud can generate the reports your business needs to see what the future of revenue really looks like based on accounts, market activity, and more.

With managers tracking run rate business better than ever, it’s not long before revenue itself turns a corner and increases dramatically thanks to the robust and comprehensive scope of Data Cloud’s insights. One early user of Data Cloud found they were able to boost digital revenue alone by 30% thanks to the personalization, security, and AI capabilities of Data Cloud + AI from Salesforce. 

Predict service needs and deliver proactive experiences

Finally, with a consistent and clear view of every customer/account in hand thanks to Data Cloud, manufacturers can more effectively predict future needs and opportunities within each account. This means proactive service and maintenance visits from informed and empowered agents for your clients—in other words, more effortless and memorable experiences that keep customers loyal and eager for more. 

For example, on the General Mills factory floor, they’re using Data Cloud to glean better insights about their end customer preferences for different product lines and brands. General Mills can then take this information in turn to create more fine-tuned marketing campaigns via email and ads according to past purchases; better engage with local grocers, schools, and community partners; and improve partner relationships at large with more valuable market information to share. 

To kickstart your path to Data Cloud as a manufacturer, let’s partner up. Simplus has extensive experience working with manufacturing organizations to clean up and prepare data for the next step—we can provide a technical assessment of your IT landscape to identify primary use cases and prepare an efficient implementation project plan for successful Data Cloud adoption.