How to Transform Manufacturing Order Management with AI
At the heart of any manufacturing company lies the crucial aspect of order management, which often serves as the backbone of their operations. Digital solutions, like those offered by Salesforce, continue to support these businesses as they strive to enhance efficiency, improve customer satisfaction, and achieve better operational outcomes. RafterOne is leveraging different aspects of Artificial Intelligence, centered around Salesforce’s Einstein 1, to offer an end-to-end solution that solves these challenges and transforms manufacturing order management with AI. Let’s delve into how AI technology is reshaping the landscape of manufacturing order management, providing a seamless and optimized process for businesses and their customers.
Order Challenges for Manufacturers
Manufacturing companies encounter several challenges related to order processing. A significant issue is the continued receipt of orders through email and fax, necessitating extensive manual data entry into ERPs. Furthermore, there is a lack of visibility into whether all incoming orders have been accurately entered. Another complication arises as customers, dealers, and distributors often seek updates on order statuses, which are typically confined within ERPs inaccessible to these groups. Consequently, these inquiries lead to frequent calls to Sales and Customer Service departments. A self-service functionality would be ideal, however direct access to order status from ERPs proves challenging. Innovative solutions like AI, Order Management Systems (OMS), and Chatbots emerge as valuable tools to enable self-service order status tracking, offering a more streamlined and efficient process.
AI-Powered Approach to Manufacturing Order Management
The idea of using AI in order management is an evolving trend. Armed with Einstein and Einstein 1, manufacturing companies on Salesforce can take an AI-powered approach to solving their order management challenges. Here’s how to integrate AI to transform your order management processes.
1. Intelligent Document Processing
Every day, companies receive a myriad of documents, with many being purchase orders in PDF, Word or Excel formats. Manually inputting these orders into an ERP can be time-consuming and prone to errors. However, with Intelligent Document Processing, these challenges become obsolete.
AI can directly ingest PDFs into Salesforce OMS, streamlining the workflow and eliminating cumbersome data entry tasks. This automation not only expedites the process but also reduces human errors. Nevertheless, recognizing the occasional complexities and intricacies of specific orders, human reviews and adjustments are always an important part of the equation. This hybrid model of AI-powered automation coupled with human oversight ensures both speed and accuracy in manufacturing order management.
Once data is imported, Salesforce OMS makes this entire process reportable. capturing records for all inbound orders and showing the status of what has been processed and what remains to be reviewed.
2. Predictive AI Models for Order Accuracy
Human errors, though unintentional, can lead to significant complications, delays, and even financial losses. Incorporating predictive AI models helps alleviate this concern. As the AI model continues to learn, the precision of data ingestion continues to improve. It becomes adept at recognizing diverse formats and ways orders are written. Consequently, the review cycle expedites over time, potentially reaching a point where, in certain instances, it can be eliminated entirely. With the support of predictive AI, businesses not only improve order accuracy but also boost customer trust, assuring that their orders are handled with the utmost precision.
3. MuleSoft Integration with ERP
Once the order is reviewed, the final step is to integrate it to the ERP so that all downstream order fulfillment can happen. However, the problem remains that the ERP is not accessible to customers, dealers, and distributors. That’s where having the order in Salesforce OMS with a bi-directional integration with MuleSoft comes in to allow for self-service and easier order data exposure. These users can now get to order details without needing ERP access. The process as a whole supports visibility across departments, ensuring that teams, from sales to fulfilment, are always in the loop. The enhanced transparency allows for quicker decision-making, improved inventory management, and timely delivery, thereby increasing customer satisfaction.
4. AI Chatbots for Order Status
In today’s fast-paced world, customers demand real-time updates and quick responses. Traditional methods of order status inquiries, such as calling customer service agents, can be tedious for customers and resource-intensive for businesses. AI chatbots are an excellent solution for removing the burden of order status updates.
Customers can effortlessly interact with these chatbots to get real-time order status updates without the wait times associated with human agents. These chatbots can handle multiple queries simultaneously, ensuring that customers get instant, accurate, and consistent responses. Moreover, by automating this aspect of customer interaction, businesses can free up human agents to handle more complex issues, enhancing the overall customer experience.
AI in Action
Manufacturing companies can achieve immense benefits by applying AI technology to their order management processes. From intelligent document processing to predictive accuracy models, from seamless system integration to AI-powered chatbots, AI solutions are taking manufacturing order management operations to the next level. In this digital age, where efficiency and customer experience reign supreme, manufacturers need to embrace cutting-edge tools to stay ahead of the curve. If you are interested in harnessing the power of AI to bring about transformative changes within your manufacturing order management solutions, RafterOne has the experience necessary to support you.