At SingleStone, it's about more than Customer Relationship Management (CRM); It's about customer experience. With its deep knowledge of customer engagement, relationship management and skills in how customers interact with you, SingleStone can provide solutions for any organization.
Primary Goal: To migrate the limited CRM system to a cloud-based customer experience environment using Microsoft Dynamics 365.
Solution Type: Customer Relationship Management
Solution Used: Customer Service
Tools Used: Microsoft Dynamics 365
About the Virginia Department of Transportation
The Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) shoulders the responsibility for transportation infrastructure in Virginia, including roads, bridges, tunnels, and buildings. As the state agency tasked with this never-ending 24/7 role, the agency uses over 7,500 employees. It generates over $1 billion in annual revenue to keep the effects of heat, snow, rain, ice, accidents, and normal wear and tear from impacting the state's citizens.
VDOT's CRM Migration Challenge
Migrating an On-Premises CRM to a Cloud-based Environment Using Microsoft Dynamics 365
VDOT was using a CRM platform consisting of an on-premises version of Dynamics. The system focused on three critical applications:
- Hosting the Statewide Service Center
- Tracking and monitoring the Tort Claims Program
- Conducting high-level correspondence with constituents.
On-premises systems have several disadvantages, especially for a fast-paced environment such as VDOT's. Since VDOT's mission is 24/7 year-round support and repair, data must be real-time or near real-time and shareable by staff across the entire system. This challenge, along with high upgrade and maintenance costs, meant that customers were not being served as well or as quickly as they could be.
VDOT recognized the need for a more agile, flexible, and cost-effective solution that would improve the response time of staff and its customers' customer experience. To do this, VDOT planned to migrate the existing platform to the Microsoft Dynamics 365 environment managed by the Government Cloud.
SingleStone's Approach
Major data migrations can be expensive and nerve-wracking. VDOT engaged SingleStone to develop a detailed roadmap to carve out the best path and timeline for the project. This roadmap had several elements:
- Evaluation – Migration evaluations include a detailed and honest assessment of a client's current reality. Because SingleStone deals with complex migration solutions, we could drill down and understand VDOT's core competencies and needs and evaluate the effectiveness of any migration to the Cloud and its advantages and disadvantages.
- Architecture – Complex CRM systems are deeply interconnected. Even with the focus on the three main areas of VDOT's existing on-premises system, there is always historical and legacy data. There’s also new information that must be moved in the correct order at the right time to ensure continuity of service during the project. SingleStone constructed an architecture that addressed these needs to keep the system going during the deployment.
- Work Timeline – Since VDOT's mission called for uninterrupted service, SingleStone projected the job's completion time to deployment while causing very little disruption.
- Economical Deployment Cost – All entities, public and private, are concerned about cost. But with taxpayer dollars on the line, SingleStone mapped out the most cost-effective solution with the highest quality results.
Results and Metrics
SingleStone created this roadmap for the VDOT executives to show them the vision needed to move forward with confidence.
While roadmaps are not new, SingleStone's cloud-based CRM deployment plan gave the VDOT CRM team a new source document to build on. The completed roadmap was able to demonstrate the value to the Executive Leadership team at VDOT.
- After project completion, VDOT rated SingleStone with a 10/10 Net Promoter Score (NPS). Used to measure a customer's enthusiasm for recommending a company's service, expertise, or products to other potential clients, the NPS scale shows how satisfied current customers are and what new customers can expect.
SingleStone also received high praise from VDOT business leaders for their consideration and depth of expertise for the project.
- SingleStone's process and depth of knowledge in customer experience software deployments are so extensive, the SingleStone team saved the client many months of planning and deployment time.
When your organization can't risk data loss or shut down, SingleStone can provide the solution required to improve, augment, and ramp up your customer engagement at any level. With our customer experience specialists, SingleStone operates across a broad range of industries to be a reliable partner in providing solutions for your critical software upgrades. To see how we can solve your CRM upgrade, contact us today.