Embracing Digitalization: Revolutionizing Customer Engagement in Electrical Distribution

Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome to Eco Ask why a podcast that dives into industrial manufacturing topics and spotlights the heroes that keep America running. I'm your host, chris Granger, and on this podcast we do not cover the latest features and benefits on products that come to market. Instead, we focus on advice and insight from the top minds of industry, because people and ideas will be how America remains number one in manufacturing in the world. Welcome to Ecosy. I'm your host, chris Granger, and I'm excited to spend some time with you today. Thank you first of all to all of our listeners who've just been hanging out with us. For the years that Ecosy has been out there, it has been just a thrill to be able to do this and to be able to put out information that hopefully serves you well throughout your journey into industrial manufacturing or wherever you may find yourself. And now you know, recently we did shift up the way that the show operates, where we're doing more deeper topics. We're not putting out quite as many episodes per month, but we're hoping that these episodes are going to be giving you some insights into how to encourage and build your own knowledge up around industrial manufacturing, how to work with industrial distributors to be able to make the most efficient use of your time, as well as to start solidifying these relationships to a whole new level. So our last episode, we talked about how you can be empowered in this new digital age. Okay, so far as the procurement process, because there's so much that is changing in industrial procurement and we know that that experience really has shifted, where many people today want that user experience that they experience outside of work right, I mean, if you have an Amazon account or if you have a eBay, whatever it may be. However, you shop for items online, we want that same type of experience in our workplace as much as possible, and distributors are recognizing this. They recognize okay, we got to make some changes. We need to start evaluating the way that people interact with our business, and this is really what we're talking about for last month, and this month we're going to be talking about that even further, because we're going to be talking about we need to embrace this digitalization, because if everything's going digital, we can either resist it or embrace it, and our encouragement to you is to embrace it, because we need to understand it. We want to help you understand, rather, how, if you embrace these ideas and concepts, you'll find more seamless ways to to engage with your vendors, with your suppliers, in a much more meaningful way. It's going to reduce your stress. It's going to put the information that you need in front of you. So hopefully you're going to enjoy this one. We're just going to get right into it Again. You can go to eecoonlinecom for all the resources that we talk about today. Check us out on YouTube, all the areas where we can support you. We're pretty big on LinkedIn as well. We'll put a lot of stuff out there to try to encourage you along the way.

Speaker 1: 3:12

Okay, and we just recognize right here that the electrical distribution sector is really transforming. I mean, when I think back to when I started my career working for ECO it was right out of college at Old Dominion and, man, we had this old character type system for entering orders and there was nothing really done online. When you walked into a sales office or to the distributor's office and I remember very well you'd have catalogs lined up all over the place and you lived in these catalogs and really to be able to serve your customers at the high level back then, if you knew the catalog and you knew where to find information, man, you had an advantage, because it has a new person coming in, particularly a college student. It was overwhelming, because some of these catalogs are two, three, four inches thick and you're trying to find one part number with all these different variables, with all these different options. How do you do it? I mean, just goes to show how far the industry has come, and just my hats off to the, to the old school who could still do it that way, because things have shifted.

Speaker 1: 4:24

And even now things have shifted even from the transaction standpoint, where these interactions, they're really more strategic. It's not just, you know, here's your PO, give me what I want. No, there's more, there's more strategy behind it and we have a lot more ways to serve people digitally, which is going to change the whole game even more. And this is really driven by this broader digital transformation within procurement, the procurement world and the rise of connected commerce. You know, I mean, just think about how so many businesses now are connected directly with their vendors and it's giving you which is great an alternative to the traditional ways of interaction with your suppliers. So we recognize this is a big deal at ECO. This is a big, big deal. This is a big enough deal. We need to make sure we have the systems in place, the processes in place, the people in place to be able to manage and navigate these streams. Okay, and we need to also recognize that you know what what we put in place today is probably going to change tomorrow, but that's okay, we're going to keep working and we're going to keep, you know, trying to to custom tailor these solutions to cater to where the customer needs are going, and this is a big deal. If you're working in manufacturing, you better be finding vendors and suppliers who think this way, versus the old school, my way or highway.

Speaker 1: 5:49

Okay, now let's talk a little bit about the whole transformation in procurement. And what does that look like? Over the history here? And really we need to recognize that procurement process has really evolved from the transactional role that it used to be to a more strategic function, and it's leveraging a lot of supplier networks. It's leveraging all this new technology because they're really trying to enhance their overall operational efficiency. And who can blame them? Look at how unbelievably competitive the landscape is out there, and we need to be able to recognize this. Okay, if it's a competitive landscape, we've got to get the best products, the best solutions. We have to manage our costs. You need to be working with vendors that recognize this, and I learned a lot If you guys go back a few episodes in the past of our catalog.

Speaker 1: 6:46

I was able to interview Michael Van Kluen and he was talking about how everything is moving towards this more strategic spin, visibly right and be able to. We need to be able to enhance supplier engagements. We need to have lots of continuity between business systems and the planning to get all this in place, and he really emphasized that. You know, since the pandemic occurred, everything has been underscored by the importance of a resilient supply chain, and that's a big deal, because if you go back a few years ago, I think you'll see where you had, you know, weak areas in your supply chain. It was a struggle. It really was a struggle, and it comes down to ultimately, you need to improve your supplier, vendor, end user relationships and you better have some contingency strategies as well, because you never know how things are going to shift. You need to make sure that you have really good relationships across the board so that you can maintain your operations and get everything that you need when you need it, and these digital technologies that we're talking about today are really crucial in that Because this changing environment it moves quick, and if you can find ways to streamline one little thing within your process and procurement is a big part of it If you can find ways to make better decisions faster, if you can find ways to reduce those errors, how big would that be for your business? Okay, and this, right here, is how you start bringing technology into the whole process, because it not only makes internal operations more efficient okay but it redefines the engagement dynamics and it helps you have a more seamless integration of everything that happens online or offline. If you're just traditional calling up distributor to place an order or replacing it online, you better have this Now.

Speaker 1: 8:39

I think there was an article that our director of digital commerce was in. He actually said this. He said Eco is spearheading digital innovation in our industry. We are committed to streamlining and improving online and offline procurement channels to meet evolving customer needs. And that was Adam Sheets, our director of digital commerce, and that's it. Somebody has to be the tip of the spear, somebody has to recognize the changing needs. And right here we are, and what I'm trying to share with you today is some things to consider with not just with ECO, but other vendors that you work with, because we need to recognize that connected commerce is here.

Speaker 1: 9:21

Connected commerce let's talk about that for a second. That really is advocating a Connected commerce. Let's talk about that for a second. That really is advocating a seamless shopping experience. Okay, so you're combining the whole digital, physical interaction that you typically would have, and you need to have that in a seamless manner, because this is going to align with how you want to buy traditionally, how things are shifting, along with how distributors manage their business. Think about how your shopping experience is right now across different channels. You need to make sure that you have that same type of opportunity to experience that with your suppliers, because then that's going to start giving you opportunities to grow and leverage some of the items that potentially could be game changers for you. Now think about this how about items like digital portals with punch out capabilities? That's a big one. We're going to talk about that here in a few minutes. How about electronic data interchange EDI we're going to call it EDI from here on out, but that's a big opportunity for you if you're not doing that with vendors or just standard e-commerce platforms.

Speaker 1: 10:23

There are so many ways that you can build loyalty with others and learn more on your own and enhance your overall service delivery. Be more consistent, engaging with your experiences and touch points. All these things are important, but you got to know what you look for, and what we're going to do right here now is I'm going to break this down into three tiers. Okay, we're going to start at the top and we're just going to work this down into three tiers. Okay, we're going to start at the top and we're just going to work right down through these three different tiers to give you an understanding of look.

Speaker 1: 10:51

We recognize there's diverse needs of industrial customers. We're not going to be able to put everybody in one basket. That makes no sense, so we're not going to try to do that. But I'm going to give you a tiered approach to consider around engagement. Okay, because you may start off and you would look at the first thing I'm getting ready to go through and be like there's no way we can do that. Our business is not big enough. That's okay. Maybe the next year is for you.

Speaker 1: 11:16

But we need to understand there's so many changing needs out there. The customer's needs are changing, the distributor needs are changing, so we have to have multiple types of solutions available to help you and meet you where you are, and that's a big deal. If a distributor that you're working with is so define what their process that they can't flex to your needs, that could be a problem. Now, if your needs meet, that, but that distributors offering that's that's one thing. But too often we can, can you know miss opportunities to work with other customers because we built it around this one particular type of of of avatar. If you will and that's not, it's not the case you have to have multiple options. So let's get into it.

Speaker 1: 12:01

The first tier integration of e-commerce portals. These are items like PunchOut and CXML. So at the forefront of this engagement is right here is these portals. You have to have this. So you have items like Ariba, coupa Jagger Tungsten there's other ones out there Coupa Jagger Tungsten, there's other ones out there and they're using CXML, which is Commerce Extensible Markup Language, and that's an open standard for electronic business document exchange. That's really all that is, and we leverage CXML here at ECO. But you need to understand that, whoever you work with, do they have that capability? And if they do, do they have that as part of their process, because this enables seamless exchange of orders, things like that invoices, other procurement-related documents all that can be defined and managed within that system. That's a big deal, and this also facilitates transactions between trading partners, including punch-out catalogs facilitates transactions between trading partners, including punch out catalogs, purchase orders and invoices Because it's very reliable, it's very flexible, it's very robust and it's clean. That is a big deal.

Speaker 1: 13:16

Now, this takes a lot of infrastructure to get set up. So, again, this may not be for you, but it's elevating the procurement process because essentially, what you're doing is you're putting your buying experience, the way that you buy and order stuff within your procurement system at your current company. You're integrating that with your supplier. How huge is that? So, whatever system you're used to navigating, you don't have to learn anything new. It's all right there.

Speaker 1: 13:40

Now there's some pretty big benefits here. You have a lot of standardization there, because this is this is basically lining up all these documents, ensuring that you have a smooth, smooth communication across these different systems. So you don't have to figure that out Once it's all set up. It's there. It also automates things. So if you have an automation setup piece, you don't have to worry about manually having data entry or or keying in the wrong uh, part number, things like that because your transactions can be actually managed automatically and at that point there's nothing else to think about.

Speaker 1: 14:16

Just use this, the material that you need. When you use it, it's also going to pick up your efficiency. As you get this implemented, your speed, your transaction processes are going to speed up, and we all know if you speed up your process here, you save some time so you can do something else there, right? It's also very scalable, because if you look at this format, the way the data is structured is highly scalable and you can handle a lot of complex transactions very efficiently. There's also an integration component of this and it allows you to, once you get this set up, there's so much seamless integration between these systems and your catalogs. It's just, this is real-time stuff, so you can look for it for right now.

Speaker 1: 15:00

Okay, this is the part number. I need to do this job. Here's the specs, here's the data sheets, here's the pricing and availability and here's when I can have it. That's some pretty powerful information to have at your fingertips and, at the end of the day, it's all about reducing your costs, because if you connect and streamline this process, you're going to reduce those costs associated with your manual entry right, because you don't have to have someone sitting there manually punching that stuff in. You can actually set these items up and manage it directly. Tell the system what you want, the system's going to take care of it. So that's the first tier.

Speaker 1: 15:41

Now, again, this is a big tier. Not everyone out there is ready for this, because you have to have professional procurement set up in your company. You have to have the integration capability on your end as well, and then you have to have a distributor with the investment for a punch-out system on their end. So there's lots of investments that take place on both ends. But when you find that, that that good match, it's pretty awesome. It's pretty incredible. It's something I know. For us, the punch out capabilities are big. It's it's about aligning the right customers to where we can meet their needs, to our business systems. And I know, know, for lots of you guys out there, if you're listening and you think you may be an opportunity here for that, for your business, you've got to reach out, you've got to connect with us and let's just see is there a punch-out opportunity? Because if there is, our team is ready to serve, all right. So that's Tier 1.

Speaker 1: 16:36

Now Tier 2, remember I talked about EDI Electronic Data Interchange. Tier two remember I talked about EDI electronic data interchange earlier? Right, well, you need to start utilizing EDI and flat file transfers. So this is kind of like your middle tier. This is not the top end, this is not really at the bottom, this is right in the middle. Okay, because what you're going to be doing right here is you're automating the exchange of standardized electronic documents and you're increasing your overall operational efficiency. That's it. This eliminates your manual, the manual entry of data. Still, it produces a lot of errors, saves a lot of time and resources, and what you do is you, you, you integrate edi to your erp system or accounting system and this helps for a smooth uh document flow. See, you see how that can really start increasing the effectiveness.

Speaker 1: 17:24

It's a big deal and it's such a big deal that we recognize, particularly at Electric Equipment Company, the EDI solutions. We have to be able to automate these things. We need to put a team of people in. This is a great solution that can hit for your business. If you're right there in the middle, if you don't have the punch-out capabilities, maybe EDI would be a great place to look at it, because, again, you're going to improve your overall operational efficiency right there, because you're automating the workflow.

Speaker 1: 17:59

Anytime you automate the workflow, you enhance your efficiency for your business, your operations, and you're still reducing the errors. You'll need to recognize that's a big deal If you can reduce errors for your business. How big is that? You don't have to waste time on doing returns and things like that. You can reduce the errors and get those out of your process. Man, it's just going to create so much more peace and actually just a better relationship with your vendors. It's also increase your accuracy Think about this because you're validating your, your, your data as you go, because if the system is not, if something is wrong with it, with the data it's going to recognize oh, we've got a flag, what's going on here?

Speaker 1: 18:37

You'll be able to validate it when you still have time, versus waiting for something again. Oh man, I got the wrong thing. Then you won't have that moment right. It's also going to give you a lot more visibility because you're going to have transparency in ordering, you have transparency in invoicing. It's going to help you make better decisions and overall, hopefully, it can help you reduce your inventory costs because you'll have more insight into the supply chain and it's going to help you optimize those inventory levels, and we all know that inventory levels are such a big deal because you're just carrying that cost. We recognize you do have to carry some costs to be able to maintain your business, but what is the right area, what's the right limits, what's the right man or max? Well, we need data to understand that. If we had data through an EDI connection, you'd be able to get that much clearer and granular faster. That's what it's all about. So now that leads us to the third tier, and the third tier is a big one.

Speaker 1: 19:33

We talked about this at length last month, but this is distribution e-commerce solutions. Okay, because you can't miss this. Now we put together a lot, a lot, a lot of resources for you on this, and the cool part about e-commerce solutions is this is for businesses of any size. You don't have to be a big Fortune 500 company to take advantage of an e-commerce solution for a distributor. The trick is you better have that thing ready to be navigated easily, and what the customer needs need to be there, right there on the site and ready. This is a big area for procurement. This is how we make some shift here Now. This solution right here extends the distributor's reach for sure. It gives you an opportunity to search and to do research on the parts and pieces that you may need for your project without necessarily, you know, having to go, go visit a store or go to a site building or things like that. You can do a lot of this right here and at the foundation of e-commerce.

Speaker 1: 20:38

What you're really doing is providing you access, really providing you access for what you need for your business to run, because usually what you want to look for, you need to have a good, user-friendly interface. You got to find a way to find parts. Just to be real, if you go through the website and you can't put in your part number to figure out what's going on, do you have the right one? It's not going to do you any good. So if the user interface is not good, it's not user-friendly, it has lots of errors or timeouts or things like that. You're not going to keep using it, and you're not going to keep using it for good reason, because it's not giving you the data that you need it to give you. So, look, you got to make sure you have a good user interface.

Speaker 1: 21:16

You need to also make sure that that e-commerce solution has a good, easy way to place an order. Just face it, sometimes that can be the hardest thing. All right, where do you put your quantities in? How do I select what day I want it shipped to me? How can I select what method I want it shipped to me? How do I actually connect my system to place an order, because I want to use a PO instead of a credit card? All this stuff is just part of your order placement and you have to have this in place. So this is something that should be important for you and this is what you can evaluate as you're looking at vendors.

Speaker 1: 21:47

And then you need a way to manage your account. If you can't go back in and look at your account and say, okay, for that job, I used that conduit, those ridges, those LBs or these couplings, this liquid type, all these things, maybe you want to replicate the project. You'd be able to search that history. You'd go back and see how often you're buying these things, see all these things start tying together and then, once you build enough history, you'd be able to say, okay, maybe I need to start stocking X item and I need to put this many on the shelf, whatever it may be, but the opportunity through a platform that you're working with, with your distributor, is huge. So if you don't do the automation, the punch out, if you don't do the EDI, you definitely need to get set up on e-commerce. It's just an easy, low entry, low hanging fruit way to better strengthen your business so that I really they're your three tiers.

Speaker 1: 22:42

I want you to consider that and everything's evolving, as I mentioned, everything's evolving. This whole digital transformation. This is at the forefront and we want to put out this information around this tiered approach, because we know the way you engage with your vendors and suppliers is changing. It's changing and you want to have, and you really need to have, digital solutions like the CXML, like the like, the like, the EDI, like the e-commerce solutions. That's such a big deal because we recognize that so much is changing on your end so fast. Your distributors need to be changing with you to meet your needs, because there's new standards for out there for customer service, there's new standards for sales. There's new standards for operations and delivery out there for customer service, there's new standards for sales, there's new standards for operations and delivery. All this stuff procurement, everything has this new standard that's been driven by this digital age, which is fine, which is cool, actually, I think, for me.

Speaker 1: 23:35

This is where I look at it. This is where it's shifted. It's so neat because it's not everything is not so tied directly to the old legacy systems and the catalogs. Most of those places have their place, for sure to find stuff. Man, if you can go online now and get cut sheets, information and this item goes with this album have you thought about that when you place this item? Most people need these things. Amazon does that. Why can't distributors? Well, we are Distributors are now because they're embracing this digital interchange, this digital integration. They're embracing the personalized service, they're embracing the solutions that are out there and they're moving forward to more connected, more efficient, more customer-centric types of solutions and distribution. So it's a pretty exciting time, to be honest, when I see the stuff that we've built and we're building and that we're focused on.

Speaker 1: 24:30

Obviously, at the end of the day, it all comes down to people. You do have to ask, because people and ideas over products that's the most important and the ideas that the people are having here around connecting systems, being able to meet end users where they're at, for the day-to-day stuff for the project, stuff for the OEM stuff. To be able to have all that stuff in place and all those business systems in place to have a seamless experience with your distributor, that's a big deal. If you're not working with eco, with any of these systems, reach out to us. There's no reason that a listener right now who is, who is within the eco you know geography if you will to not have an e-commerce account. You shouldn't. They're easy to set up. We can help you navigate that. Matter of fact, inside the link there'll be some some inside the show notes Rather there'll be some links where you can connect and go ahead and get your account set up. It's free, it's an easy process, but it gives you access to be able to start doing business directly with this through the Web site, digitally, ok. And if you have questions on EDI, if you have questions on electronic data not electronic data interchange but if you have questions on punch out, that's a big deal. That's an opportunity for you to grow. Reach out to us.

Speaker 1: 25:50

We have teams, we have experts in place that can come in. They can see what your business system looks like and really, what would that integration path be for us to be able to do it the right way, because we don't want to come in and do a solution that's going to frustrate you. No, we want to set it up so that you can come in. You have a good user experience, your people have a good user experience, your maintenance teams, whoever is going to be using that to buy the material that they need for the project? We want to build that confidence, and we know that the only way you're going to get that confidence and that trust built up is if you do it right the first time. Do it right. This is where we're here to help.

Speaker 1: 26:29

So we'd love to get your feedback on Eco Asks why, how this is going. What do you enjoy the most about the shows? Also, we're doing a lot of information on YouTube. Now we're trying to put out not just a podcast but more resources to help you grow, to help you learn, to help you just keep moving forward as you just work with vendors like Electrical Equipment Company. So we'd love to get your feedback on some of these videos, some of these resources. We have a lot of resources as well on just our digital commerce solutions, and what does that look like? So love to connect with you there again. You can go to eko online that's eeco onlinecom, to find all our resources, and you can. You can connect with us or subscribe to it to us, rather, on our youtube channel. You can follow us on linkedin. That's a great area as well. Try to put out some consistent information, but then reach out. Let's just reach out. Let's have a conversation.

Speaker 1: 27:23

As I mentioned earlier, adam sheets is the director of e-commerce. He loves to have conversations around these topics. Our sales people do, our sales management do. We want to be able to be here for you? So if you want to say hey, I think edi may be a good path for us, let us look at it with you. We can figure out okay, what this, this is what it would look like for on our end, you're set up where this is what we need to put in place to be able to do it, things like that.

Speaker 1: 27:45

The same thing with uh, punch out and then again, as a, as a last call emphasis, make sure you get your e-commerce account set up. There are. So there, it's just an easy way. So if you're needing, find yourself in the need of cut sheets, data sheets, drawings, that type of information off of the products that you're purchasing. The e-commerce solution has it all. It literally has it all. It's all uploaded right there. We put a lot of work in on that. So to take advantage of that, you've got to get your account set up, okay. So, anyway, love to hear from you guys Again.

Speaker 1: 28:20

Ecoonlinecom is how you connect with us. You go to the show notes for this episode. You'll be able to find our email address podcast at ecoaskswhycom. You can connect with us there. You can always connect with us on LinkedIn. You can connect with me on LinkedIn wherever whatever you, whatever's easiest for you. But we want to be here. We want to be a resource for you as you continue to grow. So hopefully you're embracing this digitalization.

Speaker 1: 28:42

I know it took me a while to took me a while to. I know for one thing Electric Equipment Company has definitely embraced it. We are leaning into it. We're making the investments where we need to make, because this is a huge item for the future. And as someone who's been in the industry for 20 plus years now, it's really neat to see how stuff has shifted, how things are really migrating. But one thing has remained the same this is a people relational business. It's all about just making those friendships and being able to serve each other and help each other. And I just think when I see this stuff right here, the way that the digital age is coming in, it's easy to just focus on that and lose the relationship, and that's something that ECO is committed to People and ideas over products. We're going to always make sure that that relationship with the ones that we serve is at the highest level possible the highest level possible. Are we going to make mistakes? Of course we are, because we're human possible. Are we going to make mistakes? Of course we are because we're human, but at the end of the day, we're making the investments and the people and the technologies to serve at an extremely high level.

Speaker 1: 29:47

So we'd love to get your feedback on this. Give us a rating and review, connect with us, connect with me. However you want to do it, we want to be here for you. We want to serve you. Thank you so much.

Speaker 1: 29:56

By the way, go check out the website Eco Online and you can find ways to start your account. It's very easy to get your account set up. It's just not a long, laborious process. It gets done and gets set up. It's relatively straightforward and to the point. If you have questions, just reach out. Our credit team does a phenomenal job on making that process as seamless as possible and, again, we're adding products on a consistent basis, pretty much daily, to give you more and more opportunities and access to the data that you need. Okay, so thank you again. So much for listening. It's just been an absolute honor and I look forward to hearing from you, seeing you again soon and remember to keep asking why. Thank you for listening to. Eeco Asks why this show is supported ad-free by Electrical Equipment Company. Eeco is redefining the expectations of an electrical distributor by placing people and ideas before products. Please subscribe and share with your colleagues and friends. Also leave comments, feedback and any new topics that you would like to hear. To learn more or to share your insights, visit EECOASYcom. That's E-E-C-O-A-S-K-S-W-H-Ycom.