Dell Computers (A): Field

Service for Corporate Clients

CRM Group 5 (Section Y):

Ankita Jha
Chitrali Nag
Kaushik Sahoo
Manisa Parida
Marienne Mascarenhas
Rahul NS
Sampad Panigrahi
Swastik Mohapatra
Sam Verghese

U113187
U113198
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U113206
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Some Case Facts

US Market share (PC): Q2 2001
Founded by Michael Dell, 1983

Others,
40.20%

Dell, 24%
Compaq,
12.70%

Case timeline: Late 90s till 2001

HP, 9.40%

Worlds largest PC manufacturer with mkt share: 13.4%

IBM, 6.10%

90% of Dells sales came from corporate clients

Dell moving from smaller computer systems and servers
to larger server products

Gateway,
7.60%

World Market share (PC): Q2 2001

Dell, 13%

Business model: Mass customization, High levels of

customer service and low-cost & lean production

Others,
55.90%

Compaq,
12.10%
HP, 6.90%

IBM, 7.20%

FujitsuSiemens,
4.60%

Dell Business Model

Dell Direct:
Direct interaction with the customers without any intermediaries in between
Sell computers directly to consumers
Customize as per customers requirements

Dell
Direct

Inventory Management
High inventory seen as an unnecessary cost and flaw in the service delivery
system
Create a light weight organization with little assets tied up in inventory
Efficient management of physical assets with help of information management
(intellectual assets)

Low production costs and low prices

Main objective was to assemble as many components as possible than
manufacture
More focus on efficient delivery systems than on innovation
Lower production and delivery costs and undercut the competition

Inventory
Managem
ent
Lower
productio
n costs

CRM Initiatives for Corporate Customers

Premier pages: Customized webpages for corporate consumers
Dell sales people meet the clients to build relationships and understand requirements

Direct relationships using sales, customer service and tech people with consumer
Constant collection of information on consumers evolving needs in accordance with emerging
technologies
Employment of Dell certified 3rd party service providers to provide wide scale serviceability
Call centers as well as online and offline support was provided

How Dell walked the talk in CRM

Dell hired employees for its call center based on a technical
aptitude test and level of customer service experience
First hand observations and on the job training helped keep
attrition rate low
Modified KPIs were used to measure the level of service
provided:
Ship to target
Initial field incident rate
On-time first-time fix
FTR rate
3rd party conducted telephone surveys to measure quality of
service provided by Dell
Huge web repository to previously solved problems and
discussions to help consumers solve problems themselves and
installation of diagnostic tools for online problem resolution

Choice of Dell as a large server provider

Points in favour

Points not in favour

Core competence of Dell i.e. Dell-direct can

be leveraged easily here

Customer interface will be different

compared to Dell-direct

Existing long term relationship with Dell on

smaller systems, only need to extend it to
high end large servers

Lack of experience in the high end server

market

High levels of service and commitment of

Dell in its existing line of products and
services
Multiple awards and recognitions for Dell
for its best customer service levels over the
years

Presence of established players like IBM

which not only has experience but also
higher ratio of qualified employees to
customer ratio than Dell
Operational efficiency is not the strong
point of Dell as compared to IBM;
Thousands of dollars of loss for each second
of server down-time

Thank You !