rnv uses CRM from the cloud for customized service offerings
Modern public transport in the Rhine-Neckar metropolitan region
Rhein-Neckar-Verkehr GmbH (rnv) transports around 500,000 passengers every day in the Rhine-Neckar metropolitan region around the border triangle of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse. In order to meet the requirements of its numerous private and business customers, rnv has launched a digitalization offensive. This also includes the use of a Microsoft Business Application Platform, which provides the functionalities of the Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM suite. With the cloud-based solution, rnv achieves an all-round view of its private and business customers and thus realizes lean and efficient processes in customer service, communication & marketing and sales. The local transport company implemented the CRM solution in the existing IT infrastructure together with the IT specialists from Mannheim-based PTA IT-Beratung.
Company portrait
Every day, Rhein-Neckar-Verkehr GmbH (rnv) transports around 500,000 people in the cities of Mannheim, Heidelberg and Ludwigshafen and the surrounding area. The transport company serves private and business customers from Bad Dürkheim to Neckargemünd, from Frankenthal to Leimen, from Viernheim to Maudach. The company occupies a special position among local transport companies in Germany: rnv is the municipal transport company that was founded jointly by the three cities of Heidelberg, Ludwigshafen and Mannheim and operates simultaneously in the three federal states of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse.
rnv stands for attractive and sustainable mobility in the Rhine-Neckar metropolitan region. With more than 2,700 employees, the transport company ensures a safe and sustainable journey into the future. The rnv operates over 80 lines and the longest continuous meter-gauge network in Germany. In order to provide its numerous private and business customers with a unique, comprehensive range of services, rnv decided to introduce a modern CRM solution based on the Microsoft Business Application Platform.
Bundle required information in a central CRM instance
In order to develop new, modern forms of local public transport, increase efficiency and reduce costs, rnv is now consistently focusing on the digitalization of all areas of transport operations. This has now become an integral part of the corporate strategy. The aim is to optimize work processes, whether in the organization itself or in contact with passengers and business customers from the entire Rhine-Neckar metropolitan region. Against this background, rnv also decided to invite tenders for a CRM project with the aim of mapping all processes in customer service, sales and communication & marketing consistently and bundling them in a central CRM solution. The contract was awarded to PTA IT-Beratung from Mannheim, and the system of choice was the Microsoft Business Application Platform. The focus was particularly on the pillars of customer service, sales and communication & marketing, which were to be incorporated into a highly integrated CRM landscape. With this solution, the project team wanted to achieve end-to-end process transparency across these important business areas and break down data silos.
Agile software environment ensures fast and variable processes
One of the biggest challenges in the project was to replace the heterogeneous system landscape that had grown over the years and to consolidate the necessary processes on a central business platform. “At this point, we quickly realized that we needed a high level of process expertise and the right CRM solution to achieve our project goal,” says Henning Scholz, CRM project manager at rnv, describing the complex task. Until now, rnv had been operating different, fragmented IT systems for its customer service, sales, communication and marketing, but now a modern, integrated CRM solution was to ensure that all the necessary data from these different IT systems was brought together on one platform. In this way, rnv will have an all-round view of its service processes in the private and business customer sector as well as in marketing. “We wanted to be able to control new processes quickly and efficiently via various channels – be it to reliably and promptly map changes to the Germany ticket in the system, to accelerate complaint management via our ticket system or to set up new sales campaigns in an agile manner,” explains Henning Scholz, CRM project manager at rnv.
Milestone 1: Integrated processes in customer service
In a first and crucial project step, the team set about scrutinizing and modernizing the entire customer service area. In the course of the inventory analysis, it turned out that the individual processes in the old system were very well described and that the rnv service department was very committed to the project. The analysis revealed that the existing ticket system and the associated support of the legacy system needed to be replaced by a new, integrated ticket system that would further optimize rnv’s customer management, shorten the response times of the service desk and efficiently map all customer service processes. To achieve this, the PTA’s IT experts first improved the website connection of all service tools. In the past, questions or complaints were received via the mail system and were recorded there with a great deal of effort, but with the new integrated CRM solution, rnv’s numerous customers can enter their concerns directly via the rnv website and send them to the service department. There, the new CRM suite enables the respective customer and ticket to be created in the system and automatically assigned to the responsible channel. This means that the rnv service team is now able to differentiate between complaints, inquiries and incoming e-mails at a glance, prioritize them and process them quickly.
During ticket processing, internal wiki pages, knowledge bases and standard templates help to process incoming inquiries quickly, competently and efficiently. The new CRM suite even provides text modules that reliably support the service team in their daily work. This is also made possible by Microsoft Copilot, an AI-based assistant that is integrated into the Microsoft 365 applications. It helps to summarize tasks, provides a direct insight into the customer history and even helps with writing emails. In the next expansion stage, rnv plans to connect the entire customer service area to the rnv billing system. In this way, it will be possible in future to create evaluations of how rnv is performing without a great deal of effort.
“The implementation of our first expansion stage was a complete success. We were able to go live with our new CRM module in a short space of time. This was possible thanks to the trusting and excellent cooperation between our specialist department and the IT consultants from PTA. This shows how even complex tasks can be completed on time and on budget.”
Henning Scholz, CRM project manager at rnv
Milestone 2: Key account sales also fully integrated into the CRM landscape
In addition to rnv’s countless private customers, rnv’s business customers will also benefit from lean and modern sales processes thanks to the new Microsoft Business Application Platform. To this end, the PTA’s IT experts have integrated the associated sales processes for key account sales and vehicle advertising end-to-end into the new business platform. This includes seamless data exchange and deep integration into both the rnv billing system and the entire customer service area. Important forms for major customers, as well as workshops and specialist seminars, can now be integrated into the front end of the rnv website with little effort. If a major customer makes use of a service or books a seminar, these activities now land as leads directly in rnv’s CRM backend.
Milestone 3: Centralize and harmonize communication and marketing data
As a third important cornerstone, the project managers also supported the area of communication and marketing. Numerous contacts are now centralized on the Microsoft Business Application Platform. All in all, this leads to efficient and target group-oriented communication. Until the implementation of the new CRM solution, the Communications and Marketing team used different databases and manual Excel lists to maintain a large number of contacts, particularly for invitations. By bundling this data and segmenting the Excel lists in the central CRM solution, the time-consuming collation of individual contact data from various sources will no longer be necessary. “We now keep the majority of communication and marketing contacts centrally, which relieves our communication and marketing department and optimizes processes,” explains Henning Scholz, CRM project manager at rnv.
Project ID: 6540
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The right course has been set
The introduction of the Microsoft Business Application Platform at rnv has paid off. With centralized CRM functionalities, the transport company has streamlined and consistently optimized important processes in customer service, sales and communication & marketing – rnv is thus consistently taking the right steps on the way to the public transport of tomorrow. rnv is very satisfied with the rapid go-live of the new cloud-based CRM suite. This was not least due to the collegial cooperation between the rnv specialist departments and the PTA IT team. The rnv staff fully supported the agile approach to the system changeover and the PTA’s team of consultants never missed an opportunity to get a precise picture of how rnv works in order to understand processes exactly. This also included an on-site day at the rnv mobility center. Certainly not an everyday undertaking and proof of how confidently the project team successfully mastered the individual milestones of the CRM project.
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