A major UK Energy supplier has announced it is to use Text-Connect™ to tighten up sales processes and speed up information flows with their 300 plus field sales team.

The company which supplies gas and electricity to around five million customer accounts will be using the innovative Text-Connect™ service which links mobile phones and computers seamlessly for two-way text message communication.

Text-Connect™ requires no new infrastructure or software , and treats SMS text messages as if they were emails forwarding them onto laptop or desktop computers in the office.

Outgoing “emails” sent from the office computer appear as text messages on the sales person’s mobile phone. There is no significant time delay in either direction.

Major advantages are:

• Fast & efficient communication between office and field sales staff.
• Communication is easy to manage and automatically documented.
• Eliminates the need for office mobile phones and their high costs & awkward operation.
• Sends the message directly to the most relevant person or team.
• Enables messages to be narrowcast or broadcast in either direction, so speeding up information distribution, sales leads, new market intelligence etc.

The Sales Support Co-ordinator at our client company, who employ more than 11,000 people said: "Text-Connect enables me to receive text messages on my PC from our field based account managers detailing daily sales figures. Text-Connect also gives me the means to contact our entire field sales team almost simultaneously, which is particularly effective in case of an emergency".

UPDATE: Text-Connect™ offers a cost solution to Lone Worker monitoring & Lone Worker protection. Using Pre scheduled text messages you can send a SMS text shot to your Lone workers, who in turn text back their status.

Any Lone Workers not replying can then be followed up. Alarm key words in the reply can be used if the worker is replying while under duress.