Challenges

Custard Insurance Adjusters (Custard) had been using a custom-built enterprise application for managing their sales activities, which were centered around reporting data. As the nation’s largest independent insurance adjuster with Fortune 100 clients across the country, Custard’s operational data was the key driver for sales strategies. As a result, their sales team was struggling to efficiently manage their leads and opportunities, which resulted in stagnated growth. Their sales leadership was unable to track sales rep specific activities to help determine where the bottlenecks and missed opportunities were arising from. 

Custard was in need of a modern and comprehensive enterprise CRM to meet their evolving needs, to ensure Custard remained the nation's largest independent insurance adjuster. 

Turning Point

Polar Strategy was introduced to Custard through the SugarCRM enterprise sales team. The Sugar sales team identified Polar Strategy as the right partner with the right skills to develop a tailored enterprise CRM for Custard. Polar conducted an in-depth discovery with every department and the leadership team. Custard’s concerns focused heavily on data integrity and security. Polar prepared a demo of a potential future state and an agile roadmap that included quality control and data integrity checks at every stage of the implementation.  

Polar focused the implementation on key features within SugarCRM that would allow the Custard sales team to become proactive at sales activities and keep a log of all interactions to build out a Customer360 profile for each of their accounts. After configuring advanced custom reports and dashboards, the vast amount of data provided by the custom Custard operational database proved to be an invaluable asset to the sales team; they were finally able to make sense of trends and key data elements that could align with the sales strategy and KPIs requested by leadership.  

Welcoming New Sales Strategies

In 2018, after thoroughly analyzing the CIA Custard Insurance Adjusters' current system and sales processes, Polar Strategy proposed a comprehensive solution that implemented SugarCRM, a flexible and customizable SugarCRM  Enterprise platform.

Polar Strategy worked closely with Custard to understand their sales processes, pain points, and desired outcomes. SugarCRM was tailored to align with specific requirements, ensuring the design was user-friendly and intuitive for the sales team.

Polar’s phased implementation started with the core SugarCRM Enterprise implementation, followed by SugarCRM’s Mobile App configuration, which greatly enhanced the sales team’s activity KPIs. 

User Profile Configuration

To improve data security, user profiles were configured leveraging SugarCRM permissions and profiles, allowing each user to access data they needed without exposing the complete data set. 

Accounts & Contacts Modules

As with most enterprise organizations, Custard had concerns with data quality, specifically hundreds of accounts that may have bad or missing data. Though this data was being pushed from an API, Polar configured a bi-directional sync with workflow approvals allowing users to update key data elements on both systems from within SugarCRM and the SugarCRM mobile app.

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Opportunities Module

The Opportunities module was completely reconfigured for Custard’s proprietary sales lifecycle. The sales reps were not creating dollar value opportunities, but rather developing opportunities based on client engagement which would drive revenue over a period of time. 

Cases Module

Custard’s sales reps were typically the primary point of contact for key accounts, which meant their clients would reach out directly via phone or email to report any issues. Polar configured the Cases module to allow Custard sales reps to log and track client-related issues. Polar configured the SugarCRM Mobile App and Outlook plug-in to allow emails to be converted into cases without logging into another system. 

Leads Module

Polar configured the SugarCRM Leads module as a prospecting capability that would allow the sales team to keep track of new contacts they met at events and dinners. These leads could be added to marketing campaigns before being converted into client accounts. Business cards could be uploaded as leads through the SugarCRM mobile app’s camera upload feature. 

Reports Module

Polar configured user-specific reports that were leveraged on their SugarCRM dashboard to provide real-time activity updates against their clients. Additional reports were created using the large data set provided by their API to identify trends, allowing the sales reps to be proactive with outreach. 

Training & Adoption

Polar Strategy provided comprehensive in-person and remote training to the sales team to ensure a smooth transition to the new system. The training covered all CRM system aspects, including navigating the interface, managing contacts, opportunities, cases, and leads, and generating reports. This training helped improve user adoption and ensure the system was used effectively. Polar provided a dedicated SugarCRM resource after Go-Live, along with weekly check-ins for the first 90 days to allow Custard to request and implement enhancements to the CRM. This hands-on approach to customer success led to complete user adoption of the new CRM. 

Results

Custard was very pleased with the results of the implementation and maintained a continued relationship with Polar Strategy for years after. Custard appreciated the attention-to-detail provided by the Polar technical lead which led to satisfied users and  more informed leadership.  

Custard experienced a significant increase in productivity, with streamlined processes that reduced the time and effort required to manage customer data. In addition, the 360-degree view of their customers and prospects enabled the sales and marketing teams to tailor their communications and outreach efforts, resulting in a more personalized and effective approach.

Today, Custard remains the largest privately-held loss adjusting company in the United States. 

Quote

“Polar Strategy delivered and implemented an Enterprise CRM solution for Custard, providing analysis, solution design, deployment, training, and support. Polar's scope included building integration with an internal application.”

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Tom O’Neill

Vice President

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