With the Salesforce platform, Lavoro, the largest distributor of agricultural inputs in Latin America, is experiencing continuous improvement of its internal processes, especially those that drive better identification of the needs of its consumers.
Technology is increasingly present in agribusiness. The digitization of processes in the field has helped rural producers to make the business even more competitive and, most of all, sustainable.
According to the 2021 edition of McKinsey & Company’s The Mind of the Brazilian Farmer in the Digital Age survey, after the COVID-19 pandemic, the use of digital channels by farmers has grown 46%, an increase of 10% compared to the situation before the health crisis.
The new trend was mainly driven by the use of WhatsApp and the advancement of agricultural marketplaces.
But for innovations to reach rural properties, Digital Transformation must be a priority for those who offer products and services to this sector.
Aligned with new trends, Lavoro, the largest distributor of agricultural inputs in Latin America, has been a pioneer in the Digital Transformation of the sector. Since May 2020, the company has operated an online sales channel, CompreLavoro, which is already one of the largest in the country.
In addition, it has invested heavily in the service agenda that uses technology, including solutions in agricultural insurance, digital agriculture, order tracking, application instructions and online package inserts, among other things.
At the same time, in order to continue improving the service journey to its more than 50,000 customers distributed throughout the country and Latin America, Lavoro is also investing in continuous improvements in its internal processes, especially those that drive excellence in service and better identification of the needs of its consumers.
For this purpose, in July 2021, the company adopted the Salesforce platform. Salesforce, a global leader in CRM, empowers companies of all sizes and sectors to perform Digital Transformation and obtain a 360-degree view of customers.
In this first phase of implementation, nine investors from Grupo Lavoro are already using the Salesforce solution for business automation, the Salesforce Sales Cloud, which is used for placing orders. In a short time, Lavoro digitized the company’s order entry.
Vinícius Soares, Head of Innovation, Lavoro, said: “Of the R$600 million in monthly orders scanned since the deployment of Salesforce, we have already reached R$3 billion in less than six months. Factors such as ease of use, better security and speed for the insertion of orders, which is less than 40 seconds for registration, have benefitted our resellers immediately.”
Henry Koibuchi Sakane, Digital Transformation Manager, Lavoro, said: “We chose Salesforce because we recognize its strength and offer globally scalable solutions. Lavoro has been expanding its business throughout Latin America and our main goal is to create an ecosystem that unites the physical and digital in any location that has a Lavoro reseller or investing companies.”
Perspectives for the future
According to Soares, the service provided by the Salesforce team is one of the main differentials of the partnership, which has already been showing concrete results, even with the short time it has been in existence.
“Every week, a Salesforce consultant gets in touch with the Lavoro team to identify possible challenges and offer new suggestions for the best use of the solution,” said Soares.
“We believe that this bond tends to strengthen with the hiring of other service packages, including the processes carried out in our marketplace and the global integration of the CRM group.”
The implementation of Salesforce solutions is part of Lavoro’s investment in reaching a high level of service provision and product offering to its customers, promoting the Digital Transformation of rural producers and increasing the expansion of the company in Brazil and Latin America.
