Zodiac Pool Care SA

“Maximizer was definitely the best choice for Zodiac as a CRM solution, when we factored in costs”
– Philip Hughes, Marketing Manager, Zodiac Pool Care SA

Company Information
Industry: Leisure & Maintenance
Location: South Africa
Product: Maximizer CRM 10.5 Professional
Users: 10

“Maximizer has saved us time and enabled the business to achieve more than what it could before. We look forward to expanding our use of the product in the future.” – Philip Hughes, Zodiac Pool Care SA.

Staying on top with Maximizer
Zodiac Pool Care SA is the leading provider of swimming pool products such as pool cleaners, salt water chlorinators, heat pumps and mineral sanitizers in the South African market. Zodiac is part of a global company with head offices in Paris, France. Zodiac required a customer relationship management solution to power its customer loyalty programme and enable the company to manage a database of over 100,000 users of its products within the South African market.

A need for cohesive CRM
Before switching to Maximizer, Zodiac made use of a bespoke solution that was developed twelve years ago. This ageing CRM system allowed for only one product category and was limited to database management and focused on customer care.

Says Philip Hughes, marketing manager for Zodiac, “We had a very real need for a more up-to-date CRM solution that would not only enable our customer loyalty programme but also allow Zodiac to maintain a large database of consumers, conduct direct marketing activities and provide our customer care department with the tools it needs.”

Hughes says that Maximizer was chosen over other CRM solutions based on its ability to meet Zodiac’s needs exactly and at an affordable price.

“We considered a few CRM applications,” he explains. “But chose Maximizer because the modules we required were not stand-alone products, but rather bundled with Maximizer. The fact that other solutions required additional purchases made their costs prohibitive. Maximizer is also a global product, so if Zodiac chooses to extend its services internationally, this could be done.”

Phased Integration
Zodiac chose to phase in Maximizer, enabling specific modules for their corresponding departments within the company, at intervals. The organisation originally selected Maximizer Enterprise solution 9.5 and had ten users loaded on the system at time of writing.

“Implementation for the customer care team, who were first to start using the application, took only a few weeks – including training,” says Hughes.

Maximizer CRM is deployed at Zodiac using Microsoft SQL Server and is integrated with Crystal Reports for reporting, as well as third-party scanning software that is used for channel management.

“This application is used to record product serial numbers, which are then integrated into the Maximizer database,” says Hughes.

The company makes use of Maximizer’s Service and Marketing modules, including a custom-developed loyalty programme module which was created specifically for Zodiac by implementation partner, JRB Solutions South Africa, contracted by Maximizer Business Partner CRM Consultants.

This module allows Zodiac to capture data from warranty cards sent out with all products. Dealers complete these cards which are then returned to Zodiac who award their dealers with points. Maximizer’s Workflow Automation module is then used to generate and automatically send customer statements pertaining to their loyalty earnings. Zodiac also intends to make use of Maximizer in its sales department in the future.

Enabling new areas of business
By switching to Maximizer Enterprise Hughes says that Zodiac Pool Care is now able to deliver value to its customers and drive business activities that were not possible before.

“Maximizer allows us to offer our customers a loyalty programme and to conduct direct marketing activities. These were not possible with the previous application we were using,” he explains.

“Maximizer was definitely the best choice for Zodiac as a CRM solution, when we factored in costs,” he adds.

Zodiac is also able to simply and rapidly capture customer data and maintain a CRM database with Workflow Automation taking the hassle out of communicating with customers.

Hughes says that this allows the business to focus its marketing activities and promote its core business without wasting time on repetitive tasks.

“Maximizer has saved us time and enabled the business to achieve more than what it could before. We look forward to expanding our use of the product in the future,” he concludes.