Rossignol, the French ski manufacturer, was able to use business intelligence to dramatically reduce the demand on its call center caused by its own internal company communications.

Rossignol discovered that during certain times of the year, more than 20% of customer service calls came from its own field representatives, who would tie up customer service, delaying its thousands of nationwide dealers from initiating orders.

Using web-based PivotLink software (made by SeaTab Software), Rossignol has been able to supply accurate information about order status, shipments, inventory, to its remote sales reps. This, in turn, enabled them to reduce that demand on its call center by 20% during its critical selling season. Now, the call center can serve both its reps who need information and dealers who want to order more effectively.

"Our manufacturers sales reps in the field needed timely and reliable information access for a status of an order and available inventory. SeaTab's PivotLink provided an extremely cost efficient way to deliver this, without disruption to other systems already in place," said Jim Hunter, CFO of Rossignol.

The company says that PivotLink handles the questions from outside personnel, so customer service is freed to deliver better service to dealers and customers. According to Hunter, PivotLink provided a return on investment in less than 60 days.

PivotLink provides accurate information that matches the needs of those in the field, as well as monitoring sales performance across the company and its affiliated brands, including Rossignol, Dynastar, Look, Lange, Kerma and Original SIN Snowboards.

Initially, Rossignol's management also quickly realized the benefits of this monitoring tool in providing both customized and up-to-the-minute reports on sales and category performance in various geographic locations. "Allowing a manager access to specific sales data -- when and how he/she wants it -- uncovers information a manager needs to make critical daily decisions. Because of this, PivotLink is the information tool of choice among our management staff," Hunter says.

Now, Rossignol consistently uses PivotLink across the company in sales, marketing and finance. Its parent company, Skis Rossignol S.A., sees PivotLink advantages in providing data on what's being sold and what inventory is needed in the US, without having to wait on time zones, when staff can issue reports.

SeaTab Software's tool allows business managers to custom-select only the relevant data, rather than sifting through pre-programmed or core reports for information, which can be inaccurate or outdated.