Homebuilder Front Office Integration

Homebuilders benefit from a cost-effective, seamlessly integrated front-office-to-back-office solution

The Pivotal CRM team offers business-integration solutions and implementation services, reducing the cost and complexity traditionally associated with integration to Oracle JD Edwards EnterpriseOne HMS. With Pivotal CRM solutions, homebuilders can deploy best-in-class applications in the back and front office, and optimize their cross-application business processes—quickly and effectively.

Fully Integrated Applications

Designed to meet the needs of high-production homebuilders, integration between Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office and Oracle JD Edwards EnterpriseOne offers support for the entire homebuyer lifecycle. With this solution, complete end-to-end front-office and back-office integration improves data flow and management access to shared data. Integrated processes cut manual steps, redundant data entry, and multiple user interfaces, dramatically improving efficiencies.

Any time information is maintained in more than one location, data synchronization problems can occur, and the administrator needs to ensure that each system maintains the same version of common data. For most companies, this means manually entering the same data in both locations. With fully integrated applications, however, Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office and EnterpriseOne can coexist and work together by transferring data bi-directionally between the two systems, dramatically reducing the risk of lost data and lost opportunities.

The transfer of data is typically done in a batch mode, with information visible in both systems upon completion of the batch transfer—completely eliminating the need to log and make updates in both applications, and mitigating costly data errors.

Reflect Geographic Data in Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office

Construction planning forms the basis of what products are available for sale at any given time. All of that critical information is entered and stored in EnterpriseOne HMS, available to the back-office on demand, but virtually out of sight to the people who want it most: the sales team. Sharing information and updates from EnterpriseOne with Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office allows sales representatives to access every available release, lot, and inventory home within each region, division, and neighborhood that they are permitted to sell. Their jobs are made that much easier—they always know exactly which lots and homes are available for sale and their current phase in the construction process.

Through this integration, homebuilders eliminate otherwise-daunting duplicate data entry in their CRM system. More importantly, it allows them to segment and assign sales teams and specific representatives to sales releases. When it is time to start selling, every release is optimally staffed, so sales associates can sell better, sell more, and sell faster.

Make Options for Each Construction Phase Available in the Front Office

Administrators set up available options for each neighborhood in the backend. With integration between Pivotal CRM and EnterpriseOne, these can be pushed live to the front office, so that the assignment of options to releases in each construction phase is accurately reflected in Pivotal CRM. This capability helps sales representatives work with customers to accurately build and select optimal preferences on the spot. After a contract has been signed, buyer-selected options are brought back into EnterpriseOne.

Reflect Geographic Data in Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office

Construction planning forms the basis of what products are available for sale at any given time. All of that critical information is entered and stored in EnterpriseOne HMS, available to the back-office on demand, but virtually out of sight to the people who want it most: the sales team. Sharing information and updates from EnterpriseOne with Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office allows sales representatives to access every available release, lot, and inventory home within each region, division, and neighborhood that they are permitted to sell. Their jobs are made that much easier—they Make Options for Each Construction Phase Available in the Front Office .

Administrators set up available options for each neighborhood in the backend. With integration between Pivotal CRM and EnterpriseOne, these can be pushed live to the front office, so that the assignment of options to releases in each construction phase is accurately reflected in Pivotal CRM. This capability helps sales representatives work with customers to accurately build and select optimal preferences on the spot. After a contract has been signed, buyer-selected options are brought back into EnterpriseOne.

Once a community is set up in EnterpriseOne and pulled into Pivotal CRM, all related data, including pricing, is available in the Pivotal CRM system. Only lots with a release date in EnterpriseOne will be made available to the front-office. As the release progresses, subsequent changes to the price in EnterpriseOne are reflected in the Pivotal CRM system. Pivotal CRM supports the wildcarding option feature in EnterpriseOne, allowing for a minimum amount of data transformation to the CRM system. Accordingly, administrators only need to specify options once to make them available or wildcarded for all elevations, plans, and releases in each neighborhood. This integration leads to increased productivity and lower costs.

Make Inventory Homes Available in Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office

Once geographic data and the option catalog are pulled into Pivotal CRM, the sales team can easily access the status and details of home site inventory homes. The sales team can quickly identify and look up pre-planned inventory homes, and inventory homes that have been sold once but are again available for sale. With complete access to product plans/elevations for lots, sales representatives can look up divisions and see which plans are assigned to a neighborhood and which lots are available for sale, speeding up the sales cycle.

When sales representatives are with customers, they can use Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office to look up plans/elevations that are assigned to lots in EnterpriseOne. They can also look up the status of lots. The Pivotal CRM application facilitates the management of inventory homes by automatically handling the listing of an inventory home and its configuration when a contract is cancelled and the construction has already begun.

Send Contact and Contract Details to EnterpriseOne

Once a contract is signed, the execution of the contract can be set in motion. Unique buyer information is transferred from Pivotal CRM directly to EnterpriseOne, kick-starting the construction process and instantly providing needed information for accurate billing, releasing of purchase orders, setting up building schedules, and assigning work to subcontractors. Through this integration, homebuilders eliminate the need to re-enter information, which reduces errors and administrative costs.

As customers select new options or put the finishing touches on their plans, the systems are automatically updated to reflect the changes.

Contract details are sent from Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office to EnterpriseOne only after a homesite has been sold; all quotes remain in Pivotal CRM. Cancellations, transfers, and updates to contract details—such as the realtor, lenders, adjustments, deposits, and contingencies—are all reflected in EnterpriseOne, for consistency across the business.

Maintain a Shared Address Book

Break down silos with a single system of detailed contact records. Key demographic data on customers and their relationships with lenders or brokers can be shared throughout the company—in both the back and front office. Bi-directional capabilities streamline data entry and ensure information entered in EnterpriseOne or Pivotal CRM is always in synch and up to date. Back-office personnel have everything they need to get the home built and financed, and front-office staff can easily access customer information to personalize follow-up, conduct marketing, and ultimately help find the right home for their customers.

The Integration Solution The Pivotal CRM and Pervasive teams provide a platform for integration that controls the most expensive and unpredictable portion of any integration project: the cost of development. Integration projects often start small but grow quickly as the need arises for custom coding and development to tackle the wide variety of situations an integration team often encounters during the course of a project.

A preconfigured solution provides a solid footing for a reliable, adaptable integration and also takes as much account as possible of customers’ specific requirements. The pre-packaged integration solution between Pivotal CRM and EnterpriseOne includes:

· Integration processes built using the Pervasive Development Studio, running on the Pervasive Business Integrator

· Customizations to Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office required to integrate with EnterpriseOne

· Configuration of forms and set-up processes

· The run-time environment and data repositories required to support the integration

· Documentation

· Professional services expertise from both the Pivotal CRM and Pervasive teams, executing a proven integration methodology

· Ongoing support

About Pivotal CRM for Homebuilders & Real Estate

Tailored specifically for the high-production homebuilders industry, Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office is designed to handle the complete marketing automation, lead management, sales automation, and customer care cycles of volume homebuilders—from the first point of interest through the complete sales cycle to the handling of service and warranty requests years after a home is purchased. Built on an enterprise-class, Microsoft-based platform, Pivotal Homebuilder Front Office offers industry-specific functionality, while still providing the flexibility to support each homebuilder’s unique business processes and operations. For more information, please visit pivotal.com/homebuilders.

About Pervasive Software

Pervasive Software is a global value leader in data infrastructure software. The company’s award winning products enable customers to manage, integrate, analyze, and secure their critical data, providing the industry’s best combination of performance, reliability and cost. Pervasive strength is evidenced by the size and diversity of its customer base, serving tens of thousands of customers in virtually every industry market around the world. With headquarters in Austin, Texas, Pervasive was founded in 1994 and sells its products into more than 150 countries.