National Self-Build and Renovation Centre (NSBRC) | Priava Software | Case Study

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Cloud-based system will increase sales and reduce administration time

Introduction

Established for over eight years and occupying a 67,000 sq. ft. facility on the outskirts of Swindon, the NSBRC is UK’s only permanent venue for independent building advice and support.

The NSBRC’s mission is to become a Centre of Excellence, facilitating the growth of the residential construction industry; improving the way the UK build houses and upgrading the current housing stock for the good of all. The company has developed a unique resource for consumers, industry, professionals, construction students, the media and trades people alike.

National Self-Build and Renovation Centre (NSBRC)

Key Challenge

The NSBRC wanted to increase the number of conference bookings, spend less time on venue administration, and automatically devolve venue activities to the relevant departments.

Whilst the core business of the NSBRC is the permanent exhibition, the company is very keen to develop other streams of revenue from the facility. Alongside its 200 plus permanent exhibitors the organisation also offers local and national businesses access to first-class meeting, workshop and training facilities at the same location. General Manager at NSBRC David Murphy explains, “We have five rooms available that we can offer to businesses for external meetings and conferences. They range from small rooms that can accommodate 5-10 people to a lecture theatre and a large seminar room that can hold up to 200 delegates. We believe our location at junction 16 of the M4 with plenty of on-site parking can offer companies a convenient, exciting alternative venue for off-site meetings and seminars.” He continues, “We were very keen to develop this business and so we needed a booking system that could match this ambition.“

Conferencing Manager at NSBRC, Eloise Primus, who is also responsible for sales added, “Our incumbent system was slow, cumbersome to use and took a long time to administer.” David agreed, “We recognised that our current system was not up to the job. We needed a system that would allow us to concentrate on sales rather than admin, so it was essential that the new solution was simple to use, be accessible from any location and would integrate with our existing IT environment. We also wanted it to enable essential activities such as room set-up, catering, and let front-of-house be devolved to the relevant department. Most importantly the new solution had to present our business as professional and efficient, and support our ‘5 simple promises’ proposition to clients and prospects.”

“We were very keen to develop this business and so we needed a booking system that could match this ambition.”

David Murphy

General Manager
National Self-Build and Renovation Centre (NSBRC)

Reaching for the cloud

To rectify this problem the NSBRC spoke with Priava about supplying a new ‘cloud-based’ booking system.

Eloise comments, “We were very impressed with the speed at which Priava responded to our enquiry. They provided a very compelling presentation and a live demonstration of the system. It was obvious from the very start that this solution was simple and quick to operate, could ensure the delegation of tasks to other departments, was intuitive and could deliver bespoke reporting that would assist us in developing a professional pipeline management and booking system.”

Transferring to Priava Cloud

Once the NSBRC decided to deploy the new solution, according to Eloise, the entire migration was seamless and efficiently delivered, “I was amazed at how quick the transfer from the old incumbent system to Priava Cloud took.” Said Eloise, “It was very simple, the training was straightforward, and all our data was transferred across without any hitches. Within a very short period of time we were up and working.”

The Results

A 37% increase in sales in just 3 months

The implementation of Priava Cloud has made an immediate impact on NSBRC’s business increasing its sales by an amazing 37% in the first three months of operation. David explains, “Eloise is now able to spend less time on administration and focus the majority of her time selling and building up our conferencing business. This means we can now engage with more prospects, spend more time building relationships with existing clients and revisit older clients for potential re-bookings. The return on investment has been phenomenal; I believe the system has paid for itself already”.

Supporting high quality services for clients

The events team manages around 1,000 bookings per year and this number is increasing month by month. It is therefore of paramount importance that the quality of service and professionalism is maintained for each individual booking. Eloise explains, “We have set very high standard for our conferencing events and booking process. To support this ethos we make ‘5 simple promises’ to all our customers that ensures they receive an excellent service, with guarantees on pricing and availability. Priava Cloud supports this perfectly as it allows us to create an audit trail of the complete booking from initial phone call to the time they arrive at the facility. It eliminates double bookings, and it automatically devolves the supporting activities, such as catering, to the relevant department.”

She continues, “In the past we used a paper- based system for this activity and often it created complete chaos, but now everyone understands their responsibilities and therefore we can be confident our bookings are delivered as promised. “

Effective account and pipeline building and management

Another aspect that has helped increased bookings is the ability to track all of the quotes, manage potential prospects, revisit older clients, and gain valuable business intelligence on existing customers. Eloise explains, “Using this solution I can create a professional sales pipeline building tool using the customised reporting. For example, I now know who our most lucrative clients are, which ones book the most often, where we obtain the highest margin and so forth. Also I can track prospects far better and therefore follow-up on more enquiries. I also use the system for obtaining feedback, both from customers that booked and also those that didn’t.”

Sophisticated, yet simple to customise reporting – “a pleasant surprise”

Additionally, the advanced reporting facility within Priava Cloud has been somewhat of a revelation. “I knew from the start that the report function was a strong feature, however it is far more flexible than I was expecting”, says Eloise. “We can now design, create and change tailor made reports that fit directly to the specific needs of our operation”.

Summary

The benefits that NSBRC has achieved through the use of Priava Cloud so far include:

• Increased sales of 37% in three months compared with the same period last year
• Full ROI in just a few months
• Dramatically reduced administration time
• Tracking of quotes and follow-up on more business opportunities
• Elimination of double-bookings and the ‘error-prone’ paper-based diary system
• Speeds up invoicing
• A more efficient ‘paperless’ operation
• CRM system used to support marketing campaigns
• Better able to deliver on customer ‘promises’
• Management reporting provides better business intelligence for account management and pipeline building activities
• Can devolve tasks to other departments and provide a supporting ‘audit trail’

Final comment from David

“Priava Cloud has been a resounding success and already it has proven to be the right solution for our business. Furthermore, the support we have received from Priava throughout the entire process from initial enquiry, through to implementation, training and on-going support has been excellent”.

Future

Currently NSBRC offers a small number of courses in self-build and renovation, however according to David this is an area that the company would like to expand. He explains, “This is a significant additional revenue stream for our business and we expect the Priava solution to play an important part in developing this opportunity”.

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