To maintain high customer satisfaction, software companies must have a “customer-centric” approach to delivering and supporting software products. Vocera is a software provider that is innovating the healthcare industry and beyond with integrated, intelligent communications solutions. With Thru, Vocera’s worldwide support organization quickly delivers software builds and updates to thousands of customers directly from Salesforce.
Previously, Vocera was using outdated methods to deliver software (e.g. mailing physical CDs, using on-premises FTP servers). The company found that these solutions were painfully slow and not secure, negatively effecting the customer experience. Needing to solve these issues, the company searched for an electronic software distribution (ESD) solution that could integrate with its existing Salesforce customer support portal.
“After evaluating several vendors, we chose Thru because they met or exceeded our key requirements. The Thru platform enabled the most rapid implementation and provided additional useful functionality like powerful email integration,” says Tom Southard, VP of Global Solution Support at Vocera.
Vocera chose Thru for software delivery because of Thru’s strength in large file transfer, enterprise-grade security and deep integration with CRM systems. Using the Thru API, Vocera created a custom solution for Salesforce that enables their customers to have a self-service portal for software delivery, they can simply log in and instantly retrieve the latest software builds, fixes and upgrades. All file activities with customers are then recorded as Salesforce activities and can be analyzed by admins within the Thru Audit tool.
A notable benefit that Thru has provided to Vocera’s technical support engineers is the ability to solve support cases much faster. Since Vocera embedded Thru software download links within its knowledge base articles, support engineers can simply email customers a link to a relevant KB article and the customer instantly downloads the software they need. When customers need to upload large log and database files for analysis, the customer can drop them into Vocera’s Thru Dropbox™ where engineers can securely retrieve them for evaluation.
Ever since Vocera modernized its software delivery process with Thru, the company has been able to cut costs by moving away from physical delivery methods, but more importantly, it has empowered the company’s customers with instant access to mission-critical products from Vocera and improved customer experience.
