SAP Announces New Portfolio of Tools for SAP Hybris

SAP today announced a portfolio of engagement tools for its hybris platform that give companies the ability to interact more efficiently with customers and prospects. The package, whose components will be rolled out in the next four months, includes hybris Profile, hybris Customer Experience, and hybris as a Service. According to Nayaki Nayyar, senior vice president of SAP Cloud for Customer Engagement, these tools will work together to lend companies greater insights and allow them to take immediate action, regardless of channel. 

Hybris as a Service, which will work on the SAP HANA cloud platform, provides features that go "beyond CRM," said Scott Mager, customer engagement and commerce practice leader at Deloitte Digital, in a statement.  According to SAP, such features include integration with SAP hybris applications; an ecosystem of solution providers; microservices that oversee functionality; and a cost-effective cloud delivery model.

The solution will work alongside SAP's hybris Profile, which allows companies to shape customer profiles in an ongoing manner, according to behaviors.  It collects and logs customer interactions from various sources and promises to give organizations the ability to connect with them in the moment, as they express their wants and concerns.

The third new component, SAP's hybris Customer Experience, includes an omnichannel content management system that responds to information entered at various touch points, allowing companies to use that data to deliver personalized offers, content, and service interactions.

For SAP, the announcement comes as an attempt to redefine CRM for a "new era of digital connectedness," in which the customer expects instant feedback from brands. "We fundamentally believe that CRM as a category has evolved into what we call customer engagement and commerce," Nayyar says. "We recognize that the next generation is not just about how you manage your opportunities; it's about how you listen to your consumers and the massive amounts of contextual data they provide. When I tweet, I expect you to tweet back on the same platform. Responses need to be in real time and contextual."

Nayyar described how its client Nestle might leverage the platform. If a shopper is at the mall and wants to find her favorite ice cream, she can tweet about her plight and cue the company into her request. Using the technology, which gives contextual insights, the company can take immediate action and guide that person to the nearest location that sells it, Nayyar says.

In a statement, Paul Greenberg, president of the 56 Group, commended SAP's decision to focus on customer engagement. "We are now in an era where customer engagement is a top-of-mind initiative for businesses across the spectrum," Greenberg said. "Reimagning CRM, finding ways to interact in a more personalized way with customers, and being able to understand how a customer is thinking and acting so that intelligent actions can be taken is the way of this new world." 

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