Our head office in Wattenscheid is located in the middle of the Ruhr area with its approx. 5 million inhabitants. It is Germany’s heart for industrial manufacturing. BOMAFA is located in the middle of this metropolitan region and in the middle of a residential area. So if you start your day too early, you won’t find a parking space. The cars of the residents are still there.
From 8 a.m. onwards, parking is no longer a problem. It’s the perfect time to start the day.
Let’s start … first with coffee or tea! The smell of the morning wafts through the transparent glass room that the sales people from all over the world share with their colleagues from the project department and technical office. The colourful sea of voices in English, Arabic, Chinese or German sets off on its journey – everyone checks their emails with customer enquiries that came in during the night hours.
How we communicate
Even the all-important new customer business is done through the still central email channel. Social media and online communication also help generate a lot of the enquiries. This has been evident for a few years now. We communicate via Instagram, Linkedin, Facebook; depending on the world region and customer segment, these channels are used to varying degrees.
Now emails are answered and personal conversations are started. The telephone call and the video conference are now balancing each other out again. But being able to see each other – even if only virtually – is an enormous advantage that no one wants to do without. The virtual showroom, which allows us to give interactive tours of our production, is also a real alternative. This gives potential customers an impression of how BOMAFA works and with what capacities. On-site appointments have become rarer in the meantime. But they still exist as a helpful alternative to get to know each other personally or to talk again.
Close cooperation
How enquiries are processed is precisely structured at BOMAFA. We want to answer them quickly and with quality. Finding the optimal balance between speed and conditions is a constant challenge of which we are very aware. One thing is certain: incoming enquiries go directly to our project department and are processed there in close coordination with the technical office and the sales department. The glass office makes it easy.
That’s how it is on this day as well. The project team and the sales department meet together with the technical office and process an enquiry from India. This time it is about a quotation for spare parts and assemblies.
BOMAFA is an engineering partner
We analyse the entire system. Not only the valve is the focus of the analysis, but also the piping upstream and downstream of the valve are examined when finding a solution. This can have an important influence on the control behaviour of the valve. Vibration issues and sound requirements also play an important role in the overall consideration.
Design errors can happen, but they must be detected at an early stage. Quality assurance starts with the enquiry and does not end with the quotation. In order to detect errors right from the start, a kick-off meeting is obligatory before production can and may begin.
Sales is moderation
The sales people are the interface between customers and BOMAFA. They are the translators in both directions and accompany our customers from the initial enquiry to the completion of the order. The requirements of customers from all over the world are often very different and require interpretation, discussion and understanding – not least for the thinking culture of the counterpart. Where people meet, there is humanity and everyone has their preferences. And it is precisely this diversity that enriches and inspires us time and again.
So what is the conclusion of this “normal” day? There is no such thing as a typical day in sales. Only one thing remains certain: when we go home, we swap parking spaces with the residents again. That’s how it works.
By the way: sometimes there are questions that can be answered quickly over the email: sales@bomafa.eu