Manufacturing and Distributor CRM Development

How manufacturers and distributors actually sell

Industrial sales runs on accounts, not leads. A distributor may have a few thousand active customers who reorder on a rhythm, a few hundred who are growing, and a long tail that buys once in a while. A manufacturer may sell direct to large OEMs, through independent rep agencies in some regions, and through stocking dealers everywhere else. The CRM has to reflect all of those routes at once. Tepia starts by mapping who owns each account and how orders really reach you.

The most valuable data already exists in your ERP: what each customer bought, how often, from which plant and on what terms. Most CRMs treat that as someone else’s problem, so reps work blind or flip between two systems. Tepia brings ERP history into the account view, so a rep walking into a plant knows its usual order, its last backorder and the product line it has never tried.

Engineered and configured products add another layer: drawings, specifications, samples and long approval cycles with engineering and purchasing on the customer side. Tepia tracks those opportunities separately from replenishment business, since the two behave so differently and need different forecasts.

Which system owns what

Before any code, Tepia agrees on a data ownership table with your operations and finance leads. A typical version looks like this:

Getting ownership wrong is the most common reason CRM and ERP projects stall, because two systems quietly overwrite each other and nobody trusts either. Tepia writes the sync rules from this table and logs every change that crosses the boundary. For the pattern in depth, read how to connect your CRM and ERP.

Rep agencies, dealers and the field

Independent rep agencies are a fact of life in many industrial categories, and they are wary of sharing customer lists. Tepia builds a partner experience that gives each agency its own territory, accounts and commission statements, while your sales managers see the full pipeline. Dealers and stocking distributors can get a portal for order status, literature, warranty registrations and cooperative marketing requests.

Your own outside reps need a mobile app that works in plants and warehouses with weak signal. Tepia builds offline first apps in React Native or native Swift and Kotlin that sync visit notes, photos and sample requests when coverage returns, and that show a day’s route of accounts due for a visit. Integrations usually include:

• NetSuite, Epicor, SAP Business One, Infor or Dynamics 365 Business Central for customers, orders and inventory.
• EDI order data from large customers, so the CRM sees volume that never touches a rep.
• Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace for email and calendar logging.
• B2B ordering portals and ecommerce, so self service orders still count toward the rep’s territory.

See also partner and dealer portal development and field sales rep mobile apps.

How Tepia approaches manufacturing CRM development

Tepia’s six phase process is led by a US based project manager who coordinates sales, operations and IT on your side.

1. Discovery: ride alongs with outside reps, interviews with inside sales, customer service and two or three rep agencies, and a system investigation of ERP tables and EDI flows. Deliverables are an Investigation Summary, an Interview Summary and User Stories such as an inside rep spotting customers who have not reordered a consumable.
2. Design: a design questionnaire, moodboards and a style guide, then wireframes of the account view with ERP history, the rep agency portal and the mobile visit screen.
3. Development and Testing: an Alpha with one region or product division and a Beta that includes a rep agency, with test plans for ERP sync accuracy, partner data isolation and offline sync inside a plant.
4. Training: hands on sessions for direct reps, inside sales and agency principals, remote for agencies and in person at your national sales meeting.
5. Launch: migration of contacts and notes from the old CRM and spreadsheets, a cross reference to ERP customer numbers, and support reps through the first month of orders.
6. Support: issue resolution, bug tracking and feature requests like a new product line pipeline or a dealer certification program.

Discovery typically takes 1 to 3 months, development and QA 2 to 6 months, and launch about a month. Read about our process.

When a custom manufacturing CRM beats configuration

If your ERP includes a CRM module your reps actually use, or a mainstream CRM connector already syncs your ERP cleanly, a custom build may be unnecessary. Tepia looks at that option first.

Custom tends to win when you sell through several channels with different data rights, when your ERP is older and has no supported connector, when reps need offline mobile access in the field, or when you want reorder and cross sell signals based on your own product logic. Tepia can also build those pieces around Salesforce or Dynamics 365 instead of replacing them. Learn more about ERP integration services and manufacturing app development, or contact Tepia to map your channels.

Frequently asked questions