Case Study: CRM-Driven SMS Campaigns and Order-Status Notifications for FlakeTech

Client

FlakeTech is a fast-growing office furniture brand operating primarily through e-commerce, with a strong focus on customer experience, fast delivery, and professional post-purchase communication.

Partner

Accepted Deviation delivered the solution design, integration, and end-to-end implementation across Zoho applications and an external local SMS provider.

Executive Summary

FlakeTech wanted to elevate its customer communication to a level typically associated with global logistics and high-service retailers—without compromising targeting accuracy or operational efficiency.

Accepted Deviation implemented two connected initiatives:

1. Selective SMS campaigns triggered from Zoho CRM, using segmentation logic that depends on customer behavior and financial/fulfillment data from Zoho Books and Zoho Inventory (e.g., order history and amount due).

2. Automated order-status SMS notifications for each customer based on Sales Order status changes: Confirmed → Packed → Shipped → Delivered.

The result was a streamlined, data-driven communication engine that made customer updates consistent, timely, and highly relevant—creating a significantly more professional delivery experience and reducing manual follow-ups.

Business Challenge

FlakeTech’s growth exposed a common issue: customer communication became increasingly complex as orders scaled.

Key challenges

• Disconnected data: CRM had customer records, but the campaign targeting needed financial and order data from Zoho Books/Inventory.

• Local SMS provider limitations: The provider did not offer an “out-of-the-box” integration suited for Zoho workflows.

• High selectivity requirement: Messages could not be broadcast-style. FlakeTech needed precision targeting such as:

• Customers with recent orders above a certain threshold

• Customers with outstanding amounts due

• Customers with specific purchase patterns or product categories

• Order-status transparency: Customers needed proactive updates at each stage of the fulfillment cycle, similar to the transparency they expect from established delivery networks—without the overhead of manual communication.

Objectives

1. Enable Zoho CRM users to launch SMS campaigns driven by real business rules, not generic lists.

2. Build a robust integration with a local SMS provider, including API layers where needed.

3. Automate Sales Order status notifications and ensure messages are accurate, consistent, and sent at the right time.

4. Reduce operational workload and improve customer confidence and satisfaction.

Solution Overview

Part 1: Selective SMS Campaigns via Zoho CRM

Accepted Deviation implemented a CRM-based campaign workflow where the audience is built dynamically using filters that depend on:

• Zoho Inventory: Sales Orders, items, fulfillment status, order dates, etc.

• Zoho Books: invoices/receivables context and amount due logic.

Part 2: Order-Status SMS Notifications (Confirmed / Packed / Shipped / Delivered)

Accepted Deviation implemented event-driven notifications tied to Sales Order status changes.

Trigger events

• Sales Order marked Confirmed

• Sales Order marked Packed

• Sales Order marked Shipped

• Sales Order marked Delivered

Implementation Details (High-Level)

Architecture (conceptual)

• Zoho CRM: Campaign initiation and customer context

• Zoho Inventory: Sales Order source of truth for fulfillment statuses

• Zoho Books: Financial data for “amount due” segmentation logic

• Custom Integration Layer (API + business rules):

• Data retrieval and filtering logic

• Message templating and personalization

• SMS provider authentication and sending

• Delivery response handling (where supported)

• Local SMS Provider: final SMS delivery

Key design considerations

• Data consistency: Ensuring customer identifiers match across CRM, Books, and Inventory.

• Filtering logic: Building reliable segmentation rules that handle exceptions (partial payments, multiple orders, cancelled orders, etc.).

• Message governance: Standard templates, naming conventions, and approval checks to avoid inconsistent messaging.

• Operational safety: Guardrails to prevent duplicate sends and to manage opt-out preferences where applicable.

Results and Business Impact

1) Targeted campaigns with higher relevance

Instead of mass messaging, FlakeTech could run campaigns based on meaningful business logic such as:

• customers with recent orders meeting specific criteria

• customers with outstanding due amounts

• customers with specific order patterns or product categories

This improved campaign quality and reduced unnecessary messaging.

2) Significantly improved order transparency

Automated status updates reduced inbound “Where is my order?” follow-ups and set clearer expectations. Customers experienced a more predictable and professional journey, increasing confidence in the brand.

3) Lower operational burden

The team no longer needed to manually track order progress and message customers individually. Communication became systematic and scalable.

4) Stronger brand perception

Consistent updates and professional messaging helped position FlakeTech as an organized, reliable operator—supporting its premium market positioning.

Note: Specific numeric KPIs (e.g., reduction in inquiries, improved conversion rates) can be added once internal reporting is confirmed.

What Made This Project Difficult (and Why It Matters)

This project was not a standard “plug-and-play” integration. The solution required:

• Designing and building custom APIs from scratch to connect Zoho workflows with the local SMS provider reliably

• Implementing cross-application segmentation using Zoho Books + Inventory, not just CRM fields

• Managing real operational edge cases in fulfillment and finance so that SMS communications remain accurate and trustworthy

These complexities are exactly what enabled FlakeTech to move from basic communications to an advanced, scalable customer-notification engine.

Lessons Learned and Best Practices

• Segmentation should reflect reality: Campaign rules anchored in actual orders and receivables outperform static CRM lists.

• Status automation improves trust: Customers interpret proactive updates as professionalism, even when delivery lead times vary.

• Integration layers need governance: Templates, error handling, and deduplication are essential for customer-facing automation.