How Engro Grows With Better CX and 90%+ Response Rates

What's your dream for Customer experience for Engro customers?

We want to be an international benchmark for the B2B player on net Promoter score.

Hello, I'm Adam Durrell and I'm the host of the Account Experience Podcast. This week we're focusing on Excellence in B2B Account Experience Programs. And the company that we're going to talk to today has won awards from Customer Gauge for its customer engagement, and it's been recognized multiple years in a row. So, hey, they must be doing something good. There's a lot of good lessons in here for every listener. If you're a regular on the Account Experience Podcast, you'll know that in every episode, I like to catch up with inspiring industry leaders or thinkers to share their best practices and tips that help you develop your own V2B Count Experience program. We bring together on this podcast the enterprise, client management, and the customer experience together. That's what we call Account experience, which is why we call the podcast the Account Experience Podcast. I'm also a father of four, I'm a founder, and I'm fantastically interested in humans, and I love anything that furthers the quality of business relationships. Today I'm talking with Mohammed Idris. He is the chief Commercial officer at Engro Polymer and Chemicals, which is a subsidiary of the enormous Engro Corporation, one of Pakistan's largest and most diversified conglomerates. And they've built a very special account experience program which is some of the highest levels of customer engagement and pretty good net promoter, if I can say that, that I have seen in at least 15 years. And we're going to get behind the details of that program. And I'm really delighted today to welcome Mohamed. Hello, Mohamed. Thank you for joining the Account Experience Podcast. How are you?

Hello, Adam. Thanks for this wonderful introduction and thanks for having me in your program. And I'm doing absolutely fine, and I'm loving to be part of your program.

Well, thank you so much. First of all, I just want to say congratulations on winning the Customer Gauge Account Experience Awards for high engagement. We'll get into that in a bit later on. But first of all, for people who are not familiar with Ngrow, because it's a name pretty much behind the scenes for many people. Why don't you tell us a little bit about what the company does and how your role is within that organization?

All right, thank you. Once again, Adam Ngrow, as the name says, it's the energy for growth, and again, it's enabling growth. So if I take you to the roots of the organization, we Used to be Exxon United States started operation in Pakistan in 1967 and then till 1991 we were part of Exxon. And then when Exxon decided to diverge from the fertilizer business internationally, so employees of Angro, you know, they took the company to a management led buyout. And then this was in 2003, this was acquired by, you know, Daoud Corporation which is a family owned business for more than 100 years. Anglo polymer is a subsidiary of Engro Corporation and ENGRA Polymer is 25 years old. And our main business is PVC manufacturing and selling pvc and we sell it with a brand subs. Sibs is a name in Urdu which means green. You understand, 25 years back we thought of being green and now it's more of a buzzword in the world. But we were very clear with our branding practices. And on top of it we sell hydrogen, we produce and sell hydrogen and chloro alkali, which is caustic soda, hydrogen peroxide, that's in the pipeline. So that's what our business is. And we want to take this business to a global level. Not only increasing the share in Pakistan as per the global practices, but also to take a major share in the international export market both for the PVC resident and PVC downstream value added branded products from Pakistan.

For those people who are not familiar with pvc, I mean I think of things like PVC piping which helps get fresh water to people. That's one example, I guess. What else is PVC in, in our everyday lives?

Well, yeah, that's, that's a very, that's a great question. And I come across these, you know, questions every now and then when you talk about pvc, people always think about those white color pie of PVC and that's it. But you know, I tell you PVC is everywhere, you know, and just to tell you about the composition, it's 57% of PVC is the salt that we eat every day. It's sodium chloride. So that's where chlorine part comes and then rest is ethylene, which is 43% PVC, right? From your ATM card, your credit cards and debit cards, you have them in your pocket that's made out of pvc. You go to the hospital, you have those oxygen masks and then you have those, you know, drip bags and they're tubing all the way getting into your vein. It's all pvc. So a lot of people don't know about that. But on top of it now PVC is having Those supreme composite material whereby you have wood, PVC composite material which has a look and feel of wood but it has got the supreme properties of PVC that is termite proof, rust proof, waterproof, fire retardant. So now PVC is, you know, coming as a, as an interior material for flooring, for roofing, for all your windows. Windows in Europe is all made out of pvc, those white color windows and then a lot of other materials in hospitality industry as well. Yeah.

Well, thanks for giving us a look into the wonderful world of pvc. I mean it's, you know, even as they said in the Graduate film in the 1960s, the future is plastics. Benjamin. So I guess it's, you know, this has been with us for some time. Most people are not consuming the PVC material directly from you, from Engro. So who are some of the clients or can you characterize that? Your customers that are downstream of you.

Yeah, right. So if you look at the Pakistani market, we are the only PVC resin manufacturers in Pakistan. We have a market of roughly 250,000 tons and the per capita consumption of PVC is roughly 1.2 kg per capita versus the global standards of 6.5 kg per capita. So there is a huge margin to grow the share of PVC application. So our direct customers, because we are into B2B sales, so our direct customers are the PVC downstream product manufacturers, like PVC pipe manufacturer. So they are the ones who are our direct customers then the cable manufacturers. If you look at the cable industry, the installation is made out of pvc. So every cable has the pvc. So cable manufacturers. So one of the big players then a lot of packaging comes from pvc. Then the flexible hose, Then there are the window manufacturers, door manufacturers, flooring manufacturers. So all these manufacturers are primarily our direct customers and then they have their own downstream customers, distributors, wholesalers, retailers, and then the end consumers.

So these are big customers you're dealing with. And I imagine that you need a whole team of people on your side to deal with a contract like this. And probably it needs a team of people from your customers to also interact with ingrow. So this is typically what we see in, you know, in account experience. So can you give us some detail about what an account team would look like and who is on both sides of the customer supplier relationship?

That's right. So we've got a team of roughly 30 people which is spread across Pakistan. If you look at our customers, so we have a customer which is giving us a revenue of let's say $0.1 million per annum up to the customers who take. Who give us the revenues of $50 million per annum. So there are like 700 different customers, from small to big customers. The first thing that is there is that ingrained into our DNA that our salary comes from the customer. Customer is the guy who is paying our salary. So once you have that thinking ingrained and you sort of believe that your actions and your, you know, are pretty much aligned with the customer engagement, because then it's basically your effort is to make the customer successful. And once your customer is successful, you're automatically following the footsteps of success. So 35 people. We've divided Pakistan into three regions. North and then center and the south region. And that's where our regional sales managers are located. However, we also have a very strong engagement of the top management team with our customers because some of our customers are even as big as we ourselves are. So they're having more revenues versus us. So they are big. And our interaction is directly with the sponsors and owners of those customers. So we have to have very positive relationship and repetitive engagement at all levels of the organization. So that's one part. The other part also, which is important, Adam, is that when we are dealing with these direct customers, we are actually little far from where the end consumer is. Yeah, but as an organization, as the only PVC resin manufacturer, we need to have our eye and pulse of what the end consumer is thinking. So some of the people we have in our team are the ones who get that pulse from the market that what is happening in the retail, how the end consumers are thinking about it. And that's why we've also opened up an outlet to get that B2C kind of a feature where we directly interact with the end consumer just to have that pulse from the end consumer to look at the behaviors and the patterns which are going on now.

That's a really interesting sort of feedback loop you've got. Let's take one step back and talk about the culture of the organization. It seems that sort of the experience of the customer is very important in your work. Where does that come from? Where is that tone set in, in the Engro business primarily?

You know, if you look at Engro Corporation, so it started with the fertilizer business, whereby you are actually selling fertilizer to the farmer at the DNA of the organization, because it used to be Exxon those days, used to be that right amount of fertilizer and right kind of fertilizer for the right application. So at times you would educate the farmer, which would result in maybe less offtake of your product, but at least you would use fertilizer in the right proportion to increase the crop yield. And that was the kind of DNA that we have inherited and that is something that we've taken forward as well. So as, as I've told you, when Anglo Polymer started, even in our salary slip it used to be written that this salary is coming from the customer. So you should be pretty much aligned and, and that's what you know, the DNA. So the entire culture is that right from the Chief Executive officer who is Jahangir JP at this point in time he goes and interact with the customers. We have our calendar filled with interactions with the customer. We also look at the international, you know, conferences or exhibitions like Kfare in Dusseldorf, Germany where we take some of our visionary customers to so that they get an idea of where the technology is going towards so that they bring in those that technology and bring in the efficiency and productivity in their own businesses. So it's very much customer centric organization with a great sort of spirit to engage with the customers for their benefit and to make them successful for the success of the entire country.

That's a beautiful story. I love the way it's rooted in agriculture and a sort of responsible way of making sure that you keep your customers for a long time if you, if you help them have the right amount of fertiliser. I guess that's, that's a really lovely explanation of how the culture works in the organization.

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Let's dig a little bit deeper. Let's go into the, the experience program that you've got running. So the decision was taken, as I understand, to start, you know, really formally listening to the customer base and now you're pulsing them on a regular basis. Tell us a little bit about how you see that program. What are your goals of that program?

Well, yeah, that's another thing which we had looked at. We see when we started using Customer Lead survey for the NPS score, and it's been a couple of years, it provided us a methodical sort of platform to seek the feedback from the customers. And customers are also, you know, of the view that this is one of the most effective and meaningful way of giving you the feedback. Now, one is obviously having those lot of interactions with the customer. But another important thing that starts with that is taking account of what was the feedback of the customers and how do you close that loop, how quickly you close that loop. So, for example, some of our customers, you know, obviously we are in a commodity business. Our prices are back to the international prices as well as the local currency versus dollar exchange rate. So that's how we do our pricing. So there used to be a point that when you communicate us the price change, it gets communicated to our customers and their customers even before we take an action. So that was the feedback which came from them and that also discussed when the chief executive CEO of Anglo Polymer was also present in one of the meeting. And that was the feedback from the customer which was right. So we said we use the CRM Salesforce, which is only accessible to the customers and very few people within the customer's office. So we moved it out of the email thing and we moved that communication and now that communication is done through Salesforce. And obviously towards the end of the day it comes out, somebody puts it out and it gets known to the downstream market. But at least our main clients get a time to strategize and take appropriate action. So that was, that was a feedback which was acted upon and then customer really appreciated. So then there are things that you can do something about it. Then there are things that you can only listen and then you find out that you might not be able to do a lot of things, you know, might not be able to do something about it, but at least you've communicated to the customer that I got your feedback. I worked over it. These are the limitations at this point in time and that that is the end point. So at least they have this feeling that they are being heard and they are being taken seriously. And then, you know, somebody closed the loop to them as well.

I think that is so important in the programs that I see with customers. Those are the ones successful. Because even if you can't do anything, as you say, Mohamed, it's about understanding what the customer says and then just having that loop. Maybe you cannot do anything about that, but there are other things that you can uncover on that. I think that's such a wonderful way of doing it. Let's dive a little bit deeper into the program, if that's all right. Now, your program is very closely aligned with your commercial structure. It comes under you, doesn't it, as chief Commercial officer. So how do you see this relating to the commercial side of your business? Does it help you with revenue directly or there are indirect impacts that it has? Tell us about the value of the program as you see it.

All right, so if you look at my journey at Engro, so I've spent like 20 years at Engro in different subsidiaries from Anglo Fertilizer to the operations to the HR and business development. And then coming into the commercial part, so being part of the hr, I figured out when we used to go for the employee engagement surveys or employee experience surveys, if you get a high response rate, that would mean that you are dealing with an engaged employee workforce. So if you similarly, for a customer gauge survey, if you're getting a high account response rate, that actually means that you're dealing with the customers who are pretty much engaged with you in a positive manner. So that is really important. So on the mechanic side of it, obviously our key account team and then our commercial excellence team with our digitalization gurus and you know, social media team, they all work together and, you know, send these surveys to our customers and then get their feedback and then they work on the loop closure and all those things. So that's how the mechanics part is working. If you look at the overall, I mean, it's been more than a year that I've been part of this and it's been almost two years that we are on nps. One part is that you get a methodical way of getting the feedback. Once you work over it, your relationship actually improves with the customer. And that build, that brings in a lot of trust by the customer over you. So now once they start trusting you, that is always beneficial for the business. If I share the stat with you so proud to share with you that this is the second consecutive year that we have won this highest account response award. Yeah.

This is a copy of the one you've got. I know you've got one there. So congratulations by the way.

Thank you very much. So over the last one year, if you look at the stats, so there was an increase of 8% of the loop closure rate that we were having in the last year that actually resulted into 16% of increase in NPS net promoter score. We increased from 68% to 84%. At this point in time, if you look at the top line of the organization, there was 17% growth in the top line of the organization. Now we feel that our customer engagement has a very pivotal role to play in this growth. Yes, there are other factors as well. There are some tailwinds that we've gotten, but the relationship and the customer, the strength of the customer engagement and the relationship actually helped us to bring this growth in the top line of the organization.

Those are incredible stats. Let me just check. I've got those. Because that's so significant that you're saying that. I believe you said 8% increase in net promoter over the two years. 8% response rate increase, is that right?

8% increase in the loop closure rate.

That's right.

So whatever feedback we were getting, we started working on that, we closed loop by 8% incremental on a year on year basis. That actually helped. If you look at our NPS score, there was 16% increase in the net promoter score. And if you look at the top line, there was 17% growth in the top line of the organization. So these are the three numbers that I've quoted.

Thanks for correcting me on that. But by the way, I'm always impressed with somebody that knows their metrics. Top marks to you, Mohamed. This is super important because as you said before, you know to some extent you're selling a commodity product, it's a PVC product. How you're differentiating yourself is through the experience. And that is what you put your finger on. And that is by pushing that one helps you really grow the business. That's as I understand it. Let me also qualify a couple of these things because it's important for people to know on here that the response rate in your business account, response rate and even contact response rate is above 90%. And that is incredible. We do not have many other companies out there at that level. In sometimes you're almost getting close to the 100% mark. And for me, I think this is well first of all, I just want to say a fantastic congratulations on this, on your program. It is world class and I love the way that you're targeting your staff on really pushing for the best engagement rate and I think that's really something to be proud of. So can you share a couple of tips about how you get your organization to deliver such a fantastic customer engagement?

Yeah, I think that's a very important thing. And as I assumed my office more than a year back, one of the things which is very important is the belief. So you got to believe that if you want to be successful you will have to work on your customer success because their success is your success. So that's number one thing because what we really believe, that the customers are the only reason that we exist. And I would go even further. This is not, I mean just for the word sake, I mean you got to believe it that you have to have that positive thinking and positive feeling about your customers in a very genuine and in the most sincere way. So once you have it, I tell you, Adam, you start emitting those vibes whenever you go and meet your customers, you know they can feel that vibe that from your body language that this is the guy who has come who thinks, works and acts to make me successful more than his own success. So when you start emitting those whys to the customer, I can tell you you build that kind of a relationship with your customer when you are able to get in blind trust and you're able to move them, you're able to persuade them. Everything starts from the belief. And then as Rhonda Burns says in the Secret that law of attraction works. So if you are, if you're thinking positive, if you're feeling positive, the entire universe gets on your back to make you successful in your pursuits and in your ambition.

I love hearing that you are such an inspirational person. I bet, I bet the team is really an admirer of what you do. I what an exciting company to be a customer of. I think it must be really good for the spirit to come through. Now I just want to make sure that we acknowledge the great people in your team who make this happen. So now's your opportunity to give some kudos to your team that make this happen.

That's right. There are three major departments. One is the PVC business team which manages the account of the PVC business and in the entire Pakistan which is headed by a general manager. Khurm Hussain is his name, who's heading and they are the ones who are doing the interaction with the customers. Of pvc. And then we have our chloralkali business which is headed by the business head of Chloralkili which includes caustic soda, hydrogen and that is headed by Imran Baloch and his team. So they are also instrumental in their interaction with their customers in the textile business. And then I have got the GM for the market development who make sure that the increase in size of the pie for PVC per capita consumption goes high. And they are the ones who go to the customers as well to help them with the technical problems on a day to day basis with the technical services team. And they've got their digital media marketing team with them who glorify the products of our customers. So they are the champions. And the best thing is, you know, the coherence of the entire team because Anglo Polymer Commercial is a place where teamwork meets excellence. So we make sure that there should not be the individual excellence or islands of excellence, but we all work together to make the entire organization successful. And in addition to that, I think special appreciation for our commercial excellence team which is part of the market development team, the commercial excellence team which is headed by Ina Ashdal. She's been instrumental in making sure that we stay on the right track. You know, she would come back, she would do the follow up, she would make sure that we are doing our things and taking care of the sequence and the steps in the process.

I know those team members are going to be so proud that you, you recognize them. That's part of the job of a leader as well. Well done. Now before we leave you, Mohamed, what about a glimpse into the future? How is Engro going to navigate forward? Can you share a few secrets or a little bit of glimpse into the way that the company's going?

Yeah, that's right. So as part of ngrow, we've always been working on some of the most pressing issues of our time. What we feel is that the country that we work in, our growth is directly linked to the success within the country. So for us, the country becomes successful, we are automatically successful. So the goal is to expand our business and also expand our international exports portfolio not only on the commodity side but also on the value added downstream, you know, branded products coming out of PVC and other materials. So that is very important and that's how we are looking at the opportunities on a global level as well for agro polymer.

Well, thank you so much for joining us today, Mohammed. I really appreciate the time you spent with us today and giving us a glimpse into your program. And as I said that it must be great to be a customer of engro. You take a lot of care of the customer experience and thank you for sharing the details with us today. I wish you and your team the best of success and let's hope you can make it three years in a row to win the Customer Engagement Award.

Thank you very much and we really look forward to doing. You know our North Star is that we become a world class benchmark for the B2B Net Promoter Score and also get a significant accolade in B2C segment of sales and marketing in terms of the international recognition as well.

I'm certain you will and I look forward to following that story. Mohamed Yides Ngro, thank you so much for being with us today. Hope to see you soon. Bye bye.

Thank you. Adam, thanks for having me.