Knowledge · Machine builders
After-sales software for machine builders: types and selection criteria
By Gerd Bart, Founder and Managing Director · Updated
The short answer
After-sales software organizes everything that comes after a machine is sold: faults, maintenance, spare parts, documents and the history of every machine. The main types are a manufacturer's customer portal, the spare parts shop, the maintenance team's CMMS, the manufacturer's FSM and service management software, and the Industrial Service Network. Each can be evaluated on eight criteria. The first question to ask: does the software cover only your company, or everyone who works on the machine?
What after-sales software does
After-sales software, also called an after-sales platform or service management software, organizes the work that comes after a machine is sold. It replaces phone calls, emails and spreadsheets with processes everyone involved can follow.
Faults.
Report, classify, assign and resolve them, with the machine, the symptom and a timestamp.
Maintenance.
Plan it by interval, operating hours or machine signal, and record what was done.
Spare parts.
A catalog with bill of materials, availability, ordering and delivery status, right at the service case.
Communication.
The maintenance team, the service team and the technician work on the same case, without forwarding emails.
Documentation.
Service reports, maintenance history and inspection records, available per machine.
What sets it apart from CRM and ERP: after-sales software ties every case to a specific machine, with serial number, location, bill of materials and history. A CRM knows the customer and the contract. After-sales software knows the customer's machines.
What makes after-sales in machine building different
Three traits set service in machine building apart from service in other industries.
Several companies per service case.
The maintenance team reports the fault, the manufacturer diagnoses it, a technician repairs it, a supplier delivers the part. Software that covers only one of these companies leaves the coordination between the others to people.
Long service life.
Machines stay in use for many years. Bills of materials, spare parts and documents have to be right for older series too, across several generations.
Mixed fleets.
Your customer runs machines from many manufacturers, and each manufacturer has its own portal. Software that covers only one manufacturer solves only part of the customer's problem.
What types are available
Machine builders will find six types on the market. The first five each belong to one company.
| Type | Belongs to | Main job | Stops at |
|---|---|---|---|
| A manufacturer's customer portal | one machine builder | documents, parts and requests for that builder's machines | that manufacturer's machines |
| Spare parts shop | a machine builder or a dealer | finding and ordering parts | the order, often without a link to the individual machine |
| CMMS (maintenance software) | a plant's maintenance team | maintenance plans, work orders, spare parts stock | the plant fence |
| FSM (field service management) | a machine builder's service team | scheduling visits, dispatching technicians, reports | the machine builder's company border |
| Service management software | a machine builder's service team | tickets, deadlines, maintenance, parts and reporting for its own machines | the machine builder's company border |
| Industrial Service Network | none of the companies involved | the shared layer between companies: a record per machine, fault to resolution, ordering from the manufacturer, for every manufacturer in a plant | no company border |
The first five types organize service inside one company, and they do that well. Yet service on a machine always involves several companies: the customer's maintenance team, the manufacturer, often a service partner and the material supplier. When they work in separate systems, coordinating between them stays manual work.
Eight criteria for your evaluation
Use these eight criteria to evaluate any after-sales software. They show where a solution has gaps.
Response time and deadlines.
Where does measurement start: at the machine signal or only when a ticket is opened? Do your team and your customer see the same status of the agreed deadlines? Does the software escalate on its own when a deadline is at risk, and can deadlines differ by machine type, site and customer?
Predictive maintenance.
Three maturity levels are common: reactive (faults are reported), rule-based (maintenance by runtime or interval) and data-driven (machine signals are analyzed continuously, so deviations show up before a failure). It is only as good as its data. Ask which level runs today and whose machine data feeds into it.
Spare parts and maintenance.
The catalog belongs at the machine, with bill of materials, availability and price. Orders come from the machine record or the maintenance plan, your customer can see the delivery status, and the software knows which part fits which series. The key figure: the share of orders that go through without manual work by your team.
ERP, CRM and MES integration.
Ask how deep the integration goes: does it only pass data along, or does it trigger processes, such as an order in the ERP after a fault? For machine data, open standards such as OPC UA, MQTT and REST count.
Consistent processes across countries and brands.
With an international installed base, service needs the same processes everywhere, in the language of the customer and the technician, with comparable deadlines and central reporting. Solutions to recurring faults should be recorded and available to everyone.
Service and downtime analytics.
Ideally, the software captures downtime directly from machine data. Good analytics separate the causes (planned maintenance, failure, waiting for a part, waiting for a technician) and break them down by manufacturer, machine type, site and shift. Only then can you see where the biggest lever is.
Self-service for your customer.
Your customer orders parts and consumables, reports faults with machine and symptom, follows the status of the case and finds documents and maintenance history on their own. Each of these tasks is one less call to your team.
Everyone in the same process.
The software covers everyone who works on a service case: the maintenance team with its machines and sites, the manufacturer with service, catalog and deadlines, the service partner with the visit and the report, and the material supplier with availability and price. Without this criterion, your customer has a separate portal for each manufacturer, and with it many digital islands.
What comes first depends on your situation. With a large installed base abroad, it is often consistent processes; with high spare parts revenue, the parts; and if you want to take load off your team, start with self-service. The eighth criterion is hard to add later: software built for one company stays with that company.
What to ask every vendor
Is every case tied to a machine?
With serial number, site, bill of materials and history. Software that only knows tickets doesn't know the machine.
Where does response time start?
At the machine signal or only at the ticket? If measurement starts at the ticket, the time before it stays invisible: the call, the follow-up questions, the forwarding.
Does your customer see the same status as your team?
Two views with two different statuses lead to follow-up calls. Both sides should see the same case, the same deadlines and the same status.
How do machines from other manufacturers get in?
Your customer runs machines from many manufacturers. If they need a separate system for each one, your offer stays one of many.
How are spare parts orders triggered?
Manually by your customer, manually by your team, or from the maintenance plan and machine data? Availability and response time depend on it.
How does the software grow with your installed base?
Ask what share of service cases runs without manual work and how that share changes as usage grows. If service only grows with more staff, the problem isn't solved.
Who owns the data?
Find out who owns the data, how you take it with you if you switch, and whether the software belongs to a manufacturer you compete with.
What Transaction-Network has to do with it
Transaction-Network is the neutral service infrastructure for every machine brand. The Industrial Service Network runs on it. Your customer manages all their machines there in one account, including other manufacturers' machines, and finds your documents, your parts and your service in it.
As a machine builder, you choose the modules per machine: E-Commerce for spare parts, Service Requests for requests, Maintenance for maintenance, Asset Management for your installed base as the foundation of the other modules, plus a module for the Cyber Resilience Act. The Service Brain answers questions from your documents and cites the source. Prices, customers and contracts stay with you.
Questions
Frequently asked questions
How is after-sales software different from a CRM?
A CRM manages customers, contacts and contracts. After-sales software manages machines, service cases, maintenance and spare parts, each tied to the individual machine. The two complement each other: the CRM knows the customer, the after-sales software knows the customer's machines.
Is our own customer portal enough?
It organizes service for your own machines. But your customer runs machines from many manufacturers, with a separate portal for each, and your offer only reaches them there if they look for it. An Industrial Service Network brings your parts and your service into the account where they manage all their machines. Your portal stays.
Does our customer need to adopt new software?
No. Your customer needs one account in which they manage all their machines. Their maintenance system keeps running.
Does after-sales software replace our ERP?
No. It integrates with your ERP, CRM and ticket system. Ask every vendor whether the integration only passes data along or also triggers processes, such as an order in the ERP.
Does it work for older machines without a data link?
Yes. Machine records, documents, spare parts, maintenance and service cases need no data link. Live data comes in once a machine has one, at Transaction-Network through the IoT Hub.
How do I measure whether after-sales software works?
With figures per machine: time from report to job, the share of faults reported without a phone call, the share of spare parts orders placed in self-service, downtime per machine per month and spare parts revenue from your installed base.
Read next
- Knowledge
CMMS, FSM or Industrial Service Network: which fits?
The comparison: what each system does, where it stops and what you need for your situation.
- Knowledge
What is an Industrial Service Network?
The category: what it is, how to recognize it and what each party gets.
- CEO Straight Talk ·
The 9-point check: how to build an after-sales solution that lasts
Many machine builders know they need to become more digital in service. The only question is: where do you start cleanly, and what really matters?
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