Unveiling the Chemistry of CRM and Sales Organization

Dears,

Different positions within a sales force require different functions from an CRM system, and tailoring to fit those functions is a big part of successful CRM strategies.

Corporate professionals can learn a lesson from George S. Patton, the flamboyant WWII general. "I don't expect my men to understand anything more than what's right in front of them, the tactical situation," Patton said. "As general, it's my job to understand the big picture." This speaks volumes when considering how the rank and file and various corporate leaders should carry out their CRM or sales force automation (CRM ) marching orders.
In sales, as in any department, when you move up the corporate ladder job roles go from tactical to strategic, so an CRM solution that serves every member of the sales hierarchy needs to address these various responsibilities. For simplicity's sake, let's divide sales forces into three segments: salespeople, management, and the executives. Each segment has unique requirements and functionality necessary to help customize its view of the sales department. What follows are examples of how CRM is used throughout the sales organization.

In the Trenches

Account executives are the revenue generators, and when faced with an opportunity to close a deal, they can't stumble. However, with all the hoops they have to jump through, it's a wonder when they don't. Inside CRM and CRM systems, salespeople spend most of their time punching in customer data and tracking deals. A handsome amount of time is also spent responding to customer questions and preparing customer quotes. It is irksome, then, that the systems intended to help facilitate these efforts often hinder operations, forcing salespeople to wade their way through much complexity. Part of the problem is that salespeople are forced to do too much administrative work.
That's why account executives need tools to respond to customer inquiries faster and more effectively than previous methods. To do this they'll need the ability to easily record, track, and change customer and product information. Plus, they'll need easy access to updated testimonials, sales programs, and competitive data. Naturally, the less complicated the system, the more productive employees will be. When the complexity is removed, salespeople will consider it a tool, not a hindrance, and will update it regularly, which helps managers who rely on this information to make smarter decisions.
Account executives also spend a good portion of their day communicating with management. Besides reporting results for the day, week, month, many companies have processes that require managerial approval for discounts, quicker delivery, or customers with bad credit ratings. Therefore, any system functionality that improves communication between a sales rep and her manager, such as alerts and messaging capabilities, is vital to this process.
Last, any account executive will spend at least a few minutes of company time tracking her commission. For salespeople, there isn't a bigger motivator. Salespeople "are coin operated. & Anything that keeps them updated on their ability to make money is a huge motivator."
Looking ahead, the emergence of handheld mobile devices and wireless technology has been and will continue to be the biggest technological development for the account executive. Depending on the industry, salespeople could spend most of their time on the road, and with 2010 promising to be a big year for wireless connectivity, future developments could have a big impact on how sales executives do their jobs. With the arrival of 3G networks, VoIP, and dual-mode handsets, account executives will have the ability to access and download large volumes of data from an CRM system and interact with other back office systems, transforming their handhelds and PDAs from simple email receivers to mobile computers.
Aside from mobility, some companies are strengthening the bonds between sales and marketing. For account executives this means acquiring basic information about customers who have been deemed hot by the marketing department. Any customer contact info, interaction, or purchasing history--and any marketing information like response rates--helps provide account reps with information to turn a prospect into a lead. The integration of sales and marketing has the potential to affect the account executive the most.Instead of entering information many times over, you're leveraging information already acquired by marketing, but companies are still trying to connect the dots and there is still of lot of work to be done with this business process."

CRM for Sales Management
Sales management falls somewhere in the middle of the corporate ladder, whether it's a branch manager in charge of three to four account executives or a regional manager. CRM for sales management must combine the best of both the executive's and the account representative's world. They do so by integrating multitudes of sales, market, and pipeline reports into customizable dashboards. This has enabled managers to gain an unprecedented view of their sales force. The result is, they can manage and allocate resources quickly and more efficiently than ever before. "Sales managers are involved in the deal making. "Their mindset is, What can we do today so we make our goals for the week, month, or quarter? At the same time, they need to step back and focus on the big picture, which for them is their department or region, and allocate their resources accordingly."
CRM solutions should help management measure and manage the effectiveness of internal processes. This means managers spend a good portion of their time studying dashboards that identify sales opportunities, deal stages, and close rates daily, weekly, monthly, or quarterly. These performance metrics can also be evaluated by individual, group, or region. Additionally, as companies get more adept at bringing together customer information from various areas, including sales, customer service, accounting, and the supply chain, the job of a sales manager will become more comprehensive. Depending on the industry, deals may require involvement from multiple departments inside a company, such as manufacturing, research and development, or accounting.

By gaining better visibility into other departments, a sales manager will become more of a facilitator, removing internal bottlenecks that crop up or quickly notifying all stakeholders when a change is introduced. "Now the [manager] is utilizing the CRM solution as a tool, as opposed to just a reporting function. "They want a tool that improves their ability to sell, not just something that provides reporting functionality. That's farther up the chain."
Many managers, particularly regional managers, take a more strategic approach, spending their day going over pipeline dashboards and reports to review which pipelines and markets are generating the most money. "Sales managers will be picking out the largest opportunities, the two or three out of 12 that are going to land the big bucks. "They're going to be looking at which accounts are generating the most revenue, where are the biggest pipelines, and which pipelines are growing the fastest."
Managers are also benefiting from coaching tools. In the past, CRM focused primarily on providing management with a reporting tool. Today, many vendors are embedding new, sophisticated ways to conduct account planning. New sales systems place action items around the most important accounts, such as which business processes or steps should be followed, which sales rep should conduct them, and in what time frame. By understanding where the account executives are in the sales cycle and where they are going, management can offer advice or tips to help facilitate selling success. "This promotes more of a coaching and supporting relationship between a manager and his or her sales representatives versus the typical 'I'm just looking at what you've done and if you didn't make your numbers I'll beat you for it.

The Command Center: CRM for Executives
Any good CEO or vice president of sales continually understands his company's position within the market. While sales management is focused on its own piece of the pie, C-level executives maintain a holistic view of both the sales organization and the company. They're responsible for the investments and distribution of resources and assets throughout the entire sales organization. Their responsibility is reflected in their mindset. A salesperson or sales manager thinks day to day, month to month, or perhaps quarter to quarter, but the mindset of a CEO or vice president of sales is that of quarterly, yearly, and beyond. Still, a CEO or vice president of sales should never lose sight of the tactical picture. "If you're a vice president of sales and you've gotten away from the clients, the deals, and the processes, you've probably gone way too far to the other side of what you should be doing in the sales environment," .
So how does a CEO or vice president of sales allocate his time to accomplish these goals? He spends most of the day reviewing, preparing, and presenting reports. He will review dashboards that highlight pipeline growth and forecast models, product trends (which can include cross references by geographies, regions, industry verticals, or markets), and win/loss ratios for certain divisions within the sales organization. This should enable him to determine if success or failure is from best practices at the sales force level or from strategies based at the executive/management level. Last, with such a high priority on forward-looking visibility, a vice president of sales will spend a significant amount of time running predictive forecasts. "An executive wants to know where the company is and where it's going," .. "Tactically, they still need the important numbers so they can run the business, but in general they're looking for trending information that enables them to better understand the market their company services to better determine where they should make large, long-term investments in the sales department."
Another executive responsibility is ensuring that good business practices and processes are being implemented and followed. Many times, this responsibility can be overlooked. Consequently, an CRM system should have strong drill-down capabilities so executives can take a detailed look at any segment of the sales team and its ability to enter new sales plans, market strategy, or business processes as feedback. Executives need to "take a more outward focus," .A sales executive needs a tool that will transcend throughout the organization so the organization flies in formation with his strategy. If he can do that, that's really a home run for the CEO."

Looking Ahead

As vendors continue to expand the capabilities their CRM solutions offer, members of a sales force will be hard pressed not to accomplish more in a single day than their predecessors. Advancements in wireless connectivity will bring mobility to the account executive, account planning and robust reporting tools will enable managers to gain insight into and coach their salespeople like nothing previously seen, and the ongoing development of business process and technology to integrate CRM with marketing and customer service will enable sales executives to equip their organization with a 360-degree view of the customer. Providing each level of the sales force with an application that enhances its ability to accomplish that quickly and more efficiently than before, and to communicate that information up and down the corporate ladder effectively, helps any sales department's ability to deliver profitable results to both the customer and the company. It's exciting to see how sales technology is adapting the roles of salespeople. "You have telecom infrastructures now offering full, wireless connectivity, vendors releasing new reporting tools. It's challenging the way salespeople conduct business, and forcing them to respond to customers quicker and more efficiently than before."


Sales Tools by Job Role
CEO

• Sales Forecast Accuracy

• Forward Looking Visibility

• Improved Market Share

Vice President of Sales

• Sales Forecast Accuracy

• Methods to Accelerate Opportunity Development/Share Best Practices

• Improve Revenue per Sales Representative

• Improve Win/Loss Ratio

• Effectively Capture Loss Data for Strategic Planning/Pricing

• Improve Consistency Across the Sales Organization

• More Effectively Identify New Market Opportunities

• Capitalize on Cross- and Upsell Opportunities

Sales Management

• Sales Forecast Accuracy

• Ability to Focus on Big Impact Opportunities

• More Effective Coaching and Mentoring

• Better Monitoring of Sales Performance

• More Effective Evaluation of the Quality of an Opportunity

• Monitor Account Activities Relative to Results (Call Reports)

Account Executive

• Access to Customer Data

• Improved Quote and Proposal Capabilities

• Faster and More Flexible Corporate Approval Capabilities

• Integrated Access to Relevant Information

• What-if Simulation Tools

• Higher Quality Leads from Marketing

Good Luck
Your P&C

DC*

CRM Engineering , To Synergize your Techies & Sales Force.

Dears,
Your sales force and your technology staff may not respect each other's turf, but you'd better broker a truce if you want your business to thrive. Think of the two most different people in your organization, the ones whose personalities are like night and day. Chances are, one of these is a salesperson, and the other's a technologist. It's a fairly established fact that, like Gangs in any of the popular Wild West Movies they keep pretty much to their own turf and socialize amongst themselves.

If you're lucky, the discord doesn't get in the way of their working relationship or, if it does, the individuals are not powerful decision-makers. Outside of casual chat around the water cooler, or at company outings, a sales rep and an IT runner might have little contact. The chief information officer and the executive sales director, on the other hand, can start a rumble that shakes a company to its foundation, paralyzing daily operations and stagnating innovation.

It's more likely to be this way in larger companies, where job specialization is more clearly defined, but even small businesses can experience conflict between the people who set up the laptops and the ones who use them. Minimizing those conflicts -- and getting the two factions to communicate -- is of critical importance to any business that wants to move ahead.

The Roots of Conflict

Why the disconnect between sales staff and technical personnel, anyway? "This is a good example of left-brain/right-brain conflict. The IT person is probably naturally inclined to be left-brain from the start. Then their professional training reinforces this mentality. The logical, analytical, and concrete thinking suits business technologists, leading them to the profession in the first place and then driving them to excel. Most sales folks, on the other hand, are talkers who frequently have difficulty staying focused on specific topics. This fits the sales lifestyle; sales folk don't succeed unless they're comfortable with extemporaneous speaking, and can adjust to new topics and situations rapidly. Salespeople are well served by an aggressive, competitive nature, combined with the desire and ability to keep somebody talking.

I believe it's a lack of understanding -- let's say a lack of lingua franca regarding process requirements and definition. .For the most part, sales is about closing business at the current moment. The sales role is about responding to what the customer needs in the present. There is a fundamental fear of saying 'no' to any customer need or question."

What's the Problem?

The place where sales/tech conflicts play out is usually the company's infrastructure. Salespeople demand new applications or functions that the technologists can't deliver, or the Techies abuse and ignore the tech they already have, infuriating the Sales Force. Each group complains to management, who promptly tells them to sort it out amongst themselves. The time wasted going back and forth on issues that won't get resolved is time that could be better spent on real job tasks. Energy that might have gone into a sales call, or into adding some juicy new bits of computer gear, is dissipated as waste heat from anger.

Tech folk need to understand that sales and marketing are totally dynamic -- and always will be. If these folks have worked on [enterprise resource planning], accounting, or other back-office problems, they get used to problems that are better defined and don't change as quickly."

On the other Sales folks tend to think, 'It's only a little software, what's the big deal?' Again, these issues need to be discussed in an ongoing exchange of working together to take better care of customers. People sometimes forget that that is really what their job is."

The key is maintaining a continuous dialogue -- before things blow up into a crisis and fingers start pointing. Working together should be defined as a priority and included in annual performance evaluations..

Some of the most egregious failures occur in high-profile industries. There are countless examples of sales and marketing going to market with a specific promotion or campaign that could not be supported by the billing system. Hence, revenue could not be collected and, of course, the campaign did not meet objectives.

But this seems to be a trend that is changing. Today's Techies often have a technical specialist whose job it is to act as liaison to the Sales Force, coordinating requirements and projects. "One example that comes to mind is the case of the sales organization of a large communications service provider that has decided to take back in-house its Web sales channel and some of its retail stores from a third-party sales company.. In this case, the sales and IT teams are working as one team to design and implement the communications retail experience of the future."

Solutions

Some would argue that software-as-a-service (SaaS) circumvents the Techies/Sales Force struggle. Indeed, the reduced impact on technical infrastructure and personnel has been among the chief selling points for SaaS. I don't think SaaS provides an end-run around the problem.. The same problems are all still there. Look at any big Salesforce.com project and you will see all the same issues present. Whether or not this is true, the fact remains that many organizations have already invested considerable time and effort in their CRM systems -- investments they won't be keen on scrapping in favor of SaaS. Let's focus on the needs of those companies, the ones that have something in place and no compelling reason to change.

Identifying and properly communicating requirements is one of the hardest steps for a sales team. Services-oriented architecture, business process management tools, and flexible-rules engines all can inject much-needed flexibility into a patchwork of IT systems without requiring costly, error-prone modifications to core systems. The technologists are thus embracing an environment that accepts and facilitates frequent change that will support "the sometimes-schizophrenic nature of sales."

Just as with any business, success starts with credible and reliable delivery. In manufacturing, for example, delivery of materials is crucial; in CRM, the key deliverable is IT resources. Predictability creates a certainty for sales that they can sell what they have, promote where they are going, and encourage the prospect to participate in the future vision. If there is a common, documented, up-to-date understanding of the business process -- like order-to-cash -- then it becomes easier to have a joint discussion around what needs to change." Sometimes it's a procedural change, sometimes it's a new system or feature -- and sometimes it's both -- "but you have to have the lingua franca of a common process model as your baseline.

CRM Engineering.

One possibility for facilitating communication is the use of a mediator -- especially one already familiar with both sides' needs. Whom we calls the CRM Engineers and the discipline CRM Engineering.

When it comes to bridging sales and technology jargon and processes, many organizations have a CRM Engineer-- a role uniquely designed for straddling both sides of the equation. "In many sales, there are two sorts of people at work for the vendor: the sales rep, who does the actual deal, talks about financing, and such; and a tech guy who runs demonstrations, handles RFPs, and is responsible for solution closure. We call that person the CRM engineer.

The CRM Engineer uses tech knowledge to move sales forward by working with the customer to establish technical requirements, functional needs, and points of integration. Somebody who understands the IT environment and is able to think like a salesperson could be the ideal moderator. In some cases, at least: "It depends on the seniority of the CRM Engineer, and maybe on the kind of business the company serves. With applications vendors, the CRM Engineer is always working with IT groups, and is sensitive to their needs" even while driving the sale to completion.

Improvements

I believe in iterative CRM rollouts and agile development processes. one of the common threads in failed CRM projects is trying to do too much at once.I always tell people to get a basic system up and running by focusing on the most obvious pain point, then expand to other areas as experience grows."

No matter how you establish good working relations between the Techies and the Sales Force, you must get it done in order to move on to the proper focus for a business: outward upon its customers, not inward to damage control. What is needed is for sales and IT to come together and form a consistent understanding of customer needs, business objectives, and business requirements. From there, both roles can work together to form a joint solution to immediate issues as well as future opportunities."

Your P&C

DC*

Siebel CRM 100 Success Secrets - 100 most asked questions on Siebel Customer Relationship Management Applications covering Oracle enterprise CRM, On Demand software and Business Intelligence

A Guide to Implementing Oracle Siebel CRM 8.x

Conversion Matters in Online CRM & Smart Ways to do it.

Dears,
Online Web forms that capture customer data in exchange for content or another kind of information or service are often the first point of contact customers have with your business. So, why are they frequently so awful? Or overly ambitious? Why do marketers try to collect too much information, or require extraneous information customers aren’t interested in readily handing over? Capturing and converting leads online is all about user experience. Provide visitors with a positive experience, and you're more likely to interest them in taking the next step in the pipeline: getting to know your company better.
Here are some greats ways marketers can improve the conversion rates of their Web forms.
1. Avoid too many clicks
If the goal of your online marketing program is lead generation, then keep Web forms as short as possible. Who wants to spend 10 minutes giving away a complete personal history—especially early in the relationship? We don't. Potential customers don't, either. Even if you don't require visitors to complete every field, a long, visually cluttered form can be off-putting.
Don't try to qualify prospects with your online forms—that's the salesperson's job.You can always ask more questions as you filter leads through the sales cycle; don't turn them away before they've even made it to the door.
2. Make your forms easy to find
Don't make people click away to search for a contact page—provide access to the appropriate form where visitors will want and need it on your site, and keep it visible, especially on pages that require any scrolling. People shouldn't have to hunt for the form.
3. Include a call to action
Provide a call to action on each page that guides visitors to the information they seek and to the appropriate form to address their stage of the purchase process. For instance, you could provide a sidebar with contact options such as "Buy Now," "Send Me a Quote" or "Tell Me More," or whatever is appropriate for your firm.However you approach your call to action and forms, don't leave people guessing; their guesses may lead them away from your site.
4. Mandate the minimum
The more fields you require, the fewer people you will hear from. Keep it simple. First and last name, company, phone number, email address—whatever you must have for the next step.
Unless you legitimately need more information to take action, don't require leads to provide their addresses or their titles or... you get the drill. You can gather that information during your next point of contact. Just require the information you need to take that next step.
5. Make your forms simple and interesting
Have some exciting stuff in the Webforms page without distracting them for moving to another page, have some catchy stuff about your product or the most interesting news related to your industry or community. Sometimes professional offers that are available for your existing customer..there is no limit to imagination…and yet to keep this simple and cute.
6. Measure your forms' efficiency
Speaking of tests, you need to measure the results of your forms. Test, adjust, and test again. Use your analytics platform to determine where your visitors are coming from and how many of them access your forms; by comparing page views with actual submissions, you can determine how many visitors follow through and how many click away without completing.
Break the form into pieces and test that. Check out Smart Brief as an example, which collects minimal information for its newsletters, and then attempts to collect much more information for its advertisers on the next page, using a piece of bait to encourage compliance.
Look at which products or pages drive the most visitors to action (and which result in successful form completion); then, use that information to improve the rest of your site and your other forms.
7. Consider what's "need to have" vs. "nice to have"
Marketers should ask themselves why they need more detailed prospect information and from whom they need it. It's a matter of "need to have" vs. "nice to have."Doubling your data requirement may make for a complete customer relationship management (CRM) file and a happy sales team, but does it do the same for your leads? Is it worth a lost opportunity?
Provide different options for prospects as they move through the sales funnel; some who are ready to actively engage and are at a later stage in the cycle will likely be willing and eager to provide more detailed information about themselves and their needs—and that's the right time to gather those details.
8. Maintain a long-term perspective
If you provide only one opportunity for your prospects to contact you or share online, and you're not supporting that with qualification efforts in other channels, then a short form with minimal fields could have a negative impact on your data and scoring.But, if you're relying on a single lead touch point to drive your qualification decision making, you're doing your prospects and yourself a disservice.
Engage with them, solicit more information from them at every touch point throughout the sales cycle—whether online or offline. Look into ways of capturing data without asking direct questions.For example, what page or product led them to take that first step? What is their Web interaction history with you? Such data can be tracked behind the scenes without requiring the prospect to fill out a long form.
9. Avoid junk data
The more extraneous the questions, the greater the likelihood that people will provide erroneous answers. By eliminating unnecessary requirements, most marketers will reduce junk data.
To ensure working email addresses, consider delivering lead generation materials by sending a link via email (rather than immediately displaying the information).
Think about what is appropriate for each stage of the cycle: Not everyone is ready to jump out of near anonymity.
For example, provide a short form for newsletter subscribers and a separate submission form for quote-seeking leads—don't tie those together, because they likely attract prospects in different stages of the purchase cycle who are willing to provide differing amounts of information.
Finally, lead database hygiene is just a fact of life. Records that have fixable errors such as mistyped email addresses (e.g., .cpm instead of .com) are different from those that are simply false (e.g., foo@foo.com); don't miss out on a potential deal because of a typo.
10. Treat forms as part of the nurturing process
It all comes down to providing the right calls to action and ways to connect for different prospects in different phases of the sales cycle. Not all prospects are ready to buy today, but that doesn't mean you should disregard them. Don't ask for more information than a lead in each phase is willing to give, and you won't have significant trouble acquiring accurate data up front.
Actionable data means different things at different points in the sales cycle. Actionable data for people just kicking the tires may be correct email addresses and newsletter opt-ins; there's no need to ask for too much more—yet.
And when they're ready to talk, provide them a way of augmenting existing data to connect with the right member of the sales team, and then let that salesperson walk them through the qualification questions as part of the relationship-building process.
11. Remember that "progressive profiling" isn't a magic bullet
Progressive profiling—a technique that asks new questions of visitors each time they visit your site, thereby "progressively" building a profile with you—can be an effective tool to gather additional information on prospects with each interaction. But it isn't a magic bullet that allows you to stop other qualification efforts.Visitors don't always comply with progressive profiling (and many marketers don't have the technical resources to do it well), so you need to fill the gaps in other ways.
12. Sidestep potential pitfalls
Marketers can use a lot of profile information to make prospect communications and customer Web experience more effective. But avoid collecting personal data and using it in ways customers find intrusive. That's going to encourage them to provide false data or negatively affect their willingness to provide additional information.It is important that you be clear with customers about how you will use the information you have about them and that you really think about the interactions from their point of view.
That may seem obvious, but you should use profile information to present the most useful (and effective) offers to your prospects—and not come off as someone who is "spying" on them or using their information inappropriately.
13. Cull the bad data
Of course bad data is going to gunk up your pipeline—and it is going to make it appear that you have a greater pool of leads than you actually do if you don't weed out the bad data (which will make subsequent response rates and campaign results appear less favorable than they actually may be because the deadweight pulls your numbers down).For online collection and conversion, the key is to ensure the data you collect at each touchpoint is as accurate as possible by relying on the ways we've described above.
Additionally, you need to manage leads via nurturing programs that keep prospects interested, develop trust, and encourage honest relationships. This approach encourages accuracy and information-sharing by prospects.Also, remember that bad data doesn't just come from the point of entry; contacts within companies change, people change responsibilities, and phone numbers and emails become useless if they're not kept up-to-date. Stale data by its very age will increasingly become bad data.
14. Monitor conversion rates
Conversion rates will vary, depending on what you are asking people to provide, what stage they are in the buying cycle, and a bunch of other variables. Therefore, it's important to actively test and improve your forms over time—trying to improve conversion rates and information accuracy with each test. Make sure that you are really using the information you are collecting by auditing your information collection and information usage periodically.
Good Luck
You’re P&C
DC*

Raise of New Breed CRM Consultants & End of Software is not the End of Consulting

Dears,

Mirror Mirror, On the wall. Here are some reflections of new realities.

With the days of never-ending on-premises engagements and limitless budgets long gone, CRM can no longer sustain the consultancies of yesteryear. But what kinds of professional services are still needed in today's CRM industry—and what kind of CRM are consultants selling?

When Mark Benioff cofounded Salesforce.com, in 1999, he loudly declared that the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model would drive into obsolescence the exorbitant installation-and-maintenance fees once commanded by consultancies. On-demand software could be up and running in a matter of days without putting a huge dent in budgets. SaaS vendors have stuck to the promise in many respects, providing low-cost, viable options for even the largest of enterprises. But pity the poor consultants! (Well, OK—maybe not.) Seriously, though: How are consultants faring in the changing software landscape? In the Age of SaaS, has the need for consultants evaporated alongside expensive license fees?

It’s clear that the professional services field hasn’t just packed up and faded away. Part of that is due to the continued existence of on-premises CRM implementations, which many analysts say will always have a place in the industry. However, as organizations ease away from on-premises software and look more favorably upon SaaS solutions, large-scale consulting and implementation lightens up, too. The consensus seems to be that the demand for professional services is still high—it’s just coming in a different form nowadays. With the emergence of Web services, consultancies are reshaping their offerings to meet the changing frontier. As services-oriented architecture (SOA) continues to blossom, organizations are emphasizing integration and flexibility.
So, was Benioff’s boast one of foresight or fantasy? Is there a need for CRM consultants in the cloud-computing world of Web 2.0?

Paradigm Shift

I think there is a revolution taking place in how consultancy services are delivered, both in the U.S. and globally.What’s pushing these trends is the ability to focus on value-added services—[that] has really differentiated consultancies that are providing high-end services [over] those services that are getting commoditized.
Take for example Accenture positions itself as a company that specializes in global management consulting, technology services, and outsourcing—and it’s the largest consulting firm in the world. Accenture’s clients include 80+ of the Fortune Global 100 and more than two-thirds of the Fortune Global 500. Mr.Driggs, the CRM Head of Accenture sees his role in the true sense of the word “consult”: He advises companies about creating and maintaining profitable customer relationships and building superior brand value to foster greater customer satisfaction and loyalty. For Driggs and his fellow consultants at Accenture, the professional services industry is not a matter of on-demand or on-premises segmentation—it’s about keeping customers. The main distinction, according to Driggs, is between companies pursuing emerging markets and those dealing with existing customers. He says the ultimate underlying message for consultants to impart, no matter the company type, is to be more customer-centric.
The competition for customers is huge .The need to be more customer-centric is there. At the same time, customer-satisfaction ratings are not improving and companies are struggling to keep pace. As satisfaction wanes, the economy weakens, and customers jump ship, a company’s needs change. A CRM consultant’s focus has to shift from technology to more of a top-down operational evaluation.
Whether it’s SaaS or a niche application or a large [enterprise resource planning] module, you have to figure out how that fits into your current technology environment—into current data, into the overall process and operating model environment.“The key message is that when you’re implementing these technologies, you’ve got to think about all three of those pieces.”

When Mark Benioff cofounded Salesforce.com, in 1999, he loudly declared that the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model would drive into obsolescence the exorbitant installation-and-maintenance fees once commanded by consultancies. On-demand software could be up and running in a matter of days without putting a huge dent in budgets. SaaS vendors have stuck to the promise in many respects, providing low-cost, viable options for even the largest of enterprises. But pity the poor consultants! (Well, OK—maybe not.) Seriously, though: How are consultants faring in the changing software landscape? In the Age of SaaS, has the need for consultants evaporated alongside expensive license fees?
It’s clear that the professional services field hasn’t just packed up and faded away. Part of that is due to the continued existence of on-premises CRM implementations, which many analysts say will always have a place in the industry. However, as organizations ease away from on-premises software and look more favorably upon SaaS solutions, large-scale consulting and implementation lightens up, too. The consensus seems to be that the demand for professional services is still high—it’s just coming in a different form nowadays. With the emergence of Web services, consultancies are reshaping their offerings to meet the changing frontier. As services-oriented architecture (SOA) continues to blossom, organizations are emphasizing integration and flexibility.
So, was Benioff’s boast one of foresight or fantasy? Is there a need for CRM consultants in the cloud-computing world of Web 2.0?
Paradigm Shift
I think there is a revolution taking place in how consultancy services are delivered, both in the U.S. and globally.What’s pushing these trends is the ability to focus on value-added services—[that] has really differentiated consultancies that are providing high-end services [over] those services that are getting commoditized.
Take for example Accenture positions itself as a company that specializes in global management consulting, technology services, and outsourcing—and it’s the largest consulting firm in the world. Accenture’s clients include 80+ of the Fortune Global 100 and more than two-thirds of the Fortune Global 500. Mr.Driggs, the CRM Head of Accenture sees his role in the true sense of the word “consult”: He advises companies about creating and maintaining profitable customer relationships and building superior brand value to foster greater customer satisfaction and loyalty. For Driggs and his fellow consultants at Accenture, the professional services industry is not a matter of on-demand or on-premises segmentation—it’s about keeping customers. The main distinction, according to Driggs, is between companies pursuing emerging markets and those dealing with existing customers. He says the ultimate underlying message for consultants to impart, no matter the company type, is to be more customer-centric.
The competition for customers is huge .The need to be more customer-centric is there. At the same time, customer-satisfaction ratings are not improving and companies are struggling to keep pace. As satisfaction wanes, the economy weakens, and customers jump ship, a company’s needs change. A CRM consultant’s focus has to shift from technology to more of a top-down operational evaluation.
Whether it’s SaaS or a niche application or a large [enterprise resource planning] module, you have to figure out how that fits into your current technology environment—into current data, into the overall process and operating model environment.“The key message is that when you’re implementing these technologies, you’ve got to think about all three of those pieces.”

PROCESS FIRST
“Business process” seems to be a popular catchphrase among vendors and analysts these days.. Although CRM Consultants are skilled at implementation and development, a different need is visible in the marketplace. I saw a lot of people wanting to get business consulting on the best way to use [a given] tool in [a given] business model. Many users didn’t know how to use the offerings to the extent. I always look at the customer system, and say, ‘Is it configured the way you need it to be configured?’ [Then I] come back with a recommendation list of what [the company] should be doing, and say, ‘This is the type of training you should give your employees.’ ”
With SaaS solutions on the rise, the need for systems integrators has significantly declined. Consultants now spend less time technically configuring an actual implementation and more time on consulting. I think where a buyer used to look at consulting to understand the technology and make it fit, now [consulting provides the] buyer an understanding of how it fits.
SHORT AND SWEET
Aside from helping to spawn a rise in business consulting, SaaS has shortened each implementation job, a factor that has forced many consultancies to adjust their operations. On-premises [implementations] could take one to three years. Today, the bulk of those multiyear gigs are history. Consultants can finish an installation job within a matter of weeks, which frees them to focus more on integrating solutions throughout the enterprise, rather than having to spend months (or years) making one bulky technology work. Organizations are not static—they change in two to three years. By the time we fully implement, their business has changed. One reason companies now tend to seek operational advice is because of this shorter time frame, but also because of the newfound flexibility within their consulting budgets—another benefit the speed of SaaS provides over the old on-premises consulting scene. When the project was going for two years [and companies] didn’t have any more hours left—they didn’t have the budget—[they’d] cut the training hours. Today, companies aren’t spending all the time on up-front costs. They have a nice bucket to focus on training and adoption. The cuts in integration and configuration have meant less revenue for consultancies. For an integrator, the time spent configuring is notably less. So it does erode earnings—and for [similar] implementations, you have less configuration and customization. With that in mind, some consultancies are upping the ante with overall business consulting, helping organizations to see the bigger picture by promoting the kinds of training programs that help drive user adoption and ensure the technology doesn’t go to waste. Analysts also note that, with SOA, there is more emphasis than ever on seeing the entire ecosystem. In addition, Web services and on-demand technology often involve an operational shift that consultants can help identify and administer.
The business model for consultancies can get out of whack as the drive toward shorter, briefer implementations perpetuates. Those accustomed to dedicating months—or sometimes years—to one project may find the bar being raised, and the need to develop an entirely new approach. Many of the core skills remain the same. If they try hard enough, consultants can find the connective tissue linking the old and new projects. So all the more the drive for customer centricity is something that has not changed—and it’s not likely to change anytime soon.
The adoption is too-often overlooked—training is glossed over, with users simply expected to adopt new software and tools. At the end of the day, if you don’t have people using [an] application, it’s failed. Even with SaaS’s easier implementation, there’s still a learning curve—employees need to understand the value of anything new.
PARTNERSHIPS, SEGMENTATION, AND COMMODITIZATION
The one segmentation trend is starting to appear: Consultancies are popping up to offer specific expertise with a particular vendor or solution. While this wisely targets a very niche audience, these consultancies might struggle down the road. Some also worry that off shoring services pose a threat to consultancies for one, remains convinced that there will continue to be a place for face-to-face consultation. Even though [there’s a] tremendous amount of off shoring, salaries [of consultants] are still relatively high. If you are willing to travel and you are able to perform reasonable consulting...you can pick your job right now. The demand is overwhelming
SHOWING CLIENTS THE MONEY

So with some consultancies offering solutions for every need, others specializing with one kind of software, and even some vendors offering professional services of their own, how are you supposed to know what to choose?
Any enterprise that wants to get it right will take time to sort through project objectives and work backward to think of skills and criteria: Who has the best skills to help us achieve that? “It’s a best-for-the-need world.”
Today’s CRM consultants can help companies fix problem areas such as sales processes. (20 points in revenue can be lost by companies that can’t police sales processes on their own.) . The modern CRM consultant best serves the client by aiming for customer centricity: “If I fix [a broken process] at the point of the customer, [the] business would be healthier.
And sometimes ROI is hard to gauge, even with SaaS. “When the [SaaS] consultant leaves, the end client has the SaaS product with features turned on—[but] with no real process or adoption practices,” adding that the client may “fumble initially out of the gate.The key is to ask basic questions before deploying: What’s your business model? What are you trying to manage? Where are the tools?Opting for plain-vanilla SaaS likely means less-than-full customer support, which means it’s critical that the tool adhere to your practices. You have to introduce it to your staff and understand why you’re implementing the tool.
Te switch from on-premises to on-demand can save anywhere from 40 percent to 60 percent of implementation costs, but he says it’s difficult to gauge whether the consultancy industry has picked up or dropped off dramatically. Consultants and analysts say the best of the firms pitching in on a CRM implementation—SaaS or not—are those trying to develop a positive customer experience. So, in the hunt for a CRM consultancy, look for one that engenders loyalty—and one that’s not too hard on the user. Any consultancy effort needs to work with other parts of the enterprise, not create a silo of its own.
But does any of that answer Benioff’s decade-old boast? Perhaps not, but Salesforce.com itself may provide an insight: In its most recent quarterly financial report, the original “no software” vendor’s line item for “professional services and other revenues” came to $23.4 million, an increase of 41 percent on a year-over-year basis.
Perhaps “the end of software” isn’t the end of professional services after all—just a shift in cost from implementation expense to business process consulting.

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Survivors of Siebel Effect, Wisdom from Past CRM Failures

Dears,
Fair or not, Siebel Systems—the CRM pioneer later acquired by Oracle—is often considered the poster child for both Successful & failed CRM system implementations. I’ve heard dozens of war stories about overaggressive and excessively large CRM implementations that did not come close to realizing their promised benefits—and wasted a lot of money. We can blame Siebel all we want, but an enterprise had to commit to the project before Siebel could have the opportunity to fail. And to be fair, some Siebel implementations produced satisfied customers.

The so-called “Siebel effect” is a fear of large, expensive, and often very lengthy projects intended to revamp all aspects of an enterprise’s customer-facing solutions. For contact centers and customer service organizations, this involved a “rip and replace” of the entire service-and-support application. This process could also involve sales, marketing, and analytics.
The first few cycles of CRM taught managers a few things they already should have known:
If it looks too good to be true, it probably is.

Speak to references and find out what does and does not work before signing a contract.
Include rewards and penalties in system contracts; if vendors won’t commit, neither should you.
Systems cannot change culture.

Selecting system implementation resources is at least as important as selecting the system.
But often the most important, painful, and expensive lesson that companies learned was that large and complex projects should be broken down into manageable and measurable phases. The Big Bang approach may have worked in the past, but it’s unlikely to work again in an enterprise environment.

Many organizations that did not realize the expected results and benefits from their CRM implementations have shied away from making additional investments to improve their servicing environments or finish what they started. Quite a number of companies halted their efforts and tried to make the best of what they had. This often included a combination of old systems and a new CRM application. Since these companies originally intended to replace servicing applications because they were outdated and unable to address customers’ needs, these failures were a major setback.
Having been burnt badly, many companies “limped” along with perhaps decades-old servicing applications not designed for today’s complex contact center environments. Some of these firms, however, are now reaching a critical juncture: Their servicing applications have simply run out of gas and can no longer meet their needs.
Managers in the United States and around the world are now looking for flexible servicing applications that can grow with their businesses, but are fearful of signing up for long-term and complex system conversions. Instead, they want quick fixes and are seeking ways to enhance what they have, with minimal risk, by adding a new layer of functionality on top of an existing servicing infrastructure.
While many CRM initiatives may have failed, the CRM movement itself did not. It helped bring a great deal of senior management attention and resources to customer-facing departments, including contact centers.

Most organizations, however, have yet to achieve the two primary goals of the CRM movement

(1) creating a system that provides a holistic, 360-degree view of the customer, and

(2) getting sales, marketing, and servicing organizations to work together.

It’s well past time for most companies to invest in and replace their servicing systems. But this time around, it’s understood that projects should be broken into short-term phases, and that process and training changes are as important as the system itself. It’s time to stop invoking the spectre of Siebel when trying to avoid making the necessary infrastructure investments to enhance productivity and improve the customer experience. We need to apply those hard-earned lessons to mitigate risk and greatly improve the chances of success.

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Are you socially challenged? No Social CRM is better than bad Social CRM

Dears,
Social media usage continues to grow explosively. Not surprisingly, businesses want to leverage social media for customer acquisition and retention, as well as brand building. Providing good customer service to the social consumer is emerging as a critical imperative to achieving these objectives since social media is also a natural venue for customers to air their grievances.
While going social in customer service makes sense for many businesses, it might pay to be "antisocial" first, meaning a deliberate approach to social media customer service will maximize the odds of success. It is not uncommon for businesses to simply rush into social without giving themselves adequate time to assess the need, develop a strategy, formulate policy and practices, and put the required technology, process and people infrastructures in place. The Web is rife with examples of poor social practices caused by rushing in.
Here are five "antisocial" steps businesses need to take before making the social plunge, in order to avoid such missteps and the resultant damage to their brands:
1. Do I really need to be social? Social media is best suited to address customer service queries of low-to-moderate complexity. Complex queries will involve significant back and forth and one-to-one communications that are often not relevant to the broader community.
2. Get picky about the venue. One size does not fit all when it comes to social media. As an example, social "clubs" like supplier-moderated or third-party-moderated forums are more appropriate for B2B businesses, for instance, than broad social networks like Twitter and Facebook. The more complex the products and service interactions, the better is the fit for focused media like forums and traditional one-to-one communications. Moreover, answers to complex queries do not lend themselves to the character limitations of a medium like Twitter, further limiting the fit. Pick the medium that makes sense for your business and prioritize your investments accordingly.
3. Get picky about the people. It is important to prioritize social customer service based on the financial and influence value that the social customer brings to the business. The Pareto principle applies here as well--a minority of social customers is likely to add the most financial value and wield the most social influence. Businesses are better off focusing on these high-priority customers before expanding their social efforts to the broader market.
4. Don't be impulsive. The speed of social can thrill or kill. The velocity of market influence and the resulting brand enhancement, or damage, is exponentially higher in social media than traditional one-to-one communication channels. This applies to business brands (e.g. "United Airlines broke my guitar" incident) or personal brands (e.g. Tiger Woods). Furthermore, customers often go social with their complaints when traditional customer service channels fail.
So, there's less room for error in social customer service, and the speed and quality of responses need to be much higher in social media than in traditional channels. Make sure your organization has the policies, technology, knowledge, process and people in place to provide high-speed, high-quality customer service that is required by social media before jumping in. No social is better than bad social!
Furthermore, organizations need to make sure that they do not create a social interaction silo that is disconnected from traditional interactions of the social customer with the business. Cross-channel amnesia on the part of businesses is a common problem in traditional media, and customers wouldn't want to see it extended to social media as well.
5. Research before you leap. While social engagement and interactions take time to prepare for, businesses should start monitoring social networks suited to their business sooner rather than later. This will help them identify opportunities they could leverage and issues they need to defuse, as well as make the internal business case for implementing social customer service and obtain funding.
Social CRM can enhance customer experience and brand loyalty. However, an "antisocial" wet-foot-first approach rather than an "ultra-social" jump-headlong approach will increase the odds of success.

Good Luck & Happy Bakrid
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Cart before the Horse: CRM Learnings Series

Dears,

In a successful CRM implementation process must always precede technology but in majority of cases of CRM implementations its always been “Cart before the Horse”

Process excellence is red-hot. Leading companies worldwide are turning to it to enhance such business processes as streamlining new product development and improving CRM. The strategy of business process management is working for companies before and during their CRM initiatives. A leading manufacturer, for example, opted first to document its account-team collaboration processes prior to considering CRM technologies to support these processes. This company knows that in a successful CRM implementation process must always precede technology. To drive success the manufacturer is following a six-step methodology: 1. Form a cross-functional process team comprising players who are responsible for looking after customers (e.g., sales, service, finance, logistics). 2. Let the cross-functional team chart as-is account-team collaboration business processes. 3. Validate documented processes with customers. 4. Work closely with customers to enhance as-is processes to create to-be business processes. 5. Train users on the new to-be processes. 6. Use CRM technologies to support the enhanced to-be processes.Similarly, to reboot a stalling CRM initiative a government agency temporarily halted its multiweek CRM pilot, which was meant to test its new customer account management application, and applied a five-step approach: 1. Document as-is business processes. 2. Provide these business process flows, and the resulting prioritized business functional requirements, to the CRM software's technical programming team. 3. Set baseline metrics prior to the commencement of the pilot, and then update these metrics weekly during the pilot. 4. Properly train pilot users on the new business processes and the CRM pilot tool. 5. Identify process and technical glitches, and act promptly to resolve them.The pilot was so successful using this process-excellence approach that as a result, the agency's top management is using the methodology to roll out the CRM application to additional users.Companies can also use a process-excellence strategy to boost existing CRM results. The insurance division of an automotive firm needs to increase the number of processed insurance applications five-fold within three years to meet its financial objectives. To accomplish this the organization is implementing a three-step process: 1. Document and then revamp as-is business processes, taking into account customer input. 2. Train insurance agents on the new to-be processes. 3. Use CRM technology to support the new processes.Initial results have been promising. The company is already able to process additional insurance applications as a direct result of its process excellence efforts. Management expects that CRM technology will only further enhance their results.Interestingly, these three organizations are following a similar process strategy to achieve CRM implementation success. Their first step was to get the customer-facing processes right by enhancing them as necessary. Next they took the time to secure buy-in from internal and external process users. Finally, they applied CRM technology to optimize the new, enhanced processes.

If your CRM initiative is not following the above strategy, which has process excellence at its core, perhaps now is the time to rethink your approach.

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Mastering Multichannel CRM

Dears,

Customers want it. Technology allows it. Today Digital Client demands it. So why have so few companies mastered multichannel CRM?

Multichannel CRM seems simple enough, on its face: Allow a customer to start her experience in one channel and to complete it in another. The reality, though, can be complex: After beginning a purchase at a company's Web site, the customer may call the company's contact center (which should know, in real time, her pre-call Web-site moves); then, to finalize her purchase, she visits the brick-and-mortar store (where the staff needs real-time knowledge of both her Web-site and contact center activity). In other words, true multichannel CRM requires proactively implemented processes and technology to facilitate sharing real-time information across multiple channels.Best-in-class, multichannel CRM companies include J.C. Penney, Eddie Bauer, and L.L.Bean in retail; Allstate, E*Trade, and ABN-AMRO in finance; AT&T, Verizon, and Vodafone in telecommunications; and General Electric and Acer in manufacturing. What makes these companies the best? First, they carefully segment their respective customer bases. Second, they know, within each identified segment, the exact channels their buyers prefer. And third, they have understood that multichannel CRM is a mandate for conducting business with the omnipotent Digital Client.To better understand the possibilities of multichannel CRM, let's turn to the 105-year-old American Automobile Association (AAA). Most folks know AAA as the tow-truck company -- but AAA is also one of the largest automotive and property and casualty insurers in the country, one of the largest travel agencies, and an increasingly important player in the financial-services marketplace.Moreover, unlike most companies, most AAA clubs already have multiple channels in place: the store (where you get maps or purchase AAA services); telephone (where you call into a membership, travel, or emergency contact center); ATM or kiosk (both inside and outside some AAA locations); direct mail (targeted mailings, AAA's magazine); online; and the emergency road service personnel who actually restart your car.So the potential to exploit multichannel CRM at AAA is plentiful. For example, customers can check availability or buy online and then pick up the product in the branch or store. But the back-and-forth between channels doesn't stop there: AAA can make cross-channel offers or promotions, permit in-store browsing before an online purchase from its Web site, offer online registration for store consultation, allow cross-channel returns, provide online access to information or loyalty programs that draw data across multiple channels, and much more.Effective multichannel CRM not only delivers a strong return on investment, but also reinforces the "single brand" concept: consistently positive experiences regardless of the customer's channel of choice.Retail customers using multiple channels for purchasing have two to four times the spend as those using only one channel. In retail banks, multichannel customers are 25 percent to 50 percent more profitable than their single-channel counterparts. In fact, within three years, in both the B2B and B2C sectors, 50 percent of customers -- and typically the highest-value ones, at that -- will be multichannel. We've seen an increase in the number of quality software applications enabling multichannel CRM: These typically provide a common platform to manage sales and service processes and knowledge across multiple channels; create common business rules and cross-channel workflows that permit continuous tracking of sales and service requests; and seamlessly integrate their CRM functions with information coming from the company's back-office (e.g., financial, manufacturing) systems. To deepen your multichannel CRM, research the latest offerings and case studies. Learn about your customers' and prospects' channel preferences. Then create a multichannel action plan that initially integrates processes and technologies across just two channels; later you can expand to more.

Good Luck *

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CRM in the Next Decade : Part 1

Dears,
Wish I could time travel from 2010 to 2020 to see the CRM advances, but few things which I foresee as future of CRM I have discussed in this article. We see today increasingly sophisticated (yet easy-to-use) social media tools and techniques will make creating and sustaining lifetime customers central to customer-centric business strategies. But customer needs will keep changing, leading to a difficult balancing act—one requiring not just commitment, expertise, and innovation‚ but also mastery of three essential CRM developments.

1. Engagement

True customer engagement will require a shift from one-way broadcasts reaching all customers to a two-way dialogue with each of them. This transformation is already under way, thanks in large part to technology leveraging the fundamental human desire to interact. Online communities increasingly allow people to get information, opinions, solutions, and ratings directly from each other rather than from organizations.
Consider the recent finding that more than 80 percent of healthcare consumers online place greater trust in peer-generated social media content than in pharmaceutical-company Web sites and their own physicians. The baton has passed to the consumers, and every industry will inevitably be matching their stride. Your only recourse? Become an active participant in that two-way dialogue. As the chief executive officer of Cisco Systems noted several years ago, “the collaboration that kids got through social networking is the future of business.”
The transition to customer engagement will also require dynamic customer profiles. They’re now part of every successful CRM system. Tomorrow’s profiles, however, will integrate static profile data with dynamic customer information generated from customer interactions—interactions with one another, and hopefully with you.

2. Mobilization

Portable computers are now the workhorses of mainstream business, and phones such as Research In Motion’s BlackBerry and Apple’s iPhone are not just pocket-sized personal computers but critical productivity tools and the lifeblood of enterprise communications. Even as laptops and smartphones emerge as enterprise-caliber hardware, innovative software is really the key to mobile. Today’s software runs on desktops, laptops, and smartphones, with increasingly ubiquitous access to custom applications making CRM data and customer information readily available, anytime and anywhere.

Apple’s iPad and competing devices (especially those that provide ubiquitous connectivity) aim to extend portability and expand access to information and applications. What’s more, new interfaces will usher in the era of touch (and multitouch) enterprise computing, while advances in mobile technology, broadband wireless networks, and cloud-based applications will drive the next generation of technology.

3.A New Paradigm CRM success will still depend on the People/process/technology mix:
Fifty percent of success depends on people, 30 percent process, and 20 percent technology. But new collaborative technologies will change how people interact, pushing out increasingly real-time information and analytics, and new business processes will ensure two-way customer dialogues and the integration of those communications into the customer record. Multichannel expertise, now a luxury, will become a necessity, with even the most-conservative organizations adopting a concentric-circle approach to incorporate social media tools and techniques.

Advances in people, process, and technology over the past 15 years have helped make customer relationships deeper and more meaningful. But the next 15 years will deliver innovation at a much faster pace, and organizations will only survive by embracing meaningful two-way dialogue with increasingly mobile customers.

The ones that truly thrive will be those that focus on user-adoption rates, allocating the right time, money, and effort to training, incentives, and coaching. It would be a mistake to consider this transition merely “part of an employee’s job” and far worse to assume that customers will easily adapt to a new way of conducting business.

These are the not the final points but the ones I though about as of now and you will see more to come…

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The People Factor in CRM

Dears,
More than a decade I’ve suggested this mix for a successful CRM initiative:

People (50 percent), Process (30 percent), and Technology (20 percent):

and still organizations often fail to devote the time and resources needed to address the inevitable people issues that come up. This shortcoming can lead to a less-than-optimal (or even failed) CRM implementation.
Every company needs to perform a regular CRM assessment. Think of it as your annual corporate physical. (See my earlier blog CRM Assessment) In each of the last three CRM assessments conducted (For Confidentiality purpose I am siting the examples which are outside my official sphere but heard about it from my ex colleagues), the “people” component was the core reason that a CRM initiative was performing below expectations.
First assessment was with a global venture-capital firm .In addition to a faulty software implementation, the firm had lost its executive sponsor and failed to properly train its CRM user base. The result: User-adoption rates had peaked at around 30 percent.
The next CRM assessment—at a pharmaceutical manufacturer—also involved a lost executive sponsor and improper training of CRM users. In this case, however, a less-than-optimal service process for customer incident management led to strong customer service rep resistance that threatened to kill the CRM initiative.
The third and recent CRM assessment—regarding the utilization of sales pipeline management within a Fortune 50 global services company—managers “talked the talk” but were not committed to using pipeline management reports generated from their CRM application to properly coach subordinates. As one sales rep said, “What interests my boss fascinates me, but if my boss isn’t interested I’m not going to bother documenting my sales leads.” The impact: User adoption at this company continues to remain well below where it should be.
In all three initiatives, the “people” issue negatively impacted success. You can address these issues before they become problems with the following six tips:

Secure your executive sponsor. This individual should be as high up in the organization as possible: the chief executive officer or managing director (or one of their direct reports). The executive sponsor must not only help clear roadblocks but also participate in the CRM initiative (e.g., insist that customer-facing issues get resolved utilizing information contained in the CRM system).
Create a meaningful governance structure. This will vary depending on your organization, but should at all times consist of the executive sponsor, the CRM project/program lead, and at least one subject-matter expert in each of the people, process, and technology segments. Governance meetings should take place at least quarterly.
Training Excellence.. CRM processes and tools are not intuitive. Asking users how intuitive they find these elements can be an eye-opening exercise. Instruction must include business process training for key customer-facing processes, CRM application training, remedial application training, and new-hire training. Where possible, leverage learning management tools to fulfill your CRM training needs.
Communicate effectively and often. Inform CRM users of any relevant activities they’ll be involved in (e.g., process enhancement), and promote your CRM success either in a written format (e.g., internal newsletter) or orally (e.g., meetings where successful CRM efforts get recognized).
Provide incentives and rewards. “CRM is a part of their jobs,” some executives will argue, “so why offer incentives and rewards to use it?” The reality is that small tokens of appreciation (financial or otherwise) significantly help secure long-term user adoption.
Implement meaningful stewardship. Ensure the effective utilization of CRM tools and techniques (e.g., sales managers should coach their sales reps based on insights gathered from the CRM system).
These six “must-dos” will help you secure the “people” component of the people/process/technology mix.

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CRM Assessment: Every Great Journey begins with a Single Step

Dears,
Most CRM users invest significant effort and resources in their initiatives. Fewer take the time to determine whether they’re getting the optimal return on that investment. The CRM Assessment is a cost-effective way to identify and resolve issues that may be hampering both user adoption and payback from resources allocated to your CRM initiative. As a critical evaluation of your existing initiative, the four-part objective of a CRM Assessment is to ask if your CRM:
-is still in lock-step with the organization’s strategic direction;
-is able to meet the organization’s functional and technical needs;
-can be outdone by other, more-innovative CRM software; and
-Reveals disconnects in process and/or personnel that need to be resolved.

The CRM Assessment has a specific methodology and includes one or more of the following:
Strategic Linkage Review. First things first: Do you even have a CRM roadmap?
Review and critique that plan to answer two questions:
· Does the roadmap tightly align with your organization’s strategic and business direction?
· What roadmap changes will improve alignment?
Technical Baseline Review
Do users find your CRM system to be intuitive and easy to use? Are they complaining about the system, and, if so, what are the issues? Has your CRM application been installed and configured properly? If not, can corrections be made quickly and economically? Is it easy or complicated to create reports showing, for example, which companies have purchased which products from you in a specific time period? Are ERP back-office systems (e.g., financial systems) seamlessly integrating valuable customer information with your CRM system? If not, can this integration work be done cost-effectively? Should you be considering innovative alternatives to your current CRM application and, if so, what other CRM software is available that can meet your needs?
Organizational/ Operational Assessment
This includes digging into cultural issues—such as user adoption—to determine whether all CRM users see the “what’s in it for me” benefit and utilize the system as intended. You’ll need to determine your organization’s level of adoption, since that will have an impact on the choices facing you. If adoption has reached a tipping point, it may be difficult to relaunch your CRM initiative using a new software application—but it may be in your best interest to do so anyway.
You should design, implement, and analyze a Web-based survey of all relevant CRM users to help identify people issues. This survey will identify points in the adoption process that require improvement and provide recommendations for how best to achieve it. Typically this covers CRM governance, training, communications, incentives and rewards, local support, and other user-adoption issues.
Business Process Assessment
Assess the CRM system’s handling of your organization’s key business processes. Document the five “as-is” business processes that are most important to your business model and that impact user adoption of CRM, and determine whether these processes have been (or can be) incorporated into your CRM application’s workflow tools. (You’ll also want to determine the ease with which users implement key business processes in their day-to-day work.) Finally, you should recommend business process enhancements, including any involving the CRM application itself.
Completing a typical CRM Assessment takes between two weeks and four weeks. A written presentation recommends whether or not to retain your current CRM system and outlines the issues involving people, processes, and technology that may affect user adoption.
In any economic climate, the CRM Assessment is an effective way to maximize investment in business process enhancements and enabling CRM tools. As the economy sputters toward recovery, however, customer retention and advocacy will reign supreme—making the CRM Assessment more valuable than ever.

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New Age Partner of Retail CRM: Social Networking and Mobility

Dears,
For both retailers it's an exciting time for customer loyalty programs. Accelerating advances in technology are leading to a rapid expansion of customer data, a trend that will continue to grow and transform how companies and customers interact with each other over the next five years. While many retailers introduce loyalty programs with the belief that they will make customers more loyal, successful companies are using customer data to create insights and develop strategies on how to understand and treat their best customers.Retailers have been collecting and tracking customer purchasing patterns for years with varying degrees of success. Data can inform products customers buy together, starting with the now famous beer and diaper story from the early 1990s, in which the customers of a U.S. grocer that purchased a certain brand of beer also displayed a preference for a certain brand of diaper. These insights have traditionally educated in-store merchandising and product placement, as well as cross promotions. Powered by recent advances in data storage and computing, customer loyalty took another step forward by allowing retailers to effectively understand the conditional probability of production associations over time, such as the percentage of customers who will purchase a television today and return in the next month to purchase a home theater system. Two main trends in technology are transforming the customer loyalty space once again, by dramatically increasing the accessibility of customer data.

· First, social networking is adding volumes of attitudinal data that complements behavioral transactional data. Retailers now understand customer preferences toward brands, as well as upcoming life events that indicate a potential product need or upcoming purchase.
· Second, the rise of mobile applications and convergence of applications supporting traditional talk and text, Internet, location-based services and virtual wallets store customer loyalty and financial information. Social networking Facebook surpassed Google as the most visited Internet site earlier this year and is now ranked as the third largest "country" in the world behind India and China with a population in excess of 500 million people. Opt-in services are already available on Facebook and other social networking sites, allowing customers to tell retailers what they are interested in, their preferences and attitudes, helping to refine communications and localize product assortment. FourSquare is leading the convergence of social media and customer loyalty through the use of social games. Users compete with friends and others to check in at their favorite places, where the person who checks in the most becomes the mayor of that location, whether it be a restaurant or brick-and-mortar department store. Foursquare has recently announced FourScore, a service that shares customer behavior insights with businesses. The rise of mobile technologyConsumers can use their mobile devices to stay connected with social networks; they can also use their phones to interact directly with retailers. Users with a camera phone equipped with an application can now read QR codes and receive offers directly to their phones. QR codes and open standard 2-D barcodes are appearing in more advertising campaigns daily. RFID has existed in Asia and Canada for a while to support credit payments. More retailers are installing readers across the United States, now including every taxi cab in New York City. RFID allows for faster checkouts and conversion from cash to credit, helping to reduce a retailer's cash handling costs along with the promise of higher basket sizes and increased security for customers who can pay without surrendering their credit card to the associate and swiping a mag stripe. Enabling RFID technology on mobile phones is considered the next improvement to QR codes. Low cost "smart" signage embedded with passive RFID tags will allow consumers to tap the signage with their phone, identifying themselves, and receive relevant offers instantly on their mobile device. Mobile devices will also have a virtual wallet to store offers, loyalty cards and credit cards for payment. In fact, Juniper Research estimates that more than 25 percent of phones will be RFID enabled by 2013. What can we expect in Future?According to the research in this field, location-based advertising will reach $1.8 billion by 2015, that number supported by advances in the technology enabling retailers and marketers to target those consumers. Wi-Fi is also becoming standard on mobile devices, bringing location-based services on an even more granular level. Through the use of Wi-Fi beacons within stores, retailers will be able triangulate a customer's location within a store and target offers based on that information. For example, retailers present a relevant offer via the customer's mobile device, for a specific cereal in the breakfast food aisle, or a certain brand of jeans in a department store. The addition of location-based services will further deepen these insights. Retailers will soon know that 10 percent of customers who shop at a certain grocer also stop at a specific fast food restaurant during the same trip. This could change how retailers across different verticals collaborate and promote. The advent of new technology and accumulation of more data comes with valid privacy concerns. Google reported that is was "mistakenly collecting samples of payload data from open Wi-Fi networks" as far back as 2006. Retailers will need to be ever vigilant in safeguarding additional information about behaviors and preferences, data generated by the direct relationship they hold with their customers through mobile technology and social networking. Retailers have had the opportunity to understand their customers based on what they buy. Expanding over the next five years, the challenge for retailers will be how to organize and make sense of new location-based behavioral data as well as social networking based attitudinal and preference data. Meanwhile, mobile devices will become a truly interactive channel to talk to customers and reduce dependence on traditional communications.

Retail Companies will win or lose based on their ability to leverage these trends to know and treat their customers even better than anyone else.

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Binding your CRM with Social Networks

Dears,
In the past decade, the Internet has revolutionized how we see the world and how we communicate with each other. You can video chat with someone in another country—for free—at the click of a button. Messages are sent and received in seconds, making customer service much easier for businesses. There’s also a variety of channels to reach your customers, and for them to reach you. For organizations striving to build and maintain strong customer relationship management (CRM), the Internet and its myriad services provide a key tool for doing business.

There’s no doubt that social networking is a hit—but how can it be integrated with CRM? While still associated with teens and twenty-somethings, social networking is quickly catching on with older generations. Many experts are now saying that in order for businesses to stay competitive, they must start using social networking tools to stay in the game. Here are some of the most popular social networking tools and how businesses can integrate their customer relationship management programs with them.

Twitter
While it took a few years to really become an Internet sensation, Twitter has become a vital tool for social networking. Organizations can use Twitter to find their customers online, and to begin two-way communications with them. The service is free and requires only as much upkeep as you want. Twitter engages customers (and potential customers) in a conversation and helps both the company and the user develop a unique relationship. Twitter can be used for anything—announcing a new product, hosting a contest, or just updating customers on what’s happening in the office. Perhaps most importantly, customers recognize a bond with the company—a key goal in CRM.

Facebook
Not just for college students anymore, Facebook has become a corporate world darling. This is due in part to the nonexistent barrier to entry—all that is needed to sign up is a name and an e-mail address. With millions of users logging on daily, and more and more joining each day, Facebook is another great way to connect to customers and build relationships. Companies can set up pages for themselves and attract people using low-cost advertising, or simply network through employees and customers to get the word out. Like Twitter, Facebook can be used for a variety of things. The challenge is to keep customers engaged and coming back for more. Still, it’s a great tool to maintain and build those key relationships.

Blogging
Having a company blog is a good way to build brand familiarity and product loyalty. Blogs work well with audiences because, unlike on an official website, the writing doesn’t have to be corporate and stuffy—it’s usually in a familiar tone and has language everyone can relate to. Like Twitter and Facebook, blogs are very low-cost; there’s a variety of services to choose from, too. WordPress and Blogger and the most popular platforms, and offer customizable tools to make the blog as simple or advanced as you need. Blogs serve as a casual way to create conversations with people and get genuine feedback, building customer relationships and connecting to their needs.

Being active on social networks like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and MySpace can also provide a way for a business to “eavesdrop” on what their customers—or their competitors’ customers—are saying about the products and services they offer. This source of feedback is much less formal, and therefore often more accurate, than official company surveys or polls.

As the technology advances and social networking becomes even more popular, a rising number of CRM platform providers are offering integrated social networking tools with their services, sothat customers can manage everything from one place. Others are even creating their very own social networking sites. Although it may have started as a fad, social networking has become, and will continue to be, a vital tool for customer relationship management.

Check this video link from Oracle Blog to see how Siebel CRM could be integrated with Twitter

http://blogs.oracle.com/dipock/2009/04/add_twitter_search_to_siebel_i.html

A good example of how easy it is to embed external UIs and how to possibly give an edge to customer management / siebel users. What puzzles me is why Oracle simply does not ship siebel with a bunch of these possibilities. It hardly costs any time and makes life so much easier for us as a customer. Yes we know we can do this, but we have to raise change requests, convince (old style management) people about the reason to do this and than spend outside consultancy hours to develop this. So much better if you guys create Twitter, LinkedIn, google map solutions in vanilla !!! Many Siebel users would immediately recognize the value and use it, opening up managers to a 'new' world.

I will explore this technology in detail in future blogs

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Linked In CRM, Your Free CRM Cloud

Dears,

Businesses of all sizes are looking to incorporate CMR (Customer Managed Relationship) strategies with online resources. CRM are strategies used to increase customer loyalty. CRM involves blending technology with people and strategies that encourage interaction with customers. Businesses need real views of customers. They need to know the desires of potential consumers and common behaviors among target groups. When there is a lot of debate about Public and Private clouds, I see Social Networking site offers you the Free CRM Cloud and unlimited opportunities to fine tune the CRM your own way. In this article just want to explore some amateur thoughts about Linked In CRM .


LinkedIn, Considered to be a key social networking tool is the largest professional network on the Internet, although it is less “social” and more “network.” The network boasts more than 43 million members in over 200 countries, representing 170 industries. As membership climbs, so do the opportunities it presents, from communicating with old friends and colleagues to finding new ones and making new connections. In the business world, networking is important for more than just finding a job; for sales reps, it’s a key tool for doing business, finding clients and maintaining customer relationships.

While not as popular as Facebook, LinkedIn is a delicate system that tries hard to keep relationships authentic. Instead of being able to register for free, and to add unlimited contacts, as with more socially oriented networks Twitter, Facebook and MySpace, LinkedIn requires a “formal” introduction through someone you know. LinkedIn is based on a series of “degrees of separation,” and a quick search can reveal the connections you have to any given person. These formalities are what give LinkedIn its reputation as a reliable source of information.

LinkedIn is a good way to connect, but it also has crucial CRM elements. First off, it provides a source of information like no other. A sales rep looking for a key point of contact at a company can find that information easily. Following introductions via connections, the rep and the potential client can develop a relationship, and the process works the other way, too. If a potential client is looking for someone who offers a particular product or service, a simple search can give them what they need.

Additional tools like groups and forums can really help reps use LinkedIn to get the word out about their organizations, as well as about new releases or product launches. Groups can provide support and advice and help make even further connections. Using the Q&A forum, reps can ask questions about a topic and have it answered by anyone on the network; questions can even be targeted to certain career fields to ensure the most accurate responses. Reps can also promote themselves and get their name out there by answering others’ questions.

With more and more smartphones and PDAs providing Internet access, using LinkedIn on-the-go for CRM purposes is much easier. For example, if you’re at a conference and meet a potential customer or someone who expresses interest in your company or product, you can look them up on LinkedIn, add them as a connection, and find out more about them and their business. You can also take notes on the conversation as a reminder for when you follow up.

Once you’re connected, you’ll be able to see their LinkedIn activity, and they can see yours; from posting on a forum, updating something on their profile or making a new connection, you’ll be able to see how they’re using the service – and therefore, how you might be of service to them.

Another LinkedIn tool that sometimes goes unnoticed is the recommendation feature. If you have a strong connection with a customer, you can recommend their performance based your interactions with them, and they can do the same for you. In this sense, it’s key to keep good relationships with customers so you can feel comfortable using the recommendation feature.

Selling always has been, and always will be, about communicating with others – no matter how that communication takes place. Social networking in general and LinkedIn in particular, is a great way to facilitate that communication and build stronger customer relationships.

With the growing uses of technology and the Internet, comes the need for new modern approaches to CRM and business practices. This does not mean that old fashioned business tactics are of no use. It simply means that companies are seeing the benefits of incorporating these strategies with all that technological tools have to offer.

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