When tackling lead generation you want to make sure you go after companies that have similar traits to companies you are already doing successful business.  These would be some of the lower hanging fruit to go after.  The best way to identify these companies is first take a closer, methodical look at your existing customers.

Start by ranking your current customers using three criteria: gross revenue, profitability and “fit.”

The fitness ranking is more subjective than the gross revenue or the profitability ranking. It identifies the companies you know well, those whose business you are familiar with, those that are fun to work with, those you understand best, and those with which you have—or could have—a great working relationship:

What customers come up near the top of all three rankings?  Evaluate the other characteristics of the companies on this list. How large are they? Where are they located geographically? What are the titles or job functions of their decision makers? Analyze your answers to identify common traits, and use that information to find companies with similar traits.

Tags: Marketing, Sales methodology, Sales Techniques

A friend of mine shared an experience he had at the new Yankee Stadium a couple of weeks ago that I felt important to share concerning customer service.

When he arrived at the stadium there were dozens of people with signs that said” Hello, may I help you?” This was the first time he had seen this at the stadium. They were there to help people find their gate and answered any questions they had. My friend did not need this help and proceeded to this gate. Upon handing the usher the ticket the guy said “Thank you, there are people inside that will help you”. As soon as he walked into to the main area someone came up to him and said “Hello, may I help you?” He gave her the ticket and she told him to go down the corridor and take the elevators on the left. When he got to the elevators a person was there that said, “Hello, may I help you?” He presented him the ticket and told to take the elevator to the 250 level and someone will help you. When he was exiting the elevator, sure enough there was person there and said, “Hello may I help you?” That person proceeded to escort him to the suite. Since this was my friends first trip to the new stadium he was looking at all the great pictures and stories that lined the corridor. The customer service person shadowed him far enough behind so that my friend did not feel rushed. When they got to the suite there was a person there that greeted him with, you guessed it, “Hello may I help you?” He was then shown into the suite and given a tour and had all his questions answered. Throughout the entire game he was asked if there was anything they can do.

The story amazed me for two reasons. The number of people visibly out in the open proactively trying to help their guests and the consistent mantra they all were using. There was no question they were all taking their customer service role seriously. When your customer is spending their money and time with you, the Yankees, at least for the time being wanted to make sure you have an easy and enjoyable experience. You never had to look far for help.

My friends totally experience left him feeling really good about wanting to come back for more.

Tags: crm

There is a new acronym you might not be familiar with in the world of customer satisfaction.

Customer Experience Management (CEM) is about moving beyond traditional CRM, which for the most part is about automating customer touch points, and addressing a full end-to-end customer experience. CEM is about emotions. According to thought leader Colin Shaw you are trying to address two key questions: “What’s the experience you’re trying to deliver?” and “What emotions you’re trying to evoke.

To do this you need to go beyond conversation logs and call reports. You need to get more in the head of your customers. You need to know what is stressing them out. What is keeping them up at night? What challenges and obstacles they are facing?

I do believe that sales reps know a lot about their customers at a micro level. But we need to get a macro level understanding of the customer. Social media technology is paving the way for vendors to better understand, address and work with their customers on a more macro level. I plan to go into social media in a future blog.

But to address how you can start today working with your customers on a macro level here is a simple way to get started. Define a Business Objectives and Relationship Rules section on your Organizational profile. This is where you define things such as: customer’s business objectives; customer’s relationship expectations; and your objectives with the customer. This will allow you to chart a much broader strategy in helping your customer achieve their short and long term objectives. It is not just about your product line. It is about you caring and taking an active role in helping move your customer’s total agenda along wherever you can.

Supporting this within your CRM solution allows your entire team and company to always be aware of what everyone’s expectations are for the relationship and what everyone is looking to accomplish.

Below is a simple addition you can easily add into your CRM solution to start to track this information. It is just the beginning of a broader strategy and technology you might eventually consider to share ideas and issues, solve problems and co-design design new products and services with your customers.

Organization Profile Example

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Tags: crm, crm productivity

A main goal of CRM is too make life more productive for its users. A big issue is getting timely responses to questions reps and others in the company need. It is critical when selling technical products or services and you need expert help in answering prospects technical questions. But it is also critical for any questions that require subject matter expertise for prospects or employees.

You want a CRM solution that allows users the ability to log questions, categorize it and let the system determine who the best person is that can answer the question. The solution should automatically route the request to the person(s) that has been deemed the “expert” and assigned to answer this type of question. The system will notify the expert via an email with a link to the posted question. Once they have answered it, the requester will be automatically notified via email. The beauty of this type of solution is that the requester never needs to know who or where the experts reside in their organization. The system will automatically route, track and notify the appropriate people. You can even setup backup in case the assigned person is on vacation. Once the question is answered, it should be tracked within CRM and aligned to your contact or deal to retain a full history.

If your CRM solution does not have this feature, you might want to write a custom application and tie it in. While it will require programming work the added benefit to people out in the field trying to close deals and need their questions answered quickly is critical. They do not need to waste time trying to figure out who is the right person and if they are authorized to help.

Below are some examples:

Making a Request

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Request with Answer

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Tags: crm, crm productivity, knowledge management