Adventures in Business and CRM

After a long and cautious year for marketers, 2010 will likely also be a year of cutting corners and even marketing budgets. I’ve seen many companies that were once flaunting marketing departments 60+ strong now cut down to 10 people, with similar results in terms of ROI. This is an amazing concept that makes you wonder how accountable they were keeping their employees and outside marketing agencies during better economic times. When the CFO says more people can be hired and more can be allocated for marketing funds, the money just kind of floats away, without any solid method for tracking productivity and results in terms of new marketing endeavors.

Now that times are tougher, employers should really be looking to squeeze every bit of ROI out of every dollar they’re spending on direct and indirect marketing tactics. If you’re reading this blog, then it’s very likely that your company has implemented some kind of social media campaigning tactics within the past year or two. Perhaps you’ve learned how to integrate something like Google Analytics into the mix as well, but are you really tracking results based on the time spent on each task?

Some may say that micro-managing your marketing leads to over-thinking and too much time spent on often tedious reports and tracking. Some may also say that the CEO and CFO, and even perhaps the CMO shouldn’t be responsible for making sure correct tracking has been implemented.

All things considered, even some of the most seasoned internet marketers and CRM experts have been in the industry for less than 10 years.

By most other industry standards, you’d quite possibly still be a newbie.

This being said, I am a firm believer in every CEO having a very active role in the companies CRM and social efforts. Many CEO and VP clients of mine have argued quite a lot with me about this. They insist their VP or Marketing departments can handle it. The CFO generally has the best idea of the company’s culture, as well as hidden markets and niches that the company could be targeting with it’s efforts. They have a better idea of the sales that are closing, and the reasons for stalled sales for closing. In the end, the CEO should be consistently viewing and analyzing an 360 view of every 360 view.

I’ve compiled a few of the must-do tips for keeping accountability within your CRM and Social Media efforts:

• Track time spent on tasks. I know this seems a bit aimless, but if your employees are running social media campaigns, ask them to track their time. Using apps like Rescue Time or other time tracking resources help immensely.
• Keeping these tracked times in your CRM campaign management data is imperative for accountability. If your employees are spending 5 hours per day on Twitter, with similar ROI’s to a Facebook campaign they’re spending 2 hours on, this would alert you to perhaps have them focus on Facebook a bit more. There are many scenarios like this where you’d spot better and more efficient ways to use time.
• Build enthusiasm for accountability in your department. Let employees know that it’s not that you don’t trust they’re doing their jobs correctly, but for tracking and expansion purposes.
• Keep data clean. Clean data is happy data. Make sure all client and service data is correct. There should be no duplicates, as this can greatly affect your tracking.
• Consistently re-evaluate how and what you track within your business. CRM is like fine wine. It only gets better with age. The reasoning behind this is that with time, you should be fine-tuning and customizing your CRM solution to meet your business needs. No CRM solution should be utilized right out of the box. Make sure to take the time to learn everything that it offers. This includes the all important CEO.

Happy New Year! As you can tell, 2009 has been an extremely busy year for me. While most consultants keep their blogs rather current, mine has gone on being neglected due to having a jam-packed schedule. (Which I am always very grateful for).  As in my last post, I am very excited about the coming year and the shifts that I’ve seen in Internet Marketing and customer retention. Companies are really starting to be more resourceful, and they are definitely opening up to more things that they once considered “risky” or too time consuming. I see this as a huge step in achieving success in these trying times, especially since companies are starting to implement  social media and programs like Salesforce.com, which give you an endless amount of insight into how your business is performing and so many different levels.

I am currently in the process of getting my main website in order, which I’ve been meaning to do forever now. I’ve been lucky enough that the bulk of my clientele comes from referrals, repeat clients, or serial entrepreneurs who fancy perpetually picking my brain.

The Shape of Business to Come

So what have I seen in the business landscape over the past year? I’ve seen companies buckle down and focus on what’s really important. Old processes and policies are flying out like crazy…because they’re no longer working in this climate. A few aspects that all channel into Customer Relationship Management that I’ve been focusing on with my clients are:

• Where the Business is Coming From-  No longer can businesses be lacking in their tracking strategies. Every dollar counts now more than it ever did, and this is where it’s at. No where your business comes from. This is priceless information.
• How do I Make the Process EXCEPTIONAL? – Creating an extremely unique and awesome customer experience doesn’t require vast amounts of money, just a bit of creativity and know-how. This, along with stellar customer service creates a genuine loyalty around a brand and it’s product or service. Make it memorable and elicit conversation. It’s the cheapest and most effective marketing method around (still).
• Know it All – Make it someone’s job to know EVERYTHING about your customer. Their clicking habits, the A/B test page results, what makes them tick, what sites they frequent, where their money is being spent, what email campaign traits get the best responses, and so on. Organize this all into one central location and make a meeting out of it at least every quarter. You’d be surprised at how this type of information spawns innovation in your business. Don’t be afraid to tweak processes, ads, and marketing based on the information you find. This information is useless unless you act upon it quickly.
• Service though Social Media: If your customer is talking about you, that’s great. If they’re expressing dismay with you, social media is your opportunity to make it right, while showing the rest of the world that you CAN and are WILLING to make it right. Social media is an exceptional customer service tool, because it provides past records of challenges, errors, mistakes, and fixes that are priceless to your business. Be sure to log your customer service conquests online, with basic information on the customer, what their issue was, how long it took to solve the issue, what you did to solve the issue, how much it cost you, and so on.  If you have Salesforce, or some other CRM tool, be sure to log this information thoroughly. You’ll be so glad you did!

These are just a few things I am seeing for 2010.There is a lot more I’d like to write, but I’ll save that for another post. I wish you all a prosperous and safe 2010!

It’s been a while! I haven’t found myself in front of my laptop or any other computer except for work, and business related tasks. Even now, I’m posting this from the handy WordPress app on my iPhone, while simultaneously working on 5 other things. Perhaps it’s that the economy has been so bad, that I’ve really focused in on client work and growing projects…I’ve felt extremely grateful to experience awesome growth in these otherwise hard times.

I really miss connecting via my blog and social networks, and plan to set aside some time to explain some great concepts and techniques that have propelled my businesses (and client’s businesses) over the past months.

It can be done! Don’t let the doom and gloom dishearten you in your business goals. I have witnessed some awesome innovation and determination over the past few months, and I can’t wait to share it with you!