Category Archives: Efficiency and productivity in understanding and making decisions

What’s the ROI? If you have a sales rep making $250,000/year and the shift to a voice-based reporting system can cut 2 hours of administrative time a week, giving the rep back 10 hours a week to meet with customers, prepare presentations and proposals, strategize with team members, etc., what is that worth? If the voice-bases system is $40/month or $4,800/year but the savings in rep time is $20,000, is that a good ROI? How do organizations value sales rep time doing sales reports? Is this enough of an issue that management is willing to shift to the voice-based system?

CRM Delivers the Best Results When Everybody Plays

Posted on April 18, 2012 by admin

“The Collaboration Curve – ‘World of Warcraft’ players improve their performance by leveraging a broad set of discussion forums, wikis, databases, and instructional videos that exist outside the game….The more players participate and interact with World of Warcraft’s knowledge economy, the more valuable its resources become, and the faster players increase their rate of performance improvement. Said more generally, the more participants in number – and interactions among those participants – you add to a carefully designed and nurtured environment, the more the rate of performance improvement goes up….In nearly all of these group efforts, rapid leaps in performance improvement arise as participants get better faster by working with others. This is called ‘the Network effect’ (see right for picture). These leaps in performance describe the shape and power of the collaboration curve, a new force in our professional and personal lives” (Hagel, Brown, Davison, “Introducing the Collaborative Curve,” Harvard Business Review, 2009).

CRM databases are of the highest quality when they are fertilized by a rich and continuous inflow of accurate, complete, and current information from everyone who has anything to do with customer relations. Massive accumulation and aggregation of information from as wide and diverse a population as possible ensures that the CRM database can generate the patterns and trends that give all players solid understanding, strong analytical material, better decision making choices, and more trustworthy and proper action. The knowledge rich and fertile CRM database available to and used by all is the reason the organization bought and implemented CRM in the first place.

But how do we enable and encourage this “Collaboration Curve,” this “Network Effect,” where we see “leaps of performance as participants get better faster by working with others”?

The only way to get ideas, thinking, and learning moving within an organization is a voice-based CRM data entry system. People have to be enabled to speak their minds, share their insights and experience, ask for information, challenge concepts and facts, ask for help in ‘playing the game’, and otherwise talk and ask and communicate with others in the organization. A voice-based CRM data entry system is simple and direct, using voice and phone, two technologies that are profoundly simple and intuitive and robust today for all kinds of stationery and mobile applications. Speech recognition software is too “closed” and limited to be the tool for this kind of collaborative/networking high-volume discussion and communicating. Only a human transcriptionist-based system, one that joins human capabilities with the finest computer technologies of today is capable of enabling such a Collaborative/Networked environment.

Any company considering a CRM implementation and any company considering how to improve the user adoption or the value of an existing CRM system should take a few minutes to put the words “Voice-Based CRM“ into the web browser to access information that teaches the value of such systems.

Report Immediately/Respond immediately: Value of Current, Accurate, and Complete CRM Information

Posted on April 17, 2012 by admin

The only value of a CRM system is the quality of information in its databases. What good is information from the field that is a month old before it is reported? Of what help is information to a manager or to the organization when the manager doesn’t read reports regularly?

Here is a note sent from a manager to a sales rep:

“Shawn,

Why are all these reports so old. There are no new reports that have been filed in this last batch. Not really any point filing reports this old; as Jim and I read them, we can’t really do anything with reports a month old. Are you this far behind on your call reports? Have you filed your more recent reports?”

Two things we might surmise from this statement: (1) the sales rep is not reporting his sales meeting information immediately or regularly, and (2) the sales manager isn’t reading reports anyway, as he doesn’t seem to notice the missing information until a month has gone by.

1. Sales reps who do not report immediately and regularly

Again, the problem is the quality of the CRM database. Sales reps who do not report immediately following a sales event are limiting severely the capability of the database to aggregate or accumulate information sufficient for a reader to see and understand patterns. The only information of any worth in a CRM database is that sufficiently accumulated to reveal patterns and trends. We have to have bulk, mass, accumulation from all sources of good information if we are to “see” (discern or detect) patterns. Therefore, it is imperative with a CRM system that the sales team understands its responsibility to create a continuous flow of good information into the CRM system databases. Regular reporting isn’t a merely trivial administrative activity that is forced onto the sales team. It is not something of choice. We need the sales reps to report because the entire CRM database depends on mass and accumulation for meaningful understanding, analysis, decision making, and action. A sales rep who withholds information for a month before reporting it doesn’t understand what is going on with a CRM system implementation. Once they understand, they contribute willingly and meaningfully.

2. Sales managers who do not read sales reports immediately and regularly

This is the most interesting issue with CRM sales team reporting – a manager who doesn’t read the reports coming in. Sales reps are quick to pick-up on this lack of attention by the manager, and they delay, procrastinate, and often fail to report at all, knowing there are no consequences for not reporting and no purpose for reporting at all. In many companies, because sales managers do not read the reports, the reporting function languishes and disappears. What is the consequence of this? What the sales manager doesn’t realize is that the quality of the CRM function for the entire organization depends heavily on the continuous inflow of accurate, current, and complete information from the field, from those closest to the customer relationship experience. By failing to pay attention to the reporting function, the sales manager – not the sales reps – is seriously compromising the value of the investment the company has made into its CRM program.

We encountered a sales rep who was writing this statement at the bottom of each of his daily sales reports: “If there is anybody out there reading this, please give me a call at (phone number).” For over a month, no one responded and he kept adding this statement to his reports. When we flagged this to senior management and they went checking with the sales manager, they found that the sales manager was so busy doing his own paperwork and tasks that he didn’t have time to read the sales reports and respond to them. He was fired on the spot because of his failure to understand organizational priorities.

We often ask, “If your most productive sales rep, the one bringing in the most revenue, won’t report his/her sales activity, would you fire him/her?” If the answer is yes, then the priorities of the organization towards its commitment to a quality CRM database are clear. If the answer is no, then the “tail is wagging the dog,” and revenue production ONLY is the activity of greatest interest in the organization and they should not have invested in CRM in the first place. Any simple activity tracking software would have worked better. Companies often have Lone Ranger hero sales people who “do their own thing” and seem to be successful in producing. If revenue only is the goal of management, then this is tolerated and even applauded. However, if long-term customer relationship and care management (CRM) is the goal of management, then this person needs to change or be let go. The CRM databases need this person’s sales meeting information, without exception, and the person should consider it his/her sales responsibility to report immediately and regularly.

The purpose of buying and implementing a CRM system is the quality of the databases that will result and the power that gives to everyone in the organization to see patterns in the data, to understanding more clearly what is going on, to apply meaningful analytics for clearer sense of pattern, to engage in fruitful decision making, and then to take proper action. With that goal in mind, it is easy to see why a sales rep who does not report any of his/her customer interactions for months on end, why a sales manager who doesn’t read the reports and only talks about the issue after months of non-reporting have gone by are serious constraints to a powerful and successful CRM system.

Three Essential CRM Knowledge Categories

Posted on April 3, 2012 by admin

“In chess, as in everything else, we tend to give the most attention to whatever is in the middle of our line of sight. But the chess grandmaster understands very well that the crucial piece might not be in the center of his line of sight. He considers every piece on every square of the chess board, to make sure that not a single one escapes his notice” (Slywotzsky, 1999).

So, of all of the information presented to us in a customer relationship environment (CRM), what does the seasoned (grandmaster) organization look for – in all directions?

After we consider all of the knowledge, the facts, details, observations, names, and everything else, that is flooding into CRM databases and demanding attention, we argue that there are only three basic categories of information essential to “customer relationship management.” All of the rest of it is interesting for enterprise management, but only three knowledge categories are important enough for senior management to track strategically and carefully.

The three knowledge categories are Product, Pricing, and Competition.

All other knowledge categories related to customer relationship management can be subsumed into one of these three categories of knowledge. Let’s consider:

Product

Anything to do with planning, design, testing, fabrication, production, packaging, distribution, shipping, performance onsite, evaluation, repair/parts, customer reaction, or anything else connected with the lifecycle of the product are the subjects that all subsume under this Product heading. Thus, the CRM system should be set-up to flag or channel or direct any of these Product categories into one database section. Management should consider this category of knowledge as one focus area, with all of the pieces interacting, to understand the momentum and opportunity of the products in the marketplace.

Of most importance is that the sales reps out on the road look specifically, but everywhere, for product-oriented issues with the customer, in the customer environment. What do they buy, why are they buying it, for how long, how it is working, what about service, who are our champions? These sorts of information should be watched for with a keen eye, articulated quickly and completely back into the CRM database system, and analyzed carefully by senior management.

The strategic intelligence embedded in this knowledge base is invaluable for correct understanding, proper analysis and decision making, and forceful confident action.

Pricing

Interesting how much of the information flowing into the CRM system has to do with pricing and how many senior managers are connected to pricing knowledge. Why do we price the products as we do? What are all of the discounting and promotional pricing principles and objectives? How is the customer reacting to price? How are price increases tolerated? What can we do internally or externally to affect price up or down? Why are our selling/revenue goals set as they are? What return on investment do we expect from our decisions/implementations? Why do we maintain cost levels as we do?

Many of the most important decisions in an organization have to do with the monetary value of the work of the company. So much of what is important to the success of the company has to do with pricing issues.

Again, repeating a paragraph from above, the strategic intelligence embedded in this Pricing knowledge base is invaluable for correct understanding, proper analysis and decision making, and forceful confident action.

Competition

An incredible array of organizational issues can be subsumed under this knowledge category. The action in the marketplace, the industry space, the actions of competitors and of partners, the decisions of customers, the specifications and competitive purchasing/buying rules and regulations, the competitor products and their features and benefits.

Who is beating us? Why/How? In what markets, with what customers? What are the competitive differentiators of their products or services? What are our customers saying about the competitive situation? What obstacles are we having to overcome to sell against our best competitors? How big is the market and what share do we own?

Surrounding this knowledge category are many subcategories of pertinent information concerning competition that is critical for management understanding, decision making, and action.

So, what does a wise and experienced senior management staff look for with their CRM system? The entire field of strategic intelligence (looking at the entire chess board), with specific patterning of that information into three decisive and penetrating focus areas: Product, Pricing, and Competition.

A CRM sales force reporting system that could bring all information on these three knowledge categories together into analytics that make general sense of the information and present that sense to management on a simple and quick to read dashboard, minute-by-minute up to date with current, accurate, and complete knowledge is of incalculable value.

Using Spies”: CRM Systems Success Depends on Sales Reporting

Posted on March 30, 2012 by admin

“In Sun Tzu’s ‘The Art of War’, competitive success comes from competitive intelligence. You can only understand your competitive situation if you know how to gather the right intelligence….The title of Sun Tzu’s original chapter on competitive intelligence was ‘Using Spies’…. Sun Tzu wants you to remember that the ultimate source of all information is people. The closer you are to them and the better your contacts, the better your information” (Gagliardo. The Amazing Secrets of Sun Tzu’s ‘The Art of War’).

Sales reps, out on the road, visiting customers, watching the competition, observing the marketplace and the industry – these are the eyes and ears of the organization, the “spies” who are in a position to see and hear what is going on “out there” and then reporting it back to the leaders. Enabling the sales team to perform at its peak capability should be one of the highest priorities senior management.

The only value of the CRM database comes from a continuous flow of current, accurate, and complete information into the databases from the sales team. Missing, bad, incomplete, or biased information, strictly numerical information with no sense of context or background filling CRM databases is a tremendous threat to management effectiveness.

One marker of a dysfunctional CRM implementation in an organization is given the name “User Adoption Problems.” This is the CRM industry terminology for “sales reps who won’t use the system for reporting their sales meeting information. They won’t use it!” Many leaders seem to assume that just because “they build it, the sales reps will come.” Just because they pay out all of the money and disrupt and stress the organization to implement a CRM system they assume the sales team will jump on board happily and willingly and keyboard in their sales information.

Interestingly enough, attention to how the sales reps enter their information can bring tremendous benefits to leaders trying to improve or to implement a CRM system. They need to realize or remember two truths concerning sales – (1) sales reps hate to type or write because it is administrative work that takes away from selling and they don’t like keyboarding and (2) sales reps like to talk, to explain, and CRM user interfaces are too complex, too hard, too much, and take too long.

Thus, by its very nature, the CRM system repels those it should most attract. Rather than the sales reps willingly and happily entering their sales information into the CRM system, they are being frustrated because the system is forcing them to keyboard and is restricting their ability to explain, to discourse. All the CRM systems want is a box checked or a number or a word or two. For a sales rep, what the system is saying is “We really don’t care about what you want to say, what you think is going on. Just give us the numbers and facts as fast and as simply as possible.”

So, unfortunately, the result of this failure of CRM to consider its primary source of information, is “user adoption problems.” Procrastinating, delay, short cutting, simplifying and understating, ignoring – we begin to get the behaviors associated with distrust, alienation, cynicism, and chronic negativism regarding the sales system.

BUT THIS DOES NOT HAVE TO BE SO!

Sales reps love to talk on the phone. It is natural, intuitive, and necessary for them. Voice-based CRM data entry tools, therefore, come naturally to them, easily, with no learning curve or difficult adjustments or hurdles. The organization identifies the kinds of information it desires reported, the sales rep takes good notes in the meetings, and then when the meeting is over, he/she finds a quiet place with a good cell, dials into the Voice-based CRM data entry system, enters a PIN or security ID number, and then, in an open dictation system, speaks in all of the information from the meeting. All of the facts, observations, decisions, commitments, insights, problems, competitor discoveries – everything. This talk might take three to four minutes (the equivalent of 60 minutes keyboarding under stress), and the communication is complete with context, background, and all of the associated information of the interaction with the customer. When finished, the sales rep just hangs up and gets on with working with customers, selling, and making money. The voice-based CRM data entry system, based on a human transcriptionist model, processes the information into the desired CRM database fields and syncs it automatically into those fields.

Thus, all the sales rep experiences is a phone call. Nothing hard, no difficulty, no keyboarding, no hassle. Just a phone call and hangs up. All of the complexity happens through the voice-based, human transcription system. Because such systems use native English language human transcriptionists, the transcription is highly accurate (near 100% accurate), meaning the sales rep does not spend any time editing the document and it is appearing in the database as a professional communication. This accuracy and professionalism are what discriminates a voice-based, human transcriptionist model from speech recognition or voice-to-text software options.

Leaders trying to avoid “USER ADOPTION PROBLEMS” either in an existing CRM application or with a new implementation, should put “VOICE-BASED CRM” into their web browser and read about the benefits of a voice-based CRM data entry system based on a human transcription model. Based on the cost of CRM failure, the cost of CRM User Adoption problems, the cost of a voice-based CRM data entry tool – specifically to help the sales team participate happily and willingness and fully – has astounding ROI calculation results.

The Big Three CRM Issues: Simplifying CRM Systems

Posted on March 28, 2012 by admin

“I found three Big Problems for CRM: … (1) DATA: Effectively managing the data we collect has now become a Big Problem…. (2) KNOWLEDGE: Knowledge cannot support CRM automation…. (3) PURPOSE: We don’t know what CRM is doing” (Esteban Kolsky, “Connect,” Customer Relationship Management, April 2012, 39-39).

From the perspective of the Voice-based CRM data entry industry, these three BIG PROBLEMS FOR CRM all stem from the same two causes: (1) ignoring 90% of the qualitative customer relationship management information available, and (2) overbuilding the 10% of the quantitative or numerical information.

Let’s see how this assertion explains the Three Big Problems and suggests a direction for a solution to those seeking to improve their CRM implementation or are thinking of implementing a CRM solution..

1. DATA: “Data is the reason we implemented CRM in the first place. Whether transactional, operational, demographic, attitudinal, behavioral, and now sentimental, the core of what CRM does is collect and store data from all interactions…. Effectively managing the data we collect has now become a Big Problem.”

CRM today collects too much information of the wrong kind. The key point to remember is that the service is named “CRM” and at the beginning that stood for “Customer Relationship Management.” ONLY CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT! In the beginning of the CRM movement 20 years ago, the concern was human and dealt with the needs and concerns, the background and context of customer values and desires. The need was for ways to handle the qualitative knowledge regarding the insights, feelings, aspirations, perceptions, and interests of the customer. This information was expressed through words and sentences, through conversations, discussions, shared collaborations – highly qualitative inter-human and interactive expressions. These expressions were at the heart of ‘customer-concentric or ‘customer-centered’ selling approaches and systems.

The primary source of data, information, or knowledge about the customer relationship was the sales rep and others at the front end or cutting edge of the contact with customers and the marketplace. Tom Siebel (who pioneered Siebel Systems and the early CRM industry) worried two decades ago about the possibility of CRM failure if the sales team did not participate fully in entering current, accurate, and complete knowledge of the customer interaction. The sales team’s qualitative knowledge from the field was the key to CRM success.

Today with CRM, the focus is on IT quantitative (numerical) solutions, and EVERYTHING IN THE ENTERPRISE has become content for CRM systems. The original intent of CRM, qualitative customer relationship information, has been lost and all of the information now being included in CRM systems has overwhelmed the service. However, if we choose it to be so, CRM can return to simplify and be about this limited set of qualitative knowledge again, focus again on the sales team, and be a very powerful service in successful organizations.

2. KNOWLEDGE: “All of the details you need to know are what constitute knowledge, which should be readily available and constantly updated for automation to happen effectively. As you can imagine, not all these elements are always easily available nor are they always updated. Knowledge cannot support CRM automation.”

CRM today does too much, includes too much, is far too complex! What is it, after all, that we “need to know” for CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT? Just that simple qualitative knowledge that reveals the human essentials of the customer relationship right now – knowledge from the sales reps that is current, accurate, and complete. A very limited set of fields in the database. And where does that information come from? From the sales team speaking or reporting religiously and fully into their simple database system. THAT IS THE ONLY “KNOWLEDGE” THE ORIGINAL CRM SYSTEM WAS INTENDED TO PROVIDE AND IT WAS AND IS SUFFICIENT! When we focus exactly on the CUSP of the organization/customer relationship, at the moments where our people meet their people in business transactions that affect the relationship, then we begin to get the qualitative knowledge “we need to know.” If we define knowledge only as that related directly to simple customer relationship management, how much do we really need to know to manage it well?

When CRM became everything for everyone, all things IT and digital, it grew out of simplicity and into complexity, expanding far beyond the capability of simple CRM to handle. For many years now we have all of the systems capability needed to handle true, simple CRM qualitative knowledge very well. How can we handle something that includes EVERYTHING?

3. PURPOSE: “What job (or jobs) did you hire your CRM solution to do for you?… Most organizations I have worked with have almost never been able to answer this question before implementing CRM….Whether you are spending time, money, and resources on a system that does not allow you to have full control of your data, that does not support the automation of simple tasks, and that you, well, don’t know why you have it. Could this be true?”

CRM has lost its focus and purpose. Over the years CRM has left its roots, has been taken over by IT and numbers, computers, money, talent, complexity, and high tech imperatives and demands and has focused entirely on processing the 10% of the information easily digitized and handled by computers. Most companies today are admitting that they don’t know why they have a CRM implementation when they are still struggling to stay abreast of simple, human, qualitative interaction and information.

If you want a simple Customer Relationship Management system that handles qualitative knowledge and helps your sales team capture and enter into the system the information they are generating out in their meetings with customers, then go back 20 years to the beginning of CRM and look at those early solutions – a little, sufficient digital, a lot of talk and text and explanatory information (qualitative knowledge). Sadly, high tech has drawn all of the talent and money away from the development of “human” or qualitative solutions. A little creative and innovative improvement over time would have made CRM systems today simple, clear, and powerful in providing the organization leaders with usable customer relationship management knowledge.

They were sufficient and can be again!

If you want to improve your CRM implementation or if you are looking to implement a CRM solution, stop for a moment and think about it. Turn your back on complexity and over-built IT solutions. Go looking for RETRO solutions, like VOICE-BASED CRM DATA ENTRY and databases that can handle qualitative information. Look for the generic and effective solutions to a very straightforward and simple HUMAN need to know what is going on in the customer relationship – ‘out there on the ground’!

One humble spy with critical observed information from the battlefield is more important to the success of the General and the battle operation than the trillions of computer bytes flying back and forth among the technologies in the battlespace. One humble spy who saw something ‘out there’ and has important things to say.

CRM and Pattern: Why the CRM Database IS THE POINT!

Posted on February 21, 2012 by admin

“… the fact that little causes can have big effects….” (Gladwell, The Tipping Point, 9)

The only thing valuable about a CRM system is the quality of its database. No data in the CRM database, bad data, missing data – then what good is the system? Little things can have big effects ONLY if the little things are accumulating, aggregating sufficient to form patterns.

If knowledge from the customer environment is flowing continuously into the database, if those data are accurate, current, and complete, then those who use the database can find in it patterns of meaning for correct understanding, good decision making, and proper action. Tipping points become possible.

Patterns can only form when data are aggregating and accumulating in one place, from the best possible sources, and are available to searches and queries that “see” or “discover” them. All management thinking is a matter of “seeing” patterns, gaining a correct understanding of them, making good decisions, and then taking proper action.

Consider this supporting statement from a leader in the study of “pattern” in thought:

“In any stream of ideas, some kind of pattern will be evident. The trick is to look for patterns.” (Gary Hamel, Leading the Revolution, 2000)

IN THE PATTERNS IS THE MEANING! The search for pattern in CRM databases is the key to CRM system value to an organization. We can have a tipping point ONLY if we have the accumulated and aggregated information sufficient for patterns to form. We have to have a rich “stream of ideas” before patterns can emerge.

At the end, the CRM system has only one purpose – to provide the means for accurate, current, and complete information from the customer environment to flow continuously into the database; and then, for those who lead the organization to search and query those databases to find the meaningful patterns that bring correct understanding, good decision making, and proper action. These elements of the CRM system are the essential, foundational processes through which the promise of the CRM investment and vision is accomplished.

We must get GOOD data into the CRM databases!

The essential tool to ensure a continuous flow of quality data into the CRM system is a data entry tool - for sales reps, executives, technical support, trainers, and others who travel to meet with customers – that is easy to use, quick to apply, and powerful in its capture of information. One essential tool is a voice-based CRM data entry system because (1) sales reps and others are willing to use it and make it their own, and (2) the spoken explanatory information of words, sentences, and paragraphs is the lifeblood of CRM database vitality and quality.

Every CRM system application should have at its front end for data entry (as one of the options) a voice-based data entry tool! Whatever the mix of tools available, leaders must insist on routine reporting into the CRM system by every person involved in customer, competition, or industry marketplace activity. Every one; without exception!

Accumulation and aggregation of quality information into CRM databases, with search/query routines, is essential for pattern formation and pattern recognition and ultimately for correct understanding, good decision making, and proper action.

“Getting it Out There”: When CRM Information Makes the Difference

Posted on February 13, 2012 by admin

“I received a note from a sales rep in an entirely different territory, thanking me for information on a competitor in a sales report I had entered into our CRM system a month or so ago. The person said he was bidding against this competitor and my information on several key discriminators for our products really helped him write a winning proposal.” (a Voice2insight/CRM system user report, February 2012).

One of the most important values of an active, organization-wide CRM/Voice2insight system is the continuous flow of current, accurate, and complete knowledge in the system and available through search/query to all authorized members. This organization-wide availability of good knowledge has been the “holy grail” for knowledge management systems for many years. The collaboration and sharing of lessons learned and key technical information can save many hours of searching (often with no results) and can give employees a critical competitive edge, wherever they are working in the organization. This open and collegial sharing of knowledge is a key to what is called a “learning organization,” an organization with a vibrant date entry system and with feedback loops and double loops, where good information is “powering vigorously” around in the organization.

Sales reps will use a voice-based data entry system. A key to “getting it out there” is a voice-based CRM data entry tool that sales reps find natural, intuitive, easy, and fast. If they know they can get their sales reporting task done immediately following a sales meeting, in just a few minutes, without all of the hassle associated with keyboarding and writing, they take to it willingly and with positive business intent and purpose. They know that the organization needs the knowledge, so they give it clearly and completely, with thoughtful explanation and sufficient detail. With voice and the phone, the words, sentences, and paragraphs come out naturally and fluently because these are tools the sales reps use continuously and with excellence. They are very good at speaking their minds and explaining their experiences.

The need is for explanatory knowledge not jots and tweets. Organizational use of its expensive CRM system cannot be limited to just activity reporting, a number or statistic to be entered via a smart phone or tablet computer. These notes, jots, and tweets are not sufficient to sharing the explanatory and experiential knowledge of background and context that makes information useful for understanding, decision making, and proper action. We need full and open voice-based CRM data entry to capture the full experiences the sales reps are having out with the customers on the ground. Words, sentences, and paragraphs of explanation are the life blood of a “learning organization” environment.

The power of knowledge is in data aggregation. We need all to aggregate all of the information possible, amass it in one place, so the great power of computer searching can be brought to bear for an understanding of trends, patterns, and behaviors that are operating with customers and competitors and in the industry marketplace. That is why organizations buy CRM solutions. What is going on our there? How do these purchasing decisions compare or contrast with those of last quarter or last year? Why are they asking these kinds of questions now? Are we seeing a new product development life cycle because of the availability of these new materials? Can we raise our prices now or should we wait for the next quarter – what have our customers done in the past when we have raised prices – what have our competitors done in response? Who is this new company – why are they growing so rapidly – are they taking our customers? The greater the flow of information coming into the CRM system from the sales team, the greater the aggregation of good data and the greater the potential for good analysis, decision making, and proper action.

CRM has to connect top management and the sales team. The more vibrant, the more energetic the data input from the sales team that is flowing consistently into the CRM databases, the more good information is aggregating and accumulating, and the better the searches and queries and yield of strategically useful information. When the top managers of the organization know what they want as information from the field, from the sales organization, when they communicate this openly and positively to the sales team, then the sales people can gather this information and return with it for management use. The connection between the management team needs and the sales team capabilities for gathering information is a connection made in heaven when organization leaders see it and foster it.

A voice-based CRM data entry system, willingly and thoughtfully used, brings an incredibly powerful force of knowledge for good that is available no other way and is the heart of a successful “learning” organization.

CRM and the ‘Cost of Not Knowing’ (“CONK”)

Posted on February 6, 2012 by admin

The promise of CRM is knowing what is going on with the customer, competition, and industry marketplace for proper understanding, decision making, and action.

We buy CRM software and pay the heavy expense of implementing it because we believe that the management of knowledge is critical to organization success. We believe that the organization is more capable of competing when our decisions and actions are based on good knowledge from the customer environment.

Because the knowledge we seek with CRM is that most directly related with customer needs and satisfaction, the group of people of most importance is the one most directly connected to this knowledge, and that is the sale team. The sales reps are the point of contact with customer decision makers, and, if the CRM system is to work, the information related to those contacts must be fed into the CRM system continuously for management understanding, decision making, and proper action.

We buy CRM because we need to know what is going on out there! We spend the money to train and equip the ‘point of contact’ sales team to find and deliver that knowledge back into the organization. Thus, that knowledge is expensive to gather and make available, certainly, with the cost of the CRM software, the training, the organizational changes, the monitoring, and the motivation. Certainly, proper CRM implementation is a significant cost in the treasure of the organization.

However, what is the ‘CONK’ or the cost of not knowing? What if we are NOT getting the information we planned and worked for? What if the sales reps won’t use it or won’t use it to deliver explanatory information?

What is the cost of not knowing that your competitor reps are into your major account and doing audits and offering information for their products or services as opposed to yours? How long will that ignorance go on before you find yourself shown to the door?

What is the cost of not knowing that your pricing is too high in the competitive marketplace, and that it is causing your customers to “shop around” for alternative sources? How long before your ignorance allows a significant loss?

What is the cost of not knowing that your product has features that the customers find limiting or constraining, such that bad feelings are developing towards your company that are going to be easy for the competition to capitalize on and move you out of the business? How long before you are way behind the curve and cannot catch up?

What is the cost of not knowing that there is a pattern of activity developing in your industry that changes the way businesses manage their projects, such that the bidding and contracting processes are changing to privilege or benefit competitor companies? How long before your company finds itself “outside” of the flow of the competitive market?

What is the cost of not knowing that one of the senior people in your major customer organization finds your product or service defective and poorly designed and is angrily going about in the company and among his golfing and tennis associates bad mouthing your company and your products? How long can you survive this going on?

What is the cost of not knowing….? What is the cost when the expensive CRM system isn’t producing the critical information from the field that you need?

Interestingly enough, CRM with voice-based data entry, that makes it easy and intuitive for sales reps to report their sales meeting information quickly and easily, is the least expensive element in the CRM cost. This is because it involves only the mouth and the phone. CRM based on voice-based data entry has the potential to gather ALL of the critical explanatory information from the customer environment and feed it immediately into the CRM databases. What is the cost of current, complete, and accurate information flowing into the CRM system from the customer environment? What are you already paying for your sales team? They already know how to make your CRM investment pay off with the information you need. They speak on the phone constantly.

The cost of the most important piece of your CRM investment, sales rep usage through a voice-based data entry tool, surprisingly, is the lowest of all, yet it provides the most valuable ingredient for CRM success for the organization.

(CEM) Customer Experience Management: Use Voice for ‘CEM Conversations’

Posted on January 26, 2012 by admin

“2011 was a big year for customer experience management (CEM)…. CEM incorporates many channels, for example social CRM, which offers the means to understand where, what and which conversations are happening, and how to engage in conversation. Social CRM can be used for engaging internally within a sales team, as well as externally with the customer in a collaborative conversation in order to provide mutually beneficial value in a trusted and transparent business environment.” (Steve Fearon, Oracle: “The evolution of CRM to customer experience management is happening, January 26, 2012″)

“ENGAGING IN CONVERSATIONS” is the key to social CRM and the new Customer Experience Management approaches to “providing mutually beneficial value in a trusted and transparent business environment.

CONVERSATIONS!

Conversations are people talking to each other, communicating, explaining, sharing, and collaborating. All human exchanges require the use of “voice,” which is word and sentence and paragraph based, whether that voice is spoken or texted. And the easiest and most satisfying conversations, especially of any length, are communication by voice – people talking to each other.

Voice-based CRM data entry using human transcription, rather than speech-to-text software, opens the space for speakers to explain the background and context of the information, to phrase and rephrase the explanations to get them right, and to relate the information personally to the listener/receiver. Speaking is natural, intuitive, and powerful, and a phone-device makes speaking fast and effective.

Voice is the most effective communication vehicle between and among sales team members, sales reps and their customers, among customers, and among management groups in the various organizations. Conversations, talking, explaining, asking and answering questions, clarifying positions, expressing thanks or concerns, etc. People explaining, sharing, responding. CONVERSATIONS!

The best voice-based CRM data entry systems are simple and very effective. Just dial a number, enter a secure ID or PIN number, enter an open dictation environment, and speak in the information. The voice-based CRM systems that promise accuracy and freedom from extended editing then use human transcriptionists (native English language speakers and U.S. citizens) to transcribe the audio message, and sync it automatically into the CRM fields and onto executive dashboards.

Social interaction, as CONVERESATION, is not about numbers, statistics, or jots or tweets or notes. Social interaction is about CONVERSATIONS that involve exchanges of explanatory information through sentences and paragragphs among the parties, with explanations, examples, stories, questions, answers, and all other kinds of social interactions.

Steve Fearson with Oracle continues, “A successful social CRM strategy for sales requires much more than access to social information about prospects. It requires a fundamentally different selling process. B2B companies need to leverage the vast volume of customer data and insights, but how the data is aggregated, transformed into intelligence and integrated into the sales process are the primary factors in determining the success of a sales organization ‘going social’.”

We need more than just information (the typical CRM system that monitors activity with numbers and statistics); we need “insights (CONVERSATIONS)… aggregated, transformed into intelligence and integrated into the sales process….”

Voice has to be captured in its full expression and explanation and then converted into digital form and entered into the CRM system in such a way that it can be “displayed” for all to see and available for drill down for use in the new SOCIAL CRM system.

“Sticky” CRM: Data Entry from a Sales Rep Perspective

Posted on January 19, 2012 by admin

Discussed here is the industry of voice-based CRM data entry tools that replace the keyboard as the essential CRM data entry vehicle, making CRM easier to use, more intuitive, and thus, more “sticky” or useful.

In general, CRM “stickiness” refers to the very real concern of CRM vendors and organization leaders who see that costly CRM implementations are not staying in place in organizations to deliver on the promises, hopes, and expectations – the vision – that motivated and justified the purchase. The CRM implementations are not being used by sales reps, not “sticking,” thus vendors are losing customers, some organizations in frustration are casting about at significant expense trying in-house solutions, and other organizations, increasingly skeptical, are “shopping” for plausible customer relationship information solutions amid the new world of smart phones and tablets. (For background concepts see Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference (2002) and Chip Health and Dan Heath, Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die (2007)

Yet, when we look at the CRM “stickiness” problem from the perspective of the sales reps, it is easy to see the natural and intuitive conditions for “stickiness” of the voice-based tools.

When the sales people use their phone to speak in their sales meeting information, they get the task done easily, quickly, and intuitively, moving on immediately to continue working with customers, selling, and making money. Some enter shorter dictation (and I am using a critical industry-specific distinction in the following) suitable for “closed” speech recognition systems, and others enter longer, more textual dictation suitable to more “open” text-based dictation systems. Sales reps take to the “open” voice-based system within minutes, with no learning curve or training time (they already love to talk on the phone), and they use it willingly and easily. Thus, the CRM system for them is useful, practical, and “sticky” – it stays active over time for CRM data entry – ensuring a continuous inflow of current, accurate, and complete information from the ground into the organization’s CRM database.

“Sticky” is referring to people actually using the tool, making the most of it, for the benefit of the organization. When sales reps have a tool they like, they work it and improve it, and make it better and more effective.

Thus, voice-based tools increasingly enable them to report sales meeting information quickly and easily, ensuring that the CRM databases fill with current, accurate, and complete customer, competitor, and marketplace information. Organization leaders, then, have these data and this information at their fingertips near-real time to increase understanding, good decision making, and proper action.

Voice-based CRM data entry – an industry and a concept, a practical tool that helps bring about the vision of the power of actionable customer information that CRM promises. Perhaps it is a “tipping point” for successful CRM; perhaps this ensures that your CRM system is “made to stick.”