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.

Testimonial for Voice-based CRM Data Entry System

Posted on March 13, 2012 by admin

3/12/2012

Perhaps a recent testimonial will help you see the value in a voice-based CRM data entry tool.

If you are looking to adopt a CRM solution or if you are looking for ways to improve the productivity of your existing CRM application, take a few minutes to go looking for information on a voice-based CRM data entry tool.

Put “VOICE-BASED CRM” into your browser and enjoy a few minutes of some informative reading.

Here is the text of an email to the vendor from a Senior Vice President in a large healthcare organization, giving his observations after implementing a voice-based CRM data entry system. It is broken down according to his thoughts:

1. “My thought is that – finally, a service is available that can enter information into SFDC for an entire organization based on a phone call!

2. This is an easy to use, cost effective, well supported service that eliminates manual record entry into Salesforce.

3. It drives adoption through the roof!

4. According to our Sales Manager, this service allowed the reps to enter more than 2,000 Account, Contact, Activity, and Patient Referral records with associated comments into their new SFDC in 5 days! Manually, that would have taken a month or more.

5. When a rep leaves an appointment, the call they make to V2I allows fresh information to be entered immediately.

6. Our Sales Manager estimates that this service is saving the reps 3-6 hours a week in manual record keeping and activity reporting and assures our company that appointment information is timely and current.

7. No longer do our sales reps have to wait until the end of the day (or worse, the end of the week or never) to enter results into Salesforce.

8. They calculated that each rep pays for the cost of this service in about 3-4 hours a month of saved data entry time.”

Now, that’s interesting!

Perhaps a voice-based CRM data entry tool that really works is an interesting idea for you. Put “VOICE-BASED CRM” in your browser. Check it out!

Speech Analytics and CRM Data Entry: Two Critical Technologies

Posted on December 29, 2011 by admin

“SPEECH ANALYTICS – current best practice is to analyze recordings overnight to identify trends. Once issues surface, they are shared via dashboards and heat maps and passed on to the owner of the speech analytics solution” (Donna Fluss, “Speech Analytics in the Voice of the Customer Era,” Customer Relationship Management, January 2012).

Speech analytics are critical in a time when hearing the exact voice of the customer or the sales rep is so important to having CRM databases filling with accurate, complete, and timely information. For too long now, we have used one word or one number digital designations to represent chunks of information, and we have ignored the background and context of that information. Speech analytics is changing the entire landscape of information coming in from “out there,” either with customers or from sales reps.

Donna Fluss (quoted above) with DMG Consulting speaks of the increasing importance of speech analytics: “The number of speech analytics implementations increased by 22 percent between 2009 and 2010, following growth rates in 2006, 2007, and 2008 of 39 percent, 50 percent, and 108 percent, respectively…, all of which is to be expected of a vibrant technology segment….. Quality assurance will continue to evolve and improve over the next few years as speech analytics becomes a standard component of this essential business function.”

We are talking about two critical technologies involved in Speech Analytics:

1. Voice-based CRM data entry is critical for Speech Analytics. When it comes to CRM data entry, the “Unstructured Conversations” component of the DMG Consulting model (see diagram in Fluss article), we need an open voice-based CRM data entry tool (dictation and recording system) that gives sales reps considerable “talking space” to EXPLAIN what is going on, which means they will be giving paragraphs of information. We need the background, context, and explanation that give an accurate, complete, and current picture of “what is going on out there.” Thus, for CRM data entry, the “unstructured conversations” will be as complete as possible, which makes them longer and more involved than just short note or jot or tweet data.

So, the first requirement for speech analytics is to gather, via voice, the most current, accurate, and timely information possible and as soon after the sales meeting as is practical and enter it as efficiently as possible into the CRM database. We agree with Fluss 100%, when she begins the DMG Consulting model with the gathering of “Unstructured Conversations, Recorded & Real-Time.” That is the value of a voice-based CRM data entry system.

2. Accurate transcription and effective analytics processes then complete Speech Analytics. In the DMG Consulting diagram in the Fluss article we see the “Unstructured Conversations: Recorded & Real-time” going into a “Speech Analytics Process,” where the raw data is subjected to various analysis metrics and converted into “Top Uses” for organization leaders and “shared via dashboards and heat maps and passed on” to organization leaders.

We need intelligent data display, especially on mobile devices such as smart phones and tablets. We need dashboards with software that can pull from the CRM databases to display graphically high level, highly useful information for clear, continual, and simple access, understanding, and action.

The organization managers using CRM systems might focus the analytics on three significant “center” or “core” issues – Pricing, Product, and Competition. Analytics can display on the dashboard the summary of findings related to these three subjects across all sales reps, at any given moment or across a timeline, with indicators regarding the attitude or tone of the information. Fluss in her article calls this a “closed loop process [that] ensures that speech analytics findings are used on a real-time basis. However, even when speech analytics is converted to a real-time application, there will still be value in identifying trends and regularly conducting post-mortem analyses.”

We agree that Speech Analytics is a “closed loop process” that (1) incorporates a powerful voice-based CRM data entry tool (2) that can make all of the difference in the quality of the information displayed on a mobile device dashboard. A Fluss says, this Speech Analytics system can, in turn, can make all the difference “to improve the customer experience, identify new product ideas, highlight operation/system/product/procedural issues, reduce operating costs, improve first contact resolution rates, and increase staff satisfaction, just to mention a few of the current applications.”

‘Questions Chains’ – The Key to CRM Analytics

Posted on November 21, 2011 by admin

One of the most powerful means a sales rep has to make sense of anything is to ask questions – lots of questions. Using what are called QUESTION CHAINS, one question after another to understand or analyze or expose, is a very powerful means to gain understanding and clarity.

One writer says of the Socratic Method, “The Socratic method of philosophical inquiry thrives on the question. They never run out of questions, or out of new ways to question.” Questioning is at the heart of analytics – analyzing what is happening and why.
Questioning is a method of inquiry open to all of us because our minds take to it naturally – we know how to ask questions to get answers. In sales work, the use of a simple and fast voice-based sales reporting system is a powerful way to seek understanding and to share the details of inquiry with others, so they join in the seeking of understanding. When a sales rep talks through a situation by asking and answering questions in his/her sales report, then his/her manager and others in reading the report participate in the inquiry and can help form the solutions. This is CRM analytics at its very best!

Notice how natural questions come in chains to the human mind –

Why did that happen?
Were you involved?
Who are the key players and their names, titles, and companies?
What, exactly and in detail, happened?
What is the chain of events that transpired?
What are the parties proposing as the solution?
What are the “gives and takes” involved for each party?

Or, consider this chain of questions –

When did our client first begin using the competitor product?
Did you know about it?
How good is our contract?
When did you first notice competitor products on the shelf?
What did you do?
What did the customer say?
What happened then?
What is the competitor doing or saying about our contract?

Speak in all of the questions and answers to the voice-based sales reporting system, so all of that information is recorded and entered into the CRM database for the reading and responding of others who have a stake in the solutions. This form of analytical information sharing was one of the main reasons CRM was developed in the first place – seeking ways (the analytics) to improve and manage customer relations.