And in this new world of instant messaging, mobile platforms, and social media, where news is spread virally, companies need to respond quickly and efficiently. Twitter, the micro-blogging social media platform, is a great tool for CRM.

Setting up an Effective Twitter Strategy

Social media is different than print or broadcast advertising, as the underlying fundamental principles are all about relationships, which fits smoothly into CRM fundamentals. We talk with other people in social media, not at them as in a magazine ad. Consequently, social medial such as Twitter is a more effective tool for building trust and credibility which fits in with your CRM strategy.

Let a little bird help with business reputation management.

That said, Twitter can be used to also direct contacts back to ads, PR campaigns, or blogs to reinforce messages and ensure the maximum number of customers – and more importantly, potential customers – are reached. With tweets being so much faster than other traditional platforms, your counter measures will be heard sooner rather than later.

Here are important aspects of setting up an effective Twitter strategy:

Interact

Many companies use social media to only post information such as new product announcements or invitations to events. But since platforms like Twitter reinforce interactions among participants, it is a perfect way to implement CRM to build stronger customer relationships.

While sharing what you had for lunch may not be something you care to post, interacting with others is essential to success on Twitter. Re-tweet interesting photos or links with comments in front of the RT symbol. Ask questions about posts, such as “What new products are you releasing at the tradeshow you mentioned?”  You’ll be surprised how easy it is to get a dialogue going if you’re not perceived as a spammer.

Being a good member of the community is key to social media success.

A good ratio is 80-90% interaction, with only 10-20% of your tweets talking about your products and services. If you are perceived as a good member of the Twitterverse, then when you need positive reviews, your fellow tweeters will be more than happy to help out.

Tweet with Frequency

We’re hearing marketing gurus say you don’t have to tweet everyday, and that is just plain wrong. An effective social media campaign requires that you tweet at least a dozen or so times per day. Software such as TweetDeck or HootSuite allows you to schedule messages so you can come into your office in the morning and in 10-15 minutes organize tweets that can go out throughout the day.

These don’t have to be original tweets. Re-tweeting, especially with a short comment in front such as “Ck this out” is considered good etiquette and is highly encouraged.

Frequency is important for counteracting negative customer reviews because Google will pick up Twitter posts in online searches. The more positive tweets you post, the lower those negative reviews will appear in page rankings.

Ask for Help

Don’t be afraid to ask for help. While open requests to re-tweet a post are considered cheesy, the direct message option is a great way to privately get your network to support your efforts. Of course, as in any community, you have to reciprocate and support the other members of the Twitterverse!

It’s a good bet that with a consistent Twitter strategy your positive messages will get out. They may even go viral so that your online reputation is better than ever!

About the Author:

Sarah Boisvert writes on a variety of business topics, including social media, marketing, and sales. She has over 100,000 Twitter followers in her various accounts and considers herself a Twitterholic.

A best practice for sales people by Dave Kahle, author and leading sales educator.

Mediocre sales people are content to react to the requests of their customers, and focus on maintaining the relationships in order to solidify the business they enjoy.

The best sales people understand that, while some of the above is necessary, they proactively seek to discover additional opportunities for growth in their key accounts and strategically build relationships with people who can open doors for them.

The difference is greater than just one of degree.  The best sales people work from a mindset that understands they need to continually seek for additional opportunities.  This mindset colors everything they do, and dictates the practices and disciplines they build into their routines.

One such discipline is that of systematically analyzing key accounts in order to identify opportunities for growth.  They work like this:

Periodically, every quarter or so, they methodically consider each of their key accounts one at a time (for a discussion of key accounts, see my book, 10 Secrets of Time Management for Salespeople).

They may start with a matrix of all the categories of products they sell, and then methodically collect information as to how much of each of these each account currently purchases.  For example, it may be that your company sells four categories of product:  Widgets, gidgets, fridgets and pidgets.

For each account, they may have a matrix that looks like this:

Notice that before they can analyze and prioritize the opportunities, they must first collect the information regarding the account’s annual purchasing volume.  Just that practice alone will separate the best sales people from the pack.

But, once they have that information, they routinely consider it and make decisions about which opportunities offer the closest and easiest way to improve their business.

This discipline keeps them constantly focused on the best opportunities in their key accounts.  And that means that they are always working in the most effective way.  No wonder they are the best sales people.

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All rights reserved

Image by imagerymajestic at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Every sales organization, and every sales process, begins with identifying a group of suspects.  Suspects are people and organizations you suspect may one day do business with you.  They aren’t yet prospects, because you don’t know if they have a legitimate need for what you sell, or if they can make the decision and buy your product or service.  That determination comes later.

But in order to get a group of prospects, you must begin with a list of suspects.  Here are eight ways to acquire such a list.

1.   Buy a list.

This is the information age, and lists are available for almost every conceivable set of characteristics. For example, I could, this afternoon, contact a list broker, ask for a list of names, addresses, phone numbers, size of business in numbers of employees, and email addresses for manufacturers (or any one of a couple of hundred classifications) within a set of telephone area codes.  I could have that downloaded to my computer by the end of the day.

Information selling is now a major industry in this country and there are lots of providers.  Just do a Google search on “list brokers” and find a couple with which to work.  You’ll be amazed at what information you can purchase.

2.   Get referrals from your customers.

Probably the best way to meet a prospect for the first time is to be introduced by someone you both know and respect.  Before that can happen, you need to get the name and details for the person who you want to meet.  That means you must ask your current customers for referrals.

The best way to do this is to visit your customers face-to-face, have a conversation about your products/services and their satisfaction with them, and then ask them specific questions to generate lists of names. For example, don’t ask, “Who do you know….”, instead, ask, “Who is one of your vendors who could use our service?”, Or, “Which one or two people in your committee would be possible candidates?”  By asking a series of specific questions instead of general ones, you’ll direct their thinking in more productive routes, and acquire more referrals.

3.   Rub shoulders with groups of them.

If you have precisely defined your target markets, then you should spend some time thinking and researching this question, “Where do groups of them go?”  The answers can vary from trade fairs, association meetings, to other suppliers.  The most unusual answer to this was from a client who sold reference books to lawyers.  In order to meet them, he discovered that many of them would frequent a local pub on Fridays.  He then made it a practice to show up and rub shoulders them, meeting them in a social situation.

If you can identify where they go, then you can see about getting a list of them from someone who organizes or administers that event or meeting place. Or, you can just show up and collect business cards.

4.   Advertise in publications and websites they view.

There is a reason why advertising has been around for so long.  One way to collect lists of suspects is to advertise in the publications or websites they view, offer something free or inexpensive, and collect the names and details.

The people who respond to the ads move themselves one step closer to being prospects in that they, by responding, show they have an interest in what you offer, and are willing to take action.

5.   Partner with someone else who sells something compatible to them.

The key here is “compatible.”  Again, if you have done a thorough job of describing what the ideal suspect looks like, you can then ask, “What else do they buy?” Or, “With who else do they do business?”  That should lead you to some companies and eventually people who may have a vested interest in sharing their lists with you in exchange for something of value from you.

6.   Take a survey or send a newsletter to a larger list.

If you want to find “sales managers of medium sized insurance agencies who supervise six or more sales people” for example, you could take a survey of all insurance agencies, or send them a newsletter, with an opportunity for the sales managers to respond to something that is suitable for them.  Those who respond, if you do this well, identify themselves as being in the category you want.

7.   Hold seminars for larger groups of them.

By holding a free or inexpensive seminar, you engage with people who are interested in your subject and show themselves as willing to invest time and money. This has the added benefit that you position yourself as a valuable source of information as well.

8.   Use social media to unearth them.

LinkedIn, Facebook, and the slew of other similar sites offer opportunities to join groups of them, and to identify those who meet your criteria.  You can use any or all of these means to collect a beginning list of suspects.

Keep in mind that a suspect list is never finished.  It’s not an event you take care of one time.  Rather, it is an on-going process that never ends.  You are constantly investing time and energy in assembling that list of suspects.

If you do a good job at this step, identifying suspects, it makes everything else that much easier.

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Image “Businessman Searching To The Future” by bplanet at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Activity Tracking

A high outbound call volume makes every sales manager happy. Making a lot of dials doesn’t necessarily lead to success though. What happens after the first call? Does each sales rep schedule a follow up activity? What is their ratio of call to close? How many contacts does it take to push a lead forward? If your sales teams activity levels are high but the sales numbers are still low; it might be time to make some changes. Maybe the team needs help identifying and getting through to key decision makers. A CRM with a built in organization chart can help. Maybe the sales manager needs to put in a call to the decision maker to help things progress but if that person isn’t identified correctly, then it can’t be done.

Response Time

When a lead is assigned to a sales rep, how quickly do they make contact? We live in an on-demand world and prospects operate at that same speed. If they submit an inquiry they want a response almost immediately. What tools does your company have in place to ensure prospects aren’t sitting around waiting on you? A CRM system with an integrated web to lead capture form is a huge time saver. A lead comes in, is automatically assigned to a rep and appears right on their dashboard so they know they have to work it. What could be easier? This also allows a sales manager to track when the lead came into the system and when the rep made the first attempt at contact. As we all know time is money and if your prospect is waiting on you chances are they are already looking at your competition.

Sales Tactics

When a prospect shows interest in your product or service and requests pricing information, the sales team should immediately be entering a sales opportunity into your CRM system. When an opportunity is identified and properly placed in a sales pipeline; the real selling begins. What is it going to take to close the deal? When is the opportunity expected to close? Have you worked with this customer before? Have you worked with another company in the same industry? The questions are easily tracked in any CRM system that has a customizable sales pipeline and a spot to put in competitive intelligence like industry. Using a CRM tool with this capability will allow your sales reps to have the information at their fingertips and transmit a stronger value proposition to the potential buyer. The sales manager is then easily able to track what type of information the most successful sales reps are using and to identify vertical markets that your company is strong in.

Internal Resources

What resources do you have at your disposal to use in helping your sales team close business? The best sales managers use every tool at their disposal to empower their sales reps to close business. One of the most overlooked aspects of sales is the function of marketing and sales working together. Marketing isn’t only around to brand your company or get your message out to potential new leads. Does your marketing team do case studies? Do they keep a list of customer testimonials? Do you have whitepapers and videos that support your value proposition? Most importantly; does your sales team know these tools are available to them to use while engaged with a customer. A CRM system that has a document library feature is a great place to house all these resources. Sales managers often use these document libraries to pick and choose the most valuable bits of information to place in front of their team.

Win/Loss Ratio

As a sales manager it is vital to identify which sales reps are the best closers and help the ones that aren’t closing as effectively to improve. Sales managers without a CRM system have to rely on reports and cumbersome excel spreadsheets to identify this. A CRM that has a win/loss analysis metric broken down by person provides statistics on who may need help with their closing skills. The sales managers can then work with them on the closing process and help them to improve.

About the Author:

Tom Gibson is a sales manager who is considered an expert on sales techniques, CRM and business development.

Image “Sherlock Holmes Museum” by givingnot@rocketmail.com on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

There are several products that may address your business requirements better than others, but there is no top CRM solution or best CRM system.  Sorry to disappoint you. There is a lot of hype in this industry sector and millions spent on marketing and branding, but the best CRM software for you is the system that best meets your current and future business requirements. It’s that simple.

Mid-sized enterprises and large corporations understand this. Smaller businesses tend to make their decision based more on name recognition and price than on business requirements.  If I said Microsoft Dynamics CRM was the best CRM solution no one would argue, or perhaps the folks at Salesforce.com might. Now if I said Commence CRM was the best I am sure this would generate a few replies such as “Who?!”  That’s because companies like Commence do not sell into the enterprise market or have the marketing budget of a Microsoft or Salesforce.com. But if I told you this company has been servicing the customer management software requirements of small to mid-size companies for more than two decades and has several thousand customers around the world this might get your attention.  You see my point?

While I do not know your specific business requirements, I can offer some advice with regard to your selection of a CRM solution.

1. Buy from a trusted name, but not necessarily the most branded name. For example, say you are a small business in the recruiting industry and you have uncovered a CRM solution that successfully addresses similar requirements to yours; they may be a better fit than Microsoft CRM – even if they are not as well known.
2. How long has the company been in business?  This is a scary industry and many of the current CRM solutions providers may not be around in the near term. Find one that has had staying power and a large customer base.
3. Ask where your data is. Most of the newer CRM solutions are cloud-based which means someone else is storing your data somewhere. Find out where and make sure it’s a world class hosting service that will be protecting your data.
4. Does anyone answer the phone when you call?  Many low cost CRM solution providers only provide e-mail support, probably because they don’t have the staff to support your business.  How comforting is that?
5. Product enhancements – should you expect any? Will there be any? The technology sector moves at the speed of light. You will want to partner with a solution provider that continues to invest in their product, and protects your investment in theirs.

Good luck and good hunting.

Here’s an excerpt including the introduction and you can download the full white paper below:

“As a sales executive of a computer software firm, I became consistently frustrated when comparing the number of leads that we generated every quarter to the number of new business opportunities we closed. Something just didn’t add up so I decided to dig into this and find out what was going on…

The project was driven by our internal requirements and the frustration shared by so many executives I had interviewed who were looking to address this business challenge.”

Click to view or download the full CRM Whitepaper.

Image by Ben Andreas Harding on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Q. Dave, I’m interested in what you would recommend for a subscription to a monthly sales magazine and a sales improvement seminar.

A. You have touched one of my hot-buttons with this question. So, forgive me if you give a longer answer than you expect.

First, let me applaud you for asking the question.  As amazing as it sounds, I have come to the conclusion that only about 5% of sales people ever invest in their own growth and improvement.  My understanding of that number has evolved over the years.  I used to think it was much higher, but the more experience I gain, the more I’m convinced that it’s a rare and unusual sales person who will actually spend $20.00 or so to improve himself/herself, much less to actually go to a seminar.  So, just by asking the question, you have indicated that you are probably in that top percentile of sales people.  And, the fact that you probably will invest in improving yourself means that, over time, you will distance yourself from the pack.

Before I tackle your question head on, let me sketch a little more background.  Here’s a phrase to remember:  Learning event.  What’s a learning event?  It’s an experience you have in which you encounter some new ideas, you gain insights in new ways of seeing existing ideas, or you are reminded of behaviors and practices of which you may have been aware, but from which you have drifted away.

So, reading a newsletter could be a learning event.  So could a sales meeting or a conversation with one of your colleagues.  So could five minutes spent after a sales call reflecting on what went well and what didn’t.

What’s important is this:  As a result of a learning event, you focus on some better behavior which you are going to implement in the future.  Learning, for adults, is all about behavior.  In other words, you must find something that you can do differently, and decide to do that thing.

For example, you may have participated in one of my seminars.  That’s a learning event.  Following the seminar, you say to yourself, “I really should spend more time prioritizing my customers, so that I don’t waste my time with low potential accounts.”  That thought is the “better behavior” which you decided to pursue as a result of the learning event.

Generating those kinds of commitments is what learning is all about.  When you asked for a recommendation, my belief is that you ultimately want to generate those commitments to “better behavior” in yourself or in the sales people you manage.

I sometimes hear this kind of comment, “I knew that” from an experienced sales person following a seminar.  My response is, “So what?”  This is not about what you know, it’s about what you do.  So the question should not be, “Is this something new that you didn’t know?”  The question should be, “Is this something good that you are not doing, or that you could do better than you are now?”

The emphasis has to be on action (behavior), not just knowledge.  Here’s a real life example.  I had a conversation with a sales manager calling me with a problem.  He had read my “How to Excel at Distributor Sales” book, and was impressed with, among other things, the chapters on getting organized.  He said, “It is such basic information, but yet they don’t do it.”  He went on to say that getting your file system organized was fundamental, but when he rode with his sales people, none of them had done it.

That’s the point.  They probably all knew that they should be organized, but none of them were doing it.  You see, it wasn’t about knowledge, it was about behavior.

If you want to continually improve, then you regularly answer the question: “What could I do better than I am doing now?”  The question is not, “What do I not know that I should know?”  It’s not just knowledge, it’s knowledge applied that is the issue.

The way you find answers to that question is to regularly engage in learning events.

In other words, rather than just one intense day-long seminar once a year, I’d prefer you to be involved in a learning event at least once a month, if not weekly.  My recommendation is four hours once a month.  The systematic and regular involvement in learning events puts you in the mindset of continuous improvement, constantly stimulates you with new “better behaviors” and allows you the time to focus on one or two areas of improvement every month.

One more little piece of background before I provide some specific resources for you.

We all understand that people have different ways they learn best.  One thing that is rarely acknowledged is that different media generally have a slightly different impact on our learning.  For example, when we take in something strictly by ear, we have a tendency to believe it more and remember it less.  That’s why you can’t remember last Sunday’s sermon in church.  It may have sounded good at the time, but you’ve lost the message in the few days since then.  Taking something in by reading has the opposite impact.  We are more critical of the information, but we retain it longer.  It’s not as believable, but is more memorable.

The best learning experiences, then, require you to listen, to read, and to do.  In that way, you are far more likely to gain helpful answers to the question, “What could I be doing better than I am doing now?”  By the way, that explains why my telephone seminars, in-person programs and multimedia programs are configured and structured the way they are.  They are all designed to maximize your learning by appealing to a multiple number of senses.

Sales Training Resources

That brings us to this conclusion:  If you are going to do “continuous improvement” effectively, then you need to regularly expose yourself to a variety of learning events, focusing on the question, “What could I do better than I am doing now?” as a way of gaining value from every experience.

Here, then, are a variety of resources:

1.  Newsletters

Start with my ezine by subscribing at http://www.davekahle.com/mailinglist.htm

2.  Magazines

Personal Selling Power has been a good quality publication, although I haven’t seen it around recently.  I also subscribe to Sales & Marketing Management Magazine, which focuses both on management and sales.  There are industry-specific publications for almost every trade group imaginable.  Rather than attempt to list them here, let me just encourage you to get on their subscription lists.  Contact the national association of companies who do what you do, and find out what publications are available for your industry.

3.  Seminars

I have to admit that I’m a terrible critic of others in my business.  I think there is so much fluff passed off as information by people who have no idea how to help people learn, that it’s outrageous.  So, I rarely find someone to recommend.

Beyond that, there are dozens of learning events in the form of seminars.  Ask around, and get word-of-mouth recommendations from people whose opinion you respect.  AMA does a good job with almost everything they produce, although they are a little pricey.

4.  Books

With about 50,000 books published in this country every year, you have an almost limitless variety from which to choose.  I’m regularly asked to recommend a good book.  My response is this: Read my books first.  After you have read my books, then it really doesn’t matter much.  If your attitude is right and you prepare your mind with the question, “What could I do better than I am doing now?” you’ll find something of value from almost any book.

Go to the library or the local book store, and pick up whatever appeals to you that day.  Having said that, I have to admit that I am impressed with Neil Rackham’s books, and recommend them highly.

5.  Other resources

Self-study multimedia programs are highly effective because they appeal to all the basic ways to learn.  I specialized in them, and you’ll find a variety on my website.  If you really want to get serious, check our Sales Resource Center® where we deliver 455 multimedia training programs 24/7 over the web – but remember, it’s only for the top 5-percenters of the world.

Whew!  Now that’s a long answer to a short question.  Hope this helps.

Article By Dave Kahle

Copyright MMXIII by Dave Kahle

All rights reserved

There are several very common temptations that routinely present themselves to the field salesperson. One is to become too reactive.  When you succumb to this temptation, you eventually default to a mindset that sees your job as essentially being your customer’s gofer.  You determine where to go and what to do on the basis of who wants something from you at the moment.  Thus, where you go on Monday depends on who called on Friday.

Another temptation is to be lulled by the repetitive nature of the business-to-business selling situation into a mindless routine.  When you succumb to this temptation, you quit thinking about the most effective actions, and give in to the lure of the routine.  It’s 10 AM on Tuesday, and you are at account ABC.  Why are you here?  Because it’s 10 AM on Tuesday.  That’s what you do.  It’s been years, if ever, that you thought about why you are here.  You just are.

Both of these create salespeople of marginal performance, because they rob the salesperson of one of his most powerful assets:  The ability to invest his/her selling time where it will produce the greatest return on time invested.

There is, however, a discipline that serves as a counter-weight to these temptations.  The best salespeople routinely and with discipline and method, create a monthly plan for the investment of their time.

The monthly plan is an essential discipline that holds the two temptations discussed above at bay, and, at the same time, produces decisions that lead to the most effective actions.

It is a best practice of the best, and one of the Five Key Disciplines that we teach participants in our Kahle Way^® Selling System.

A monthly plan is just that – a plan that you create for the investment of your selling time over the next 30 days.  You do one every month, at the beginning of the month.

Normally, it will take you 30 to 90 minutes.  In it, you complete a two-page form that asks you to identify the most effective actions you can take during the coming month, by category.  For example, the monthly plan lists each of your target accounts, and asks for a one-line description of what progress you want to make this month in each of those accounts.

If your company expects higher performance on key product lines, then planning for this month’s efforts in regard to those is another category.

If you have some expectations for acquiring new customers, those efforts are described and to which you are committed.

You identify those opportunities that are closest to the money, and describe what progress you are going to make to bring them to closure.

You identify and commit to your efforts to improve yourself this month.

All of these are areas on which you focus, make decisions about, and then commit in writing to specific actions.

The result?  A plan for the most effective use of your sales time next month.

It is a regular discipline of the best.  To learn more, consider The Kahle Way^® Distributor Selling System, or The Kahle Way^® Business-to-Business Selling System.

Image “08:40″ by Alberto676 on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Article by Dave Kahle

This is one of those pieces of conventional wisdom that no one seems to question: “It’s good to be passionate about your product.” Like so many of these conventional myths that ingrain themselves into our psyche, this one has the potential for frustrating countless thousands of sales people, sales managers and chief sales officers.

Let me reassure you: It is not necessary to be passionate about your product or service in order to sell it effectively. In fact, your passion may be a detriment to an effective sales process.

Before you impale me on the skewers of this deeply-help belief, let’s consider this together.

The dictionary definition of “passion” is this: “enthusiastic — showing or having intense emotion.” In a business sense, we commonly think of passion as arising from a conviction that our product or service is a great value, or has some really unique features. So, when we are passionate about our product/service, we are so enamored with it that we become enthusiastic promoters of it. This enthusiasm is thought to be a good thing, and managers everywhere promote it.

Enthusiasm about your product is, however, greatly overrated, for a number of reasons. Let’s look at them.

First, enthusiasm comes out of you, the sales person. It arises out of your unique combination of life experiences and values. It says something about you, but has nothing to do with the customer, and says nothing about the product.

For example, you can have two sales people viewing the same product. One, a young, inexperienced sales person, is enthusiastic about the product. The other, a more experienced veteran, is much more objective and less emotional about the product. In that very real example, does the sales person’s passion arise out of the product or out of the person? Clearly, it says something about the person, and that person’s lack of experience.

I believe that experienced purchasers often view a sales person’s enthusiasm about a product as an indication of that person’s naivety and inexperience.

But, that’s not all. In fact, enthusiasm can be a detriment to servicing the customer because it clouds the communication process and weighs it heavily on the side of the seller. It holds your (the sales person’s) opinions up as more important than the customer’s.

When you are passionate about a product, you naturally want to talk about the product – after all, it’s so great that you are enthusiastic about it. And that enthusiasm then means that you don’t inquire deeply into the customer’s needs, interests or desires. Your enthusiasm often overrides your attention to the customer.

Here’s an example. Let’s say you are looking for a car, and have in mind a used, small SUV. You visit a car dealer, and a sales person introduces himself. You explain what you are looking for. The sales person walks you over to a new car – a model that has just been introduced. It has some really great new features, and the sales person is clearly enthusiastic about it. He goes on and on and you can tell that he is passionate about this new car. You listen politely, and then excuse yourself.

His enthusiasm got in the way of your needs. Perhaps if he weren’t so passionate, because he liked the new car, he would have spent more time trying to meet your needs. While he may have liked it, you weren’t particularly interested.

His passion was based on his opinion, his needs, and his interests, and not yours. So, passion comes out of the sales person’s experience and needs, not those of your customers. Passion can interfere with the sales process.

Passion can also blind you to the truth. Here’s an example. There was a reality TV show on for a while that rated people’s inventions. One inventor has created a wooden board game. It required a large wooden construction, larger than an ordinary card table to play. It looked like an interesting game, but the judges criticized the need for this construction, particularly in a day when far more fascinating games are routinely available for a fraction of the cost on smart phones and tablets.

The inventor stuck to his guns. He was passionate. He had invested his life savings in this game, and was enthusiastic about it. His passion and enthusiasm blinded him to the truth: It wasn’t very saleable. He would be better served by cutting his losses and moving on. Alas, his passion wouldn’t let him do that. His passion had blinded him to the truth, and interfered with a more rational decision.

Early in my career I was engaged by an entrepreneur in a similar situation. He had created a device that would alert the parents of school age children when the bus was about to appear at their bus stop. He was passionate about it, and invested lots of time and money into the product. Unfortunately, the market just did not want it. It took a couple of years and hundreds of thousands of dollars for him to find that out. His passion stood in the place of a wise decision.

As a veteran sales consultant, I routinely see people who are suffering in the aftermath of a passion, misplaced. They find or create an effort or company based on a passionate belief in something. However, their passion blinded them to the realities of the market. In a last ditch effort to rescue their vision, they call for the consultant. Unfortunately, I can rarely help them. Typically, they have depleted their resources in a mistaken effort that just a little more of some marketing effort would open the flood gates, and the world would share their passion and recognize their product.

The self-improvement literature is littered with exhortations to be ‘passionate’, to follow your passions, etc. Various examples are put forth of people achieving great things by being enthusiastic and following their passions. But very seldom does one see the far more common story – a misplaced passionate enthusiasm resulting in defeated dreams, mediocre performance and human potential squandered.

From my perspective, I’ll take experience, commitment and skill over passion every day of the week. There is a problem with passion.

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Copyright MMXIII by Dave Kahle

All rights reserved

Image by MyEyeSees on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Take a break, and check this out one more time.

How many names did they collect?

What’s the last action you can do to be a tiny part of this masterful piece of marketing?

If you can get your audience to respond, act, remember, engage, think, click, create, offer, contribute, participate, like, tweet, take action – or  even name a baby Clydesdale – you have successfully used your social media marketing tool.

Think about what actions you can ask your consumers to take. If they become the slightest bit personally invested in your business, your name and product will stick with them.

It’s a fact: A whopping 63% of consumers are using social media. That is a massive amount of exposure, and if you aren’t using social media to cast a wider net, now is the time. The list only seems to grow each year: Twitter, Instagram, Quora, ZoomInfo, LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+, etc. Each and every one of these forms of social media is a golden opportunity to spread the message that you want to spread and to attain an even stronger reputation for your business. Just ask Budweiser.

Think of the connection between horses and beer. It seems like a far stretch, until you involve Clydesdales – make that a baby Clydesdale – and combine it with a warm-spirited, handsome, sentimental, and dedicated trainer. Budweiser created a story around that nameless pony, and what’s a viewer to do? Retain the product, retain the story, and of course, retain the question. No doubt, a fair portion of viewers will want to participate in the game of throwing into the ring a name for the pony. This is a superb example of how to create a buzz and get people talking after the commercial is over.

So what else can you do to get some of those 63% of buyers to bring some energy to your online presence? Every time they do, your online reputation is going to get a boost. Try some of these engagement techniques:

• Take a vote. Offer a few ideas for potential products that you’re thinking about bringing to the market, and have them cast their ballot with a simple click.
• Create a contest. Maybe it’s a trivia question of the week, or something light and fun that gets them to take a quick break from their daily tasks at hand.
• Let them inside. Create a short video that highlights you and your employees’ stories and pride. This will help your customers to feel a little bonded to the folks who work hard to create your product or service. We’re all in this thing together – this thing called life.  Share that mentality, and you’ll grow both your reputation and client base. Keep it real, and they will respond. Maybe your viewers of the video will provide a comment or reaction. ASK them to!
• The direct involvement is always worthy, but you can also encourage your potential customer to participate in an indirect involvement question. Remember your first love? Maybe it was Fido, when you were five years old. Maybe it was your mom or dad, or maybe it was that little cutie in the back row in Algebra. For an indirect involvement question like this, you’re not actually soliciting answers, but you will still be getting them to respond. It’s an action, and that’s exactly what you want. Tie that indirect involvement question to an aspect of your business, and you’ve got them connected.

Get them to take some action, and watch your reputation skyrocket!

Engagement. Action. Response. Contribution. Connection.  Your reputation and sales will increase if your social media viewers get involved.

Valerie J. Wilson is a freelance writer who writes about marketing, business, and the economy.

Image “Baby Clydesdale” by Bill Garrett on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Image “Rocket Drag Race” by Steve Jurvetson on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Including CRM in your sales cycle is a smart business strategy

In part one of this paper, we discussed how critically important it is to select a sales model that is appropriate for the products or services you are selling.  In our case study the ‘NewCo’ company needed to transition from a high cost direct sales organization to selling via the internet and channel partners.

The second and equally important strategy to ensuring good sales execution is to implement a structured sales process or methodology that standardizes how you sell. This is important for two reasons.

1. Simplified Sales Management

First, you cannot manage and properly direct your sales team if every representative has a different approach to selling.  Remember sales people traditionally come from all walks of life – from teachers, accountants and engineers to college students just entering the work force.  Unless you establish a specific sales training program every member of your team is going to conduct their business according to what they feel is right.  Using this approach some will perform better than others will. However, one thing is clear you will not have a uniform approach to selling.

This is something many companies continue to struggle with.  CRM systems do an excellent job of providing structure for companies that don’t have one, or are unsure what theirs should look like.  This is not rocket science.  Start by outlining the steps that occur during your sales process.  The steps will vary from business to business, and the number of steps depends on the length of your sales cycle.

What are the steps in your sales cycle?

For example, the sales cycle typically begins with qualification or a needs analysis. This ensures the new opportunity is real, and that the prospect has a need for your company’s product or service, and the budget to pay for it.  Next step may be a product demonstration, followed by a quote, a trial of the product, verbal agreement then closure.

2. Consistent Sales Forecasting

The benefit here is clear.  Having a definitive sales process such as this allows management to see a snapshot of every new sales opportunity. If you are managing every new sales opportunity in a structured fashion, you know where each one is in the sales process and what is required to close the sale.  This leads to highly accurate monthly and quarterly sales forecasts.

Using a set of pre-built analytical reports sales management can follow each opportunity through the pipeline and take a proactive approach to help win the sale.

Graphical and spreadsheet view of sales by stage

About the author:

Larry Caretsky is president of Commence Corporation a leading provider of online CRM software.  Caretsky has more than 30 years of experience in the client management software industry and has written numerous white papers on the subject along with an eBook “Practices That Pay”. He leads a consulting team that assists small to mid-size businesses implement best practices for sales execution and sales performance.

Image “Businessman With Idea Lightbulb” courtesy of Nutdanai Apikhomboonwaroot/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image “5 Steps” courtesy of samuiblue/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

1. Implement a marketing strategy using a lead nurturing system

What I am referring to here is a series of direct or e-mail campaigns that serve one purpose, and that is to ensure that your company, your product and the value you offer is consistently in front of potential customers for months on end.  Marketing people refer to this as “the rule of seven” which simply means that people may not recognize your offering until they see it seven times.  So many companies make the mistake of sending a single message. If the prospect does not respond they move to a new list, convinced the first one was no good.

2. Make sure your message delivers value to the prospect

Stop selling for a minute. Special holiday discounts or offers for “free anything” don’t make sense.  In fact they can irritate the buyer.  I get these all the time; buy now and get 50% off. I don’t even know what they are selling so why would I have any interest – discount or no discount.  Instead offer something you would have an interest in reading.  If you wouldn’t click on it why would you expect a prospect to?

3. Try to differentiate yourself from your competition

Some people call this “thought leadership” which is nothing but a fancy title for being smarter than your competition. Present ideas that are outside the box, ideas that inspire creative thinking for both you and the potential prospect. If your message is educational or intriguing and gets them to think about what they read, chances are they will remember you.

4. Don’t stop marketing

People seem to think marketing is a part time job. Send a mailer and you are done.  It’s not. Let’s go back to what we said earlier – You may not know the right time when a prospect will decide to buy, but as long as your product and service is consistently in front of them you can bet that when they do decide to buy you will be on the call list.

Creating an automated marketing program without the proper tools can be quite the challenge.  The good news is that there are several very good CRM software programs that can automate this process and make life easy for you.  In part two of this paper, I will discuss the automation process and how CRM software has matured and is delivering value for marketing professionals.

This article is sponsored by Commence Corporation, a leading provider of web based CRM software.

Image by Federico Raviele on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Commence Corporation supported this initiative by creating a few activities for the kids so they could learn about what the company does and how we assist customers with their business requirements. This year the kids were given a series of fun challenges to encourage teamwork and to learn about the features of web based CRM software.

• Create a new company logo.
• Search for an image to use in a blog article. You can see the results of this challenge on the Commence CRM Blog.
• Guess the number of jellybeans in the jar.
• And a tough challenge… untangling a box of computer cables.

Their day ended with lunch and an outdoor recess. We love the results of their work! What do you think?

Image “soma dispenser” (jellybean jar) by Troy McCullough on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Although we use the word ‘meet’ to describe our first contact with new clients and others, what really matters is whether we connect with them. Whether you ultimately want to focus on selling office furniture, IT equipment, or marketing services to the customer, you have to first make a connection.

Every process is easier if you have a strategy.

The best way to ensure that will happen is to have a strategy. Strategies for breaking the ice with new customers should include careful prep work, and the meeting must include interacting with the individuals.

Strategies do not come with 100% guarantees; however, almost everyone agrees that talking with clients and customers is a great way to initiate a connection. It’s what to say and how to say it that seems to cause concerns.

Basic Tips

As mentioned, breaking the ice is not just meeting and greeting a customer; the goal is to make a true connection. In order to do that, it is important to initiate a conversation. Ideally that conversation will start on a positive note.

Real conversations are built on the exchange of ideas. This means each person gives and shares thoughts. As the conversation takes place, other things should also be happening. For instance, this is the time to work at finding a way to link the person with his or her name and personality and ideas.

Preparation for the Connection

Learning all you can about the person or business before the meeting makes it easier to know how to break the ice. Besides providing basic information that will be helpful, the knowledge learned can help you feel more confident and comfortable about the meeting.

It’s also a good idea to learn something about what is happening in the niche or industry that might impact the individual or business. In today’s world, it is usually a simple process to find information about industries, people, and businesses online.

Arming yourself with this information makes starting conversations a simple process. In addition, it makes it easier to align yourself with the potential customers’ perspectives.

Body Language Speaks

Your body language may say more than your words do. This means it is important to give consideration to the way you dress and present yourself. Plus, the tone of your voice and the way you say things does matter.

Customers are people, and they want to connect with individuals they feel comfortable with. Most people feel comfortable with someone who displays confidence and authenticity.

Do you present yourself with confidence and poise?

Sometimes it’s the simple things that get overlooked. That is, we forget to smile and make eye contact or to offer a firm handshake. Once again, preparation counts. Good posture along with appropriate attire is a great start in the preparation for a meeting with a new or potential customer.

Align with the Potential Client

After preparing for the meeting, you will have some information about what matters most to the potential customer. But keep in mind that establishing a real rapport will make the meeting go more smoothly.

Take the time to ease into the conversation. As the discussion unfolds, it is your job to actively listen to what the potential client is saying. Listen for the deeper messages. This allows you the opportunity to provide insights about how your company or products can help the client meet his or her needs.

Listen closely for the deeper message behind the words spoken.

Listen Closely

Although you have lots to say about your business or product, it is very important that you listen closely to what the client has to say. Much can be learned about a client’s needs, goals, and desires through the information he/she shares.

After all, most meetings are restricted to a tight time frame. With that in mind, whatever the client spends time talking about ranks high on his/her priority list.

Final Points

When your focus is on breaking the ice with new clients, your real goal should be on ways you can help the potential customers. Approaching the task in this manner takes the mystery out of the process and suddenly potential customers become people that have needs.

Planning and preparing for the meeting will help ensure there will be a true connection. If you are sincere in your efforts to help and you respectfully listen to the client’s ideas and perspectives, most ice-breaking meetings will turn into much more.

About the author:

Debbie Allen is a freelance writer and online marketer who often writes about business topics such as online reputation and selling office furniture.

Image “Business Strategy” courtesy of ddpavumba at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image “Confident Young Businessman Posing Casually” courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image “Thoughtful Business Person” courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

“This is nothing new.” says Larry Caretsky, president of CRM solution provider Commence Corporation. “I think the biggest challenge facing small to mid-size companies today is dealing with the evolution of how products and services are sold today.  The Internet has created an on-demand mentality for all kinds of products and services – products that were once sold by professional sales people, either face to face or via the telephone.  While the bigger guys have adapted to this new sales paradigm, many small to mid-size companies are trapped in old school thinking.  They tend to stay with what they have done for years even though it is no longer working.”

Let’s look at an example.

THE GOAL   The ‘NewCo’ company sells sales management software and consulting services to mid-market companies via a direct sales team.  They have an average sales goal of $20,000 to $30,000 per customer – not huge but enough to cover the cost of sales salaries, commissions, and overhead and still make a profit.

THE CHALLENGE   Over the past 5-7 years, the industry has changed substantially and has become even more competitive.  Web based programs can be deployed via a cloud-computing environment, and require no hardware or software.  The competition’s software is available over the internet at a fraction of the cost of NewCo’s  original sales software.

THE STRATEGY   NewCo responds with a new web based offering of their own at a competitive price, and retains their highly skilled sales team as their only sales channel.

THE RESULTS   While they are winning sales, they are losing money on every one.  Why? Because their cost per sale is simply too high. Competitors are selling their products over the internet using lower cost telesales representatives.  If NewCo doesn’t find a way to reduce costs and improve their efficiency they will likely be out of business.

THE OPTIONS

There are three selling models to consider (excluding retails sales).

• Direct Sales – a well-trained in-house sales team employed by you
• Channel Sales – third party companies that sell your product or service based on a percentage of revenue or business they close
• Internet Sales – low cost telesales staff that simply process orders or assist customers with the order process

Of course, you can have a combination of the above.  Your decision with regard to which one(s) are most appropriate for your business will be based on the overall cost of your product, the cost associated with selling the product (i.e. , salaries and commissions) and your margin or profitability on each sale.

In NewCo’s case, it is clear that relying solely on direct sales will no longer work for their business, but perhaps adding a telesales team with some regional channel partners will.

Meeting your quarterly or annual marketing and sales objectives is not as simple as just adapting to the right sales paradigm.  This is critical, but the next step in the road to success has to do with implementing the proper sales structure and process.   I will discuss this in part two of this whitepaper – “Using CRM to Leverage Sales”.

About the author:

Larry Caretsky is president of Commence Corporation a leading provider of online CRM software.  Caretsky has more than 30 years of experience in the client management software industry and has written numerous whitepapers on the subject along with an eBook “Practices That Pay”. He leads a consulting team that assists small to mid-size businesses implement best practices for sales execution and sales performance.

Image “Money With Magnifying Glass” courtesy of Sujin Jetkasettakorn at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Q. What are your views on dress? Does it matter?

A. Sure it matters. Everything that you say and do matters. Dress can be a powerful part of your persona. On one hand, how you dress can facilitate your objectives and make you more effective, and on the other, inappropriate dress can present an obstacle to your interaction with customers.

Let’s get some basics out of the way.

1. Your dress should never be provocative or suggestive.

2. Your dress should never be outlandish or foolish.

Now, let’s get down to the strategic use of dress. Here is the next rule:

3. Dress like your customers, only a little better.

Your dress should convey to the customer that you are like him/her, not different from them. There was a time when men wearing a suit and tie, and women a skirted suit was the expected mode of dress. However, if you are calling on maintenance supervisors, foremen, or uniformed personnel, for example, that suit and tie separated you from your customer, making you seem aloof and unapproachable.

So, how does your customer dress?

One of my clients sold supplies to farmers. Dressing in flannel shirts, blue jeans and boots was OK, because that was how the farmers dressed. Note the second part of the rule, ”a little better.” That’s where your positioning as a successful, competent person comes in. You should, within the context of the customer’s world, look successful, competent and confident. So, if you are going to wear jeans and flannel shirts, they should be good quality jeans, (a good brand name), clean and pressed. Your flannel shirt should be a better than average brand, clean and pressed.

If are calling on management level people, it gets a little more challenging. In today’s world, some companies adhere to a coat and tie discipline, where others prescribe “business casual” for their employees. Honestly, I keep notes in my customer files as to what the mode of dress is in that organization. I keep it simple by using two categories: C&T (coat & tie), and BC (business casual). When I’m making one of my rare live sales calls, I check the file the day before so that I know how to dress.

One of the sales people in one of my classes shared his approach with me. He explained that he always wore grey dress slacks, a light blue button down collar shirt, a tie and a navy blazer. That way, he could dress up or down, depending on the situation. With the tie and blazer, he felt comfortable calling on coat and tie executives. If the call required a conversation with a front line supervisor, he’d remove the tie, and leave the blazer in the car. A nice approach. I’m sure there is a similar outfit that can be spontaneously dressed up or down for the women as well.

4. Once you have incorporated the previous three rules, if you want to take this issue to the level of the masters, and then incorporate the final rule: Dress in a way that expresses your own unique style and persona.

I’ve come across sales people who always wear lapel pins, for example. I vividly recall one sales person who wore the loudest tie I ever saw. When I asked him about it, he indicated that he found these very loud ties to be a conversation starter and a unique emblem of his. People remembered him for it.

In the last couple of years, I’ve come, more or less by accident, to develop a “style” of my own. Whenever I speak, I always wear a silk or cotton mock turtle neck shirt with a sport coat or blazer. Even though I routinely speak at conferences and conventions to audiences in the hundreds, I seldom wear a tie. That combination is now my style. I arrived at it by chance. Since I travel so much, like all frequent travelers, I try to fit everything in a carry-on. The silk shirts can be rolled in a ball and stuffed into the tiniest corners of a carry-on, without showing wrinkles or taking up nearly as much space as a starched shirt. After a while, I’ve standardized on them.

Hope this helps.

Article By Dave Kahle

Image “Adult Man Fastening Tie” courtesy of imagerymajestic at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Your online reputation is what people are going to use to judge you and decide whether or not they want to do business with you. So when they Google (or Bing or Yahoo!) you, what do they see?

What Others Think

Obviously.

When you search for something/someone online, some of the first things you are going to find (after the website that you spent months getting on to the first page of Google) are reviews, articles, posts, etc., that talk about you and what you have to offer. They will see what others have experienced when working with you and what they thought of that experience.

What fills those speech bubbles when people talk about you?

How You Respond to Criticism

What do you do when someone posts a negative review or a piece of negative feedback about you? The first thing someone is going to do when they find that review or article is check to see what kind of response you have to it. How you handle a situation that is not entirely within your control says a lot about you and what kind of person (or business) you are to work with.

Your Commitment to Your Community

People want to know how community-oriented you are. Sometimes this is literal: They want to see if you do volunteer work or help people who need it. The rest of the time, they want to see how much time and effort you put into giving to others. Is everything you post a thinly veiled sales pitch? Or (preferably), do you put at least as much effort into simply entertaining, informing and helping your audience? Do you give more than you try to take?

Who You Are Personally

When someone types in your name or your business’s name, they are undoubtedly going to come across some information and evidence of who you are outside of work (your personal Facebook page, for example). Remember, humans are inherently curious creatures. They want to know as much about you as possible—they’re going to click on your personal social media links, blogs, etc.

Is this you?

Your Competition/Campaign Style

What you say about others, particularly those who compete against you in the marketplace, says a lot about you. Do you put a lot of time and energy into trashing your competition? Or do you acknowledge them as worthy competitors and simply work hard to make yourself look as good as possible? A potential customer is going to want to know why you think you’re the best and how you address that question says quite a lot about who you are.

Each of these brushes helps paint the portrait that is you. Before you let that freak you out, think about this: You do have some say in what kind of online reputation you build for your company. You are in control of what you put out into the world. What you put out into the world has a direct impact on your reputation. Make sure you’re putting your best foot forward!

About the author:

Erin Steiner is a writer and vlogger from Portland, Oregon. She has written extensively about small business, personal finance and internet related topics.

Image ‘Social Network’ courtesy of Renjith Krishnan/FreeDigitalPhotos.Net

Image ‘Malice’ courtesy of Rattigon/FreeDigitalPhotos.Net

I received various answers from leads, customers, phone calls and even the internet. The real question that I should’ve asked is “what steps did you or your team take to win those sales and how are you tracking that.” When I did pose that question; I received mostly silence and one of my colleagues even challenged me on why it is even important.

Quite simply; it’s critically important to track the steps or processes you used to generate new sales so you can emulate what is working and stop doing the things that aren’t. If you aren’t tracking what you did to generate a sale; how do you know what made the customer buy or how that customer learned about your product or service. Personally, I don’t like to leave the sales of my company up to chance.

My colleagues of course demanded to know how I do this and again my answer was simple. I use an automated online CRM system to track where my sales opportunities come from.

The system called Commence CRM has a customizable sales source button that allows me to put in my sources and track them accordingly. Some examples of my sales sources are cold calls, referrals, website inquiries, e-mail campaigns and inbound calls. It also allows me to track new business opportunities by industry so that I can determine if we are doing better in one industry sector verses another.

When I started using Commence CRM to track how sales were being generated I discovered that I had a sales person who was a very strong prospector; he was getting appointments, doing presentations and closing sales. His formula seemed to work very well, and the key was knowing where the lead was being generated from and what industry the prospect was in. He used the strength of the company’s customer base and testimonials to support that he had a solid solution designed specifically for their industry the prospect was in. His success drove me to want to emulate this process for the entire sales staff.

Needless to say my colleagues became convinced that tracking what sources you are using to generate sales can play a vital role in increasing your chances of winning business. They also had an increased interest in using a CRM tool to track this sort of data.

About the author:

Tom Gibson is a sales manager who is considered an expert on sales techniques, CRM and business development.

“Relationships, not technologies, are what make CRM strategies successful. They connect people and get work done, deliver value, solve problems and gain insight into how better to serve customers in the future.”

Louis Columbus, Forbes.com

Our goal is to help you get the most value from our CRM solutions. How do you do that? Just ask! Customers can call at any time during our business hours and speak with a qualified sales or support representative. After hours you can take advantage of our web-based knowledgebase, free training videos and e-mail support. The company has been operating this way for more than 20 years and has built a solid reputation for providing world class customer service.

We invite you to stay connected with us on your favorite social network. Send us your feedback after your service or support inquiry is resolved.  Be the first to sign up when free classes and webinars are offered, see what we’re reading on other sites, pick up some expert sales tips and best practices, and see how other customers are realizing exceptional value from our CRM Customer Success stories.

Google+

Every week we share some of our top posts on Google+ so you can stay up to date and share the news with your colleagues.  To make sure you don’t miss a post, all you have to do is add the Commence CRM Google+ page to your circles or follow us.

We’re on other social networks, too.

Twitter

If you’re new to Commence and want to catch up on what you’ve been missing, follow us @CommenceCorp. Here you’ll find an assortment of news, reviews, special promotions and other updates.

Facebook

Like the Commence CRM Facebook page to get our top stories in your feed.

No time for social networking?

We’ve got you covered. If you’d rather visit our website for your CRM news, we have some other easy ways for you to keep up:

• You can subscribe to our RSS feed to read the daily Commence CRM Blog in your favorite newsreader. We have an excellent weekly series of training articles from sales expert Dave Kahle, and you can get the latest company news and white papers in our CEO corner.

However you choose to keep up, we’re happy to have you join us!

Consider the following tips to keep the focus right where it should be: customer attraction and retention.

(Quick: Which movie made Wilson famous?) Keep your eye on the ball!

Consistent and clearly defined in-house methods need to be established

Work hard to find your best practices to stay systematized, efficient, synchronized and automated. That’s a tough bill to fill! CRM software is a critical first step. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel; customer relationship management involves many facets, and the software breaks it all down, step by step.

What’s your goal?

If the goal is to keep the focus on both prospects and present customers, consider the following questions:

• What does the customer want?
• How can you cross sell and/or up-sell?
• What information can be gathered that will provide you with more insight into the customers’ needs?
• For each customer, which has proven to be the most efficient method of gathering this information? (Email? Phone chat? Face-to-face meetings? Meetings with different groups within the organization when you are on premises?
• Who are the stakeholders and key players within each account that you seek to acquire?

These questions should be revisited from time to time, and often that just doesn’t happen. Organizations sometimes collect all of the start-up data, but it’s important to press the pause button and revisit this information on a quarterly basis. The facts and insights change, and so do the people involved. Maintain excellent communication with your customers by regularly going right to the source and asking about these facets, and then post the results for all to see.

What Are the Results?

It’s crucial to keep everything centralized. All the key players in your organization need to have access to the same information so that the customers can easily observe that you’re all on the same page. When there is lack of visibility about what is happening with an account, that’s when truly embarrassing situations can occur. The last thing anyone wants is to come across in an unprofessional manner, but that’s exactly the result you’re going to get when all departments are not collaborating efficiently on each and every account.

Updating Is Imperative

Gather the Information all in one place, and require that each department regularly updates the data. Consider when this is most important:

• Every time there has been a customer contact
• Every time there has been a change in the customers’ service or product needs
• Every time accounting has handled a statement or receivable
• Every time a prospect, lead, or contact has been established
• Every time marketing materials have been shared
• Every time customer service has taken place
• Every time technical support has been involved
• Every time a post-sales report has been written, reviewed, or shared

That list is positively daunting if you’re relying only on in-house emails and chats. The data entry involved with these issues keeps confusion down and efficiencies high. Most importantly, it tacitly shares with each customer that there is a truly collaborative effort inside the company with whom they have decided to conduct business.

Look carefully! You want the right person making the goal! Keep all communications visible, and you’ll hit your target every time.

Perception Is Reality

Consider the reaction of your clients when they share that they’ve received a call or email from another department in your organization, but you don’t know about it. It’s embarrassing for you, but more importantly, it sends a message to your client that simply is not good.

It’s critically important that your company is known for being organized, efficient, and detail-oriented. If your organization proves to be the converse, the truth is that there is another company right around the corner that they could send their business to. To increase revenue, the goal is retention. Maintaining high levels of collaboration, professionalism, and organization has never been more important – or easier. Study the various CRM software choices, and go with one that will keep your eyes focused on the customer.

About the author:

Valerie J. Wilson is a freelance writer who enjoys writing about health and wellness, business, and marketing.

Photo Credit: Erik Renko

Photo Credit: pierodemarchis

So what does being a pure play vendor really mean? “It means developing and supporting Customer Relationship Management software (CRM) is all we do” says Todd Pape, Chief Technology Officer at Commence. “Because we are focused on one aspect of the business we can in fact be better than the industry giants.”

“The rapid evolution of cloud computing means that smaller organizations like Commence can build software solutions using the same underlying architecture as enterprise software companies like Microsoft, Oracle or Salesforce.com” continued Pape. “The functionality may be different and that’s exactly why companies like Commence can be a better fit for the small to mid-size business sector we serve. While the enterprise companies are focused on addressing multi-language requirements, high transaction volumes, and integration with ERP and other disparate systems, companies like Commence are focused on delivering a CRM solution that’s comprehensive, but also easy to use and affordable. It’s our core competency and what has differentiated Commence CRM for the past two decades” says Pape.

“We are focused on adding new features requested by our customers while the big guys are instead ripping out functionality that small to mid-size businesses don’t want.  They need to do this in order to make their product less complex and costly.  Surely a product designed specifically for small to mid-size businesses is going to be a better fit than one that’s been re-engineered to address the requirements of a different business sector.”

Then you have the issue of service.  “CRM is a service oriented sector” continued Pape.  “Customers often require assistance with importing data from other systems, training, customization and integration with other software programs. Companies like Microsoft are poorly equipped to provide high quality service to their customers. They instead use local value added resellers who more often than not are not properly trained or don’t have a great deal of experience with the product. The customer may think they bought a CRM product from Microsoft, but the implementation, service and support comes from someone else.”

This does not mean you should not buy a CRM solution from companies like Microsoft. It simply means that a pure play CRM solution provider like Commence CRM, that is laser focused on providing an excellent product and service, returns exceptional value to customers in the small to mid-size sector.  

Image by Roger Luijten on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Get the Full Picture

Four best practices for achieving a holistic customer view. One of the main reasons businesses implement a CRM system is to gain a complete, 360-degree view of their customers. However, large enterprises in particular often have difficulty achieving this goal. Many organizations grapple with how best to provide a holistic view of all the activities of an enterprise customer and how to implement a one-stop shop for analytics and actionable data.

CRM analytics reveals more about customers — maybe too much

A man walked into a Target store near Minneapolis demanding to speak to the manager, a jumble of coupons for baby clothes and cribs in his hands. His 16-year-old daughter had just received them, and he was fuming. But when the store manager called a few days later with an apology, the man had one too. His daughter was pregnant after all. Target knew it before he did. It’s an anecdote many have heard, after a New York Times article went viral last year, and it’s widely used in business circles to illustrate the possibilities of CRM analytics.

In the simplest terms, CRM analytics involves drilling into customer data to make smarter business decisions and to offer customers more personalized service. Target used information about customers’ past purchases — unscented lotion and vitamin supplements, for example — to identify women who were statistically likely to be pregnant, then sent them coupons for baby products.

Commence Corporation, a leading provider of online CRM software, has teamed up with Dave Kahle of the Kahle Way sales system to provide customers with a winning formula for improving sales execution and performance.   Start with a top rated CRM solution for contact and account management, lead management, sales opportunity and pipeline management, sales reporting and sales workflow automation.  Complement this with sales representative and sales management training from an industry expert to create and implement a structured sales process that will deliver more sales more quickly.

The best salespeople are habitual goal-setters.  There’s a good reason for that.  When you set a goal, you survey the world of all possible things that you could possibly do, and decide which of those things are the most important. You then turn that decision into a goal.  And that goal then influences your day-to-day, week-to-week, and month-to-month decisions.

I’ve often maintained that a field salesperson has a set of decisions to make, over and over in the course of every single day.  Those decisions are these:

Who to see?

What to do?

Where to go?

The ability to consistently make these decisions effectively will, more than any other single thing, impact that person’s productivity and eventual success as a salesperson.

When you create a handful of specific, measurable sales goals, you develop a set of criteria which help you make those all important decisions more effectively.

For example, let’s say that one of your sales goals is:  To penetrate my “A” accounts more fully by selling each at least two more categories of product.

It’s Tuesday morning, and you have a number of conflicting demands on your time.  You have a “C” customer who has a problem and has asked for you to visit to help them solve the problem. You have a quote to prepare for a bid request by a “B” prospect.  You have a list of materials that you need to pick up at the office.  You’d really like to have a conversation with your boss about the competition’s action in one of your accounts.  And you have the opportunity to discuss one of your categories of product with an “A” account.  You can’t possibly do all this today.  What do you do?  Who do you see?  Where do you go?

Refer back to your sales goal.  There, you identified the most important things that you can do, and committed to them in a written goal statement.  The answer, then, is a no-brainer.  You go to the A account and have the new category discussion.

Too many salespeople see sales goals as arbitrary and sometimes unrealistic expectations. That ignores the incredible power of a sales goal to influence and direct our daily decisions about the investment of our time.

To dig deeper into this issue, see Ten Secrets of Time Management for Salespeople, and visit www.salestimemanagement.com for a variety of resources.

If you’d like a multimedia training session, visit The Sales Resource Center® and view Pod-69.

Image by Found Animals Foundation on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

The Functional Gap

CRM systems seem to come in two flavors. First, low cost solutions that offer basic functionality. There are dozens of these and they are almost like having a contact manager on the web. You can manage accounts, contacts, add notes and a sales forecast. But these products provide little in the way of additional departmental functionality, customization, analytical reporting or integration with third party programs. They are typically differentiated solely on price because they are considered commodity products. There is nothing wrong with this as long as you have your expectations in line with what you are going to get and that you realize you may quickly outgrow the functionality offered.

The next level of CRM is offered by mainstream players that service the enterprise market. Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Salesforce.com and Oracle are household names in this sector. These products are designed to address enterprise business requirements and are complex and costly. What if I need more than a basic CRM solution, but not the cost and complexity of an enterprise system? I call this the functional gap. Both Microsoft and Salesforce.com have aggressively gone after this mid-market by stripping out functionality and creating low cost editions of their product, but this has not addressed the complexity issue. It’s almost like removing equipment off of an aircraft carrier. After you remove it you still have an aircraft carrier which requires a lot of money and people to operate. I think you can see where I am going here.

There’s a real gap for middle market companies that need more than the basic functionality offered by low end products, but not the cost and complexity of enterprise level systems.

Commence CRM Fills the Gap

One of the companies that has bridged this gap is Commence Corporation. Commence is not as well-known as the mainstream players, but has actually been providing customer management software to small to mid-size enterprises for two decades and has an impressive track record and customer base. Commence picks up where basic CRM solutions leave off and in many instances offers functionality only available in enterprise level solutions.

The first area that differentiates Commence CRM is customization. While low end solutions offer little to no customizability, with Commence CRM customers can create custom dashboards, custom views, custom searches, add custom fields, generate custom reports, and even create custom business processes. Commence CRM is also a comprehensive offering. The application suite offers the standard account and contact management, activity management, lead and sales management you’ll find in other solutions, but also a project management system, a document library and help desk ticketing system you won’t find in similarly priced products. If you need a graphical snapshot of your business or links to social media sites like LinkedIn you’ll find it in Commence CRM. Commence also includes the same analytical reporting you will find in enterprise offerings and has seamless integration with all popular e-mail clients. Mobile access via tablets and handheld devices is also available. Commence CRM is very popular with Apple Mac users because it requires no plug-ins or add-on components to use. With this level of functionality at half the price of enterprise CRM solutions, Commence CRM is well positioned to address the needs of mid-size companies.

While it’s quite clear that there is a functional gap in the CRM sector for small to mid-size enterprises there is also a service gap which is highlighted below.

The Service Gap

Companies that have selected a free or low cost CRM solution are well aware that there is no service component to these offerings. In fact, in many cases there is not even a telephone number to call. This is because the products offer very basic functionality. There is no service requirement because without the ability to customize the solution or generate ad hoc reports, you can’t get into too much trouble. But there is usually is an e-mail listed if you have an inquiry.

With enterprise level offerings the service requirement can be extensive and costly. Service agreements are often mandatory with annual fees ranging from 20 to 30 percent of the annual software cost. While this is acceptable among enterprise level organizations, mid-size companies prefer a combination of self service programs complemented by paid support if necessary. Commence CRM provides just that. Online help, a knowledgebase and free training videos are available from the company’s website and live technical support can be purchased on an hourly basis when required. This meets the support requirements of the SME sector, filling the gap that exists today between low end solutions and enterprise CRM systems. For additional information about Commence CRM, visit the company’s website at www.commence.com and ask for a free trial.

Image by blauente on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Article by Dave Kahle

Effective sales time management is the greatest challenge facing sales professionals.

I just had a conversation with a sales manager at my last seminar. The gist of it is this: he has so many competing responsibilities; it is difficult to spend time with his sales team. Sound familiar? It should. I have heard that idea expressed countless times by executives, sales managers and sales people. In one way or another, sales professionals find themselves increasingly occupied by trivial tasks at the expense of the important ones. Effective sales time management is the greatest challenge facing sales professionals in this turbulent economy. It is an epidemic that is raging unabated in our economy. It renders people unproductive, and organizations operating at a fraction of their potential. It often comes from what I call “other stuff.” Over the years, I have seen this phenomenon to be so pervasive that years ago I labeled it and gave it its own acronym: OSE. That stands for “Other Stuff Expansion.”

The rule is this: When you give a proactive sales person “other stuff” to do, the other stuff will always expand, taking more in time and energy than you anticipated, and rendering the proactive sales efforts to an unacceptable smaller part of the person’s labors.

Here’s how this looks in practice. A branch manager needs someone to fill in a couple of hours a day for a customer service person who has taken a maternity leave. “The salesman can do it,” the branch manager thinks in a flash of inspiration. “He’s got time.”

Presto. The problem is solved.

But, alas, the couple of hours a day turn into a half day, and sometimes more, as the sales person gets caught up in reacting to the inbound calls. Those proactive sales calls that should have been made in that time are never made. The silent costs of that decision and the inevitable “Other Stuff Expansion” begin to be felt months down the road.

Or, you have a sales manager check out that promising new product line, or write that new procedure because he/she “understands that,” and, of course, you’re too busy.

Or, you have inside sales people who also answer the phone and respond to inbound calls, and you are constantly frustrated that they don’t make enough outbound calls.

The example can go on and on. A quick perusal of your sales efforts will unearth dozens, I’m sure.

There’s a simple explanation for this. Making proactive sales calls is a high risk effort that requires initiative, motivation and self-discipline. In other words, it’s hard to do. That’s one of the reasons why most people aren’t sales people. On the other hand, taking care of “other stuff” is usually low-risk, easier and somewhat fulfilling. And, it keeps you busy.

That’s why, “When you give a proactive sales person “other stuff” to do, the other stuff will always expand, taking more in time and energy than you anticipated, and rendering the proactive sales efforts to an unacceptable smaller part of the person’s labors. “ It’s the law of OSE.

In a bigger picture, OSE for sales personnel is just the specific application of a deeper rule. That rule is this: When you give someone something to do, you are, by that act, preventing him/her from doing something else. Or, to be more personal, when we accept the responsibility for doing something, we, by that action, eliminate the possibility of our doing something else.

What sounds blatantly obvious is open reflection, so often violated that it has become one of the major productivity killers, and one of the most common mistakes made today by managers and self-managers of all kinds.

Here are two solutions

a. If you have given, or are tempted to give, anyone who has proactive sales responsibilities, other things to do – don’t! There is always a greater cost than meets the eye. If you are a salesperson who has other stuff to do, try to hand it back to your manager or pass it on to someone else.

Be very careful about giving responsibilities, or accepting responsibilities, that detract from your core focus. In today’s hectic, multi-tasking world, it is more powerful to say “no” than it is to say “yes.”

b. OK, you can’t do that. For whatever reason, your sales personnel must also do other stuff. Plan B. Keep the division between the two sets of competing responsibilities as clean and sharp as you can. So, the other stuff should be well defined, have clear guidelines for completion, and be limited to a specific period of time.

So, for example, don’t say this: “John, we want you to do this other stuff.” Instead say, “John, I’d like you to spend ½ day every other week doing this other stuff.”

By keeping the divisions clear between the competing responsibilities, you limit the damage done by other stuff expansion.

In the long run, it’s those organizations and individuals who focus on the core tasks and don’t diffuse their efforts who succeed.

###

About the author:

Dave Kahle has trained tens of thousands of B2B sales people and sales managers to be more effective in the 21st Century economy. He’s authored nine books, and presented in 47 states and eight countries. His latest book, Eleven Secrets of Time Management has just been released.

Sign up for FREE sales course at The Sales Resource Center.com, as well as the free weekly Ezine.

Copyright MMXIII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Image “Focus” by ihtatho on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

While companies have always, to a greater or lesser extent, called themselves “customer-centric,” this is different. It is not about customer-centric thinking or taking the attitude that the customer is always right. Instead, the new power of customers means that a focus on the customer now matters more than any other strategic imperative.

You can also get our take on this in a past blog article “Is Your SMB’s Marketing Strategy Product Centric or Customer Centric and Why Should You Care?”

Picking the right tool and the right vendor is the most important first step to effective use of a customer relationship management, or CRM, system, according to Mark Dancer of Channelvation, featured in MDM’s recent episode of Executive Briefing. You have to pick a solution that is aligned with how you want to use CRM.

You can also check out these online CRM resources with additional tips for selecting the right CRM product and vendor:

• Commence CRM White Paper: Don’t Make a CRM Buying Mistake : 7 Points to Consider Before Selecting Your CRM Solution
• Articles about selecting a CRM vendor are here and here.

Article By Dave Kahle

Q. If you dropped the ball with a customer, how can you redeem their trust again?

A.  By “dropped the ball”, you can be referring to two different situations.  First, it was your company who messed up.  Your company didn’t fulfill the promises you made.  Or, second, it was you.  You didn’t do what you said you would do, or you somehow personally violated the customer’s expectations for you.  Regardless, the remedy is similar.

You must make a personal, heartfelt and detailed apology, as soon as possible.  And you must do that to everyone who is impacted by the problem.  If the problem was your company, apologize on behalf of the company.  If the problem was you, personally apologize.

You do that first, because that eases the tension in the situation and acknowledges the impact on the customer.  Remember, you are building a relationship with these people, and, as in all relationships, sometimes things don’t go quite right.  An apology is a great way to clear the air.  Most people will tend to accept your apology and not hold it against you.  Everyone makes mistakes.

Now comes the hard part.  While most people will accept your apology, they won’t necessarily forget the infraction.  It’s like catching one of your teenagers smoking dope.  He may ask for your forgiveness, and you may give it, but it is prudent for you to watch him carefully for the next few years.  You can forgive, but you are wise to not forget.

Same thing with your customers.  It’s one thing to forgive, it’s another to forget.  They won’t forget quickly or easily.  So you have to earn their trust back by your actions, not your words.  You’ve got to consistently do what you say you are going to do.  Your company must, time after time, do what you say they will do.

Regaining trust is, in most cases, a long term project.  It’s much easer to lose a customer’s trust than it is to gain it.  Your actions, consistent and reliable, backed up by your heartfelt interest in the customer, will, over time, win them back.

You’ll find this encouraging.  A number of years ago, a study was done on two different buying situations.  In the first, a company bought from a new vendor, and everything went well.  The company delivered as promised.  In the second, a company bought from a new vendor, and there was a problem with the purchase.  The sales person inquired, discovered the problem, apologized and fixed it.

The researchers went to study in which of those two situations was the customer more likely to purchase again the second time.  Interestingly, those customers in the second situation were far more likely to buy again.

If you’ve been following me for any time, you know why that is – risk!

The vendors in the second situation were now viewed as lower risk than those in the first.  In other words, the customers now knew how the company would respond to a problem.  Since they now had proof of the company’s commitment in a worst case scenario, they felt more secure in purchasing again.

For those companies in the first situation, they still did not know how the vendor would respond if there were a problem.  So, those vendors were still a higher risk than the others.

Now, I am not counseling you to intentionally cause a problem.  But, what I am saying is that a problem with a customer is not the end of the world, and, if you handle it correctly, can be a spring board to a more secure relationship in the future.

This new approach to licensing and delivering software as a service offers several immediate benefits to customers.

• Software as a service implementations can often be operational within a few hours.
• There is no large cash outlay to purchase hardware and software.
• There are no IT infrastructure or resource requirements. Both hardware and software are maintained by the service provider.
• Your organization can spend more time on managing and growing your business.
• You are not locked into one solution. Most companies only ask for an annual contract.

One software segment that has seen a significant rise in software as a service is Customer Relationship Management software (CRM).  CRM software helps businesses manage their relationship with their customers by automating the internal business processes that impact sales and customer service. The explosive growth of this sector has encouraged dozens of companies to enter this space with product offerings ranging from free to more than $200 dollars per user per month.

There are a plethora of solutions to choose from depending on your functional requirements and whether you are price sensitive or value sensitive.  The reason I use these terms is because I have seen many companies look for a CRM solution based solely on price. If there is a free solution, great! They will start with that and see how they do.

Value sensitive shoppers are first and foremost looking to solve a business requirement and will focus their energy on selecting a few products that address their needs.  They will then compare pricing with the objective to get the best deal for a product that they are confident will solve their problem.  These companies are smart to do this and here’s why.  The CRM software sector is so competitive that the difference between a free or very low cost solution can be just a few dollars more per month.  Is it worth trying a free CRM that you will most likely end up throwing out six months down the road, or one that will actually address your business requirements? Value sensitive companies are finding and selecting these CRM solutions and you can too as long as you place value in front of price.

Image “Makes No Cents” by jDevaun on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

One product that has become a very popular choice among the SMB sector is Commence CRM. Commence is a web based CRM system that operates online via a cloud computing environment, which means there is no hardware to purchase or maintain and no software to worry about upgrading every year.   Commence CRM takes client management to a whole new level, enabling you to not only manage accounts and contacts but also sales, leads, projects, documents and customer service.  Unlike contact management systems that simply manage contacts, Commence CRM is a customer management solution offering departmental functionality to improve how you market, sell and provide service to your customers.

Another significant advantage to using a product like Commence CRM is that the solution is browser based, which means you can access your data 24/7 from any device including a PC, Apple Mac, iPad, iPhone or Android device.  Commence CRM is simply the next step up for companies looking to manage more than contacts, notes and history.  Migration to a product like Commence CRM is quick and easy with a minimal learning curve.

If you are still using one of the older traditional contact management systems it’s time to take a look at a new generation of client management system like Commence CRM.

Image by eagle1effi on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Salesforce.com has done an excellent job at building their brand and creating name recognition.  How have they done this?  With a lot of money and some tricky marketing.  The problem is that they have a cost structure that’s not really designed for small to mid-size enterprises.  Let’s face it, Salesforce.com was designed for enterprise level companies that have unique business requirements – features that people simply had to pay dearly for if they really required them. I am referring to things like multi-language and multi-currency support and the ability to support several thousand users.

But small to mid-size companies often do not require this, and if you compare the features you get in the Group and Professional Editions to competitive CRM products you will discover that Salesforce.com can cost twice as much or more.  You see, when people evaluate Salesforce.com they tend to focus their energy on what they will be getting when they should really be looking at what they are not getting.  Here are just a few examples you will find right on their pricing page.

• For $25 dollars per user per month I see that I get Dashboards. That’s great, but if I want customizable dashboards, well that’s $65 dollars per user. Tricky marketing I would say. The problem here is that many of Salesforce.com’s competitors offer customizable dashboards as a standard component of their product for a lot less money.

• What about role permissions or security settings?  That’s also part of the $65 dollar per user per month Professional Edition, but a standard feature in competitive products at half the cost.

• Want graphical reporting? No problem, $65 dollar per user per month. But once again, half the cost with competitive offerings.

So what am I getting with Salesforce CRM at the Contact Management or Group Edition level?

• How about limitations with the number of users you can have.  The Contact Management and Group Editions are limited to only 5 users. Add a sixth and you have to upgrade to the next edition and pay much, much more – really?

• Perhaps it’s world class customer service that’s attracting you.  The website says send an e-mail and you can expect a response within 48 hours. Of course you can also pay if you want to talk with a human being.  So much for customer relationship management!

So what is it about this company that makes people buy?  Is it the badge of honor once bestowed to companies like IBM in the 70’s?  I really don’t know, but it does look as through the path to winning the small to mid-size community may be a bit more difficult for Salesforce.com.  These are savvy businesses that have learned to do a lot with very little, and are more price sensitive than enterprise corporations.  With strong competition coming from companies like Microsoft and Commence CRM at half the cost, the water may get a bit choppier for Salesforce.com in the months ahead.  We will have to wait and see.

Image by Nathan Rupert on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

The most current training video helps customers take advantage of one of Commence CRM’s powerful search capabilities which enables you to create specific views of information.  For example, create a mailing list of all customers in the state of California, or all customers who have attended a specific trade show.  This search capability is one of the features that differentiate Commence CRM from competitive solutions.   The training videos are freely accessible 24 hours a day, 7 days a week from the Commence website.

Are you Reactive or Proactive?

Today’s selling environment is jammed with an unbelievable array of “things to do.”  Left without any mechanism to take control, salespeople can easily default to a way of going about their jobs that is characterized by being extremely busy at all the wrong things.  We spend all day reacting to the pressures and demands on us.  At the end of the day, we have been busy, but we’ve accomplished little of value.

The best salespeople understand that daily temptation to give in to the urgent in place of the important.  They understand the need to prioritize.  And, when it comes to sales, the most important aspect of your job to prioritize is your list of customers and prospects.

Look at Future Potential not Past Volume

The best salespeople spend the most time with the highest potential customers and prospects.  In order to consistently do so, they need a system for classifying customers and prospects into categories based on potential – ABC.  The “A” customers are the highest potential 20 percent of their account base.  The “C” customers are the lowest potential 30 – 50 percent, and the “Bs” are everyone who is left in the middle.

Note that the discriminating characteristic is “potential.”  So many salespeople erroneously categorize their accounts based on the quantity of their purchases.  Thus, the A accounts are those who bought the most last year.  But that view is historic – who bought the most last year.  In our rapidly changing economy, that historic basis for investing your sales time is misleading.  The issue is not who bought the most last year.  It is far more effective to determine who could buy the most this year.

The best salespeople understand this, and develop a systematic way of determining the potential in each account.  Having a defendable basis for their decisions, they are then free to invest their time where it will get the best results – one of the hallmarks of the high-achieving salesperson.

This may seem so simple and common sense, yet the vast majority of sales people don’t have the discipline to adhere to a methodical system.  Those who do can see a transformational change in their results.

The best place to visit in order to dig deeper into this best practice is chapter six of my book, Ten Secrets of Time Management for Salespeople.  Visit www.salestimemanagement.com for additional resources.

If you prefer a multi-media training program, consider Pod-138 and 139 in The Sales Resource Center®.

There are a plethora of CRM solution providers to choose from, but very few that meet all three criteria. There is one company however that has consistently risen to the top in all three areas.  That company and product is Commence.  Outlined below are some of the reasons customers say they chose Commence CRM for their business.

The Company

• High quality company in business for 24 years
• Successfully implemented several thousand CRM installations
• Serving customers in 30 unique industries in 19 countries around the world
• Consistently enhance their products year after year for over two decades, protecting  customers’ investment

Match this against other companies you may be considering

The Product

Commence CRM offers a comprehensive application suite with functionality traditionally found only in higher end more costly solutions

• Frequently listed as a Top 10 CRM solution for small to mid-size enterprises
• Customizable without programmer intervention
• Modular in design, allowing you to start small and add functionality at any time
• Affordable and less expensive than competitive alternatives offering similar functionality

 Match the product’s functionality against other products you may be considering

Customer Service

• Commence has a staff of highly skilled professionals with experience in sales, marketing and customer support
• An account manager is assigned to every customer
• Trained service and support personnel answer the phone when customers call
• Free self-service training and educational materials are available 24/7 directly from the website
• Commence secures your data with the # 1 application service provider in the industry

Match this level of service to what other vendors may be offering

We suggest you match our company, our product and our level of service against other solution providers you may be considering and take a moment to see what our customers say about Commence CRM.  Click here for more customer testimonials.

Image “Qualities of Service” by Mike Costello on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Have you ever been in a “blame” meeting? It’s one of those meetings called when numbers are down or after a project or purchase failed miserably. As you might guess, there’s a lot of finger pointing and blame spreading. Not only are these meetings painful, they are completely unproductive. Since everyone is too busy deflecting blame, no one learns from their mistakes.

This article has some good advice and mirrors the points we have discussed on our blog many times, about how we help customers have successful CRM software implementations. It all depends on the people, training, process, and commitment that you make to your new CRM solution. And Commence has great experience in helping companies do this successfully.

By Dave Kahle

Almost every professional B2B sales person comes to grips with one of the challenges of penetrating key accounts.  Key accounts are different than the ordinary, and require some more sophisticated skills and strategies.  Here are four fundamentals for effectively penetrating key accounts.

1.  Recognize that key accounts are different.

            First of all, they are larger, but that’s only the beginning.  Their decision-making processes will be much more complex, and in some cases, highly structured.  A product that may, in a smaller account, only need one person’s approval to purchase can require dozens of people to sign off on it in a key account.

The people have widely different specialty skill sets, perspectives, and motivations.  In smaller accounts, you may only have to deal effectively with an owner or executive.  In key accounts, the same product may require skillful communications with an engineer, a purchasing agent, a project manager and a foreman.  Each of these specialties is likely to have a different personality type, challenging the sales person to adapt.

Because of the size and complexity, there are a variety of motivations and agendas inside a key account.  A naive sales person can be constantly frustrated because they all don’t think the way he/she thinks.

I can go on for pages on ways in which key accounts are different, but this is sufficient to make the point. If you don’t adjust your strategies and tactics to the unique dynamics of a key account, you will be wasting your time.

2.  Approach the organization of your time within a key account like you would your entire territory.

            When you look at your territory, you see lots of independent units we call accounts.  You understand that each has a unique set of needs, budgets and personal dynamics, and that each offers its own set of opportunities.

When you approach a key account, think of it as a territory on its own, with lots of units that act like accounts.  These units can be departments, or branches, or plants, or whatever organization exists within that account.  Each one of them may conceivably have the ability to purchase or move forward the purchase of your products and services.  Each unit, whatever it may be, has its own unique set of needs, budgets and personal dynamics.  And, in many cases, the purchasing power of one of those units can far outstrip the purchasing power of one of your smaller accounts.

Just as you would begin your work in your sales territory by first identifying all the potential accounts, so too, you begin your work in a key account by identifying all the individual units, and then understanding the relationships among them.

Just as you would take six months or a year to come to know the accounts in your territory, so too, expect that it will take a like period of time to identify and come to know all of the units within your key accounts.

Just as you would attempt to ascertain what opportunities there were in each of your other accounts, so too, you should attempt to uncover the opportunities in each of the key account units.

While key accounts are more complex and require some more sophisticated strategies and skills on your part, the perspective that you take to managing your time in a key account should mimic the perspective you take in coming to know the accounts in your territory.

3.  Understand that you gain traction in key accounts through relationships, leverage, and organization.

            If you are going to have influence in a key account, you must have relationships with the influential people.  Because of the size of a key account, and the natural movement of people within it, that means that coming to know the influential people is not an event which has an ending, but is rather a constant process that never ends.  Make a list of the people who should know you, and update it after every sales call.

Who are the department heads in each of those units?  Who are influencers?  The decision makers?  Who could be a champion for you?

Not only do you need to proactively expand your relationships deep into the organization, but you also need to focus upward, and come to know those people who oversee combinations of units, and the C-level people in the corner suites.

There is a fundamental equation in B2B sales, and it operates just as reliably in key accounts as it does elsewhere:

• Relationships lead to opportunities.
• Opportunities lead to projects
• Projects lead to sales.

So, if you want to increase your sales, begin with relationships. And, the primary way you do that is to leverage every question, every positive relationship, every conversation, and every opportunity to more of the same. Leverage, in this case, means using something to create something additional.  In other words, you use every conversation as an opportunity to open the door to more. Assume the attitude that there is always more.  There are more people to meet, more opportunities to uncover, more problems to solve, and more needs to fill.

In every single sales call, you ought to ask, “Who else should I be talking to?”  Or, “Who should I know in xxxx department? “ If you successfully sell something, that experience should be leveraged to uncover the next opportunity.  If you meet someone, that relationship should be leveraged to create more.  And so it goes, unending.

4.  Finally, key accounts are no place for the unorganized sales person. 

            Successfully selling in a key account requires organizational tools and disciplines that are a stretch for the average sales person. Imagine all the people who you need to know, multiply them by the relationships and agendas among them, overlay that with the account’s strategies, needs and budgets, factor in all the opportunities and the steps in each process necessary to bring it to fruition, and you’ll begin to get an idea of the degree to which you’ll need to collect information, store it, and continually use it.  A sophisticated CRM system is a must, as is the discipline to use it religiously.

While these few ideas are not the whole story, they will get you started in your efforts to successfully sell to key accounts.  Recognize the difference, plan your time as if each were a sales territory on its own, and apply the weapons of relationship, leverage and organization to the task.  You’ll be well on your way.

Copyright MMXIII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Article By Dave Kahle

Q.   Is “being yourself” a sales strategy?

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved

Larger firms that have definitive roles within their organization such as a sales, marketing and customer service department spend time documenting their business requirements and traditionally provide these to the CRM vendors they are evaluating.  This may include functional requirements as well as the need for professional services.  For these businesses it is imperative that the CRM vendor respond to which requirements they can meet and those they cannot. These firms look at each CRM solution provider as a potential long term partner in their business and make their decision based on numerous criteria such as:

• the product’s ability to meet the majority or all of their functional requirements,
• the company’s track record for successful implementations,
• training programs that are available to reduce the learning curve,
• the company’s data hosting services,
• system reliability and up time performance,
• the support services that are available after the sale,
• and of course price.

Many smaller businesses, particularly those that do not have definitive roles, tend to overlook these criteria and look at the acquisition of a CRM system as a simple transaction based primarily on price.  It is easy to appreciate why this would occur.  If you have not documented specific requirements for your business you have no way to differentiate one CRM vendor from another.  As a result, they all look the same – almost like a commodity.

CRM is not a Transactional Sale

CRM should not be viewed as a transactional sale.  You are not buying a television or DVD player here. You’re buying a business solution that you should expect will help you become a more efficient sales and service organization for years to come.  This simply means you need to take the time to document where you are as a business today, and where you want to be. For example, what improvements do you want to make to your sales, marketing and customer service operations?  Then share those with the CRM solution providers you believe can meet your requirements within your budget.

Service Matters

Your list of functional criteria should also include any services that you think you may require to fill a gap that you may have internally.  Smaller businesses for example often have limited resources in the marketing area.  If you plan to improve lead generation via bulk e-mail programs and do not have the staff to do it perhaps the CRM vendor can play this role and assist you with the creation of professional mailers.

The array of services a CRM vendor can provide can often be clear differentiators between one company and another, helping to make your selection easier.  The point here is clear.  You do not have to document every change you wish to make and every feature you want to see in a CRM solution, but don’t go into the process blindly.  Taking the time to document your needs before you make a decision will significantly improve your chances of realizing a high return on your investment.

Image by Global X on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Commence is no stranger to the CRM software industry and has been developing and marketing customer management software for small and mid-size businesses for more than two decades.  Commence is well regarded in the United States for the development of high quality business software that is not only flexible but easy to use.  The company has had prior business partnerships with IBM, Compaq Computer and AT&T all of whom had resold Commence products under private label agreements.

“We come from the small to mid-size business sector,” says Larry Caretsky, President of Commence Corporation “and we understand their requirements and the type of services they require.  Our competitors cut their teeth in the enterprise sector with robust offerings and complex functionality that is required for large multi-national organizations.  When this sector became saturated they removed functionality and reduced their cost to sell into this market space, but here’s the problem with that:  these products are still complex and hard to use and reducing the price does not change this.  Customers that select these products end up with dozens of features that they never use. This is one of the reasons so many smaller businesses fail with these products.”

“Commence is a pure play CRM solution provider. It’s all we do,” says Caretsky “so it should not be too difficult for people to appreciate why despite not being as well-known as Microsoft or Salesforce.com we may in fact be a better solution for small to mid-size companies.  We certainly have a twenty year track record that supports this and a large customer base that agrees.”

For more information about Commence’s cloud based CRM software visit the company’s website.

Image by  Andres Rueda on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

It’s so easy to become complacent and satisfied with our “relational comfort zones.”

Those are defined by the people with whom we have developed comfortable relationships, who can be counted upon to see us and spend some time with us. These people make us feel comfortable.

But, in today’s hyper-active market, relying on just existing and comfortable relationships is a prescription for disaster. People turn over frequently, and positions are eliminated overnight. Eventually, all those people with whom you have become comfortable will be gone.

A constant stream of new contacts is necessary nutrient for the professional b2b salesperson to grow his business. This is nowhere more true than in our A accounts.

The average salesperson is comfortable meeting with one or two key contacts in the “A” accounts. These contacts know us, we know them, and it’s easy to be content with that. However, the best salespeople understand that if we only have one or two key contacts, we are vulnerable.

There is always someone else who should know us, someone else who should have a relationship with us and our company. Sometimes those are people who are up the ladder from our key contact: Our contact’s boss, and the boss’s boss. Sometimes those are influential people within each of the departments or operating units of the organization.

Regardless, the more of them that know us, the more solid is the total relationship with that account, and the more opportunities are presented to us as a result.

Our ability to fully understand the dynamics in an account is dependent on the depth of our relationships within that account. Each relationship brings us a different perspective and a deeper awareness of what the account really wants. We will never fully penetrate an account unless our relationships are broad and deep.

The best salespeople, the top guns, understand that. They methodically make lists of the key contact people, and systematically meet and interact with them.

As a result, they are well known within their A accounts, they uncover more opportunities, and they write more business. That is why they are the best. And that’s why this is a best practice of the best salespeople.

Image “01 (49)” by Victor1558 on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Competition in the online CRM software sector is intense and growing as more players seem to enter the space every day. While companies like Microsoft Dynamics CRM and Salesforce.com CRM are mainstream players that are trying to be all things to all people, several other CRM software providers are now challenging these companies with similar offerings that have been designed specifically for small to mid-size businesses.

One of these products is Commence CRM from Commence Corporation. What makes Commence appealing to this market sector is the product’s ease of use and lower price points.

Let’s face it, small to mid-size companies just do not have the comprehensive requirements that enterprise programs like Microsoft Dynamics CRM and Salesforce.com are designed to address. As the enterprise market became saturated, both companies introduced a version of their product for smaller businesses at a reduced cost. But lowering the cost does not reduce the complex nature of the offering. So what you have here is a product that’s just not the right fit for the SMB sector. For most small to mid-size businesses, the biggest challenge is getting people to use a CRM system. Make it hard and forget-about it, you’ve thrown money right out the window.

Commence CRM has been designed specifically for small to mid-size businesses. The company has been providing customer management software to SMB’s for more than two decades. It’s their core competency. I am not suggesting that Commence is a better company or product than Microsoft Dynamics CRM or SalesForce.com,  just a better fit for this segment of the industry. Commence CRM  offers a number of advantages over other CRM players serving this sector. In addition to having a large customer base and a successful track record spanning 20 plus years, the company uses a world class data hosting service and has experienced personnel that provide an array of professional services to its customers. These services have been instrumental in ensuring that Commence customers realize the maximum value from the CRM software. Learn more about Commence CRM features or signup for a free test drive.

Image by Timothy Vollmer on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Commence is addressing this challenge by coupling a set of services and best practices with the company’s CRM software. The services include helping companies create targeted marketing campaigns that are generated and executed right from within the CRM software. Once the leads are generated they are color coded and placed in specific categories which automatically determine how they will be managed going forward. Highly qualified leads are immediately turned over to the sales team. Others are placed in an automatic “drip marketing” program that automatically sends information to these prospects on a pre-set timetable – traditionally weekly, monthly or quarterly.

The lead management process is highly effective and ensures your sales organization is focused on new business opportunities that have a chance to close in the near term. The remaining leads are automatically nurtured by the Commence CRM system.

Commence offers an array of professional services that have served to differentiate the company from competitive CRM firms that only sell software.

Everyone knows that the CRM software industry is highly competitive with companies like Microsoft making a whole lot of noise and spending millions of dollars to market their solution. So how does a smaller player like Commence Corporation continue to make a name for itself and win decisions over this industry giant? “It’s easy if you understand what you provide and your competitors do not” says Tom Gibson, sales manager at Commence. “Of course some people are always going to make their decision based on name recognition, but Microsoft’s reputation in the CRM sector is sort of ‘good company, so-so CRM product’ and it has been this way for years.”

Commence is a pure play CRM solution provider with a mature product that has been designed specifically for small to mid-size businesses. The company has serviced this sector of the industry for more than twenty years and is highly recognized for having a top rated product and outstanding customer service.

“We know this market well” says Gibson “and we have a CRM solution that addresses the requirements of the SMB sector. It offers comprehensive functionality, is easy to use and affordable. Where we differ from other companies, especially Microsoft CRM, is in the level of value added services we can provide to customers. Small to mid-size businesses are looking for a partner not a vendor when it comes to CRM software. They often rely on the value added services that Commence provides. In addition to instructional training these services include sales training or implementation of a structured sales methodology, customization, system integration and the design and execution of marketing campaigns. Commence has a staff of people with experience in sales management, marketing and customer service. They have completed hundreds of CRM system implementations and are instrumental in ensuring that our customers realize extensive value from our product.”

“Microsoft CRM is sold through value added resellers and while I am sure many are very good, they simply do not have the in-depth experience with the product that we do with ours, nor can they offer the scope of value added services Commence can. This all leads up to a successful implementation and a high return on investment for our customers” concluded Gibson.

Commence is a cloud based CRM system that operates online and is sold and supported directly by Commence Corporation.

Image by JD Hancock on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

These are incredibly difficult times for sales people.

Competition in almost every industry continues to intensify.  At the same time, customers seem to expect more and more service and demand lower margins.  Most markets are rapidly changing, and it’s hard to keep up with the changes in technology and products.

Customer’s demands seem to be a moving target.  Sometimes it seems like the lowest price is all anyone is interested in, while at other times they talk about the need for trusting relationships and partnering with vendors.

            These rapid changes are a mark of our times.  In fact, if anything, the indications are that the rapid pace of change will continue.

            Consider this.  In 1900, the total amount of knowledge that mankind had was doubling about every 500 years.  Today, it doubles about every two years.  And the pace continues to increase.  One futurist predicts that today’s high school students will have to absorb more information in their senior year than their grandparents did in their entire life.

            That incredibly rapid pace of new knowledge drives the forces of change at an unprecedented rate.  It’s almost as if a malevolent spirit were stalking our economy, rendering all the wisdom of the past useless, and casting a spell of confusion and uncertainty over the land.

            As a consultant, I work with executives and sales people in a variety of industries.  And almost invariably, during my first interview with a new client, I hear words something like this, “You need to understand that things are changing very rapidly in our industry.”

            I do understand, because I see things changing very rapidly in virtually every industry with which I work.  And the indications are that this rapid state of change will not be a temporary phenomena we all must live through.  Rather, it will be the permanent condition we must accept for the foreseeable future.

            Howard Stein said, “All I know is, things don’t work like they used to work.  So don’t plan on doing anything based on the past.”

            But rapid change is only one of the forces that is surging through our culture and contributing to the uncertainty of our turbulent times.

Relentlessly Growing Complexity

            In every direction we look, we see the world becoming more complex.  On a world-wide basis, the evening news is dominated by reports of wars between countries we didn’t even know existed a year or two ago.  The Soviet Union was one entity a short time ago.  Today it’s incredibly more complex.

            Closer to our own lives, we see our markets splintering into more and more fragments.  Products, energized by the explosion in knowledge and new technologies, are becoming increasingly more complex.  For example, can you imagine a piece of equipment today that doesn’t have a computer somewhere in its innards?

            The services we buy and sell are becoming more complex as computer capabilities are folded into services of all types, and providers respond to the market demand for personalized service.

            For example, a few years ago we had one number to call for our phone service.  Today there are so many vendors of various phone services that we need to employ people just to deflect their incoming calls.

            Unfortunately, the trend toward growing complexity in every area of our business also shows no signs of weakening.

            The business environment in the near future, therefore, will continue to be characterized by rapid change and growing complexity.

            All this means that the skills, strategies, and tactics that have served you well in the past may be becoming obsolete.  But here’s an even more sobering thought – because of the rapid rate of change, the new skills and tactics that you develop today may well be obsolete in just a few years.

            That means that in order to deal with these difficult times, sales people need to be able to continually change what they are doing.  They need to absorb new information created by our changing world, review their tactics in light of it, and change their behavior in positive ways.

            In other words, they need to continually learn.

            The ultimate self-improvement skill in the 90s and beyond, is the ability to master “self-directed learning.”

            When most of us hear the word “learning” we often associate it with formal school, or perhaps seminars and company-sponsored training programs.  While these are all means of facilitating learning, they don’t capture the essence of the ultimate self-improvement skill.

            Self-directed learning is the ability, on the part of the individual, to absorb new information about the world, and to change one’s behavior in positive ways in response to it.  The key is behavior change.  Learning without action is impotent.  Knowledge that doesn’t result in changed action is of little value.  Constant change in your behavior is the only reasonable response to a constantly changing world.

            Self-directed learning differs from the traditional approaches to “training” in that it requires the individual to assume complete responsibility for his own behavior change.  The stimulus for the learning must come from the individual, and he/she must develop his own learning program to expose himself to new information, and to change his/her behavior appropriately.

            Let’s look at two fundamental areas of a sales person’s job in order to see how the need to “learn” is critical.

Products

            The explosion in information has led to technological innovation and change at a dizzying rate.  This means that new products are coming into the market – every market – more quickly and more regularly than ever before.

            The competent sales person can no longer rely on his/her product knowledge.  The product that is today’s hot new seller will likely become an obsolete dinosaur within a couple of years.

            So, sales people must acquire the skills of constantly learning about new products and new technologies.  There will be a continuous string of new language to learn, new features to understand, and new applications to new needs on the part of their customers.  How long ago was it that none of us knew was a “486” was, or what to do with a “CD?”

Markets

            On the other side of the selling equation, the markets – our customers – are changing just as rapidly.  On one hand, there is a great deal of change in the names and styles of the players (Wal-Mart instead of thousands of independent businesses), while on the other, every industry is becoming more complex as the trend toward specialization creates a kaleidoscope of market segments in place of the homogeneous markets with which many of us grew up.

            Sales people will have to continually refine their interactive skills and deal with each customer as a unique individual.  That will require them to learn more intently about their customers and the processes which are most effective with them – a never-ending challenge.

            At the same time the world is changing rapidly for ourselves, it is changing just as rapidly for our customers.  One day it seems that the lowest price is the only concern.  While the next day they talk about long-term “partnering” with trusted suppliers.

            The competent sales person not only has to keep up with changing customers, but also customers who change in their needs and demands.

Preparing to Master Self-Directed Learning.

            Proficiency at the ultimate self-improvement skill demands some new competencies from sales people.  While the specific skills are too detailed for this article (my book “Menta-Morphosis” describes a systematic approach to “self-directed learning” in detail) we can describe some of the qualities needed to enable a person to become an active self-directed learner.

            First, they must have an attitude of “pro-active” responsibility for their situation.  In other words, they must believe that their actions have consequences, and that in order to change the consequences they must change their actions.  This sounds so fundamental as to be ludicrous, yet it seems to be a concept that is foreign to situations on forces outside themselves.  As long as we remain a victim of someone else, we have no responsibility to change our own behavior.

            So, sales people must accept the responsibility for their own behavior and for the consequence of that behavior.  As one of my clients said to me, “If you always do what you always did, you’ll always get what you always got.”  Therefore you need to change what you do, if you expect different consequences.

            Next, sales people engaging in self-directed learning need to have an openness to new information.  Probably one of the sure harbingers of pending failure is the attitude that you know it all.  Sales people who will continue to improve themselves understand that they don’t ever have all the answers.  There is always something new to learn.  And, like magnets, they’re continually searching for new ideas, new perspectives, and new information.

            And finally, they need to be able to follow through on their plans.  They must have the ability to act on decisions they have made, and become creatures whose actions arise out of conscious thought rather than unconscious habit.

            Given this set of attitudes, a sales person can begin to master the procedures and disciplines that will characterize him/her as a “self-directed learner” and equip him to be successful in our turbulent times.

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved

Image “Change” by busy.pochi on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Image “Lifelong Learning” by Carol VanHook on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Got your attention haven’t I and isn’t this exactly what small businesses want to hear?  It sure is and it’s the “tag line” of the majority of CRM vendors who sell to the small to mid-size business community.  Why?  Because it’s the only way to sell to this segment of the industry and it works.

No one wants to hear that they have to invest time in training or customization to address their business requirements.  The darn thing should just work out of the box and make my organization a more efficient sales and service organization.

The Myth of Low Cost CRM

Thousands of small to mid-size businesses have jumped on the CRM bandwagon due to the plethora of low cost CRM systems that you can simply download in minutes over the internet. Despite documented reports that as many as 70 percent of these companies fail to realize any measurable results they continue to buy these programs anyway.

What is it about CRM software that leaves this false impression – that you can improve how you market, sell and provide service to your customers by simply buying an online CRM system over the Internet?   More importantly what makes smart people believe this?

The Truth about CRM

Here are a couple of facts to think about…

Fact: CRM software is a tool

Not unlike a hammer or saw, it requires people to take hold of the tool and do something constructive with it.  By itself the tool does nothing.

Fact: Easy CRM is not the same as Functional CRM

If the CRM software you select is incredibly easy to use, it probably will not provide much value to you.  Certainly if you’re looking to simply get rid of your Excel spreadsheet and get a database of accounts and contacts you will be fine. But if you require much more than this then forget-about-it.

A Successful CRM Implementation is More Affordable than you Think

One CRM software firm that is having a great deal of success in the small business CRM sector is Commence Corporation.  Commence offers an affordable online CRM solution that has proven to help small businesses improve sales execution and customer service, but it’s not downloadable over the Internet.

In addition, Commence strongly suggests that its customers take advantage of the company’s expertise in sales, marketing and customer service by engaging in what Commence calls its on-boarding program. The on-boarding program ensures that Commence customers realize immediate value from their solution. The program engages the professional services team at Commence to tailor the CRM system to meet your unique business requirements and then train your staff on CRM workflow automation.  It’s a small one time investment that returns measurable results and has helped catapult Commence to a leadership position among small to mid-size businesses seeking customer relationship management software.

Image “Hard at Work” by Will Vanlue on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Select a CRM Vendor Committed to Your Success

As an executive of a company servicing the Customer Relationship Management software sector, CRM has become a bit of an oxymoron for me.  I believe that building long term business relationships with your customers requires a commitment to providing quality products and great customer service.   This traditionally involves reaching out to your customers and engaging with them so that they realize the maximum value from your product.

But many small to mid-size companies and CRM vendors that service the SMB sector just don’t see it this way.  The vendors prefer that you just buy their product over the internet. If you need assistance send an e-mail and they will get back to you when it’s convenient for them. The buyers seem to feel comfortable with this and often hold the position that if I need assistance using your product, then it’s too hard so I’m not interested.  It’s almost as if they view CRM software as nothing more than a commodity.

Your CRM Success Needs Your Commitment

Interestingly enough industry reports have indicated that there is as much as a 70% failure rate among CRM implementations.  This is far worse than any other segment of the software industry.  Much of this occurs in the SMB space where companies never get off the ground and as a result discontinue the service.

You could place the blame on the CRM software providers for developing products that are too hard to use; or perhaps the management of the company that purchased the system for failing to properly match their business requirement with the vendor’s offering or assign a champion who’s in charge of the CRM system. I blame the management and here’s why.

The CRM sector is crowded and highly competitive, with several hundred solutions ranging in price from free to more than $200 dollars per user per month.  Most of the offerings targeted at the SME sector offer basic functionality and as such are very easy to use so this is not the problem.  Furthermore, they are designed to offer limited to no customization so that the customer can’t get themselves in too much trouble. This is because with price points of free to $15 per user per month the vendor cannot afford to hire the resources to provide customer service.  So when you see CRM products offered for free — no contract, or go month-to-month with no commitment, they mean it.

The real problem lies with the management of these small to mid-size businesses that have limited resources, are stretched thin and often do not understand that in order to improve how they market, sell and provide service to their customers they have to do more than download a cheap piece of software over the Internet.  This commodity mentality is what I believe has led to the high failure rate in the industry.  So how does this change?

Successfully Implementing Your CRM Solution

First, the management needs to agree that No Commitment – Means No Results.  The first task is to make a commitment to put someone in charge of the CRM process. A champion who will document the business challenges such as ‘we need to improve lead generation‘. Then focus on finding a CRM solution that will address these challenges and a CRM vendor who can provide advice, counsel or value added services that will ensure results.

CRM is a two way street and you need to feel comfortable that the vendor has the staff and experience to make a commitment to your success. As I stated earlier you won’t get this by putting your credit card over the internet. This does not mean you have to mortgage the business to find a quality product and company that can deliver both at an affordable price. There are several good ones and you may be surprised to find out that the difference between a low cost CRM product and a CRM solution provider offering the value added services you need may be less than you think.

About the Author:

Larry Caretsky is President of Commence Corporation, a leading provider of online CRM software for small to mid-size businesses.  Caretsky is considered an expert in the field and has written numerous white papers on the subject and the book, Practices That Pay – Leveraging Information to Achieve Selling Results.  All are available from the company’s web site at www.commence.com

Image by Piero Fissore on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

CRM software offers an array of automation that can meet this challenge, but smaller businesses have one disadvantage larger firms do not, and that’s resources.   Due to the low cost of newer online CRM software programs that you can purchase and download over the internet, smaller business have been purchasing CRM software in record numbers and failing just as quickly with them.  Why?  The answer is simple. They are not prepared to make the investment to ensure that the CRM system gets properly implemented and utilized.

Becoming a more efficient sales and service organization isn’t just about buying a CRM system.  It’s about automating internal business processes that in many small businesses don’t exist.  So now you have a CRM system and don’t really know what to do with it so it becomes shelf-ware.  In addition, many of the lower cost CRM systems offer only basic functionality which is why they are so cheap.  Businesses that select these free or low cost solutions are often quickly disappointed when they cannot meet their business requirements.

One of the leading small business CRM companies that services the small to mid-size community is Commence Corporation.  “What has made Commence CRM a leader among small businesses is not just the software” says Tom Gibson, the company’s sales manager, “but the value added services we provide. Many of the firms that select us are looking for guidance in establishing a structured approach or methodology for managing leads and the sales process.  It’s new to them and a sales process has to be established first before it can be automated.  Our professional services staff can help customers implement business processes in sales, marketing and customer service. Because the software is so flexible it can be tailored to meet unique vertical industry requirements and ensures that new business processes are adopted by the customer’s staff.” says Gibson. “The impact is substantial and is often the difference between realizing a return on investment and shelf-ware.”   To learn more about Commence CRM, visit the company website at www.commence.com.

The one concern that does exist is that the number of business applications designed specifically for the Mac is far less than for the PC and in some areas there is a large gap.  One business segment that has experienced this is the CRM or Customer Relationship Management sector.  While there are some programs that support the Mac, they require additional add-on or plug-in software which is often more costly and can be problematic.

Commence Corporation is one firm that has addressed this need with a CRM solution that runs natively on the Mac. This means there is no add-on or plug-in software required to utilize the program.  Commence CRM even integrates with e-mail on the Mac which is one of the most sought after integrations when using CRM software. Another key feature that has made Commence CRM a popular choice for Apple Mac users is that Commence operates in a mixed environment, on both Mac and PC.  It’s quite common to see a combination of PC and Mac in small to mid-size businesses today and Commence has got it covered.  If you have a 100% Apple Mac environment or a combination of Mac and PC take a look at Commence CRM.

Leads are the bread and butter of every company. Properly capturing and managing leads can make the difference between closing more business or wasting time on tire kickers.  Despite this, most small to mid-size companies do not have an efficient process for lead management and conversion.  The good news is that they can.

The process of capturing, managing and converting leads can be easily addressed using online CRM solutions like Commence CRM.  Commence is a lead management solution that automates the process of lead management and lead conversion.

Leads can be generated from multiple marketing channels such as trade shows, direct mail, e-mail campaigns, customer referrals or cold calls.  Once captured, systems like Commence classify the leads by placing them in individual buckets. This allows you to determine which of your marketing campaigns is producing the best results.

Cold Leads categorized by Marketing Source and color-coded ranking

The lead management tool then helps to qualify each lead by color-coding them according to pre-defined criteria. Leads can be red for hot, yellow for warm and blue for cold.   The color-coding serves two functions.

• First, it ensures that your sales team is working on qualified new business opportunities; those colored red.
• Secondly, it enables you to take the warm and cold leads that are not ready to make a decision or engage with your sales team and place them in an automated lead follow-up program.

Automated Lead Followup

The automated lead follow-up system sends out a marketing email message on a weekly, monthly or quarterly basis. The message can contain product information, customer testimonials or news clips for example about your product or service. This ensures that these warm and cold leads are being nurtured without robbing valuable selling time from your sales team.

Commence CRM is recognized as a top 10 solution for small to mid-size businesses. What differentiates Commence CRM from competitive products is a combination of unique product features coupled with an array of professional services.  “Smaller businesses want to compete with the same tools and business applications as the big guys” says Larry Caretsky, president of Commence Corporation. “With Commence they can, but there is one thing big companies have that the smaller ones do not, and that’s experienced resources.  Smaller organizations often have limited resources in the marketing department and may not have seasoned sales managers or customer service personnel.  Commence has an experienced team of marketing, sales and service professionals who provide advice and counsel to our customers. This ensures that they realize the maximum value from our CRM software and get a measurable return on their investment.  Few companies serving the SMB sector can offer this” says Caretsky “and it has resulted in improved business performance for our customers.”

Commence CRM is utilized by small to mid-size firms across numerous industries and is functionally competitive with both Microsoft Dynamics CRM and Salesforce.com. Companies that have selected Commence CRM have indicated that the product’s user interface, cost of ownership and quality customer service were driving factors in their decision.

To learn more about Commence, contact the sales department at www.commence.com and ask for your free trial.

Image by Russell Davies on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Article By Dave Kahle

Q.  Mr. Kahle, was there ever a time in your sales life that you just decided to be the best?  Or was it something that you have always had?  I started a business a few years ago, and need to take it to the next level.

A. Wow.  What a good question.  I have honestly never been asked that before, nor have I ever thought about it.  So, your question prompted a whole new area of thought for me.

I’ve been fortunate in my sales career to have been the number one sales person in the nation for two different companies in two different industries.  I’ve had other successes in almost all of my jobs.  My firm, The DaCo Corporation, is today one of the most successful of our type of business.

Having said that, your question prompted some real introspection and reflection.  Thank you.

Let’s begin by defining the terms.  First of all, I rarely compared myself with other people.  So, when you use the words “the best”, it wasn’t that I wanted to achieve more than other people.  Instead, I wanted to become the “best” that I was capable of becoming.  So, my motivation has always been to make the most of the opportunities and gifts given to me.  It was never to be better than someone else.  “The best” was never a statement relative to my standing with other people.  It always was an internal goal, relative to the situations in which I found myself.

To this day, I continue to think that way.  For example, I spend very little time comparing my company and my personal progress to others.  It’s not about me (or us) relative to others.  It is always about us, relative to who we are, to the opportunities that present themselves to us.

I think that is an important distinction.  My standards and goals were always internally derived, and never defined in terms of other people.

Here’s another thought.  To be the “best” connotes a fixed position.  When you are “the best” you have arrived.  The race has been won, the prize achieved.  I have never thought in those terms.  To me, it has always been a continuous, never-ending process.  I am certainly not the best that I can be, not by a long shot.  My company has not “arrived,” nor will we ever.  We continually strive, however, to become ever-better.  The focus is on the journey and the process, not the end.

One more thought.  While the concept of becoming the “best that you can be” may make sense in a general, long-range, lifelong perspective, I have always found my motivation to be more urgent and within reach.  In other words, while I could understand and assent to the general rule to “become the best that I could be”, what motivated me on a day to day basis, and still motivates me, are the immediate opportunities and challenges.  In a practical sense, I have not been motivated to “be the best that I could be in my life,” rather I have been motivated to do the best with the opportunity and situation which I see in front of me.

Since your question really speaks to core motivation, I feel compelled to share that with you.  We both realize that this Ezine focuses on sales and sales management concepts and situations.  I have no desire to stray from that focus.  However, because my core motivation is such an integral part of my approach to everything, I can not ignore it.

I am a committed, born-again Christian.  That commitment, and the growing relationship that I have enjoyed with Jesus Christ, has been by far the greatest impact on my performance.

It is a basic premise of Christianity that each Christian is given certain gifts of talent and abilities and is expected to use them to the fullest.  It is also a basic tenant that each Christian is given responsibility for jobs and people, and is expected to effectively manage that which he/she has been given.

It is from those basic Christian values that my motivation proceeds.  I view every talent that I have as a gift from God, temporarily entrusted to me to make the most of it.  I view every employee in my organization in a similar vein.  I view every client and every participant in every seminar as opportunities put there for me with which I must do the best I can.  It is my responsibility to bring as much value to them as I can – to have the greatest positive impact on them that I can, within the constraints of the time and situation.

From a sales perspective, I view every customer and every opportunity as specifically entrusted to me.  I must do the best with whatever opportunity and challenge I have in front of me today.  I must maximize every opportunity and our impact on every person.

Understand, also, that this represents an ideal to which I strive.  I fall far short of implementing it perfectly.  However, even though I often fail to do everything as well as I would like, it keeps me on my game, focusing on the process and the journey.

Whew!  I have waxed philosophically.  I hope it has been of benefit to you.

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved

Image by Julie Rybarczyk on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Customer Relationship Management is all about maximizing the long term business relationship with your customers. In order to do this you need to ensure that you become efficient with how you market, sell and provide service to your customers. The problem here is that this is a significant challenge for most small to mid-size businesses, who often do not have the resources or experience to become a more efficient sales and service organization. Those who foolishly believe that a good CRM system will address this requirement have found out the hard way that it won’t and are now frustrated that a year has gone by with little to no change.

The fact is that online CRM software programs have proven to be an excellent tool for facilitating change and helping you to improve sales execution and customer service, but like an automobile that’s driven by a human being, CRM software doesn’t work by itself. It’s driven by experienced people who understand business workflow, sales process management and can manage change.  Well what if you don’t have these people?  Does this mean you can’t become more efficient or improve your internal business processes?  Of course not and in fact the availability of experienced resources is one of the key components that is now differentiating one CRM software provider from another.

Commence Corporation for example has been providing customer management software to small and mid-size businesses for more than two decades and while in the past businesses selected Commence CRM for its  powerful feature set and flexibility, today it’s an array of professional services that’s making the difference.

“We’ve got a top rated CRM solution” says Larry Caretsky, President of Commence Corporation, “but it’s the value added services that we provide that is making the difference for our customers and for our business.  We have a staff of sales, marketing and customer service personnel that average 20 years in the business who are filling the resource gap and providing substantial value to small and mid-size businesses at an extremely affordable cost. This team has helped companies establish business practices for managing the sales cycle, created target marketing campaigns, improved lead generation and lead qualification and implemented an automated ticket management system for improved customer service.  No other CRM software provider can offer this level of service to the SMB community” says Caretsky, “and it is the difference between a failed CRM implementation and providing a return on investment for our customers.”

Image “UX Help” by Betsy Weber on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Step 3 – Value Added Services

Some businesses seem to think that CRM software solutions are like an appliance.  You simply plug them in the wall and they work, but this is just not the case.  CRM software does not run your business, people do. And if you are a small to mid-size firm chances are you have limited resources and may not have experience in critical areas such as sales process management or marketing campaign management and that’s alright.

Previously I wrote an article called “Don’t Fly Solo with CRM Software”.  What I was referring to is the fact that if you are serious about improving your internal business processes and effecting change, you are going to need help from the CRM solution provider. In fact, you should expect it.  These guys are in the Customer Relationship Management business, aren’t they?

Self Service for Simple Solutions

The challenge here is that not every vendor can offer value added services.  Certainly the low end small business solutions do not.  As we discussed these “out-of-the-box” systems are designed as pay as you go programs. You put your credit card over the internet and away you go. But let’s be fair here.  Due to their low cost how could these companies afford to provide any level of service?

Full Service for Complex Systems

If you have narrowed your search to one or two Enterprise level solutions you can bet that these companies can offer an array of services from full on-site implementation to customization and integration with disparate systems like accounting and ERP.  Big companies have complex requirements and understand they are not simply purchasing a piece of software here. They are looking for a partnership.

Professional Service for Diverse Solutions

The mid-market sector is one where you will find the most disparity.  Some CRM solution providers offer an array of value added services and some offer none.  Remember what I said earlier.  If you expect to realize the full potential of any CRM solution you will need to rely on the expertise and value added services offered by that vendor.  Don’t fly solo!

A high quality CRM solution provider will offer not only implementation support and training services, but sales process methodology, marketing campaign management to assist with brand recognition and lead generation, service ticket management and web site integration services.  These guys can help you to not only maximize the value of your CRM solution, but to also become a more successful sales and service organization.  Isn’t this the reason you are looking for CRM software?

I truly hope my Three Step Approach to Differentiating CRM Software has been of value to you and will help you to feel good about your decision.

About the Author:

Larry Caretsky is President and CEO of Commence Corporation, a leading mid-market provider of CRM software.  Caretsky is well regarded as an expert in CRM software and has written numerous articles on the subject including;  Back to Basics, CRM an Executive Perspective, 7 Points to Consider Before Making a CRM Decision,  Don’t Fly Solo with CRM Software, and an e-book, Practices That Pay – Leveraging Information to Achieve Selling Results.  These articles and additional information about Commence Corporation’s CRM Software are available from the company’s web site at www.commence.com

Image “Cube” by Wyerthfali on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Image “mirrorigami” by Elod Beregszaszi on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Image “Kusudama with a message” by Simona on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Price without value

As a provider of online CRM software for small to mid-size companies most of the businesses we deal with have one thing in mind when it comes to CRM software and that’s price.  It’s the first question that is asked which is a clear indication that the cost of the software may be more important than the value the software actually provides.

Seems a bit silly doesn’t it? But it’s true and it’s the primary reason so many small to mid-size companies fail with CRM.

Small businesses cannot attract or maintain experienced sales or marketing personnel and that’s ok, but no CRM software program on its own is going to address this problem.  What will address it is a CRM software provider that can provide an array of sales and marketing services as part of their overall CRM solution.  You will not however find this with the typical low cost out of the box solutions that you purchase over the internet.

CRM solution providers like Commence Corporation, have done an excellent job of differentiating themselves by providing a software solution that is complemented by an array of services that fill the gaps the customer cannot.  These services include marketing campaign management, lead generation services, and automating the sales process.   The results are measurable and include targeted marketing campaigns, better quality lead generation and a significant improvement in the management and reporting of the sales process.  This is what a quality CRM solution provider will offer.

If you are firmly set on improving how you market, sell and provide services to your customers you need to be willing to invest your time and money to engage this level of expertise. If you are not, and price is the driving factor for engaging in CRM, re-think your decision. You will be glad you did.

Image ‘#price without #value’ by Francesca Romana Correale on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

There is, in the world of professional salespeople, a significant group of salespeople who cringe at the prospect of someone working with them, and who shun every such opportunity.  These salespeople are more comfortable in anonymity.  They want to exist under the radar screen of those who could help them improve.  I believe that they understand, somewhere deep within their psyche, that they are far from the best at their jobs, and they realize that someone working with them will quickly see their deficiencies.  To hang onto their job, they avoid exposure at all costs.

Fortunately, that’s not the mind set of the sales masters.  They believe just the opposite – that there is always something to learn from someone else, and that people who can coach and mentor them are to be sought after and nurtured.

That’s why this is a best practice – a consistent effort of the best salespeople.  They seek opportunities to be coached and mentored.

Coaching, in all professions and walks of life, is a growing phenomenon.  It’s easy enough to understand.  As the demand for productivity grows and the pressures to do more, be more, and accomplish more mount, thoughtful and serious people understand that someone else can often see things in their performance that they can not see themselves.   That’s why Tiger Woods has a swing coach, for example.

It is why even those who are at the top of their profession need an outside observer to detect their flaws and unintentional lapses from time to time.  The greatest athletics would not attain the height of their achievement without their coaches.  So true of the world class performers in any endeavor. Actors, musicians, athletes, CEOs, and yes, even salespeople, can attain higher levels of achievement and performance by availing themselves of a coach.

There is not one field of human endeavor where the practitioner can’t be helped by a coach.

The best salespeople understand that, and continually seek out opportunities to be coached and mentored.  It’s one of the characteristics of the best.

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If you are serious about improving your productivity, you need to learn how to do that.  Consider The Sales Resource Center ® where we have best practice assessments, and 455 learning units, all delivered 24/7 on-line, and designed to help you sell better, manage better and lead better.

Copyright MMXII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved

Image “Coaching” by Sarah.E.Binder on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Step 2 – System Architecture and Hosting Service

If you agree with the above and have found that the features and functions of CRM systems within a specific category all appear similar, then you will have to make your decision based on other criteria. The good news is that you should be doing this anyway because what I am going to discuss is equally important in making the right decision for your company.

Most people pay little attention to the system architecture or the hosting service provided by the CRM vendor.  This is simply because they do not understand the impact this can have on their business. The system architecture is of critical importance for companies that expect to realize growth in the number of users and the volume of data they capture, store and share with people within their organization.  We can say with confidence that Enterprise CRM solutions handle this quite well, where “out-of-the-box” systems simply do not.  Of course I am not talking about businesses of 10 people or less, but instead about mid-size and larger firms where this has and will make a difference.

System Architecture

There are two components to system architecture.  First, the platform itself is traditionally Java or in the case of Microsoft CRM their proprietary .NET architecture.  Both are excellent proven platforms for scalability and performance.  So if the vendor you are interested in is not based on one of these two platforms this may be a reason for concern.  But there is more to performance than a scalable platform.  There is the software itself and its ability to take advantage of the platform.  You may have heard some of the horror stories from customers who were trying to do queries or searches that took 20 minutes to run; or those who were trying to generate quarterly or annual reports and when they failed to print, the vendor suggested that they run the report overnight.  Ouch!  This is a sign of an immature system that was not designed for maximum performance.

If you’re a small business you need not worry about this, but if you are expecting to grow and add people and functionality to the system, you will want to make sure the CRM system you select has a proven track record for addressing growth in the number of users, number of transactions and database size.  Don’t be afraid to ask the vendor what the architecture of their system is and how well the system responds to large data queries and reports.

Hosting Service

Another equally important component of your decision process should be the hosting service itself.  If you are considering a cloud based solution, remember that the vendor is storing, hosting and managing your data and that this is typically done by a third party provider.  Find out where is your data is, who is managing it, what type of backup and recovery procedures the vendor has. Also ask how you can get access to your data if there is a disaster or if you wish to terminate the service.  Hey – for all you know your data may be inTimbuktu.

Congratulations, in Step One, you selected the category of CRM vendor best suited for your business and now in Step Two you narrowed down your choices to 2-3 vendors.  Don’t miss Step 3 which is equally important to your decision and will help you to differentiate your top choices even further.

Image “Cold Aisle” by Phil Windley on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

First, and I know this may sound strange, forget about consultant reviews or Google searches you may have done for the top CRM or best CRM systems.  Vendors pay for these reviews, for Google listings and for their position on these search pages. So when you see a particular company listed in the first few positions on the page this simply means they paid more than the other vendors.  Some people are comfortable with this and will simply select two to three of the top vendors listed and make a decision for one of them.  If you feel that this is a good way to select the best solution for your business that’s fine, but stop here.  My three step approach won’t help you.

There is an interesting correlation between the CRM sector and the automobile industry in the following way.  They both have a targeted audience (or profile of the company or person they want to sell to).  Ferrari for example, has a targeted audience and so do General Motors and Kia. The CRM sector is no different and just like the automobile industry the products and value added services they offer have been designed and priced for a specific audience.

Of course every vendor will claim to have a solution for you regardless of your size or requirements. But if you analyze the myriad of CRM solutions that are available today they almost always fall into one of three categories:

1)      Small business solutions

2)      Mid-market products

3)      Enterprise solutions

Step 1  – The 3 Classifications of CRM Solutions

The first step in this process is to know thy-self.  Take a moment to fully understand your business and what you are really trying to achieve then document it.  You’ll see why in a few minutes.  This does not have to look like the yellow pages or incorporate every detail.

I suggest listing the top three challenges you are looking to address.  Perhaps it’s simply data consolidation so that you have a sharable customer data base. Maybe you want to incorporate a structured methodology or process for managing leads and the sales cycle. Maybe it’s much more.  It does not matter — just get it down on paper so that you can match your objectives to one of the three categories above.

Let’s take a brief look at each one of the three categories.

Small Business CRM

CRM solutions that cater to the small business community offer basic functionality and are often referred to as “out-of-the-box solutions”.  The term “out of the box” simply means what you see is what you get.  There is a core set of functionality, but little more and there is nothing wrong with this.  These are self-service commodity products that are inexpensive and perfect for the start-up company or small business that simply wants to manage contacts, add activities and notes, tag e-mails and perhaps view a sales pipeline.

Small business CRM offerings may be purchased over the internet.  You put your credit card in and you are ready to go.  Don’t expect too much in the way of customization however.  You may be able to add a few custom fields, but you are not going to get security or role permissions, full search capabilities, ad hoc reporting or analytics at this level. And you can’t simply call and talk with a representative about your specific business requirements.  Customer service is traditionally only available via e-mail.

Mid-Market CRM

For companies that need more than account management and a sales forecast there are several good mid-market products offering functionality that rivals many of the more costly enterprise solutions. Unlike the out-of-the-box solutions described above, these solutions allow for a high level of customizability and an array of value added services that help you realize the maximum value from the solution.  Mid-market CRM solutions traditionally offer a suite of applications including robust sales and lead management, marketing campaign management, customer support, a document library, quoting, project management, analytical reporting and the ability to integrate data with other third party solutions.

These products are traditionally offered in different versions so you can start small and add functionality as needed. They are designed for companies that are serious about improving how they market, sell and provide services to their customers.  You will need to take ownership of them and assign an in-house system administrator to work in conjunction with the solution provider.  These are not programs that you buy over the internet and they traditionally require an annual agreement for utilization.

Enterprise CRM

Enterprise CRM systems are obviously designed for large corporations, and large companies traditionally have comprehensive and complex requirements.  Many are multi-national which means they require multi-language and multi-currency support, scalability to several thousand users, comprehensive security and role permissions and a system architecture built for high performance and high transaction levels.  Integration with third party solutions such as accounting and EFP systems is a must have, and so are value added services for global implementation support, system development services, system integration, disaster recovery and more.  This is a whole different level of product and support services than outlined above.  So if you are a large or multi-national corporation, your selection of product category is easy.  You need an Enterprise CRM system.

Now that you have a good understanding of the three classifications of CRM software take a moment to review the requirements you wrote down and compare them to the three categories above.  At this point you will have narrowed down your search to a “category” of CRM providers, but we have more work to do.

In Step 2 of the report we are going to take a look at something most people pay little attention to – the quality of the cloud hosted service provided by the CRM vendor and how their platform can ensure high reliability and system performance.

Image “Mama Bear, Pappa Bear, and Baby Bear” by HiddenJester on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

“Ready, shoot, aim.”  Unfortunately, that’s the all too common description of the field sales person’s modus operandi.  In a misguided attempt to stay busy and see as many people as possible, too many sales people subscribe to the theory that any activity is good activity.

There was a time when this was true.  Customers had more time, sales was a simpler job, and any conversation with a prospect or customer was a good thing.  But times have changed, and the job of the sales person has become much more complex.  The pressure on the sales person to make good decisions about the effective use of his time has never been greater.  Sales people now must confront an overwhelming number of potential “things to do,” and that requires them to make decisions about which customers in which to invest their time, to prioritize their activities every day, and to continually choose from a menu of possible activities.  In other words, sales people must now engage in strategic planning.

Not that this is new.  There have always been sales people who have regularly planned strategically for the effective use of their time.  It’s been a characteristic of superstar sales people and highly effective sales forces.  For that small percentage who do it instinctively, or are encouraged to do so by their management, it’s as much a part of their routine as brushing their teeth in the morning.

Unfortunately, that describes the minority of sales people and sales forces in the world.  What was a practice of only the best has now become a requirement for everyone.  Most sales people have never been trained in the best practices, processes and disciplines which will set them apart from the pack.  In this case, that means that most sales people have never been exposed to the principles, processes and disciplines of effective strategic planning.

Creating the best Strategic Plan

Let’s define our terms.  A strategic plan is composed of a set of measurable goals, coupled with a list of the most important, most effective things you (or your company) can do to reach those goals.  A strategic plan is not a detailed action plan.  That comes later.  The plan itself is often limited to no more than two or three pages.  The idea is to identify the highest priority and most effective.  Too much detail defeats the purpose.

Strategic planning is the process of thinking about your job (or your company) in such a way so as to develop your strategic plan.

Creating a strategic plan for your company always involves a dedicated chunk of time devoted to the process.  So, too for a strategic plan for a sales person.  Creating a strategic plan for your company always involves some preparation, and a gathering of the best minds in the company.  So, too for a sales person’s strategic plan:  Preparation, and a melding of the ideas of the sales person and his/her manager.  Strategic planning for your company always involves the discipline to adhere to a formalized process.  So too for a sales person.

With your company, the creation of a strategic plan is often an energizing, inspiring event, from which everyone leaves optimistic and full of confidence, assured that they have identified the goals, plans and tasks that will bring them the best results.  And that is exactly the benefit for a sales person creating a strategic plan.  Sales people spring up out of the strategic planning process confident that they have identified the most effective focus for their action, that they have identified the highest priority activities.  They emerge confident, focused and optimistic, ready to take on the world (or at least their customers) with renewed vigor.  And that’s a good thing!

How to go about it?

1.  Set aside, once a year, a significant amount of time dedicated to the task. 

I’d suggest at least a full day or two.  The date of the strategic planning session should reflect the sales person’s selling situation.  Sales people vary in their seasonal “busyness” depending on the industry to which they sell.  For some, a time towards the end of their fiscal year might be in order.  For others, a time at the end of their busy season.  For most, a time around the Christmas holidays works best.

One of my clients brings all his sales people into the office for a planning retreat once a year.  In another, sales people come together for an annual goal setting and strategy developing retreat.  At this three-day event, they meet with their sales manager and create specific goals for the year.  Then, together with the manager, they jointly develop the overall strategy for achieving those goals.  If your company organizes such an event, good for you.  If not, then you need to do it yourself.

2.  Find a space where you can work virtually uninterrupted.  

This may take some creativity.  I doubt if it’s your company office.  It may be your home if you have a room in which you can seal yourself.

One year, I was one of two people responsible for leading an organization.  The two of us drove to a state park, climbed in the back of my old conversion van, and worked in the back of the van all day long.  We were isolated and uninterrupted.

3.  Gather the materials you’ll need:  all your account folders, account profiles, your company’s goals for the year, information about key products, services, or categories, computer print-outs of last year’s sales, maps of your geographical territory, and anything else you may want to review.

4.  Immerse yourself in the process. 

For the duration of the planning, don’t do anything else other than emergency tasks.  You want to focus your thinking on the strategic decisions you’ll be making.  Any interruption will disrupt your thinking.

5.  Focus on what you are going to produce in this planning event – the output or result of your efforts.  You are going to create these things:

1. A set of sales goals for your territory.
2. A well-defined ABC analysis of your customers and prospects.
3. Individual goals and strategic plans for each of your key (A) accounts.
4. A basic territory plan.

Sounds arduous, and it is.  But, when you spend disciplined, focused time thinking about these things in detail, you will find it to be much easier than it sounds.  You will prepare the best, most effective plans of which you are capable, and that will free you to implement effectively when you are in the field.

Later in the year, you won’t be tempted to head out on Monday morning without a clear plan in mind, because you have spent this time formulating the plan.  And when the press of customer problems and inquiries threatens to overwhelm you and force you into becoming too reactive, you’ll be held on track by the goals and plans you created in your planning discipline.

Outcomes

Let’s consider each of these four outcomes of your planning retreat.

1.      A set of sales goals for your territory. 

Your work should lead you to a series of sales goals for your territory.  In order to get there, you must first determine the categories of goals that you are going to create.  It may be that you work for a company that has already determined this, like my clients described above.  If so, good for you.  If not, then it will be up to you to determine your own set of categories.  Depending on your unique set of products and services as well as your company’s emphasis, you may create goals for the following, most frequently used, categories:

1. Total sales
2. Total gross margin
3. Number of units
4. Total sales per product category (dollars, gross margin, or units) for each of several categories of product or service you sell.
5. Goals for acquiring new accounts.

This is just a list of the most common sales goals.  You can have a virtually unlimited variety of goals.  The categories of goals are up to you, your company, and your manager.

I’d suggest no more than five categories.  Remember, one of the reasons you create goals is to help you focus your energies on the most important issues, and thus become more effective.  More than five goals defeat that purpose.  Too many goals cause you to diffuse your energies, not focus them.

Let’s illustrate.  Assume that I sell sophisticated cleaning equipment and supplies to three different market segments: manufacturers, school systems, and shopping malls. My product line consists of a series of heavy-duty floor cleaning machines and the associated supplies used by those machines.  I select the following categories to create goals:

1. Total sales.
2. Total number of cleaning machines
3. Total number of “Superscrubbers,” our new, high-tech machine.
4. Number of new accounts.
5. Total sales of supplies (as opposed to equipment).

Now that you have determined which categories on which to focus, you next need to create specific numbers for each.  This is where the art comes in.  You consider your company’s goals, you consider your understanding of what the market is doing, you factor in your best understanding of what your competitors are doing, and you consider your customers’ situations, as well as your situation.  Out of this comes your best attempt to predict a result that will cause you to stretch, but not be unreasonable.

I prefer to look at each account individually, think about it, and determine its likely contribution to each of the categories.  Examine each account, analyze the potential, consider your situation, and determine a realistic goal.  Go on to the next account, and do the same.  Then compile each of the numbers from the specific accounts, and presto!  You have an annual number.

Back to the example.  Let’s say we’ve done this, and come up with a set of annual goals that look like this:

1. Total sales = $1,765,000
2. Total number of cleaning machines = 71
3. Total number of “Superscrubbers”  = 16
4. Number of new accounts = 10
5. Total sales of supplies = $1,000,000

Now you are ready to move on to the next step.

2.  A well-defined ABC analysis of your customers and prospects.

            When it comes to strategic planning for sales people, one of the most important strategic exercises is determining in which accounts you want to invest the bulk of your sales time.  Too many sales people become very reactive in their decisions, responding to whoever happens to be on the other end of the phone.  Others find themselves in a route-type rut, mindlessly traversing their sales territory out of habit.

The cure to both of these issues is to strategically think about the potential of each account, and then to rank each account into one of three categories based on its potential.

I describe a system to do this in Chapter Six of my book, 10 Secrets of Time Management for Salespeople.

The result of this exercise is to have graded each of your prospects and customers as either “A” (highest potential), “B” (medium potential), or “C” (low potential).

3.  Individual goals and strategic plans for each of your key (A) accounts.

            If you are in the kind of selling position where you are attempting to sell more to certain key accounts, then you need to create specific, monthly strategic plans for each of those key accounts.  For now, let’s assume that you have prioritized your accounts and that you have a list of your “A” accounts.

In the typical sales territory, around 50 – 80% of your business is going to come from this group of accounts.  That means that these accounts warrant special attention, special preparation, and special thought.  You ought to apply the disciplines we have already discussed to your “A” accounts.  In other words, create annual sales goals for each “A” account, and think about how you are going to do that, one account at a time. .

4.  A basic plan for your territory.

You have, at this point, decided what you want to do (your goals), with whom you want to do it, (your ABC categories), and how you are going to do that (your key account plans).

Now, it’s time to put all this thinking together into an implementation plan.  This is your basic plan for the use of your sales time.  Where are you going to be on Monday?  How will you manage that trip to the outer reaches of your territory?  When will you schedule office time?

Lay out your basic schedule of how you are going to travel your territory.  Make sure that you focus your time and attention on the A accounts, and that you work in time for the achievement of all your goals.

When you have done that, you will have created a sales person’s strategic plan.  This annual exercise in discipline and thoughtfulness will serve you well, guiding you to the most effective use of your time, and keeping you focused on those activities that will bring the greatest result.  And that is well worth your time.

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved

Image “The Posters are BACK!” by Kyle Van Horn on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Series of images titled “Strategic Planning Meeting” by Michael Cardus on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Article By Dave Kahle

Q.  Are sales people made or born?

A.  I field this question, in one form or other, in almost every seminar I do.  Just heard it again yesterday in relationship to the competency of building relationships.  The questioner opined that building relationships was a natural talent.  You either had it or you didn’t.

One of the things I’ve learned over the years is this:  On some issues, the person’s opinion says more about that person than it does the subject of his thoughts.  I’ve found that to be true in regards to the question “Are sales people made or born?”

Nature vs. Nurture

Those sales people who have learned on their own, who have never been trained in the best practices of the best sales people, have a tendency to hold that sales people are born.  After all, no one taught them.  So the degree of success that they have attained must have been a result of natural talent.

On the other hand, those sales people who were nurtured in a company that trained and developed them hold the opposite opinion.  They saw that there are best ways of doing almost every thing a sales person does, and that most people in their training class were able to learn to do those things.  So from their perspective, sales people are made, not born.

So where do I fit on this issue?

First, it helps if you have a basic set of personality characteristics and aptitudes to begin with.  Some people are just not suited to the job of the sales person.  That’s why we sell pre-hire aptitude assessments – to measure the aptitude of the individual for a sales position.  But, just because someone has the aptitude does not make him/her a good sales person.  And it is unreasonable to think that most sales people are going to learn the best practices on their own.  They must be educated in the best practices of the profession.

That’s where the “making” of a good sales person comes in.  It is an unfortunate truth that the overwhelming majority of sales people have never been educated in the best way to do their jobs.  And, those companies who invest in the regular and methodical development of their sales forces generally out-sell those who don’t.

The position that sales people are “born” becomes then, for many companies and sales people, an excuse for not investing in their development.  If sales people are “born”, then no amount of education will change their behavior.  So, why invest in developing sales people?  And, from the sales person’s perspective, why invest in developing yourself?  You can’t learn anything, because, after all, you either have it or you don’t.

The concept that “sales people are born” then becomes a rationale for abdicating responsibility.  That position absolves the company of the responsibility to invest in developing sales people, and it absolves the individual sales person of the responsibility to learn and grow and develop.

It helps if you have a natural talent for it, but everyone, given a basic set of aptitudes and personality traits, can learn to sell.  Sales people are made and developed, not born.

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Images from the “Seven Principles of Learning” series by Darren Kuropatwa on Flickr under Creative Common license.

Maintains good records about customers by using an ‘account profile’ and ‘personal profiles’ for every account.

It is the Information Age.  That means wise and effective sales people collect, store and use good information about their customers and prospects. That information provides the salesperson with a competitive advantage, is invaluable for planning for the best use of his sales time, and allows him to be much more effective in his sales calls. 

In this day of CRM systems, hand-held devices and smart phones that make information management so easy, it’s a wonder that I even have to mention this, but the sad truth is, there are still sales forces that don’t use any kind of automation tool for salespeople.  And, even in those who do have some kind of electronic system for information management, a considerable portion of the sales force doesn’t comply with the company’s directions for collecting information.

            These salespeople realize that information – particularly information about the specific opportunities within an account and the quantifiable potential of every account – brings with it some accountability.  If account X has this much potential, for example, what are you doing to acquire it?

            It is that accountability that frightens the information-leery salesperson.

            But not the sales masters.  They understand that specific, useful information about every account – the kind you would collect and put into an account profile – is valuable, not only for the salesperson, but also for his/her company.  They welcome the accountability that rises out of information, as they understand it helps keep them sharp and focused.

            Even in companies which do not have a system-wide electronic approach to information management, the best salespeople create their own tools, and discipline themselves to rigorously use them.

            That’s why this is a practice of the best.

For more information about this best practice:

•     Read chapter six of Transforming Your Sales Force for the 21^st Century.
•     Read chapters three, four and five of How to Excel at Distributor Sales.
•     Read chapter three of Take Your Sales Performance Up a Notch.

If you are a subscriber to The Sales Resource Center®, review Pod-43: Managing Information Before it Manages You, and Pod-45: How to Collect the Right Kind of Information.

Copyright MMXII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved

 Image by Victor1558 on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

The mobile device market is booming.  2012 will be the year that mobile devices, specifically tablets, end up as holiday gifts for more people than ever before. While many of these tablets will be used mainly as social media devices, more and more companies are beginning to outfit their field sales and service personnel with tablets for business use.

What does this mean for CRM solution providers?  Well cloud based CRM providers like Commence Corporation are paying very close attention to the mobile explosion and understand that the use of these devices for business purposes will continue to grow.

The challenge for online CRM providers like Commence is to ensure that the data is not only accessible from any device, but is also properly formatted for that device.  To support this Commence CRM requires nothing more than an internet browser to access customer information. Secondly, Commence has resized the software to meet the size and space limitations of the mobile device industry.  Today’s next generation Tablets for example range in size from 7, 8, 9 or 10 inches in diameter.  Data displayed on a 10 inch screen may not format properly on a 7 inch screen unless it is resized for that device.  Commence has ensured this so that users can properly conduct business on any size device.

One of the other nice features of Commence CRM is that mobile access is free with every edition of the product.  Now that’s something no one will complain about.  To learn more about Commence online CRM software visit the company’s web site at www.commence.com.

Image “Apple iPad 2″ by IntelFreePress on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

The problem with relationships

By Dave Kahle
In the B2B world, the relationship between the customer and the vendor, and more specifically, the vendor’s sales person, can be of utmost importance.

It doesn’t take long in the business to understand that if the customer dislikes you, he is rarely going to see you.  And if he does know you and trust you, he is more likely to do business with you.

Creating positive business relationships with all of your customers and prospects is, then, a fundamental step in the path toward success for any B2B sales person.

Having said that, the existence of positive business relationships is one of the primary hindrances to success for the typical field sales person.  I know that seems like a contradiction, but let’s dissect how this works.

See if this doesn’t sound familiar.  The typical field sales person, when presented with a sales territory, naturally attempts to see as many people as possible, and sets about building relationships with some of them.  Since he typically has more accounts than he can effectively handle, he naturally tends to spend time with those with whom he has some affinity.  He likes those customers who like him, and he spends more and more time with those with whom the relationship is easy and natural.

Over a few years, these relationships become solidified, and the sales person is content to work with that set of people with whom he gets along.  Given the choice of making a cold call on a prospect, and visiting an existing relationship, the natural inclination is to go where it is easiest.  Relationships coalesce, and the sales person develops routines based on them.

For years, this mode of operation was acceptable.  In a growing economy, most of the customers grew as well, and all the sales person had to do was show up and he’d expect a certain percentage of the business.  Life was good, and the job was easy.

Now, however, most of the customers aren’t growing, and most sales territories are down.  Many of those same customers are struggling to stay profitable.  The sales person’s market, defined as the people with whom he/she has positive business relationships, has shrunk.  In many sales territories, if the sales territory is going to grow, or at least gain market share, the sales person has to look outside of his current relationships.

Sales people, who became comfortable calling on the people who liked them, are now faced with an uncomfortable prospect:  In order to gain market share, they must go where the market is.  And, the market is bigger outside of their relationships than inside of them.  If they are going to grow their sales, and their income, they must reach out beyond their current relationships, and call on people who don’t know them.

Unfortunately, many are hampered by their existing relationships.  They have invested so much time in some customers, who frankly, aren’t worth it, that they can not extricate themselves and devote the time and energy to creating new relationships and new customers.

Their existing relationships are the greatest hindrance to their success.

Some Solutions

Ultimately, there must be a change in the sales person’s routines.  He has to spend less time with those of his current customers who are struggling or of smaller volume, and more time with customers who offer greater potential.

But changing established routines is an arduous task that requires, in most cases, both management intervention as well as willing sales people.

The starting point is for sales management to create specific expectations, measurements, and rewards and consequences for the sales people.  It’s no longer effective to announce, “We need more new customers, guys” and think that will get results.  Changed behavior requires specific expectations, something like “One new customer per month, for the next 12 months.”  It requires regular measurement and mid-term corrections.  Management should be meeting with every sales person, every month, and measuring progress on the expectations.  There should be both rewards as well as consequences.  For example, double commissions for the first six months of a new customer’s purchases will light a fire under most sales people, especially when coupled with a consequence like removing some current accounts from the sales person’s territory.

As a distributor sales person, my territory was cut every year.  I started out with responsibility for 77 accounts, and ended up with a territory of just 17.  My sales grew from nothing to over $5 Million a year.  Each time my territory was cut, my business grew.  I would not have done that on my own.  I would never have volunteered to give up 80% of my customers, but, in retrospect, I’m glad my manager had the courage and conviction to do it.

Once the expectations are created, the measurements put into place, the consequences and rewards fixed and articulated, then management needs to educate the sales people in the best practices of creating new relationships.  Some are absolutely unsure of how to make a cold call, and most have totally unrealistic expectations.  That’s where training and education come in.

You can’t expect people to do something if they have never been educated in how to do it.

Having said all that, you cannot realistically expect every relationship-oriented sales person to change his routines and excel at the new expectations.  For those who don’t seem to be able to make the transition, you’ll have to decide whether they are profitable with their base of customers and reduced sales volume, or whether it may be wiser to find someone new and more trainable.

Don’t let their relationships hinder your business.

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Image by Aunt Owwee on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Q: How often should a sales manager visit the customers?

A.  There are a couple of ways to answer the question.  From one perspective, you need to have your own relationship with the good customers in your area of responsibility. There are several reasons for that.

First of all, you’re a boss – part of the company’s management.  As such, you are perceived to have more power and influence than a sales person.  Your good customers will want to know you, because the relationship with you gives them access to higher levels within your organization.

Additionally, many of these customers will tell you things that they won’t tell the sales person.  They will share concerns, plans and goals that they don’t share with your sales person.

Secondly, you need your own relationship with the good customers so as to provide a back up if the sales person leaves.  In the worst case scenario, if a disgruntled sales person leaves and joins the competition, you need to know who the customers are, and they need to know that you are the face of the company behind the front line sales person.

Notice that the emphasis here is on “good” customers.  I don’t think that you need to know every customer, nor do you need to know the prospects.

Now, back to the question.  How often should you visit the customers?  Often enough to accomplish the above two objectives.  Then, you should visit them with your sales people to support the sales person, to add credibility to his/her presence, and to coach and counsel the sales person on techniques and strategy.

That’s the first answer.  The second answer is simpler:  More than you do.  I have yet to meet a sales manager who spent as much time in the field as he/she would like to spend.  I can almost categorically state that every sales manager should spend more time in the field than they do.

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Image “Business Meeting” by thetaxhaven on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Built into Commence CRM is an automated business process that ensures that the sales team completes a series of questions to determine if the lead is highly qualified, has future potential or is simply a bad fit. The questions and appropriate responses are created by management and are completely customizable.

Lead Qualification in Commence CRM

Based on the responses entered by the sales representative the system will immediately determine how qualified the lead is and enable the sales representative to determine the path forward. Highly qualified leads color coded red require immediate follow-up, while those rated yellow or blue can be placed in an automated marketing campaign of follow-up program. This is also automated within Commence CRM and ensures that those leads that are not highly qualified continue to receive information about the company’s products and services until such time that they become highly qualified or ask to be removed from future mailings. Either way Commence CRM ensures that there is a future path for every new business opportunity and that not a single one falls through the cracks. See more details and a video about this unique lead qualification and scoring solution.

Be smart at renewal time

If you chose a CRM solution over the past 18 to 24 months you may have paid more for that system than you would today.  The CRM software industry that had once been dominated by a few vendors, like Microsoft Dynamics CRM and Salesforce.com, has now become highly competitive and somewhat of a commodity.  In fact, there are now more than 400 companies offering some component of CRM software to the small to mid-size business sector.  This increased competition has caused prices to plummet and the advantage that companies like Microsoft and Salesforce.com once had in the sector has withered away.  Why has this happened?  The answer is quite simple.

When you take a look at the core features that most small to mid-size companies utilize in a CRM solution, they are all pretty much the same. More than 90% of these businesses use a CRM solution to simply manage contacts and customers, keep notes and history, schedule follow-up activities, manage the sales cycle, send documents like quotes and proposals and integrate their e-mail.  And guess what?  90% of the CRM vendors today offer these features.  The gap has closed and what once was a unique but pricey offering from Microsoft and Salesforce.com is now – well just a commodity.

In fact, there is now a sizeable group of quality CRM solution providers who may be a better fit for your business.  Why? Because these newer offerings were designed specifically for small to mid-size businesses versus being scaled down to meet the reduced functionality and cost concerns of the smaller business community.  All of this is good news for the consumer. Upon your contract renewal date you should be able to negotiate a better deal than you have today, especially if you are using one of the higher priced offerings from Microsoft CRM or Salesforce.com.  And if you can’t – see the link below.  It highlights the Top 10 CRM companies to help manage your business.

Top 10 Cloud Based CRM Services

 Image “Money, Money, Money” by Daniel Borman on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Only one out of every twenty salespeople has invested $20.00 or more of their own money on their improvement in the last twelve months.

Amazing, isn’t it?  In a world that demands ever-improving productivity, the overwhelming majority of salespeople are content with their personal status quo.   That is not true, of course, of other professions.  That’s why teachers have in-services, doctors go to conferences, nurses have on-going training, ministers and social workers attend workshops, etc.  Members of every other profession in the world understand that continuously improving yourself is one of the characteristics of a professional.  If you are going to be in the game, you have to play by the rules.  And continuous development is an expectation for every professional.

The sales masters understand that.  That’s one of the things that make them the masters – the top five percent of salespeople.  And that’s why this practice is one of the “best.”

One of the things that I have appreciated about the sales profession is the fact that you are never as good as you could be.  No matter how competent you may think you are, there is always room for improvement.  The best salespeople understand that, and continually and methodically invest in their own improvement.

They read the electronic newsletters, they subscribe to the magazines, they regularly buy a sales or personal improvement book, they attend the seminars, they solicit input from their managers, and they dialogue with their colleagues, constantly searching for another good idea.

They understand this basic truth about sales:  Your behavior is what brings you your results.  Improve your behavior, and you improve your results.  Improve your results and you become more confident and more competent, more valuable to your companies and a better provider for your families.

One of the best salespeople who calls on me happened to mention, just in passing, that he was attending his monthly “master mind” meeting that night.  It is a group of sales people who get together regularly to discuss issues, trade ideas, and support and encourage each other.  Of course.  The best salespeople continually search out ways to improve.  This is just another example.

What is so compelling about this best practice is that it is so easily attainable.  Everyone can decide, right now, to begin to invest in their own development.  Within ten minutes of reading this, everyone can be subscribed to a sales Ezine, or have purchased a book online.

All it takes is the will to make the decision.

Alas, only 1 out of 20 will.  That’s why this is a practice of only the best.

If you would like to methodically expose yourself to the best ideas of your profession, investigate The Sales Resource Center®, where we have 455 learning units to help you sell better, all delivered on-line, 24/7.

Copyright MMXII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved

Image by NCVO London on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Many small to mid-size businesses continue to manage their business using basic contact management tools and an Excel spreadsheet.  They have become so comfortable with this process that they may have overlooked the value offered today through the use of CRM or customer relationship management software.

Why should these businesses consider CRM?  The answer is clear.  In order to respond quickly to customer inquiries and new sales opportunities, follow-up on leads and get proposals out the door your staff regardless of their position needs immediate access to vital customer information.

The strength of today’s CRM software is that it provides you with a single consolidated database that enables you to capture, track, manage and share information throughout the organization. This allows sales and support personnel to become much more efficient and productive in their jobs.

The second reason is that CRM software programs have become very affordable and easy to use.  Online, or what is commonly now referred to as cloud based CRM systems, require no IT investment and there is no hardware or software to install.  Many of these systems are operational in just a few hours or less, and there are dozens of alternatives that have been specifically designed for small to mid-size businesses.

The link below lists a group of the top cloud based CRM solutions.

http://www.cloudtweaks.com/2011/05/10-cloud-based-crm-services-to-help-manage-your-business

Article By Dave Kahle

“He has the gift of gab.  He’ll make a good sales person.”  It’s been a while since I last heard that expression.  The idea is, of course, that sales people are good talkers.  If you are a good talker, you are well on your way to having the necessary qualifications for a sales career.  While that figure of speech isn’t popular today, the idea behind it continues to have currency.

That idea is, like so many other pearls of conventional wisdom, completely and utterly wrong.

Good sales people are not good talkers.  Rather, they are good listeners, good thinkers, and hard workers.

Good talkers generally make mediocre sales people. They commonly delude themselves about their effectiveness, and see their sales calls and customer relationships through a distorted perspective.  Since ‘talking a lot’ is one of their core personality traits, it makes them feel good when they exercise that trait.  Since they feel good, they think the customer must feel the same way, and therefore, it was a successful sales call.

I once made a joint sales call with a sales person who spent two hours talking about a range of subjects.  When he finally left, he hadn’t gotten to the subject of the sales call.  In debriefing after the call, he actually felt good about the call, which was, by any measure, a disaster.

Good talkers often see themselves as the repository for product knowledge, and believe that their job is to disseminate as much product knowledge in the sales call as possible.

I had the ultimate example of this in one of my sales classes.  We were role playing “presenting” a product – what should have been at most a ten minute exchange.  This classic “good talker” turned it into a 35 minute monologue, which ended when I mercifully intervened and called time.  The person playing the role of the customer had actually begun to nod off.

The “sales person” saw himself as a product knowledge expert and good talker.  And so, he lived up to that vision of himself.  I, on the other hand, saw him as a disaster.  In my evaluation after the class, I asked my client to consider whether he belonged in a sales position.

Unfortunately, the large quantity of customer contact that comes with the job of the sales person is an attractive source of ears, and leads a lot of “good talkers” to a career in sales. So, they have a tendency to gravitate to sales careers, where they have lots of opportunities to exercise their personality trait and talk to a lot of people about a lot of things.

Alas, that doesn’t have a lot to do with what makes a sale happen or the processes and skills required to become good at the job.

Good sales people, on the other hand, are better listeners than talkers. They instinctively understand that the customer feels better when he/she is able to share with them what’s on his mind.  In the communication process, the customer’s conversation is far more valuable than the sales person’s, and the best sales calls are characterized by 75 percent of the conversation coming from the customer and 25 percent from the sales person.

Good sales people understand that the essence of the job is to provide the customer what the customer wants, and the necessary prerequisite is to discover what the customer wants in depth and detail.  In this process, you can never discover what the customer wants when you are talking.  That only happens when you are listening.

That’s why “good sales people are good talkers” is one of those ideas that have a debilitating effect on sales people and sales teams.

Image “The Talker” by Jennifer Mathis on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

The Promise of CRM Online Software

“…no CRM system alone is going to fix a sales team that has no sales process, no management and no direction.”

Sales is a tough game and getting harder and harder in this troubled economy.  For sales people it seems like the competition will do almost anything to win business.  This is why it so critical to have an established set of rules in place for qualifying new leads and managing the sales cycle.  By properly vetting leads you can ensure that you are following up on the most promising new business opportunities. Having an established sales methodology or process in place will help define each stage in the selling cycle from introduction to closure.

Frustrated businesses have turned to CRM online software to address this difficult business challenge. They have heard all the promises of growing their sales by 200% within the first few months, knowing what the sales team is doing at all times and producing more accurate sales reports. Much of this is true, but it’s not the software that’s producing better results – it’s up to YOU to establish a sales process that ensures that every member of the sales team is singing out of the same hymnal.

The process for achieving this is not that difficult, but no CRM system alone is going to fix a sales team that has no sales process, no management and no direction.  In today’s competitive arena there are only two types of sales organizations; those that have an established methodology for managing the sales process and those that don’t.  Those that don’t are having a difficult time, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Having an effective sales organization begins with establishing structure.

Putting a Sales Process In Place

You must first outline the process for how you qualify leads or new business opportunities and how you plan to manage the sales cycle from introduction to closure. What CRM software can do here is provide you with a framework for establishing the structure in the following way.  CRM programs like Commence CRM for example provide customers with an automated tool for rating and scoring leads.  The tool rates the quality of the lead based on pre-defined criteria.  If the lead meets the criteria the sales team gets engaged. If it does not it’s placed in an automated following marketing program until it become qualified or drops off.

Qualified leads follow a path which consists of a series of steps or processes which drive the prospect towards closure.  The steps are identified by management and entered into the Commence CRM system. This ensures that every new business opportunity is being managed the same way regardless of which sales representative it is assigned to.  No rocket science here, just a commitment by management to change the way they have been managing leads and the sales process.  The results speak for themselves.  A 200% increase in sales in the first few months? Probably not – but there is no question that performance will improve, you will realize higher close ratios and produce more accurate forecast.

Image “01 (273)” by Victor1558 on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

CRM for Mac

Users of Apple Mac computers have had difficulty finding customer management software designed to operate specifically on the Mac platform.  Some vendors indicated that they could operate on the Mac, but required plug-in software or add-on components that added complexity and caused reliability concerns for Mac users. While more options have become available, internet bloggers and customer forums are recommending an online CRM software program from Commence Corporation that not only offers robust functionality, but operates natively with the platform.  Commence CRM also integrates with e-mail for the MAC allowing Mac users to continue to use the e-mail environment they are accustomed to.

Commence is a top rated CRM solution for small to mid-size businesses that operates via any internet browser and as such does not require any add on software or plug-in components. Commence also offers Mac users the freedom of choice to start small with basic account and contact management. Users can add sales, lead management, marketing or customer service applications at any time during their annual agreement.

The positive recommendations for Commence CRM are based on the company’s 24 years in business, strong customer references and flexible CRM pricing which ranges from $5 to $60 per user per month.  Customers say that in addition to comprehensive functionality, Commence CRM has an intuitive user interface which makes the product easy to use and easy to navigate.

The problem starts with lead qualification.  Your sales team is most likely made up of a few senior representatives, several others with 3- 5 years of experience and some that are just starting out in sales.  Each representative sees a new opportunity differently.  Some think it’s highly qualified while others do not, and that’s the problem.  What I discovered is that the sales representatives who were doing well and delivering new business were doing a good job at vetting each new lead while others were chasing tire kickers.  Knowing this my team and I then embarked on a simple task and that was to create set of criteria for rating and scoring each new opportunity.

We then incorporated the criteria into the Commence CRM system which automated the process and ensured that every sales representative regardless of experience level was qualifying new business opportunities according to a specific set of criteria.  The results speak for themselves.  The team became laser focused on the most promising new opportunities instead of wasting valuable time on those that were not.  Our close ratios went up, our forecast was much more accurate and we realized higher monthly and quarterly revenues.  The Commence CRM software became a simple affordable solution to a difficult business problem.

Image “quality decisionmaking (271/365)” by Allix Rogers on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Q.  How would you suggest I respond when a customer gets abusive and uses profanity with me?

A. That’s a difficult call.  I have had only a couple of these experiences in my career.  Let me do a little thinking out loud (or as it may be, on the computer.)

First, let’s clarify the situation.  We are not talking about a customer whose conversation is routinely laced with four letter words.  In that case, there is no animosity, anger or abuse directed at you; this is just how he/she speaks.  These customers are crude and vulgar, but they are crude and vulgar with everyone, not just you, and there is no negative impact intended.  We all know customers like this.

In that case, we keep our dignity, refuse to lower ourselves to that level, ignore the four letter words and carry on.

I don’t believe that is the situation to which this question refers.  The writer is describing a situation where the customer is verbally attacking the sales person, and using profanity to sharpen his verbal assault.

This is a particularly tricky situation because it moves out of the realm of the purely “professional” and into the realm of the “personal.”  In other words, it is not just about the customer/sales person interaction, it’s about you, personally. It’s not just a “sales person” who is being abused, it is you.  That makes the basic direction of the response dependent on who you are.

Let’s examine that situation.  First, I don’t think your use of profanity is ever appropriate, particularly in a sales or a management situation where you are dealing with people as a representative of your company.  It reduces you to that person’s level, diminishing your stature and reputation.  So, let’s rule out the option of reacting to someone directing profanity your way by spitting it back to him/her.  Responding in kind is, then, off the table.

On the other hand, the option at the other end of the spectrum; to meekly accept the verbal abuse and allow yourself to become the whipping boy for the customer’s vulgarity – to just meekly accept it and not respond to it – is also, I believe, an unacceptable response.  That also diminishes you and makes you seem less valuable and worthy.  So, let’s take that option off the table as well.

We have now narrowed down the range of options considerably, having ruled out the two positions on either extreme.

The issue then becomes persona — one of identifying where your personal lines are drawn.  There are some sales people who would not find this situation upsetting – who have the ability to let it roll off of them and move on to the next customer without giving it a second thought.  There are others who would be devastated, upset and off their game for days.

It really is helpful for you to think it through before you find yourself in this situation.

Where is the line for you, personally?

How affronted would you be?

What would be the emotional impact on you?

Once you have given those questions some significant thought time, you’ll be better prepared to react on the spot.  Here are some possible reactions:

1.  Stay calm; respond to the content of the customer’s remarks, and not to the emotionally-laden language.

2.  Let the customer know that you are personally affronted by his/her language, and try to continue the conversation in a more civilized manner.

3.  Let the customer know that you are personally affronted by his/her language, and leave.

As an experienced sales person, sales manager, sales executive and business owner, I can tell you that I would not have any problem with you choosing any one of the three options, were you a sales person working for me.

Which of those you choose depends on the answers you came up with to the questions we asked above, as well as the variables inherent in the specific situation.  I can tell you in the two of these kinds of situations in which I recall being involved, I chose option two on both occasions.  I also have vague recollections of hanging up on someone who got abusive in a phone call.

The bottom line is this:  You have a right to protect your personal dignity.  Where the line is and what you choose to do depends a great deal on you – your experience, your emotional make up – and the specifics of the situation.  Take some time to think it through beforehand, and you’ll be better equipped to deal with the situation when, and if, it arises.

If you’d like some specific direction on option number two, above, you may want to check out my “Best of Dave” seminar, #15 How to Skillfully Handle Difficult Customers

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Image “News International in front of the Select Committee / Speak No Evil See No Evil Hear No Evil” by Surian Soosay on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Salesforce.com has done an excellent job in establishing themselves as a leading provider of CRM software. They have done it with a massive marketing and advertising campaign and a pretty good product, but this solution is not for everyone and small to mid-size enterprises continue to find it to be cumbersome and simply too expensive. The good news is that like any product or service offered today there are some very good low cost alternatives that are easier to use.

CRM solutions come in all flavors from simple contact managers to comprehensive systems that automate both front and back office business processes.  Most small to mid-size businesses however are just not that sophisticated.  Their focus is traditionally centered on managing accounts and contacts, adding notes and history, scheduling follow-up activity, managing leads and sales opportunities, integrating e-mail and generating reports.  These features are fairly common among CRM providers that service mid-size businesses.  So who are these alternative players?  I will get to that in a minute, but first let’s talk about what makes one CRM solution better than another.

Comparing Alternatives to Salesforce.com

This is a common question that is traditionally addressed by people engaging in a feature function war, meaning who has the most features, but the answer is much deeper than this.  What makes Salesforce.com who they are has a lot to do with the architecture of their product which has proven to support a large number of users with pretty good performance.  The system also supports multiple languages and multiple currencies so if you have hundreds of users and require multi-language and multi-currency support, Salesforce would be a very good solution. But what if you don’t need all of this? What if you have 10 or 20 users, even 50 and have no enterprise level or international requirements?  If this sounds more like your business, then there are some better easier to use more affordable options for you. If you do select Salesforce.com, that’s fine. Just keep in mind that you will be paying a high price for features, functions and a platform that you simply do not need.  I am not referring to the $5 or $15 dollar editions that reduce the product’s capability to nothing more than a basic contact management solution with a sales forecast.  I am referring to the $65 to $250 dollar editions that are twice as expensive as other high quality providers that offer similar functionality.  Add a service agreement and you’ll wonder what you got yourself into when the annual contract renewal arrives. This is not a let’s beat up on Salesforce.com article.  As indicated earlier theirs is an excellent choice for large organizations with multi-national business requirements. But for SMEs there are other good online CRM software products that have been specifically designed for the small to mid-size business sector that have proven to be a better choice.

Top Rated CRM for Small to Mid-Size Business

One of these products is Commence CRM from Commence Corporation.  Commence has been providing customer management software to small and mid-size companies for two decades, has a large customer base and a proven track record for providing a quality product and excellent customer service.  Commence is not an enterprise platform and has no multi-language support at this time, but what it does offer is a comprehensive suite of applications that rival Salesforce.com at half the cost.  In addition to the traditional contact management and sales functionality Commence takes CRM software to the next level, offering  a marketing application, a customer service or help desk application, a document library and project management.  The product also offers good integration with popular e-mail programs.  Customer data can be accessed from a PC, Apple Mac, Tablet or smartphone. Full mobile access is also provided at no additional cost.

What also differentiates Commence CRM however from mid-market competitors is the product’s architecture.  Similar to Salesforce.com, the Commence platform is designed with industry standard components for cloud based computing and is scalable and fast.  Customer data is stored via a strategic partnership with Rackspace, the number one provider of data hosting services in the world.  This combination of functionality and price coupled with a 20 year history and track record for high quality service and best in class data hosting has made Commence CRM a popular choice among small to mid-size businesses.

To learn more about Commence CRM software visit the company’s website at www.commence.com.

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The key to building quality customer relationships is ensuring that all employees have immediate access to the data they need when a customer calls. Today’s customer management software solutions offer the ability to capture, manage and share vital customer information with the people who need it to provide world-class customer service.  Using a single consolidated database of customer information allows both sales and service personnel to access a complete 360 degree profile of customer information including what they purchased, when they purchased it, and if they have had any service history associated with the purchase.  More importantly the information is current and consistently updated by the people who are interacting with the customer.

While some businesses attempt to manage their relationships using Microsoft Outlook and an Excel spreadsheet, the problem is that the information cannot be shared or easily updated.  Sure you can send over a copy of the spreadsheet to your staff, but it will be obsolete ten minutes after you send it and require each staff members to update it and forward it back to all employees. This is quite a task and completely inefficient.

Customer Management software solutions are available for small, mid-size and enterprise level organizations, and are not only affordable but easier to use then they were several years ago.  A simple search of Customer Management Software or Contact Management software will provide you with a list of available companies and systems.

Image “Hi-tech robot vacuum cleaner” by Mark H. Evans on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Timing is everything…

Now, you’re probably thinking you’ve heard this many times before – how being persistent while on a call or making a pitch can improve your results. However, this article isn’t just about being persistent; it isn’t enough to just keep trying. Continuing your sales efforts at the right time and through the right means is how you can increase the performance of your sales and those of your team members. Accurate and efficient lead management with the use of CRM software is how your team can turn things.

Seeing the Numbers

If you’re cold calling or are following up with inbound leads, make sure you’re doing so at the right time and with the right information in your hand. The time it takes you to call is essential. The time of day you choose to call is also important. If you’re calling a business after their working hours, your chances of being successful won’t be very high. Not only does time of day matter, but so does where your prospect is in the buying stages.

• According to a 2011 study by Harvard Business Review, firms that tried to contact potential customers within an hour of receiving a query were nearly seven times as likely to qualify the lead as those that tried to contact the customer even an hour later—and more than 60 times as likely as companies that waited 24 hours or longer.
• In another study, InsideSales found that making 6 calls to a lead creates up to a 90% chance of contacting a lead… but only 10% of reps even make 3 calls (and 30% of leads in the study didn’t get called at all). They also found the best time to respond to a lead is within 5 minutes!
• In a study from Dr. James Oldroyd from the Kellogg School of Management, Thursday was the best day to contact a lead in order to qualify that lead. Tuesday and Wednesday ranked second and third, respectively. Thursday was almost 20% better than Friday, which was the worst day of all. He also found B2B prospects are easier to reach and more willing to talk on Thursday.
• In Oldroyd’s study, the best time to call during the day is early morning (8 to 9 am) followed by late afternoon (4 to 5 pm). The 9 to 10 am slot ranked third, with 2 to 3 pm coming in fourth place.

Make sure your persistence involves following up on various days and on more than one occasion. Just because you may not make contact the first few times doesn’t mean you should abandon the lead. Call until you make contact or reach 6 outreach efforts.

Reading the Data

You want to provide the right information at the right time. Every time you get a lead on the phone, make sure you are ready to provide them with information that will add value to their business or clients. Whether it is the offer for a free whitepaper for research, a new idea on how you can benefit their business or clients or something else, take data from your CRM or sales software to map out buying behavior.

• Pay attention to region. Conduct some research into who you are calling, the region where they are located, and their hours of operation. Make sure you are calling during hours that are convenient for them, not you.
• Look at their industry. Different industries can mean different approaches, times to call and more. Spend some time in your sales tracking database to look for trends in various industries.

Hearing No

Sales teams hear no. A lot. Just because you hear no doesn’t mean you should give up hope. If you have an inbound lead, it’s clear that they displayed some type of interest, even if it was just research. Here are a few questions you can ask an inbound lead who is saying no.

• How they found your site/business. Ask how they found your site or business and you can determine what they were really looking for. You’ll know whether your business can help them or not.
• Why they chose to fill out the form. This is an elaboration on the first question. You’ll get more specifics into what their needs are and what they are hoping to get from your company.
• What their chief reason for saying no is. If they’re saying no, ask why. You may be able to work with them on a better fit solution, product or price.

If you’re hearing no from a cold call, you too should be asking why they are saying no. Don’t take “No” as the end of the conversation. Sales teams can find out whether this contact is worth reaching out to in the future. Update your sales software with the reason why. Just because a prospect isn’t ready to buy now doesn’t mean they won’t be in the future as both your companies grow.

Persistence in sales means approaching leads with something new and valuable each and every call, and making more than one call.

Use your CRM or sales software to see when your sales team has the most success reaching out and after what number of calls. It will vary from company to company, but making multiple calls and varying times and gathering information from prospects can lead to a more successful team overall.

Author Bio:

Erica Bell is a small business writer who focuses on topics such as call center software solutions and lead nurturing campaigns. She is a web content writer for Business.com Media, Inc.

Image “What time is it?” by fotologic on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

While the amount of information can be overwhelming, you can always count on that one report you can’t wait to get your hands on once you see it – “The Top 10 Report”.  Consumers who download these reports feel as if they have hit “pay dirt” or have they?

Top Rated CRM

Today there is a top 10 report for almost any product or service including CRM software. But can you rely on these reports to provide you an unbiased review of the product or service you are interested in?  Unfortunately, there is a reason to be concerned. Why? The fact is many reports charge a fee to be included in them.  This is known in the industry as “pay to play” and has become so prevalent that some of these reports may no longer provide the credibility you think they do. They instead simply list the companies that have agreed to pay to become part of the listing.  This isn’t quite fair to the consumer but this is business and things are not always fair.

Web CRM Reviews

So what can you do if you are looking for a specific product or service, or in this case an online CRM system?  Use the reviews as a starting point then do more homework about the company or vendors you may be interested in.  Check how long they have been in business and how many successful implementations they have done. What kind of customer service can you expect? And if you are focused on online CRM software, where will your data be managed and stored and how can you get access to it if you need to

Social Networking

Another great source of unbiased information is Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. These social networking sites represent the public at large who often provide excellent unbiased feedback about specific products and services.

Image “Gold top 10 winner” by Sam Churchill on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

By Dave Kahle

The best salespeople are systematic in their approach to their job, while ordinary salespeople are haphazard.  That’s one of the reasons why they are the best.

We know that sophisticated routine work is best accomplished by implementing effective systems.  McDonald’s, for example, didn’t get to where they are by hiring the best people they could find and then asking them to figure it out.  Rather, they created a system, and then constantly tweaked that system. That approach applies to every area of human endeavor.  From surgeons to ministers to fishermen to house painters, the routine and sophisticated aspects of their jobs are best addressed with systems.  It applies to sales as well.

There is a best way to sell every combination of products/services to specific markets.  In other words, if you are selling carpeting to independent retail stores, there is a best way to do that.  If you are selling the same product to contractors, there is a best, though somewhat different, way to do that.

Each of these unique combinations of products to markets is what I call a selling “situation.”  In my example, above, selling carpeting to contractors is one situation, while selling it to retail stores is another.

Every selling situation, if it occurs routinely, is best handled by designing an effective system, and then forever improving on the design and implementation of that system.

The best sales companies design sales systems for every situation.  In my practice, I have honestly worked with very few companies who had familiarity with the concept of a sales system, much less a well-designed and effectively implemented one.

So, it often falls on the individual salesperson to design the appropriate system.  This is what the best salespeople do.  They don’t just “go out there and sell something.”  When presented with a product or service to sell, they ask and answer questions which lead to the development of a system.  Here is a condensed version of the “system-building questions” I recommend:

1.  Who is the most likely market (customers) for this?

2.  What problem does this solve for them?

3.  Why would they pay for this?

4.  What is the best way to gain access to the decision makers?

5.  What is the specific process I’ll follow to sell this?

6.  What is the best way to uncover the pain/problem this solves?

7.  What is the best way to present this?

8.  What are some natural and logical concerns they may have?

9.  What is the best way to resolve those concerns?

10.  How long will all this take?

11.  What tools will I need to accomplish this?

Answer these questions, in writing, and you have the beginning of a system.  Now, by working your system, you’ll be far more effective than the salespeople and “go out and make something happen.”  Thoughtful preparation trumps random action every day of the week.

That’s why this is a best practice of the best salespeople.

If you’d like to dig deeper into this practice, download the white paper, How Systems Thinking Can Transform Your Sales Force, or purchase the book,

How to Sell Anything to Anyone Anytime.

If you are a member of The Sales Resource Center®, consider Course C-1: The Kahle Way® B2B Selling System. 

Copyright MMXII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved

Image “Big M – Kuala Lumpur” by Rolling Okie on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Article By Dave Kahle

        Sometimes it is so frustrating.  You know you have a better product than that which your prospect is currently using. Your price is attractive, your service is outstanding.  If the prospect would switch to your solution, you know they’d be delighted.  You’d save them money, smooth out their processes, reduce their inventory and generally make their life simpler.

         So, why won’t they switch?  Are people really that stupid?  Or, is it you?  Did you do something to put them off?

While there are some circumstances where the answers would be yes to the questions above, the most likely answer is something totally different.  The reason they won’t switch is likely not their IQ, nor your deodorant.  It is the risk!

Risk is several things.  First, it is often the number one issue in the mind of the customer, particularly when the account has no history with your company.  That makes it the number one issue to address in the sales process.

Risk is what the customer perceives it to be.  In other words, it’s not anything quantifiable, like the price or delivery of your offer.  It’s not objective or tangible.  Instead it is much more insidious, lurking underneath almost every conversation between you and your customer.  Because risk rises out of fear, risk is often not mentioned.  To acknowledge risk is to admit fear.  To admit fear is, in many people’s minds, to expose weaknesses.  No one wants to look weak.

Risk is the answer to these two questions:

1.   “What happens to the company if they make the wrong decision?”

2.   “What happens to the individual who is making the decision, if he/she makes the wrong decision?”

Risk is the combination of the financial, social, emotional, and time costs that the company and the individual decision-maker will bear as a result of making a mistake.

Understanding Risk

Here’s how I help people in my seminars understand risk.  Two examples.  Let’s say that on the way home tonight, your spouse calls you on the cell phone and explains that some friends are coming over for the evening.  You need to stop at the grocery store on the way home and pick up some disposable cups so that you’ll have something in which to serve the drinks.

You stop at the grocery store, rush in and see brand A and brand B.  You select brand B, scoot through the express lane, and arrive home just a few moments before your guests are scheduled to arrive. Your spouse has a pitcher of Margarita’s mixed up, and you pour yourself one in the disposable cup you just bought.  As you raise it to your lips to take a sip, you discover a leak in the bottom.  You quickly grab another cup, pour the contents of the defective cup into that one, and raise it to your mouth.  Oops! A leak in that one, too.  One after the other, you discover that every one of the cups you bought is defective.

Now, imagine yourself in this situation.  What price are you paying for your mistake?

I don’t know about you, but in my house, I’d be the recipient of some negative emotion from my spouse.  There would be a social and emotional price to pay.  I’d also have to invest additional time, running back to the store to fix the problem with another bag of disposable cups.  And, I’d have to pay for them, so there would be some financial costs.

All of this over a simple little purchase, at which you made a mistake.  Even so, when you compare the risk of this decision with all possible decisions you could make in your life, this one has relatively little risk.  Here’s a simple exercise to help you understand this concept. Draw a short vertical line.  At the top of the line write the number 25.  At the bottom, write the number zero. Now on a scale of 0 – 25, where would you put the risk of buying a package of disposable cups?  It’s close to zero.

Now, let’s compare that with a risk on the other end of the equation. For a number of years, I had an international adoption agency as a client.  Consider a young lady in a crisis pregnancy.  What is the risk involved as she contemplates releasing her unborn child to adoption?  Certainly a lifetime of consequences for at least four people. On our 0 -25 scale, most people would rate it as a 25.  This risk is at the opposite end of the spectrum.

The point here is that different decisions carry with them different degrees of risk.  Now, put yourself in the shoes of the individual who is making the decision to buy your products.  What happens to that person, if he or she makes a mistake?

Now I know you are thinking that you and your company will make it right, so that there really is no risk.  But that’s your perspective, not your customer’s.  He doesn’t know that you’ll make things right.  Even if you say it, he still doesn’t necessarily believe it.

So, put yourself in his shoes, and see the situation through his eyes. On the 0 – 25 scale, how much risk does he accept when he says “yes” to you?

Here’s an easy way of calculating it.  Just ask yourself what happens to that individual if you, or your company, mess up.

Sales Strategies for Reducing Risk

Hopefully, you now have a different perspective on that prospective customer for whom your pricing is attractive, your product is better; your net impact on the customer would be positive, but who won’t buy.  It’s not about the price, it’s not about the quality, and it’s not about the service.  It’s all about the risk!

If the risk to that person is high, the way to make the sale is to reduce that risk.

Here are three strategies for reducing the risk.

1.   Develop a closer personal relationship.

The greater the relationship, the less the risk.  The lesser the relationship, the greater the risk.  That’s why they would prefer to buy a less effective product at a higher price from the salesperson who has been calling on them for years.

         Focus, not on reducing the price, but rather in increasing the relationship.

2.   Make the deal tangible.

The more vague and intangible the purchase, the more risky.  Take all the imagination out of the buy.  Bring them into your facility so they can see that you really do have an office/production facility.  Take them to a location where the machine is being used by someone else.  Hand them certificates of warranty instead of just telling them.  Show them pictures of the product being used.

Look at every aspect of your offer, and think about how you can make this piece more tangible and objective.

3.   Use Proof.

What is “proof?”  Someone else, other than you, saying something about your product, company, or service.  Proof is letters of recommendation from other customers, photographs of other customers using your product or service, testimonials, case studies, lists of clients, third party studies, copies of articles from trade journals, etc.  Anything you can find that in any way adds substance by someone else, even if it is remote and only distantly connected to your offer, will go a long way to reducing the risk.

The concept of risk and its role in the buyer’s mind is one of the most powerful concepts in the world of B2B sales.  Taking it into account and planning to reduce the risk of every decision will be one of your most powerful sales strategies.

###

About the Author:

Dave Kahle is one of the world’s leading sales educators. He’s written nine books, presented in 47 states and eight countries, and has helped enrich tens of thousands of sales people and transform hundreds of sales organizations.  Sign up for his free weekly Ezine. A great source of specific tools to help you with this issue is Dave’s book, Question Your Way to Sales Success. Check it out here.

Copyright MMXII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Image “Worried!” by Alon on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

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Image “Danger Style” by thethreesisters on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

]]> http://www.commence.com/blog/index.php/2012/10/10/thinking-about-sales-its-all-about-the-risk/feed/ 0 http://www.commence.com/blog/index.php/2012/10/08/commence-offers-best-in-class-crm-cloud-hosting-service/ http://www.commence.com/blog/index.php/2012/10/08/commence-offers-best-in-class-crm-cloud-hosting-service/#comments Mon, 08 Oct 2012 13:17:52 +0000 Commence http://www.commence.com/blog/?p=3667

Cloud Hosted CRM

Selecting a cloud based CRM solution can be challenging. There are literally hundreds of options ranging from free open source programs to complex enterprise offerings.  While features and functions traditionally differentiate one product form another one of the most overlooked criteria when selecting these systems is the hosting component.  What’s even more perplexing is that fact that many small to mid-size companies don’t seem to care.  Many simply view cloud computing as a commodity.  The cloud is the cloud it’s all the same, but it’s not.

Where and who manages your data may in fact be more important than the CRM software program you select, particularly if you are purchasing a low cost service from an unknown CRM software provider.  The hosting and service component of your decision is very important because if the CRM vendor or hosting service provider goes out of business, you may have just lost your complete customer base.

Mainstream cloud based CRM systems like Commence CRM and  Salesforce.com for example use best in class hosting services that provide back-up and recovery services, virus protection, 24/7 management and even the ability to host your data at more than one location if desired.  These are important decision criteria and often do not cost any more than low cost CRM solutions providers that do not offer this service.  So be smart and make the hosting service a critical component of your decision process.

Image by Intel Free Press on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

CRM software is now regarded as a must have for any size business that sells products or services.  What these software programs provide is the ability to manage customer interaction and share vital customer information with the people and departments that need it to effectively do their jobs.  CRM comes in several flavors from basic programs that provide contact management and sales management to more mature systems that offer lead management and lead qualification, sales analytics, marketing campaign management and customer service applications.

Best CRM for Small Business

One of the most popular CRM systems for small to mid-size businesses is Commence CRM.  Well regarded for its robust functionality and ease of use, Commence is a cloud based CRM system that operates over the Internet. As such, there is no hardware to purchase or software to install and customers can be operational very quickly.  What Commence CRM does best however is that it automates the routine tasks that are performed daily by sales and customer service personnel.  Right from the opening screen or dashboard, sales and support staff can enter new leads, a new sales opportunity, a service ticket, schedule follow-up activity or access the complete profile of any customer.  The speed, efficiency and ease of use of this system is unmatched in the industry and has made Commence a popular alternative to highly marketed CRM programs like Salesforce.com and Microsoft CRM.

Sales Process Management

While Commence offers several unique features in the software, the company’s expertise in sales process management has enabled Commence customers to quickly get a leg up on the competition. The Commence program allows for the implementation of a custom tailored sales process that displays a graphical analysis of where every new sales opportunity is in the sales process. This provides sales management with the ability to be proactive with each new sales opportunity and has resulted in more accurate sales forecasts, higher close ratios and more sales.

Free trials and CRM reviews comparing Commence against other online CRM programs are available on the Commence web site at www.commence.com.

Image by Andrew Wong on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Commence Corporation is realizing a great deal of success with their CRM offering by providing potential customers with an Evaluation Guide designed specifically to review the core features of the product and by highlighting several of the features that differentiate Commence CRM from the competition.  “The value here is that we have made it easy for customers to review our software” says Tom Gibson, sales manager at Commence.  “Each section of the guide starts off with a review or discussion of the feature. This is followed by an actual test drive where the reviewer is provided with instructions to test the feature. The guide has made it easy for customers to see the potential of how Commence CRM can be used within their company to improve sales execution and customer service.  The feedback has been great” says Gibson, “and sales have picked up nicely.”

Commence Corporation serves small to mid-size enterprises with a robust CRM solution that rivals programs like Salesforce.com and Microsoft CRM while being easier to use and more affordable. Commence fits squarely between the low-end CRM programs that provide contact management and a sales forecast but little in the way of reporting and customizability, and higher end solutions that are costly and difficult to use.  Commence is a cloud based CRM offering that operates online over the Internet.  A customer support application along with project management, social CRM and full mobile support has also helped Commence to differentiate their offering in this competitive market space.

Q.  I worked on a large bid for a company with which I had relationships in the past. I knew that we could do a great job for them but I also knew the buyer in charge of the project worked from fear and comfort and it would be a big change for him to turn over about 600K of business to us. I asked up front if we were to put something “special” together for him would we be given an opportunity or just used as a negotiating piece for the current vendor (my old company). I did not get a straight answer, and proceeded to put together an A+ presentation. We found out our program showed an immediate 15-18% reduction in cost. All of our information was given back to the current vendor and they eventually matched our proposal.

My question is: I am considering going over the local and national buyers head laying out the facts to a VP or CEO, not in spite, but to say if we did this on this opportunity what else could we uncover that may be being missed. Also should I have refused to move forward with the bid unless I received some kind of commitment guaranteeing me the business if I were to meet some specified requirement?

A.   This is one of the most difficult issues a B2B sales person faces.   It represents one of the true “lows” of field sales.  We often talk about the “highs” of gaining a big deal, but rarely the “lows” that come with being used and abused.  Unfortunately, almost every sales person has one of these kinds of stories to tell. I can still remember a very similar situation in my experience.  It was a several million dollar piece of business, involving a buying group, and I was left in the same situation you are in – a lot of work done to create a great proposal, and someone else, who had invested nothing, got the business on the basis of broken promises and a few cents difference.  I was used and abused, and to this day, I have bad feelings about it.

Just as an aside, if you were the competitive sales person, you would be bragging about your relationship, and how you got the “last look” and the ability to meet some competitor’s best efforts.  I’ve always had a bit of distaste for that approach, even though a number of sales people consider it desirable.

I’m not sure I have the 100% fool-proof solution to this, but I do have some thoughts to share.

First, let me respond to your specific question:  Should you go over the buyer’s head to a VP or CEO?

I don’t think so.  No matter how careful you are, you are going to look like you are bitter and tattling on the buyer.  You won’t look good, and that will come back to bite you some time in the future.

Now, let’s try to learn from this.  I see two questions:

a.  What to do in this account?

b.  How to prevent this from happening again?

1.  What to do in this account?

If you can pull it off, you may want to find a way to share your view of things with the buyer.  Does he even know that he did something that most people consider is immoral?  He may think nothing of it.  If you can have that conversation with him, it may make him feel a bit obligated to you in the future.

Chances are, though, that is not a conversation you will be able to have with this buyer.  I honestly think, if it were me, I’d pull back and wait for a change in buyers before I put any significant investment of time or energy into the account.

Those of you who have been through my system of rating accounts by potential will recognize that this account is low in “partnerability.”  Hopefully, there are more responsive fish to fry elsewhere.

2.  How to prevent this from happening again?

I’m going to share some thinking with you that you will probably have never heard before.  You don’t want to have this happen to you again.  To prevent this in the future, think about “risk.”

“Risk,” in this particular case, is the fear in the mind of the customer of what might happen to him if he makes a mistake in awarding the business to someone he doesn’t know well.

One of the core reasons why you didn’t get the business is that, in the customer’s point of view, you represented a greater risk than their current vendor.  (By the way, “risk” is one of the biggest issues in the buying/selling interaction.  Check out my article on it, and consider one of my one hour seminars on it.)

This deal sounds like a big one, relatively speaking.  The mistake that you may have made is to pursue a “big deal” in an account where you were viewed as the higher risk choice.  This rarely ends up well, and more times than not, produces a result similar to the one you experienced.  The other company, because of their past relationship, is always seen as lower risk than you.  Since the customer is fearful of the risk, he’s going to find a way to do business with the lower risk choice.

Strategically, the way you make your option look like less risk is to do small pieces of business first, so that you establish some history of performance.  Then, when the big deal comes up, you are operating from a “less risk” perspective.  Alternatively, if you could have broken the $600K deal up into four or five smaller pieces, that could be executed and implemented sequentially, one-at-a-time, you would have had a better chance.  Smaller deals are less risk.

I would generally NOT put much time and effort into pursuing “big deals” with accounts that had little previous experience with my company.  I know they are tempting, but they almost always turn out like your experience — a waste of your time and energy.  You get used and abused.

So, pick your battles carefully.  Don’t put a lot of time and effort into “big deals” unless you have a history with the account, and are seen as a “low risk” provider.  Your time and effort are valuable commodities.  Don’t waste them on opportunities and customers that aren’t worth it.

Hope this helps.

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Image “Do not fear risk” by Leland Francisco on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

1)      They  may not have the brand recognition of larger more established competitors

2)      They may lack the financial and human resources to compete at the same level

3)      Recruitment of experienced sales management and staff can be challenging

4)      The sales organization may not be equipped with the same tools as larger competitors

So what do you do if you are one of these companies?  Well you can fight back by implementing the same tools and best practices the big guys are using to automate the lead qualification and sales management processes.

It’s Time to Fight Back

For years large corporations have been using Contact Management, Sales Automation and CRM software programs to automate the internal processes that impact sales execution. Today these same tools are available to smaller organizations and they have become affordable and easy to use.

I am not however suggesting you run out and buy a CRM system because this is simply a tool to automate your sales processes. You have to have a process in place first before you can automate it, so you may be better served to engage the expertise of a company that can assist you with defining your target market, and creating a process for lead generation and pipeline management.

Lead Qualification and Pipeline Management

One CRM company that has established a solid track record for assisting companies with the above is Commence Corporation.  Commence offers an online CRM solution that is wrapped around a set of best practices for lead qualification and pipeline management.  The best practices for example enable you to determine what constitutes a qualified lead for your business. Once this is outlined, it is quickly automated using a business process automation tool built into the Commence CRM software.  Based on the criteria entered by the sales representative, the CRM system then color codes the lead; red for highly qualified, yellow for needs additional qualification or blue for not qualified at this time.  The program has delivered impressive results because it ensures that your sales team is immediately focused on the most promising new opportunities based on a standard set of criteria and not the gut feeling of the sales representative.

The Sales Pipeline Management feature operates in a similar fashion, with Commence CRM’s professional staff assisting you to define and automate each step in the sales cycle from the initial introduction to closure of the sale.  Graphical reporting illustrates where every single sales opportunity is in the pipeline. This allows sales management to take an active role in assisting the sales representative in moving the opportunity toward closure.

What is unique about Commence is not the CRM software itself, but the combination of using CRM software with a set of best practices, guided and implemented by experienced sales professionals.  It’s a combination that has delivered impressive results.  Commence customers claim higher close ratios and increased revenue within a few months of utilization.   For more information about Commence CRM and its best practices for sales execution visit the company’s web site at www.commence.com.

By Dave Kahle

“Mañana.”  It will wait until tomorrow.

There are times when it is so tempting to tell yourself that, and to actually believe it.  Clearly, sometimes it is true.  However, when we continually put off for tomorrow those things that could and should be done today, we become less effective today.  And while it is true that it is only one day, the truth is that we will never have that day back again.

If we accept mediocrity in our performance for one day, we will never be able to gain that time back, and live that day over.  And a day wasted can easily become another day, and another, and eventually turn into a habit.  Habits turn into character traits, and character eventually determines our performance.

Procrastination, the character trait of putting far too many things off to be done later, is one of the insidious cripplers of sales performance, lurking under the surface of sales performance, and sucking the energy out of a sales person’s performance.

The best sales people guard against procrastination.  They work hard, with discipline, to ensure that every day is spent as effectively as possible.  They recognize the temptation, and build tools, practices and disciplines into their routines to prevent themselves from falling prey to it.

Top 3 Tips to Overcome Procrastination

There are proven tools and techniques to help with this.

One is scheduling appointments as fully as possible throughout the course of the day. If you have an appointment for this afternoon, it’s difficult to put that off until tomorrow.  The best sales people are in the habit of making appointments for at least the first call of the day, as early as they can, and the last call of the day, toward the end of the day.  That way, the temptation to put something off until tomorrow conflicts with the need to stay mentally in the job until you are finally finished.

“To-do lists,” re-organized at the end of every day, with firm priorities and deadlines, is another effective tool utilized by the “do-it-now” group.  By creating a prioritized list of the things that you must do, and assigning deadlines to each of them, you force yourself to confront the necessity to get things done.  By developing this daily  habit, you regularly force yourself to confront the urgency and importance of the tasks in front of you.

And, of course, the regular discipline of developing realistic goals and attaching clearly envisioned rewards to them is one of the most common devices used by the pros to keep themselves in the moment and on top of their games.

The best sales people understand that they need to manage their weaknesses.  They understand that their ability to manage themselves is one of the keys to sustained sales excellence.  That’s why they excel at overcoming procrastination.

If you’d like to learn more about this best practice,

• Read Chapter 12 of How to Excel at Distributor Sales
• Read Take Your Sales Performance Up-a-Notch

If you are a subscriber to The Sales Resource Center ®, view Pod-24:  Motivating Yourself to Excel Every Day; and Cluster CL-86:  Managing and Motivating Yourself.

**************************************************************************************************

For Sales Managers…

Use this rating scale to assess the extent to which each of your sales people evidence this best practice.

-5         -4         -3            -2            -1               0             +1           +2           +3           +4           +5

Comments:  ____________________________________________________________

To help a sales person build this practice into a habit,

a.  Share your assessment with them.

b.  Talk about how that impacts their performance.

c.  Refer them to one or more of the resources listed above.

d.  Ask them to commit to a couple of specific changes.

e.  Monitor their progress at a future, pre-determined date.

Copyright MMXII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved

 Image “Mañana mañana” by toettoet on Flickr under Creative Commons license

Small to mid-size companies often have trouble recruiting experienced marketing and sales management, and often promote from within the ranks. This is fine, but it also means that newly promoted sales managers may not have the experience to create and manage the internal processes that drive improved business performance. They may not understand how to maximize the value they can realize from CRM software. If you are looking to implement a CRM solution, whether online or on-premise, you need to consider the following:

• SALES EXPERTISE – Does the company I am interested in offer any sales or marketing expertise or do they simply sell their CRM software.
• LIVE SUPPORT – Is there a support organization available for assistance with a real telephone number to call or is there nothing more than an e-mail address
• BEST PRACTICES – Does the company offer any documented “best practices” for the implementation and use of their software or are you flying solo?

These questions can be quickly addressed and will make a substantial difference in the value you will realize from the CRM software. Every company regardless of size can use a bit of expertise from their software vendor. It’s important to realize that CRM software does not run your business, people do, but don’t fly solo when it comes to CRM.

Image “Two Thumbs Up!” by Carlos on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

The sales training literature is awash with advice.  Some of it tedious and trivial:  “If he says this, you say that.”  Other advice is grandiose:  “35 new sure-fire closing techniques.” Still other is harmful.  “Overcome that objection,”  as if selling in the B2B world was a contest between you and the customer, with one of you winning (overcoming) and the other losing (being overcome). That’s an attitude that won’t get you far.

All of this advice shares one common element.  It’s incredibly overdone.  There is no one aspect of sales (at least in the B2B world) that undeservedly receives more disproportionate time and talk than the subject of “closing the sale.”

Not that there is no need to “close.”  Every project must come to a conclusion, every offer be resolved one way or the other.  It’s just that, in my experience, closing has never been the result of verbal gymnastics on my part.

It’s not my clever refrains, my slick tactics, my memorized “objection over-comers” nor my manipulative perseverance that has brought me business. Instead, it was the suitability of my offer to the needs/desires/values of the customer.

On those occasions where my offer precisely met the customer’s combination of desires, values and preferences, I got the business.  Where my offer was off, and some competitor’s offer was a closer match, I didn’t get the business.

I don’t mean to imply that every sales opportunity is that black and white.  Clearly there is a lot of grey area in the process.  But, from my perspective, the grey area tipping point was most often the personal factors of rapport, relationship and trust, and almost never the tactical manipulations of the salespeople involved.

I learned early on in my sales career that it was far more important and profitable to “open” the sale precisely than it was to close strongly.  If I spend a lot of time, energy and mental acuity on learning the precise dimensions of the customer’s needs, and if I crafted an offer that matched those precisely, there was very little need for concern about closing.

I realize that I am tramping all over the hallowed ground of a vast number of sales managers, sales trainers and sales consultants.  I am, however, reflecting thoughtfully on my 30-plus years of selling all kinds of things, and my 18-plus years of training and developing sales people.  I believe that most thoughtful salespeople will line up on my side of the issue.

Customer Follow up Steps

All that said, there some principles and simple rules that can give us direction on this issue. Let’s start with our language.  Instead of “closing the sale” let’s first call it “resolving the next step.”  Not only should the project in general have a resolution, but also every sales interaction (a conversation with a prospect or customer), should have as its goal the identification of a next step in the sales process and the natural and logical commitment to that step.

So, for example, when you are seeing a prospect for the first time, the ideal next step is to get a commitment from the prospect for a second meeting. Without that, you have no hope of getting the ultimate purchase order.   To walk away from the sales call without resolving “what happens next” is to leave the sales call incomplete and relatively worthless.

The ideal next step for a meeting when you are collecting information about the customer’s needs is the customer’s commitment to view your presentation of your solution.

The ideal next step following a sales call in which you present your solution is for the customer to identify the next step in his/her buying process, and commit to that.

On and on we go. Every sales call should end in some resolution of the next step in the process, even if the resolution is “no next step with you.”

Notice that in each of these occasions, the definition of the “next step” is a commitment on the part of the prospect or customer to do something that moves the project forward.  Acquiring that commitment, in each and every sales interaction, is one of the habits of the most successful salespeople.  It’s what I term “resolving the next step.”

If the goal is to successfully arrive at the ultimate resolution, the perceptive salesperson understands that the means to that is a step-by-step process. Every sales call is an investment of time and energy on the part of the customer. And every investment of time and energy should result in some kind of an action step. Unless you are so entertaining that the customer looks at his/her time invested with you as a substitute for the movies this weekend, he/she probably doesn’t want to squander his time with you.  He probably wants to accomplish something as a result of his investment of time with you.  The something will take the shape of a “next step” in his process.

So, the thoughtful and effective salesperson recognizes that, and merely asks the customer to identify the next step.  When he does, it’s nailed down with a deadline.  The project moves forward, the sales process continues, and you know exactly where you and the customer stand.

Powerful Sales Strategy

All of that brings us to one the most powerful “resolution” strategies. I call it “Alternate next steps.”  The definition is this:  An alternate next step is an offer made to the customer following the stated or implied rejection of a previous offer.  It always involves a smaller risk on the part of the customer, like plan B.  If the customer agrees to the alternate offer, it always keeps you in the game and the project moving forward.

Here’s an example.  You are offering a one year contract on a product which the customer uses every month.  The customer indicates that he’s not ready to sign that. Instead of confronting the issue, you resolve it.  You offer plan B, an alternate next step.

You suggest, instead, that the customer buy two months worth of the product to see how it works out, and then you and he will get together to assess the benefits of continuing.   Instead of a 12 month contract, your offer is a two month trial.

Does that offer represent less risk to the customer?  Of course.  If the customer agrees to that step, are you still in the game?  Is the project still going forward?  Yes to both.

You see, the reason the customer didn’t say yes to your original offer has to do with his concerns – perhaps issues that have nothing to do with you or your product.  By offering an alternate next step, you reduce his risk, and provide a mutually acceptable way to resolve the next step.  The reason he didn’t offer a positive solution to your original offer has more to do with you missing something in the customer, than it did with your lack of verbal dexterity.

Let’s summarize:

1. Forget “closing the sale.” Instead think, “resolving the next step.”
2. Remember that effective “opening” is the best single tactic for closing.
3. Create a habit of always asking for action as a way to resolve every sales interaction.
4. Develop the habit of offering “alternate next steps.”

If you can execute these four things with ever growing excellence, you’ll enjoy your customers respect, you’ll maintain positive relationships and become far more important to them, and, you’ll far outsell the manipulative “closers” surrounding you.

###

Copyright MMXII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Image “a step in the right direction” by downbeatpuppet on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Q.  Dave, I have been a fan for a number of years, and have a number of your books.  In the last couple of years, I have grown increasingly frustrated.  Why won’t people respond to my emails, return my voice mails, or even see me when I show up in person?  Am I doing something wrong? 

A.  You have asked a question that tens of thousands of other sales people have bouncing around in their heads every day.  I hope the response which follows will be helpful.

First, I can empathize with you.  You are frustrated that people who should be interested in what you have to offer don’t respond to your emails, don’t return your calls, and are hesitant to spend time with you. I can tell you from my personal experience, and conversations with lots of sales people, that you are not alone.  The condition you are describing is shared by hundreds of thousands of sales people.

What’s going on?  First, I don’t think it’s you.  It’s not that they are responding to other sales people’s emails and just don’t respond to yours because they don’t like you.  While that may be the case, (I have no way of knowing) I suspect that it is not.  I hear similar stories, and experience it myself, far too often to think that the problem is you.  It’s not you.  It’s them.

The reality is that things have changed dramatically in the past few years, and will continue to change just as dramatically in the next few years.  Your customers have too much to do, and not enough time in which to do it.  They are being asked to do more, in less time and with fewer resources than ever before.  Blame it on the recession and the relentless development of technology. 

That “too much” label applies to almost everything.  They get too many emails to thoughtfully reply to all but a handful.  They get too many voice mail messages to take the time to reply to anyone that isn’t directly related to a project at the top of their list.  They just don’t have the time anymore. 

They need to be productive, to get today’s project done, knowing that there are dozens of others vying for priority just behind it. So, your emails and phone messages get pushed down the list in favor of something that is top of the mind today.

            So, what do you do about it?

3 Tips to Add Value to all your Sales Calls

Here are some suggestions.  First, let’s think in terms of two classes of people:  Prospects, who have never bought from you, but could; and Customers, who have purchased in the past and know you.

For prospects…

1.  Be visible in the media that they use to do preliminary research on their options. 

A few years ago, most customers would maintain a base of sales people or companies that they knew provided a certain class of solution.  They would see those sales people in order to have some knowledge so that they could make an informed decision when they needed to.  They would allow you the time to identify some issues in their operations or businesses and propose some solutions. 

Today, many of them have replaced that process with searching the web and social media sites to identify the list of players to whom they want to talk, when they want to talk to them.  It takes five minutes to skim a website, as opposed to 45 minutes to visit with you.  It’s not that they will necessarily make a buying decision through these media (although if the risk is relatively low, they may), it’s that they do their preliminary research there.  If you’re not visible in the spaces they choose, you won’t be in the game.

So, do some research.  Find out where they go to make contacts, and put some time and effort in being there.  It certainly should be an attractive, informative website, and it could be certain LinkedIn groups, or Facebook, or even Google Plus.  By the way, in addition to on-line spaces, trade shows continue to be a place where buyers go to find sellers and solutions.  As a seller, they can be a great place to find buyers.  This will increase your chances of receiving a call and an invitation to visit when they have a timely issue.

2.  Do a better job of refining, prioritizing and qualifying your prospects before you attempt to reach them.

A few years ago, you may have had a list of 200 “prospects.”  Today, you will be more effective having researched, qualified and refined that list to a high-potential list of 20. With a smaller, much more highly refined list, your mindset changes. 

Instead of thinking ”I’ll made 30 outbound calls today and see if I can get an appointment or two,” you instead think, “I’ve got 10 people I need to get to see.  How can I do that?”

Your thinking, and therefore the actions that follow that, become less “quantity” and more “quality;” less tactical and more strategic.

This article is too short to address some ideas on how to get to those ten people.  I’d recommend a couple of learning units in The Sales Resource Center™: Cluster Cl-82: Making Appointments, Pod-47:  Making an effective first call, and Learning Action Plan #3: The Four Week “New Customers” Course.

            Now, let’s talk about customers…

3.  Change your mindset when it comes to phone calls, emails and live visits with your customers.

Be cognizant of the value the customer receives from your visit with him/her.  You cannot just “stop in.”  You cannot expect to take your customer’s time, unless you can reasonably expect him/her to get something of value from the time he/she spends with you. 

So, before you make a phone call, send an email and place a live sales call, answer this question, in as a detailed a way a possible, “What value will the customer get from the time he/she spends with this email/phone call/visit?”

This is a long-term strategy.  As you consistently adhere to it, you will gain a reputation with your customers.  As that reputation grows, you will find they will be more likely to meet with you.

When I was selling, I developed a rule which I have tried to stick to ever since.  If I did not have something that I thought the customer would likely think was of value to him/her, I would not attempt to see him.  I wouldn’t see him for the sake of seeing him. Over time, my customers grew to know that about me.  Then, whenever I called for an appointment, they were much more likely to meet with me, because they knew that they would likely walk away with something of value.

In the short term, try to do some of what you would do in a live visit in other media.  For example, email and use webinars to deliver information that you would previously have done in person.  Don’t limit your thinking of webinars as large group presentations. You can do a webinar product presentation privately for just one person.  We do a couple of those every week. Use some of these electronic media to save time for both you and your customer.

There are a number of other ideas that may be helpful to you, that I just don’t have time for in this article.  Let me suggest that you invest $97, buy a one month’s subscription to The Sales Resource Center™, and take this lesson, among others: Pod-48:  How to add value to all of your sales calls.

Unfortunately there is no simple, easy answer to this question.  You are going to have to challenge yourself to learn, change and constantly adjust, with no guaranteed solutions in sight.  This is why they hired you.  If sales were easy, they would have a computer doing it. 

Copyright MMXII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Image “Matthieu on the phone” by Andre Mouraux on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Today’s sales professionals are constantly in a race against the clock. Not only are they trying to close deals as quickly as possible but they are often racing against monthly and quarterly quotas.  The good news is that there are now very good sales management tools available to help shorten the sales cycle. One tool that many sales professionals utilize to help shorten the sales cycle is CRM software.

Sales Management Software

Most CRM systems include the ability to manage the sales cycle from introduction to closure and create alerts along the way if a deal is not moving in the right direction.  There are a couple key features however that some CRM systems offer that will help shorten the sales cycle.

Salesforce Automation

A CRM with a customizable sales process management tool is very valuable to sales professionals.  Tracking potential deals throughout a sales process helps sales professionals track the amount of time it takes to close a deal, forecast when they expect the deal to close and communicate effective messages to prospects based on where they are in the buying cycle. Some CRM programs also offer sales analytics making it easy for a sales professional to get an overview of his or her entire business.

Sales Process Management

Organizational Structure & Decision Making

A CRM with an organizational chart can really help shorten the sales cycle as well. One of the first things a sales professional learns is to get to the key decision maker as quickly as possible. Identifying key decision makers is a huge challenge in sales. An organizational chart makes it easier to see who the executives are in the company and who may be making the final decisions.

Use an Organizational Chart to identify Decision Makers

Shortening the sales cycle is the key to success for many sales professionals. Tools like CRM software are helping sales professionals better manage the sales process and remain focused on the most promising opportunities.

Image “Clock Work Man” by Sean MacEntee on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

By Dave Kahle

The job of the sales person is always a bit of a balancing act.  On one hand, we continually cruise our territory to see what opportunities look the most promising.  We’re constantly scanning the account base to identify that to which we should react.  On the other hand, we also need to be proactive, determining which accounts hold the most long-term potential, and strategizing our approaches to those accounts.

It’s the second part of that equation that is the subject of this piece.  The best sales people regularly (annually, quarterly and monthly) think deeply about their highest potential accounts, and create a step-by-step plan for methodically penetrating them.  That’s the definition of a strategic plan.

Note that the practice assumes some prior work: The sales person has methodically identified the highest potential accounts. That’s a special process all by itself.  In order to do that, he/she has collected meaningful information, analyzed it, and applied some thoughtful criteria to it in order to bubble up to the surface those accounts which offer the highest potential.

Those top 5 to 20 percent have so much potential that they warrant special attention.  And that special attention means a well crafted, constantly reviewed strategic plan.

Typically, these plans involve:

1. A clear understanding of the opportunities within the account.
2. A specific plan for expanding and broadening relationships with key people within the account.
3. A set of short term, as well as long term, objectives for penetration of the account.
4. A specific, step-by-step sequence of actions to follow in order achieve those objectives.
5. Benchmark measurements to which to compare your results.
6. A written commitment.

The best sales people spend time annually reviewing and refining their list of key accounts.  They then spend time either quarterly or monthly defining, in writing, their strategic plans for those accounts.  The resulting document helps them to effectively focus their investment of sales time in those actions which will get the best results.

It’s a matter of “thinking about it before you do it,” one of my ten secrets of time management for sales people.  And that means devoting the necessary time to the task, acquiring the important disciplines, and asking the right questions.

Alas, so few sales people do that.  Of course, that is why this is one of the best practices of the best sales people.

To learn more about this practice,

• Review Chapter Two of the book; 10 Secrets of Time Management for Salespeople
• Review Chapter15 of the book,  How to Excel at Distributor Sales
• Review Chapter Four of the book,  Take Your Performance Up a Notch

If you are a member of The Sales Resource Center®, view Pod-37:  How to Master Key Account Selling, Pod-11:  Managing the Impenetrable Account, and Pod-12:  How to Protect Your Good Accounts from the Competition.

Copyright MMXII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved

Image “Balancing Act” by Colin Harris ADE on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

The Google Map icon is conveniently located on the Account, Lead, and Contact detail screens next to the Postal Code or Zip Code field. Clicking the icon connects to Google maps and displays the location of the customer.

This new feature enables sales and customer service personnel to map the location of an account and plan their travel arrangements accordingly. They may also wish to visit other accounts in the area. For additional information about Commence CRM software, visit the company’s website at http://www.commence.com/.

Commoditization now Helping Competitors

Let’s give credit where credit is due.  Salesforce.com paved the way into the cloud based Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software sector with a unique offering that made good sense for customers who were tired of spending months of time and thousands of dollars struggling to implement desktop software applications.  Being the first company in the SaaS, or software as a service sector, Salesforce.com was able to charge a hefty price for their offering and companies were more than happy to pay it. But that was then and this is now.

Today the CRM software sector has become highly competitive with literally hundreds of vendors offering some component of what is known as CRM.  In fact many industry analysts and consumers of CRM software believe that CRM is quickly becoming a commodity market and I would tend to agree.

CRM Software Pricing

The first sign of commoditization of any market is price erosion.  We have seen this across numerous industries like consumer electronics for example and we are now seeing it in the CRM sector as well.  In fact, over the past 24 months we have seen Salesforce.com repackage their offering on several occasions.  The repackaging is really nothing more than a clever way to reduce the cost to the consumer by offering product editions with fewer features.  But let’s be fair here. The same can be said for Salesforce.com main competitors SugarCRM and Commence CRM. However these companies never had super high price offerings to begin with so they don’t have the same business challenge going forward that Salesforce.com does and that’s customer renewals.

Customers who were once happy to pay premium prices for Salesforce.com’s unique offering may not be so eager to renew at the same high cost particularly when similar offerings from top rated CRM companies like Sugar and Commence offer significant savings.  I don’t think customers will be racing to change CRM vendors, but I do think that Salesforce.com will be forced to reduce the renewal cost to these customers or risk losing them to competitive offerings.  Either way this has got to be a concern for the company.  Of course time will tell.  History has taught us that the commoditization of any product or service is only good for the consumer.  But hey, that’s not a bad thing.

Image “Fruit – Juicy Red Shiny Apples” by Digital Wallpapers on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

By Dave Kahle

One of the fundamental principles that I’ve held to for my career in sales is this:  One of the best things a sales manager can do is make joint sales calls with his/her sales people.

While I continue to believe that, I received an email from an Ezine subscriber some time ago that made me think a bit more cautiously about this.  He identified himself as a buyer, and wrote me about the practice from his point of view – a person on the other side of the desk.  He began by observing that joint sales calls with the sales manager often caused more harm than good.

Here are some of the observations he made, followed by my comments.

The sales managers often come in with a patter that is all positive.  I saw it as B.S.  …. in that they did not really believe it themselves, and both the sales person and I [the buyer] knew that he was ignoring a lot of negatives.

DK – Transparency and honesty are always preferable to B S.  The days of expecting that your overtly positive patter will gloss over real issues and enamor the customer (or the sales person) are long gone.

The sales managers were often not open to taking suggestions, or, if they did, there was no follow up back to the customer.

DK – Could it be that some sales managers are so concerned with their view of themselves as the all-knowledgeable person that they come across as not being open to suggestions from the customers?  One of the reasons for a sales manager to make joint sales calls is to hear it directly from the customer’s mouth.  Sales managers should develop the habit of listening carefully to the customers.

There was often a tension visible between the sales manager and the sales person.  It gave me, as the customer, a feeling that the relationships were rarely what they should have been.

DK – In my career as a sales person, I had a couple of sales managers with whom the relationship could be called “tense.”  Frankly, I tried to avoid having them make joint sales calls with me.  Perhaps it was because I felt the customer would pick up on that tension.  Regardless, this is a sobering observation from a customer which should prod both sales people as well as sales managers to examine their relationships and improve them if necessary.

The sales managers were not aware of the problems that were previously reported to the sales person.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard the “I’ll look into it” answer, and never heard back.

DK – One of the reasons to make a joint call is to let the customer know that he/she is valued by the management of the company as well as by the sales person.  Showing a lack of knowledge of the customer’s issues sends a message that you really don’t care.  And, of course, every sales manager should “do what they say they are going to do,” and follow up with the customer whenever appropriate. That’s Sales 101.

One of the most sobering experiences in our lives occurs when we gain a glimpse of how other people see us.  This reflection by a corporate buyer should cause many of us to stop and consider our actions, attitudes and motivations, in order to take our performance to a higher level.

Image “modern communication skills” by kevin rawlings on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

About the Author:

Dave Kahle is one of the world’s leading sales educators. He’s written nine books, presented in 47 states and eight countries, and has helped enrich tens of thousands of sales people and transform hundreds of sales organizations.  Sign up for his free weekly Ezine, and visit his blog.

Copyright MMXII by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Activity Management CRM

Commence CRM now offers a rich text editor within the CRM system which enables you to make your task list stand out with color and bold formatting. Just select a word or paragraph and change the font, text, color or background. It’s fun, easy to use and allows you to use color to prioritize your task list.

Activity Management view in Commence CRM

The rich text formatting toolbar is available in Firefox, Google Chrome and Internet Explorer, and includes shortcuts to popular styles and formats such as bold, italics, and underlining similar to Microsoft Word.

Task details in Commence CRM are enhanced using the Rich Text Format Toolbar

Easy-to-use CRM Feature Highlights

Shortcut buttons on the toolbar give you easy access to:

• Create lists and step-by-step details with the BULLET and NUMBERING tools
• INDENT paragraphs or OUTDENT paragraphs
• Choose between LEFT, CENTERED, OR RIGHT ALIGNED text for each paragraph
• Insert TABLES to neatly display rows and columns of data
• Place HORIZONTAL LINES in your notes to create sections
• Use the HYPERLINK button to create interactive content right within your activity notes. Add clickable URL links to open an http website, a secure https site, ftp site, news group, and other internet addresses.
• Email addresses are converted to live and clickable MAILTO: addresses, allowing you to quickly send an email message to that recipient.

Drop-downs menus on the formatting toolbar make it easy to set your font, font size, and choose from a variety of font styles and paragraph formats including 6 heading levels!

This activity management feature is just another example of Commence’s commitment to continuing to enhance our CRM software through new and innovative features.

Image “Accessible Communication. It’s the Law!” by Giulia Forsythe on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

All other images owned by Commence Corporation.

Lead Management Software

Inexperienced sales representatives often struggle with lead qualification. Either they fail to ask the proper questions or get caught up in the excitement of a new opportunity and fall into the trap of being led by the prospect.  Either way the result is the same. They end up spending valuable time chasing tire kickers versus qualified opportunities.  This costs your business money in wasted time and lost opportunities that perhaps they should have been working on.

The Commence online CRM software addresses this concern by enabling sales management to automate the lead qualification process.  Built into the sales CRM software is an automated business process that consists of a set of pre-qualification questions that a sales representative must answer before taking any additional action.  The questions are designed to ensure that every new lead is qualified according to a strict set of criteria and not the gut reaction of the sales representative.  It’s a clever program that guarantees every sales representative qualifies new leads according to the company’s criteria.  It also ensures that the sales organization is focused on the most qualified new opportunities.

Sales Management Software

The second area addressed by the CRM software is the management of the sales process. Most sales representatives have a process by which they manage a sales opportunity, but it’s their process which is rarely documented and different from every other representative.  As such, there is no way for management to get a handle on multiple sales opportunities when each representative handles the process differently.

The Commence sales software provides the ability to define each step of the sales process from introduction to closure. This way management and the sales representative have a clear picture of where each new opportunity is in the sales cycle and what the next steps are for winning the sale.  Click the link below to learn more about managing the sales process with CRM.

CRM Online Video: Manage the Sales Process with Commence CRM

Article By Dave Kahle

Q. Help!  I’m so frustrated.  I just attended a “sales training” program that never addressed the real issues that I have to deal with every day.

What causes me problems is not my lack of sales ability, it is my company’s back orders, the lack of responsiveness and competence in my customer service people, and the mistakes in delivery by the warehouse.  Those are the real issues.  What can I do about those things?

A.  Thank you for a “real world” perspective on the real issues that impact the ability of real sales people to do their jobs.  I appreciate you asking the question that so many sales people are hesitant to ask.

Believe me, I understand.  For much of my life, I dealt with those same issues.  It seemed like my results (and my income) were totally dependent on how well someone else did their jobs – materials management, customer service, delivery, etc.  No matter how effective I was, my efforts could be totally sabotaged by a problem in inventory, quality control, warehouse or delivery.

How do you deal with this?

1.  Put it in perspective.

Keep this in mind.  Your customers may point out your problems with delivery, back orders, or quality.  As a result, you think that your company is the worst performer out there.  The truth is that your company is probably no worse than your competitors.  Your customers may complain about you, and since you are the one fielding the complaint, you take it personally and think it is just your company they are complaining about.  Trust me, when your competitor is calling on them, they are likely saying the same things about his service to him.

So, your reaction is probably a bit too extreme for the circumstances.  Unless you are going through a particularly horrible time, you are probably no worse than your competitors.  You probably don’t have any more problems than your competitors do.

So, first, realize that the situation is probably not as bad as you think it is. Relax a little bit.

2.  Communicate the specifics to the appropriate powers within your company.

Two keys to this statement:

A.  Specifics. Don’t say, “We’re losing business because our price is too high!”  Do you know how many times your management has heard that?  Hundreds.  It has no meaning because it is too general.  Say, instead, “I lost a deal for $10,000 at XYZ Corporation because our prices on ABC products were 4% higher than our competitor, CCC Company.”  Your boss can’t deal with generalities that have no substance to back them up.  But he can deal with the specifics.  If you can’t collect and communicate specifics, you’re not going to be persuasive.

B.  The appropriate powers.  If the problem is delivery, take your case to the head of shipping.  If your problem is back orders, take your case to your material manager.  Communicate the specifics to those people who have the authority to do something about them.  Complaining to your colleagues will not solve anything.

3. Do what you can do to alleviate the problem.

I understand that the problem is some other department or person.  However, I also know that your behavior influences your company’s ability to perform.  And, while you can’t change other people, and you can’t change other departments, you can change your behavior.  So, search for the little things you can do that will help with the problem.

For example, let’s say that you are plagued with back orders.  What can you do to positively influence this problem?  It may be that:

a.  You could be more conservative in your promises to your customer. Instead of promising that new item next week, you could say, “We should be able to deliver that first order within 30 days.”  Manage your customer’s expectations.  A back order is an order that isn’t received when the customer expects it.  Change his expectations, and you’ll impact your back orders.

b. You could communicate new demands to your materials manager before it happens. If you expect an order for a substantial number of gadgets, for example, let your materials manager know how many you expect to sell and when you expect to do it.  Don’t let the actual order be a surprise to your inventory control person.

c. You could check on your inventories of an item before you promise delivery of it. You could take a moment to check to see if you have sufficient stock of an item before you tell the customer that he can have it next week.

Don’t misunderstand me.  I’m not saying that you are the reason for back orders, or mistakes in shipments, etc.  But, you are part of the system.  And, by changing your behavior, you can influence the performance of the total system.  Accept your responsibility to do what you can to help the situation.

4.  Trust your coworkers.

When you are in the heat of the battle away from the office, it is easy to imagine the incompetent and uncaring people who manage things inside.  However, when you go speak to them, and see the situation from their point of view, you’ll often discover that they are just as intent on serving the customer as you are.  They are, in their areas, just as competent.

Instead of pointing fingers from a distance, see the world from their point of view, have some empathy for them, and trust them to do the job for which they are paid.

5.  Be proactively honest with your customers.

Don’t make promises you can’t keep.  Don’t make excuses that aren’t real.  Don’t blame anyone else.  Admit your company’s problems, be honest about what you are doing, and offer the customer some options.

In my tenure as a sales person, back orders were a constant headache.  I’d get on the computer every morning, and print out a back order report for the customers I was going to call on that day.  I’d then get on the phone with my favorite customer service rep, and strategize how to expedite those orders.  I’d have a solution for every back order before I left my house.  When I made that day’s calls, I’d say, “XYZ product is backordered, but we expect to receive them on the 10^th, and I’ve already put in an expedited order for you.  You’ll have them on the 12^th.”

I’d proactively identify the problems, create solutions, and then be the one to inform the customer of both.

Hope this helps.

Copyright MMX by Dave Kahle
All Rights Reserved.

Image “Pointing fingers” by Newtown grafitti on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Learn How in this Report

Ok, you are looking for a CRM solution for your business.  You have surveyed the market reviewed and tested a dozen or more CRM software solutions and you are still not comfortable in making a decision.  In fact you’re frustrated and you are not alone.

The CRM software sector may be one of the most competitive in any industry. There are literally hundreds of CRM solutions available from desktop programs that run on your personal computer to cloud based ones that operate over the Internet. What’s most troubling is how hard it is to differentiate one from another.  Other than price and term of contract they all seem the same.  I understand and hear this every day.  As an executive of a leading CRM solution provider I can assure you that every CRM solution is not the same. Certainly most CRM solutions offer similar functionality. That’s a given, but there are other things to consider during the decision process other than features and price.

Outlined below are “7 Points to Consider before Making Your CRM Decision”.  I hope you find this valuable and that it helps you to make the best CRM decision for your business.

1) Select a mature solution provider

With today’s economic uncertainty, it’s extremely important to select a solution provider with a trusted reputation and long-standing track record for delivering high quality products and services in your industry. There are no guarantees today, but a company that has been in business for a decade or more with an established customer base is clearly a safer bet than the one that’s just getting started.  It’s also a good idea to research the vendor’s customer base and ask for references that can discuss the provider’s commitment to quality customer service and product enhancements.

2) Know your requirements beforehand

Don’t make your selection of a CRM solution a beauty contest. Take the time to document the core requirements that you are looking for and make sure you fully understand the workflow of your internal business processes. Smaller businesses tend to lose sight of this during the evaluation process and become too focused on cosmetic appearance and price. As a result, they are often disappointed in the product’s inability to support the unique business requirements that were not part of the initial demonstration.

3) Where’s my data?

Your customer information is your lifeline. Without it you’re out of business. Don’t be afraid to ask where your data is being hosted and by whom. Most vendors utilize a third party service to host your data. Ask who they use and check into the company’s track record for performance and reliability. You may also want to inquire about backup and recovery along with their procedures for obtaining your data should you discontinue the service. This is one of the most important yet overlooked aspects of your CRM decision process.

4) Scalability

Your business is going to grow. If you didn’t believe this you wouldn’t be in business.  I stated earlier that there are a myriad of CRM product offerings available. I didn’t say they could all meet your current and future business requirements.  In fact, many are designed for very small businesses and will not perform well when pushed to higher levels of utilization.

Make sure the product incorporates a comprehensive set of applications even if you are not planning to utilize them today. Furthermore, make sure the solution you select has been proven to perform at two to three times the current number of users you plan to have.

5) Back-end integration

While this may not be your top priority, CRM is the front-end to all backend processes and sooner or later you are going to want to integrate customer data with your accounting or ERP system. Make sure the vendor you are most interested in offers an application programming interface or API that enables back-end integration.

6) Select a partner not a vendor

If you have made a decision to implement a CRM system because you are committed to becoming a more effective sales and service organization, then you need to select a partner to assist you not a vendor.  A partner will provide you with a proven implementation plan and best practices to ensure that you realize the maximum value from their solution. A vendor will sell you their solution then suggest you send an e-mail if you require help. CRM is not a toy or an electronic gadget that you simply plug in the wall.  You will require professional assistance from the CRM provider in order to maximize the value of any CRM solution.  Make sure you select a partner who has a solid track record for providing this level of support.

7) Stay away from free

Nothing good comes out of free. Not good products and not good services.  A world class product from a trusted solution provider who can…

• protect your data with a reliable hosting service
• provide a high level of performance
• offer scalability and growth
• enable back-end integration
• and partner with you to ensure your business objectives are met

… isn’t cheap and doesn’t come free.

This is an important decision for your business and the difference between a top rated trusted solution provider and a low cost one may be just a few dollars a month.

About the author: Larry Caretsky is President and CEO of Commence Corporation, a leading provider of cloud based online CRM software. Comments about this article may be sent to sales@commence.com.

Image by Tom Magliery on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

Some were low cost programs for contact and account management while others offered more robust offerings for marketing, sales and customer service. Today there are literally several hundred companies competing in this space, but can they all survive?  It’s unlikely in light of the fact that the CRM sector is perceived by many to be a commodity.

Affordable CRM

One of the first indications that a sector has become a commodity is price erosion.  Price erosion occurs when the market becomes flooded with options and the buying community perceives that the available offerings are all pretty much the same. These consumers no longer pay close attention to features and functions, but instead view price as the main differentiator. This is not new to the technology sector, but it is uncomfortable for CRM manufacturers who are struggling to differentiate themselves in this highly competitive market.

CRM Features Comparison

For years, technology and software manufacturers have fought the commoditization of products by trying to outmatch their competition.   They would scramble to add a feature or two that the other guy doesn’t have and were convinced that this would not only help to differentiate their offering, but give them the right to charge a high price. Salesforce.com worked this angle rather well for a while, that is until the other guys caught up. Like most technology companies, I think Salesforce.com learned that trying to “out-feature” the competition is not a solid long-term business strategy.

CRM Competition

So what does the future hold for CRM manufacturers?  I am not sure they know but what is apparent is that Salesforce.com, Microsoft, SugarCRM and Commence CRM, all considered mainstream CRM solutions, have on several occasions been forced to re-package and lower their price.  This is a clear indication that the commoditization of the CRM sector has already begun.

I do not think these companies are blind to this. Salesforce.com for example has been acquiring other products and services perhaps to offset the reduced growth and lower price points associated with CRM while Commence has been adding an array of professional services and sales training programs around their offering.

The commoditization of the CRM industry however is not a bad thing.  It’s good for the consumer.  Competition traditionally breeds better products and lower price points.  While competing in a commodity market can be frustrating to the CRM manufacturers, the companies mentioned above have already navigated through choppy waters and will continue to offer quality products and services well into the future.

Selling products or services has never been easy.  For every successful salesperson there are ten unsuccessful ones.

So what makes one salesperson better than the other?

Well you can point to a host of things such as their product knowledge, their understanding of the value their product or service provides, their follow-up and persistence, knowledge of competitive products and your comfort factor in buying from them.

Others point to the use of automated sales tools such as CRM software and crm best practices that enable salespeople to more efficiently manage the sales cycle, keep notes and history for each sales opportunity and ensure that customer inquiries are followed up quickly and efficiently.  While all of these are excellent points there is one thing that you cannot teach or automate with sales management software and that’s passion.

Top Characteristics of Successful Salespeople

How many times have you received a call from a salesperson who sounds like they would rather be doing anything else but calling you to pitch their product?  Good salespeople sell with passion. You can hear it in their voice and see it in their mannerism if they are in front of you.  They not only believe whole heartedly in their product, but become disappointed if at the end of their presentation you don’t feel the same way.  To them it’s a personal failure.  These are the type of people that become successful in sales.

These are the people who believe making a sale is more important than the commission they will receive. These are the people you want on your team.  I cannot tell you where to find them, but only what to look for when interviewing them and that’s passion.

Image “Energetic Crepe Guy – Boulevard de Clichy – Montmartre, Paris” by Chris Goldberg on Flickr under Creative Commons license.

In smaller businesses, the use of CRM software is typically driven by the sales organization for managing the sales cycle and used by other departments for contact management.  In larger organizations it is typically used throughout the organization.

Regardless of the company’s size, the objective of CRM software is the same and that is to ensure a better buying experience for the customer.

There is no ownership issue here.  Creating a better buying experience for the customer occurs before, during and after the sale.  As such, CRM software often plays a vital role not only in the management of the sales process, but also in the efficient management of projects, and providing high quality customer service.   It’s a corporate initiative driven by senior management with the goal of maximizing the lifetime value of every customer relationship and it should be shared by all.