Month: October 2016

Every now and then a client who used to be great undergoes a drastic personality change. You wind up with a nightmare client on your hands. What can you do? Were there warning flags you missed? How can you get Dr. Jekyll back?

What Happened to the Affable Dr. Jekyll?

You landed a client and began working together, but the client is suddenly dodging calls or ignoring invoices. Your progress on the project has slowed to a crawl. Or worse, the client has made one extra demand after the other, causing the scope of the project to grow out of control. Suddenly, this seemingly normal, average client transforms into your nightmare. But was it really all that sudden a change? Is it too late to address the problem?

Was He Mr. Hyde All Along?

People have bad days. Sometimes emails come across unintentionally curt. It can be a mistake to brush off odd behavior from a potential client, especially if you’re excited about landing a sale or project. Take note of important red flags you must not ignore:

• Fired Others Before You — Your potential client mentions that others before you have been fired on the same project or that they have chosen not to pay others for their work.
• Freebies — The client wants something from you for free before you sign a contract. They say they’ve gotten freebies from other vendors and didn’t always hire them.
• Rate Negotiation — You provide your rates to the client and their first response is an attempt to negotiate lower rates.
• Multiple Contacts — Your emails get forwarded around before being answered or several people are CC’d into a message and all are responding to you.
• Avoids Phone Calls — Many people prefer to do business digitally. It’s quick and can be done almost anywhere. However, your clients should be available to you by phone, even if just once before entering an agreement with each other.
• Rude Emails — Some people have a naturally abrupt manner when corresponding online, but if your client consistently comes across rude, you may soon regret working with them.
• Scope Creep — Everything seemed black-and-white when your project began, but the client asks for more from you at every turn.

Can You Get Back Your Jekyll?

The answer to this one is a solid maybe. A few steps can be taken to avoid a problem client in the first place or address a current problem client.

• Interview Carefully — A 15-minute phone interview with a client before signing a contract can be invaluable to determining whether this is a person you really want to work with. Create a list of questions in advance that address your primary concerns.
• Create a Scope Of Work (S.O.W.) — When it comes time to discuss exactly what your client wants from you (and vice versa), figure out the details before you start working. Create a document listing exactly what you expect from each other. Both of you should sign it. If the client asks for extras, refer back to the S.O.W. If necessary, provide them with prices for anything extras.
• Avoid Hiring Potential Problems — Don’t hire clients who raise any red flags. It’s sometimes best to trust your gut instinct with potential clients, too, even if you can’t put your finger on what’s bugging you.
• Communicate Effectively — The answer to many problems can be clear communication. If your client seems to have an attitude via email, set up a phone call or video conference to discuss things. If you need to address their tone directly, do it respectfully.

When to Write Your Own “Dear Utterson”

Okay, nobody’s going to die, but you may need to ask yourself whether the relationship with the client is worth your while. If you do decide to fire a client, be sure to keep the process as classy as possible. Avoid the temptation to turn Hyde yourself and send a ranting, raving email about what a horrible client they are. Simply state your intent to sever the relationship and a concrete time frame for the end. Return any pre-payments for work you haven’t done. Do your best to get the project to a natural transition point, so it can be easily turned over to someone else for completion. Even if your client is a nightmare, always strive to leave them in a good place with the best possible impression of you.

 

---

 

At Insightly, we offer a CRM used by small and mid-sized businesses from a variety of verticals. Learn about Insightly’s features and plans on our pricing page or sign up for a free trial.

 

Has your business outgrown your last customer relationship management (CRM) tool? If so, it’s time to make the switch to something new. Are you ready? Is your team ready?

Switching to a new CRM means uprooting old habits and creating new ones. Although this is done with an end goal in mind of something spectacular, it’s not always easy to go through the growing pains. Lack of CRM integration is one of the biggest bottlenecks to sales success.

To make the process work faster and be more effective for you, it’s important to set up SMART goals.

What Are SMART Goals?

SMART is an acronym for the key points that should be woven into each goal you set for your team during this transition. It stands for:

• Smart
• Measureable
• Achievable
• Realistic
• Time-Relevant

Let’s take a closer look at each point when it comes to CRM implementation.

Specific

Before you can start using your CRM, you have to know how you’re going to use the new tool to better your business. Although you probably have a general idea of the benefits of switching to the new system, it’s time to hone in on the specifics.

Specify the following:

• What data points will you input?
• When will you input them?
• Who will input each data point?
• Where will the data be stored? (this will already be defined for you, but it’s still a good idea to write it down in your plan so there’s no confusion)

Then, when you have a clear vision of how you’ll use the system, it’s time to specify your goals with the new CRM.

Get ultra-specific on what you hope to achieve by implementing the new system. Whenever possible, use quantifiable information. For example, a goal of “get more sales” should be replaced by “increase sales by 10% by following up with leads after 3 days, one week, two weeks, and one month.” In this example, you’re specific about how much you want to see your sales increase and how you’ll make that happen using the new CRM.

Measureable

Ever heard the old adage, “what gets measured, gets done?” When goal setting, you have to have accountability by measuring what you accomplished. Without measurability woven into your goals, it’s too easy to lose focus.

Measureable goals are those that you can track with cold hard facts. They are not open to interpretation. Instead, they’re defined in a way so that there are no questions left about whether or not you achieved them.

Here are a few things you can measure with your CRM:

• Value of incoming opportunities
• Value of opportunities won/lost
• How many leads were won at each stage of the pipeline
• Percentage of sales in each category

When goal setting, list all of the relevant metrics you can track in your CRM so you know which data points to measure to track your progress toward your overall goal.

Achievable

Not only should your end goal be achievable, but so should each of the steps your team needs to take to reach that end goal.

Forming new habits takes practice. Every day, your team will need to force themselves to break away from their old way of doing things and learn a new system. This takes work, but with achievable steps incorporated into how you plan to reach your end goal, it feels more doable.

Outline specific actions that should be easy enough for your team to do every day to form these new habits and make your implementation a success. For example, you might set a smaller goal of reviewing reports as a team each week. This goal is certainly achievable and lends itself to greater success learning the system and tracking progress toward your bigger end goal of making more money.

Realistic

Goal setting should be challenging, but the challenge you set forth for yourself should also be realistic. If you expect to see a jump from $10,000 in sales to $1 million in sales overnight, you’re setting yourself up for failure.

Keep your goals realistic. By setting your sights too high, you discourage your team right out of the gate. When a goal is realistic, it’s seen as having potential, which makes people work harder to succeed.

Time Bound

Give yourself enough time to make the switch. Expecting immediate changes overnight will only cause you to get frustrated or discouraged when things don’t go quite your way.

Make your goals timely enough to challenge you but also give you enough of a buffer to get set up and learn the new system. Think in terms of how many months it’ll take you to accomplish your goal (at least while you’re getting things set up) instead of weeks.

What Goals Are You Setting For Your New CRM?

Whatever goals you’re setting for your team after implementing a new CRM, make sure they’re SMART. By following this structure, you’ll keep everyone motivated (including yourself) and see the results pay off by tracking non-negotiable data points.

---

 

At Insightly, we offer a CRM used by small and mid-sized businesses from a huge variety of verticals. Learn about all of Insightly’s features and plans on our pricing page or sign up for a free trial.

Sinister service outages, blood-curdling budget constraints, and chilling cyberthreats have long been the stuff of IT nightmares. Now a new survey looks at what’s really terrifying IT pros this Halloween and beyond.

Read the full article at: www.informationweek.com

In our work helping clients increase their online conversions, we’ve noticed a significant, consistent drop in visitors filling out traditional lead forms.

Read the full article at: marketingtechblog.com