Meet Joe. The Best CRM Client Ever.
Every year, about five to ten times a year, I get the same call.
“Yeah,” the voice says to me on the phone. “I’m Joe. I’m a sales manager. And I need a CRM system.”
“OK,” I say. Time to ask some questions. Except before I do, Joe keeps going.
“I just switched jobs. At my last job I used a CRM system called XYZ. I understand you guys sell that, too. I’m not saying XYZ is the greatest, but I’m happy with it. So I want you to come out to my new place and set it up for me. I want it to look exactly like the system at my last job. I want you to teach my guys how to use it.”
“OK,” I say. So far so good.
“Except there’s just one thing,” the guy says.
Uh-oh, I think. Here it comes.
“I need you to make sure you’ve set up three reports for me. I need these reports to do my job. You set up the system and set up the reports and teach my guys just to do the data entry and the rest will be up to me.”
“When can I start?” I say. I love my wife, but I want to kiss Joe.
Because I love Joe, too. I love when I get these calls. Joe, a sales manager, knows exactly what’s needed from a CRM system for it to be useful. He’s not a technical guy. But when I get calls like this I know from the start that he will be successful with his CRM system. That’s because he understands four core things about CRM systems.
For starters, CRM systems are nothing more than databases. With all due respect to the great CRM vendors and software out there, Joe knows this. The fact that these databases can now be hosted and maintained online only makes them that much more available and easier to use. But putting aside all of the buzzwords and features—opportunity management, campaigns, workflows, alerts, and social integration—in the end, the data is just stored in a database. Joe knows that he needs a good, reliable repository of data to run his organization and wants to be sure that it’s configured the right way and his people are trained to get the data in accurately.
He also knows the 20% rule. Joe is a sales manager. And like all workers in today’s organizations he uses software: word processing, spreadsheets, online applications. But he also knows that he doesn’t use all the capabilities of all the software applications available to him. Who does? The same goes for CRM applications. My best clients, like Joe, use maybe 20-30% of what their CRM applications do. There are entire areas that they don’t even touch. But that’s OK. No one has to be 100% good at everything. Joe and other sales managers like him focus on those aspects of the software that help their teams the most and don’t get caught up in features or functions that have no value for them.
He’s very direct: Use it or don’t work here. Joe and sales managers like him are brutally frank. He tells his team that the CRM is not about them. It’s his system. It’s the company’s system. He will do his best to employ experts (like me) to make it as user-friendly as possible and provide as much training as needed. “But in the end,” he says to them. “I need the information from this system to manage this group. I need it to do my job. And you’re going to have to get that data in there if you want to do your job.” No wimps here! That’s what it’s like to run a sales team in 2015. Good sales managers need data. They are sympathetic to their employees, but they don’t bow down to them.
Finally, it’s all about the reports. Joe wants his reports. He lives by his reports. He is a manager. And managers need accurate, complete reports to help them manage their teams, their organizations, and their businesses. A CRM system is completely useless unless good data is coming out of it, routinely, consistently, and accurately. Joe knows that to be a good manager, you have to be a data-driven manager. And that is the core function of his CRM system. What reports does he like the most? Stay tuned….
So thank God for Joe. He knows what he wants. He’s asked for very black-and-white deliverables. He’s all about the data, all about the reports. He values his CRM system as a tool to help him get his job done, not some miracle technology that will change his life. I wish every one of my CRM clients was as focused and pragmatic as he is.
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About the Author: Gene Marks is a small business owner, technology expert, author and columnist. He writes regularly for leading US media outlets such as The New York Times, Forbes, Inc. Magazine and Entrepreneur. He has authored five books on business management and appears regularly on Fox News, Fox Business, MSNBC and CNBC. Gene runs a ten-person CRM and technology consulting firm outside of Philadelphia. Learn more at genemarks.com
Image courtesy of khunaspix at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
