Microsoft's Latest Release of Dynamics CRM Online - The Last Chink in the Armour Filled

I've been selling Microsoft Dynamics CRM for a long time.  There were always value points for Microsoft Dynamics CRM over the competition such as the Microsoft Outlook Integration, the Price and the ability to customize the solution in a easy and quick way (often referred to as Extended CRM or xRM) but there were also weak points in the Dynamics CRM solution that the competition would pick on as well. 

Microsoft filled a lot of those weak points when they first released Dynamics CRM Online some two years back but there were two things that still came up again and again.  Clearly the competition was trying to take advantage of Dynamics CRM's weak points.  These were...

1. Cross Browser Support (including Support for iPad); and
2. Providing a Simplified User Interface.

... neither of which Dynamics CRM was good at.  Well in the latest release of Microsoft Dynamics CRM both of those problems have been "largely" solved. 

Dynamics CRM Cross Browser Support

The problem with a lot of customers was that they had already made investments in non-Microsoft technologies such as iPad and Android Tablets.  They weren't willing to give up on those investments and it took a while for Microsoft to realise that the Desktop and Laptop were tools of the past and the Tablet was the tool of the future and that for the time being Microsoft was not the dominant player in the Tablet.  Well with the latest release of Microsoft Dynamics CRM Microsoft have corrected that oversight.  Below is a list of the browsers and platforms that Microsoft Dynamics CRM now supports.  So if you are an avid Apple Desktop or iPad user your investments in those tools can be maintained and you can have Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online too!

 

 

 

With the Multi-Browser Support Microsoft has also provided a limited iPad Client a screen shot of which is shown here...

 

 



 

Providing a Simplified User Interface

When doing demo's of Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online often customers would complain that Dynamics CRM looked too complex and they liked the simplified user interface of the competition.  As a sales person we would go to great lengths to configure CRM simplify the UI to counteract that conclusion.   Well with the latest release of CRM Online Microsoft have started moving to a simpler "Process Based User Interface".   The idea is that the UI changes depend on what stage you are at in terms of your business process and that the business process is built into the system. That same business process is largely user configurable to your own specific needs.   An example of the new User Interface is show here...

 

 

So now when I walk into customers I can tell them that the solution works across all platforms and is simple to use.  Two additional value points which most of my customer appreciate.  Add to this the lower price than the competition and the traditional strength of the CRM to Outlook Integration and really you have an unbeatable combination. 

Now when customers ask me how I position CRM against the competition I simply say " we can do everything they can do... but just cheaper."    This is a story that all my customers understand and appreciate.

David Goad is the Managing Director for eSavvy – Microsoft Dynamics CRM Gold Certified Partner. eSavvy is an award winning Microsoft Dynamics CRM Partner staffed by some of the most experienced solution and technical architects in the Microsoft partner channel. We build and deliver relationship management solutions based on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform for large enterprises as well small and midsize businesses in Australia.

The New Evolution in Mobility is Already Here

The Next Evolution in Mobility is Already Here

It is clear that the latest and biggest market in IT these days is in mobile devices.  Tablet devices are leading in Retail Sales compared to Desktops and Laptops.  Microsoft's recent foray into the Tablet/ Mobility market with the Surface recognises this fact.  The plethora of devices provided by a number of different vendors and their relatively low cost is changing how IT works.  During a recent visit to a local retailers website there were over 60 tablet devices listed all less than $1000 in price.  Over 1/2 were less than $600 in price.  That same retailer also has about 40 different smart phones on offer again most for less than $500.

Bring Your Own Device

This evolution in hardware means that there is an evolution going on in IT infrastructure.  Most corporate IT organizations have locked down desktop environments and for good reasons.  The greater the variety in devices and software you have to manage the higher your IT costs.  Because Hardware and Software used to be costly and these budgets managed centrally IT could enforce these controls but no longer.  If I had a nickel for every time I heard the following story I'd be a rich man...

A Sales Manager goes to his local retailer and sees a great Tablet Device for less that $600.  He says to himself "I can afford this on my own budget I don't need to get IT's approval".  The next day 30 to 40 sales employees all have a new Tablets.  Then the Sales Manager walks over to the IT Department Manager and says "It's done, I've got these 40 new devices and now you need to support these and by the way I want all my Business Applications to work on these new Tablets".  The IT Manager goes white and you can see his hair greying before your eyes.

Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) is here to stay.  You can't do anything about this.  IT costs go up. 

Bring your Own Application

Now this leads me to the next challenge.  Each of these great devices has their own Applications Store.  Apple, Google and Microsoft all have one and they pretty much all work the same.  Download an Application for free, try it and if you like it then pay a few $ per month to continue to use it.

Suddenly these IT folks not only have a variety of hardware they have to support but also a variety of software to support.   Bring Your Own Application (BYOA) is here to stay as well. IT costs go up yet again. 

Enterprise Application Stores

The smart IT departments are fighting back.  They are developing their own Enterprise Application Stores to combat this trend and try to reduce costs and gain some control.  Gartner says that 25% of Enterprises will have an Enterprise Application Store by 2017.  But these Enterprise Application Stores will need to provide Applications that can work across a multitude of devices and Operating Systems for IT to easily maintain them. 

eSavvy's Response to these Trends

As you know eSavvy have been in the CRM space for number of years.  We were Microsoft's CRM Partner of the Year last year for Australia and Dynamics Asia Pacific Partner of the Year last year as well.  We are a loyal Microsoft partner and will continue to be so in the future.  We believe in the power of Microsoft Dynamics CRM and will continue to have this as being core to our technology strategy as a Systems Integrator.   But we do see a change in how people will use Dynamics CRM in the future.  Taking into account the above trends, customers will less and less want to be using Dynamics CRM over a desktop and more and more need to be using it with their mobile device of their choice (Tablet or Phone).  Microsoft recognises this as well.  They recently released versions of Dynamics CRM which supported multiple browsers and a version of Dynamics CRM for the iPad. 

There is a gap however.  The form factors provided by Microsoft don't suit the mobile phone space well (iPhone, Android or Windows Mobile) and the iPad version is restricted in the entities you can access and isn't very customizable.  It also doesn't allow you to go offline.  There is no support for Android Tablets as well.  Customers needed a mobility solution for Dynamics CRM which can be supported across multiple different devices and operating systems simultaneously.   Enter eSavvy Mobile. 

eSavvy have taken the extraordinary step of developing their own Mobility Application which integrates with Dynamics CRM.  Built on a new Technology called Titanium that mobile application allows you to manage the same code base across multiple different devices and operating systems and it allows you to take your data offline.  It becomes the ideal CRM client for that BYOD and BYOA environment that we have been talking about and becomes something that customers can include in their Enterprise Applications Store.  Best yet, the baseline application is licenced for free to eSavvy CRM customers. It will be released by eSavvy in the upcoming weeks with a webinar being presented in the next few weeks.  To find out more details and to subscribe to that webinar just send an email to info@esavvy.com.au

Enterprises need to include the terms BYOD and BYOA into their vernacular.  IT departments will need to develop strategies to address these trends.  eSavvy is positioning ourselves to be an asset in this regards and help IT departments reduce their costs. 

David Goad is the Managing Director for eSavvy – Microsoft Dynamics CRM Gold Certified Partner. eSavvy is an award winning Microsoft Dynamics CRM Partner staffed by some of the most experienced solution and technical architects in the Microsoft partner channel. We build and deliver relationship management solutions based on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform for large enterprises as well small and midsize businesses in Australia.

 

Artisan vs. Manufacturing Approach to Marketing

The challenge with Marketing these days starts right from when the kids come out of school having graduated fresh from the marketing program at the local college or institution of their choice.  Having interviewed a number of Marketing School Graduates it amazes me how ill prepared some of them are from a technology perspective and how immature their view of what marketing should be.  Marketing is heavily digital these days involving a heavy reliance on Content Management Systems, Email Marketing Tools and CRM systems.  Yet many Marketing Graduates have little to no practical experience in these areas.  Good Data Quality and Data Cleansing Strategies are typically just as important as what your Creative Strategy is going to be for a particular campaign.  Yet again schools spend very little time on these nuts and bolts of Marketing which we all have to deal with whether we like it or not.  Rather Marketing Schools fill their graduates minds with visions that they are going to be involved in the creative of the next product launch for Coca Cola or Microsoft as soon as they graduate.  Which is likely not the case.  At least not within the first few years of graduation.

Really this all relates back to a core shift that needs to happen in terms of the philosophy of how to approach marketing.  This shift needs to start at the local Marketing education programs and move out into industry from there. 

Artisan vs. a Manufacturing Approach to Marketing - A Fundamental Change in the Philosophy of what a Good Marketing is. 

Now there is no doubt in my mind that all good marketers should have a creative streak in them.  Any content produced should look innovative, professional, fresh and thoughtful.  But the challenge is that most marketers approach each new task as a complete new project with all the content unique to that project.  Everything they deliver they consider to be unique. This is the "Artisan" way of Marketing.  Sitting in the corner chipping away to create that next statue of David. This is what they've been taught in school.  A classical example of this is the conference event.  The marketer registers for the conference event as a one off, generates unique offers and programs for that event, the event is executed, may or may not be successful and then all the content that is generated is filed most of which is never used again.  The problem in this example is that you are getting no economies of scale.  Each activity is generated uniquely.  Sure the Marketer gets that feeling of satisfaction about what they've created but because everything is unique to each event there are no efficiencies and the effort to generate those "Impressions" or "Leads" that every marketer is chasing is huge. 

Now my suggestion is that Marketers should approach what they do as a "Manufacturer".  The goal being to have standard processes, high level of automation and to reuse as much of the content they produce as possible.  To me the Manufacturing Approach to Marketing means...

1. Avoid the big one off events.  If you do have to do events make as much of the content reusable as possible.  Have standard formats, standard email templates, standard marketing collateral that you use over and over again.
2. Focus on Digital Marketing.  Aside from the fact that Digital Marketing has the benefit of being more targeted it also allows you to build once and use many times.  The website you build or the YouTube video you create can reach many more interested parties that the one off Marketing Event that had a few hundred people participate.
3. Increase the Use of Technology to Improve and Automate the Process.  Use CRM Systems, EMail Marketing Systems and Content Management systems that allow you to have standard templates to reduce the time.  Focus on using automated Workflows and Customer Experience Maps that allow you automate much of your interactions with your target audience.  Marketers need to get comfortable with the use of technology.  Being able to write work flows or generate complex data queries needs to be as natural to them as breathing. 
4. Having a Standard Approach to New Offers.  Everyone in every industry comes out periodically with new pricing offers or new packages trying to entice customer to buy and give them a compelling event.  If you are going to produce new offers have a standard process for creating them and have a regular cadence as to how they are released out into market. 
5. If you are going to run events do smaller ones.  Rather than do a one off event think about doing the Events as a Series.  Don't do one webinar, do a regular schedule of webinars.  Do a series of the same event but in many different geographic locations or do a number of similar events based on a theme with slightly different content. Finally and most importantly...
6. Every time you start a new campaign ask yourself the question "How can I make this repeatable?".  What can I do to apply a build once use many times approach?     

Henry Ford proved that the Assembly Line was much more effective than the individual work stations.  Marketers need to learn this lesson that was learned in other components of business almost a century ago.  Their job is not to create the statue of David but to build an assembly line that allows them to create as many impressions or leads as possible with the ever decreasing budgets they are being faced with.    Volume and efficiency wins out over creativity these days.  It has to.

David Goad is the Managing Director for eSavvy – Microsoft Dynamics CRM Gold Certified Partner. eSavvy is an award winning Microsoft Dynamics CRM Partner staffed by some of the most experienced solution and technical architects in the Microsoft partner channel. We build and deliver relationship management solutions based on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform for large enterprises as well small and midsize businesses in Australia.

Best Practices in Organizational Change Management

Change Management is one of the most forgotten and/or underserved components of most Business System Implementations these days.

Organizations still tend to focus on the technology and direct costs without sufficiently understanding the impacts on the business or the indirect costs of sufficiently facilitating the changes that are about to occur.

Change Management isn't just about training rather it's about taking a holistic view of providing the customers of the solution (i.e. the business) with the tools they need,through a multitude of channels, to do their job successfully.

When considering setting up a Change Management program for a business system implementation all of the following tools should be considered under the following general categories...

Prepare Me

• Staff Briefings - so they can ask questions
• Fact Sheets - so they can read and understand what's coming
• Road Shows - to make sure the message gets out to all the branches

Tell Me What I Need to Know

• Business Process Flows - As-Is and To-Be. Allow people to understand how their current processes changing
• Functional Workshops - To work through all the design issues
• Audience Impact Analysis - Understand how peoples roles will changes and their work loads will shift

Show Me what to Do

• Instructor Demonstrations - This is the classical in class training
• Instructor Guides - Capture the IP so that the training can easily be repeated
• Training Classes - Schedule a number of them so people can attend around business commitments

Let Me Do It Myself

• Exercises - Give people the ability to do self learning at their pace
• Training Systems and Data - Give them an environment where they can try different things and make mistakes

Help Me

• Work Instructions - Detailed how-to guides
• Quick References - So they can look something up
• Online Support - Someone to call if they can't figure it out
• Cheat Sheets - so that they can easily refer to something
• Evaluations - so they have an idea of where there skill level is at

When you actually do the training remember these three guiding principles. Good Training Plans are ones that...

• Provide training that is Specific to their Business;
• Are Incremental in their structure so as not to bombard people with too much information too fast; and
• Are Continuous training is essential. Sending a person out to one course is not the way to go. Retention is best when the training is done over a period of time and their are frequent refreshers.

At the end of the day don't let a really good technical implementation of a business system be perceived as a failure because you didn't pay enough attention to Change Management and Training. I can tell you from my experience it happens all too often!! Give your customers the tools they need. A once off training course is not enough!

David Goad is the Managing Director for eSavvy – Microsoft Dynamics CRM Gold Certified Partner. eSavvy is an award winning Microsoft Dynamics CRM Partner staffed by some of the most experienced solution and technical architects in the Microsoft partner channel. We build and deliver relationship management solutions based on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform for large enterprises as well small and midsize businesses in Australia.

Marketing Best Practices

Like any other business issue or problem you can break down Marketing as a business function into three key components...

- People

- Process

- Systems

... and all three components should be considered when setting up the marketing capability for your business. The problem is these days that business quite often leave out at least one of these categories from their thinking. Because of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) , Marketing was also one of the first areas to be cut in terms of funding. As the GFC subsides and businesses start to build up their Marketing functions again they should have a re look at how they build that capability and make sure that they cover off all the components under People, Processes, and Systems as they begin to reinvest...

People:

From a people perspective your should consider...

- Selection: Are you treating the selection of your marketing staff correctly? Do you see these resources as being strategic or are they glorified administrators. Do they have the seniority, creativity and also bottom line focus that a successful marketer needs.

- Job Definition: Have you made it clear to them what you expect? Is you goal generate business marketing or awareness or some combination of both?

- Key Performance Indicators (KPIs): Are the KPIs that are set relate back to the job definition. Are they SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Time based)? Have you set specific goals in terms of Lead Generation and qualified what a "Good Lead" is? Do you use the BANT criteria (Budget, Authority, Need, Time Frame) to generate a "Marketing Qualified Prospect".

- Remuneration: Is there remuneration tied to their KPIs. I don't think variable compensation is used heavily enough in marketing organizations.

- Performance Feedback: Is your feedback that you are giving to your marketing team, direct, honest and bottom line focused. You are not paying them to generate pretty PowerPoint but to generate results.

Process:

From a process perspective your should consider...

- Strategy: Is it clear to your marketing team which markets you are going after. Have you prioritized. Is the message that you want to convey to your client base both on a Micro and Macro level clear to them? Do they understand what is a good deal or good customer vs. a not-so-good deal or customer?

- Campaign Prioritization: Do you use "closed loop marketing" analysis which estimates the payback to your individual marketing investments to understand what has worked and what hasn't?

- Campaign Execution: Are the processes to drive a campaign well laid out with clear roles and responsibilities and easy access to the requisite resources?

- Data Quality and Lead Quality: Are their processes in place to ensure that your marketing folks are getting good qualify data for them to execute their campaigns against. Once the campaign is executed is the correct Lead information being trapped. Are you focusing not just on leads but on other data that can be used for future campaigns?

Systems:

There are different levels of sophistication here from the "Crop Duster" to the "Jet Fighter" to the "Rocket Ship" that from a systems perspective could be put into place. The key though is do you have the people and processes in place to support the systems and then select the right systems for your organization. Marketing systems these days can provide...

- Data Quality by providing automated de-duplication detection and elimination

- Automated Content Management which is important for Marketer productivity. Huge amounts of time can be consumed by marketers doing basic things around preparing web pages, generating EDMs (Electronic Direct Mails), preparing brochures, etc.

- Marketing Automation in terms of campaign execution. Generate EDMs from templates, automatically distribution them and track responses. Integrate your web site with your lead generation and your CRM system. Track the campaign planning tasks. Track lead generation and manage lead allocation.

- Take your marketing systems to the next level with Automated Lead Nurturing and Lead Scoring eliminate the Sales persons little black book and the need to diarize tasks. Take work off your sales team by having leads which are "not ready yet or are immature" and having them managed by your systems automatically interacting with the leads in relevant ways until the Lead has a sufficient score to say they are ready and waiting for human intervention.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM combined with certain Add-ons can provide all of the above but you need to look at what your business needs and have a plan to build your marketing capability incrementally as your business grows.

The important thing to do is consider the People, Processes and Systems as you build the Marketing capabilities within your business.

David Goad is the Managing Director for eSavvy – Microsoft Dynamics CRM Gold Certified Partner. eSavvy is an award winning Microsoft Dynamics CRM Partner staffed by some of the most experienced solution and technical architects in the Microsoft partner channel. We build and deliver relationship management solutions based on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform for large enterprises as well small and midsize businesses in Australia.

Best Practices in Customer Service and Call Centre Process Design

Call Centre and Customer Service Processes can be very complex. Ask yourself the following questions...

- Ever deal with a customer service person and have to give them the same information over and over again?

- Have you had trouble getting through to the "right" person in a call centre?

- Ever not want to call a centre/ customer service person but we forced to do so because you couldn't easily find another more self service way of doing what you needed?

- Been frustrated because you've had to call a customer service/ call centre line only to get a different representative every time and each time to have to educate them on the history of your case?

- Been passed around from one call centre person to another and after talking to 2 or 3 people still you haven't gotten what you've wanted?

... these are all symptoms of poor customer services/ call centre business process design that we've all had to deal with. The fact that these type of call centre and customer service organizations have been in existence for years and yet most people wince when you suggest having to call one indicates that we are still a long way away from perfecting the "science" in this area.

In dealing with development of call centre and customer service business processes there is no secret road map or easy path to success. But there are a few common sense concepts that you can apply when designing your process and some process goals you can work towards achieving which if you do achieve them you will certainly reduce costs and improve the overall perception of service.

At a high level the following are the key components of any best practice customer service and call centre processes and a model you can use for process design…

Profile

Understand the person you are interacting with. Obtain and be able to present more information to the call centre/ customer service agent about the person they are talking with. Make sure that you business processes and systems trap that information as you interact with the person that you become a learning organization. Collect information to map their buying behaviours and interests.

Segment

Automatically differentiate the process depending on the person calling and understand what they want. Develop this segmentation as part of your profiling process. Understand the persons worth to you and client/ candidate preference and differentiate service levels accordingly. Not all customers perceive a higher level of interaction as being a higher service level.

Push those customers who are lower value to you and/or prefer less interaction to your self service channels (IVR, web). Reallocate those resources to provide higher levels of services to those who need/ want it. Develop processes to proactively call those people who need/ warrant the higher levels of service.

Interact

Manage and plan the interaction types based on the process, profile and segmentation. Automate the processes as much as possible and minimize search time and data entry time. Eliminate double entry and double ask where possible. Allow the person to easily self select the business process/ procedure that they need. Match you agents questions, inputs with the persons stage in the buying cycle. The goal here is to minimize the time to resolution in a call and make the process seem seamless to the person.

Personalize

Make every interaction, every session and every campaign feel personal. Lack of personalized service is often the reason sighted for avoiding the use of call centres. By having/ maintaining good quality profiles of your customers and presenting the information in the right way to your customer service/ call centre people it will allow them to personalize the interaction with the customer and provide a higher perceived level of service.

Clearly there is a lot business process design and implementation effort required to achieve the above. Supporting Technologies and and emphasis on effective Change Management are also important considerations. But the above methodology can provide you a guide as you lay out your plans for process improvement over the next few years.

David Goad is the Managing Director for eSavvy – Microsoft Dynamics CRM Gold Certified Partner. eSavvy is an award winning Microsoft Dynamics CRM Partner staffed by some of the most experienced solution and technical architects in the Microsoft partner channel. We build and deliver relationship management solutions based on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform for large enterprises as well small and midsize businesses in Australia.

Customer Retention: Survival Strategies for a Recessionary Environment

Everyone knows and understands that you need to save money and cut costs to survive in recessionary business environment. But what other things should you consider and have as part of your tool kit of tactics and strategies to employ?


Well in this article I would suggest that Customer Retention should be a key focus area for most companies and that there are a number of tactics under the banner of customer retention that you can employ.

Studies show that even in good times acquiring new customers can be 2 to 3 times more expensive than retaining old ones. In bad times like these with sales cycles lengthening as people give any potential expenditures more scrutiny, this difference in cost of sale is becoming even more significant.

Clearly this isn't a great epiphany for most people as the market statistic's show that IT spend in support of improved customer retention is increasing or at least continuing. For example one of the fastest growing products for Microsoft last year was Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0. Microsoft's latest release of their premier relationship management product grew more than 30% in Australia last year and was one of the top three fastest growing products for Microsoft globally.


So if you buy into the fact that Customer Retention as a strategy to recession proof your business is something you should be focused on then here are some tactics that you can employ to achieve that end goal...

• Establish a 360 Degree View of Customer: the more you know about your customers the more proactive you can be and the better service levels you can provide. The better the service the more reluctant they will be to try and cut costs by going to another supplier;
• Proactively develop recession sensitive Service Offerings: your customers are being hit by the recession like you are. What can you do to help them through it. What new products and/or services might they be interested in during this period? For example if you are a service firms perhaps there are some lightweight offerings that you can provide to help a customer cut costs? If you a distribution company then what can you do to help them reduce their investments in inventory and improve cash flow? Better service offerings that recognise that times have changed will not only retain existing customers but attract new ones.
• Differentiate Your Service Levels based on Customer Value: If you are forced to cut costs and reduce the services you offer then make sure you are prioritizing the services to those customers that are critical for you to sustain your business. Inversely many customers don't want premium service and actually value lower costs. So by understanding their needs and wants and selective reducing the services that they are not using and becoming more cost competitive this tactic also retains those lower value customers as well;
• Improve collaboration: put tools in place to communicate with your customer more quickly and effortless. Improve your business intelligence so you see the signals earlier. If a customers demand is dropping then be quick to reduce your supply. If they are having financial issues then understand this early and respond accordingly let. If they are fighting to keep their customers by being responsive then be more responsive and proactive to them; and
• Simplify your Service Experience: I'm sure that you wouldn't be surprised to learn that a customers overall perception about a supplier either positive or negative is often heavily influenced by how easy they perceive you are to do business with. When they call you do they get the answer they want quickly? Is it easy for them to find things? Do you shield them from endless paperwork and bureaucracy? These are all process issues which if you address customers will perceive you to be easier to work with and therefore will value you more highly.

Anyways... some things for you to think about as you continue to do battle with this recessionary environment. Whether you are a pessimist or an optimist about where the economy will be in 6 months to 1 years time keeping the customers you've already got is always a good start down the road to business success.

For those of you interested in more information around Customer Retention please go to www.esavvy.com.au/cr for more information on future training and webinars that we will be running on the topic.