Know your customer… Max Effgen, October 23, 2009 A “Know your customer” re-post. Have a great weekend. “Know your customer” is the mantra. When you know the customer, good things happen. – Example, Client A increased user adoption to 70% of total call volume. ROI increase 25% in one quarter. When you know your customer, you can spot… Continue Reading
Read Getting Started with Disruptive Business Design Max Effgen, October 20, 2009 Nice read on disruptive businesses by John Sviokla at Harvard Business Blog. Check HBB: Getting Started with Disruptive Business Design It made me think about the future of CRM. Salesforce.com over turned the market leaders and is now the market leader. What will disrupt Salesforce? Is it new technologies that… Continue Reading
CRM Trends Max Effgen, October 9, 2009 In a recent conversation, the topic turned to the future direction of CRM. Normally, I would wax philosophic on this but it is really pretty simple. Marketing is taking over more and more of the traditional sales cycle. Sales will spend less time educating and more time selling qualified prospects…. Continue Reading
Avoid the road to nowhere Max Effgen, October 8, 2009 Avoid the project road to nowhere with these 3 common sense tips: – Align technology and business process. – Proactively drive user adoption. – Never “package slam”. Continue Reading
The best salespeople… Max Effgen, October 7, 2009 …are your customers. They have credibility that your sales team will never have — and amazingly they pay you. Nice read on this topic at Marketing Donut: Turn your customers into your best sales people. Continue Reading
Proactive service Max Effgen, October 6, 2009 What does it mean to be proactive in customer service? The goal is simple. Customers do not want to have to tell you there is a problem. To get there is long and often elusive. Understand your support process. Take the time to truly understand what causes customer support problems… Continue Reading
How to scale support Max Effgen, October 5, 2009 Increases in customers means increases in customer support. An effective tactic when starting a self-service initiative is to reassure Customer Support that the organization has to do more with less. Positive and forward looking initiatives will gain traction. More with less does not mean less people. More with less means… Continue Reading
Why I blog… Max Effgen, September 28, 2009 Great video above on the power of blogging. I find myself talking about my tiny little blog more than I ever thought I would. I blog to build my brand and make me better. The blog forces you to think and stay relevant. It is mental pull-ups, push-ups and sit-ups… Continue Reading
Is SaaS CRM Privacy Moot? Max Effgen, September 21, 2009 A few conversations on SaaS based CRM have recently centered on privacy. The SaaS problem regardless of solution is privacy and integration into core corporate systems. Always has been. Always will. There needs to be a dose of reality though. Cloud based e-mail is reality and many companies are moving… Continue Reading
The FORD model Max Effgen, September 15, 2009 Interesting read on the Verasage Institute blog on consulting. Check FORD – a model for consulting. The Findings, Options, Recommendations and Decisions steps bring to mind the keep it simple mantra. Question: How do you know if you are overpaying for consulting? Answer: If you ask the consultant the time… Continue Reading