Social CRM is Really About Strategy Not Tools #SCRM
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Today’s social media podcast (direct download here) is focused on social customer relationship management. Social SCRM (#SCRM on Twitter) is really where sales and social media form a nexus point with customer service, leadership and community. This of course is assuming we use the Social CRM for its intended purpose. Too many organizations fall in love with the tools but they should really be showing their customers and prospects that love. Here’s a great blog post that defines social crm well: “What is Social CRM?”
Monitoring conversations is great – but getting involved in the conversation and being a thought leader is where the true opportunity is. Having a Social CRM strategy is vital, we need to help our sales team understand how to socialize online. Today’s podcast talks about some of the pro-active components that should be included in that strategy.
Guy Kawasaki Podcast Interview on Enchantment
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To directly download the Enchantment Podcast Click Here.
I first met Guy Kawasaki at an Olympic Tweetup here in Vancouver a little over a year. My co-author Jay Conrad Levinson had already filled me in on guy, and Jay may have even used the work “enchanting” when he described Guy. He seems to arrive and light up a room and make everyone around him feel at ease, when guy speaks about marketing and leadership business leaders listen. When Guerrilla Social Media Marketing was being written Guy was #1 on our list as the person to write the foreword, and we were absolutely honored to have him do so. He is a true guerrilla marketer and his use of Twitter and the creation of his site Alltop.com make him a social media thought leader and innovator. He also is an Apple Fellow and the driving force behind the creation of the Apple Fanboy many decades ago (a movement which is still in full force).
With Guy’s new book Enchantment being released today I responded to Guy’s announcement and asked him to do a podcast interview. In the interview we discuss:
- Enchanting brands
- Social media marketing
- Enchanting today’s worker
- How to resist enchantment
- and the difference between enchanting brands like Apple and Zappos and mainstream run-of-the-mill brands
Below is an “Enchantment Info Graphic” to accompany the podcast:
Social Media Assessment Part 1 of 7
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Today’s social media podcast is part 1 of a 7 part series on assessment. Before any major endeavor we need to take inventory of our assets, attitudes, and liabilities. Working with everyone from one person businesses right up to fortune 500 companies I have developed a social media assessment process that helps take that inventory. It’s a work in progress and in it’s present form has already helped me develop strong direction and focus with my clients. I’m sharing this process to help my readers and listeners, and also of course to get feedback — what do you like? What am I missing?
This is a process we developed working with our clients at Socialized! and it takes an inventory of the following:
- Your existing website: Is it socialized with a blog, integrated with the major social networks and well optimized for search engines?
- Your social profiles: Are you maximizing the use of the major social sites that are relevant to your audience. This entails not just creating content but having relevant conversations and engaging?
- Social Media Policy: Do you have a personal or corporate social media policy that fosters a social culture and creates accountability?
- Social Media Plan: Do you have a strategic plan for launching and sustaining focused social media communications.
- Trained staff: Is your team trained in the rules of engagement and in the technical aspects of the tools they will use?
- Integration: Silo? Online/Offline? Bi-directional?: What best describes your social media use. If only one person or one department is using it then you will be faced with bottlenecks and a one dimensional communications strategy.
- Metrics, Monitoring and Measurement?: Are you using social media monitoring tools like Twitter Search, Post Rank, Google Alerts etc. to find business intelligence, identify stakeholders and get involved in the conversation.
Today’s Podcast is focused on part 1 of the assessment: Your Socialized Site or Blog and asks 12 major questions (covered in the podcast)
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1) Website/blog platform: Is it based upon a platform that is social ready? |
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2) Is it easy to upgrade and keep pace with social media advancements? |
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3) Does it offer multiple channels/media for two-way communications? |
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4) Does it aggregate online conversations about your brand and industry? |
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5) Does it provide a launch point to your social media outposts? |
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6) Does it provide industry standard blogging capabilities and plugins? |
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7) Is it search engine friendly? |
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8 ) Does it allow community contribution of content, ideas or questions? |
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9) Does it include multiple methods and media to learn about how you can help? |
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10) Is it easy for visitors to share all of your content on the web? |
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11) Are you proactively participating in communications and conversations on your site? |
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12) Is the content consistently updated and current? |
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The most important thing to realize here is that most of the questions are focused on how you are using your blog and site. Some of it focuses on basic functionality but most is about the application. I will be posting Part 2 “Your Social Profiles Assessment” in the next few days.
Interview with Bruce Philp author of the new book Consumer Republic
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Today I had the opportunity to interview Bruce Philp author of The Orange Code and the soon to be released book Consumer Republic. We had a great discussion about the power of the consumer and our ability to vote with our pocketbooks.
Here’s what the book site says about the book:
Consumer Republic
Using brands to get what you want, make corporations behave, and maybe even save the world.
Consumer Republic is premised on the uncomfortable truth that brands give consumers power over the marketplace that is essentially political. Brands make corporations accountable for their actions and, especially now, they give those corporations something valuable to lose if they fail us. Consumer Republic faces consumers with that power, explains how we got it, and then shows how the choices we make at the cash register can change our own lives, the way that corporations go to market and, ultimately, our entire way of life. Just as an engaged citizen is essential to an effective democracy, so an engaged consumer is the key to a sustainable free market, says Consumer Republic. My new book is a challenge to all of us who consume to vote with our money… and to marketers to be ready for a future in which they will face their customers eye to eye.
Should you let your sales team publish content using social media?
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Today’s podcast answers the question “Should you let your sales team publish content using social media?” I cover 5 reasons sales professionals should not be publishing content on social media and 13 reasons they should be. Here’s a brief summary of what is covered:
5 reasons why you should not let your sales team publish content using social media:
- You have hired idiots – even if you trained them they would just be motivated idiots.
- You have so much profitable business that you couldn’t handle any more
- Your product really sucks
- Your company and culture really suck
- You haven’t or will not equip them with
– The rules of engagement and a social media policy
– Training in the tools of engagement
– Accountability in place – once engaged it’s game on – have a framework support and accountability.
10 reasons why you should let your sales team publish content using social media:
- “It’s not marketing it’s talking to customers” – Scott Stratten of UnMarketing
- It adds to value added frequency
- It opens up new channels
- It can save time
- Load balance your branding
- Social CRM is the next big thing – are you cruising or are you road kill (Social CRM Podcast)
- Immediate data instead of compiled and stale data
- It makes them almost as smart as your customer
- You can see the activity
- It builds a passive pipeline and makes projections easier “If you’re talking to unqualified prospects it’s not a sales problem, it’s a marketing problem” – Zero Rejection Prospecting (Michael J Durkin and Norbert Orlewicz)
- It builds a fence around the customer
- It creates joy
- It elevates sales people above pitch artist to trusted advisor
Podcast Interview: What They Don’t Teach You At Stanford Business School – Larry Chiang
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Photo Credit Terry Chay
Today’s podcast is an interview with Larry Chang author of What They Don’t Teach You At Stanford Business School. Larry is also a seriously Sociable! guy and can be found organizing after parties at some of the biggest social media and cultural events from South by South West to conferences at major universities across North America. In fact Larry may be the 3rd best party guy and networker I have met. (Sociable! Book Launch Party). In this interview Larry and I talk about topics you don’t learn in business school such as Man Charm, how to land a super star mentor and sales skills.
Larry’s book sold out it’s first printing on Amazon but you can register for updates at Amazon by clicking on the book below:
What They Don't Teach You at Stanford Business School
Podcast – Helping salespeople get smarter with digital assistants and technology
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Amacus
Today’s podcast is with sales technology thought leader John Cousineau who is President of Innovative Information the creators of Amacus. John and I have had a number of coffee chats and debates around why and how to use technology and social media to improve sales performance and customer experience. The nexus of sales and social media seems to be happening in the CRM and Social CRM space. The question is it happening fast enough and making things more efficient or is it just giving sales people more buttons and buzzwords to worry about.
Creating a Sales Culture in Your Organization
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Many organizations want to create a sales culture but many also fail at doing so. Today’s podcast covers nine lessons around creating sales culture that I have learned while helping non-sales organizations create sales culture:
- You need buy-in
- It’s really about creating an opportunity culture
- You need to reward people, that means everyone
- “What gets inspected gets respected” – Trevor Greene
- Move poor fits out quick, and hire the right people
- Feed the monster – train and develop continually
- Fix operations if they don’t support sales
- Fix products and services that don’t meet needs or fulfill promises
- It takes time, up to 18 months or longer before true leadership evolves
Prospecting is a Discipline
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Today’s podcast is on developing a prospecting discipline and why you need to plan it out and make it part of your sales and marketing strategy. Bullet points on the podcast:
Four Types of Prospecting:
- Face to Face
- Extended Personal
- Community and Network Prospecting
- Media Marketing/Prospecting
Make a Plan:
- Have the intent to meet people wherever you go, be aware and focus on rapport
- Book time everyday for e-mail and phone calls
- Book time everyday for prospecting on Linkedin and listening/monitoring the web
- Attend two target rich events per month and one major conference per quarter
- Budget a percentage of your projected income or revenues and spend it every month on media and press releases etc.
What’s your prospecting plan look like?
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Serendipity and Intuition are Not Random
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Today’s podcast is on the connection between serendipity and discipline as well as the connection between training and intuition. I’m also going to talk about why very few people experience high levels of positive serendipity or tap into their intuition because they quit too soon. I’d love your feedback and thoughts on this topic. This applies to social media, sales, traditional marketing and even networking activities.
Looking for a social media speaker for your next conference?
You can contact us or take a look at Shane Gibson’s bio.
Why You Need to Be a Nomadic Social Media Tribalist
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Today’s podcast is more about questions than answers, this is somewhat of a roughly formed thought at this point. Tribes by Seth Godin really resonated with me when I first read it a year ago. Jay Conrad Levinson’s concept of Nano-casting to small unique groups (often only parts of a tribe) has always intrigued me. On a recent trip to Florida Jay and I spent an evening talking about Nano-casting, nomadic tribalists and social media marketing.
Here’s some of the core thoughts
- We no longer can broadcast, or niche market, we need to nano-cast to small groups of people, often smaller than the entire tribe.
- Nano-casting isn’t enough, we need to employ Listening 2.0 strategies and have intimate conversations.
- You must be adept at being a nomadic social media tribalist, your ability to move from tribe to tribe and adapt as you market is vital.
I really would like your feedback on this concept. Make a comment below, Tweet me, or find me on Google Wave (closingbigger@googlewave.com).
Speaking and Training
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