Part 2 - Where to start with CRM, what comes first?

Welcome back to week two of “What is this CRM stuff” over the past 25 years I’ve seen it all, I’ve had the opportunity to work on endless projects, sorting data and setting up CRM systems to meet many different requirements.

?I’ve integrated, formatted, and configured systems for businesses large and small in multiple different countries and industries, and what has always been evident is that implementing great CRM systems comes from starting with the right outcomes.

?You may disagree and you may think CRM is just another bit of technology another database and yet more data but having a successful outcome to any CRM project means starting at the right place.

?CRM projects are not something for the IT department, they should not start with the CTO or the CIO but should be led by the business leaders in your organisation, this includes Sales, Marketing and Service elements and activities.

?Yes, those that define the strategy for each of those activities, you we read many stories of high-profile implementations where the CRM project failed, some 60% of actual implementations fail to meet business requirements and outcomes, which is staggering

So why is this, well in most cases the starting position for the project was wrong.?And the true starting position for a well implemented CRM systems is defining the requirements and having an understanding what success looks like for your business.

The idea that you can just install some software or subscribe to a cloud-based service and by doing so it will give you a great CRM and help your business grow is sadly incorrect.

Sure, technology partners for the big providers what to sell you a bunch of service days and licences, but many forget the principles of how to define success, when it come to the implementation.

?You may have a CRM system right now, and you may be thinking this does not work for me, our sales team hate it and it never gets updated and you might also be thinking “My CRM is broken, we need a new CRM”

?The thing is if you just replace it with another bit of technology, then unfortunately the outcome will be the same, you sales team will hate it, your business users will not update it and in 18 months post the change you will be back to the same place.

Yes, this might sound like common sense, and some of you may say “Yes, Yes we know all of this”, but strangely having also had the opportunity to rescue some failed or failing projects we’ve always gone back to the start to see if the foundation was built first, and usual 8 out 10 times it was not.?

So is there a proven starting place to kick off your CRM implementation, is there a step-by-step methodology.?The good news is yes there is the bad news is you have to do the work and follow the steps and that does not mean just a quick-fire exercise.

In fact, there are several methodologies, but the one we subscribe to is this

1. ?·????????Initiation (understand)
2. ·????????Plan
3. ·????????Design
4. ·????????Develop
5. ·????????Deploy
6. ·????????Extend
7. ·????????Release
8. ·????????Support

Yes, you can put whatever words you like to describe the top-level steps and each of these steps have sub steps, but we can look at that in a future newsletter, ?.

As we come to the end, we just wanted to conclude with one thing.?This is the one thing to take away and to hopefully understand, and that is CRM in your business is the process you adopt in looking after your customers, the technology you select, supports this.

Just buying the technology is a bit like buying soap powder and not having a washing machine, where the washing machine is the process for cleaning your clothes.

Please do leave a comment, if you have any question about your CRM or any technology approach in your business then we are happy to try and help

In the coming weeks we will be looking at the methodology steps, that we used to understand what CRM means to you.

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Have a great week

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Team MyCRM

Alistair