Making sure your CRM solution is a success…

Choosing and implementing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) solutions can be a resounding success or an unmitigated disaster.  Big businesses can ‘afford’ the shock of failure.  Small and medium businesses can’t.

To achieve success in selecting and implementing CRM in your small and medium business, pay attention to overcoming the following:

1.     You’re Not Sure What You Need:  Each CRM solution is different.  To make sure you identify and choose the best solution for your business, prepare a brief summary of ideas, requirements, or objectives that you wish to be solved or delivered by the solution.

2.     The Solution Can’t Adapt to Your Business:  Is there something unique about how you manage your customer relationships?  If so, does a particular vendor allow you to ‘customize’ the solution to your unique needs?  If the solution can’t adapt, look elsewhere.

3.     An “Uh Oh” Cost/Expense Moment:  From up-front ‘investments’, to customization/consulting fees, to monthly or annual licensing costs, or subscriptions – each solution costs something.  Make sure you uncover all the costs before you get started.  Choose to work with solutions with simple fee structures and no hidden costs or additional expenses.

4.     An Inexperienced Vendor:  CRM is not ‘accounting.’  CRM is not “technology.”  Make sure that your solution vendor is deeply experienced in customer relationship management processes, best practices, solution implementation, and support.

5.     Information Security:  Your customer information is a key, strategic business asset.  The information, communication, terms, services, and products you sell to your customers must be secure from intrusion, theft, virus/trojans, or other external threats.  Make sure your CRM vendor is skilled at protecting you and your assets.

6.     The Solution Doesn’t Expand:  Your business and customers can’t be held back by an inadequate CRM system. Choose a solution that easily expands with your business and always provides fast, anytime/anywhere access – no matter how many customers you have.

7.     The Solution is an Island: Your business is integrated to deliver the best customer experience possible.  A CRM solution must fully integrate with your business processes, your environment, and your customers.

8.     Little or No Connectivity:  Your business uses common productivity and communication tools. Things like personal computers, software, email, fax, and mobile devices.  You need the flexibility to have each of these devices act as communication tools and access points into your customer information to and from your CRM solution – even if you’re out of the office.

9.     Can’t Get Fast Information:  Make sure the solution you choose allows for ‘real-time’ reporting and analysis.  Also ensure that you have access anytime, anywhere, from virtually any type of device.

10.   Can’t Get Help When You Need It Most:  To maximize the benefit of a CRM solution, it must be used fully and across all relevant parts of the business.  As such, training and support/help desk is mandatory.  You need to have people and information ready to help, when you need help.  Your business can’t be left to ‘figure it out.’

By NextCorp, Ltd., Dallas Microsoft Dynamics GP and CRM Partner

Make sure 2010 brings new advantage and profitability.

2010 is squarely in everyone’s sights.  Many are looking forward to 2010 simply to put the last two tough years behind them.  Others are taking a more optimistic view to 2010, as the economy appears to be stabilizing.  While even others see 2010 as the ‘breakout’ year for their business.

Whatever your perspective, there are a few strategic actions that every business can take to drive new value and advantage in 2010.

In a recent McKinsey survey (700 CEOs, 11/09), the top priorities for CEOs for 2010 are:  innovation to create new value; drive costs down even more; and, further tighten relationships with existing customers as a key to profitability growth.  Perhaps these are chief among your priorities as a small and medium business as well.

What can you do to achieve these priorities, quickly and inexpensively?

1. Research Buying Habits:  Take a peek into past customer invoicing, and identify any trends.  Look at specific, repeat customer invoices and see if you can identify any shift in purchasing habits toward new value areas.  Once discovered, work to align and package your services and products in a way that will attract more business.

2. What is Most Profitable?:  Often a business will continue to operate in a ‘business as usual’ manner.  That is, they offer the same products and services and even expand their offering as a mechanism to attract more revenue.  Within every business there are a few products/services and customers that drive the bulk of the profit while the rest are nominally profitable or are losing propositions for the business.  Identify the most profitable products/services and customers and determine how to serve or find markets that need more of your most profitable items.

3. Where are You Leaking Cash?:  In times of abundant demand and revenue, sloppy habits become common within the business.   Sloppy habits create cash ‘leakage’ that drains profitability – thereby reducing capital to sustain or grow the business.  Look across the entire business and undertake a ‘profitability analysis’ of business processes, customers, and hard and soft assets.  Find where cash is leaking out of the business and quickly plug any holes.

4. Get Out of the “Technology Business”:  Unless your enterprise is a technology-oriented in nature, significantly reduce your acquisition, upgrade, and management of technology within the business.  Do this by eliminating your in-house ‘IT department.’  Sound crazy?  It’s not.  In recent years it has now become strategically and economically wise to ‘outsource’ computer-based technology to experts – eliminating capex spend, salary and benefit costs, and driving new flexibility and advantage to the business.

5. Expand Your Markets:  If you haven’t done this already, you’re already behind the curve.  Your nearest competitor is a block, mile, or click away!  Exploit technology to reach and serve new markets and customers.  Your competition already has – why not you?

6. Communicate to Your Customers:  It is fascinating that most ‘conversation’ with a customer occurs when a business seeks revenue; or, if there is a customer service problem.  Otherwise, the normal business habit seems to be ‘no news is good news.’  Customers want to hear from you about your business, new value they can derive from new products/services you offer, and how they can gain advantage from having a relationship with your business.  Make sure that your customers hear from you regularly and with impact.

7. Collaborate Everywhere:  Gone are the days when a business can stand on its own, going it alone.  Today, new opportunity and profit is created by working together with upstream suppliers and downstream customers – across your ‘value chain.’  Identify those businesses with which you need to partner and collaborate on new efforts that are sure to drive differentiation, advantage, revenue, and profit.

8. Real-time Business Management:  No longer is it possible to manage the business to monthly income statements and balance sheets.  Things move too quickly and require fast, real-time adaptation.  Managing the business through traditional financial statements is like driving by looking in the rear-view mirror – a certain recipe for disaster.  Instead, fully utilize various ‘real-time’ reporting tools that give you the business information you need, where you need it, and when you need it.  Manage the business daily, or hourly in some cases.  Sometimes advantage and opportunity have short windows.  If you wait 30 days, you’ll miss that opportunity and many more.

10 Things Small Businesses Need to Ask of their Financial Software

Operating a small and medium business is hard work.  Juggling strategies and day-to-day needs seems almost impossible – especially in light of greater competition, customer expectation, and economic change.

Forward-thinking businesses have recognized that technology can help them improve the speed, accuracy and effectiveness of their financial processes. By using the right financial tools in conjunction with best business practices, these organizations are better able to:

·         Plan:  See where and how much to invest dollars, time, and energy into the business.

·         Execute:  Smooth product/services delivery, lower costs, increase customer satisfaction, and drive new competitive differentiation

·         Measure: Understand where to optimize the business for opportunity and profit.

To get these benefits, what questions should you ask of your financial software?

1. Will this technology help me integrate my business processes? The optimal solution will allow you to integrate your purchasing, sales, inventory, customer management, communication, and productivity processes such that you gain the advantage of speed and accuracy.

2. Will this software automatically notify me of business problems and opportunities?  The tool you adopt must be able to help you see financial problems before they occur through advanced reporting and notification capabilities.

3. Will the financial system help me quickly focus on what is important and gain insight?  Small businesses should demand the same capabilities that large business has – insight into expenses, profitability, customers and satisfaction, productivity, new opportunity areas, and the like.

4.  Is it easy to use; will my employees use it?  Financial solutions should be as easy to use as traditional technology-based productivity tools.  Find out about training and help desk options available to you and your employees.

5.  Will the software enhance period/year end closing, tax planning, and audits?  Small businesses never need to compromise on being fully GAAP compliant with full audit capabilities.  The solutions you choose must speed up closing, easily transfer information to your accountant, and provide full transactional audit tracing.

6.  Can I collaborate with my peers?  The finances of a company don’t stand in isolation from the business or financial peers.  A financial system should easily integrate with existing email and collaborative tools allowing easy transfer of information, updates, and accessibility to employees who use the system.

7.  Can it grow with my business?  Small business has a history of being held back by their ‘systems.’  Financial software has evolved such that now there are solutions that are easily able to scale up/down with your particular business needs.  You don’t have to ‘overpay’ or ‘underpay’ at any time.

8.  Is the financial system secure; is my information protected?  With the realities of spam, viruses, trojans, internet intrusions, and disgruntled employees, the financial system you choose must counteract each of these and more.

9.  What happens if the system ‘breaks’?  Unfortunately, technology will occasionally fail. The keys to ensuring your business never stops, due to technology failure, are having the right redundancy, fail over, backup and recovery capabilities.  Also key is making sure that your workers have immediate access to needed help, no matter when.

10.  Will implementing the system disrupt my business?  Adopting new technology and software is not for the faint of heart.  Make sure that the system you choose will easily ‘slipstream’ into your existing operations without disrupting, defocusing, or taking away necessary energy from running the business.

By NextCorp, Ltd., Dallas Microsoft Dynamics GP and CRM Partner