7 weeks + 3216 oz of Diet Pepsi

Unusual title, right?  I'll get to that in a moment......

There are numerous things to do to bring a marketing automation system online - there are setup decisions, building (or re-building) asset fulfillment, building numerous smart campaigns to run behavioral scoring models, etc.

For most small(er) businesses, setting up a MA system can be relatively painless.  Your Salesforce.com environment is without a lot of customization, you have less records to account for, and your sales teams are pretty straight forward (one lead owner, one product line, one lead routing plan, etc).

My plan is to share our trials & errors, funny stories, lessons learned, and best practices to setup a highly unique, highly customized Marketing Automation system for an Enterprise sized deployment connected to a highly customized, highly unique Salesforce.com environment.  Hopefully, others can learn from our adventures!   And as for the title of this blog installment?

My UK colleague came to Detroit to "build" the Marketing Automation system on September 10th - and we joked about how many Diet Pepsis it was going to take for us to bring the system operational in 7 weeks (our "Go-Live" date).

So at the conclusion of our build/setup over the 7 weeks, I snapped pictures of my growing Diet Pepsi soldiers that contributed to my contribution to helping take the system "Live".

Here is the "final"* picture of the soldiers that I collected over the 7 weeks:

All in all, I consumed 3216 ounces of Diet Pepsi.

Not that I'm recommending this approach - but this is the first part of telling our journey.  It takes a lot of patience, a lot of note taking, a lot of test/re-testing - and in my case - a lot of Diet Pepsi.

Hopefully, you'll find some nuggets of wisdom that you can take away toward your Marketing Automation project.  If nothing else, you'll read some funny tidbits about our adventure.

Until the next installment!
B

*I know that I missed some of the soldiers that went missing - so the final number is much higher.

Forcing motorists to drive the right way.....

So I lived in Boston for a long time - and driving in Boston requires a certain ability to navigate tight spaces, traffic that won't grant you a pass, and the need to know how to parallel park.

Upon moving back to MI, I have been disappointed by the fact that the Michigan population has somehow lost their ability to drive.

If I had better insurance, I would use the Kathy Bates/Insurance line from "Fried Green Tomatoes."

TOWANDA!!!!

That said, I will do my best to use my car horn and my evil look to combat:

• Not signalling when you decide to merge into my lane.
• Driving 40MPH in a 45MPH zone - in the left lane.
• Drifting over the lane markers as you text your girl/boy friend.
• Staying in the left lane for miles (under the speed limit BTW) until you make a radical shift (without blinker) to the far right lane.
• Slowing down to 0 MPH to go over train tracks.
• Parking your mega-SUV across parking spots simply because you can't aim straight.
• Knowing how to dodge pedestrians - and when they are in the right and when you are (as a driver).

Might seem irrelevant on this blog - but NerdGirls know how to drive. :)

On corporate letterhead...

How proud am I that I'm published on "official" letterhead?

http://application-performance-blog.com/end-user-experience-and-50-shades-of-grey/

Blending my insane reading ability with my fascinating work life is the inspiration of this post.

Update: Social Media Can Force Better Customer Service

A few posts ago, I blogged about a horrendous customer service experience with a cable provider.

I had numerous folks reach out to me to share their grievances - and more importantly, I had a Twitter user from the cable company reach out to me to help correct the issue.

Within 24 hrs, after two direct messages on Twitter, my problem was resolved.

I finally felt vindicated.

However, in the afterglow of resolving the solution, I took a moment to reflect.

It took one semi-heated rant posted to a service like Twitter to get the Office of the President to address my issue.  Is Twitter the FINAL or the FIRST step that you need to take to get better customer service?

Isn't the true first step to have an employee-empowered customer service org to deal with lowly customers like me?

If your customer front line is not empowered or educated to handle situations like mine - what is the point of them?

Customer Data 911

How do you quantify bad data?

I remember an instance some years ago that my Chief Strategy Officer walked into a meeting with a current customer to schmooze them (they had an active deal on the table).  He was briefed by his team using SFDC information on the customer on what products they owned, when their maintenance was to renew, etc.

He walked out, 30 minutes later, with egg on his face.

The data was wrong.  From the "main" CRM system.

Needless to say, after that meeting, he championed a major initiative to correct - and course-correct - the data, how it was captured, who was held accountable, when it was put in the system, and what data was mandated.

The project, which involved upwards of 100 people and at least 10 different groups (Marketing, Sales, Customer Support, IT, Finance), took over a year to officially fix.  It changed behaviors, it changed processes, it changed the company.

How did it change the behaviors? Everyone became responsible for accurate data. If there was an inaccurate forecast or field sales plan, Sales earned the black-eye.  If the data showed an out of date product in its record, Finance was held to the fire (due to their ownership of the pricebook).  If customer issues were not properly catalogued (or dealt with), Customer Support had to answer for it.

Why do I bring up this project?

Data is often treated like a 2nd class citizen in organizations - and the reality is that is can cause a major loss of revenue for a company.  There are numerous research studies that show it costs a company less money to sell to a current customer, to retain a current customer - and that customers provide a huge value in terms of referrals.  To land a net-new customer, it will typically cost 6-10x more than to cross/up sell a current customer.

So in terms of trying to quantify the cost (or value) or accurate customer data, think in terms of revenue.

• How much did it save you to sell back to your current customer? 
• How much did it cost you to lose that customer and then win them back?  

Imagine your C-suite blundering a critical deal meeting - not only think of the current deal on the table - but in the long-term viability of that customer in terms of revenue.

That is not a pretty scenario.......