Refreshing Sales Call

I just had a very refreshing sales with a CRM SaaS provider called Aplicor. After 15 minutes she told me their solution is likely not a great fit for our needs. And she even offered to put me in touch with someone who just went through a similar process.

The fact that a sales person can recognize when their solution is not the right fit and walk away is very refreshing. I cannot begin to tell you how many times I have been on that side of the fence where, as an organization, you sell a solution that requires a boatload of customization. Nobody wins.

This gives me a glimmer of hope that there are (sales) people and organizations out there who get it. If anybody is looking for a vendor to help drive and qualify leads i would strongly suggest calling Aplicor and asking for Lisa D.

Wine vs. Scotch

As Mark Twain said, "I didn’t have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead", which I think is a perfect statement to my current situation. I could consider my traditional way of think as to over complicate things. I tend to look too far down the road and consider ALL variables and options. Which in many situations is a good thing. But what I am discovering now that the it may be better to go with the simple(r) ideas.....at least with technology.

When you consider how fast technology changes why invest in the biggest and best solution today when there will be a bigger, faster solution tomorrow? When is the right time to pull the trigger on an investment? Compound the change in technology with the change in economy and who knows what tomorrow will look like for retailers, developers and other businesses.

Which is why I am exploring the idea of integrating 3 to 4 businesses that each specialize in one area of CRM, instead of looking for one fully integrated solution. Some of the disciplines include:

• Campaign Management


• Business Intelligence


• CRM Platform/Data Hygiene


• Loyalty


• Email management

The beauty of this strategy is it keeps my initial (capital) investment low and provides a best of breed solution to each discipline. In addition, if some new widget or strategy becomes available down the road, my investment is minimal which gives me great opportunity for change.

One downside of this solution is the fact that I have multiple vendors to manage and I need to rely on making sure they all play nice together. And the fact that I have to look at my payment structure as being spread out over time (paying for each sip of wine vs. purchasing an entire winery). However, this might not be a bad thing if we decide scotch is our drink of choice after a few years? okay bad analogy but you get the idea.

As of right now this direction is only an idea. I have defined a few players but now all. I am not sure if I can make this a reality or not in the time frame I have been given...but i am going to give it a shot.

The Power of Chris Brogan

I never stop being amazed at the power and timeliness of social media.

No less than 60 seconds ago I decided to send Chris Brogan a Tweet about a social media idea I came up with last month. The idea is simple. How quickly (and how much) can a single blog and a few posts penetrate the social network to drive attention and awareness.



In this case, I decided to see if I could raise money for charity. The Power of One (dollar). No less then seconds, literally seconds from the time is sent my tweet to Mr. Brogan (check out his website) did I see an influx of Twitter followers and people already supporting this cause.

THANK YOU CHRIS! Thank you Social Media.


http://www.chrisbrogan.com/

Customer Service the Way it Should Be!

I just had to post a quick statement regarding TheLadders executive recruiting web site. Customer Service the way it should be....

I signed up for a three month membership when my previous employer decided to relocate my job. At the time, I did not read the fine print (my error) about auto renewal.

Fortunately, I landed my current opportunity within three months. But I have continued to receive premium benefits from The Ladders. I thought it might be just a timing issue so I did not check...until this morning. It turns out I have signed up for another three months.

Talk about convenience. The Ladders offers real time chat. So I initiated a dialog with Gloria. After explaining the situation and listening to Gloria defend the company's policy, I asked her if she "will do the right thing" and she did. Refunded my $75 and wished me a pleasant day.

As you can see.....I am surprised and grateful.