CEO's: You must optimize your CRM to create valuable customer relationships

As a CEO, the stronger and more individualized your engagement with customers and prospects, the more likely you are to gain long-term, loyal and valuable relationships with them. CRM systems are so important in helping you to achieve valuable relationships that result in long-term sales, and optimizing this system is key to getting the most from your CRM.

As a graduate student in the Northwestern Medill IMC program, I have been studying CRM optimization strategies and have two articles you may find helpful and insightful.

According to 3 Key Ways To Optimize CRM For Your Business by Meghan Bassett you should focus your efforts in these key areas. First before you start implementing and optimizing your CRM you should identify your goals. It will help you to connect all your processes and know what things you will need in place to meet your goals. Next you should clearly define your business processes to help assure a smooth and efficient flow of information and outline interactions between all people involved. Finally you need take time to continuously evaluate the goals, objectives, and processes that were established to make sure they align with any changes that occur in your organization. With this evaluation you should also always be looking for places where improvements could be made to increase efficiency and improve engagement with consumers.

source: www.insideup.com

Another helpful article is CRM Optimization Checklist by Jenna Hanington who outlines the steps to optimize a CRM that will help increase marketing and sales productivity. The steps include: Clean up your data, set goals, train your sales team, explore new features, demonstrate value, start reporting, and gather feedback.

From my graduate studies at Northwestern University and my exploration of CRM systems, here are three action items that I recommend you consider when setting up and optimizing your CRM.

• Define All Business Processes - If we over look a business process this can result in gaps in the chain of informational flow needed to keep a consumer engaged. Also defining your business processes can help you create the most impactful goals to help your business grow.
• Set CRM Goals - Having CRM goals will help you integrate your business processes with your overall business goals and identify what you need in place to meet them.
• Constant Evaluation - With the constant changes that occur within organizations there needs to be someone that takes the time to ensure that all the aspects of the CRM are aligned with these changes. Ongoing evaluation will help you to get the most benefit from your CRM system.

Today CRM systems are a must for organizations that want to maintain valuable relationships with their customers. However, it is not enough to just buy a CRM and turn it on. There are key processes and goals that need to be defined and constant evaluations to ensure that the CRM system is best matched and optimized to meet the needs of the organization and market.

Lucas De Jong is a marketing professional with significant experience within higher education markets. He specializes in strategic communications, content marketing and CRM strategy/ optimization. Lucas is currently pursuing a master’s degree in Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism. Connect with him on Twitter (@lucasdejong48) and LinkedIn.

Brand Marketers: Targeting Technology for Households in a Multi-screen Era

As a CMO, you know an effective cross platform targeting strategy is key to engaging consumers whose attention is divided across several devices within the same household. As a graduate student in Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) at Medill, Northwestern University, with a focus on brand strategy and digital & interactive marketing, I have studied how the increasingly fragmented media landscape is making it harder for brands to reach individuals effectively. I came across two interesting articles on how marketers, particularly auto marketers, can take advantage of this situation.

In an article, “Video Ad Network YuMe Homes in on Households,” Tim Peterson from Advertising Age explains how the video ad network, YuMe developed the household targeting feature for brands to advertise to connected TVs, smartphones, tablets etc. in a house. Tim cites an example of how Hyundai and the agencies Innocean and Initiative used the strategy of a household targeting feature to reach households who were inclined to purchase premium vehicles.  Tim notes, “To aim ads at all the various devices in a household, YuMe homes in on the IP address tied to the residence's wireless network and layers in data from YuMe, YuMe's publishers and third parties to determine which households to show ads for which brands.”

                 

Source:  Business Insider:  By 2017, We'll Each Have 5 Internet Devices (And More Predictions From Cisco)

According to another article, How brands can solve the targeting paradox on iMedia Connection, the Senior Vice President of global marketing at Specific Media, Bill Schild, discusses how brands can increase conversions by reaching all members of a household and how even children have an influence on certain purchasing decisions. Bill emphasizes that brands must shift focus to reach consumers across screens by viewing groups of devices as a single platform. Bill recommends three considerations for brands to examine before using the household approach to integrate messages across their screens. First “ensure a household approach is the right strategy for your product or brand.” Second “ensure consistent measurement” where Bill identifies that a house holding campaign can be measured effectively across different devices through a single platform. Third is to “identify and implement cross platform frequency management” so that one can effectively control the number of ads shown cross platform.      
                                                                                                                

Based on my analysis of the articles, here is a summary of the action items I would recommend you consider for your company:  

1. Household strategy for products with long purchase cycles and group involvement:  Advertisers looking to influence consumers for products which typically have a long purchase cycle and which involve more than one family member of a household should consider employing this strategy. 
2. Utilize platforms that provide coherent results and increase efficiencies: To overcome the disjointed metrics across multiple platforms, brands should consider testing platforms which use a single currency of measurement to target households.
3. Focus on the consumer experience and frequency capping: Advertisers should take advantage of delivering their message according to the customers' device consumption patterns. At the same time, they should utilize cross platform frequency management to make sure that serving the same ads across multiple devices repeatedly does not result in message fatigue.

Marketers need to realize that even with time shifting, users jointly consume more media across multiple screens than before and thus even though the media consumption habits of individuals are changing, using the above recommendations, there is opportunity for marketers to capture their attention while they are connected to multiple devices online. Testing these measures will help make metrics across disparate platforms less complex and eventually help marketers improve return on investment.   

Farheen Shah is a Digital Marketing Strategist who has previously worked in various positions at Google primarily managing Digital/Search Engine Marketing Agencies in Australia & New Zealand. She is currently pursuing a Master's degree in Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern University specializing in Brand Strategy and Digital/Interactive Marketing.

Questions or comments?  I’d love to hear your thoughts! Contact me via Twitter: @farheenshah or 

LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/farheenshah

CMO's- Misunderstand Your Brand Value...and Risk Losing Customers!

As a CMO of any company, establishing brand equity is important because it leads to a supply of loyal customers and helps develop a company’s personality.  As a graduate student at Northwestern’s Medill Integrated Marketing Communications program, I have found this topic very insightful and I would like to draw your attention to the following two articles that summarize the importance of brand equity and the ultimate goal of brand loyalty.

The article by Scott Cullather, “The Importance of Brand Equity and How to Maintain it”, focuses on the value of brand equity and the ultimate drive to customer loyalty.  The development of brand equity is important as it allows companies to more effectively engage with their customers in ways that drive brand loyalty, allowing the business to grow.  Brand equity is particularly important to start-ups because it helps them define themselves and their core values as well as steer the company in the appropriate direction towards profitability.  Start-ups also have an advantage, as they have the ability to figure out particularly who they would like to target at an early stage and leverage their customer base accordingly.  This helps them figure out their own niche and maintain a competitive advantage.  The structure of brand equity from an internal company’s standpoint is also very critical, as it can affect the outward brand appeal.  As the business becomes comfortable with its customer base, it is easy for it to lose sight of its core values and therefore affect the internal culture of the company, which in turn, reflects the brand positioning and could eventually lead to problems retaining customers. 

The article by Jennifer Taylor, “The Importance of Brand Equity for your Business”, discusses the importance of building a brand personality through brand equity so that the customer base recognizes the product and product sales lead to profitability in the long run.  It is crucial the brand or product is unique in some fashion and can be differentiated from its competitors.  The ultimate goal of the company is to provide value to the customers through emotional ties and passion.  These emotions lead to sales and lower price sensitivity, which lead to customer loyalty.  Finally, brand equity is the value of the brand that you have created; strong brand equity can lead to higher profit margins and customer retention.

Based on my review of these two articles and my graduate work in the Northwestern Medill IMC program, there are three things you should know to achieve high brand equity:

1.     Figure out who you would like to target- You can’t target everyone at once, your company needs a market to focus on and adjust to.

2.      Turn the customer into a loyal buyer- Make sure your brand is unique enough to be differentiated by the consumer.

3.      Establish and maintain core brand values internally and externally to create a brand personality- although external values are important, if the company employees don’t retain these values in an internal setting, this will eventually be visible to the consumer through external branding and can lead to diminishing customer retention.

In the ever changing business world knowing your customer, staying one step ahead of the competition and developing a brand personality can help you maintain a competitive edge and ultimately create brand loyalty. 

Sources:

http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/media-network-blog/2012/aug/10/brand-equity-start-ups-advantage

 http://www.womensenterprise.ca/blog/importance-brand-equity-your-business
Image- http://growthweaver.com/brand-equity-and-social-media/

Marina Goldshteyn is pursuing a Masters degree in Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) at Northwestern University.  She currently works as a Sr. Marketing Acquisition Associate at Discover Financial Services. She hopes to continue her professional career post graduation to focus on brand strategy and execution. 

Continue the conversation via Twitter @MarinaGoldshte1 or via LinkedIn.

Brand Managers - Drive Passion Using Your Brand Essence

Brand Managers are perennially in search of ways to not only maintain their standing with their customers, but increase excitement and strengthen passion for their products.  I have found articles reiterating the importance of allowing insight gained from your customers to drive innovation; ideas introduced to me as a graduate student at Northwestern University's Medill IMC program.

In the beauty world, there is the tale of two entities. There are the main industry titans and the newcomers garnering lots of buzz with their unique perspective yet both are fighting to attract customers, old and new. The most important action for each is to build desire, a thought expressed by Revlon’s CMO Julia Goldin.  This desire for the newest shades, trends and products helps your brand remain relevant. This is the charge for your brand; build, create and sustain desire.

After listening to your customer, the next and most crucial step is what you do with what you've discovered.  Translate this newfound information into customer-friendly innovation improving the customer experience with the products as done by cosmetic titan, L'Oreal.

How do we create this elusive desire?  The aforementioned articles and my studies in IMC have guided me towards these three items to implement and achieve your desired results. Listen to what your customers are saying and uncover what they are not able to express directly.  This can be done in several ways but none more important than engaging via social media, which provides a unique opportunity to learn more about the ways customers interact and use your product.  Capitalize by listening to your brand community on sites where they interact with each other most; the major social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. Read comments left on YouTube video tutorials and gain a deeper understanding never before accessible.  Respond accordingly to customers needs and employ cutting-edge technology to create their desired iterations of products helping you retain and attract them.

In the cosmetics world with infinite possibilities for self-described "beauty junkies" companies are faced with the daunting task of differentiating their brand from competitors. Using the above actions will help your brand achieve the distinguishing qualities that build desire to draw your customer in and keep them coming back for more.

Jaclyn Bivins

@jaclynbivins

Jaclyn Bivins hails from Chicago, Illinois and is a graduate student at Northwestern University in Medill's Integrated Marketing Communications program. After graduation, she hopes to work in brand management and marketing strategy in the cosmetics and beauty industry. 

Mobile - Leveraging the New Era of Brand Engagement

As a brand manager or digital strategist, it is critical that you understand how to leverage new technologies, like mobile, to engage your customers in a manner that adds value to their relationship with your brand. IBM reports that over 91% of consumers keep their smartphones within an arm’s reach 100% of the time. These digital lifelines are changing the way that companies interact with consumers; yet only 25% of companies have a mobile customer service strategy in place. As a graduate student at Northwestern University’s Medill IMC program, I have been studying examples of companies that have been excelling at connecting with consumers on the go around the world. Based off of insights from two articles on mobile marketing and digital content experiences, it is clear that the keys to a successful mobile strategy are customer service and brilliant content.

Credit: http://www.pivotguild.com

Customer Service

There is a lot that companies can learn from taking the time to reflect upon the success stories from online, namely those that have dedicated themselves to customer service. The same applies to mobile. HBR points out that Zappos developed an online shoe empire by empowering customer service reps to do what they saw fit and by solving customers’ problems. Your company or client’s mobile strategy needs to become the Zappos of mobile – part of an integrated approach to delivering on your brand’s promise to consumers across channels. In a recent white paper, BSSDigital recommends you use qualitative and quantitative research to better understand your consumers’ joys and pain points so that you can maximize the powerful opportunities mobile technology affords. It's time to expand your vision from using mobile as a way to convert a sale and see it as the powerful customer aid that it is.  

Content Marketing

The content of your mobile strategy is a way to foster relationships with consumers. People thrive off of stories and experiences and when your brand is positioned to be there at the very time of need with the right information, you are poised to be an aide that the consumer is ever grateful for. Remember, your content either needs to entertain consumers or help them get something done. At the intersection of content and utility is an understanding of how to make consumers’ lives easier. The luxury of having the real estate for advertising and content that co-exists on a computer is not present on mobile. BSS Digital points out that you do not need to develop an app, certainly that is quite a lofty investment, but a better approach is to ensure that your content is available and easily accessible to consumers on a 3.5-inch screen. So please, ditch your mobile banner ad budget and invest the resources into crafting content that the consumer will actually benefit from.

Where do you begin? From my analysis of the recommendations from HBR and BSS Digital together with my studies in the Northwestern IMC program, here are three immediate actions that you can take to help get you on the right track as you look to develop a mobile strategy for the future:

1. Optimize your website for mobile
This is non-negotiable. Ensure that your website has a responsive design or that the consumer is automatically directed to a mobile site. You cannot help customers do anything if, when they are looking for content on your site remotely, they are forced to squish, scroll or wait for something to load and get frustrated. Don’t force consumers to go to a competitor’s website for information - because 40% of them will.

2. Use location-based data to your advantage:

IBM reports that 75% of mobile shoppers take action after receiving a location-based message. But, the key to doing this successfully is to ensure that the message you are sending is going to help the consumer, if not you are just going to be an overbearing creep instantly ruining the relationship. Geo-targeting needs to be seamlessly integrated into your overall commitment to customer service and not be another tactic to get a sale.

3. Shift your mindset and start solving problems:

Take off your marketer hat and actually think if you, as a consumer, would appreciate what you are proposing. Johnson's bedtime app is a great example of a company solving problems instead of selling products. The app helps new mothers track their baby’s sleep schedule, connect with other sleep-deprived parents, get help from experts, and have a lullaby on hand – all working to build interactions, engagement and loyalty for years to come. This is a prime example of how to leverage superior content and a customer service strategy to foster a relationship

Shifting your focus to view mobile marketing as the powerful content delivery and customer service tool that it is will ensure that your company or client is well on its way to crafting a mobile strategy that helps grow your business for years to come. 

Martine de Gannes is currently pursuing her Masters in Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern University's @MedillSchool. She is highly interested in mobile and shopper marketing and when not in the classroom, you can find her at the nearest golf course. Follow her at @martsdeg.