6 Reasons Your Small Business Should Monitor Reviews Posted on July 28, 2021July 23, 2021 by Jonathan Herrick We live in an age where information is just a few clicks away. If we want to buy something, it’s not hard to look into the product first by searching online review sites, consumer ratings, and seeing what our favorite influencer thinks of the product first. In fact, 91% of consumers read online reviews before purchasing a product. And, the majority of online shoppers will read anywhere between one and ten reviews before they make a decision. This means that if you have a product and are actively thinking of the best ways to market and sell it to your audience base, you need to pay special attention to what your online reviews are saying. Online reviews simply cannot be ignored, especially if you want to maintain competitiveness within your industry. Let’s break down six reasons why your small business should be actively monitoring reviews. 1. The Power of Reputation Reviews and 5-star ratings are probably the most influential factor when it comes to trust and gaining confidence to make a purchase. Thanks to the power of third-party credibility, positive reputation, and social proof are among the most powerful marketing assets a business can use to gain new customers. It’s crucial that businesses not only obtain this type of credibility but that they harness it by integrating it into their standard marketing efforts. This means adding customer testimonials to your website, sharing your average rating and number of positive reviews on your landing pages, and integrating it into your email nurture campaigns. Case studies are great for bottom-of-the-funnel email campaigns. It’s also smart to use quotes as images for your social media posts. You earned these great reviews, so make sure you share them out for the world to see. 2. More Clicks, Conversions, and Better Search Rankings With reputation and positive reviews, customers are more likely to make a purchase. In practice, that can reflect in measurable results, such as CTR and conversion rates. Think about it. Review sites are just another high-traffic site through which your website is linked. When your reviews are impressive, the people traveling to those sites will be more inclined to click on your website and check your company out. As long as your website is optimized for lead conversions, you can capitalize on all that exposure and traffic and turn those visitors into high-quality leads you can nurture. 3. Get More Local Customers If you’re a small business operating on a local level, you still can’t escape the marketing power of reviews. Star rating can be one of the most important factors that consumers look at when judging a local business. But don’t think you need to totally hit it out of the park. While a 5-star rating is extremely impressive, most consumers will think it’s too good to be true. If you’re able to hit that star review sweet spot, you’ll be able to use it to gain more interest from other local customers and see more foot traffic through your door and more visitors on your website. Just make sure you’re prepared to handle the influx of customers so you can maintain that good reputation. 4. Responding Gets You More Positive Reviews When you actively monitor your reviews, you also have the opportunity to respond and interact with your customers. This not only helps you address any issues quickly, but it provides your customers with a high level of customer service, which they’ll love and respond well to. If you get a negative review, at least you can publicly state your point and/or apologize. But responding to positive reviews is equally important. If happy customers know the business owner is going to see their positive reviews, let alone respond and interact with them, they could be more inclined to leave them. Just make sure your customers know how important reviews are to your business and that you’ll go above and beyond to ensure you receive positive ones. 5. It’s a Great Source of Customer Feedback Online reviews are an excellent source for direct customer feedback. People are more honest and straightforward than if they were to give customer interviews for case studies. Even if you get a negative review, it’s not too late to turn it into an advantage. Use those negative reviews as a way to grow and learn what you could do differently or how you can handle issues in a better way. You can contact these customers, engage with them, gain feedback and resolve their issues and do so quickly. Sometimes, these customers can turn into your most loyal yet, but it all comes down to how you handle their feedback. 6. Beat Your Competition Monitoring and responding to online reviews is increasingly common among successful businesses. However, there are still too few of them doing it. Taking this seriously can not only become one of your best growth strategies, but it can also help you get a big step ahead of your competition. When you’re the company that responds to customers instead of ignoring them, that will impress the people you’re trying to reach and show them that you’re invested in making their experience with your business a positive one. We hope this article helps you tackle your online reviews head-on by engaging with them and making them part of your marketing and sales strategies. There are tons of benefits to be had; you just have to find an approach and process that works for you.
9 Content Marketing Performance Metrics to Start Tracking Posted on July 22, 2021July 16, 2021 by Guest Author If you’re involved in SaaS content marketing, metrics are vital to your strategy. You need to be able to quantify your actions to trace their impacts and have a clear idea of what success looks like. However, just as looking at call center KPIs throws up unexpected metrics, content marketing has overlooked metrics of its own. Give your content marketing a boost with these new approaches to performance tracking. 1. Qualified Visitors This refers to how many users are likely to buy something from you. It often encompasses users from countries you deliver to. If geography isn’t a concern, it might be users who visit important product or service pages. If these qualified visitor numbers are high (but aren’t matched by sales), what you offer might not be attractive to them. Consider what you can do to change this – try highlighting delivery options, for example, or revising product pages to include more information. This can form part of a customer nurturing campaign that targets frequent pain points for customers. 2. Repeat Visitors Take a look at how many website visitors have visited before. High returning numbers are a good sign – you want people to pay regular visits. It shows they value what you have to offer and are receptive to your product or service. However, if the site’s bounce rate is also high, it suggests your content schedule needs amending. Make sure you have a steady stream of content that justifies repeat visits, or your visitor numbers could start to trend downward. A daily stand-up can generate new content ideas or troubleshoot existing ones. 3. Pages Per Visit As part of your content strategy, you want to keep people on-site for as long as possible. The longer people are on your site, the more they will learn about your business and the more likely you are to make a sale. A low pages-per-visit metric means customers are being kept in the dark about your merits. Aid people’s understanding of your business with internal links to other relevant content. This is a great way to keep users on your site and, more importantly, give them something useful in return. 4. Content Syndication Effectiveness As the name suggests, this refers to the impact of syndicated content and guest posts on your users. These kinds of content are an excellent way to enhance your brand awareness and expand your audience base by tapping into readers of the publications your content is being placed or syndicated on. But, like anything else, we need to scrutinize them for effectiveness. To track the impact of syndicated content, you need to add UTM tags to your content (which track the campaign’s source and medium). This, in turn, will tell you where searchers are coming from and what drew them to you in the first place. To turn this effectiveness into a metric, divide your total number of site visits by the number of leads delivered over a given period and then multiply this by 100. The resulting percentage helps you compare the impact of different partners on your business. 5. Content Engagement The time spent with your broader content offering is also instructive. See if there’s a mismatch between the average consumption time for your content and the time spent on its page. If there is, this can give you an insight into the quality of your content. You can get a good sense of how long it takes to read an article by looking at its word count. The average reading speed of an adult is 275 words per minute. Add 12 seconds to the total for every image you include in the article. To get your content engagement metric, divide the average time spent on a page by the content’s average consumption time, and multiply it by 100. A low percentage suggests your content isn’t engaging. A high percentage suggests your content is difficult to consume. If you’re seeing differing reception to your written and video content, collaboration software can bring your teams together. Sharing your approaches – and the lessons learned – might help identify ways to improve your content. 6. Attribution Today’s businesses have numerous channels for marketing – social media, email campaigns, paid search, and so on. But are all of these useful for your business? You need to be able to attribute sales to specific marketing campaigns for them to be of value. While this is a complex area, it’s best to use a multi-touch attribution model to track this metric. These look at all the steps a user takes before purchasing from you. The right attribution model depends on your specific business. 7. Open to Click Comparison Do you offer multiple content types (for different parts of the sales funnel) in emails? This metric lets you see if people are interested in what you’re selling – and how you’re selling it. You might send different ebooks to customers in different parts of the sales funnel, emphasizing savings or product features as required. Calculate this metric by dividing your clicks by your opens and multiplying the resulting number by 100. By calculating this metric for each of your content types and messages, you can get a clear sense of how receptive your audience is. It can also help you better gauge customer lifetime value, i.e., how much value each customer actually brings you. Since a user won’t know the value of most content before viewing it, the problem may lie with the sales message. If this metric is unusually low, consider rephrasing your email messaging to better serve your customers. A virtual whiteboard is a great way to collaborate on effective messaging. 8. Mobile Entrances Mobile browsing is very popular with today’s internet users. Are you tracking how many people are coming to a content page via mobile? If this number is high, check in on your site’s mobile optimization. This is important for both content marketing and general site ranking. Google prioritizes mobile page load speed in its assessment of your website, which is a key consideration for mobile users. Pages also need to display well on mobile, which they should if you have a responsive website. 9. SERP Ranking This isn’t a metric you can calculate in the conventional sense. However, your position on a search engine results page is a pretty good barometer for your content’s value and, therefore, the visibility of your site. After all, users can’t do business with you if they can’t find you! A good SERP ranking can help to strengthen the perception of a startup business. A strong website, active social media presence, and professional logo are all essential. But ranking highly in SERPs also contributes to your authority and expertise. By tracking your content’s movement in a SERP, you can get a clearer sense of whether that content is valuable (or seen as valuable by Google). Featured snippets contain content of exceptional value and can help you to usurp clicks from top-ranked content. Image source As such, creating content that’s featured-snippet friendly is an excellent way to bolster your content marketing strategy. Conclusion An effective content marketing strategy takes a holistic look at the content being produced. You can’t just look at the quality of the content itself; you need to see the nuts and bolts of how (and where) users engage with it. Good businesses also appreciate their content creators – virtual celebration ideas can help keep teams motivated. By taking such a broad perspective, you’ll be able to create content that truly serves the needs of your many customers. Author Bio Jenna Bunnell is the Senior Manager for Content Marketing at Dialpad, an AI-incorporated cloud-hosted unified communications system that provides valuable call details for business owners and sales representatives. She is driven and passionate about communicating a brand’s design sensibility and visualizing how content can be presented in creative and comprehensive ways. Here is her LinkedIn.
Which Organizational Structure is Better for Your Business? Posted on July 21, 2021July 16, 2021 by Jonathan Herrick The key to effective business collaboration isn’t contingent on the type of personality that your team exhibits. It doesn’t depend on what your company does or what it’s selling. While all those areas may contribute in some way, they aren’t solely responsible for achieving effective collaboration. It may surprise you to learn that organization is a crucial factor in determining whether or not your business will be able to collaborate effectively. The truth is, the more products and people added to the equation, the harder it is to keep everything together. Therefore, a company looking to grow must develop a configured system early on. Enter: The Organization Chart. What is an Organization Chart? Consider this the roadmap of your company culture. An org chart lays the groundwork for the way a business functions and how roles are maintained. It helps to define three key elements: Chain of command Span of control Centralization These types of systems determine which tasks are delegated and where work is approved. It establishes how proposals, requests, and issues are communicated and the line of authority to manage them. An org chart will arrange the decision-making process and answer the how, who, and where of daily operations. It guides everyone on accountability and creates the foundation for corporate growth. Not only that, but it also provides your team with a clear outline of who supports whom. Types of Org Charts Companies can either be flexible and organic, or structured in a more mechanical and departmentalized manner. Each method has sociological advantages and disadvantages. There are several different types of org charts that fall on the spectrum, and it’s important to understand the flow of each before deciding which is better for you. It’s also crucial that you have a sense of what kind of company you want to be. If you want to create a more autonomous environment, one that is more linear, then your org chart will look very different from that of a company focused on who manages whom and who’s in charge of what department. 1. Hierarchical Structure This type of organization (also called a bureaucratic or mechanical structure) is known for having a narrow span of control that follows more traditional patterns of organization. Below is an example of what this organizational chart might look like: One or two entities ultimately make final decisions. Specific standards and practices are used to govern every aspect of decision-making. A clear chain of command Controlled accountability High level of specialization Coordinated policymaking Centralized decision-making A mechanistic organization chart is based on top-down management. There will always be someone seated at the highest possible spot. The hierarchical structure can be organized based on a variety of positions in a company involving: Function Market Geography Product line Process A bureaucratic org chart is very formal and highly centralized. Although it is an efficient form of management, it can stifle organic growth and deter employee engagement. Other disadvantages include: Limited collaboration between departments Can be a hindrance to creativity and agility Slows the decision-making process Duplication of activities and resources (less communication) Missed opportunities to network It may be hard for a company to keep up with a swiftly changing market if their organization is structured too tight. In this model, teams only collaborate as needed. If your company involves a market that shifts arbitrarily, an organic org chart may work better. 2. Organic (Flat) Structure On the other end of the spectrum is an org chart that is defined through organic positioning. Authority is flexible, and the autonomous environment promotes a free flow of information. Below is an example of what this organizational chart may look like: Benefits to an organic (flat) structure include: More balanced decision-making Increased opportunity to share resources Less hierarchy-related pressure Spurs innovation and productivity Consistent communication and collaboration An org chart with this type of construction is not a tiered pyramid, like hierarchical arrangements. Instead, it can look like a flat structure with limited levels of management. All employees are only a few steps away from leadership. An organic structure yields a decentralized decision-making process where final choices are made within a group or team. This may not work for every business. Especially if you are looking to scale quickly. A company may need a central person to make quick decisions. Other disadvantages to a flat org chart include: A confusing approval process Difficult to identify authority Unclear responsibilities Lack of accountability Hard to settle disagreements If you choose to have a flat organization, best practice is to have a marked tier of management or group of employees. This way, executive decision-making can happen fast when necessary. 3. Functional Organization Structure As the name suggests, a functional organization structure groups individuals based on their job functions. The structure is centralized and significantly overlaps with the traditional line or hierarchical structure, offering more communication channels. Source Each department has its director, who reports directly to the CEO. Besides, the directors have employees over whom they have direct authority. In addition, the lines of communication seem open, so the directors can send or share information with managers they don’t directly control. Benefits of functional structure include: Scales easily and is applicable for organizations of all sizes. Allows a high degree of specialization Enhances self-sufficiency and innovation For example, if your organization adopts a functional chart, you’d put all salespeople, marketers, and customer service staff in three separate departments. Putting employees in skill-based departments allows employees to develop specific, specialized roles. However, since the org chart is mechanistic in nature, it can impede an employee’s growth. Beyond that, the functional structure can create barriers between departments or functional cohorts. Other disadvantages include: Limits people’s knowledge to departmental boundaries Inhibits communication among different departments 4. Matrix Structure Unlike most organizational structures, the matrix structure deviates from the traditional line structure. It’s a hybrid org chart that combines functional and project-based structures. Source For example, the leader would have direct authority over representatives from traditional functional groups, say, marketers, developers, and salespeople. And then, the representatives report to respective functional managers in their areas of specialization. In other words, in a matrix structure, there are two bosses. Benefits of Matrix organizational structure include: Team leaders are at liberty to choose the best talent for each project It assigns different responsibilities for each employee It enables employees to hone skills outside their area of specialization Even though the matrix organization structure works, its true nature can also be a source of multiple challenges. Some of the disadvantages of this structure include: It’s prone to frequent changes It causes a conflict of interest between the needs of the department and project organization. Other Organizational Structures The four structures mentioned above are some of the most common. However, there are other structures out there that companies use and find efficient to their process and needs. Other organizational structures worth a mention include: Market-based divisional structure – Responsibilities and job roles are based on the market being served. Product-based divisional structure – Responsibilities and job roles are based on the products being created and marketed. Process-based structure – Designed around the activities each employee performs, as well as how those activities interact with one another. Circular structure – Instead of a hierarchical structure, this one focuses on leadership from within spreading outward. Geographical divisional structure – This structure works best for companies in various regions and geographical locations. While each is part of a larger entity, they run the individual locations according to what works best for that particular division or local requirements. Network structure – This structure is pretty non-conventional. It’s less focused on hierarchy and is flat and flexible. Managers within this structure control relationships both internal and external to the company. The Benefits of Organizational Structure Organization charts can be applied to a business of any size, in any industry. As a company grows, this type of system helps new employees understand how processes are managed. It defines corporate culture and keeps daily operations running efficiently. An organizational structure will visualize workflows to forecast future business. It enables a company to pivot or shift leadership as the brand evolves. There is no right or wrong way to organize your business. Some establishments may require rigid and centralized foundations, while others flourish with flexible and decentralized environments. Factors to Consider When Selecting an Org Chart For a Remote Team There’s no doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic strongly affected the world of remote work. During the pandemic, 70% of employees in the U.S. worked from home. Remote work seems to have had a lasting impression on most employees, 80% of whom expect to work from home at least three times a week after the pandemic. If there was ever a question if your organization should adopt remote work, the time is now. Keep in mind, embracing hybrid teams or allowing fully remote work may change how your company manages its employees. For this reason, you’ll need to entwine your remote company’s culture with a befitting organizational structure. Doing so lets employees fully understand the direction of your organization and how they can contribute to reaching the set goals. Having a formal organizational structure helps hold remote employees to account and manage projects without a hitch. And when selecting an organizational structure that would pair nicely with the remote work model, pick a structure that: Boost communication Fosters collaboration Allows managers to monitor progress via regular check-ins Clearly outlines who will be held accountable for what. Why It’s Important to Understand Organization Structure One of the key reasons salespeople in the B2B niche spend a lot of time looking for decision-makers is that they don’t understand the internal structure of the prospective organization. The org chart helps you know exactly who’s in control and can make closing a sale much easier. Organizational structure can also be helpful in account-based marketing tactics. Consider, for example, a case where you’re selling full-service marketing, sales, and customer service platform. You’ll require departmental heads to give the “go-ahead” for the sale to go through. In this case, an org chart helps you pinpoint each of your key accounts, the position they hold, and how the installation of the software might affect them. This way, your sales and marketing teams can prepare a pitch that hits the nail on the head and present it to the decision-makers. Select an Org Chart Based on Business Needs Org charts are not set in stone. If one isn’t working, change up the workflows. In the real world, the solution lies somewhere in between. Companies typically choose a hybrid version of a hierarchical and organic chart. Try borrowing elements from different structures. Ultimately, it’s about daily function, brand identity, and employee satisfaction and productivity. No matter the type, a well-defined organizational structure is always critical for business development.
12 Ways to Grow your Social Media Audience in 2021 Posted on July 15, 2021July 9, 2021 by Guest Author We’ve moved past the point where social media is a nice-to-have addition to marketing and sales strategies. In 2021, if you’re not utilizing social media for growth, you’re missing out on an opportunity to speak to a whole new side of your potential business audience. Learn how to grow your social media audience by refining your current social strategy and see just how easily you can move from lurker to thought leader on every social platform. 1. Analyze Social Media Channels Before you make a whole social media strategy, you need to analyze the channels your brand is using, underutilizing or neglecting completely. If your brand is only on Facebook, but all the action is on Twitter, analyzing where your efforts are best spent is the first key to unlocking a door of success online. Likewise, if your brand is fairly active on Instagram and seeing good but not great engagement, you know where to hunker down and concentrate your efforts in a more targeted manner. 2. Have Clear Goals There’s no one-size-fits-all solution. Since every company’s business goals are different, their social media strategy will be too. Defining your business goals for social media early on will save you time in the long run. Is your goal to grow an audience? Become a leader within a niche social media community? What will the social media approval process look like, and how many layers will there be from ideation to publish? Whatever your goals are, define them as a primary step in your social media strategy before wasting time exploring each platform. Once you do, learn how each platform works and do some test posts to see where and when your content gets the most engagement from your audience. From that point forward, you’ll be able to determine which channels are most lucrative for your end goals and business needs. Remember: Not every social media strategy needs to end in financial gain or more customers for your business. Some other goals might be related to educating your audience, informing an underserved population, receiving audience feedback, or developing/changing your brand perception. If your goals are lead and prospect-focused, that’s okay, too. 3. Identify Your Audience As you’re defining your social strategy goals, it’s time to identify your existing audience and your targeted audience. Whether you rely on personas or actual customer data, find out who your target audience is and curate content for them. If you’re marketing to a millennial age group, you should know that “college students” and “high schoolers” aren’t your target market – the youngest millennials are 25 in 2021. So make sure you know who you’re trying to reach in your social posts. Let’s say you’re a luxury pet goods brand. If your target audience is cat lovers, posting dog-centric content won’t get much engagement. Know who they are and who you want them to be. If you’re trying to branch out and move from a cats-only audience to a pet-friendly audience, you’ll want to post a variety of content featuring cats, dogs, fish, and exotic animals. But if your audience is meant to be strictly people who like cats, stick to content they’re most likely to share and don’t deviate from what works. 4. Create a Strong Brand Presence Brand presence is key for building your social profiles and social strategy. If your company doesn’t have brand images and profile pictures that really say “this is who we are,” people will feel lost or uncertain about the brand they’re interacting with. Who are you really? Make it abundantly clear so when people see your logo, they know exactly who you are. On top of imagery and visuals that speak your brand persona, have a unified brand voice. Whether that’s a word, catchphrase, or exceptional dedication to keeping up with social issues and recent events, make sure your brand voice is unified and mirrored on every social platform you live on. 5. Create Delightful Content When developing your social media workflow, make sure you know what kinds of content you want to make. Social media posts are great, but you’ll have to vary what kind of posts you publish and make that determination based on your audience per platform you use. LinkedIn content will likely be longer form, written posts. But Twitter posts are short burst tweets that may or may not contain images. Determine the content type, length, and add-ons (i.e., videos, GIFs, emojis, photos) and start from there. Below is an overview of the types of content you should post and see on each platform: Source: Differences in social media platforms, Hearsay Social Once you’ve done that, you can start to play with content types and get more creative. After creating one piece of content, you can repurpose it into multiple content types such as infographics, standalone images, and short-form videos. Infographics are great because you can take longer-form blogs or text posts and rework them into something more visually appealing and easy to disseminate. Likewise, using images and short videos is another way to bring a visual element into the mix. Here are a few other content types to consider: Polls and question posts: Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram all have poll and question posts. People love giving their opinions and yes/no question answers. Ask people to vote for their choice or ask them to drop their opinion or recommendations for something. People love talking and even more so love sharing what they think is important. So don’t be shy to ask. Contests and incentives: User-generated content is an incredible way to ask for audience help on projects or initiatives you have while providing them with incentives for doing so. Whoever comes up with the best caption wins a free $10 gift card! People love to win. So turn some of your posts into opportunities to win whatever it is you’re willing to give away. 6. Use Hashtags Effectively Once you’ve solidified your brand’s social personality, you can delve into more niche parts of the internet – specifically areas where you might be able to lean on hashtags for keywords your audience is looking for. When brands start using keywords relevant to their audience and niche, they can reach a more hyper-specific audience and help people focus on finding information, news, and content from their brand. Sometimes brands can utilize trends if relevant to a larger brand initiative. Let’s take holidays as an example. If you’re a greeting card company, it makes sense to hop on hashtag trends like #MothersDay, #FathersDay, and #HappyGraduation for big summer events. If you aren’t a hyper-nuanced brand like that of a greeting card and are maybe a tech company instead, a good starting point is to check out what’s trending on Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Because all three of these platforms rely heavily on hashtags as fuel for content, it’s smart to browse posts that are performing well (i.e., high-engagement, likes, and comments) to see what works and what doesn’t. Starting even smaller, whenever you post something on your social media accounts, try to incorporate some hashtags – even if it’s just two or three. These little signals will bring people to your social media accounts and potentially turn them into site visitors, depending on what you bring to the consumer’s table. 7. Link Your Website with Social Media One of the easiest ways to boost social media visibility is by making sure you’re visible everywhere. Do your website landing pages have social media links at the bottom of them? If not, you make it that much more difficult for users to connect with you outside of your email newsletter list. Sometimes customers and prospects like browsing social platforms to gauge how active and engaged your brand is – and that could be the decision between your product and a competitor’s product. Make sure that you link all of your social media accounts to your website in the header, sidebar, or footer of your website – somewhere highly visibly and easily accessible. And make sure the links are accurate and open to your social profiles. See the example webpage below and how it clearly links to social media accounts in the footer of its site: Another easy addition is adding social sharing buttons to your website content so people can share as they read. Make it super simple for people to share your blogs on their Twitter or your awesome video on their Instagram story. The easier it is to share, the more likely people will actually share your content. 8. Post Consistently Nothing looks worse than a brand with a social media profile that simply never posts. Having social profiles means nothing unless you actually use them, and brands with social platforms that never post are seen as out of touch or “old school.” Utilize social media monitoring software to help you keep a consistent posting schedule and build out a full social media calendar. Source: What a social media calendar looks like, Sprout Social Whether it’s once or twice a week or something more frequent, regular, consistent posting lets your audience know you’re keeping them top of mind when thinking through your social media strategy. If you feel like you have nothing new to say or share, try resharing and repurposing older content types. Retweet and repost content from others – especially your customers. Even if you just post a generic “hi!” message, people will notice, and you will find yourself with a more engaged audience. 9. Piggyback on What’s Trending Take advantage of national trends online. Is it National Pizza Day? Good thing you’re a pizza brand! An opportunity like this is something that our example pizza brand should do. Post photos of your product and drop your “order now” link in your post. Make it as easy as possible to follow along with a trend without completely forgetting what the point of the trend was. 10. Humanize and Personalize Don’t just post into the dark and hope people will like your silly GIF or heartfelt text post. If you’re not putting a human element into the content you share, people won’t feel compelled to engage with it. Because of this, it’s important for brands to practice both reactive engagement and proactive engagement. When you’re reactive, you’re answering direct messages, incoming mentions, or comments. When you’re proactive, you’re the one sparking conversation with people who may be talking about you but haven’t necessarily sent messages to you directly. Being proactive on social media is one of the core principles of being successful at social selling, which is especially important for building rapport with prospects, which brings us to our next point. 11. Build Relationships, Not Just Followers Having 100 followers who regularly engage with you and your content is infinitely more valuable than 10,000 that ignore you. You can post content endlessly, but if you don’t interact with your followers, you’ll struggle to grow your account. Engage by interacting with customers, replying to responses, and reaching out to them first. Engagement is number one in building an audience that’s worthwhile. 12. Never, Ever Buy Followers and Fans Lastly, never buy followers. A vanity metric like follower count might feel nice, but it’s all fake. Let your content speak for itself and reach followers without tricking the algorithm into thinking you have more followers than you do. Keep it honest and seek out a real audience. Conclusion These 12 tips are a surefire way to grow your audience, build a presence, and acquire a more dedicated customer follower base. Even using just a few tips will take you from a blip on the radar to the first brand your customers are thinking about the next time they’re asked, “Which brand does social media well?” Author Bio Meenakshi Nautiyal aka Meenz is a Growth Marketer for Nextiva. She’s passionate about everything SaaS, start-ups and SEO. She has a successful track record of 10+ years scaling organic traffic and inbound leads for various startups. Bibliophile and coffee-lover who dives into art therapy during her free time.
Sales and Marketing Performance Metrics and Why You Should Track Them Posted on July 14, 2021July 15, 2022 by Jonathan Herrick Growing your small business is as much about math and numbers as it is about customer satisfaction and service delivery. Paying attention to the right metrics will let you design the best and most effective strategy for meeting your sales and revenue goals. So what are the metrics that you and your B2B team should be tracking? Here’s a list of key indicators you can use to keep your momentum going. Sales and Marketing Performance Metrics Sales and marketing performance metrics help determine if your outcomes align with your small business goals. You track the metrics and select ranges (some sort of benchmark) that signify ideal performance. You can then weigh the tracked metrics against those ranges to evaluate performance. When a metric is within the range, you know you’re on course to reach your targets. However, if the results are short of the range, it’s time to investigate your processes and take remedial action to put performance back on track. If you want to improve your sales and marketing performance, here are the metrics you should track: Sales Performance Metrics Sales performance metrics help you determine whether your sales teams are hitting their set targets. They enable you to track progress towards set goals, tweak your sales process to accelerate sales growth, award performing reps, and replace underperforming reps to boost performance. Here are the most critical sales performance metrics you should be measuring: Average Deal Size The average deal size gives you the average revenue brought in from your closed deals within a certain period of time. It’s a quotient of the total dollar amount of closed sales and the total number of deals. For your business to keep an upward trajectory, you need to ensure the sales reps are closing deals that align with your goals. If your goal is to move upmarket, you want to see the deal size grow – or vice versa. Sales Productivity Sales productivity helps measure how much time the reps spend selling. It’s an important metric to understand as it helps evaluate sales performance in terms of efficiency. Ideally, your sales reps should spend little to no time on non-selling activity and more time on actually selling (and closing). Statistics show that high-performing sales reps spend 65% of their time in direct selling and the rest in non-sales activities. In contrast, average-performing reps spend their time in the exact opposite way — 35% selling and 65% in non-selling activities. Conversion/Win Rate The conversion rate is simply the percentage of leads that become customers. For example, if you generate 400 leads every month and only 80 of those ultimately buy your product, your conversion rate is 20%. Your conversion rate helps you figure out how many leads you need to hit your monthly team quota. For example, if your target is $1,000,000, and the average deal size is $1,000, your reps need to close 1000 deals. If your conversion rate is 20%, you need to generate 5,000 leads to hit the monthly quota. Sales Funnel Leakage Tracking sales funnel leakage helps determine where leads are exiting your funnel at the highest rates. Consider, for example, a case where 40% of your leads sign up for a discovery call, 50% of those make it to the demo phase, and only 3% buy the product. Clearly, the drop-off rates are high, and this means your reps aren’t: Qualifying leads enough Giving convincing demos Negotiating properly You can investigate further to determine where the problem is. And then delve into the potential issues to remedy them to improve conversion rates. Marketing Performance Metrics Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) This metric is a snapshot of how much it costs you to gain each customer. New customers are important, but not to the extent that they cost you more than the revenue they generate. CAC = (Sales Costs + Marketing Costs) / New Customers In order to calculate your client/customer acquisition costs, take the number of total sales and marketing costs for a specific period of time for all customers, and then divide that by the number of new customers and/or clients that you generated during that time period. Here’s how it would work: if you spent $20,000 on sales and marketing advertising, salaries, and other overhead in one year and generated ten new customers in that same period, your CAC is $2,000. Your goal, over time, is to see that number go down instead of up. This will show you how efficient your B2B sales efforts are and allow you to adjust any planning and strategy accordingly. Fit Rate, Closing Rate, and Win Rate Your fit rate is a calculation of the number of meaningful conversations that your B2B team needs to engage in to find the right customer. For example, if your sales team has to talk to four prospects (on average) to get to a proposal, your fit rate is 25%. Fit Rate = Proposals / Sales Conversations Your closing rate will then be the number of people who sign a proposal, divided by the number of clients to whom you send a proposal. So, in short, this metric is the number of fit rate proposals divided by the number of closed sales. Closing Rate = Signed Proposals / Sent Proposals Your win rate, then, is the number of new accounts that you generated, multiplied by your fit rate. If out of three conversations you get one final yes, your closing rate is 33%, and your win rate is 8.33%. Win Rate = New Accounts X Fit Rate Why track this? Because it will help you plan for a reasonable and actionable amount of conversations that you need each team member to engage in during any sales period. If you know your fit rate, you can set goals based on that data. That way, you’ll have realistic expectations for conversions and revenue goals. And, you’ll be more prepared for instances when your goals aren’t going to be met. Qualified Lead Rate Your qualified lead rate will help you assess the quality of both the channels you use to generate leads and the strategy you use in looking for leads going forward. Not every avenue will produce the same amount of warm leads. Some will direct you to businesses that are less likely to be interested in your product or service. If a broad approach is turning up a ton of leads but no real prospects, go deeper on the channels that result in more prospects ready to buy. Take the time to assess the number of leads that any one channel generates over a specific period in comparison to other B2B lead generation avenues that you use, and adjust your plan accordingly. Monthly Visits and Leads Tracking the number and type of sales opportunities is critical for your business. In one study of companies not exceeding their sales goals, 74% of them weren’t tracking their monthly activity in this category. In order to set clear and measurable targets for B2B sales, compare your old data with the new, and set tangible goals for what you want to strive for. There are a number of sales metric tracking tools out there that will help you do this, many of which use Excel or another software that you probably already have. Marketing Revenue Attribution As an organization, you run multiple marketing campaigns to accelerate revenue generation. Marketing revenue attribution helps you understand how much revenue each channel generates instead of looking at your campaign as a whole. It helps you determine which of your marketing campaigns are effective and which ones are not. This way, you can double down your efforts on campaigns that are beneficial as you look for ways to improve ineffective marketing channels. Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) As the name suggests, the customer lifetime value (CLV) is the average revenue your business can expect over a single customer’s lifespan. It’s heralded as a complete metric for marketing analytics because it blends all the most critical statistics of individual customers. CLV is a measurement of how valuable a customer is to your business over time. If your business has a high CLV, it means you have more loyal customers – and the opposite is also true. And because acquiring a new customer is five times more expensive than retaining an existing one, keeping a high CLV is essential to your business’ success. Digital Marketing ROI When you spend money on marketing, you need to see a return on your investment. The digital marketing return on investment (ROI) gives you the bigger picture of the returns you’re reaping from the marketing efforts. The marketing ROI equals sales growth minus marketing investment, divided by marketing investment. For example, if you invest $10,000 into marketing campaigns that ultimately grow sales by $50,000, your marketing ROI is four (four times as much as you put in). Landing Page Conversion Rates Your landing pages present an opportunity to website visitors. The landing page conversion rate indicates how many of these visitors are taking advantage of what the landing page is offering. It’s a traffic-to-lead ratio and signifies how well the landing page is performing. For example, if a landing page attracts 1,000 visitors a month and only ten sign up, the landing page conversion rate is 1%, which is far below the industry-wide average of 4.02%. However, note that the landing page conversion rate varies between industries. Click-Through Rate (CTR) The click-through rate (CTR) measures the number of clicks you receive on your ads or email per number of impressions. CTR uncovers some critical insights that you cannot glean from email deliverability and open rates. For example, if you send out 1,000 emails, 900 make it to subscribers’ inboxes, and 90 leads click on the email CTA, your click-through rate would be 10 percent. A high CTR means your audience is highly engaged and interested in the content you’re sharing. What Do Sales and Marketing Teams Do? Enough with the math and numbers. Let’s now turn our attention to the people responsible for these metrics and KPIs. Every organization has teams that work diligently to keep the sales and marketing operations sailing along to achieve the set goals. The teams are: Sales Teams Your sales team is the link between the product or service your business offers and the customers. The core objective of the team is to meet the sales goals of an organization. To that end, the team performs a handful of functions, including sales generation and conversion, customer acquisition and retention, and business growth. Depending on the size, goals, and stages of your organization, you can set your sales team to take one of the following structures: Functional Market-based Geographical Products-based Marketing Teams The marketing team is also focused on sales but relies on the necessary research and peripheral vision to get there. They identify target customers, create collateral that attracts prospects or customers, create an overarching brand image, and assemble content for salespeople to leverage. The marketing team is responsible for various tasks from building brand awareness, fueling engagement on digital platforms, and promoting products or services. Depending on the size, product or service you offer, and sales goals of your organization, the marketing team can take one of the following structures: Customer experience model Operational model Product-based model Channel-specific model Segment-focused model Geography-focused model The Importance of Sales and Marketing Alignment One element that teams often fail to track is the alignment of the KPI of sales and marketing teams. If your sales and marketing staff don’t regularly meet and share data, it’s common to be missing the info you need to determine which sales activities are working. Some analysis indicates that as many as 24% of marketers don’t know whether their efforts resulted in closed deals — which is crazy, considering how easy it is to track this information with a small business CRM! Aligning your sales and marketing efforts will allow your talent to see what is working best and double down on those strategies while pulling back on those that are less effective. How Sales and Marketing Work Together Sales and marketing teams are all focused on sales. Even though both teams use different means to reach the ultimate goal, they benefit from working together. Proper alignment of sales and marketing generates 209% more revenue and a 20% annual growth rate – who doesn’t want that kind of result? However, building alignment is easier said than done. The team needs to align on all levels, including process, feedback, and focus. Building connections across those levels helps overcome any hurdles you may face when aligning and getting the teams to work on the same page. Here are some ways sales and marketing teams work together: The sales team helps the marketing department understand the customer better. Since the salespeople spend most of (if not all) of their time engaging with the customer, they have firsthand information about the customer. They understand the customer’s pain point better, the challenges they face, and what makes them tick. The marketing team can create more tailored campaigns that exemplify how your organization solves the issues using these invaluable details. Super strategic campaigns help generate better-qualified leads that can lead to increased sales. Marketing prepares leads for sales. Picture this: the sales team helps the marketing team create ads that use strategic words and offer solutions to the target customer’s specific problems. Any lead that enters the sales funnel will have a higher probability of converting because they’re consistently sent resources and content. Simply put, the marketing teams warm up the leads, making it easy for sales to convert. Marketing can nurture cold leads. Besides warming up leads, the marketing team can lend a hand in nurturing leads. If your sales team pursues the easiest targets to reach daily or monthly quotas quickly, integrating with marketing could unlock the seemingly “hard” targets. The marketing department can ensure leads that require a little more time and effort to convert don’t slip through the cracks. How? It can create a tailored prospect nurturing campaign that nudges the cold leads and hand them over to sales when they are ready to convert. If you’re working to grow your business, don’t shy away from incorporating these sales and marketing performance metrics into your strategy. If you haven’t used them before, it only takes a little practice to get comfortable reading and analyzing them. Make sure you have a set plan for consistently tracking them (every quarter, for example), and the work will pay off and keep your business headed in the right direction.
Summer Marketing Tips for K12 Communicators Posted on July 8, 2021July 2, 2021 by Jess Lunk Summer is here, and while school isn’t in session, your job as a K12 communicator doesn’t get to take a vacation. You’re probably spending this time reflecting on the previous year and getting things ready for the 2021-2022 school year. After all, it will be here before you know it, and it never hurts to be as prepared as possible. We put together this handy guide to ensure you’re getting the most out of these last weeks of summer before school ramps up again. So read on for some specific ways you can lay the foundation for a great year ahead. 1. Plan and Organize Summer is a great time for the organization that’s tough to manage when school’s in session. Here are some things you can do as the school’s communicator to set yourself up for success in the fall. Utilize Marketing Automation Marketing automation is a no-brainer for K12 communicators. It ensures you facilitate regular communication and provide need-to-know information to the right people, freeing up your time for higher-level tasks. By automating standard emails, like welcome emails for new students and staff or monthly newsletters, you can get ahead of your inbox and stay on top of communication. When you automate routine communication, you’re making sure that the job gets done without delays, and you aren’t bogging down your to-do list in the process. Your time management becomes more efficient, and you become more productive; it’s a win-win! Plus, once the emails start going out, you can track engagement and open rates to see how your communications are landing with your audience, as these tools are built right into your automation tech! Clean Up Your Lists Another great feature that’s built into your marketing automation is email contact list management. Email bounces and inactive accounts can affect your email deliverability and drag down the effectiveness of your email campaigns. Email is an effective mode of communication. It gives you a direct line to your audience, so it’s important that you maximize your reach as much as possible. Start by cleaning up and organizing your email list so that your actual and intended audiences are as close as possible. When segmenting your lists, think about who will need to hear what, and create groups accordingly. For example, faculty emails will be vastly different from parent newsletters. Look at all the emails you sent over the last year to gauge how to best organize your recipient groups. Conduct Surveys Feedback is the backbone of an effective communication plan. Send out short surveys to parents, students, and faculty to understand how effective your communication plans are and if they have any specific needs that aren’t being met. Analyze this data and use the insights you glean to inform your plan for the coming year. The additional benefit of asking for feedback is that it gives parents a chance to feel heard. And when they feel heard, they’ll pay more attention to the communication you send them and participate in school events and activities. Identify Policies and Important Content The world has changed dramatically over the last year, and so have the needs of parents and students everywhere. When creating your content and communication plans, think about how you can make them relevant to the current context. Does your school have a new vaccine policy? Are there rules regarding masks or social distancing? Consistent education is key to making sure any recent developments and back-to-school protocols are integrated and made aware to those they’ll affect. When formulating a content plan, make sure that your communications across various channels work together to send one message. For example, your social media posts, emails, and intranet announcements all need to work simultaneously to deliver a unified message. Formulate processes and templates over the summer. This will make sure that during the hectic school year, you will be better prepared to manage the chaos without letting it affect your content. 2. Engage The summer break isn’t a reason to shut down communication channels with parents. Continue to send out emails (as long as they’re purposeful) and post consistently on social media. Just because students are away doesn’t mean school should disappear from their radar. Use this time to keep parents engaged with informative and useful content. Informative content could include local summer activities, camps, and resources. Mix it up with some light-hearted reading, like interesting facts about the faculty, student achievements from the previous school year, book recommendations, or fun quizzes. The summer is a great way to show the human side of your school and build a relationship with parents, making them more receptive to your future communication. 3. Upskill As a school communicator, it’s likely you wear many hats: digital marketer, copywriter, internal communicator, and maybe even designer. Prioritize self-growth and development during the quieter summer months by reading into digital and technological developments, marketing automation, email campaign strategy, and more. Webinars are a great way to stay abreast of industry trends. They’re super convenient, as they offer the ability to learn and share knowledge across borders, from the comfort of your home or office. And a quick Google or LinkedIn search will help you find relevant virtual events. The evolution of school communication has created new relationships between schools and parents, and as a K12 communicator, you’re at the forefront of this incredible shift. By using the summer months well, you can make sure the next school year offers exciting opportunities for collaboration and growth within and between schools, faculty, parents, and students.
Things Agencies Should Keep in Mind with the iOS Update Posted on July 7, 2021July 7, 2021 by Katie Culp It’s that time again: time to ask yourself if your marketing agency is ready for the next iOS update! You probably knew an update was coming since Apple updates their iOS 10-15 times a year, but just because updates come regularly doesn’t mean they are minimal or not worth paying attention to. For example, did you know that the next one, a privacy update for iOS 14, is going to have direct implications for agencies? Your success as a marketing agency depends on your ability to take user activity and have it inform your messages on various platforms. This means taking advantage of valuable new technological features and being prepared to deal with any potential issues. Here’s what you need to know about the latest iOS update. What Does the iOS Update Mean? The most noteworthy items from the iOS update are centered around user privacy. With more and more news stories of user data being compromised, people are becoming more protective of what data they share online or through apps. Even if they didn’t care before, people are starting to care now. One major feature of the new iOS update is that users will now be able to limit the amount of data collected by any third-party sites they visit. Of course, this feature was always available, but it took some time and effort to locate and turn it off and on. The new version will now have each app ask them if they want to allow the app to collect data during its use. Making it easier to prevent data collection may be good for the user, but it prevents the app (and the app’s owners) from tracking them and collecting valuable data for marketing purposes. In addition to giving the user the ability to turn off app data collection, the user can also limit the details of their location. They now have the option to share a general area instead of an exact location. What Does This Update Mean for Marketing Yourself and Your Clients? These new security features will prevent you from collecting detailed data that previously gave you insight into what to market to users. You must learn to adapt as you can no longer rely on app usage combined with exact location details to target a specific ad to a specific user — but this isn’t a major cause for worry. If you can’t target data to users, you can develop your marketing to appeal to a larger audience. Advertising a broad message will allow you to reach larger groups of people. From there, you can engage with them through newsletter subscriptions or surveys to understand how to market more specific ads. Explore New Ways to Reach Your Audience You can also increase your social media presence and advertising on multiple platforms instead of focusing on just one or two. From there, you can analyze where your audience is typically coming from (Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, etc.) and develop more targeted paid ads for the platforms that are delivering the most engagement. In addition to branching out into other social media platforms, agencies should also consider branching into different channels for marketing. For example, advertising spots on certain podcasts could be a great way to get in front of a wider audience. Make sure you research what your audience is interested in and look into which popular podcasts touch on those areas and interests. Another channel that’s getting a lot of hype is text messaging. Users are on their phones more, and text messages are an easy way to grab someone’s attention. Whether it’s to remind them about a seasonal sale or promote a new product based on their past purchases, text messaging is a great way to increase engagement. Embrace the Change These privacy updates are not meant to scare consumers or hurt businesses. User privacy is an important issue, and Apple is doing its part to show it cares about user privacy. These iOS privacy updates won’t dramatically reduce the number of ads users see on pages – they’ll just mean the ads users see could be less relevant to them. This generic experience may even cause some users to be willing to share their data/location with apps without any hesitation. If I’m going to see ads regardless, then they might as well be relevant to my interests, right? These changes will affect a user’s social media experience, but they don’t change the fact that there are still consumers who will need products. Expanding your marketing presence across other platforms, surveying customers who visit your website/stores, and strengthening your core advertising will ensure you and your clients will stay on top of your audience’s minds. Is There Anything Else Agencies Should Do to Help Them Deal with the Aftermath? Don’t worry. Your audience is still out there, and they still need your products. You may not be able to send a push notification when a user is next to your store, but you can develop an eye-catching campaign that will make people want to go to your store, regardless of where they are at the time. You just have to put in a little more time to figure out how to reach your audience.
When to Tackle a Marketing Project In-House and When to Outsource Posted on July 1, 2021June 25, 2021 by Natalie Slyman As a small business owner, there is so much to do (and be). You need to be an expert general manager, customer service manager, marketer, copywriter, sales leader, and so much more, which is why outsourcing can be so useful. Outsourcing can save you time and money and allow you to spend your hours focusing on areas to grow your business. But how do you know which marketing projects to tackle yourself and which to outsource? Marketing can be an all-encompassing undertaking, and there are no set parameters around which strategies to outsource and which not to. Deciding where you could use some external help ultimately depends on your circumstances, needs, and area of expertise. And when you do decide to outsource, your primary focus must always be on the quality of the work that’s being outsourced. Here are some questions to ask yourself while you consider whether or not you should be outsourcing that particular marketing project. 1. Do You Have a Strategy? There’s a lot that goes into a documented marketing strategy. If you haven’t had a chance to assess your audience base and put together your buyer personas, along with your overall goals and methods for reaching them, then hiring someone to outsource might be a serious waste of money. You need to have at least some kind of basic marketing strategy in place before you begin; otherwise, how will you know whether or not your plan is adequate? For example, if you are posting to your social media accounts without much of a theme or purpose, you might as well save your money and do it yourself until you have time to sit down and cultivate a plan. Then you can tap into external sources to help you put things in motion. Another option, however, would be to include a strategy deliverable in your outsourcing. Just know that if you choose to go with an agency that also provides a high-level strategy, then the outsourcing fee may be higher. 2. Do You Have the Knowledge? When you have carefully assessed your marketing needs and in-house talent, and have discovered that you are missing a particular skillset, then you have two choices. You can either: Do some training to boost your skills and that of your team, or Outsource it to someone who already knows how to do it, saving you time in the process If the learning curve is huge and the time required to pick up the skills is extensive, then outsourcing may clearly be the way to go. However, if these skills are part of a long-term strategy, then it could be valuable for your team to educate themselves through available courses and content. 3. Do You Lack Inspiration? Sometimes you know what you want to say, but the words just won’t flow. Hiring someone to create content or a marketer to put your thoughts down on paper and fine-tune it, so you have a professional piece of text or graphic can be beneficial. Everyone suffers from writer’s block at one time or another, and utilizing a copywriter to assist you during these periods can help you maintain your focus. There are many different types of freelance content creators out there; it is just a case of finding one which works for you. 4. Are You Failing to Connect with Your Target Audience? You may believe that you are handling your marketing A-OK, but the proof really is in the stats. If the marketing statistics show a disconnect with your target audience, then it may be time to outsource to a professional to improve the results. You want to know that every minute you spend on your marketing is contributing to a good return and that it is worth the effort and money being spent. A professional marketer and up-to-date marketing software can often improve your analytics and provide you with quality results to elevate your marketing reach. 5. Are You up on the Latest Trends? Professional marketers will know the tricks of the trade and perform the necessary research that keeps them up on the latest marketing trends. But as a small business owner, finding time to research these trends and educate yourself just doesn’t exist. If you decide to outsource a marketing agency, it’s important that they know the best channels to tap into so you can find new audiences to increase your lead pool. They should also know the right approach to using those channels best, be it creating guest-contributed content, paid social ads, or video marketing. 6. Are You Task-Driven? If you find you are more focused on tasks than strategy, hiring a marketer to help you move forward and grow your business will be beneficial. You may feel like you’re getting through your to-do list and posting online, but unless each act is part of an overall strategy, you are just greasing the wheels and keeping the lights on. This is not the same as intently and thoughtfully growing your business. Your marketing aim is to generate new leads through whatever means are available to you, so if you’re able to execute just not on strategy, outsourcing could be the route to go. At BenchmarkONE, we know that outsourcing isn’t typically easy, especially for small businesses. There’s a budget to consider and the time needed to look into possible outsourcing solutions. We hope that this checklist will help you make the decision more easily without spending too much of your precious time doing so.
5 Keys to Success Prior to CRM Implementation Posted on June 30, 2021June 29, 2021 by Allie Wolff It’s true. A customer relationship management (CRM) system empowers you to have a single source for managing client relationships. However, it does more than that. Your CRM solution can inform the strategies and communication among each department, leading to more effective solutions and company growth. But obtaining a CRM system that solves all your problems requires a bit of legwork on your end. And if you rush the process or don’t appropriately prepare, your CRM implementation can go awry. What do we mean exactly? Here are some situations that won’t set your small business up for CRM success: Having unclear goals Not having executive buy-in and support Choosing a vendor that’s not right for your needs Expecting too much from your CRM system Trying to implement too many features all at once That said, the right CRM under the right circumstances can make a measurable positive difference in your company’s efficiency and effectiveness, particularly with important tasks like lead cultivating. Here are five things to keep in mind before implementing a CRM system. 1. Your Marketing and Sales Strategy CRMs are not interchangeable, so you’ll have to learn what each can do (and what they can’t do) before you make a selection. One of the best ways to do this is to know what your marketing goals and objectives are before you begin researching systems. When narrowing your options, go for CRM solutions that directly address the areas your goals are centered on. For example, if one of your goals is to increase productivity among your sales team, look for a CRM that integrates with your email provider. Or, if you need to build a newer, better sales pipeline, check for CRMs with a comprehensive deal pipeline your sales team can use. What if you want more leads? Make sure you look into CRMs that include lead generation features, like online forms and landing pages. 2. The Type of Data You’ll Access There is no substitute for taking the time to understand exactly what information you’ll gain access to with each CRM you evaluate. Naturally, you want to choose a system that is capable of handling the data you’ve already amassed and supports the things that your various spreadsheets, workflows, and software packages strive to do. Create a side-by-side chart of data, features, and infrastructure requirements. It probably doesn’t hurt to include costs, type of setup, and technical help you can expect, too. Use that chart to cross-reference and compare CRM solutions to determine which is going to support the data you’re used to accumulating on your customers and prospects (or that you need to accumulate). 3. Develop Your Expectations You might be surprised at how many businesses don’t take the time to think about their specific expectations after implementing a CRM solution. Maybe they think that since all their competitors use a CRM system, they need one too, but that’s not enough reasoning to ensure you’ll make the best choice. Think long and hard about what you want to happen after your team is set up to start using your new CRM. Here are some examples to consider: Implement a new lead nurturing process Increase the number of leads per month by a certain percentage Increase your customer lifetime value by 3% Having these benchmarks in mind before implementation will ensure that your new tool is actually offering value. 4. Your Implementation Plan and Milestones The people who will use the CRM system need to know when it will start being deployed how they will learn to use it, and when they’ll be expected to demonstrate competency with it. Let end-users of your proposed CRM system know when system elements will be deployed, and when previous tools, like spreadsheets or databases, will be phased out. A deployment schedule with definable milestones (“Everyone will have completed the online training course by April 30,” for example) that are clearly communicated to all stakeholders is necessary to prevent the disruption from damaging morale or getting people off on a bad start with the new system. 5. Key Metrics You’ll Track Having defined your expectations for a CRM system and articulated your goals and objectives, you must also commit to measuring progress toward these goals and objectives once the new system is rolled out. Consider metrics like: Are more leads being pursued? Does it look like this quarter’s sales figures will top last quarter’s? If so, by how much? Are your email campaigns leading to higher conversions? It’s up to you to know what you want from your CRM system and to measure KPIs that will give you a true picture of your progress and how long before you can expect a return on investment. Using a new tool is exciting, but that excitement can fade quickly if you aren’t set up for success ahead of time. Keep these five things in mind before CRM implementation, and you’ll be sure to land on a solution that keeps you satisfied.