Customer Effective Blog

Provide Five-Star Service and Maximize the Value of Customer Relationships with CRM 2011

Lately, I came across the American Express® Global Customer Service Barometer from 2011, which reports on consumer sentiment concerning the state of customer service in America. Interesting survey findings include the following:

• Consumers will tell 16 people about subpar service encounters. Conversely, they will inform only nine others about positive, memorable customer service experiences.
• Consumers value quality customer service and even will pay more to receive it as 70% indicated they would spend 13% more on average with businesses that deliver stellar service.
• Consumers will rebel with their wallets as 78% have canceled a transaction or taken their business elsewhere upon encountering negative, frustrating customer service.

Though this research study was targeted towards individuals, it is safe to say that the same attitudes and preferences on customer service hold true in the B2B world as well. Companies that differentiate themselves from the competition by providing superior customer service will earn repeat business from clients and begin to receive more referrals. On the other hand, customers that do not consistently deliver positive and meaningful customer experiences will suffer instant client churn and defections and lose drastic revenue.

Similar research from the Aberdeen Group entitled “Customer Experience Management: Using the Power of Analytics to Optimize Customer Delight” emphasizes how the customer experience can profoundly impact client acquisition, engagement, and retention. By continually measuring, monitoring, and improving the customer experience, firms can be more in tune with evolving service preferences and provide better service to their high-value clients and outperform their competition. As seen in the graph below that I created to display some of Aberdeen’s key results, Best-in-Class organizations that are committed to Customer Experience Management (CEM) initiatives constantly outperform their peers. For instance, customer retention rates, response times to customer inquiries, customer lifetime values (LTV), and customer satisfaction rates all improve considerably year over year for Best-in-Class companies compared to the Industry Average and Laggards.

Source: Aberdeen Group “Customer Experience Management: Using the Power of Analytics to Optimize Customer Delight,” Jan. 2012

Additionally, Aberdeen stresses how properly deployed CRM technology combined with a client-centric strategy can enable top-tier firms to achieve significant gains in their CEM programs. In fact, one of the recommended CEM strategies by Aberdeen is to replace highly fragmented views of customers with a single unified and consistent view of the organization’s customers via CRM. A robust, intuitive, and easily configurable CRM system, such as Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011, can certainly give firms this highly coveted all-encompassing 360-degree view of their customers and allow them to better hear and capture the voice of not just their customers, but also their stakeholders and shareholders.

To read more about how Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 can serve as the foundation and enabler for your firm’s CEM and CRM strategic initiatives in route to helping improve your overall business results, please visit www.customereffective.com.

Improve Customer Relations and Reshape the Customer Experience with Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011

In today’s turbulent economy, corporate decision-makers are reexamining how they can consistently deliver a more memorable and differentiated customer experience that is more aligned with customers’ needs and ultimately generates profitable top-line growth. Striving to meet and exceed the expectations of the new, digitally savvy and often fickle consumer in a cost-effective manner is not easy, though. More empowered than ever before, many of today’s capricious customers want everything personalized, provided at a discounted rate, and done as quickly as possible, regardless of the channel. Up to the challenge, many top-tier companies across the globe recognize that they must refocus on the end-customer and engage in more consultative and meaningful dialogues with their clients and interested buyers across all touchpoints.

With such a growing imperative to maximize customer value and reshape the customer experience, many top-tier firms are turning to Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011. As a fully centralized and interactive business management tool, CRM 2011 provides a complete, reliable, and integrated 360 degree view of client-related information so that companies can better identify, segment, service, and retain their customers and create a more positive customer experience in the following ways:

• Cultivate and deepen relationships to earn client loyalty, retention, and pave the way for repeat business via upsell and cross-sell opportunities.
• Dissect the critical information found in the client profile to develop more targeted marketing campaigns, more effective sales call plans, and more seamless, cost-efficient service delivery strategies that are relevant and tailored to the unique customer purchasing preferences and habits.
• Glean insights on a customer’s interaction, ad response, and transaction history across various channels and touchpoints to grow company-wide awareness and knowledge of each customer’s unique needs and be better positioned to offer value-added products and services.
• Facilitate employee and department collaboration, sharing, and communication of critical information to improve and automate front-office sales and service processes, minimize response times to client inquiries, and reduce customer frustration by not having to ask the same questions repeatedly.

The good news here is that all of the above benefits of improving the customer experience and overall client satisfaction will eventually grow customer spend, provide an incremental sales lift, and maximize the lifetime value of your more profitable clients and prospects.

To learn more about how the vast experience and expertise of Customer Effective combined with our industry specific accelerators and pre-built configuration templates can help lower your total cost of ownership, shorten your implementation timeline, and increase the return on investment of your new robust Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 system, please visit www.customereffective.com.

Wealth Management Firms turn to Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 to Amplify their Sales and Service Results

Customer Effective is poised and ready to empower wealth management firms with flexible, scalable, and security-enhanced CRM tools and integrated solutions to grow their business. Customer Effective: FinServ for Wealth Management is our pre-configured Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 offering consisting of a full-featured Marketing, Sales, and Service suite tailored to wealth management industry needs. Below I have highlighted some common business and operational challenges faced by investment advisory firms and how these can be overcome with the help of the Customer Effective: FinServ for Wealth Management platform:

Advisor needs more insights on Household Relationship Management and Client Acquisition Tracking

• Link Clients to multi-generational affluent family Households and obtain consolidated 360-degree views of all Household Members, Accounts, Assets/Liabilities, Transactions, Market Values and be able to see their complete financial picture in one central location.
• Track related 3rd Party Advisors, Qualified Plans, Employers, and Client Interests and receive the extra knowledge and background to become the go-to trusted advisor and “quarterback” for any financial situation.
• Track Client Acquisition Prospecting efforts, RFP requests and responses, and lead conversion success rates to identify the most effective and efficient ways to win new business.

Advisor needs better recordkeeping for Compliance

• Uphold data integrity and maintain accurate Client, Prospect, and Partner records for individuals and companies.
• Track system and field data changes via historical Audit trail logs to meet tightening compliance requirements.
• Track and store all Client communication and correspondence to adhere to SEC and FINRA guidelines – emails, phone calls, portfolio review meetings and notes, service inquiries, client newsletters, buy/sell recommendations, Client Monthly Statements, Financial Plans, Investment Proposals, Monte Carlo Hypos, Investor Suitability Due Diligence questionnaires, KYC/AML compliance docs, proxies, research reports, and prospectuses.

Advisor needs more timely and robust Sales Pipeline Management reporting

• Sales, Marketing, Client Service, and Compliance Dashboards and Reports capture KPI’s and production results for each individual Advisor, Branch, Region, or the entire firm.
• Real-Time Sales Opportunity Pipeline Management and Forecasting help focus time and resources on more profitable relationships and shorten sales cycles.
• Target vs. Actual Goal Tracking of Closed Deals and Prospecting Activity promotes competition, instills accountability, motivates reps, and helps identify areas for improvement.

Advisor needs to automate New Client Onboarding Processes

• CRM can be tightly integrated with Portfolio Management/Trading/Rebalancing/Custody platforms to eliminate dual entry, save time, and further streamline and automate the Client Onboarding, Account Setup, and Ongoing Service Processes.
• Once the Onboarding Process is complete, ongoing monthly, quarterly, semi-annual, or annual Review Meetings can automatically be set up to consistently and frequently stay in touch with Clients, earn their trust, and provide superior levels of service to the competition.
• Track and rate Referral Sources based on lead generation profitability.

Advisor needs an easier way to plan, execute, and follow up on Seminars

• Devise quick campaigns to plan, execute, and track the success of converted leads from attendees of Retirement Planning, College Savings, Tax Minimization, and Estate Planning Seminars.

Advisor needs to reduce the time involved on Client Allocation Change and Distribution Request Processes

• Create automatic follow-up tasks and deadlines for review of Account activity and maintenance to increase client retention and ensure consistent behavior amongst Client Service Teams.
• Identify At-Risk Clients based on recent, frequent high-dollar withdrawals; develop and execute client outreach and retention plans.

Please visit www.customereffective.com to learn more about Customer Effective: FinServ for Wealth Management and how its pre-designed wealth management tools and templates can vastly improve your practice’s customer-centric approach and widen your competitive advantage.

Use Goal Management in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 to Track and Improve Sales Team Performance

With the Holidays behind us, many Sales teams are in the process of receiving new comp plans for the New Year. Sales management is faced with the dilemma of devising compensation structures that not only reward top performers, but also motivate them to continue producing at a high level going forward. Besides possibly changing compensation, Sales Goals for reps and territory assignments may be altered as well. In many cases, the new Sales Goals may seem extremely challenging at first glance. Regardless of how well management clearly defines and articulates the changes based on their analysis of last year’s company results, current and future market environments, and projected growth rates, some Sales reps may wonder why the changes were necessary, and thus they may have some reservations about hitting their new lofty numbers until they start closing some deals again. Without Goals, though, businesses, Sales teams, and Sales reps have no real measure for success in place.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 recognizes how important it is for Sales executives and top producers to track and achieve Goals. For instance, CRM 2011 offers Goal tracking and management functionality that Sales reps can use to view their individual performance results and see how they stack up against their respective Revenue or Sales Volume Goals. Plus, Sales management can use Goals in CRM to chart and analyze the progress of the teams or territories they oversee and really target areas for improvement based on how much time is left in the current sales period. The Sales Goals can be for a custom time period, such as monthly, quarterly, or annually or even set to a particular Fiscal period. Moreover, tracking and managing Goals within CRM will make the overall Sales Goal maintenance, roll-up, reporting, and review process far less cumbersome and error-prone, especially compared to the extremely time-consuming and manual-intensive approach of doing the same in spreadsheets.

Furthermore, the built-in robust Goal charts are great visualization mechanisms for Sales reps to see where they stand at a given point in time against their peers and their individual Goal(s). For instance, the chart below displays a comparison of Actual and In-Progress Sales Opportunity Revenue figures versus a Quarterly Sales Goal for three individuals. It is taken from “Tracking status against goals with built-in predictability” on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Blog, which I encourage you to reference if you want to get more insight on the use of Sales Goals in CRM 2011 and see more sample Goal charts. Being able to always refer to these instant individual Goal results via a Dashboard or an in-line visualization chart helps maintain Sales focus and momentum, instills accountability, and fuels competition amongst reps, managers, teams, and regions.

Additionally, I recommend watching this brief Goals tutorial video from the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Resource Center to learn more on how to create and assign parent/child roll-up Goals and Goal metrics. It actually focuses on an example of Service Case Goals, but the steps are a great primer on how to create Goals in CRM, particularly Goals with a Goal Metric based on a “Count” as opposed to a Revenue $ Amount metric. The video really can serve as a guide if you have the need to create a Sales “Count” Goal, such as number of Opportunities or Products sold per month, number of outbound dials per week, or number of leads generated from a Marketing campaign.

Lastly, if you would like to discuss further and see first-hand how Customer Effective can leverage and tailor the Goal Management functionality in CRM 2011 to optimize your Sales Department’s processes, productivity, and performance, please e-mail us at info@customereffective.com.

Scribe GP/Microsoft CRM 2011 Templates and CRM Online

I recently worked on integrating Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 Online with a local deployment of MS Great Plains 10. While you might assume that this might be an easy task considering that Scribe has had the GP templates around for a while now, it presented some challenges stemming from the security around CRM 2011 online hosting. The native Scribe GP templates need adjustments to connect to CRM 2011 online.

Scribe pointed us to the following blog post that will help you get started. We won’t go into all the details covered in the posting but here are the key points that you will need to do in order to make this work.

• You will need two CRM online accounts for this modified process which means customers have to pay for additional user licenses.
  • One of the accounts needs to have the “isintegrationuser” set to 1. You need to create your own DTS to flip this value.
  • You will need to modify all DTS connection that point to CRM 2011 to use one of the accounts you created above. There is one exception so please review blog posting.
• You will have to modify the “publishers” associated with CRM 2011
• The steps related to installing and configuring “Order History Monitors & Views for Microsoft Dynamics CRM” will not work because you cannot create an ODBC connection to the CRM DB located in the cloud.

The ability to use the GP templates and CRM 2011 online is mentioned in the release notes.

Lesson learned: always read the release notes for Scribe templates (and any Microsoft Dynamics CRM updates). They include important information about system requirements, and can save you from making time-wasting mistakes.

Hope it helps!

CRM 2011 for Private Equity: Fundraising, Deal Making, and Microsoft Outlook

Relationships count in every business, but for a private equity firm the ability to see the extent of relationships can be the difference between a good firm and a great firm.    Its uncommon in other industries to see the web of connections  that are seen in private equity.  A company that a private equity firm works with  could be the debt provider in one deal, a co-investor in another, and could be the company that brings the next big deal to its doorstep.  And that same company could also be part of a bidding group that is that is the competition in another deal.  Try keeping track of this in one CRM, even one system, and do it all through a tool that everyone uses everyday like, perhaps Microsoft Outlook.   And to make matters even more complicated your system has to be able to turn on a dime in order to respond to one of the most transitory regulatory environments since the New Deal.  These problems are right in the wheelhouse of CRM 2011.

First, CRM 2011 is inherently designed to work with Microsoft Outlook.  Other CRM essentially try and force a synchronization.  I will routinely get the question of “Am I in Outlook or CRM?” in working with new users.  My answer is “Yes”: especially with 2011 , the difference is blurred.  This is no small concern when thinking about how users are going to interact with the system.  For one thing, users don’t have to go to sign in to X other systems each potentially with its own password and, even more importantly, its own learning curve.  Instead, CRM 2011 is “just” another set of folders in Outlook, and that is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Outlook integration.  But think about this feature in concrete terms: what if users had a Deals or Fundraising folder right in Outlook?  What if you could tie Outlook appointments to a particular Deal, or even to a potential lender on that deal in 2 clicks?  And of course, what if you wanted to see all this in a dashboard that shows your Deal pipeline for the year in Outlook?  CRM 2011 has its own user-friendly charting tools to provide dashboards that are the three R’s: rich, relevant, and role-based.  And of course, these dashboards are Outlook accessible. (See screen shot below as an example of the Outlook experience).

 

But even if you take Outlook off the table,  CRM 2011 is powerful in its ability to surface relationships and do it rapidly.     Being able to show how a given financial services company may interact with a private equity firm in the aforementioned ways is an easy feat for CRM 2011.  In a world where a financial services company is always acting in many different capacities and their roles change depending on the deal, this is not by any stretch a hypothetical example. And of course, this is the kind of thing we see again and again in our work in private equity. But let’s talk about “rapidly”.  Imagine being in a room with a compliance team, and they bring up a new requirement that the CRM must follow.  And of course, this requirement must be followed presently.  And then imagine that you prototype that change in the meeting.  If only all meetings could be like that?  This example is not hypothetical but very relevant. One question to ask in terms of a CRM is quite simply: can I change it if I need to? 

This segues into what I think is the most compelling feature of CRM 2011 in that it allows for a private equity based CRM solution to be brought into a firm, without being locked into that solution.  The regulatory environment brought about by Dodd-Frank is still being interpreted, and will most likely continue to be so for years.  The takeaway here is that firms need to be able to react quickly, but have a solid foundation.  That is CRM 2011.

This will be the first in a series of articles discussing the challenges faces by financial services firms and how CRM 2011 meets that challenge. If you’d like to hear more about our insights and experience in the private equity arena, and how we use CRM 2011 to solve problems like the ones discussed here, please contact us at info@customereffective.com.

Managing Change in a CRM Project

I once did an implementation for a very large organization that had a combined ERP/CRM project that spanned 18 months.  The end-goal was to implement SAP, combined with a CRM application suite, which would manage the SFA (Sales Force Automation) processes, along with handling the trade funds management and deduction management functions.  After a long engagement, which cost the organization millions of dollars, the CRM application eventually was removed.

So why did this happen?  Who was to blame?  How can an organization spend over $40 Million dollars and have nothing to show for it?  Is that possible?  Absolutely. 

Typically there are a number of causes to implementations not succeeding, but usually the most likely culprit is “Change Management”.  From Wikipedia, “Change management is a structured approach to shifting/transitioning individuals, teams, and organizations from a current state to a desired future state. It is an organizational process aimed at empowering employees to accept and embrace changes in their current business environment. In project management, change management refers to a project management process where changes to a project are formally introduced and approved.”  Out of this broad definition, the most important part occurs when employees must “accept and embrace changes”.  This is not an easy task.  Inherently, people do not like change.  People like consistency and routines.  Whenever a company decides to change a process or add an application, this consistency is disrupted – and there are bound to be differences of opinion and possibly conflict. 

With this concept of “Change Management” in mind, I’ve put together some good areas to focus on BEFORE and AFTER a CRM implementation that will help ensure that your CRM implementation is successful.

 

Before the Project Starts:

Project Sponsor:  Define who is going to be the “Project Champion”.  This person should be fairly senior in the organization.  He/she should conduct both a company-wide presentation, as well as a web-based meeting to introduce the project.  During this presentation, the key areas to cover include:

• Project Purpose
• Project Timeline
• Key Project Team Members

Covering these areas in a public setting will ensure that everyone in the company is aware of the project and it's’ importance.  Additionally, it will lay out the timeline and introduce the people on the project team.  This will help people to identify who they can reach out to should they have any questions.

Project Kick-Off / Launch:  “Excitement. Buzz. Did you hear? Wow!”  These are the kinds of expressions and feelings you want around the launch.  “Mediocre, bland and boring” are not feelings associated with success.  In order to achieve the former, Kick-Off and Launch the new application in a fun environment.  If possible, get the employees away from work.  Taking employees out of their environment helps to enforce, “Hey, this is NEW!!”  If you have the Kick-Off Meeting or Launch meeting in the lunch room or a conference room at the office, it says, “Same ole’ thing” to everyone involved.  It doesn’t have to be a Space Shuttle Launch, but take some time to make it seem “New and Different”.  Your team members and employees will appreciate the effort.

Status Updates:  The key here is communication.  Make sure to update non-project employees about the status of the new implementation as well.  This will keep them informed and up-to-date on events related to the upcoming launch.  Additionally, it will prompt non-team members to discuss the project.  This, in turn, might influence people to provide feedback and get more involved with the system.

 

After the CRM System is Live:

Go-Live and Turn-Off:  We’ve already talked about the Kick-Off and Launch meetings and their importance in re-enforcing the project with the company.   However, one area we have not covered is the idea of “Turn Off”.  The best way to cover this is with a good example.  Company XYZ has just implemented Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 in order to enable their sales organization to manage their customers, products and promotions.  During the second day of training, I was helping a sales person with her Opportunity Records.  As we were still loading data, not all historical records had made it into the system.  After reviewing the data, the sales person says to me, “Well that’s OK.  I’ll just keep tracking everything in old tool.”  This type of "doing things the Old Way” can be the death-blow to a new system.  With this in mind, legacy systems and processes should be “retired”, in favor of the new CRM system.  You do not want people doing things “twice”, simply because they can’t let go of “how they used to do things”.  If possible, literally have the applications “Turned Off” and uninstalled from the network and user computer systems.  It’s harsh, but necessary.

Training:  This is a tough area to get right.  When someone receives an Outlook invite for “Training”, the usual response is a groan, followed by a moan.  In order to flip this general response, make sure to add some excitement in the training.  Ultimately, the employees will need to learn to use the CRM applications, but if they can have fun doing it, that is a plus.  Conduct the training “Out of the Office”.  Even if your organization has to rent office space at an off-site location, it is a “change”, which is what you are trying to enforce with the participants.  Break up the training sessions with some interesting exercises, speakers and even entertainment.  The best training I ever attended brought in the comedy team of Penn and Teller to do a presentation and team “Pep Talk”.  It was immensely successful – and everyone talked about it for WEEKS.  It was expensive for the company, but ultimately getting everyone in the company to talk about the CRM Application Launch Event for 2 months was worth every penny.

Feedback:  This needs to be a two-way street.  Putting a “Contact Phone Number” and “Feedback E-Mail” at the back of the training manual is not going to really get anyone to be pro-active in their feedback.  Key team members should be designated to conduct “User Interviews”.  These can be set up as a simple lunch meeting – but going out and getting the feedback, rather than waiting for it to come in through the proto-typical “Helpdesk Phone Lines” is faster and, usually, a better source of information.

Post Go-Live Go-Live:  Similar to the actual application launch, people want to know “How Things are Going”.  Periodic, weekly e-mails soon become ignored in everyone’s Outlook Inbox – so in order to re-engage the organization in the CRM Application’s success, conduct a final off-site meeting.  The purpose of this meeting will include:

• Summarize the performance of the system to-date
• Review all feedback received
• Review system changes
• Analyze the impact of the system on the organization
• Outline future developments
• Congratulate the Team

This meeting will help re-enforce the application’s involvement in the organization.  By highlighting these areas, everyone will see the impact that it is making.

I hope these ideas have prompted you to approach your Dynamics CRM 2011 implementations a little bit differently than you “Normally” would do things. 

Good luck with your implementations in 2011!

Enforce Consistency and Streamline Tasks with Prompt and Response Dialogs in Microsoft CRM 2011

The concept of Workflows in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 has been replaced by the term “Processes” in CRM 2011. Now there are two categories of Processes: 1) Workflows and 2) Dialogs, and both are intended to automate key business processes. Workflows and Dialogs can help automate just a few steps or multiple layers of business activities in strategic areas such as lead qualification, client acquisition, client service, and client retention.

Workflows

The aim of the familiar and reliable Workflows concept from CRM 4.0 continues to be to automate tasks or sets of actions to be executed on CRM records. For instance, Workflows can be designed to send new account, client assignment, or support case email notifications. They can also automatically create user follow-up activities and even update CRM fields. As before, Workflows run in the background of CRM asynchronously. Workflows are usually triggered by some particular event or can even be run on-demand by certain users.

Dialogs

The new feature of Processes in CRM 2011 is Dialogs, which are interactive step-by-step guides that ease data input and data collection based on prompt and response logic and conversational scripts. Unlike Workflows, Dialogs are synchronous and cannot be initiated by an event. CRM users must start Dialogs, and in order for them to keep running to completion, user input is required. Besides automating business tasks, Dialogs create consistency in how users interact with customers. The use of wizard-driven scripts encourages compliance, discourages rogue behavior, and results in standard messaging and uniformity.

To view, create, or activate/deactivate Workflows or Dialogs, one can go to Settings – Process Center – Processes. In the following example, I will focus on how to create a new Dialog. First, click the New button, and fill in the required fields as seen below.

Now you can actually build the steps for the Dialog.

To construct a basic Prompt and Response Dialog, follow these instructions:

• Under Steps, select the row, click Add Step, select Page, and type a description of the Dialog.
• Click Add Step again, but this time select Prompt and Response.
• Click Set Properties next to Prompt and Response under Steps. This allows you to actually add Prompt and Response steps to your Dialog.
• Fill in the Statement Label to title your set of steps for this Prompt and Response component of the Dialog.
• Type in a certain question or list of instructions in the Prompt Text box.
• Use the Tips text box to type in supplemental tips and reminders related to the Prompt.
• Use the Response Details section to indicate how you want to track the Response, such as option sets or lines of text. If an option set is selected, you can then define your values to the response or query CRM data to bring in values from a record already in CRM.
• Click Save and Close.
• Repeat the above if more Prompts and Responses are needed. Then Save and Activate the Dialog.

If the Dialog is set up to be run on-demand, users can click on the “Start Dialog” icon in the ribbon on any screen showing the related entity. The same applies to Workflows.

Below, I have highlighted how the tips section can supplement a question in the Dialog. In this case, the CRM user, a client service associate, is asking the client how she would like to receive her withdrawal proceeds. The answer is recorded in the picklist and can be one of the following four options: 1) check by mail to address on file, 2) ACH, 3) Wire, or 4) check to special payee. The tips on the right remind the client service associate to secure a signed letter of instruction from the client if proceeds are to be sent to a different address than the one on file. Providing these tips mitigates risk and facilitates compliance with internal and external regulations. Additionally, the associate is reminded to disclose possible fees with the selected method of delivery, such as overnight delivery charges or bank wire processing fees.

The next screenshot from the same Dialog example demonstrates how scripted phrases can be placed on the screen for reps to say word for word. This may come in handy when needing to relay adequate disclosures or just to provide thorough next steps on particular transactions to keep clients informed and at ease. Besides basic “Yes” or “No” radio button or picklist option sets, blank text fields can also be included on the Dialog form to record answers. Any additional information collected throughout the course of the Dialog can also be captured at the bottom in the Comments section as seen below.

Lastly, in CRM 2011 Dialog results can even result in the creation of new records, such as an Opportunity or Case, or possibly lead to another child Dialog or a Workflow. However, a Workflow cannot lead to a Dialog. Once all responses for the prompted Dialog questions are saved, the entire log history of the Dialog Session is then stored with the related record for future reference.

Enjoy leveraging Workflows and Dialogs in your CRM 2011 implementations to reduce manual efforts, lower processing costs, enhance operational efficiencies, improve data quality, and ensure daily consistent execution.

CRM Online E-mail Security Message: This content cannot be displayed in a frame.

I starting working with a client using CRM Online, who had previously installed a sales methodology accelerator.  While trying to send an e-mail from CRM, I would always get the following message:

Having another client with CRM Online, I tested sending an email there and I didn’t encounter the security message.  I also made sure this site was listed in my ‘Trusted Sites’ in Internet Explorer 8, as well as enabling “compatibility mode”.  To complicate things, a test of this issue using IE7 did not create the problem.  Unfortunately, the client PC’s are all running IE8 and reverting back to IE7 is not an option.

Solution

The installed accelerator changed an obscure email setting in CRM.  It made CRM require the use of secure frames to restrict e-mail message content.

To change this setting, go to ‘Settings’, ‘System Settings’ and click on the ‘E-mail’ tab.  Under the ‘Set E-mail form options’ section, set ‘Use secure frames to restrict e-mail message content’ to “No”.  See below.

 

This seems like an easy-to-find solution, but the added variable of IE versions really increased the size of the “haystack” where the needle was hiding. 

CRM is Critical to Success in a Post-Merger Environment

Mergers and acquisitions and the recent trend towards consolidation continue to reshape the global landscape. PwC notes that M&A activity stabilized in 2010 despite fluctuating confidence in economic conditions across the globe. Though transaction volume was flat for the past 12 months, the value of deals increased nine percent from $722 billion to $786 billion as of the end of November 2010, according to Thomson Reuters. Martyn Curragh, a PwC US Transaction Services Leader, explains the strategic shift of M&A deal focus from recovery to growth: “For the past 18 to 24 months, companies focused their deal making strategies on synergies to improve cost structures to withstand the challenging economic environment. Backed by stronger credit and equity markets going into 2011, corporations have shifted their transaction focus from a mindset of recovery to one of strategic growth, to generate additional revenues.  Furthermore, as debt markets have improved, private equity funds are beginning to spend more time looking for and executing on new opportunities, rather than focusing on existing portfolio companies and waiting to deploy capital.” It is nice to finally hear a positive forecast for the capital markets.

Once an M&A deal officially consummates, the new partners must begin rapidly executing an integration plan. The combining organizations must overcome differences in corporate cultures so they can quickly achieve value for investors, customers, and employees. They must convey to the marketplace that they can compete better as a combined company than by continuing to operate on their own. Decisions need to be made regarding staffing and which policies and IT systems will no longer be used and which will remain and be scaled up to support the new larger combined organization. The CRM systems of the merging parties, for instance, are usually different, sometimes not compatible, or may not even exist. In order to ensure a successful integration of the two companies and to most effectively leverage their complementary strengths, a centralized CRM infrastructure must be in place for the new combined entity going forward.

Upon completion of the M&A transaction, the new company is faced with the task of serving substantially more clients, strategic partners, and valuable referral sources, and thus has more data to manage. The new firm can use a central CRM system, such as Microsoft Dynamics CRM, to more efficiently capture, track, and maintain accurate data on its growing number of relationships. In some cases, the two companies joining forces may actually have a few of the same clients. This situation poses challenges for both clients and for the companies. On the one hand, the clients may be confused because they don’t know who their dedicated account manager is or where to submit their questions or orders; and on the other hand, sales reps from both sides that previously competed against one another may now have to work together or be forced to back off pursuing potential deals. Microsoft Dynamics CRM can be used for business intelligence to help sales reps see who else in the merged entity has corresponded with the overlapping clients and prospects. Then, sales managers and reps can collaborate and compare notes on why particular products and services were previously chosen over the other options. Details on the entire client relationship, including purchasing history, open opportunities, and active quotes, can also be examined and used to secure more business. Relying on Microsoft Dynamics CRM can help the new partners offer the best solution to meet their clients’ needs. Utilizing Microsoft Dynamics CRM also helps the merging companies present a more unified front and prevent a misallocation of resources due to internal competition and poaching. Furthermore, since all interactions with clients are documented within the CRM database, sales and support teams are able to easily identify future cross-selling opportunities. Even if they were not the original rep on the account, reps can offer the appropriate cross-sell because they have instant access to client likes and dislikes in the comprehensive client profile.

Senior Management of the merging firms must also decide how to restructure their sales and support teams to better serve their expanded client base and limit client defections. Once staffing changes and cuts are finalized, all clients must then be informed of their new point of contacts. Next, Microsoft Dynamics CRM can be updated to reflect the reassigned Account Reps, Teams, or Territories. Doing so, helps employees become more familiar with their defined role in the new org chart, territory alignments, and service model, and it lays the groundwork for coverage ownership and performance tracking. Plus, duplicate Accounts and Contacts can be detected, edited, deactivated, or merged within Microsoft Dynamics CRM so that employees have more consistent, accurate data to work with in order to maintain high-quality levels of service. Frequently providing clients and employees with quick updates and concise explanations of personnel and policy changes during the integration phase will certainly lessen confusion and instill loyalty.

M&A deals result in challenging, complex transitions and usually come with several changes in leadership and account reps. Without Microsoft Dynamics CRM as the sole chosen CRM platform in a post-merger integration, service levels and communications with clients and prospects could suffer and sales opportunities could be lost. The lack of the scalable, robust functionality of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM system could result in extreme growing pains, and the new combined entity may even be unable to achieve some of the growth objectives that it promised to accomplish for stakeholders when the deal was announced.

CRM and Integrated Technology Can Produce Significant Dividends for Financial Advisors

Financial advisory firms, including large Wirehouse Brokerages, Independent Broker/Dealers, and Registered Investment Advisor firms (RIAs), are always clamoring for cutting-edge technology solutions that can help their advisors build more efficient and profitable practices. Investing in and offering sophisticated technology platforms can often help firms successfully recruit and retain top-tier reps and top-producing teams as well. The typical financial advisor workstation consists of a combination of the following software platforms: 1) a portfolio accounting and consolidated performance reporting system to track investment holdings, market values, transactions, and cost-basis, 2) a trade order management system for trade order entry, settlement, and rebalancing, 3) a financial planning engine to help with retirement planning via portfolio growth projections and hypothetical Monte Carlo simulations, 4) a client relationship management (CRM) system to track and manage client data, prospecting activity, and sales pipelines, 5) a compliance module to satisfy Know Your Customer (KYC), Anti-Money Laundering (AML), investor suitability, and trade fraud detection requirements, 6) an investment research tool for portfolio analytics, screening, and backtesting to aid in portfolio construction and risk management, and 7) a document storage solution to image, archive, and manage client documents. Merely offering some or all of the aforementioned platforms is not enough, though. Unfortunately, many of the currently available specialized software solutions designed for the advisor workstation only run as standalone applications and do not harmoniously work in sync. Since these legacy systems cannot exchange real-time data, advisors and their support teams must switch back and forth between platforms to manually input data twice, thereby wasting valuable time and opening themselves up to potential error. To truly gain an edge over the competition and to make their producers more efficient, financial advisory firms must eliminate disparate solutions and instead offer a tightly integrated technology environment.

An integrated advisor workstation provides many benefits to financial advisors. First, integration eliminates cumbersome, time-consuming re-keying of duplicate data between multiple systems, thus significantly reducing the risk of inaccurate data entries. With an integrated suite of solutions, data entered in one system will then automatically populate the others. Due to the newfound convenience of reduced data entry, advisors can now focus more of their precious time prospecting for new business. Now able to more effectively nurture relationships with their clients, advisors will be well-positioned to cement trust with their more profitable clients, win future large dollar opportunities, and receive more referrals to other high net worth individuals.

Additionally, advisor teams will now have more time and resources to better serve their existing client base. Moreover, advisors will be more prepared and better able to quickly respond to client inquiries and possible even turn them into sales discussions. For instance, suppose an advisor has been unsuccessfully trying for months to reach one of his C-level exec clients about a substantial IRA R/O opportunity and a forthcoming maturing CD. Then, out of the blue at 7am, the exec randomly calls just after the advisor has turned on his computer. If the advisor has to slowly fumble through multiple systems to address the busy exec’s question and give him a brief update on his portfolio, he will run out of time to engage in quality dialogue and ask for more business. It could be weeks, let alone months, before they speak again, and by that time, the funds may already have been invested with another financial institution. A better scenario for the advisor would be to immediately pull up the client’s name in a CRM system, such as Microsoft Dynamics CRM. From CRM, the advisor could then quickly glance at current opportunities, answer the exec’s question, provide him some insight on his investments, and schedule a portfolio review meeting. Without having to open up multiple systems, the advisor can view background info, opportunity detail, and portfolio holdings all from within his CRM system. Then, after the call, the client data from CRM could automatically populate an integrated financial planning engine to produce a proposal on how to better allocate the rollover and maturing CD funds. Next, the advisor could email the proposal to the exec and instantly store the email message and proposal documentation in CRM for future reference and follow up. Having a single comprehensive view of the client due to integration is a huge time saver and competitive advantage for financial advisors.

Findings from the Aite Group further support the case for integration.  Their research indicates that advisors leveraging integrated technology spend close to 50% more time with clients compared to other advisors. Along those lines, Aite also found that there is a direct correlation between the level of technology integration and RIA firm size. For instance, their research shows that 91% of surveyed RIAs with assets under management of $100 million or greater have most or all of their systems integrated.

Without tightly integrated, configurable, and easy-to-customize business applications, financial advisors will not be able to provide an optimal level of client service and grow their book of business. Financial advisory firms must invest in integrated technology to enable their producers to be more efficient. As financial advisors spend less of their day on manual-intensive administrative work, risky data duplication, and onerous switching between multiple screens, they can commit more time to revenue-generating activities with high-growth clients and prospects.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM is one example of a cornerstone system containing an open, flexible architecture that can seamlessly integrate with not just other Microsoft applications, including Outlook, but also with other core 3^rd party applications on the advisor workstation. Check out www.capitaleffective.com to learn more about how investing in Microsoft Dynamics CRM and integrated technology can produce significant dividends for financial advisors.

Use eNewsletters to Cement Relationships with your Clients

The other day, I received my monthly eNewsletter from my Financial Advisor. Personally, I enjoy receiving the eNewsletter because it is a non-intrusive, gentle reminder of the quality of services and expertise he and his firm provide. In particular, I like reading the informative articles and videos on current stock market trends and evolving regulatory reform. So I thought I would briefly write today about how an eNewsletter is an excellent medium and marketing tool for all companies to cost-effectively stay in front of clients in a non-threatening way.

If well-written, informative, interactive, personalized, and professionally designed, an eNewsletter can keep firms connected and visible to not only clients, but also prospects, partners, and professional referral sources. Through consistent delivery, an eNewsletter can build brand awareness to increase revenue opportunities, generate referrals, and strengthen customer loyalty and satisfaction. After receiving the eNewsletter multiple times on a regular basis, subscribers will more than likely think of that company when the need arises for them or for one of their friends, relatives, or colleagues.

So what should be in the eNewsletter? Contact info (phone, email, company website link) and a picture of the author should always be included. Also, contact info for co-workers should be listed if a team selling/service approach is utilized. Additionally, links for questions, feedback, and customer service should be easily viewable. Regardless of the industry, the content and links in the eNewsletter should be targeted towards key high-growth market segments. There should be a nice blend of promotional articles, educational commentaries, and videos that highlight upcoming events, new products/services, sales promotions, or rewards programs. Interactive polls on current events and buyer preferences can be added in the eNewsletter, too. Poll results should be available real-time and eventually officially tallied and relayed to subscribers in the next edition. Also, it never hurts to thank clients for their business and continued loyalty or to even include a few testimonials or case studies of clients who benefited from certain products or services. In addition, the eNewsletter can emphasize that client meetings and visits can be scheduled outside of standard office or store hours, if applicable. Moreover, be sure to abide with CAN-SPAM Act regulations, honor opt-out requests, and always check with the compliance department to determine appropriate messaging and required disclosures for the eNewsletter.

To set up and send out a monthly eNewsletter in CRM 2011, users can first set up a specific new “Monthly eNewsletter” template in the Settings-Templates area. Then, after following the instructions below, the eNewsletter can then be sent to active contacts.

Should the need arise for only a certain segment of contacts to receive the eNewsletter or any other promotional email, CRM 2011 also provides the ability to filter all contacts/accounts/leads to create a more targeted marketing list. In the case of a quick campaign, all contacts can be filtered to produce a marketing list that drives to whom the eNewsletter is then emailed. Alternatively, an eNewsletter can be incorporated into a more extensive full campaign, such as a new product launch that is going to occur in eight months. A diverse mix of marketing activities, including eNewsletter and other email blasts, outbound calls, mailing of product announcement fliers, webinars, and a global road show, can be targeted towards exclusive members of a custom-filtered client marketing list. All marketing activities and their corresponding costs, results, and responses can then be tracked, reported, and scrutinized directly within CRM.

To help CRM 2011 users further distinguish between when to use the direct email feature compared to the other available out of the box e-mail communication methods, I have included the table below from the 2011 Online Resource Center.

	Direct E-mail	Mail Merge	Quick Campaign	Full Campaign
Templates	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Response tracking	Yes (as an activity).	Yes (as an activity) - Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online for Outlook only.	Yes (as a campaign response).	Yes (as a campaign response).
Unsubscribe request tracking	No	No	Yes	Yes
Return on investment tracking	No	No	No	Yes. Return on investment (ROI) can be tracked based on the cost of the campaign and its activities. The Campaign Performance and Campaign Comparison reports can be used to track and compare ROI.
Automatically send e-mail messages	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Use marketing lists for recipient selection	No	No	Yes	Yes
Attachment in e-mails	Yes	Yes	Yes (when using an e-mail template).	Yes (when using an e-mail template).

Firms sending eNewsletters directly from CRM out to thousands of recipients via their Exchange Server may experience severe performance issues, though. Besides possibly bogging down their Exchange and CRM Servers, the bulk eNewsletters that firms send out may be perceived as spam or phishing emails, and thus never get delivered. Furthermore, Exchange has no way of tracking whether or not the intended recipients received, opened, or read the eNewsletter, and if they clicked and focused on particular links. To overcome these potential challenges, Customer Effective often suggests that Microsoft Dynamics CRM users consider utilizing the services of CoreMotives, ExactTarget, or ClickDimensions, which offer automated email marketing solutions.

These interactive marketing experts use dedicated, high-powered, and scalable email servers that integrate directly with a firm’s Microsoft Dynamics CRM system, thereby eliminating the burden on a firm’s Exchange Server. By using email sender authentication, they help firms comply with CAN-SPAM rules, reduce email delivery barriers, avoid getting blacklisted, and come across as a trustworthy email publisher to increase delivery success rates. Moreover, they can produce professionally designed emails and eNewsletters and even track delivery, open, response, and bounce rates, which can then be recorded directly within CRM. Additionally, their web analytics and lead capture and ranking technology can monitor website traffic patterns, detect repeat website visitors, identify particular areas of interests based on links visited and documents downloaded, and ultimately rank the lead quality of the visitors.

Contact Customer Effective today to learn how we and our digital marketing partners can help you select and set up the appropriate eNewsletter or other e-marketing campaign/communication method in Microsoft Dynamics CRM to grow your business.

Spur Retail Bank Performance Improvement with CRM

In today’s increasingly sophisticated and fast-paced global market, retail bank customers conduct their banking via multiple delivery channels, including traditional retail bank branches, in-store branches, ATMs, mobile, online, and call centers. Regardless of the channel or location, bank customers desire a consistent way of doing business, and they require convenient and secure 24-hour access to execute and review transactions for all of their aggregated accounts, without any delays or disruptions. An August 2010 research report from the Aberdeen Group entitled “New-Age Retail Banking: Five Technology Imperatives for Customer-Centricity” (subscription required) reveals that many retail banks are losing revenue opportunities and failing to achieve sustained customer relevance because of poor integrated channel capabilities and inadequate or non-existent CRM systems.

The Aberdeen study surveyed 100 Retail Banking Institutions and classified the respondents into three categories: 1) Best-in-Class (top 20%), 2) Industry Average (middle 50%), and 3) Laggards (bottom 30%).  CRM-focused findings from the report include the following:

• “75% of Laggard banks do not integrate CRM data with enterprise applications.”
• Best-in-Class retail banks “are two-times as likely as Laggard banks to be currently using a CRM application.”
• Best-in-Class retail banks “are 1.7 times as likely as Laggard banks to be currently using BI tools for customer analysis.”
• “73% of Best-in-Class banks compared to 23% of Laggard banks align customer service and sales touchpoints with customer requirements.”

Evidently, Laggard banks struggle at gathering and storing real-time customer data in a central location.  Without a robust, customizable, and scalable CRM platform and a comprehensive 360-degree view of client data at their disposal, sales, service, and underwriting teams across all lines of business and channels at Laggard banks have no chance of providing a uniform banking experience to today’s price-conscious and rate-sensitive customers. Unable to capture historical interactions with customers, service teams of the Laggards suffer as they have no actionable insights to cross-reference to assist with account inquiries. Service reps may even provide inconsistent answers to client inquiries or ask clients to explain with whom and where their last conversation took place. As a result, customers may become so frustrated in the bank’s lack of communication between channels and departments that they feel their money is at risk, and thus they decide to move their assets to a Best-in-Class bank across the street or to an online bank offering a significantly higher interest rate.

Aberdeen also points out that Laggard banks don’t have adequate tracking of client purchasing habits or growth potential analytics so they cannot quickly capitalize on customer cross-sell and up-sell opportunities for deposits, loans, and investments. As Laggard banks miss revenue opportunities, provide inferior service, and fail to develop deep, cohesive client relationships, their overall performance suffers, too. As one would expect, Best-in-Class retail banks have a clear advantage over Laggards in terms of client service and retention, employee turnover, and profitability according to the chart below. There is much opportunity for improvement for the Laggards, as their employee turnover rate is more than twice that of Best-in-Class banks, their year-over-year client retention rate comes in at a very weak -3%, and their year-over-year return on net assets is flat.

Source: Aberdeen Group, July 2010

Retail banks can certainly leverage CRM to attract and retain more profitable clients, increase productivity, manage risk, track and integrate channel communication, and provide an enhanced and consistent customer experience. In particular, Laggard banks looking to gain traction on Best-in-Class banks should consider investing in Microsoft Dynamics CRM. To learn more about how Customer Effective has tailored the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform for Retail Banks and other segments of the financial services market, please check out www.capitaleffective.com.

CRM Update Rollups and Hotfixes and Updates That Must Be Enabled or Configured Manually

You are probably aware that approximately every 8 weeks Microsoft releases an Update Rollup, a cumulative set of updates and fixes. 

When deploying an Update Rollup, it’s important to realize that update rollups include two categories of updates:

1. Bug fixes—these are fixes to issues where CRM is not working as designed, and they are applied automatically when you install the update rollup.

2. Design changes—these are updates where CRM is working by design, but Microsoft has made a change in the way CRM works. For example, there were recently some updates that changed how CRM handles housekeeping of completed system jobs. Design changes require a manual change on the CRM server, typically a registry change, to enable the update, since Microsoft doesn’t want to change the system design for users who expect it to work the way it was originally designed.

The changes that require a registry change to enable are included in knowledge base article for the update rollup under the section "Hotfixes and updates that you have to enable or configure manually.”

This is why it’s important to read the knowledge base articles associated with CRM update rollups before you roll them out. Read through the changes included. I only make the changes that require registry changes if the fix addresses an issue that I’m seeing in my environment. Making changes that fix issues that you are not experiencing can have unintended side effects. It’s ok to pick and choose which ones you enable.

This is also why, if you read a blog or hear somebody from Microsoft say “Rollup X fixes that problem,” don’t automatically assume that the problem is fixed because you have installed the update. Read the small print—there may be additional steps required to enable the change.

 

del.icio.us Tags: CRM,update rollup,best practices

Marketing Effectiveness with Microsoft CRM

Whether your company has a mature CRM program fostering growth and managing relationships or your company has recently decided to add a CRM solution to support your business model, we are finding that customers are starting to increase their focus on marketing capabilities.  Microsoft CRM provides users with a great starter set of tools for everything from managing marketing campaigns, to building dynamic marketing lists, to tracking and analyzing the productivity of your efforts.  I am not going to write about the individual feature sets within Microsoft CRM for marketing, but instead I am going to focus on some guided stages to ensure marketing success when coupled with an effective marketing management solution.

 

At their basic cores, Marketing and Business Development, work to ensure that your brand awareness is high, prospects and customers are educated on your offerings and your sales teams have a steady flow of potential business to win.  Marketing departments work to cover as many customer touch points as possible - this often includes outbound marketing efforts like email marketing, direct mail, print or television ads, social media communications and trade show attendance.  All of these activities are meant to drive customer interaction to your company –through your website, an inbound sales phone number or a social media forum. The vast majority of these touches are designed to gather information about potential revenue targets.  Another evolving area of marketing is social media and its impact on brand awareness management.  This topic in and of itself is a rather complex and ever evolving set of processes to be discussed later.

 

The success of most marketing efforts is based on an individual interaction’s ability to achieve an end goal.  For example, in an email marketing effort, the end goal may simply be to inform your potential customers about your brand or introduce a newer, better version of a legacy product to your existing customer base.  In the example of the new product introduction, there are many steps to this process.  We will walk through the business processes to manage this type of a campaign while mindfully visiting a successful CRM roadmap for marketing success.

 

Step 1 - Determine the Marketing Effort

 

Before you do anything in any CRM application, you need to understand your marketing effort and the desired goal or direction.  This likely includes the scope of the effort, budget, start and end dates, expected response or success measurement and who is the target.  In Microsoft CRM, the out-of-the-box Campaign Management functionality is a good place to start.  You can find numerous articles and posts on how this functionality works in Microsoft CRM.  Microsoft CRM is a great tool, out of the box, to track these efforts - including strategic direction meetings to content task definition, ownership and review.

 

While Planning Tasks allow you to track, manage and maintain the campaign direction and planning execution, Campaign Activities outline the tactical execution of the marketing campaign.  These activities include email communication execution and scheduling phone calls for account managers.  Again, there are numerous places to understand the unique uses for each of these items.  One key component to marketing campaigns is marketing lists.  All of the time spent within the organization to build and maintain your CRM database comes into play at this point.  The Advanced Find functionality is a key component of marketing list creation and administration.  Be sure to spend time working with and understanding the intricacies of Advanced Find and the subsequent marketing lists.  These skills are required to communicate with your target audience whether that is through email, direct mail or voice.

 

One additional item to take into account when planning your campaign relates to effectiveness.  It is important to spend time documenting what will constitute a successful campaign.  Be sure to address success metrics like response rate, budget, leads cost versus pull through or many other analytical items.  You should ideally put yourself in the position to know if a campaign has been successful.  If you have expectations that an email marketing campaign is going to have a 15% response rate, be sure to capture that metric up front.  You have a lead generation marketing campaign that targets a specific set of unqualified suspect records in your CRM database.  It is important to know the source campaign of an opportunity (pull through from the lead to a qualified sales opportunity).  Be sure to differentiate lead or contact record source campaign tracking for a lead versus the pull through of a lead to an actual sales opportunity.

 

Once you have identified your marketing efforts, campaign tactical steps, target audience and success metrics, you are ready to launch your campaign.  The basics of marketing management are achieved with the out-of-the box functionality within Microsoft CRM.  You can extend the information you are capturing at the various points, which is not a difficult extension to perform.  In the next article, the topics will include different integration options to bolster your Microsoft CRM marketing management - like email marketing, social media and web analytics.

CRM 4.0 Workflow Considerations and Modified By

When using workflow to update records, it is important to consider how the workflow will impact other processes.  For example, how does the change that the workflow is making impact integration, other workflows, or other business rules.

A good example from a recent implementation.

I recently was involved in an implementation with a company in the insurance industry that had fairly stringent security requirements.  When a record is updated in CRM it is synched to their production system that is used for very important financial processes, such as claims payments.  In this process the modified by user is very important, since it touches on financials and SOX compliance.  Any change to production data needs to reflect the actual user who initiated the change.

In the initial implementation, workflow was used on the record to update fields post create or update.  The problem we ran into was that when a workflow updates a record, it changes the modified by field to the owner of the workflow.  This caused a problem because when the integration sent back the update it would update the modified by user field in their financial system to the owner of the workflow, not the user that actually initiated the change.  Until a record is saved, you can’t really capture the modified by user, and after the record saved, the workflow would update the record before the integration grabbed the change.

The lesson learned here is not “don’t use workflows.”  Rather it is be aware of how the workflow impacts the records, and if sending back the modified by user in an integration setting is required, workflow may not be the best fit.

In this example, we replaced the workflow with a combination of javascript and plug-ins, and were able to make the necessary system updates to the record without affecting the “Modified by” field of the record.

 

del.icio.us Tags: CRM Workflow,Microsoft Dynamics CRM,workflow,modified by

Effective Dashboards for Microsoft CRM

Ask yourself:  How effective is my CRM program?  Am I getting everything I need to manage my business and make informed decisions? 

 

If any of your answers aren't backed by CRM supported facts, then you should keep reading.  If you've partnered with Customer Effective in the past, you know about our User First Design Formula.  Nearly everything we do is weighed against it's impact to the end user - from the Executives to Administrators to End Users.  Within the methodology we feel it is extremely important to inspect what your business does and surface value-added detail through CRM.  Yes, we are talking about Dashboards and Managing by Metrics.

 

A common approach taken to resolve this business need leverages SharePoint and custom web parts.  All of these are exposed via CRM.  Recently, Customer Effective has added a new tool to it's CRM project toolkit.  If you are a customer working with us, you know about Interactions.  Our value added add in that truly provides a one stop shop for that 360 degree view of what is happening with your customers, prospects and organization.  Effective Dashboards bring additional tools to the end users.  Out of the box, CRM doesn't provide end users a simple way to build visual elements and add them to your deployment.  The SharePoint approach is still extremely valuable and a recommended strategy for projects that really push Business Intelligence.  Effective Dashboards can supplement this approach or be utilized on it's own.

 

Effective Dashboards gives trusted end users or Business Analysts, where security appropriate, the ability to create a dashboard on the fly that leverages CRM entities.  You can take this responsibility out of the hands of the IT department to build specific web parts and manage a SharePoint site.  Imagine being able to build a dashboard based on CRM records from within CRM.  Salesforce.com commonly targets this "missing" functionality in CRM.  For Customer Effective, that is no longer an issue.  In fact, we believe we now are able to address Business Intelligence in a way that Salesforce.com cannot.  You now have multiple BI delivery points and possible solutions.  Did I mention we will bring this to the table for all of our projects going forward?  As part of our project offerings, we bring all of our toolkit items to the table for your use. 

 

What do you need to know about Effective Dashboards?  Just like views, Effective Dashboards leverage Advanced Find functionality.  You have the ability to create both System-wide and My Dashboard applications.  Yes, you can drill through the dashboard charts and graphs to CRM records.  It honors your security model.  You can create a dashboard to look at your business metrics and expose it in CRM in hours instead of weeks.

 

 

You can learn more about Effective Dashboards and the rest of our project offerings, hear real world examples from our customers and gain a deeper insight into Microsoft CRM at the Customer Effective User Conference.  The event is being held October 29th and 30th in Greenville, South Carolina.

 

You can find more information about the User Group here: Customer Effective 2009 User Conference.   If the User Conference doesn't fit your schedule, you can contact us at (877) 252-2171 or (864) 250-2170.

Lead or Languish: Why Microsoft Dynamics CRM Programs Require Top Management Leadership

Recently, I've been writing for MSDynamicsWorld.com.  This website discusses all things Dynamics.  There are news articles, best practice advice and general information about CRM as well as AX, GP, NAV and SL.  You can check out my latest column on the importance of Executive Leadership in a CRM Program right here -

Lead or Languish: Why Microsoft Dynamics CRM Programs Require Top Management Leadership

Best quote ever on why and when to CRM!

From Gene Marks at Business Week on Dec. 2nd:

"Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Software. What's the tipping point for buying CRM software? This is not a gray issue; it's black and white. It's strictly mathematical. You buy CRM software because you can mathematically prove that it will help you get more sales. How? By making sure that all quotes are being pursued to their very end. By making sure customers who haven't heard from you in the past six months are hearing from you. By making sure prospects who may in the future think about buying something you sell are hearing from you frequently enough to make them come to you first. By making sure you don't look like a dope when customers call because you don't know who communicated with them last and what problems they may be having. Think of all of all these situations you've encountered in the past three years, calculate how much revenue you've lost, and then compare that against the cost of a CRM system—and voilà! You have your answer. Here's another tipping point: You suddenly discover that the airline industry provides better customer service than your company. That's enough to make anyone take action."

Read the whole article here: http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/dec2008/tc2008121_663967.htm

Handling Sales Management and Account Executive CRM Adoption Issues

No matter how focused your efforts, user adoption is always the final sticking point in a successful CRM program.  You can select a knowledgeable, proven partner to aid in your implementation.  You can be proactive in your CRM program by reviewing processes and establishing a Steering Committee.  You can provide the exact technology needs to the users and train them thoroughly.  At the end of the day, if your users aren't able to see management using the CRM technology AND if the CRM program doesn't provide operational value to them - adoption will be an issue.

 

We will spend a few moments on sales adoption.  Common issues with sales management and user adoption fall into a few buckets:

 

1. CRM becomes a Friday morning pipeline update  database, nothing more - nothing less.
2. Management doesn't leverage the data in CRM, especially dashboards and reports available for knowledge building and intelligent decision making.
3. There are no carrots for the users - only sticks are employed to force user adoption.

 

If you fall into one of these categories it's time to consider inspecting your processes or direction.  Here are a few simple ideas to counter the adoption issues described above:

 

1. Give the Account Executives functionality that increases or optimizes their selling time.  Sales staff are paid to sell.  Give them the tools to make that happen.  While updating an opportunity record can seem tedious (but very necessary), augment by providing address mapping integration or automated workflow to remove manual tasks like trip reports.  A recent customer's Account Executives rely heavily on their Sales Support staff through various points in their selling cycle.  By giving the AE's visibility into the planned enterprise-wide sales activities of the support staff, the AE's are able to more quickly solidify meetings that require support team members for a prospect or customer product demonstration.  They no longer have to manage this during every instance with phone calls or email strings back and forth to the support team.
2. If you find your sales staff is not adopting CRM because they don't perceive management to be leveraging the information going into CRM, try running your pipeline meetings - in a group or individually - from your CRM dashboards or reports.  This is a technique that you can use to supplement or remove the common stick approach that requires opportunity management in CRM or the AE will not get paid.  Sales staff will understand management is making decisions based on CRM information and they will see management taking ownership of the CRM program.  This is a powerful message.  Don't expect after one pipeline meeting to have the light switch change.  Be diligent.
3. Inspect your sales processes and continue to ask for feedback on what will help optimize sales efforts.  We previously mentioned map integration or workflow.  Each sales process is different - inspect what your users need, plan to address their needs, COMMIT to the users you will help them and engage you CRM IT team or partner to work through the enhancements.  If you are not using a dashboard, I strongly suggest you start by examining your Business Intelligence needs.

 

These are just a few examples of sales adoption issues.  Feel free to share in the comments additional tricks or steps you've taken to improve on a process that makes your organization succeed - Successful Sales.

Default Unit of Measure-version 3.0

In many implementations, the Customer's product catalog will only contain one unit of measure.  If this is the case, most of the time the unit of measure is Each=EA.  A common question from customers with this set up is "since my unit of measure is always the same, why do I need to select a unit of measure on my Opportunity or Order products?".  This blog provides basic Java script to default the unit of measure for version 3.0 for Opportunity products. 

1. Go to Product Catalog under settings and open Unit groups
2. Open the Unit of Measure you want to use for your default
3. Click Ctrl-N to get the guid value for this unit of measure
4. In the code below copy and paste the guid in
5. // This sets the default values for Quantity and Unit of Measure upon a new
   //form
   //  UOM = Each
   var CRM_FORM_TYPE_CREATE = "1";
   var lookupItem = new Array();
   var iUnit = "Each";
   if (crmForm.FormType==CRM_FORM_TYPE_CREATE)
      {
       // Set: GUID of unit "Each", object type code and the text name "Each".
      lookupItem[0] = new LookupControlItem
   ("{C96EA008-7D70-DD11-A905-001B7803AB14}", 1055, "Each"); // Set the form control value to the lookupItem just created.
      crmForm.all.uomid.DataValue = lookupItem ;
      }
6. Place the Java script on the Onload event of the Opportunity Product form and on the Onchange event of the product attribute field
7. Enable and publish

Hiding Navigation Items within a form

The ability to hide items on the main Navigation menu is a function of modifying the site map.  However, hiding Navigation items from within a form requires some basic jscript.  For example, a customer is not using the invoices or quotes functionality of the CRM system.  Therefore, when the Account or Contact form is opened these items need to be hidden.  The following jscript is entered on the on load event of the entity in question.  In this case, it would be the Account and Contact entity.

Of course other navigation items can be hidden to by simply replacing the item in the ("navXXXX") section of the code.

var oCloseMenuItem = document.all("navQuotes");
if (oCloseMenuItem != null) {
    oCloseMenuItem.parentElement.removeChild(oCloseMenuItem);
    }

var oCloseMenuItem = document.all("navInvoices");
if (oCloseMenuItem != null) {
    oCloseMenuItem.parentElement.removeChild(oCloseMenuItem);
    }

CRM Partner Selection Tips

All too often, Customers find they have selected the wrong partner too late in the game.  The importance of selecting the correct partner to implement your CRM strategy is as important as selecting the correct CRM application.  If you are selecting a partner for your CRM implementation you must consider several factors across the functionality you plan to leverage – marketing, sales and customer service.  There are several fairly equally weighted factors in this decision:

• Two words – User Adoption.  When selecting a CRM partner it is imperative that they understand and can articulate their strategy on successful user adoption.  This is a MUST HAVE and ranks at the top of the list with selecting the right application for your organization and having an active long-term CRM strategy.
• Choose a partner that can PROVE competency in the tool you have selected.  In my experience, I have recently seen a trend where “Rescue Missions” initially selected a partner who performs a number of consulting services across a myriad of products.  They have generally found themselves with a partner who is competent in one area, ERP for example, and less experienced in CRM. A great litmus test is to find out what CRM application they are using.  If they don’t answer with the CRM product you have selected or they are selling, a big red flag should be brought to the flagpole.  If the partner manages their business with the CRM tool you are buying, you know they believe in the application and understand the value of setting performance metrics and CRM processes.  Simply ask them to demonstrate how they use CRM.
• Common “Rescue Missions” share one or all of these themes: our go-live date slipped considerably or was never realized, we went way over budget and/or our CRM deployment didn’t fit our users needs.  Ask the hard questions when determining your partner and get them to prove their quality.
• When working through reference calls, be sure to verify the partner’s ability to bring best practice guidance to the table.  Best practices MUST include more than configuration best practices.  Great partners will be a solid rock to lean on when you need to make difficult process decisions around marketing, sales and customer service when incorporating the CRM application’s use.
• By understanding what you think is best for your organization; you will be more informed when selecting your partner.  You can reference a previous post entitled Tips to CRM Project Success: Pre-Project Kickoff that will give you some suggestions to prepare. If you have selected your partner and are now working through the cost of the project it is important to understand what you are getting for the amount you are paying.
• If you find yourself looking for a new partner, my advice is NOT to make your partner decision from the same criteria as the initial process.  In a recent sales call, I spoke with a prospect who found themselves well over-budget with less than expected functionality.  I was surprised to hear that the prospect was using the exact same decision making process to select this partner.  In the case of Microsoft CRM, if you have to find a new partner and don’t know where to start, consult your Microsoft Account Manager.

So spend the necessary time, perform the due diligence required to make a sound decision and don’t forget the end game - you don't want to become a Rescue Mission.  On time delivery, on/under budget of initial scope and a great user experience are important.  Your partner should demonstrate they will be equally responsible for all three of these objectives.  These are important for project health.  Best practice guidance, successful user adoption strategy and a performance metric-driven focus are important to the success of your long-term investment.

CRM User Cannot Query Filtered Views

We ran into an issue where a valid CRM user could not run a particular report.  The root cause was that the user (who is a valid CRM user) could not query data out of the Filtered Views.

Further investigation revealed that after his CRM account had been created, his domain logon name had been changed in Active Directory.  However, in the SYSTEMUSERBASE table in the _MSCRM database, it was still the old login name.

By changing the login name field in the SYSTEMUSERBASE table to the new domain login name, the issue was corrected.

NOTE: take extra caution when directly modifying the CRM database.  Be sure you have a backup!