Rich's Picks
CRM - Needs Analysis Process (NAP)
Congratulations on your decision to automate your sales efforts! I cannot think of another single step you could take that will have such a profound effect on your sales organization. If your experiences are like those of most of the companies that I work with, in just a few months you will enjoy more sales. Perhaps even more important, you will have that quiet peace of mind that comes from knowing your sales team is in total control of all sales activities!
Which Customer Relationship Management program is best for me?
In the more than 15 years that I have been writing these reviews, that is the one question I have heard over and over.
I wish I could give you an easy answer to this question, but I can't. The problem is still just more complicated than it should be. Your many different selling scenarios are just too diverse! And the many programs, though similar on the surface, vary tremendously.
Though I can't give you a simple answer, I can save you a lot of blood, sweat and tears as I guide you through this over crowded (and over hyped!) software segment. Over the years, I have helped thousands of people discover the best program for their sales & marketing situation. These companies come from every imaginable business and all sizes - FORTUNE 500 to SOHO. Based on these countless discussions, I have developed my Needs Analysis Questionnaire to help me understand your unique requirements.
If you are willing to invest some time telling me about your business, I can suggest the two or three programs that will work best for you! Together we will explore some very basic issues: What do you sell? Who do you sell to? What do you hope to accomplish with computer technology? Using the Needs Analysis Questionnaire that I have refined over the last ten years, we will zero in on the precise information that will give me the insight I need to recommend the best program for you!
The cost of this service is just $487. You have probably already spent far more than that just thinking about which programs might work best for you. Now you can finally answer the question with the reliability of my unbiased recommendation!
I will study everything that you send back to me and suggest the two or three programs that I think will work best for you! Then I will send you my In-Depth Reviews of these programs, along with any other suggestions that I think will help you take better care of your customers and sell more now! The whole process should take about a week and you can be on your way successfully automating your sales efforts.
Don't forget, I also include 30 minutes of telephone consultation as an important part of this process. If you have any follow-up questions, you can call me to discuss them after you review the materials that I send. Many people use this as a "truth detector" session to review the proposals of the different software vendors! Remember, I want to help you find the program that will let you achieve your sales automation objectives. Let's work together to make this happen!
Proper use of Customer Relationship Management technology will help you take better care of your customers and blow next year's quota right out the window! I know that with all my heart. So, if you still haven't found the time to find the right software and get on with more effective selling, let me help you now.
No BS, Better Than Risk Free, Lifetime Guarantee
I am committed to your success and happiness! If you go through my Needs Analysis Process and are unhappy with the results (for any reason!), I will give you a complete refund. Simple as that. The reviews I send are yours to keep in any event.
So let's get started.
I look forward to working with you, Rich Bohn
Special Note: We recognize that customers of this service provide a substantial amount of information, much of it proprietary, to us. We assure you that this information is handled with the utmost discretion! Any information submitted as part of this Needs Analysis Process is viewed by Rich Bohn alone and is used only to make a software recommendation to you. To further protect this sensitive information, Rich is happy to sign a non-disclosure agreement. If this is a concern to you, please feel free to forward your non-disclosure agreement directly to Rich at richbohn@sellmorenow.com. To review our general privacy guidelines, see our SellMoreNow.com Privacy Policy.
After testing this process on over one thousand sales professionals, I have found it important to go "back to the basics" before jumping into all the various technical issues. So, please bear with me as we explore some fundamental issues of your sales situation. Please try to answer each question as honestly and candidly as possible (Remember, this is just between you and me!) It is probably best if you quickly scan through all of the questions first, then go back to the top and start writing your answers. Now, let's get started!
A SOLID FOUNDATION
Please take some time to introduce me to your company, products, customers and sales environment. This information forms the foundation that I will keep a priority as we examine individual facets of your customer relationship management challenges.
Please Tell Me About Your Company
What are the vital facts about your company? When was the company started? By who? What is the primary business? What is your specific business? Are you a publicly owned company? If so, can you provide a recent annual report? If not, what financial background can you offer (Sales, growth, profitability, etc.)? How many employees there? Any other information you can provide that will give me a good picture of your company will be appreciated.
Please Tell Me About Your Products
What do you sell? (If possible, please include a brochure and sample information.) What is the typical price of these products? What information do your customers expect you to have immediately on hand about your products? What other information would it be nice for you to have on your products?
Please Tell Me About Your Customers
Who buys your products? Please describe your typical prospect for me in some detail. How do you make initial contact with these prospects? Cold calls? Sales leads provided by the company? Sales leads provided by some other source? How do you get these leads today? If an initial literature package is sent, who sends it? Can you prove your sales leads result in orders? If so, what percentage? Do you know which lead sources result in the most orders?
What is your customer buying cycle? When I look at different sales cycles, I find that they fall into three broad categories:
- Short buying cycle
- Long and complicated buying cycle
- Continuous buying cycle
Think about your typical sale. What is the length of your sales cycle, the total time from your initial contact to getting your first order? What actions (telephone calls, personal visits, quotations, demos, etc.) do you take with your prospect to get an order? This is a very important issue, please take your time and think this one through!
Once you have a qualified sales lead, do you manage and monitor this sales process until you get an order? If so, how? Do you know if prospects are getting bogged down at some point in the sales process? If so, where?
When closing an order, who must you deal with at an account? Do you have primarily a single decision maker, or many contacts at an account?
How much repeat business do you do? Do your customers reorder things from you on a continuing basis? On average, how much business do you do with each customer in a typical year?
How many regular customers does each sales person manage now? How many new leads do you get per month? To meet your corporate growth objectives, how many new customers do you need? What percentage of your prospects do you successfully convert to customers?
Are your sales people responsible for installation or service? If not, who is? What activities after the sale do you pursue with your customers?
What percentage of your customer contact is by outbound telephone, inbound telephone, mail, or face-to-face?
If you prepare proposals or price quotations for your prospects, who does the work and how?
Knowing your company's true customer orientation will help me make the most appropriate CRM software recommendation. Please rate your company's customer orientation on each of the following business processes on a scale of zero (0) to ten (10), where zero is the lowest score and ten is the highest score.
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Please Tell Me About Your Competitors
Who are your competitors? Please provide a thumbnail sketch of each. What are their strengths and weaknesses? How do you rank relative to your competitors? Are you aware of any sales automation efforts at your competitors? If so, what are they?
Have you given any thought to how a sales automation system might help you defeat a competitor? If so, how?
To shed some more light on your competitive environment, how would you characterize your total industry in terms of:
(please "X" One Box)
| Total demand? | a) growing | b) stagnant | c) declining |
| Competition? | a) fierce | b) moderate | c) mild |
| Threat of new competitors? | a) high | b) moderate | c) low |
| Supplier power? (how powerful are suppliers in your industry?) | a) high | b) moderate | c) low |
| Buyer Power? (how powerful are buyers in your industry?) | a) high | b) moderate | c) low |
| Availability of substitutes? (buyers' ability to substitute your industry's products) | a) easy | b) somewhat difficult | c) very difficult
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| Threat of substitute technology? | a) high | b) moderate | c) low |
| Dynamism? (upgrading of products/technology) | a) dynamic | b) stable | c) in-between
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| Major basis of competition (how do various firms try to increase sales?) | a) product innovations | b) pricing /promotion | c) better service |
How has your firm's performance been for the last three years: (Please "X" one )
a) Growing b) Declining c) Stagnant d) Other ______
Any Comments?
Please Tell Me About Your Management Team
Please provide a detailed organization chart of your management team. Thinking about the key members of this team, what information, potentially available from the sales team, would permit these managers to do a better job in their areas? Consider the flip-side, what information do you think your sales team wishes they had from these functional managers? Now, double-check these speculations with actual feed back from your sales team.
Think about the people your sales team routinely communicates with at your company. Who are they? Where are they? What information does the sales team send them now? How do they send this information? What information do they get from them now? How do they get this information? Are there other people the sales team might regularly communicate with? Who? Where? What about?
To help you close more orders, what information does the sales team wish it had at their fingertips? How is order entry handled in your company? How much of this work does the sales team personally do? Do they have any after sale accounting responsibility, bill collecting, etc.?
Please tell me more about your marketing team. Do they currently work well (and closely) with the sales team? If not, what are you doing to improve this situation? What opportunities do you see where your marketing and sales teams might work together to take better care of your customers. Is this CRM project being launched in conjunction with any new marketing projects? If so, please provide as many details as possible so that we can explore how the CRM system might enhance these efforts.
Please Tell Me About Your Computer Experience
Do you have a corporate IT manager? If so, it is essential that you get their input for this section! If you do not have an IT manager, please get the support of the "designated computer guru" on your management team.
Do you have a corporate computer system at this time? If so, what is it? Specifics please: processor type & speed? Memory capacity? Disk capacity? Operating system? If you do already have a computer, must you use it or can we scrap everything and start fresh?
Are you currently using a contact manager, sales automation package, or some other CRM solution now? If so, what program are you using now? What don't you like about it? What have you liked about it? What do you really wish this program would do that would help you take better care of your customers now?
Please Tell Me About Your "Back Office"
Is your accounting or manufacturing system already automated? If so, what accounting/ERP software do you use? Details, please: company, program, version. Do you hope to interface your CRM solution with your back office software? If so, what do you hope to accomplish by doing this?
If you have an accounting system, who did you buy it from? Who installed it and performed your on-site training? Were you happy with their efforts? Are they a potential source of support for a CRM system?
TOTAL CUSTOMER
RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
At this point, it is
necessary to introduce the concept of a customer relationship continuum. When
you first discover the name of someone who might be a candidate to do business
with you, this person is just an unqualified suspect. You may have some useful
information about this person. For example, they might be a referral from a
trusted business colleague. However, you do not have a relationship with this
suspect. This “unqualified suspect” defines the starting point for our
customer relationship continuum.
Now, think of your best
customer. These people are your “raving fans.” They love your products, your
company and do not hesitate to recommend you to everyone they know! These are
your happy, repeat customers -
your best and most profitable customers. I assume that, in a perfect world, this
is the level of relationship you would aspire to with all of your customers.
This “raving fan” the target level for our customer relationship continuum.
The goal of most customer-focused
businesses today is to efficiently move people along this customer relationship
continuum. You do this through a series of interactions that engage your
customer in a dialog to establish a meaningful customer relationship. So, the
next step in my exploration of your CRM requirements is examine the
different interactions, appropriate at any point in the customer relationship
continuum, that you currently perform. More importantly, those interactions you
might not perform that you know you should!
To help you think about some of these issues, please tell me your most critical business needs?
Internet Enable Sales, Marketing, and Customer Service
Teams
Enhance Customer Interaction and Communication
Improve Lead Generation Management
Improve Sales Forecasting, Revenue Predictability and Reporting
Shorten Sales Cycles
Increase Revenue Through Accurate Quoting, Pricing and Order Generation
Maximize Call Center Effectiveness
Reduce Call Center Expenditures
Implement e-Service Solutions to Decrease Call Volumes
Improve Customer Retention by Improving Customer Satisfaction
In our traditional definition
of an organization, different departments are responsible for the interactions
and different points in the customer relationship continuum. For this reason,
the next several sections of this Needs Analysis Process examine your
requirements from this departmental perspective. We begin with the Marketing
Department, responsible in most organizations for developing the unqualified
suspect into a “warm” lead. Then, we progress through the other typical
departments that would be responsible for nurturing the precious customer
relationship.
NOTE: You don't need to attack all of the following functions at the same time! In fact, I suggest you take them one at a time. However, for this process, it is helpful to tell me whatever you can about your challenges and goals for each function.
MARKETING SUPPORT
CAPABILITIES
Any application claiming to
provide total customer relationship management capabilities must also address
the lead acquisition and management stage of the customer life cycle. Here you should detail any capabilities you
would like to see that will help you improve your marketing.
Tell me what you can about your existing Marketing Campaigns and marketing programs
How do you manage Lead qualification and distribution?
Do you conduct Events and Seminars as part of your marketing effort?
How do you currently handle Collateral fulfillment?
Do you regularly Survey customers and prospects?
Do you conduct Online incentive promotions, sweepstakes and contests?
Marketing
Analysis
Can you clearly define your Customer segmentation/profiling?
Do
you monitor Product Performance (revenue
Do you know the real effectiveness of your marketing investments?
FIELD SALES SUPPORT CAPABILITIES
How many people are on your sales team? What is their typical background (education, work experience, etc.)? If possible, encloses copies of any resumes available.
What sales training do you provide for your sales team? If you currently follow a specific sales methodology, please provide complete details for my review.
How is your sales team currently organized? Exactly where are these people located? Will this stay the same?
Where does your sales team actually do their work (home, office, car, customer site, etc.)?
What are the primary responsibilities of your sales team, please include actual job descriptions if they exist? Does this work still make sense as you ponder your future corporate objectives?
Of the following items, what do you think your sales team would personally hope to achieve from this CRM project?
Check all that apply:
- To improve productivity
- To improve frequency of contacts with customers
- To improve frequency of contacts with prospects
- To increase closing rates
- To shorten selling cycle
- To increase personal earnings
- To decrease time spent on grunt work
Now, go back and rank these, in order of importance. When would you hope to achieve these objectives?
Give me some idea of your company commission plan? Is your sales team on a straight percentage or some other formula. If they were to double their sales in the next year, what impact would this have on their personal earnings?
Does your sales team have a computer now? If so, what is it? Specifics please: processor type & speed? Memory capacity? Disk capacity? Operating system? If you do already have a computer, must you use it or can we scrap everything and start fresh?
If you do not own a computer, have they ever used one in the past? If so, what was it? What was it used for? How long was it used?
Do your sales team currently have a working knowledge of a word processor or spreadsheet? If so, which ones? How are these used?
Do you already have the support of the sales team for this project, or is it being "suggested" to them? Would you say that your sales team is a happy and productive group of people? Or, are there some other problems you need to deal with? If so, what are these problems? Details, please.
CALL CENTER SUPPORT CAPABILITIES
Many organizations find a
call center, whether they have 10 agents or 1,000 agents, an effective tool to
take better care of their customers. Do you currently operate (or, desire to
operate) a call center.
If so, how many agents staff this call center? Do they handle inbound calls, outbound calls, or both?
Do you want your staff to communicate via:
Do you require Remote
Agent Support
Computer Telephony
Integration
Do you need this solution to
integrate with any existing telephone
equipment? If so, please detail your current telephone equipment.
SALES MANAGEMENT
CAPABILITIES
One of the reasons customer
relationship management efforts can have such a profound impact on the overall
results of a company is because of the tremendous potential leverage of the
sales team. Increase the
performance of your “average” sales person, and the results generally flow
right to the bottom line. So, when
I evaluate customer relationship management requirements, I look for any special
opportunities that might help sales management increase the overall performance of
the sales team.
Planning &
Deployment
How do you currently plan and optimize sales territories?
How do you manage a territory reorganization?
Quotas &
Forecasting
How do you currently set quotas?
How do you currently manage your sales forecast? Are you happy with their accuracy?
How do you roll-up sales
forecasts?
Sales Process
Management
Performance Measurement
How do you currently perform Sales Cycle Tracking?
How do you currently measure Progress toward sales objectives?
How do you currently
perform Comparative analysis -
individual sales people vs. the entire sales team
Sales Compensation
How do you currently help sales managers optimize their compensation plans?
Please clarify any other sales management
PARTNER MANAGEMENT
CAPABILITIES
Do you sell through a
distribution channel? If so, this is where you should
describe, in detail, whatever partner management issues that you face.
Key points to consider include:
Partner Acquisition
Lead Distribution &
Management
MDF & Co-op
Administration
Partner Profiling
Channel Program
Management
Extended Team Selling
Channel Forecasting &
Reporting
Please clarify any other
partner management
CUSTOMER SUPPORT CAPABILITIES
In these days of total Customer Relationship Management, strong customer support capabilities are also important. So, lets explore the customer support issues that you face. Please detail your customer support challenges by addressing the following issues, as appropriate.
Call Management
Products
Web-enabled
Problem Resolution
Service Agreements
Please clarify any other
customer support
eBUSINESS SUPPORT
CAPABILITIES
Even if you
primarily use a “classic” sales and marketing approach to serve your
customers, every business must plan an electronic commerce strategy to assure
their long-term survival. So, here I examine the specific e-commerce
capabilities you wish to provide.
Do you currently sell any products over the web? If not, do you have products that you could sell this way?
Does you web site support the efforts of your sales team? Or, is it still mostly a collection of online brochures?
Please clarify any other eBusiness
support
Final Thoughts
Why do you think you want to automate your sales effort? What are the real business issues you are trying to solve? Too many of the companies that I work with decide to implement CRM without really stopping to ask why they are doing it! Please don't make this mistake. CRM is a means to an end, not the latest "silver bullet" solution to all of your problems.
Realize up front that CRM is an ongoing effort. This will surely be a project that will change over time as you re-examine your sales processes and discover the power of the computer technology. Don't expect to get everything "right" on your first try and please budget realistically to assure the success of the project.
The sales team and and other players on your CRM team are different groups with different needs. However, for any CRM project to be successful, it must ultimately meet the needs of all these groups. In the initial phases, my recommendation when in doubt, give the nod for any capability decisions to the sales team. These people are the best sources of much of the information marketing, support and management might be interested in! Give them tools that simplify their lives and help them sell more and they will use the system. Very quickly, your CRM solution will change the way you do business. As with any such change, senior management commitment is essential! Publicly committing to the use of the system for key information is the best way to illustrate commitment and get results.
NAP Instructions
This is not a test. There are no right or wrong answers. You don't even have to answer every question. Though the more information you do give me, the better the recommendation I will be able to make.
Don't worry about making your reply look like anything special! Just grab a pad and start writing your replies. If I can read it, I will work with it.
Send your completed NAP back to me along with any other information that I might find useful. If you have specific questions that you feel need special attention, please ask them here.
I will study everything that you send back to me and suggest the one program that I think will work best for you. I will send you my In-Depth Review of this program, along with any other suggestions that I think will help you take better care of your customers and sell more now!
This whole process should take about a week. Don't forget, I include 30 minutes of telephone consultation as an important part of this Corporate NAP process. If you have any follow-up questions, you can call me to discuss them after you review the materials that I send. Remember, I want to help you find the program that will let you achieve your sales automation objectives. Let's work together to make this happen!
If you want me to analyze your questionnaire and make my recommendations, my fee for this service is $487.00. Just return your completed NAP to me with your check or credit card number.
Or you may order online by clicking here:
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Reminder: This Corporate NAP process has been developed and refined to assist SOHO, Small Business, Mid Market, Small Enterprise and Medium Enterprise accounts with their CRM efforts. However, if you are using this service to establish a starting point for a larger CRM project, this can still be a valuable exercise. Either way, I will try to help you in any way I can.
As always, stay in touch! If you are really stuck on something, give me a call (425-392-3514). You can also reach me via e-mail at RichBohn@SellMoreNow.com
Let me know how I can help you sell more!
Rich Bohn
Copyright © 2004 by The Denali Group, Inc. (www.sellmorenow.com)
