Archive for Marketing Funnel
Define the Expectation, Delight the Customer
Posted by: | CommentsIn tomorrow’s podcast with Marc Stickdorn, co-author of This is Service Design Thinking, I asked my typical “last question” and it went like this:
Joe: Is there something that I didn’t ask that you would like to expand on or mention about service design thinking?
Marc: Maybe I would like to add one thing and that’s about expectations. We talked a lot about experiences now and one really; really important thing is the expectations. If you’re thinking about what advertisements do and communications if you go online and read reviews about said product and so forth it’s all affecting expectations. That is something really, really important.
If you’re thinking what satisfaction is, customer satisfaction, it really depends on the expectation. You level your expectations against your experiences. That’s what still many companies don’t really get to level their expectation that right manner. Expectation management is one thing which needs to be included in service design.
Joe: The expectation of what a customer should know and what an organization should do. Having that commonality really is what makes the product experience great. I think that’s a great point.
Marc: Definitely. That’s why low-cost carriers are working so good because they promise you nothing and at the end of the day you get from A to B and that’s all you want and that’s all they promise and that’s all they do. That’s why they work. They can have an awful customer experience but if they don’t promise anything else, fair enough.
If you promise to have an awesome customer experience and you just provide an average experience that’s something negative. That’s what I meant with a shift from advertising to experiences as well.
How many of us spend time on expectations? How many of us over promise and under deliver? We spend time on defining customer needs and how we can deliver on them but do we ever define his expectations? Most sales teachings employ techniques that are manipulative and tied to customer emotions. You try to guide them down a certain path. I have written about this before in Kill the Sales and Marketing Funnel where I said:
The Sales and Marketing Funnel is a theory that needs to be laid to rest. A linear approach to predict, plan, and proceed is a precarious way to advance. This approach prematurely foresees a solution for the customer without ever understanding their problem. And if you consider addressing the application of social media, it does nothing to support inbound marketing. As we work our way down the funnel, it is just as likely evidence will mount that the proposed solution is wrong. However, we have so much invested we attempt to sway the course of action in our favor. Linear planning will increase the risk for a customer to engage in an inappropriate course of action.
I find expectations are closely rooted to empathy. You have to take interest in the customer’s well-being in able to assist them in defining the minimum level of performance needed and the amount of effort they are willing to put forth. The key is listening with empathy. Your persona is more important than the customers at this point. Before you begin teaching the customer what they need to know, start thinking of this process a little differently. Think of it as you being the pupil rather than the teacher. Think about you having that “aha” moment or that moment when you “get it” versus when your customer gets it. When that “Aha” moment arrives – delighting the customer may not be all that difficult.
P.S. Review the The Lean Engagement Team
Related Information:
The Subservient Marketing Funnel
Servant Leadership in the Toyota Culture
Can anyone truly understand and empathize with another?
Four Star General on Leadership–Listen, Learn…
What Sales and Marketing can learn from Demand Driven Manufacturing
Posted by: | Comments“Demand-Driven manufacturing is a manufacturing requires a fundamental shift form the centrality of inventory to the centrality of demand. To be successful, company must be able to sense and adapt to market changes.” – This is from the Orlicky’s Material Requirements Planning 3/E.written by my recent podcast guest Carol Ptak and Chad Smith of the Demand Driven Institute.
Why is sales and marketing the last to adapt to this thinking? Sure, they understand that push marketing does not work and have stopped sending out promotion
al mailings, feature driven ads and of course they never encourage cold-calling! Or have they? Most ideas for good marketing are investing more money to get someone into their funnel, not to make that time in the funnel a memorable experience.
After reviewing the new book, I saw striking similarities in DDMRP that can directly apply to the sales and marketing process. They are substantially solving the same problem that exist in sales and marketing. It is no longer a market that has excess demand. Our product/service cannot be at the centrality of our sales and marketing process. With lessons learned from D-Logic (The Service-Dominant Logic of Marketing by Stephen Vargo and Robert Lusch) concepts the centrality of our sales and marketing must be the value that is created in the use of our product or service.
Demand Drive MRP is focused around critical parts called strategically replenished parts. It has five integral components that are:
- Strategic Inventory Positioning
- Buffer Profiles and Level Determination
- Dynamic Buffers
- Demand-Drive Planning
- Highly Visible and Collaborative Execution
I intend to break each of these components down in future blog posts to demonstrate the viability of this thinking. It is not meant to replace an existing sales and marketing structure. It had not been used and is pure conjecture on my part. However, it offers some interesting parallels that are worth considering. I encourage listening to the podcast with Carol and Chad, Is Orlicky’s MRP relevant today? Think DDMRP and even their earlier ones listed on the podcast page as they set the stage for this discussion.
This blog series will show how a DDMRP process can reduce dramatically the uncertainty in response levels required and sort the important responses needed. If this can be done we may be on a path that efficiencies and increased effectiveness is possible in sales and marketing. It’s interesting to note that DDMRP does not replace but leverages technologies like Theory of Constraints and Lean.
Many times in my discussions of mirroring the customer buying process and building the appropriate value stream and response, we have a tendency to consider a one to one marketing approach. Looking at the value stream through the glass of DDMRP it answers the question of a more complex and larger environment.
How outdated is your sales channel structures? Are you segmenting by products or geographically? Or Direct Sales and Distribution? Or even Online and Offline? Once someone is in the sales funnel are they classified be level of interest such as A,B,C? Or level of opportunity? Maybe you consider past, present or new? Or in new marketing circles we are discussing early adaptors, earl majority, etc.? Or the buzz words like Influencers and Enablers? How do you decide? Or for that matter, do any of them work?
The three will-known rules of forecasting have always limited the sales and marketing world:
- Forecasts are always in error.
- The more detailed a forecast, the more error will be realized.
- The further into the future the forecast goes, the more error will be realized.
Most experienced sales and marketing are aware of these shortcomings and the wide array of sales and marketing processes. Most believe that it still comes down to beating the pavement. Can that be changed?
First, you must answer: How do you manage variability and volatility in today’s market? The book starts out by saying, “Experts in variability and volatility tend to be less enterprise focused and more specific event focus. Variability must be considered in relation to its impact across a holistic system. All variation does not have the same impact. Reducing variability does not necessarily improve the overall process. There are places where it must be protected against in order to keep the system stable and effective.”
Can we protect key portions of our sales channels? Can we reduce variability and volatility in sales and marketing? Seems like a tall order. However, if it is being done in the supply chain based on a forecast that sales and marketing is forecasting, why can’t we improve our forecasting by considering the same five steps with a slightly different view:
- Strategic Inventory Positioning: Position our organization to learn from our customers.
- Buffer Profiles and Level Determination: Profile the customer and our knowledge gaps
- Dynamic Buffers: Flexibility within teams to self-organize autonomously
- Demand-Drive Planning: Use of a system that promotes better and quicker transfer of knowledge at the execution level.
- Highly Visible and Collaborative Execution – Why change this?l
Our exploration has started.
Related Information:
The Perfect Storm has come together of Excess Capacity and Product Variety
Will Product Managers embrace Open Innovation?
Implementing the TOC Supply Chain Solution
Transforming your Supply Chain to a Lean Fulfillment Stream eBook
Reducing Muda for Others with Kaizen
Posted by: | CommentsKaizen is about involving employees to get them not only the way to do work but to help improve the way others do their work. The Friday Video Series continues with Dr. Michael Balle, the Gemba Coach at the Lean Enterprise Institute. This series of videos continues with a central theme of Kaizen.
Dr. Balle is a multiple Shingo Prize winner as an author of the The Gold Mine
Dr. Michael Balle is the Gemba Coach at the Lean Enterprise Institute
Past Videos with Dr. Balle on the Biz901 You Tube Channel
Books Mentioned in this discussion:
One Team on All Levels: Stories from Toyota Team Members, Second Edition
Toyota Culture: The Heart and Soul of the Toyota Way
Toyota Kaizen Methods: Six Steps to Improvement
Related Information:
The Subservient Marketing Funnel
Servant Leadership in the Toyota Culture
What will your workplace be like in 2020?
Change Education, Change the Sales Cycle
Posted by: | CommentsThough this is a well documented Ted Video, I ran across the RSA Animate video version of Ken Robinson’s discussion on education. Funny thing about it was that it really hit a chord when thinking about the typical Sales Cycle or Marketing Funnel. Not the part on Attention Deficit Disorder but when he talks about standardization and divergent thinking. It starts around the 6 minute mark.
Related Information:
Asking the right questions about Lean?
Service Design Thinking
How to build a Sales and Marketing Team
Kill the Sales and Marketing Funnel.
Improve your Sales Cycle, Work on your Feedback Loops
Posted by: | CommentsWhen I start talking about speeding up the sales cycle the initial reaction is that the sales cycle is controlled by the customer and there is just not much we can do about that. I usually counter with, most companies understand that there is an average sales cycle time and if we just agree that there is than there is room for improvement.
My next discussion point is asking, can you describe the typical sales cycle based on the decision making criteria of your customer. At this point, I am again met with resistance saying that they are all different. I once again counter with let’s just take empirical view of a well-known market segment or even if we have to a well-known customer who we would consider “typical.” I do not do this too intentionally classify a customer as average or typical but to establish a base line on how we respond to our customers’ needs.
With that being said, I next ask what the average deviation from the sales cycle is there and if there are common decision making steps that get added or subtracted when this happens. That highlights the variability and creates awareness on how little active management of the process is going on. Further discussion generates reasons for excessive wait times by both parties and considerable rework that we call “fine tuning”.
Why change this? In my experience, the longer the process the more likely the criteria will change as a result of other influences rather than the actual need changing. The length of time does not necessarily equate to a better choice. The choice is based on the conditions, the influencers, the knowledge and if the problem increases substantially. The objective is not to have the customer buy your product.
The objective is for the customer to make the best informed and knowledgeable decision possible. The fundamental goals of your sales cycle should be one of discovery, learning and adaptability with a shared responsibility for a successful outcome. Your ability to generate the required knowledge effectively and efficiently in your customer decision making process will ultimately make you the preferred supplier. The question of course is how do you do that?
In most cases, unless you have already mapped your process (Value Stream Mapping), you will have cycle times that are highly variable and more than likely long. Developing a more consistent pattern with less variability will allow sales teams and customers to develop a higher degree of trust in each other.
One way of reducing cycle time is to create faster feedback loops. First, take one of the stages of the customer decision making process and break it down into multiple loops or cycles. Prioritize the loops and define the work that needs to be done within the first cycle through the use of a user story. The result of this is that you generate fast feedback by offering the customer smaller parcels of information to see if you are on the correct path or gain buy-in of a smaller step of the process.
Early customer feedback results in a better focus on the problem. As a result less work is done on superfluous tasks and more work is done on the required objectives. Little waste is generated because the feedback is so quick that obvious deviations are discarded.
Faster feedback can result in increased quality. There are number of reasons for this. Shorter cycles result in better fit since the feedback can be gathered and applied frequently. Also, faster feedback means that the team can minimize the work required to meet the objectives. Less rework is required (you are constantly tweaking) and this is very advantageous when compared to large time consuming proposals that are many times generated.
Another advantage of this process is that you only do the iterations that are you are comfortable doing. You don’t have to start every task in order. The flexibility of being able to put off some decisions to the last possible moment does not distract from the overall objective. By doing other cycles first, you will have increased knowledge of the cycle that will add better definition to the most difficult tasks.
Putting order into your sales cycle you will find that most of the time spent before is waiting on decisions or task that others are doing. Wait time is significantly reduced because of the smaller cycles are much easier to complete and easier handoffs are created which may simplify the task of others.
Working on the basics, makes a difference. To improve your football team, you need to work on blocking and tackling. To improve your sales cycle, you need to work on your feedback loops.
Related Information:
The Role of PDCA in a Lean Sales and Marketing Cycle
The Little PDCA Sales Loop
The 7 step Lean Process of Marketing to Toyota
Marketing Kanban: Marketing Kanban
Value Stream Mapping
