Most businesses start their CRM journey with the best of intentions. They’re excited about the prospect of collecting data to better manage their customers, products, relationships and business opportunities.
They are used to having an ERP to manage the back end of their business. They assume its rollout can’t be much different and proceed to hand it over to their IT person to lead the charge.
If it’s that easy, why are many leaders unsatisfied with the results of their CRM implementations?
The No. 1 reason a company fails on the first attempt and is now embarking on CRM 2.0 is that they haven’t tapped a CEO for CRM.
CRM is not plug-and-play. To get the most out of your solution, you must account for all the touchpoints within your company, from inside and outside sales to product support and marketing.
To ensure you’re doing that, you need to involve a diverse set of team members that include the CEO for CRM, stakeholders, super users and a project manager.
Why does a company need a CEO for their CRM journey?
Before we jump into any CRM implementation and rollout, we need a point person in charge. That person is the CEO for CRM.
Why the title?
The CEO for CRM is responsible for driving the initiative at startup and continuing after it’s up and running. They are the CRM advocate and executive champion for its success. You can either have an internal CEO for CRM or bring one in from the outside to act as a wingman.
This person is typically in a sales management position (optimally an internal team member), understands the sales process and needs of the sales team, and has the bandwidth to tackle this ongoing commitment. They must have the capacity to sell the value of CRM to all members of the team.
The CEO for CRM is a change agent, tasked with changing people’s habits, changing culture, changing the way you do business. That is no easy task.
That’s why assigning this important task to the IT department or an operations manager quickly creates a disconnect. It’s not their fault. They haven’t lived in the sales management world.
What are the key attributes a CEO for CRM requires? For success on the first try, they must:
- Be a respected sales leader in the organization with the power to make changes
- Believe in what CRM can do for an organization
- Understand team selling in various roles from inside and outside sales to marketing
- Have the bandwidth to manage an ongoing CRM initiative
- Have experience working with CRM and other technology
- Demonstrate exceptional leadership skills like listening and working as a team
This individual plays an important role across the company’s entire CRM journey, from pre-implementation to post-implementation. (Perhaps even more important than the CRM software selection itself!)
Don’t confuse the duties of the CEO for CRM with those of a project manager. The project manager is responsible for administrative and coordinating tasks such as organizing meetings, generating reports and gathering data to assist the CEO for CRM.
Where do outside vendors fit in? Learn more about who should drive your CRM project.
Why getting executive stakeholders on board early is key
Without top management support, most CRM projects are destined to fail.
Your stakeholders are sales managers or other leaders who oversee regions, territories or divisions within the company. The stakeholders act as an extension of the CEO for CRM and assist in championing the value of CRM.
A common question I get from companies is how to get executive leaders on board after purchasing a CRM solution.
The simple answer: After the purchase is too late.
Leadership should be included in the CRM evaluation from day one. When executives are involved in selection, they will feel invested from day one and will have a better understanding of CRM’s potential to help the company achieve its goals.
One way to get and keep stakeholders on board with your project is to demonstrate how CRM is a revenue generator, not a cost. When implemented correctly, CRM can have a substantial impact on your top and bottom lines:
- Improved quote follow-up leading to increased sales
- Effectively share and leverage data company-wide
- Documented sales process for new and transitioning salespeople
Don’t forget about your super users
Your super users work with the CEO for CRM to provide feedback and guidance throughout the entire CRM journey. Through your super users, you gain valuable insights about how departments collaborate and work together.
Without their real-world insights, you can miss important opportunities or risk creating inefficiencies within various departments. Super users are representatives from key roles throughout the company who actively use the CRM systems in their work and may include:
- Sales managers
- Outside and inside sales
- Customer support representatives
- Marketing managers
- Data analysts
- Other C-level executives
In a perfect world, you would have two super users from each role, including a tenured employee and a fairly new employee.
Each individual brings a unique perspective and sees the role differently, which benefits a company looking to improve its processes.
The role of the naysayer
It never hurts to have a devil’s advocate on your team. Those members of your team who may be skeptical should be part of the conversation. It’s someone who may have tried CRM at your or another company and think it won’t work on this round, either. If you can get them onboard with CRM by the end of the initial implementation, you’re golden.
Can a CRM team get too big?
Absolutely. Even with large companies, 10-12 is a good number to be involved in the CRM selection and implementation journey. It’s wonderful when more want to be invested, but too many representatives can slow down progress or create confusion about goals.
Together, the CEO for CRM and their team of super users can develop a logical phased-in plan for CRM pre- and post-implementation.
The result? Through clear and focused collaboration, you can choose the right CRM design for your business, experience streamlined project execution and ensure effective onboarding of your CRM solution for long-term success.