Without a doubt, this downturned economy has been a struggle for most organizations. Layoffs, reorganizations and new executives seem to be the crutch du jour (perhaps ‘du ans’ is more fitting) to fix downward spiraling revenues. Add to that a layer of new(ish) customer communications and feedback via social media channels and you have yet another complexity to deal with. In the past customer feedback was contained to customer service or a customer satisfaction survey designed to hedge qualitative and quantitative feedback to guarantee an internal pat on the back. With unfettered social feedback, the organization emperor’s kimono is being opened and the proverbial band-aid is being ripped off.

Structured in a top-down hierarchical manner, organizations have positioned their products and services to take center stage. This familiar “command and control” structure is typically the wellspring of alienation between customer and company and often the cause of reduced revenue generation. The challenge of reorganizing is avoid playing musical chairs so that the last person sitting is not the new person reinventing the standard and comfortable hierarchal structure.

What is an organization to do then? Is it possible to design an new organization that reduces the friction between profit generation and customer satisfaction? Is it even feasible to center an organization around the customer? There is evidence that clearly it is achievable, but not without stress, focus, tension… and power withdrawal.

The question is can organizations handle short-term pain in order to achieve long-term gain?

Customer Think: You Can Sell Products—and Please Customers: An Interview With Jay Galbraith

“Bob Thompson: What kind of leader needs to be in charge of these types of shifts? I mean, we’re talking about either a business or a business unit that has decided it needs to make the shift to customer-centric strategy in organizations. You’ve heard a lot of the anecdotal stories about failures of CRM projects or what have you. You’ve mentioned HP as struggling with this idea in years gone by. So what kind of leader do you feel is required to make this work?

Jay Galbraith: It’s going to be one that has a great deal of strength, because they’re going to have to marry this back end and front end, the customer-centric and the product-centric part. And those are inherently tension-ridden relationships, so you’ve got to be good at managing conflict. You have to be good at getting a team of people around the table and getting to a decision. So if you’re someone who waffles, if you don’t like conflicts, you’re going to have a hard time moving toward customer-centricity.”

Harvard Business Review: Silo Busting: How to Execute on the Promise of Customer Focus

“…I’ve found that few companies are actually structured to deliver products and services in a synchronized way that’s attractive from a customer’s perspective. Individual units are historically focused on perfecting their products and processes, and give little thought to how their offerings might be even more valuable to the end user when paired with those of another unit. It’s not just that the status quo doesn’t reward collaborative behavior—although the right incentives are also critical. It’s that the connections literally aren’t in place.”

Business Courier: Reorganizing around customers can produce big gains

“Companies should begin moving from where they are now (typically all or almost all orientation around products or geographies) to these progressive models until they arrive at the right customer orientation level for their business. Most companies are too deeply entrenched in product- oriented models and need to move to the more customer orientation. Simply put, make the customer a larger part of your organizing model.”

Jones Lang LaSalle: Beyond Boundaries: Leveraging Partners to Maximize the Value Chain

“The elimination of inside/outside boundaries by an organization can improve value to customers, increase speed and flexibility and boost competitiveness in the unforgiving global economy. At the same time, greater interdependence with suppliers makes both open collaboration and appropriate oversight more important than ever before.”

“Leaders in corporate infrastructure services are being called to respond to these forces by:

• Understanding the business environment that creates change in the organization
• Knowing the organization’s overall business strategies and aligning service delivery with these objectives
• Increasing customer knowledge and intimacy
• Becoming a master integrator of the delivery supply chain
• Focusing on key strategic activities that make a difference, and partnering for the rest”

All Business: Handling reorganization: what to expect, what to avoid when moving little cogs in big corporate wheel.

“Companies always underestimate how difficult this process is largely because it means creating a customer-centric view,” Galbraith noted. “That is, if you are going to combine products and services for the benefit of the customer, you have to know a lot about who that customer is.”

“ ‘…It requires much more than bundling and cross-selling products,’  he said. It requires major organizational change, including, for example, a new structure, new management processes, new measurement systems, new talent and new reward systems. It also requires leadership that can interact with multiple product and customer unit managers as opposed to handling one business unit at a time. These are ‘tension-filled processes,’ according to Galbraith.”

[Image source: Jezebel]

It’s 2011, do you know where your social media strategy is?

As a marketer who has been in the social media game for a while now, I understand why companies struggle with social media. There is much misunderstanding between the concept and the tools—and the benefits of either. There is confusion as to why social media tools can’t be used just like e-mail, direct mail and advertising. There are also power struggles internally for who should own social media and who has control over what is for public consumption.

What’s a Marketer To Do?

That’s the question author and social media expert Paul Chaney discusses in his latest book, “The Digital Handshake: Seven Proven Strategies to Grow Your Business Using Social Media.” (Paul’s first book is “Realty Blogging: Build Your Brand and Out-Smart Your Competition.”)

The answer? Start a conversation. However, the smart thing to do before diving into any conversation is to understand the new rules of communication, why they matter, and the five trends turning the business world upside down.

• Consumer Skepticism
• Fragmented Media
• Loss of Control
• Niche Marketing
• Customers are in Control

Trust me. Your customers will thank you for taking the time to understand these tectonic shifts.

I get it, things have changed. Now what?

Great attitude! Now it’s time to roll up your sleeves and get to work. Lucky for you, Paul provides seven proven strategies to help you become successful with your social media strategy. Now, I know what you are thinking… Why can’t I just share my press release on Twitter and Facebook and call it a day? Well, I suppose you could, but I am not sure how much ROI you’ll get from it. And isn’t that what management is demanding from social media? (Psst! We all know that asking for ROI is secret code for “We don’t get this, so we’re going to challenge it.” Be smart and prove them wrong!) Ready?

• Business Blogging
• Social Networks
• Niche Online Communities
• Microblogging
• Video
• Podcasting
• PR 2.0
• RSS, Tagging, Bookmarking and more!

The Digital Handshake

All of these strategies mean nothing without a plan of action that includes listening, engaging and measuring. In that order, too.

I love that Paul positions listening as the new marketing. I couldn’t agree more! And marketers, I am sorry to say, but you aren’t very good at listening…only talking. Now is your chance to understand why listening before engaging will determine whether your social media plan will be successful or not.

You’ve met customers offline, right? What is the first thing you do? You shake their hand. Now you can do that digitally. We call it engaging. Paul offers tips for how to best engage in online conversation and his “table” metaphor is spot on and so are the tactics he shares for getting a seat at someone else’s table or setting a table of your own.

Finally, here’s where you get to show your management team just how smart you are. All of those digital handshakes are measureable. Paul shares a whole bunch of tools to help you along the way. Some are free and some are paid, but either way you’ll have more than enough to select from.

About Paul Chaney

I would be remiss if I did not share with you that Paul is a friend of mine and when reading his book, I heard his voice in my head. The topics he covers in this book have provided the two of us with hours of conversation and debate over the years whether it’s been face-to-face, on the phone or, yes, even digitally. What’s that mean for you? Well, my hope is that you will believe Paul is extremely passionate about social media. I hope you will become so as well once you finish The Digital Handshake.

Disclosure: I received a free copy of The Digital Handshake from Paul Chaney. This review is based on the contents of the book and my belief that marketers (and their management teams!) could really benefit from reading it.

[Image Source: odesk.com]

When is the last time you asked your boss, management, executive team or co-workers ‘why?’ But more importantly, why is asking ‘why’ in a business setting akin to being somewhat insubordinate?

Recently I wrote about why integrated marketing communications is failing in the business world and why social media won’t be the salvation most organizations are seeking. Why? Because there is much internal work still to be done in order to harness the value and full potential that social media offers in order to become fully customer-centric.

And often when I speak about becoming customer-centric I get two responses: ‘How can we do it?’ (Usually from those who respect and have relationships with their customers already.) or ‘It will never happen.’ (Usually from those who have their eye squarely on revenue generation.) My response? It is possible to be customer-centric and make money. That should be enough to satisfy both groups, hopefully.

However, until we all start asking why more frequently, we can’t possibly know how or where to get started or how to move beyond what we already know or are comfortable with. And both situations are limiting when it comes to finding out what we need to accomplish or fix in order to develop strong relationships—with customers, employees, and stakeholders—that allow for customers to live in the center of the organization. Asking the right why questions at the right time can make the difference between prosperity and scarcity.

Off the top of my head, here is a list of some “why” questions that executives, marketing management and support teams, and other departments should be asking:

• Why don’t we know what our ROI is?
• Why don’t we know how to determine ROI?
• Why isn’t my management team figuring out our ROI?
• Why do I know how to figure out ROI, but the management team doesn’t?
• Why doesn’t my team know the ROI of our yearly marketing budget?
• Why hasn’t the CMO shared a plan with us?
• Why doesn’t my team have a plan for each campaign?
• Why do I know how to write a plan?
• Why doesn’t my team know how to write a plan?
• Why don’t we have a CRM system?
• Why do we have a CRM system no one uses?
• Why doesn’t the entire company have access to the CRM system?
• Why do we use our CRM system just to capture contact information?
• Why don’t we know what our customers want if we have a CRM system?
• Why don’t we know how much each customer buys from us each year?
• Why do we market to all customers equally?
• Why do we create and market products and services our customers don’t want?
• Why don’t we have data that supports new product or service development?
• Why do we let sales drive product and service development?
• Why don’t we have market data?
• Why don’t we tap into our customers to determine new products and services?
• Why isn’t the marketing department allowed to talk to customers, but the PR department is?
• Why haven’t I worked with the customer service department?
• Why don’t I know the products and services my company makes inside and out?
• Why do our customers know our products and services better than the marketing, PR and branding teams?
• Why do I count on PR or branding for messaging?
• Why don’t we find out what messaging customers want to hear?
• Why doesn’t our messaging change when we know it isn’t resonating?
• Why do we care so much about lead generation?
• Why don’t we focus on marketing that allows the customers to pull us to them?
• Why do I protect my departmental turf and budget?
• Why do others protect their departmental turf and budget?
• Why do I know more about marketing and communications than my boss?
• Why does my boss know more about marketing and communications than me?
• Why do our customers use social media to complain about us?
• Why do our customers use social media to praise us?
• Why are we afraid of using social media?
• Why are we diving into social media without a plan?
• Why aren’t we integrating social media into other departments?
• Why are we using social media?
• What aren’t we using social media?
• Why does management do a yearly customer satisfaction survey?
• Why doesn’t management use the results of the customer satisfaction survey to better the company?
• Why don’t our customers know our management team?
• Why don’t our customers know each other?
• Why do we spend more in a marketing budget than a small nation spends in a year?
• Why don’t we have a bigger marketing budget?
• Why did half of the marketing department get let go in an economic downturn?
• Why doesn’t marketing get more respect?
• Why doesn’t the company have a culture that respects asking why?
• Why do I not think about marketing when I leave the office?
• Why do I always think about marketing?
• Why do I not think about how to do a better job?
• Why doesn’t the management team work towards putting customers first?
• Why don’t we have a plan for making customers happy and making money?
• Why can’t we survive a bad economy without layoffs?
• Why don’t we support a cause?
• Why don’t we give back to the industry?

Kudos if you’ve made it this far!

Is the organization you work for open to your asking why? What ‘why question’ would you add to the list? What ‘why question’ would you like management to ask of you? What ‘why question’ would you like to ask management?

There are a lot of marketers out there that understand that integrated marketing and communications (IMC) is a preferred way to do business because it is an outside-in approach. If an organization isn’t integrated, what are the best approaches to getting management buy-in? Anna Barcelos and I wanted to share nine key ways to provide management with the value of IMC.

Sales-Oriented Vs. Market-Oriented – Which Are You?

It’s often been said that the mindset of “If we build it, they will come” is not viable for long term business. To understand why, let’s look at the difference between a sales-oriented and market-oriented organization.

Sales-oriented organizations have a heavy reliance on promotional tactics to sell whatever products/services the organization has selected to produce. Sales teams, not marketers lead the pack and have the burden of performance (i.e. revenue generation).

In the short-run, markets can be created with aggressive campaigns and sales work; however, the lifetime value of a customer is minimal. The organization mindset is focused on ‘the next big thing,’ hungry and aggressive sales teams, and sales beating up marketing for not dishing up qualified leads or customers ready to spend.

Market-oriented organizations identify what markets need/want first and tailor their operations to deliver products/services that meet those demands as efficiently as possible. Within a market-oriented organization, marketing takes the lead not sales.

Because the market-oriented company has its complete focus on the customer, the end result is often brand loyalty, sales, and strong customer lifetime values.

Getting Management Buy-In

If you are in a sales-oriented organization, how then can you get management to understand the benefits of customer-focused integrated marketing and communications? Here are five areas to focus on:

1. Execute long-term customer acquisition programs across channels instead of short-term lead generation to feed the sales funnel. While the former may take a little longer, the end results produce longer term customers with much higher life-time values. Demonstrate this with metrics and show management. They are always interested in seeing results tied to revenue generation.
2. Emphasize that a customer for life is a much more cost-effective model versus solely focusing on new customer acquisition.
3. Communicate the benefits of how integrated marketing communications delivers a consistent message to both existing and prospective customers.
4. Involve key players from “silos” within the organization in planning process. If you can’t beat them— join them. Realistically, sales-oriented organizations will always have silos due to individual department goals/quotas.  If sales and marketing work together, both are vested in acquiring/retaining customers.
5. Build incentives around existing and new business initiatives to not only motivate sales, but customer service and marketing as well.

You would think that a market-oriented organization would have a leg-up on getting management buy-in, but a lot of times there are still silos and separate budgets in place that affect true IMC. But by demonstrating the value of IMC, chances are you’ll have an easier time convincing management of its inherent benefits. Here are four ways to show value:

1. Do an A/B test of an integrated campaign versus a non-integrated campaign (suggested by Valeria Maltoni, Conversation Agent) Testing is a risk-free, quick way to prove the value of IMC. Large companies shy away from radically changing their current marketing efforts. Testing gets them interested without any disruption in day to day. If tests delivers expected ROI, then scale.
2. Leverage/collect behavioral data and analytics for follow up IMC campaigns with existing customers and build profiles on potential untapped new markets. It’s astonishing how companies have amazing databases that they are not exploiting as much as they could.
3. Survey/talk to customers for the best insight on what works with them and what doesn’t. (“How can we be better?” “ Where do you want to find information?”) Management is always interested in seeing results of these efforts!
4. Maintain communication across all departments. Market-oriented organizations are more customer-centric than sales-oriented organizations. Goals are aligned across the organization from top to bottom. Everyone plays a part in the customer experience. IMC works well within these organizations, but communication is key.

Whether an organization is sales- or market-focused, and the latter may be more beneficial, the reality is that unless upper management encourages a customer-centric culture, self-contained silos and status quo will continue to be the norm.  The benefits of outside-in planning that IMC offers will bring you closer to the customer and social media has really helped put that into perspective.  The voice of the customer is louder than ever, which is forcing traditional organizations to rethink their marketing communications strategies and encouraging customer-centric organizations to develop deeper relationships with their customers.  Both take time, but small efforts across an entire organization will deliver what’s most important—a happy, loyal customer.

Share your expertise with us! Have you encouraged management to implement IMC? Have you broken down or bridged silos in your organization? What worked best? What didn’t work? What would you add here?

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