Dave Cain: Welcome to unsuitable on Rea Radio the award-winning financial services and business advisory podcast that challenges your old school business practices and the traditional business suit culture. Our guests are industry professionals and experts who will challenge you to think beyond the suit and tie while offering you meaningful, modern solutions to help enhance your company’s growth. I’m your host, Dave Cain. We talk about the importance of relationships a lot on this podcast from forming strategic relationships to maintaining positive relationships with our customers and clients and everything in between. Ours is a society that values interaction. Past episodes and personal experience have also taught us that relationship-building can be a difficult and drawn-out process.
But in the age of data-driven innovation, we now know that this doesn’t have to be the case. On today’s episode of unsuitable, we’ll learn more about customer relationship management system and how companies are using CRM to develop more meaningful relationships with their customers while becoming more effective as an organization. Mike Moran, co-founder and president of Affiliated Resource Group, an IT implementation and professional services firm in Columbus, Ohio, will join us on this episode of unsuitable to talk about what a CRM solution is, how business owners can use it to help achieve their organizational goals and how it can promote greater efficiency and collaboration throughout the business. Welcome to unsuitable, Mike.
Mike Moran: Well, thank you for having me, Dave. I greatly appreciate the opportunity to come and chat with you and learn a little bit about the podcast. I’ve spent some time seeing it and I know that you are award-winning, because last year at the end of the year Business First gave you some recognition for that. So, I give you a tip of the hat for that, and I’m glad I’m here.
Dave Cain: Well, perfect. We’re looking forward to the next few minutes and I apologize for that long drawn-out introduction, but we had to do it because …
Mike Moran: Wow.
Dave Cain: … you’re famous.
Mike Moran: Okay.
Dave Cain: Give us maybe an elevator speech about the company, Affiliated Resource Group. You’re an entrepreneur. We need to hear about the company.
Mike Moran: Sure. Well, Affiliated helps our clients. What we really focus on, using technology solutions, building out systems, if you will, that help them improve their operational efficiency, help them drive increases in customer loyalty. And really helps them improve their profitable revenue. I mean, in a nutshell, that’s what we do.
Dave Cain: Where are your customers located? Are they all over the United States?
Mike Moran: We have kind of two core parts of our business. We have an IT infrastructure management practice that really focuses in central Ohio. Then we have our CRM practice that really works nationwide. We work with a number of what I’ll call upper-small business and mid-market companies, helping them implement systems based on customer relationship management solutions that will allow them to accomplish their business goals. Kind of them align their IT with their business goals to make that asset more productive.
Dave Cain: You writing off all those travel expenses as you travel across United States?
Mike Moran: Depends on where I go.
Dave Cain: You ever sneak in a nice meal or two?
Mike Moran: Dave.
Dave Cain: Are you a football fan? We got to talk about football.
Mike Moran: I thought we were here to talk about CRM.
Dave Cain: We will. We’ll get there eventually. The audience has to get to know you. That’s Podcast 101.
Mike Moran: Outstanding. Well, I am who I am, so yes. I love college football.
Dave Cain: You root for the Buckeyes?
Mike Moran: On certain Saturdays.
Dave Cain: And which Saturdays would you not root for the Buckeyes?
Mike Moran: Every Saturday in the fall when they’re playing football.
Dave Cain: It’s an inside joke for the audience.
Mike Moran: Thank you, Dave.
Dave Cain: We’ll let that go, but it’s bad for business if you would disclose …
Mike Moran: Exactly.
Dave Cain: We got to keep it …
Mike Moran: Exactly.
Dave Cain: Mike, you sent me an article — how to optimize CRM teamwork and collaboration — and it was a white paper you wrote back in November of 2016. I thought it was an excellent article.
Mike Moran: Oh thanks.
Dave Cain: We’ll talk about that a little bit. I think maybe our audience … We may want to get that out to them. I think it’s a really good outline. What we want to talk about, the first thing, is the overall value of a CRM solution to help organizations achieve their goals.
Mike Moran: I appreciate that. Thank you. That document is really part of a series of some blogs and some LinkedIn posts that we looked at as I looked at spending more and more time with our CRM customers. It was really kind of understanding what is it they’re looking to do. Traditionally, people looked at CRM systems as a contact management tool or they looked at it as, “Well, it’s a sales force automation function and we’ve now got an administrative tool. We’ve gotta enter a buncha stuff in and that’s where it goes.” Today though, there’s so much more and we look at what the value those thing those provide to organizations is really … It’s kind of a complex multi-level scenario.
The key I think to me is it helps provide visibility. That visibility is anyone in the organization that’s using the system now has the ability to see what’s going on with our end users, what’s coming, going on with. Depending on what industry you’re in, you may call them different than customers. I mean, we have clients that are in the healthcare business, that are in professional services. Obviously, the healthcare business, they call them patients. In the professional services business it’s clients. In the traditional industrial group, they call them customers. We have some business in government services and they obviously call them constituents. So, it’s really a multi-faceted capability, but it’s that ability to see what’s going on.
If I’m in sales and I go out on a sales call, it would be nice if I had the visibility to see all of contact that we had had with this entity, this individual or this organization so that I’m aware of it. If I’m in customer service, it’s sure nice to see what’s going on because Lord knows if there’s a big opportunity, if there’s a key issue in a healthcare situation, if I have the authority to see this, if there was something that affects the patient or they’re coming in, it’s nice to know that so that I can refer to that. It makes me as an individual see more on top of things and understanding who that entity is, that customer is, if you will, and I’ll use that loosely going forward.
It’s also me as an organization. I can get a view of what’s going on with people in our company and how we’re interacting with that group. I think the other piece of it is having that visibility gives you a lot of efficiency. It helps you improve your productivity. The old standard was is that, “Oh, I’ve got this sales force automation tool. I gotta enter all my crap.” Well, with today’s technology, you have talked to text functions, so that when you finish a meeting instead of having to take notes and then going back to your hotel or going back to your office and type those into the system, you can hit a button on your phone. Your CRM system’s already there. Hit a button. Do talk-to-text and it’s there. Your note is there.
It’s in the system. The other piece of that goes to the integration point is that it helps the other departments see what’s going on so that we’re not double-dipping or I’m not calling you, Dave, to say, “Hey, what’s going on with this account? I’ve gotta deal with something or I’m waiting for you to get me … ” With the CRM, if we’re using it effectively, I can see what you’re doing and I don’t have to waste a whole lot of time.
Dave Cain: One of the things … And you hit it perfectly. My fear of CRM, like you said, it’s a sales tool. Just a sales tool and it’s high maintenance and it’s anything but … And in fact, what I think I hear you saying is really it’s more than a sales tool. It’s a customer service tool firm-wide, company-wide, no matter how many locations you would have. It could be a valuable tool.
Mike Moran: And don’t discount the fact that it also can help significantly improve productivity. For example, let’s use your business. When you engage with a new client, you have a variety of different pieces of paper and documents that they have to sign from an engagement letter to a variety of different things. Using your CRM system, you can automate a fair amount of that so that not only can it be taken care of in a proactive manner where it’s sent out to the customer, the client, if you will. When they respond back, it could then go through a workflow scenario that takes it through administrative. It takes it through leadership.
It takes it through all of the various facets of your business so that you are in a position that it’s walked through where it might’ve been done manually before. In this case, it can be done so that it can speed things up. We had a customer a few years ago that worked with us that they were in a fairly administrative, intensive role and it would take them 21 days from the time they signed up a new customer until they could actually start generating revenue. In addition to helping them improve a number of their processes, we looked at this workflow and said, “Hey, how can we reduce this?” We got it down to … It’s not a standard three days to get them done.
They have a number of approvals. They have a number of financial responsibilities that have to be validated, but all of that’s done in three days with automation and using workflows in their CRM system.
Dave Cain: So, you put the fear to rest, “I don’t have to manually enter a lot of stuff. I can touch the text”?
Mike Moran: That’s one way. I mean, the other side of the coin is that when you look at the advance products, they have complete integration with … You use Outlook for your email, so they have a complete integration with that. So, for example, I am not a technical person. I am a business person. In fact, the people in my company would laugh if they had me to say that I was a technologist because I’m far from that. At the same point in time, it’s very easy for me to track all of my emails, to track all of my calendar appointments right there in the CRM system. It’s two clicks and it’s very simple. I use my standard Outlook scenario as the basis for my CRM solution.
Now, other companies, CRM products don’t necessarily have that, but the one that we use is very clean in terms of where that goes and that makes life even easier. And again, the big advantage is that tracking of that email in my Outlook system, when someone else is the CRM system looking at that entity, that customer, if you will, that account, they can see all of that information tracked. If I’m assigning a task to one of my staff, I can very easily make sure that it’s there and in their activities in their dashboard in their Outlook. That activity is right there and we can see it.
Dave Cain: You talked about in your article or your blog, using CRM as a collaboration tool. Can you expand on that comment?
Mike Moran: Sure. Obviously, it helps between the organization and your prospect and customer. If I’m going out on a sales call or if I’m going out on an account call to having that knowledge of what’s been going on, what’s involved? Have they had any challenges from a customer service perspective? What’s the update on our order status? What’s the update on what we’ve quoted? How are things in general? How’s their financial situation? Are they on credit hold? Knowing all of that information before I walk in the door helps me be better prepared to help what goes on. Then while I’m sitting there, if the person I’m meeting with has a question about something, instead of saying, “Well, Dave, let me get back to you on that,” I might be able to go right into the system fairly quickly.
I might be able to find the appropriate information and say, “Dave, I’ve just found this article. I’m gonna email this to you from our knowledge base and you’ll be able to help,” or, “Hey, I’ve just taken a look here at the order status and you’ve got something that’s going to be shipped tomorrow,” right there from my CRM system. So, from that end, that’s one way to help in that collaboration with the customer. When you look at the idea of marketing and sales, the age old scenario of sales people don’t understand marketing and marketing people are frustrated with sales folks, a lot of that really comes back to the idea of they’re not working together.
And being able to have a situation where if I am updating my system, now marketing can pull the right people and send the right messages to those folks and guess what? Maybe a couple times a month they may call and say, “Hey, buddy. I saw a note from you and I’d like to talk to you about something,” whereas if I’m not entering that information, I’m not updating that stuff, it never comes to me and the gal sit next to me is getting all the extra business and I’m there busting my hump and I’m not getting anything. That’s part of that scenario. The other side of the coin for marketing is, having that information helps them be in a position to give better messages in terms of what goes on.
We have customers who use their CRM system to report on warranty information, to report on recalls or to be following up with people that say, “Hey, we know that you’re using this part of our business. By the way, here’s another solution.” Many of those things are automated so it’s not having to go through the old-fashioned way and I have to go through the old accounting or ERP system. I got to pull a list. I got to move it into a spreadsheet. I then got to create this, try and merge it up with Word and then go to Constant Contact and then I try and send it out. Boom. This stuff can be automated and set up and work so much easier for people in terms of where that goes.
Dave Cain: With the technology the way it is today, can I assume that I can reach a CRM through my phone?
Mike Moran: Yes. Through your phone, through your iPad, through your workstation.
Dave Cain: So, if we’re out networking and I want to make a note to put into your account or we talked about something, I can just head over to the corner and put it in?
Mike Moran: Yes, you could, very easily.
Dave Cain: So, collaboration among not only your team is big between leadership and the staff and certainly the customer service, collaboration’s huge.
Mike Moran: Yeah, just a quick side of that. People look at … Well, traditionally, they have a sales meeting. I can’t tell you how many times we’ve worked with folks and over the years. I mean, I had many friends who were in sales. Oh, the dreaded sales meeting where we sit down and everybody in the group, there might be five, six or 10. We put up all of our opportunities on the wall and we’ve got to talk through each and every one of them. Well, in all honesty, that’s kind of waste the time today. The advantage to that is, is that I’d much rather a sales team spend that time mentoring and talking about, “Hey, here’s a strategy to help get more. Here’s an opportunity to see that.
Why do I say that is because if I have all of my opportunities in a system and I can see those on a dashboard as a sales leader, I can easily look at a list of those and determine, “Here’s one. Here’s an account that doesn’t have a follow-up date. I need to ping my rep and ask for where that is.” I can do that at 10 o’clock on a Sunday night versus in a call that’s wasting valuables either customer-facing time, or more importantly, opportunities to mentor those people. Another situation is, is that I’m looking at I’m looking at, you want to have a validation of your pipeline not because, “Oh, it’s at … ” But it’s other people in the companies rely on that.
Finance is relying on that because they want to make sure that the business is there to do the cash flow. Production is interested in that. Whether you’re in distribution or you’re in manufacturing, they’re very interested in understand how accurate the pipeline is because they have demand, responsibilities for production and ordering and all of those things. So, it really is a big cycle and it is important to collaborate. My point though is as a sales manager, I’m looking at this, and I’m in a position where I can come back and say, “Well, I have an opportunity here, a sales deal, if you will, and my rep saying that it’s going to close next week, but we haven’t quoted it yet. And I know our quoting process takes two weeks. How in the world is it gonna close that? What’s the accurate scenario?”
I look at the opportunity and they’re saying that it’s going to close next week. And the decision process, which we’ve documented says that it has to go to the board. The board doesn’t meet again till the middle of June. I know it’s not going to close so I can send in a scenario to the rep and say, “Hey, can you update this for me? Something doesn’t jive.” The value proposition there is, is that as a rep, I know my manager’s looking over my shoulder. As a leader or manager, if you will, I can help them focus on that, but I can also talk to them about what are some of the strategies to help move some of this forward in terms of where it goes.
Dave Cain: So, there’s some planning and accountability tools built in to this CRM?
Mike Moran: Very much so.
Dave Cain: My first thought as I begin to look at some CRMs years ago is that it seem like it was just a product. After talking to you and reading some of your blogs, it’s really a system. It’s an operating system.
Mike Moran: It really is. I mean, I kind of define a system as people, process and technology. You need all three to be successful. To me, a CRM solution is really part of that. I think the key is you do have to have some planning and execution up front to get it done. So many companies just think, “Oh well, you know, if I buy this, it’s not that big a deal. Everybody says I can figure it in seven swatches.” No, that’s not necessarily the case. What are we trying to get out of it? How is this going to solve a business goal? How are we getting it aligned? The second part is, is that it does require commitment from everybody. Part of that commitment is, is that as a leadership, well, I wrote the check. Okay. That’s part of the commitment.
It’s getting involved and asking questions and actually then once it’s live, looking at it and doing some of the things that I talked about, “Hey, I saw you close this,” or, “Hey, this.” From the staff’s perspective, it’s also part of the job of the company, is helping the people that are going to use this system on a day-to-day, understand what’s in it for me. How is this going to help me do better? You heard me talk about that idea if I’m part of the sales team and I enter stuff, I know that marketing can do better job of outreach and they can help me maybe make a couple of calls, extra calls every month that I wouldn’t be able to do.
And oh, by the way, when somebody calls me then, hey, that’s a win. Because if they’re calling about something, they’re sure heck of a lot more interested than if I’ve got to pick up the phone and make a cold call or if I’ve got to knock on someone’s door and they may or may not be interested in something. Then I think really the third thing is, is that as a company, you really do have to look at this as something that’s an ongoing situation. It’s not an event that it’s once and done. It’s a situation where you’re really looking at an opportunity to say, “Hey, I’m gonna continue invest in this. I’m gonna continue to invest in this why?” Well, because if you’re a 25 or a 30 million dollar company and you want to grow 10% every year, that’s two and a half to three million dollars.
If you look at what your margin is, that could be … Depending on where you are … 10 to 20%. Some guys’ is a little smaller, but 10 to 20% of your margin … Hey, is it worth investing 20 to $30,000 to help make sure that my staff has the knowledge and the tools to make things better? There’s a lot of other folks. I’ll give you this example. I think this very important. We had a customer a number of years ago that basically had an inside and an outside sales staff. They took those folks and they implemented the system and it was working well. Then they had a situation where they had a couple of people leave the business and the outside sales rep.
They chose not to replace them because from their perspective, they had enough communication and things that their inside team they felt could handle it. They had a number of their customers came back and said, “Wow. I have gotten more communications from you since the change than in the three years that the person was in the field.” The person in the field was pretty successful. So, I think that that’s another opportunity in terms of, how can I look at this to help me again continue to align so that I’m with my business goals?
Dave Cain: This could go … A CRM could be built for just about any industry?
Mike Moran: Yeah. We have nonprofits that we’ve worked with. There’s an organization that does the carbon credit business. We helped put that together. They run one of those markets. Obviously, as I said, we’ve got some people in healthcare, manufacturing, distribution, professional services. We done a number of things with CRM that’s … And sometimes I scratch my head and go, “Wow, it’s pretty amazing how my team has been able to do things and I don’t take any credit for their work.” They’re pretty good guys and gals. What they do is … It’s pretty impressive.
Dave Cain: Let’s close up with … I’m a pretty impatient person. When this goes in, what should my expectation be? How long does it take to get a CRM fully operational?
Mike Moran: That’s a very good question. It really depends on …
Dave Cain: That’s why I ask it. That’s why I’m in this chair.
Mike Moran: Great.
Dave Cain: That’s why they pay me the big money to do this.
Mike Moran: Oh Dave, you are crazy. The real value I think is twofold. Again, it goes back to that planning, what is the goal that you’re trying to achieve with the system? We had CRM systems that can be implemented as fast as 60 days. We’ve had ones that have taken a year to get done. It depends on what the customers’ expectations and what their desired business outcome is. The other piece of that is once it goes live, and I think this is very important. People that sell systems are very big on selling that concept of, “Oh, you’re gonna see great improvements in productivity.” And in reality, you can, but anytime you implement something new, a new process, a new system, that first 30 or 60 days, it is going to be a learning experience.
It is going to take a little longer. You may find that, well, it’s not as … This is part of that whole idea of how the company has to help you understand, yes, you’re learning a new system. It will get better. It will help you be more efficient. I’m very comfortable with the idea when I come in in the morning, I use the system to tell me what I need to do. I have my activities. I bring up my dashboard and there are the things I know I need to get done today. I used to have that. I used to keep it on a pad of paper. I know what’s there. Oh, by the way, I’ve got my staff is asking me to call different people, some of which I’ve met, some of which I haven’t.
I can click on that information, and in literally five minutes, I can see all that I need to see about that account, that individual, that opportunity and I’m prepared to make a call and at least apparently appear like I’m an informed person.
Dave Cain: So, I have to get rid of my sticky notes that are on the side of my computer now?
Mike Moran: Yeah, especially the ones with your IDs and passwords.
Dave Cain: Our guest today has been Mike Moran with Affiliated Resource Group, talking to us about the overall value of a CRM, using CRM as a collaboration tool and CRM as an operating system and using patience to implement. Again, Mike, thanks again for joining us unsuitable today. Great insight on a very trendy topic today. If you have any questions about CRM or would like to learn about this solution, email us at podcast@reacpa.com. You can also get additional resources on our website at www.reacpa.com/podcast. Have you checked out the Rea & Associates YouTube page lately? If not, head on over there and check out the full length episodes of our show. As always, don’t forget to subscribe to unsuitable on iTunes. Until next time, I’m Dave Cain encouraging you to loosen up your tie and think outside the box.