News Worth Sharing

Awesome News from AddressTwo Professor Pat Altvater of AFP Marketing Group

On May 21, 2012, BizTV Shows officially launches their second, and Indianapolis’s only, Internet TV Channel providing business and quality of life advice to area small to mid-sized business owners, in the form of quick tip video episodes on the website http://indybiztvshows.com.

“Indy BizTV Shows provides shows that educate, coach and motivate business owners,” said Pat Altvater of BizTV Shows.  “We’re also giving an elite network of local entrepreneurs an opportunity to showcase their expertise and extend their influence through their semi-monthly video shows featured on the website.”

The Indy BizTV Shows website will be updated daily with a new episode from one of the various local experts.  Each episode can be viewed in less than five minutes. To get all the latest updates about new episodes, new shows and/or new expert show hosts, visit our channel http://indybiztvshows.com or subscribe to the Indy BizTV Shows website RSS feed http://indybiztvshows.com/feed/, become a fan of our Facebook page, http://www.facebook.com/indybiztvshows, or follow us on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/biztvshows.

AddressTwo University Podcast

With Lisa Peskin of Business Development University

Tune in 4pm (E.S.T) Tuesday May 29th

U.AddressTwo.com

 

Lisa Peskin

CEO Business Development University

 Training, Coaching and Consulting

Lisa Peskin has more than 25 years experience in sales performance and management. Throughout her career, she has developed an award-winning reputation as a motivational and results-oriented sales professional. After a successful career as Vice President of Sales for Automatic Data Processing (ADP), running a 40 man sales force, Lisa launched her own sales training, consulting and coaching business in 2003.  Since then, Lisa has helped thousands of sales professionals and sales managers increase their sales through training, just in time support and programs designed to maximize opportunities and drive ROI.

Lisa is currently CEO of Business Development University.  BDU offers a comprehensive soup to nuts approach to sales and business development. BDU helps  individuals, sales teams and companies identify and research their ideal prospects, connect with their prospects without traditional cold calling, track and measure their successes, get more appointments and close more deals.

Lisa received a Bachelor's degree in Psychology from Pennsylvania State University and an MBA in Marketing from Temple University. Lisa resides in Upper Dublin, PA and is married with two children.

Breaking Down CRM: "Management"

What makes up CRM?  Simple: Customers, Relationships, and the Management Thereof.  In this three-part series, we looking at each term to better understand what a CRM system is and what it can do for you.

Today, let's look at the final term: "Management."

As individuals, we have many relationships that we do not often think about "managing" in any structured sense.  But, that is because we are not seeking the same outcome from every relationship, and we do not have success metrics and goals for how well we do with that process.  In business, however, we do.  And moreover, we often need more relationships than any one human can maintain naturally.  So, naturally, we rely on technology like CRM to manage it all.

Managing business relationships begins with defining how we want relationships to progress.  We cannot begin to manage a process until we have defined it.  How do strangers learn about us?  How do prospects experience our value?  How do leads come to buy our product?  How to customers refer us future customers?  These are all aspects of a relationship that must be defined before they can be managed. 

But once they are defined, management is not a passive tracking or monitoring, it's the act of progressing relationships through the defined processes.  Managing customer relationships using CRM software can be scheduled, held accountable, and even automated in many cases. 

You cannot manage what you cannot define.  The first step in managing customer relationships is to define how they are expected to progress.  But the most effective form of management will automate as many actions as possible so that the human interactions required can be most effective and efficient. 

Without the "M" a CRM is reduced to little more than an archive.  Management is the crucial component that makes CRM an essential tool to any small business.

AddressTwo University Podcast

With Dr. Kevin Kragenbrink of Estrada Strategies

Tune in 4pm (E.S.T) Tuesday 22nd

U.AddressTwo.com

Dr. Kevin Kragenbrink is an entrepreneur, a Business Coach, an Inspirational Speaker a Small Business and Leadership Expert, a teacher, and an author.  The common threads that hold all of these roles together are his passions for creating successful businesses and for working with the people who start and run those businesses.

A serial entrepreneur with 7 business startups to his credit, Dr. Kragenbrink is currently a partner in Estrada Strategies, a business coaching franchise started in 2004.  He is also the owner of Estrada Strategies franchise offices in Knoxville, TN and Tampa, FL where he provides coaching, training, leadership development and strategic planning services to other successful business owners and executives.  His record of personal success is matched by his passion to contribute to the success of the business owners and executives he serves.
  

Breaking Down CRM: "Relationship"

What makes a CRM?  Simple: Customers, Relationships, and the Management Thereof.  In this three-part series, we are taking a detailed look at each term to better understand what a CRM system is and what it can do for your business.

Today, let's look at "Relationship."

The term relationship is one that we use so often in our personal lives that it seems almost impersonal to attempt a rigid definition of it for business purposes.  Not only so, but relying on a computer system to plan, script, and automate a relationship probably seems even more impersonal.  But in business, every process must be scalable and repeatable, especially the process of building customers.  So, a CRM software is not only wise, it's often necessary.  But just what is it that we're managing?  What is a relationship?

To start, relationships entail things we know.  For sure, relationships are much more than facts we know about a person, but they are not less than those facts.  My relationship with my wife is much more than knowing her birthday, eye color, favorite foods, and her preference in gifts.  But if I did not know this information, deepening the relationship would be difficult, if not impossible.  The first thing that a CRM must do to manage a relationship is store and recall pertinent details.

But we can know facts and figures about complete strangers.  A relationship, by definition, takes on a much more dynamic nature.  There is interaction, messages back and forth, conversations and discoveries that build the relationship over time.  In a good relationship, my interaction today will be impacted by what I've learned over the interactions in the past.  If I do not adapt my own behavior in the relationship based on what I've learned previously, then I am a bad friend (or vendor, or client, or what-have-you).

Lastly, relationships ultimately will entail commitments between parties.  When we say that we are managing relationships with customers, we are not only storing facts, figures, and a log of historical interactions for reference.  We are using the system to hold us accountable to commitments made and future interactions.  Relationships are fluid and must be maintained, not merely archived.

Your CRM must be able to not only archive, but also drive the relationship forward. 

Keeping Customers Happy

AddressTwo University Podcast 

with Scott Ginsberg of Hello My Name is Scott

Tune in 4pm (E.S.T) Tuesday 15th

U.AddressTwo.com

 

 

Scott Ginsberg is an author, speaker, consultant, mentor, publisher, award-winning blogger & one smoking hot piece of brain candy. He's done 600+ programs worldwide on approachability, identity, execution and stick-to-itiveness. He also wears a nametag 24-7. Even to bed.

Breaking Down CRM: "Customers"

What makes a CRM?  Simple: Customers, Relationships, and the Management Thereof.  In this three-part series, we are going to take a detailed look at each term to better understand what a CRM system is and what it can do for you.

Today, let's look at "Customer."

If you took a good look at anyone's CRM database, you might be surprised that it chronicles data on far more than merely the company's existing customers.  It may contain leads and prospects--those whom we hope to become a customer some day.  Just like any relationship in life, customer relationships began long before they became customers.  We each had relationships with our friends long before we may have counted them a friend.  They could have been strangers in our building, attendees at the same church, or even family members.

So, when it comes to relationship management, we have to adopt a broad definition of the word "customer" if the exercise is ever to grow our businesses.  But the scope of the term "customer" often extends even beyond prospects and leads.

Managing relationships with customers entails relationships even with people who will never become a customer, and were never intended to.  For example, in any CRM database we might find vendors.  VRM (Vendor Relationship Management) is a practice all to itself, but often the relationship a business maintains with it's vendors, if well-managed, can lead to new customers.  A vendor relationship is perhaps one of the most common examples of a "Strategic Relationship."

Our CRM database helps us to manage relationships with members of the media, government offices, bankers, and even some competitors -- none of whom we would ever pursue as a customer.  But, all of whom have the propensity to lead us into new relationships with would-be customers. 

When we speak of "Customers" in business relationship management, we should be careful to consider all the relationships that, either directly or indirectly, impact a customer relationship.