by twieberneit | Jan 26, 2022 | Blog, CRMKonvos |
One of today’s big business topics is robotic process automation. What is it? A boon or a thing? Where is the real value in applying RPA and how to do it right? So many questions that the #CRMKonvos team needed to ask Sebastian Eggert of SOGEDES. It is no secret that RPA has its roots in UI based test automation to conduct load and stress tests and screen scraping. It is also no secret that it is always better to use APIs than that. That would put RPA firmly into the category of dying animals or, in more technical terms, make it a bridge technology. But then, how about real life? Can one always do connect applications with APIs? How about empowering business units to get solutions faster than working with a continuously overburdened IT department? And: How about the risk of entrenching existing processes instead of entering the road to digital transformation, which is a business transformation? Is it reasonable to expect investments being made into RPA being turned over fast? After all, temporary solutions have the tendency to become quite permanent. And if it is a bridge technology: What is the future? Hint: Look into process mining and machine learning… Most important of all is the right approach for implementing RPA. Where to start, how to decide about good candidates for automation? Does it need a strategy? He answered them all! Watch the episode that will remain known as the “hot shit” show. Because RPA is quite...
by twieberneit | Jan 12, 2022 | Blog, CRMKonvos |
Three times is the charm. Our first attempt was disrupted by Texas getting off the (power) grid due to a winter storm, the second one due to Streamyard going offline (courtesy of a Google problem), now we finally made it happen and talked with an enterprise software user about sales operations. Based upon real life experience, how can sales ops be improved, how can it contribute to sales success? Does it need process, tools, or what? Well, the answer to that one is, of course, both. But what comes first and how to make sure that people love to use the resulting system? Our guest Thomas Verly, VP of Sales and Marketing at EagleBurgmann has quite some interesting answers. Also to the question whether Revenue Operations is really a thing. Is it new wine in an old bottle or rather old wine in a new bottle. Thomas has some truely interesting stories to tell that help us identifying what is really important for a sales organization, even if it is in a quite specific industry. At EagleBurgmann they identified the secret of what makes their sales reps use the system – and they have a truly astonishing adoption. Hint: It is not force but they managed to make the people want to use the system because it delivers value to them. How? No spoiler here besides: Don’t digitalise chaosSimple is beautifulHarmonisation is a good thingDon’t forget about change management Watch the episode. It is worthwhile. More than...
by twieberneit | Jan 4, 2022 | Blog, CRMKonvos |
Everybody is talking of “creating customer experiences” – even I, although I am convinced that any experienced is created by the person on the receiving side of an engagement. But then, how to formulate this in only a few words? Nevertheless, when it comes to engaging with customers or prospects, we are immediately also talking content, be it images, texts, videos, podcasts, 3D rendered objects, or whatever the future will bring us. We are also talking about more than just marketing processes, but also service- or employee-facing processes. Which brings us into the realms of knowledge management, product information management, web content management, enterprise content management and enterprise search. Or the question about how the same content can be used in different scenarios? How can it be found, so that it can be made available? Does it need a platform? What type of platform? Looking at individualised marketing campaigns that theoretically ask for individually tailored content. How much can this scale? Where is the limit? Spoiler here: Manpower to create the content … Still, how is a technology stack helping marketing, sales and service functions with prepared and personalised relevant information – that then also resonates? What is the role of “headless” in this whole picture? Is headless a thing at all? Shouldn’t be the content headless after all (which then solves the content problem across the metaverse – oops, now I used the buzzword)? Lot’s of unanswered and very interesting and important questions! This creates the perfect need to talk to someone who knows. So, we discussed with Dina Apostolou of Contentful how a content management system can be of help. And...
by twieberneit | Jan 3, 2022 | Analysis, Blog, CRMKonvos |
The new year just started, so it is the perfect time to look at some data. To keep you curious: There are some interesting data points. I looked at and reviewed the success of our CRMKonvos. We are streaming live on various channels, including my LinkedIn profile, several Facebook channels including mine, the one of Ralf Korb, Korb & Kollegen as well as Tante Emma 4.0 and occasionally Kompetenztraining Ralf Korb. Of course, we are on Twitter using @twieberneit and @loneRangerCRM. Last, but not least we stream to our YouTube channel CRMKonvos. We are live every Tuesday at 10 am PT / 1 pm ET / 7 pm CET. Why do I say that? Because we are serving an international audience and timing matters for live shows. On all of these channels the videos remain available for viewers who could not make it to the live episodes. Shameless plug: Please subscribe to our YouTube Channel! Streaming to Twitch doesn’t seem to be that successful for us. I think, this is due to being live once a week is not often enough to build an audience. And then Twitch is full of gamers, who might be less interested in the latest and greatest of CRM and CX, delivered via good discussions with our expert guests. A hard part is that we haven’t found a solution that gives us detailed statistics, like views over time, duration of the view, engagement, etc. across platforms. Means, getting this data it is all manual work. If there is anyone who has a solution for this: I am all game, let me know via the comments or ping me via my LinkedIn or Twitter profiles. So, I did the data collection and am now able to tell you the 5...
by twieberneit | Dec 28, 2021 | Blog, CRMKonvos |
Amazon is surely an example for a company that has the reputation for good CX. Where does it come from? After all, the site is ugly. Too much advertisement, too. But then Amazon has outstanding supply chain and logistics. Customers like having alternatives even when they buy habitually. Amazon was good at delivering in 2-days and forgiven for not doing so during the pandemic. So they established their reputation before disruption upset it. Amazon also focuses on consumer experience. Many other firms don’t manage their supply chains that far forward. We are discussing with Steve LeMay, Associate Professor of Marketing and Logistics at the University of West Florida, and Professor Emeritus of Marketing and Logistics at Mississippi State University. Steve has a long history in researching supply chain, supply chain ethics and circular closed-loop supply chains. And he is the person who knows Paul Greenberg longest – apart from Paul’s brother … This makes him the perfect guest to talk about the impact that supply chains have on CX, and how to make sure that they contribute to a good CX. Have there be learnings from the Covid crisis? Or from the 2021 blockage of the Suez Canal? Which ones? Are they being implemented? Are lean supply chains too lean? How to make them lean and resilient? What is the state of research? Steve shares a wealth of experience and examples in this episode, which make it well worth reviewing it. Enjoy the last CRMKonvo of the year 2021. CU again on the other side of New Year’s...
by twieberneit | Dec 21, 2021 | Blog, CRMKonvos |
The word is that it takes two to Tango. It turns out that sometimes it needs three! I will not spoil the excitement by naming who they are, though. Why do we have silos in enterprise software? How to remove them? Do they even need to be removed? Does throwing more software at a software problem help? Aren’t the problems a software problem after all? If more or different software helps, what type of software can or should be used? Or are corporate silos even a Wallstreet problem? Great questions and even better answers by Joshua Greenbaum in this #CRMKonvo. This one got even bigger than I expected. But then, Josh thinks in big lines. And he has wits, a lot of wits. He did not disappoint, really! Apart from a lot of knowledge, that is. Listen in to our CRMKonvo. I can also highly recommend to read Josh’s article “Death to all Silos, with Aphorisms”. It is worthwhile, promised! Death to All Silos, With...
