The Pandemic for the most part is over, but there is no going back to "normal." Many elements of our lives have changed for ever. Some for the better, some for the worse. For example, how we form and maintain relationships with individuals and our communities of staff, partners and customers has fallen victim of The Pandemic. Digital communications and communities do not adequately replace thousands of years of human behaviour. It maybe efficient but it is not effective. It degrades our experiences, erodes trust, corrodes authenticity. According to HubSpot, sales email open rates are collapsing, down 40% and 65% of Google searches result in no click. Social channels are clogged with unwatchable, meaningless detritus. It should be entirely unsurprising that digital fatigue is everywhere.
But people crave community in both good times and bad.
More than ever, sellers must maintain deep and meaningful communications with their customers across the full lifecycle. Digital fatigue and fractured communities are making this harder and harder than ever.
There were several trends well underway before The Pandemic that have accelerated over the past couple of years.
Most notably is the inexorable rise of the "subscription economy" a term made popular by Zuora CEO, Tien Tzuo back in 2014. The business benefits for sellers in the form of recurring revenue are well documented. It has had significant implications for the way selling organisations treat and track the relationship with their customers. As well as literal subscriptions we may have to software, books, entertainment channels, there are other services, car leases spring to mind, that while technically not subscriptions for all intent and purposes act like them.
The old adage, "You can't outrun bad retention," rings louder than ever in the ears of CEOs and CROs around the world.
The importance of a flourishing relationship sits at the heart of the subscription economy. Nurturing and growing the relationships you have with your target audience and existing customers is of paramount importance and the customer lifecycle should be the golden thread running through your organisation around which sales, marketing and service teams must align and core processes must be built.
Purchasing complexity has increased notably over the past few years. The number of people involved in making a B2B purchase decision has steadily increased. Research now places it somewhere between 6-14 people depending on the complexity of the solution. The role of the go-to-market team is really helping customer's buy as much as it is selling your solution. The implications are significant. Do you know who the decision makers are? Are you clear on their specific role in the process? Do we have content that addresses their concerns? Have the sales team been coached to uncover the buyers and their needs?
Overcoming The challenges:
Digital fatigue
- When buyers look for solutions to the problems they have, they are engaging with suppliers later and later in the purchase process. Google research suggests buyers are 80% of the way through a purchase process before they want to engage with a salesperson. They are doing their own research. They rely on their own networks, asking for advice from peers and trusted advisors. Happy loyal customers are your best source of quality leads. In these times of extreme digital fatigue, wary buyers are refusing the attentions of marketers and sales people like never before.
- Invest in a Customer Advocacy Program. The value of an endorsement, freely given, by an existing customer to a prospect is priceless. Yes, this can happen organically without your intervention but a structured program should deliver greater and more consistent results.
- Reinvest in real thought leadership. Real means just that. It must be genuinely thoughtful, tackling the issues facing your industry and for the most part, written by your leaders (or at least on behalf of your leaders.) Buyers want to see your senior executives discussing the burning topics of the day, to see them leading from the front, showing empathy and understanding for the opportunities and challenges that might face them. Often this content revolves around upcoming potential disruption facing the sector. That might be regulatory, technological or economic. Some firms partner with authoritative brands such as management consultants like McKinsey or Deloitte or media companies well known in their space, for example the Financial Times of London for business or finance issues. Speaking in your authentic voice builds trust that your organisation would be a good partner, not just seller. Content must be unselfish, not self promotional, genuinely helpful and it should go without saying ungated. Buyers when they are ready will find you, but they need to know and trust you first and foremost.
- The power of story. Build a strategic narrative. Find your organisation's voice. Story activates, illustrates and illuminates your organisation's purpose. This is not your mission statement. A mission statement is a dry, boiled down, largely internal document. Your story breathes life into your organisation's purpose, its reason for being, it engages the heart as well as the head. As your organisation's purpose is intimately related to your values and culture this initiative should come from your senior leaders. But let's be clear, your narrative isn't about you. Place your customers at the centre of your story. They are the hero, struggling against adversity to beat seven bells out of the bad guys - in this case the challenges they're facing in their business. Your organisation is Yoda to their Luke Skywalker, the mentor, advisor, coach and then later, the supplier of light sabres - in other words your solution. Once you articulate your story it becomes a unifying message that your sales team, marketers, customer service executives, partners and by the way, your recruiters, should all use in their communications and can be shared through your usual distribution channels.
- The CRO or head of marketing and head of sales working together, should develop a clear positioning and messaging framework. Understand who are the buying roles and their degree of influence through the purchase process . Whether it's the CEO, CIO, CFO or perhaps it's good old Bob from accounting, while they might each share a generic goal in finding a solution, their specific goals and the current pain they are experiencing will be very different. Do you have a clear story and content that helps them move from stage to stage through their buying journey?
- Perhaps this may seem like a no brainer, but invest once more in non-digital experiences. Exhibitions, events, conferences or more intimate breakfasts or lunches. Invite interesting speakers talk on the topic du jour. Invite loyal customers and new prospects to sit next to each other at sports games or the opera. Do not underestimate people's desire to get back out there. Curate these occasions, at all costs resist the temptation to overtly promote yourselves and your solution. Your customers are not dumb, they understand the give and take of such occasions. Instead use the time to learn something about them, to express a genuine curiosity about them as individuals as well as their company.
Processes and Tools
- If you accept that the customer lifecycle is the golden thread that connects their experience of working with your organisation, it follows that aligning your processes and teams around that lifecycle must be an early priority. Clearly defining the handover points between marketing, sales, the service team and back to the renewal team is critical. Set service level agreements for these critical handover points. For example, how long from receiving a new customer's signature until onboarding is completed? How many qualified leads should marketing pass to sales each week, what is the definition of a qualified lead? Meet in small teams regularly to work on problems and kinks in the process.
- Collecting every interaction, outbound and inbound with everyone at the customer in a single central repository, your CRM, is becoming mandatory. All of these two-way discussions, interactions, resolutions, CSat, NPS surveys and so on need to be collected and tracked accurately and in a way that is easy for the whole team to access and to interpret. The impact of having this information in one place is hard to overstate. There is great power in having a single lake of data from which to run reports and analysis. Imagine being the account manager responsible for renewals without knowing the status of all the support tickets that the customer has raised.
In Conclusion
The challenge: The subscription economy requires sellers to maintain deep and meaningful communications with their customers across the full lifecycle. Digital fatigue and fractured communities are making this harder and harder than ever.
The solution: Start with a strong narrative tied to your organisations purpose. This will be build a powerful meaningful, authentic dialogue with the full cast of your customers' characters. Develop content that revolves around your 'hero' ie your customer. That illustrates your core purpose in action. Align your marketing, sales and service teams around that story so they can articulate that story as one. And vitally, record all interactions, both outbound and inbound, from stranger, to prospect, to loyal customer in a central place, your CRM.