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The Impact of Marketing Automation and Salesforce Automation on CRM
73 Plays6 years ago
This week on The B2B Mix Show, we speak with Pete Gillett of Zuant about the impact of marketing automation and salesforce automation on CRM. If you deal with or depend on one or all of these systems, you don’t want to miss this episode.
During our conversation, Pete touches on the following issues:
- How tech stack purchase decisions shouldn’t be made in a vacuum or siloed by department
- Whether or not companies are best-served by vendors that create integrated suites of all three platforms
- The benefits that come with integrated platforms from the standpoint of productivity and efficiency gains
- The importance of systems integration and data harmonization when it comes to compliance with privacy legislation
- And more
Want to connect with Pete online?
Email: pete@zuant.com
Twitter: @gillettPeter
Twitter: @ZuantApp
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/Peter-gillett-673a0a5/
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Transcript
Introduction and Episode Milestone
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to the B2B Mix Show with Elena and Stacey. Each week, we'll bring you ideas that you can implement in your own marketing strategy. We'll share what we know and advice from industry experts who will join us from time to time here on the show. Are you ready to mix it up? Let's get started.
00:00:18
Speaker
Hi, everyone. I'm Stacey Jackson. And I'm Elena Jackson. We are the co-founders of Jackson Marketing. And in case you still haven't heard, we are also sisters. We're bringing you episode 30 of the B2B Mix Show. Stacey, what's the topic of today's episode?
Importance of Automation Integration
00:00:34
Speaker
Today we're talking about something that's really important for companies to pay attention to however elena and i have both seen that not everybody does it's about the impact of marketing automation and sales force automation on crm and this isn't just a. Conversation about technology and how systems affect one another is really bigger than that.
00:00:54
Speaker
If these three pieces of your tech stack aren't working together, you've got data issues, sales and marketing efficiency and productivity issues, and you might even be hampering or even jeopardizing customer experience and leaving your company open to privacy law infringement and spam non-compliance. So this is a really important topic and we've brought in an expert to discuss it
Introducing Pete Gillette
00:01:17
Speaker
with us. His name is Pete Gillette and he is the CEO of Zuant. Alina, why don't you introduce Pete to our listeners?
00:01:24
Speaker
Absolutely, and an expert he is, which you're going to find out why. Pete Gillette is CEO of Zuant, where he's responsible for driving product development and client rollouts of the company's award-winning mobile lead capture app across US corporations. He is also CEO of MarketPoint Recall, a global recall and crisis management company.
00:01:44
Speaker
A pioneer in database marketing since the late 1970s, Pete is a serial entrepreneur. He created the world's first web-based CRM system funded by Lucent Technologies in the 1990s. In 2010, Pete launched the first CRM applications for the iPad, and CRM lead generation and follow-up are still in the focus of Zuom and its network, Nacent, call centers around the globe.
00:02:10
Speaker
In 2017, he was voted one of the 40 most inspiring people in sales lead management by his peers. With four decades of experience in marketing and sales, Pete is highly sought after thought leader on hot button topics like mobile and GDPR. He writes a regular monthly column series for Martek series where he explores what's new in marketing and sales from a global perspective.
00:02:34
Speaker
Today's Zuant and MarketPoint are Pete's sole focus, but he is as excited as ever about innovation as more and more new technologies enable highly visual and cost-effective versions of the original database marketing concept to be offered to world-leading global companies. Pete, welcome to the B2B mix show. We're excited to have you. Yes, thank you. What an introduction.
00:02:59
Speaker
So, anything else you'd like to share with us, Pete, about your background or the companies you work with? I don't think so. I think you've covered the whole thing. I can retire now, happily. All right, we'll wrap it up. That was a great podcast, guys. Great. There we go.
Defining CRM and Automation Systems
00:03:15
Speaker
So Pete, before we start talking about the impact of marketing automation and Salesforce automation on CRM, maybe we should start with a few general definitions just to ensure all the listeners are on the same page as us. So could you just tell us your definition for all three of these pieces of the tech stack?
00:03:32
Speaker
I think the core ingredients, obviously, the CRM side, customer relationship management, I come from a database marketing background. And that term seems sort of faded away in the 90s, early noughties and replaced by CRM customer relationship management, which doesn't really do a good enough job, does it? Because that's
00:03:52
Speaker
really to include also it should be PRM prospect relationship management and suspects and so on. So it's all of those contacts with the outside world. Salesforce automation then is
00:04:07
Speaker
Not a robot salesforce yet, even though AI is going to have a go at doing that in the future, but it's about providing productivity tools to really focus the attention of sales guys on the right prospects and customers and help them along the way. Whereas marketing automation is, of course, managing content and distributing information to the right people within your CRM
Challenges of Siloed Tech Stacks
00:04:36
Speaker
database.
00:04:36
Speaker
And we know that in an ideal world, all of these systems should work together, right? So how are
00:04:44
Speaker
There are always examples where companies are siloed in their departments and different decision makers are making purchase decisions and they're getting a sales tool or they're getting a marketing technology and all their tech stack is done separately without consideration for all the different areas and finding out they're going to play nicely. So how should companies approach this type of decision making?
00:05:10
Speaker
Well, I mean, this is really the big subject and it has been the big subject for the last two decades because you go back to the
00:05:21
Speaker
the late 90s and the market was dominated by this new emerging Siebel company that had a larger market share that salesforce.com does now. Their mission really was to have everything all on the one mini computer based system and then sort of taking over from the old IBM days. But since then, so many other systems have emerged that are so good within their own niche, within that
00:05:50
Speaker
siloed area that companies have wanted to use those new systems in that area. We've lost that integration.
Benefits of CRM Integration
00:05:58
Speaker
I was chatting to a friend of mine, Jim Dickey, the other day from Sales Mastery, and he had this good comment about this. It's quite timely. We're talking about that list today. You wouldn't buy a new Tesla Model 3 and expect it to be delivered on the drive with the separate
00:06:15
Speaker
drivetrain and interior fittings and panels and so on and expect you to go ahead and use the product unless you are a real DIY expert. It is really incredible that
00:06:30
Speaker
We go to CRM conferences even today and the big subject is integration and the larger the company, the harder it is to integrate these systems. The more and more people want their own applications dealt with well and they don't care about the rest of the company. They want to obviously do a good job for themselves. So integration
00:06:52
Speaker
is the biggie and it's not really worth having a CRM system or any of the other systems unless you get the situation done. There's so much money spent when the bigger goal is never achieved.
00:07:06
Speaker
Do you think some of that comes down from the top down because maybe they're not communicating how they need to be working together? Do you think that that's part of the problem? Because a lot of these companies aren't thinking about, oh, this might impact sales or this might impact customer support or something like that. Is it part of the issue from the top down that that communication is not happening? Yes, for sure.
00:07:35
Speaker
It's really that second level in a big org, isn't it? It's marketing management, it's sales management and event management. I'd obviously bring them into this picture now as well.
00:07:51
Speaker
those guys have their own jobs to do. Take the sales management side, the sales team, they've always been fairly maverick, haven't they, about just doing their own thing. As long as they get the sales in, you know, that's the power, the money's rolling in, then no one's going to tell them what to do. So that's the problem. It's getting all three around the table and putting an integrated plan together.
00:08:17
Speaker
And all three of those will not necessarily have the right knowledge and experience on tech products. They've probably come up through the roots, just doing it the old way, doing a good job. And bringing IT into the picture isn't easy either. So you really need some form of special agent who's going to be a really good communicator
00:08:41
Speaker
a really good motivator, have a pretty good technical knowledge. And that's like finding gold, isn't it, to find those people that are going to be those ultimate capitalists. I wonder, what do you think... I know that there's always been friction between sales and marketing and misalignment, but do you think all these
00:09:00
Speaker
new technologies as they've emerged have caused more issues because companies aren't making sure the tech stack is integrated? Yes, I think so. And it's not just those three tech products we talked about. I mean, another important one that really I think is just as important to all three would be your telephony system.
00:09:23
Speaker
you know the new cloud-based telephony systems to link to your outside call center network or to have your internal inside sales team on that system. That's a really important ingredient that
00:09:40
Speaker
keeps your CRM data up to date, nurtures leads to go into your sales automation package, and also follows up the leads that you've generated at your events and trade shows and so on. So I think that's the fourth dimension in this, you know, the tech stack that really is just as important as the other three and should be considered. But once again, that makes it even more complicated because that's someone else to bring into the picture, you know, your call sender managers,
00:10:08
Speaker
probably got no experience of events and perhaps not a marketing automation either. So it really is a challenge and I'm not saying it's easy to do. Hey folks, let's take a break to hear about today's sponsor. And we are back.
00:10:31
Speaker
Do you think organizations that try to make it easier on themselves would be best served by going to a vendor who has most of the components integrated together, or is it possible to not have to lean on a HubSpot or a Salesforce and to assemble different pieces of technology to work together effectively? I think the way the market is at the moment, it's better to still have the best
00:11:00
Speaker
technology for each application and they're likely to come from a different vendor. I don't think one has emerged that really gives you that one integrated package. When you look at Oracle,
00:11:16
Speaker
who have acquired, particularly in the last three or four years, a number of, you know, top-line products like Eloquo Marketing Automation, Bonsys on the business-to-consumer side, then they've got various content management, social media platforms all in their sales and marketing suite, but they're still silos really. And some of those products can be too heavy
00:11:38
Speaker
for some companies who want the modern light cloud-based systems that are available together, you know, like a HubSpot, like our own Zuant system for events and so on. You know, fast and light is really what you need, I think. Easy to use. Yeah, those are the features.
00:11:57
Speaker
It's got to be hard to be the best in all of those different areas because they're different. They're so different. And like you said, if you want the best, you most likely have to go to separate solutions and then make them all work together. And I think that that's one thing that people kind of lose sight of is I want the easiest way to make this happen, but they're maybe not making the best decisions for their company, right? Yes, absolutely. I think the application should always come first.
00:12:26
Speaker
because that's going to make that area, you know, if it's your inside sales team, they need the best software to be productive and efficient. And integration now isn't as hard as it used to be. You know, there's some easy ways of connecting through APIs. So all of the data can flow back. I think the CRM should always be at the center.
00:12:49
Speaker
as the sort of one version of the truth when it comes to all of your data audience and have all of these other applications pulling that data and synchronizing both ways with the CRM at the center. Right. And many people listening to the episode are
00:13:05
Speaker
most likely have some solutions in place and maybe their solutions work together, maybe they're siloed, I don't know. But what are some reasons that listeners should audit their tech stack to ensure that better data harmonization is happening and what benefits are they going to get out of that? What are they going to experience from that, like upsells, cross-sells?
00:13:24
Speaker
So good integration is really going to give them, I'm taking an oracle phrase, speed to lead. Everything is faster these days, isn't it? If we go as a prospect onto a company's website and you expect to be able to chat someone in real time or complete a form and have a response within an hour.
00:13:46
Speaker
Having good integration means that that visit to a website can flow quickly through to the CRM, start providing information to you over whatever channels you want almost instantly and trigger a phone call or a visit.
00:14:03
Speaker
if you're a business to business inquiry. So that speed is an important part of the integration. And the other aspect of it is that you can make sure that your sales productivity is so much quicker because you're going to be faster than your competitors.
00:14:23
Speaker
to follow up those leads and you're going to be able to make sure that whether it's your inside sales team or your sales force themselves, they're going to be talking to people at the right time and not irritating them when they're not in the market.
00:14:41
Speaker
There are those two competitive advantages. And thirdly, the big one and the big payback of all of this is that if someone isn't in the market from that initial inquiry or when they went to your trade show booth, they may have all the right credentials to purchase from you and you're a good lead.
00:15:01
Speaker
but you're not going to have budget approved maybe for 12 months down the road. And most systems that aren't integrated won't have any way of following up those people.
00:15:13
Speaker
And if the initial leads or people come to your tradeshow booth, maybe only 3% or 4% of them are ready to buy now. There's that lurking 20% that are just sitting there. They're fully qualified, but you need some integrated system to make sure that they're followed up and nurtured over.
00:15:33
Speaker
Well, maybe longer, 12 months, 34 months. We even had a lead the other day that we first spoke to seven years ago and they've just purchased our product literally last month. Oh, wow. They're still out there somewhere. I imagine too that when all these systems work together that it helps the people if you're in an account management situation where you can
00:15:58
Speaker
have better customer experiences and loyalty and keep people engaged between signing the contract each year. Yes, yep, no, for sure. And so much can be done now, can't it, without the old traditional face-to-face meetings. In so many industries, it's rare to
00:16:17
Speaker
to actually meet people, isn't it? So it's so much easier these days to have a web meeting, ping someone an email prior to their contract being about to expire, have a review, you don't get to know people over the web. And that's why you see the rise of systems like Zoom, for instance, that make this so much easier with their Zoom rooms for web meetings and collaborating between different offices and so on. Definitely. So beyond
00:16:45
Speaker
The benefits of integrating these systems, I think a lot of people would be well served to prevent some risk by making sure they're integrated because we've got laws about spam. There's GDPR in the
GDPR Compliance and Data Privacy
00:17:00
Speaker
EU. What other considerations are there and how can these systems working together protect a company?
00:17:06
Speaker
Well, yes, GDPR, that's a really important one that I missed out earlier on because I always think that GDPR is a really good thing. A lot of our clients take that on board as their global privacy policy. We've got the Californian legislation coming in from January 1st that
00:17:26
Speaker
mimics pretty closely the EU's GDPR. And unless you've got that central CRM data connected to your other systems, and that includes mobile as well, of course, you know, people forget that, you know, salespeople, they use mobile phones, that's almost their main touch point for CRM data. But that's the Wild West, there's no thought to have any sort of opt-ins normally.
00:17:53
Speaker
of those guys on the road day to day. So integration is once again vital to have all of those touch points linked back. So you have really easy opt-in permission to hold someone's data and taking it further. So it's a really positive thing from the marketing point of view to run a preference center to say, okay, what information do you want to receive and which products, how frequently, what channels, you know, do you want to get a text or
00:18:22
Speaker
you know, suppress your email. It's a better experience for customers. So I always think GDPR is a really positive thing. And yeah, getting that in place is virtually impossible for the larger companies in reality, unless there is that person that's in charge of getting everyone integrated and educating people on the benefits of GDPR. I think
00:18:51
Speaker
One of the things you need to have if you're a company over a certain size is a data protection officer. And I always think that sounds like the Gestapo or something. You're going to steer clear of that guy if you cross paths on the stairs in the office. Why not change that name to something much more positive? Give it a little bit of a marketing spin. The positive integration manager. Right. There you go.
00:19:19
Speaker
So are there any best practices or tips that you can offer just in general to help our listeners if they're thinking about maybe they need to make their systems all work together? What are some best practices that they should follow to make it happen? Well, so I think it's more human engineering. So we laugh about the data protection officer, but a larger company needs to find someone who's going to take that role. And so finding someone, I think possibly from marketing,
00:19:49
Speaker
is going to be the best place. So looks after that, that data solid and takes on that role of forcing through the integration and in a way has to become the friend of each of the different departments that you're looking to integrate with. So, you know, your inside sales team, the sales manager and whoever's in charge of Salesforce automation, look at how they're using their systems.
00:20:17
Speaker
And then to make their life easier, show them what the benefits will be by integration, by having more up-to-date data, maybe a bigger pool of quality data to work from, more leads, more leads that are in the right buying cycle stage. The end of the day, what's going to
00:20:38
Speaker
make things more productive and more profitable is going to be the big thing that makes that person a superstar in the organization and then truly recognized by the C-level guys. Right. And everybody wants to be recognized, right? And given that recognition and be the superstar. I think so. If they're getting the results, why not? Right. You know, let's spread the word.
00:21:04
Speaker
marketing can work. Right. Exactly. So Pete, we have one last question for you. It's a just for fun question. If you weren't leading Zuant and Market Point Recall, what would you, what would your dream job career be? Well, I do enjoy the product development side. That's for sure. So it's, you know, something in tech. I have a keen interest in motorsport. So, you know, something,
00:21:33
Speaker
in a sort of high tech area of the sort of Formula One world. And the other area would be something in the eco space. So there's some really cool new inventions that need backing and funding and promoting to help reduce plastic usage around the world and in the oceans, which everyone's concerned about at the moment.
00:21:56
Speaker
I'm getting rid of plastic packaging and having stuff that's biodegradable to wrap your sandwiches in for lunch and so on. So, you know, something in that role would be great. So I could use my tech and my marketing skills to help a startup in that area. It would be fun to do. Yeah. I'm not surprised that that would be something that you would like to do. I mean, development seems like it's in your blood. Yes, yes, exactly. I drive the techies mad every day.
00:22:26
Speaker
with new ideas and stuff. And they said, look, let's just focus. Let's just keep doing what we're doing at the moment. That's the real battleground. Right.
00:22:40
Speaker
Well, Pete, thank you so much for joining us and sharing your insights on the impact of marketing automation and Salesforce automation on CRM.
Conclusion and Contact Information
00:22:47
Speaker
If our listeners would like to reach out to you or have any questions for you or want to connect online, what's the best way for them to get in touch? My email address is probably the easiest. So pete at zuant.com. So zuant.com is the easiest. So delighted to hear from anyone.
00:23:04
Speaker
Alright, so there you have it. If you weren't already aware, it's time to ensure your sales roles, marketing, and service platforms are all working together to help meet corporate goals, staying in compliance with various laws, and deliver better customer experiences. So take a hard look at your tech stack and see what you may need to make improvements on.
00:23:24
Speaker
If you want to get in touch with me or Stacey, you can hit us up on social. On Twitter, you can find Stacey at Stacey underscore Jax. That's S-T-A-C-Y underscore J-A-X. And you can find me at Elena underscore Jax. That's A-L-A-N-N-A underscore J-A-X. And if you're not a Twitter fan, you can look us up on LinkedIn. And don't forget, you can always leave us a voicemail on the Anchor mobile app or on our show page. Have a great week, everyone.
00:23:52
Speaker
The B2B Mix Show is hosted by Stacy Jackson and Elena Jackson of, you guessed it, Jackson Marketing. If you need help with your B2B inbound marketing efforts, visit us at JacksonMarketingServices.com.