Customer relationship management (CRM) technology is highly evolved. We can determine with great precision who is most likely to buy what and when. But in the rush to create the most powerful, versatile CRM systems, marketers have lost sight of the actual customers behind the numbers.

CRM Is Not Really About Customers

The term “CRM” is really a misnomer. The typical CRM system is very effective at helping companies segment their markets more effectively (most profitable to least profitable customers) and measure key metrics (customer satisfaction, response rates, etc.). But where does the relationship come in? What does the word “relationship” even mean? Does it suggest numbers and percentages and algorithms, or is it something more qualitative?

The lack of customer focus is evident in CRM as it’s practiced by virtually every modern business. CRM is really not about giving the customer a better experience. In fact, customer relationship management should really be called “vendor relationship management” given that its purpose is strictly vendor-centric – driving sales, revenues and profits for the vendor – and not making sure the customer is happy.

Customers Really Want R-E-S-P-E-C-T

In a word, customers really want “respect.” Which is precisely what they do not get when dealing with the average business. For example, what happens when a customer tries to download a case study or white paper from your website? Or simply request that someone call them because they’re interested in doing business with you?

If your site is like most, your prospects are immediately hit with a barrage of information demands: “What is your job title?” “What is your company’s annual revenue?” “How many employees do you have?” “What database vendor do you use?” Is it any wonder customers are turned off? Where is the respect? How is this tell-us-what-we-want-to-know-or-get-lost treatment supposed to drive customer loyalty? Intrusive questions like these are not only not productive, they’re actually counterproductive because they drive prospects to withhold important information or even lie.

Focusing on the Customer

Market2Lead believes the focus of CRM should be brought back to the customer, by identifying the customer’s perspective and working backward from that point, always placing respect for the customer above all else. In fact, we propose redefining CRM as “customer respect management”:

Customer Respect Management

Customer: The individual who represents a company and who is in a position to recommend that his company buy your product.

Respect: The attitude customers increasingly demand before they agree to spend their companies’ money. Customers don’t want you to “manage your relationship” with them – they simply want respect.

Management: Gaining insight into customers’ wants and needs by placing those wants and needs first, and using that insight to direct highly relevant, personalized, precision-targeted communications.

A Matter of Trust

It’s clear that the current approach is deeply flawed. After all, markets don’t buy products and services – individual people do. And they make buying decisions only after deciding to trust the vendor. How do we build trust? Demanding that prospects fill out long lists of questions on Web forms only encourages distrust and dishonesty, which is why they have no compunction about pulling their answers out of thin air.

Data Flow Precedes Purchase Decisions

Before people buy, they gather information. Hence, an adequate flow of information necessarily precedes every purchase decision. This creates a dilemma because the needs of prospective customers and vendors are at odds with one another. Customers need information, but they prefer to remain anonymous to avoid unwanted sales contact.

While customers prefer to reveal nothing, vendors want to know everything. Detailed customer information gives vendors the ability to develop deep insight into their prospects, allowing them to decide which ones are worthy of their sales efforts (qualified leads) and which ones are planning to buy soon (hot leads), and providing them with specific information that will help them close sales as quickly as possible. In their rush to gather usable data, vendors often lose all sense of reasonableness, and forms with 20 or more questions are not uncommon.

Market2Lead – A New Approach

Market2Lead helps companies focus on the customer’s experience instead of on the capabilities of their CRM technologies. We’ve developed an approach to CRM that gives customers the information they need to make buying decisions, without putting them off by demanding too much information too soon in the relationship. Our method “progressively profiles” individual decision makers, allowing us to develop more comprehensive insight into them as we deliver information that is useful, relevant and timely – all of which contributes to developing all-important trust.

Improve the quality of self-reported data – Web registration forms typically request data that prospects are not yet willing to provide – job title, for example. Top-level managers often don’t want to reveal their titles, so they’ll make something up (e.g., “engineer”) just to get the download. We all understand the need to generate accurate data. Why not make it easy for them to tell the truth? For example, Market2Lead doesn’t include a “job title” field for the first download request, relieving prospects of the need to lie to get the white paper, podcast, etc.

Take advantage of real-time behavioral data – At best, Web forms are severely limited as to what they reveal about customer behavior. Market2Lead lets marketers take advantage of behavioral data in real time by observing prospects’ behavior on your website and catering the experience to their interests dynamically based on those observations.

Develop long-term relationships – Companies cannot expect to learn everything about prospective customers in one interaction. Deals are rarely closed within the first sales call. Hence, concentrating on nurturing long-term relationships based on mutual trust and respect is much more effective than trying to gather too much information all at once.

Build on each interaction – Learning with every contact helps companies move steadily toward closing deals. Never repeating yourself is the most productive way to leverage every interaction.

Respond in a timely manner – The most successful marketers adapt to their customers’ reported schedules by responding timely. If a project is three months out, for example, build toward that date.

Company Overview

Market2Lead, Inc. helps companies generate betterqualified leads and close more sales. The company’s solutions enable leading enterprises and small businesses to progressively gather deeper insight into individuals, their needs and their purchase intentions. Market2Lead is a privately held company headquartered in Santa Clara, California. For more information please visit www.market2lead.com.

Product Overviews

Market2Lead’s solutions – Turbo Web2Lead, Market2Lead, Bronze Edition and Market2Lead, Gold Edition – deliver all the benefits of CRM marketing automation systems but in an on-demand and much faster, more consumable way.

Turbo Web2Lead: Delivers increased confidence in customer interactions with every touch. Progressive Profiling reveals current, relevant insights about customers and prospects. Using Intelligent Interaction, Turbo Web2Lead delivers appropriate messages and survey questions to customers based on their individual characteristics and the business rules you specify.

Market2Lead – Bronze Edition: Unites our Progressive Profiling and Intelligent Interaction with our Personalized Outbound Email Marketing and Dynamic List Segmentation features to ensure a seamless and individualized match. End-to-End Marketing Effectiveness Reporting identifies what works and what doesn’t.

Market2Lead – Gold Edition: Delivers state-of-the-art automated outbound marketing capabilities, including lead nurturing and program automation and bidirectional integration with your salesforce automation system. Market2Lead – Gold Edition’s advanced analytics enable real-time reporting on campaign results for all media types. It also ensures data quality and response validity, to provide reliable, accurate measurements and increased marketing effectiveness.