Cultivize Your Relationships: Jason Kramer's Guide to Effective CRM Implementation
Episode 43 Frederick Dudek (Freddy D)
Cultivize Your Relationships: Jason Kramer's Guide to Effective CRM Implementation
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Jason Kramer, founder and CEO of Cultivize, shares invaluable insights on the crucial role of effective lead nurturing and CRM implementation in today's business landscape. He emphasizes that having a defined process for following up with leads is where the real money lies, as many companies waste marketing dollars due to poor tracking and follow-up strategies. With over 20 years of experience in marketing, Jason highlights the importance of cultivating relationships and seizing opportunities to optimize sales processes. He discusses the common pitfalls businesses face, such as relying on outdated systems or failing to connect their various tools effectively. Through real-world examples, Jason illustrates how implementing a robust CRM can transform operations and lead to increased revenue, turning customers into super fans who advocate for your brand.
Throughout the episode, Jason discusses the common challenges faced by businesses when it comes to tracking marketing efforts and following up with leads. He points out that many companies invest heavily in generating leads but fail to implement effective follow-up strategies, leading to wasted resources and lost sales. By sharing specific examples, such as a client relying on manila folders for organization, he illustrates the dire need for a modern CRM system that can streamline these processes. Jason also dives into the crucial aspect of data quality, explaining how poor data management can hinder a company's ability to convert leads into customers. He advocates for a systematic approach to data entry and management, ensuring that every team member is on the same page and can access accurate information at any time.
As the conversation progresses, the importance of nurturing leads through consistent communication becomes a focal point. Jason encourages businesses to view lead nurturing as an ongoing process rather than a one-time effort. He highlights strategies for maintaining engagement with leads, including personalized follow-ups and leveraging technology effectively. Jason invites listeners to rethink their current processes and consider how they can enhance their CRM systems to foster better relationships with clients. By the end of the episode, listeners are left with actionable insights and a clear understanding of how to elevate their sales processes through better lead management and nurturing strategies.
Takeaways:
- A well-defined sales process is crucial for businesses to avoid wasted marketing investments.
- Timely follow-up within 15 minutes significantly increases chances of converting leads into customers.
- Understanding the quality of leads generated is essential to optimize marketing strategies effectively.
- Many companies fail at CRM implementation due to overwhelming complexity and lack of direction.
- Cultivize aims to help businesses create a solid foundation for sales processes and technology.
- Proactive engagement with clients fosters long-term relationships and drives customer loyalty.
Companies mentioned in this episode:
- Cultivize
- AdWords
- QuickBooks
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Podcorn - https://podcorn.com/privacy
Transcript
Joining us today is Jason Kramer, founder and CEO of Cultivize, a consulting firm specializing in lead nurturing and CRM implementation.
Freddie:With over 20 years of experience, Jason has worked with global and local brands to help bridge the gap between marketing and sales.
Freddie:He's here to share his insights on optimizing the sales process and how to identify poor performing marketing campaigns.
Freddie:Jason, welcome to the Business Superfans podcast.
Freddie:And you're with the company called Cultivize.
Freddie:So tell us a little bit about your story of how you came about creating this cool business.
Jason Kramer:Cultivize is a made up word, of course, and stands for two things that you and I both know really well, Freddie, which is to cultivate relationships and seize opportunities.
Jason Kramer:My background, which is a little bit unique in the world of CRM, is that I spent 20 years in marketing.
Jason Kramer:I worked for marketing agencies as a graphic designer, global brands, small brands you have audiences never heard of.
Jason Kramer:And what I realized, being out of school just a few years, Freddie, was that there was an opportunity to help businesses that couldn't afford an agency, but also didn't want to go to the freelance route.
Jason Kramer:So I started my own agency.
Jason Kramer:We were a small team.
Jason Kramer:I ran that business for 16 years, built websites.
Jason Kramer:We did a lot of great cool things.
Jason Kramer:But what it taught me was that there's a lot of moving parts to a business at the tail end.
Jason Kramer:Before I sold that business, I started getting involved with email marketing, marketing automation, CRM.
Jason Kramer:And what I realized was there were a lot of companies out there that were doing a lot of things to make the phone ring and to get people to fill out a form on a website or to come to a trade show booth.
Jason Kramer:But what they were doing a really terrible job at, Freddie, is tracking all of that and then following up.
Jason Kramer:And so therefore they were spending all this money to hang that shiny object in front of somebody's eyes, but if they didn't snatch it and that person disappeared, that was it.
Jason Kramer:Like they spent all that money for basically nothing.
Jason Kramer:And so that's why I started Cultivize, to help businesses be able to not just find the right technology when it comes to CRM and other tools, specifically on the sales side, communication side.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:Sales enablement.
Jason Kramer:But also what is the process, right, Helping you extract out of your own mind, what is our business process to find leads, educate them and convert them and to follow up with them.
Jason Kramer:And believe it or not, so many people don't have a process.
Jason Kramer:And that's where it really all has to start.
Freddie:Oh, absolutely.
Freddie:Process is everything.
Freddie:And you hit the key thing there is follow up.
Freddie:Follow up is where the money's at.
Freddie:As you said, people spend money on a trade show or an event and stuff like that.
Freddie:Get the leads and they just sit there.
Freddie:It's mind boggling.
Jason Kramer:Right there.
Jason Kramer:They were in a drawer, right?
Freddie:Yeah, they're in a drawer.
Freddie:I've closed more sales because of speed.
Freddie:And what I mean by that is I have a rule that if there's an inquiry made, you've got 15 minute windows to reach out to that contact.
Freddie:And if you reach out to that contact, that prospective customer within 15 minutes, you set a bar because you beat everybody else.
Freddie:Second of all, as you know, in sales, first guy in has the ability to set the bar because they will probably look at some other competitors.
Freddie:But you've got the chance to set the bar and you can set it up pretty high so that competitor two and competitor three have got a long way to go to meet that bar.
Freddie:The second thing is you never want to be number two because number two always gets squashed.
Freddie:You either want to be the first guy to respond or the last guy because the last guy has a chance to beat the bar and the middle guy always loses.
Freddie:It's systems to put them in place and making sure you follow up with the systematized process so that the inquiries don't get wasted.
Jason Kramer:Absolutely.
Jason Kramer:Couldn't agree more.
Freddie:So let's continue that conversation about some of the things that you do and offer your customers today.
Jason Kramer:We talked before, right, about the process.
Jason Kramer:Before we even get the process, we have to understand is it a business that is ready to build a process?
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:Young businesses are still figuring things out.
Jason Kramer:They might be getting business from referrals.
Jason Kramer:They may not be spending money on lead generation yet.
Jason Kramer:So the volume may not be there to warrant the process.
Jason Kramer:But I'm a big believer that you really don't want to have a business that's chaotic and that's growing really rapidly and then start building a process after the fact.
Jason Kramer:Because things are going to probably fall through the cracks as you're building the business and you're putting your business plan together and all these things.
Jason Kramer:If you're a young business, it's about what are we going to do when it comes to our sales efforts, how are we going to work that?
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:How are we going to follow up with people?
Jason Kramer:Are we going to use just a tactic of email?
Jason Kramer:Are we going to call people, we're going to use technology or do we use social media?
Jason Kramer:So all those things are really important.
Jason Kramer:But for us, Freddie to answer your question specifically, when a company comes to us, they're usually in two places.
Jason Kramer:So place A is they don't have what I would define a defined system.
Jason Kramer:On paper, their system, their system's up in their head, right?
Jason Kramer:Or it's up in the sales manager's head.
Jason Kramer:And whether or not that system is then communicated to the rest of the team, there's a missed kind of gap there in the way that it's executed.
Jason Kramer:We just brought on a company this summer who is actually using manila folders, running things out of manila folders, and they just had stacks and stacks of manila folders on their desk even.
Jason Kramer:They're a multimillion dollar business.
Jason Kramer:They didn't have a system.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:That was their system.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:Which is archaic to say the least.
Jason Kramer:So that's one scenario.
Jason Kramer:The other scenario is they have some technology.
Jason Kramer:We work with a lot of manufacturers, a lot of B2B companies, where they have an ERP system, they have a quoting tool, they have something that they're using that kind of runs their business, but it doesn't do everything right.
Jason Kramer:It doesn't.
Jason Kramer:It's not a CRM, it's not a sales tool.
Jason Kramer:And so we fill in the gaps.
Jason Kramer:What is that system missing that we could complement and we could help make it more efficient?
Jason Kramer:So that's part of our process, right, is figuring those things out and then coming up with recommendations for the technology that we're going to use.
Jason Kramer:We work with a handful of different platforms, but then we both know that, and there's a great article Harvard Business Review did years ago, which you may have seen, Freddie, where they said that over 70% of businesses will fail at trying to implement their own CRM.
Jason Kramer:And the reason they fail is because it's overwhelming, right?
Jason Kramer:It's.
Jason Kramer:You're using something you've never used before in terms of a piece of software.
Jason Kramer:In the demo, it might look really easy, but once you get into a blank canvas and it's there, think of like, you take a painting class and you see this beautiful example when you signed up, of all these things you could paint, but then you get there and they give you a white canvas with some paintbrushes, and they're like, okay, go at it.
Jason Kramer:You're like, where do I start?
Jason Kramer:And if you have no direction, no understanding of how to create a foundation, how to put down base color, and how to build your piece of artwork, it's no different than in the world of CRM.
Jason Kramer:To help with that, we do all of the work for our clients.
Jason Kramer:So Once we find technology, we're the ones.
Jason Kramer:The cultivized team is there to implement that technology, to bring all your data in, to set up your sequences, your emails, connect your website, do all those technical things that need to get done.
Jason Kramer:Then we show you how to use the system.
Jason Kramer:We do training, we hold the hands of our clients and that's really, I think, the big differentiator for us and a long way of saying what do we do?
Jason Kramer:We help companies become more systemized, more productive and to eliminate gaps in their business where they might be potentially losing revenue.
Freddie:Oh, absolutely.
Freddie:You hit a couple key things.
Freddie:You remind me of a company I had worked with earlier this year that was in a commercial flooring business and they've been in business for over 30 years and they're exactly that manila folder type company and they really don't know or didn't know what they were leaving on the table.
Freddie:They would bid a commercial flooring project and that was it.
Freddie:They were waiting to hear back from the general contractor, no follow up strategy.
Freddie:And if they didn't hear anything, I guess we lost it and we'll just bid another one.
Freddie:They'd land a few.
Freddie:And so they were in business in spite of themselves.
Freddie:We implemented a CRM into their system and did some tweaks and some adjustments to some processes.
Freddie:I increased their potential bidding pipeline to over 1 $1 million in less than 60 days because of the stuff that was just falling through the cracks tracking any of it.
Freddie:So what you say is paramount for small to mid sized business is not only the systems, help them improve the overall operations, but they're going to find things that they've missed or overlooked or didn't get followed up on and they squandered opportunities.
Jason Kramer:Absolutely.
Jason Kramer:And another big piece that too.
Jason Kramer:And I don't know if you did it for this client or not, but so this pool client we had come on board recently, they spend six figures a year on marketing.
Jason Kramer:And so they didn't really understand what marketing was actually driving revenue and driving qualified leads.
Jason Kramer:And so the common issue is in you, a marketing agency will say, yeah, Facebook, LinkedIn, AdWords, whatever it is, generating this many leads because these are how many people are filling out the website form.
Jason Kramer:And this we know.
Jason Kramer:What the agency doesn't know is what happens to those people after they fill out the form.
Freddie:Correct.
Jason Kramer:And if you don't have a CRM in place that's tracking that activity, you're going to be really lopsided and potentially wasting a lot of marketing dollars on things that aren't actually working.
Jason Kramer:And that was the case here, specifically with their Facebook campaign.
Jason Kramer:It was generating a high volume of leads, hundreds every month.
Jason Kramer:But something like 80% of them were just garbage.
Jason Kramer:They were bad phone numbers.
Jason Kramer:They weren't returning anybody's phone call when a salesperson called.
Jason Kramer:And until they had that data, they weren't able to go back to the agency to say, hey, agency, something's wrong here.
Jason Kramer:Yes, you're generating a lot of leads from us, but they're really poor quality leads.
Jason Kramer:And as it turns out, the agency had demographic data not set up correctly, so they were targeting the wrong types of people on Facebook.
Jason Kramer:They were doing other things inadvertently, just by accident, not really fault of anybody's, but they didn't realize that they were bringing a high volume of poor qualified leads into the client's account.
Jason Kramer:And that's something a CRM can help manage and report on if you have that feature enabled.
Freddie:Well, it's paramount to track what your marketing is doing and what the conversion is.
Freddie:And what I mean by conversion is not just inquiry, but actually turning into a customer bonafide revenue to the business.
Freddie:Of course, you gotta track that stuff because otherwise you're squandering money without even knowing it.
Freddie:You think you're doing something.
Freddie:Like you just said, look, they're getting leads.
Freddie:Wow, we're getting leads.
Freddie:We're getting 200, 300 leads this month.
Freddie:But if 95% of them are garbage, just like he's just said, Jason, then it's a waste of money.
Jason Kramer:Absolutely.
Freddie:You can reroute the money that you're wasting and putting into something else and get a better return on that investment than getting a whole bunch of leads.
Freddie:Because I rather have five good leads than 500 bad leads.
Jason Kramer:Yeah.
Jason Kramer:And it's.
Jason Kramer:I think it's also too.
Jason Kramer:I know you have a lot of entrepreneurs and younger businesses that are starting out, which is great.
Jason Kramer:We're all there.
Jason Kramer:I was there.
Jason Kramer:Do you think about networking?
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:I spent more than 10 years, 15 years probably at least, doing in person networking, the bnis of the world and other groups and with tips and all those things.
Jason Kramer:You spend thousands of dollars and you put all these hours to go to breakfast and you meet people, you have coffee and you build strategic partnerships and yeah, you get leads and you're like, this is great.
Jason Kramer:Freddie D.
Jason Kramer:Is awesome.
Jason Kramer:He's giving me 20 leads every time I see him.
Jason Kramer:But if you're not tracking that and knowing, okay, are those leads actually converting to revenue?
Jason Kramer:And how much revenue am I generating?
Freddie:Doesn't matter.
Jason Kramer:John might just be a nice guy.
Jason Kramer:He might be just giving me names because he wants to give me names.
Jason Kramer:Not good quality or he doesn't know me.
Jason Kramer:So I think what's important to note here is it's not just marketing dollars, it's everything you're doing to cold calling.
Jason Kramer:How many leads are you generating from cold calling to know if your cold calling strategy is working or not.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:So it's every aspect of lead gen.
Jason Kramer:Oh yeah.
Freddie:Years ago when I was selling manufacturing software, I was the district manager and we were on the innovation side.
Freddie:We would do lunch and learns before lunch and learns became a thing.
Freddie:Yeah, I was doing them long time ago.
Freddie:And so we would invite engineering, VPs of manufacturing.
Freddie:VPs of engineering.
Freddie:I would.
Freddie:We were in shared office space, so I'd hired a women to contact all the guys to come for the lunch and learn.
Freddie:We would come in and we would talk about how the technology is transforming the main engineering and manufacturing space of a computer.
Freddie:A computer aided manufacturing CAD cam.
Freddie:We weren't selling, we were just talking and demonstrating our product, showing the benefits and how it can be cost savings and minimize metal scrap and all that stuff.
Freddie:But what would happen is these guys would invite us to their companies.
Freddie:They would say, come on in, take a look at and let us know how this could help our business.
Freddie:That's all I was after is getting them to invite me into their shop.
Freddie:It's letting a fox in the hen house.
Freddie:The bottom line is we didn't get to 2, 300 people.
Freddie:We got 10 people showed up.
Freddie:The one event I remember years ago, there was one guy, it was downtown Chicago and we were out in the burbs and was like, should we cancel this or not?
Freddie:There's just one guy.
Freddie:I said, you know what, let's go.
Freddie:And we had to carry the computer stuff.
Freddie:It wasn't laptops back then.
Freddie:It was big computer stuff.
Freddie:Let's go.
Freddie:Worst case, it's a practice run for us.
Freddie:And we went and it turned out was a VP of manufacturing company.
Freddie:He liked what he saw, invited us in.
Freddie:Next thing we know, he bought two seats, $120,000 sale.
Freddie:One guy in the meeting.
Freddie:But he's qualified.
Jason Kramer:He's qualified.
Jason Kramer:It's all matters.
Freddie:It's all matters.
Freddie:Our marketing investment was some letters inviting these guys to a luncheon.
Freddie:So exactly what you said.
Freddie:It's very important to be able to track all that stuff and get rid of the noise.
Jason Kramer:Absolutely.
Freddie:So Jason shares a story of one of the clients that you stepped in and what took place.
Freddie:And how did you transform them into your super fans that are out there telling all their friends about the great services that you guys provide at Cultivize?
Jason Kramer:There's a lot of stories I could think of on the Cultivize website.
Jason Kramer:A fun thing I did a few years back is testimonials are good.
Jason Kramer:Admittedly, I think that written testimonials are okay, but I was always after, how do I make that more personable, make it more human?
Jason Kramer:So I hired one of my clients at the time who does video production.
Jason Kramer:I said I could interview my clients, but they may not be honest with me.
Jason Kramer:They may not tell me what I want to hear.
Jason Kramer:He's.
Jason Kramer:I got this great program where I can interview them remotely.
Jason Kramer:I got the software and so we interviewed a bunch of clients, which was really cool because, like, I didn't even know what the questions were that he was asking them.
Jason Kramer:I didn't know what the final product was going to be.
Jason Kramer:And it turned out great.
Jason Kramer:So to answer that question, Freddie, there was one on there particularly, actually two of them, like I briefly mentioned.
Jason Kramer:So one was a catering company, but they also had a retail food service business and they had software out the wazoo.
Jason Kramer:They had software for everything you could imagine.
Jason Kramer:They had several different departments.
Jason Kramer:Every department had their own software.
Jason Kramer:And nothing spoke to each other.
Jason Kramer:Nothing was connected.
Jason Kramer:And so their retail was not connected to catering, catering wasn't connected to events.
Jason Kramer:And it drove the head of marketing absolutely bonkers, as you can imagine.
Jason Kramer:And us coming in there and having a central platform that we could segment all their data and have their data in there from one central location was a huge pivotal point to make their outbound marketing that much more effective.
Jason Kramer:What really helped them?
Jason Kramer:Many things helped them.
Jason Kramer:But what was a pivotal thing, I remember from that testimonial at the aftermath, if you will, of COVID they were doing a lot of lunch and learn virtual events where they would send product out to companies and to people and then get everybody together on a Zoom call so they would all sample the product together.
Jason Kramer:And for these more corporate businesses they were trying to do work with, and because they had the data from all this effort, they were able to have that be an extremely successful campaign.
Jason Kramer:The attendance, I don't know the numbers off the top of my head, but the attendance for these Zoom meetings and the results of them, or more than they would ever have imagined, and it wasn't.
Jason Kramer:It was only possible because they had all this data in one place that they could do that from, and it filtered down to the rest of the team.
Jason Kramer:It got the rest of the team excited, wanting to use the CRM, wanting to contribute data, wanting to make sure that data was up to date.
Jason Kramer:Another one that quickly comes to mind.
Jason Kramer:We do a lot of work with agencies.
Jason Kramer:We love working with agencies, Freddie, because agencies get people to knock on the door like we were talking about before, to generate that lead.
Jason Kramer:It's Cultivize's job to get people in the door, sit them on the couch, get to know them, build a relationship, and then say, hey, salesperson, this is what Jason has going on.
Jason Kramer:This is what Jason is interested in.
Jason Kramer:You should go talk to Jason.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:And so one of the agencies we work with, a great firm out of Seattle, was only working with maybe out of all their clients.
Jason Kramer:They had two or three clients using a CRM, but at a very entrance sort of entry level.
Jason Kramer:And we worked with them for years and we still work with them.
Jason Kramer:In fact, they brought on, I think in one year, they brought only a dozen new clients onto the CRM because they had us as a resource.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:Because they had our expertise in their back pocket.
Jason Kramer:They were now able to then take that conversation from marketing strategy to marketing implementation, to actually cross it over into the sales enablement piece, which they were never able to do before.
Jason Kramer:They were never able to really work with the sales team.
Jason Kramer:All they were able to do is work with the CFO or the CEO.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:And saying, what are your sales goals?
Jason Kramer:What are your revenues?
Jason Kramer:And this is what we can do from a strategy perspective.
Jason Kramer:But here, now, they had the data of the CRM, and I remember sue was the owner of that agency, actually co founder over and over, saying, you really just changed the way we could actually help our clients because you're now an asset and a value add to what we can do to help those clients actually excel further than we could before you.
Jason Kramer:And so those are two things that kind of come to mind when you ask that question.
Freddie:Yeah.
Freddie:So those two companies are your super fans that are basically your advocates telling other people about the great services that your company provides.
Jason Kramer:Yeah.
Jason Kramer:And listen, at the end of the day, I'm all about education.
Jason Kramer:So everybody I talk to, even if it's on the consulting side, you said before about which I loved about being the first to the table, when I get to that first conversation as I was talking about CRM, I'm like, listen, there's no doubt you're going to talk to other companies, you're going to do research, you're going to see other demos, but these are the things you should be asking that other company.
Jason Kramer:And if you're not asking them, then that's potentially a pitfall because you might miss out on something.
Jason Kramer:And what kind of service do they offer in terms of their support?
Jason Kramer:Is it just over text, is it over email, is it chat, is it the support overseas?
Jason Kramer:Are they going to talk strategy with you or just ask the technical questions?
Jason Kramer:Right, because there's a huge difference.
Jason Kramer:And we talk about pricing, we talk about all these different things.
Jason Kramer:And every time, Freddie, I will tell you, your actions are the same.
Jason Kramer:Oh, I would have never thought of that.
Jason Kramer:I didn't think of that.
Jason Kramer:Or I do catch them, like you say, in the third or last position.
Jason Kramer:But, oh, what did this other company say about xyz?
Jason Kramer:And it's usually crickets because it never came up in conversation or they didn't know to ask.
Jason Kramer:And so I believe that it definitely does help us to make our clients to be informed as possible and not just to look at that shiny object, right, which is the potential CRM that they might want to buy, but to dig deeper and say, okay, is this the right decision for us as a company?
Jason Kramer:Like you say before, it's so easy to spend money these days, whether it be on marketing or anything else.
Jason Kramer:And software is no different.
Freddie:When I was selling manufacturing software, I would start off really dealing with management, executive management, or a lot of times the owner of a tool and die shop.
Freddie:I would basically say, look, there's about four or five of us in the same market space.
Freddie:They all do the job okay.
Freddie:That's reality number one.
Freddie:So number two is I'd say, okay, let's talk about where you want to be in three years, in five years, what's your strategy?
Freddie:What's your business challenges?
Freddie:So I got myself out of the conversation of the software because I look at it as it's just a tool.
Freddie:But if you can change the conversation to a business strategy, what are the pain points?
Freddie:Okay, in the manufacturing, you know, scrapping metal because the tool path gouged the metal, now you can't use it.
Freddie:That's a $20,000 piece of metal that you just scrapped.
Freddie:What did that do to your profit margin?
Freddie:Who's your competitors?
Freddie:What are the challenges that you're experiencing against them?
Freddie:So we would talk about business growth and strategies.
Freddie:Then once I understood that, I went back and says, here's how our platform is going to help you achieve these things.
Freddie:I had all their bullet points, I had their pain points.
Freddie:And so I was able to boom, bam, boom, boom, bing, hit all those Points.
Freddie:I know the competition wasn't doing that.
Freddie:They were too busy saying my stuff turns right, it's blue, it's green.
Freddie:They were into the features, they were into the features and benefits.
Freddie:And I'm like, where do you want to go as a business?
Freddie:That changed the whole conversation and I never lost because of that strategy.
Freddie:It just changed the game.
Jason Kramer:Yeah, I couldn't agree more.
Freddie:So, and that's the fun part because then you, you're into a whole different conversation.
Jason Kramer:Not only that, but you're also going to caught in that never ending circle that just keeps spinning with focusing on those features and benefits.
Jason Kramer:I just actually before we got on the call, was talking to a new prospective client that we just did an audit for to assess their current CRM and provide some strategy.
Jason Kramer:And on that follow up call they were talking about, oh yeah, we want to add like this custom object field for this and do this and what about tags?
Jason Kramer:Should we use a tag?
Jason Kramer:Should we do that?
Jason Kramer:And I said to them, I was like, listen, that's all like secondary.
Jason Kramer:We have to have a strategy first, like a business strategy.
Jason Kramer:Otherwise you're going to keep on creating all these customizations and configurations that will have really no use.
Jason Kramer:And then next thing you know, everything's a big hot mess.
Jason Kramer:I had to dial it back for that.
Jason Kramer:Let's spend a few hours building that strategy first and then we could figure out how we're going to apply the tools and the features.
Jason Kramer:Yeah.
Freddie:Because those are two different things.
Jason Kramer:Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Freddie:I know the answer, but I'm going to ask you to say the answer.
Freddie:How important is the data that you put into the CRM?
Jason Kramer:If you want crappy data out, then you got to put good data in.
Jason Kramer:Data obviously is king.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:What I think goes beyond that is the center of truth.
Jason Kramer:So what I often see sometimes Freddie and larger organizations that maybe have multiple systems is that they have their data living in multiple places.
Jason Kramer:They have their data living in a quoting tool and a project management tool and an accounting tool in QuickBooks and wherever.
Jason Kramer:And so what happens is if you need to update a record, oh, Jason's title changed, his phone number changed, his email address changed.
Jason Kramer:Where do you do that?
Jason Kramer:Do you do it in every single piece of software?
Jason Kramer:Probably not.
Jason Kramer:You're probably doing it in the software that you as your role.
Jason Kramer:If you're the bookkeeper, you're probably doing it in the accounting software and nowhere else.
Jason Kramer:So you need to have what we call like a center of truth, which sometimes could be an external sort of database.
Jason Kramer:We Build for clients that manages all that data and connects it all.
Jason Kramer:Because I think that's where data can get messy very quickly, is if you have different teams using different systems.
Jason Kramer:The other big thing, I think that's a huge misconception.
Jason Kramer:There's so many companies out there selling data.
Jason Kramer:I won't mention any names, but no, data you buy is 100% bulletproof and is perfect.
Jason Kramer:We've seen time and time again companies assuming, oh yeah, I got this list from this trade show or this manufacturer gave me a list of their vendors or whoever.
Jason Kramer:Regardless of where you get it, my one thing I would say strongly to anybody listening, even if you're using a product like mailchimp, it doesn't matter.
Jason Kramer:Before you send out an email to a list, definitely run that through an independent, what we call an email hygiene tool and check the quality of that list.
Jason Kramer:Especially in the smaller businesses, if you start sending out emails to bad lists, you're potentially going to get blacklisted.
Jason Kramer:Your domain credibility can go way down sometimes.
Jason Kramer:It's going to be irreversible.
Jason Kramer:You can get blacklisted on Gmail.
Jason Kramer:There's all these really bad things that can happen that you may not even realize are happening until it's too late.
Jason Kramer:That would be something I would definitely urge because that's all part of this.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:We talked about nurturing and a lot of nurturing is done via email.
Jason Kramer:And so that would be one thing I would just leave with is the importance of having good quality data, good quality email addresses.
Freddie:And the other thing too, I think that to continue on that is having conversations logged in one place for a individual within an organization.
Freddie:So if you're talking to Mary sue at some company, all the correspondence should be, all the emails, all the text messages, all the phone calls, all the notes should be there.
Freddie:Because if you're not there and some other customer support person needs to step in and they have no idea what's been going on, that's disastrous because Mary Sue's going to go, what's going on with this company?
Freddie:It's just a major negative impression to that customer.
Jason Kramer:100%.
Jason Kramer:Couldn't agree more.
Jason Kramer:Yeah, it's.
Jason Kramer:And a lot of it can be automated.
Jason Kramer:Like, again, like you don't have to copy and paste every email you send.
Jason Kramer:It could be linked right into the CRM to their profile, text messages, it could LinkedIn, voicemails, audio.
Jason Kramer:Audio messages.
Freddie:In today's world, you get all that stuff.
Jason Kramer:Yeah.
Jason Kramer:You don't have to do anything.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:With the calendar, the appointments you had Are all there.
Jason Kramer:So, yeah, now's the time to really use the technology.
Jason Kramer:Remember tools like Goldmine and other original CRMs, they were a lot more clunky, a lot more manual.
Jason Kramer:Now, like AI, Even when note taking data meetings, like the notes are being taken for you, next steps are being written for you.
Jason Kramer:It's, it's pretty incredible of what's available if you know how to use it.
Jason Kramer:Yeah.
Freddie:And that's glad you brought up AI because that was something I was going to bring up.
Freddie:That's a game changer if you implement it properly.
Freddie:I was in a networking group and this woman in our group was talking about that.
Freddie:She was chatting with somebody and was getting answers and everything else.
Freddie:Then about 10 minutes into a chat conversation, she realized that she was talking to a robot.
Freddie:It was as if it was a human being, but she got her stuff and then she was actually connected to a live person.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Freddie:Once it got to a certain point.
Freddie:But that's a huge game changer in being able to engage with prospective customers, existing customers, providing excellent customer support, leveraging technology the proper way.
Freddie:Absolutely, yeah.
Freddie:And that's to me, how you start creating super fans is taking care of one is the team, edifying the team that you've got working for you.
Freddie:But more importantly, that team is now engaging with the customers, your suppliers, your distributors.
Freddie:So you creating a total experience where all the stakeholders are involved in what's going on in your organization, both customers, suppliers, distributors, employees, management.
Freddie:So now it's a holistic approach and those businesses that implement that whole aspect and just like you said, implement the tools properly that they need could only go one way, skyrocket, because they got everybody behind them.
Jason Kramer:Absolutely.
Jason Kramer:So it's all about adoption, about everybody having also accountability.
Jason Kramer:And that's one of the main factors of why these systems fail, is because there is no accountability in an organization.
Jason Kramer:So if you have the recognition, I always say there's a few things, right.
Jason Kramer:You have to have somebody there that's going to be the champion, that's going to take ownership of saying, we're going to do this, we recognize as a problem and we're going to stand behind it and make sure it gets done.
Jason Kramer:You have them also doing the part.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:So it's not just saying, hey, sales team, go do this.
Jason Kramer:They're doing it themselves, they're in the trenches, they're using the software, they're putting in data.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:They're doing what they want their team to do.
Jason Kramer:Yeah.
Freddie:I'm going to expand upon it.
Freddie:It's got to be a collective approach.
Freddie:Yes, because customer service is one end.
Freddie:Delivery, if it's a service or a product has got to be part of the conversation.
Freddie:Sales got to be part of conversation.
Freddie:Marketing has got to be conversation.
Freddie:But I think one of the biggest things is empowerment.
Freddie:You have to empower your team to be able to make decisions and be able to go ahead and take the initiative to do stuff versus telling them that they've got to do stuff.
Freddie:Whole different ballgame because they got ownership in it.
Freddie:If they are empowered and if they.
Jason Kramer:Realize also that it's going to be a helpful tool, it's not something that I think a big misconception when it comes to the world of sales tools, sales CRM, whatever it might be, it's, oh, this is going to be more work for me.
Jason Kramer:I'm having to do double data entry.
Jason Kramer:And so if things are designed properly, that concern should be out the window pretty quickly for a company.
Freddie:I used to have back decades ago, I created templates and when I would go do a presentation to, let's say, a manufacturing company, and we would get all the people into the presentation, so it'd be the guys from the shop floor, be management there, be the owner of the company, et cetera, I made sure that I got everybody's name.
Freddie:Then when we got done with the presentation, I would go back to the office, I would send them all a thank you letter, thank you for taking the time out of your busy day to look at our product and blah, blah, blah, et cetera.
Freddie:Jason, you're the guy on the shop floor running the milling machine.
Freddie:A couple days later, you get a letter that I was sending letters back then, and you'd open it up and you go, wow.
Freddie:You felt important because nobody recognizes you.
Freddie:You're in a shop floor and all of a sudden everybody got a letter.
Freddie:So everybody felt appreciated.
Freddie:And we would win more sales because of the fact it set the mindset that at post sale we would provide the best support to wrap that part of it up is it's important to have systems in place like you said, because I had systems in place decades ago.
Freddie:They weren't as automated, but they still were automated.
Jason Kramer:Of course, the point piece, I think I would say is they were repetitive.
Jason Kramer:That's the key.
Jason Kramer:Yeah.
Freddie:Do you have another story that you'd like to share about one of your successes or what makes you guys rock stars?
Jason Kramer:I would say what our differentiator is the fact that the world we live in, Freddie, isn't a one and done, meaning we're not designing a brochure or designing a logo and saying, hey, it's done.
Jason Kramer:A CRM is a living and breathing thing and you need a team that's going to not just do all the things we spoke about, help you with strategy, help you figure out how to integrate to your current processes and technology you're using to build it for you, to show you how to use it, but you also need a team that's going to stay with you day after day, week after week, month after month, indefinitely, to make sure that the system is doing what it's set out to do.
Jason Kramer:Are the email campaigns you're sending getting the engagement, getting the results you're looking for?
Jason Kramer:Is the website forms bringing in the type of data that you're hoping that you could actually use in segment, are they working properly?
Jason Kramer:Are those advertising campaigns that you set up still tracking properly?
Jason Kramer:Is anybody monitoring that?
Jason Kramer:How is that going to integrate to the CRM?
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:A lot of times these things are thought of as an afterthought and not before.
Jason Kramer:And so the biggest differentiator, I would say, beyond everything that we spoke about Freddie today, is that we are here as a partner.
Jason Kramer:I don't think of us as a vendor to our clients.
Jason Kramer:I truly think as us as an extension of their team and we become family almost to them.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:And we're on that first name basis where they're a phone call away, a zoom call, an email away whenever there's a question and there's that comfort level to say, we need to run this by Jason and his team before we actually go forward with this, to make sure that we're not missing anything.
Jason Kramer:And that's what we try to embody in terms of the relationship we have, is that just run something by us, just let us give us our input on it.
Jason Kramer:Not to say that we're the experts in everything, but if there's any room for a potential chance that the CRM can have an impact on something you're thinking about, it should definitely be considered to talk with us.
Jason Kramer:And that's what's been, I think, a huge differentiator.
Jason Kramer:And I know that Freddie, because years ago, when I started this company, about six years ago now, we didn't really stay on board as much as we do today.
Jason Kramer:We, we were like, okay, if you need support, you're here, we're here for you, here's our number.
Jason Kramer:But we weren't proactively pushing to want to have these conversations.
Jason Kramer:Even clients today that we've had for years, where we speak a very Minimum once a month.
Jason Kramer:How's everything going?
Jason Kramer:I know that we spoke about this a few months ago.
Jason Kramer:Just want to see everything is working out the way you expected.
Jason Kramer:I'll go into the account myself even if I'm not asked to.
Jason Kramer:You just make sure everything is working as it should be.
Jason Kramer:If I see anything, I'll let them know.
Jason Kramer:So I'm proactively trying to make sure that their everything is good on their end because I don't want to be on the flip side of that, which when software, you don't want to be on the receiving end.
Jason Kramer:Hey, there's a problem and you're finding out it from a customer.
Jason Kramer:You want to find out about the custom problem first and inform the customer about it.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:Because that shows you're being proactive.
Freddie:That formula you just laid out is how you create super fans out of customers.
Freddie:Because as I look at all the testimonials on your website, those are all super fans that actually took the time to give you a testimonial is by being proactive and engaging with them versus being reactive.
Freddie:Because reactive you're already in trouble.
Jason Kramer:Exactly.
Jason Kramer:Nobody wants, nobody wants to be reactive.
Freddie:If you are in a position.
Freddie:I worked with an interpreting and translation company and I grew them a little over a million dollars in a year.
Freddie:The answer again was speed.
Freddie:Acknowledge the issue.
Freddie:First off, understand where they're coming from and how fast can you fix it.
Freddie:And people will because things happen.
Freddie:It's life.
Freddie:But the fact that you're on top of it.
Freddie:You acknowledge it and then you go out of your way to get it resolved.
Freddie:Those are the secrets to creating super fans.
Freddie:When things make a left hand turn.
Jason Kramer:Yeah.
Jason Kramer:And you become also, I think that resource.
Jason Kramer:The one thing I'll say for these younger businesses that are listening today, I've helped many clients with things that I know nothing about because I know other people.
Jason Kramer:Right.
Jason Kramer:Jason, Our website's down or this is problems happening.
Jason Kramer:That problem's happening.
Jason Kramer:Or I can't get in touch with.
Jason Kramer:Now they're not asking, they're more in some cases just venting.
Jason Kramer:But I'll be like, hey, Freddie, I know an amazing.
Jason Kramer:For example, we just started working with a company that does apparel like T shirt embroidery and all that great stuff and promotional products.
Jason Kramer:I was like, how was your weekend, Mike?
Jason Kramer:He's good, he's.
Jason Kramer:I spent hours and hours on my Shopify site trying to upload things and I really don't know what I'm doing.
Jason Kramer:I said, listen, I don't know if you want any help But I know an amazing person that's like awesome at Shopify.
Jason Kramer:I can make an introduction, maybe they can help out.
Jason Kramer:And had nothing to do with what I do.
Jason Kramer:I was trying to help out a new client and within three days he spoke to my contact, he emailed me and actually made a point to call me and say thanks for introducing me to Beverly.
Jason Kramer:She was great.
Jason Kramer:I don't need her right this second.
Jason Kramer:I'm definitely going to work with her because she knew exactly what she's doing and it's going to be a great asset for me.
Freddie:And there's a super fan.
Jason Kramer:That's all it is.
Freddie:Right?
Freddie:That's how you create a super fan.
Freddie:Cost you nothing.
Freddie:Yeah, little goodwill.
Jason Kramer:Exactly.
Freddie:Super fans are your biggest brand advocates because they're going to tell everybody they're going to write reviews.
Freddie:And today reviews is the new word of mouth.
Jason Kramer:That's right.
Freddie:Jason, as we wrap up here, tell us how people can find you and what kind of offer do you have for our audience?
Jason Kramer:Sure.
Jason Kramer:First off, Freddie, this was a great conversation.
Jason Kramer:I really want to thank you for having me on today and to have what I thought was really good topical, important things that a lot of businesses really need to be thinking about if they're not already thinking about.
Jason Kramer:So I'm all over social media.
Jason Kramer:You can find me Jason Kramer and Cultivize.
Jason Kramer:But the easiest thing to do Freddie would be go to afterthelead.com just like it sounds after the lead.
Jason Kramer:Com on there.
Jason Kramer:There's three things that they can get Freddie.
Jason Kramer:So one thing is I talked before about education is so paramount.
Jason Kramer:You could sign up for our newsletter.
Jason Kramer:Just an email address.
Jason Kramer:We don't send out nonsense and garbage.
Jason Kramer:It's only really good content about resources.
Jason Kramer:When it comes to email marketing about CRM, sales enablement, lead nurturing, all the things we spoke about and much more.
Jason Kramer:There's also a playbook that I wrote Freddie which is a 13 page guide on how to actually build a lead nurturing campaign almost regardless of the CRM system you have.
Jason Kramer:And so it gives you all the step by step with examples.
Jason Kramer:Uh, it's a really great roadmap for anybody that's not doing lead nurturing.
Jason Kramer:Get download that for free.
Jason Kramer:And the last thing is I'm always.
Jason Kramer:You mentioned before about all these lunch and learns which I thought was great.
Jason Kramer:And you're like I'm not selling.
Jason Kramer:I'm just here to, to teach and to educate for all your listeners.
Jason Kramer:I offered to do a one hour call with any of your listeners that have any questions about anything we spoke about today.
Jason Kramer:It's not a sales call.
Jason Kramer:It's just me being friendly to help out.
Jason Kramer:And so you could book that meeting after the lead.com as well.
Freddie:Jason, great information for our audience.
Freddie:And the importance of really implementing a good CRM and multitude of other systems collectively into one hub is paramount for today's success.
Freddie:And thank you again for being a guest on the show and we look forward to having you as a guest down the road.
Jason Kramer:Sounds good.
Jason Kramer:Thank you so much.
