An informative presentation was given by the leadership of the VOC program to MLC members last month, and we’d like to share both the audio and accompanying slides from that webinar. The take-aways include:

• How the MLC assessed nominations for this prestigious award (sorry, no slides for this portion)
• The drivers and process for creating a customer reference program
• An alternative approach to fulfilling customer reference requests, which is typically extremely labor-intensive and reactive
• An approach to measuring the value of not only this VOC, but any VOC program

Enjoy!

The work involved in getting raw data extracts from CRM systems, home-grown operational systems, wikis, Sharepoint and others, is not for the faint of heart. We happen to have a Data Rock Star on our team, and a very capable support staff that can turn the barely-usable into clean, reliable information for the reference team’s benefit.

The main point here is reaffirmation of the oft-used, but true cliche “Garbage In, Garbage Out.” Before considering any reference management system, do what’s necessary to ensure the data you want to import is clean, consistent and reliable. The extra upfront effort will make the import process less stressful and expensive, and ultimately yield a better database down the road. Here are some other data considerations/tips:

• Continue to ask the question, “Will this data be essential to the customer reference team’s needs?” Try not to pollute the RMS with data that won’t get touched, and will therefor fall out-of-date quickly and simply clutter your database.
• Find a solid data resource in your IT department that not only has technical skills, but has the skills to ask how you intend to use it in your RMS. That leads to discussions about whether it needs to be refreshed or synced, and if so, how frequently.
• Take ownership of the data. This seems obvious, but so often the data becomes somewhat overwhelming and the true ownership is ceded to providers like us. It’s critical that you understand your data when the project is complete and that means playing an active part in the strategy and QA of the data.
• Make sure that things like product names and the hierarchy related to names (e.g., family, segment, etc.) you standardize on make sense to the primary end users (Sales). That means you may need to resolve differences between how marketing thinks of these things, and how Sales does—before populating the RMS.
• Accept that data changes over time. Once the initial data migration project ends, fields will be added, fields will be removed, new logic will be applied to prepare new data, etc. The customer reference database is a living, evolving thing. Expect change and when it’s called for it won’t be traumatic.

An article was recently published on BtoB online providing some tips for getting the most out of this channel for B2B video. We especially liked these recommendations:

• Give videos a “face”
  We are huge proponents of letting customers do the talking for your products/solutions. In fact, the informal customer videos can be very compelling if done right. When you pick the “face,” be sure there’s nothing about the individual that distracts from the story. When we assist our clients with this style of video we typically arrange to listen in via speakerphone. There are usually a few key pieces of the story that our client wants to ensure come through in the video. So we offer light guidance if the customer goes off track. These videos must be no more than 3-5 minutes. Listening in also gives us an opportunity to ensure the final video isn’t a long, unwatchable dissertation.
• Be funny (on purpose)
  The point here is to make sure that there isn’t something unintentionally funny in the video which causes it to go viral and do more harm than good. That’s the job of the reference program to make sure their customers are shown in a positive light. Quirky can be fine, as long as it isn’t made fun of all over the web.

This article also contains a link to a best practices guide from Google (YouTube’s owner) that’s worth reading. And it’s only 2 pages long! Enjoy.

We’re often asked to help companies put together their customer content strategy. To begin, we share our version of a well-known quadrant diagram to set a foundation for how we approach content in reference to the sales cycle. Each type of customer content has a place, but in formulating a strategy, one cannot confuse how various categories relate to each other from the perspective of the sales team.

As you can see, we plot each type of content in terms of level of candor and level of detail. Like any sort of relationship, the deeper you get in terms of commitment, the more you expect in the way of candor and detail. Website testimonials may serve well to move a “suspect” to a “lead,” but won’t help convert a “prospect” to a customer. Why? Because testimonials tend to be low on both candor and detail. However, they serve an important purpose for the inside sales team filling the pipeline.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, late stage, there are few content types that suffice when it comes to due diligence. Live customer interactions are ideal, but sole reliance on them isn’t a scalable approach. But granular, recorded one-on-one interviews and recorded reference forum calls (Q&A between one customer, many prospects) fill the need. They are, by design, far too candid and detailed for an early stage prospect.

Each Program is Different

We recognize that there are different flavors of, for instance, case studies. They range from the one page, 300-word summaries to 10-page ROI studies. If you were to plot each of the content types your program produces on this grid their positions could vary from ours, and that’s to be expected. Each customer reference program approaches things slightly differently. The value of going through the exercise, however, doesn’t change. It will help you understand where gaps exist relative to demand. You may have a gap and it’s intentional—i.e., sales people don’t need content support at that stage. The point, ultimately, is to be more thoughtful in the allocation of your finite content development budget.

The Importance of Measurement

After completing a thorough inventory and gap analysis it’s essential to build some form of measurement into your content management approach. Tracking use of content to revenue closed and understanding why certain, specific content items are used more often than others to close business is the closed loop that makes what is usually an art into more of a science. The most effective way to do that is by associating sales opportunity IDs to content use, and periodically reporting on revenue influenced.

Here’s a list of recommendations for adapting to the “hyper-social world”:

• Let go of control and empower customers to tell their own stories
• Make sure all your customer stories are customer-centric to a fault
• Think tribes, not market-segments
• Don’t pay for your customer references
• Forget information channels and think knowledge networks

We’ve been exclusively focused on supporting B2B customer reference programs for 7 years now. There has definitely been a shift away from incentives for references, telling the customer’s story (not so much the vendor’s), and toward more credible and authentic customer stories in audio, video and text. On the social media front, many clients have established online customer communities, customer advisory councils, and begun gathering more “customer-sourced” content.

Yes, it’s still “gathered” because sales people still need an easy, timely way to find successful customer “proof points” in order to serve the needs of prospective buyers (and close deals). Even in B2C it can be hard to find customer stories/reviews that are meaningful and sufficiently plentiful. That problem is multiplied in six, seven or eight figure B2B deals.

The role of the reference program is becoming that of the customer networking nerve center, irrespective of the latest and greatest tools/sites (Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.) that operate independent of the vendor. The smart program managers always saw themselves in this light. There are plenty of companies still stuck in the old paradigm of churning out written case studies to meet some arbitrary quota—and consider that a reference program. But those situations are the anomaly from our experience.

We, the founders of Point of Reference, come from a sales background. As such we see things through the lens of the sales force. If the customer reference program doesn’t start with the sales perspective, we believe it’s unlikely to be successful. So when we talk to companies in the early stages of building their case, we recommend beginning with a survey of the field. There are a number of questions that should be asked, and there will be variation from organization to organization, but here are a few we feel are “must haves”:

• What percentage of your deals require customer references in order to close?
• On average, how many customers make up any single request (e.g., I need to talk to 3 of your customers)?
• How are you finding those customers today (this list should reflect your environment)?
• On average, how much calendar time elapses from a request to fulfillment?
• On average, how many hours do you spend on any given request?
• On average, what percentage of the reference interactions you arrange actually hurt your chances of closing the deal?
• How many of your customers have asked to be rested or taken off your reference list in the last year due to overuse?

These questions create a baseline of understanding, and also a basis of comparison for a survey you’ll want to run after the program has been launched and the kinks worked out. The key take-aways are related to sales efficiency, the risks of having reactive/unorganized customer reference practices as well as the potential to damage your most valuable customer relationships.

Use the feedback you get from sales to set targets for reducing and monetizing the time spent by sales rounding up references, to reduce this portion of the sales process (e.g., accelerate the cycle), to ensure all references help the process, and that customer overuse becomes a thing of the past. Coupled with arguably the most meaningful metric programs have today, revenue influenced, you’ll gave a strong starting point for building your customer reference program case.

For more resources on building a program and achieving successful user adoption, visit our reference program tools page. As always, we welcome your comments.

Map Content to the Buying Cycle

Understanding how Sales uses the content your customer reference program generates/manages and ensuring you’re providing good coverage is a hallmark of an effective program. Within Galen’s post is a link to Ardath Albee’s 7 stages of a sales cycle. This is a little different and worth taking a look at as you map your content. Her stages are:

The 7 Stages of the Buying Process

• Status Quo:  Prospects have not yet recognized the problem as one they need to solve.
• Priority:  The problem has been recognized but prospects are unsure which route is best for solution.
• Research:  Prospects are now actively engaged in learning what they need to know, building confidence.
• Options:  Learning about solution sets that will best fit immediate and future needs is underway.
• Step Backs:  Something has arisen that’s made the prospect return to an earlier stage to verify beliefs.
• Validation:  You’re on the short list and now the prospect wants to know if you can deliver on promises.
• Choice:  The decision to buy must move from intent to reality with the purchase and implementation.

Point of Reference Commentary: We encourage all clients to “tag” all the content in their library to 1 or more stages of the sales/buying cycle and even provide features to make finding and using those stage-appropriate collections in ReferenceStor, our reference management system (RMS), super simple and painless. As it should be.

Review your content analytics

Analytics can be great, but too often we fail to actually learn from them.Take a look at last year’s numbers for the content on your site.

• What was the most popular content?
• What did these visitors do?
• What were the conversion rates?

Point of Reference Commentary: Our technology solutions have been capturing answers to these questions for 7 years now. And most importantly, we capture what prospects are responding to, not just what was sent by sales users. When it comes to conversion rates, we associate opportunity IDs with the content accessed so our clients can show Revenue Influenced relative to won deals.

2010 promises to be an interesting, probably a see-saw sort of year economically. It’ll be a year of spending only on what makes sense and making sure the sales team doesn’t miss a beat in meeting each prospective customer’s needs at each stage of the sales cycle. Here’s to a more efficient use of your content dollars in the new year!

-          Length. Don’t make them too long; In most of our initial conversations with clients the length of the podcast is the first thing we suggest should be cut back. If the content is going to run past 20 minutes you should definitely split it into a series, and ideally keep the length under 15 minutes max.

-          Serialization. Related to the above, a series is better than a one-off. Particularly where sales is concerned, a series gives you more opportunities to illustrate another way in which the Customer Reference Program is supporting their selling efforts, and (if the podcasts are for external consumption – see next item) gives them more relevant evidence and another reason for a valuable conversation with their prospective client

-          Audience. External / internal podcasts; internal podcasts can be an excellent way to expand the water cooler conversations to your global sales community. Every sales person wants to know ‘how did you close that deal?’, and to have the best tips and tricks learned from their colleagues. A podcast is an excellent way to achieve this.

-          Delivery mechanism. Creating a podcast is one thing, but how do you intend to get it in the hands of the recipients? Through the sales portal? Via iTunes? Available directly from the public website? Make sure you’ve got this part mapped out – and the internal / external resources on board – before you embark on the podcast series, or you’ll have some great assets gathering dust.

-          Topic. It seems obvious, but when you relate it to the first two items above, do you have enough sales-worthy content to warrant a podcast series, or does it just seem like a cool idea?

Do you have other items you’d add to this best practice list? Please feel free to share, and as always, any other thoughts and comments are welcomed!

Compuware launches $1 million giveaway for customer testimonials

Surely it couldn’t mean Compuware is paying, publicly!, for customer success stories. I saved it to read this morning when I could give it a bit more time. Turns out, it is for real and Compuware “plans to award $1 million to a business customer of its mainframe software with the best story about its use and cost savings.”

What’s interesting is that all the customers’ stories will be under non-disclosure and will “not be used in future marketing campaigns.” I wonder if that also means the stories won’t be leveraged in any sort of customer reference activities. Seems like a big lost opportunity if that’s the case.

If your company launched this compaign, what would you do? Celebrate, cringe, or something else?