Speaker 1: 0:00

In today's fast-paced digital landscape, having a robust customer relationship management strategy isn't just an option, it's a necessity. But it's not just about the tools and technology. It's about adopting the right mindset to leverage those tools effectively. How do you build meaningful relationships with your customers? How can you use data to drive personalized marketing efforts and, most importantly, how do you ensure your CRM strategies align with your overall business goals? Today, I am going to explore these questions and more with my business partner and COO of Buzzworthy Marketing, Tori Barker. We will both share insights on how marketers develop and execute a CRM strategy that truly resonates with their audience. Whether you're just starting out or looking to refine your existing approach, this episode is packed with valuable tips and strategies to help you elevate your CRM game. Welcome to the Buzzworthy Marketing Show. What's up, Tori?

Speaker 2: 1:11

Hey, how's it going.

Speaker 1: 1:12

Doing. Well, you've got a little. Are we up and awake? Here We've got the East Coast meets the West Coast today, kind of early in Tori's morning, early afternoon for Mr Baczynski here in Virginia. Today we're talking about customer relationship management, or, as I like to say, because we're always talking B2B client relationship management right, because we don't have customers in B2B, we have clients, we have partners. I love partners. You know, like people are like, well, our partners are blah, blah, blah. So I'm like, so, like business partners, a vendor partner, a JV partner, like, just say, clients, people it's not nobody's being fooled here Like you're, unless you have equity, actually like hold stock or private equity, you don't, you're not a partner, I partner. I just want to put that out there. That's one of my. I'll get off my high horse on that one.

Speaker 2: 2:09

There's your rant for the day.

Speaker 1: 2:10

That's my soapbox for the day. Right there, I'm just like, yes, I have friends who do it too, and I just kind of have to snicker. I was like partner, partner, we're talking, partner, anyway, that's an NFL. Anyway, we digress. So CRMs so what is a CRM? Let's, let's start right there. I'm going to let you take the definition of a CRM.

Speaker 2: 2:36

Yeah, so CRM stands for client relationship management and it's a tool that you use to manage your clients, manage your marketing and the reputation of what you're doing for your clients.

Speaker 1: 2:48

Yep, I think that's pretty good. Booyah Right there on the point, right there. More like deeper into that. I think that for the folks who like the bait, they're past the 101, right. So, because I want to talk to both our beginner listeners and I wanted to and our folks who have already have CRMs, and how we can better utilize them today.

Speaker 1: 3:11

So we're going to flip back on both sides of this coin and, in the deeper sense, I feel that CRMs are a gateway into your communication ecosystem with both your current clients and your potential clients. And if you can just think about ways that you would love to talk to your clients and just imagine it like in a perfect world, if there are a hundred of me to talk to every client every day in every way that I possibly could think of, how would I do that? Right, if I could text him every day with something, or maybe every week, it doesn't matter email calls, whatever, it is right. A good CRM is gonna allow you or facilitate every one of those dreams, with very little exception, right, would you agree?

Speaker 2: 4:04

Absolutely 100%.

Speaker 1: 4:05

So when we're looking at that, it so if we came with into, because a lot of people are like I need a crm to keep track of my sales pipeline, and I'm like, yes, that that's a basic of crms and for a long time that's all crms did, right, like salesforce and a couple of, and nothing against them. Today, a lot of them are very robust, I would say, for most small businesses and I'm talking businesses that have less than a hundred employees and sales teams that have no more than maybe even 20 salespeople right, most of the CRMs, the enterprise level CRMs, are way too much right.

Speaker 1: 4:51

And they cost an exorbitant amount of money, right? So I think that it's important for small businesses not to get wrapped up into the hype of these. You know, I'm going to say it out loud, hubspot it's not my favorite, right, and everybody, everybody talks, I mean, in the industry. There are actual HubSpot agencies, just like there are Salesforce agencies out there.

Speaker 1: 5:15

Right, we're fortunate enough to have a CRM that is specifically tuned to B2B service providers, business consultants and fractionals, right, and these are made for companies that are doing 10 million and less in revenue, all the way down to our newbies, right, we've got clients that are just starting out their first year and they're like I need to network, but I can't keep up in my email all of the things I'm doing. I need a CRM to keep track of all these conversations and start automating some of my reminders and scheduling out things and all that good stuff. And so I think that when we think about, like, the dream of the communication ecosystem in our business, that right there, like, I think that just shifts the entire mindset into a marketer's mindset, because as marketers, that's what we do, right. We sit down with a client and they're like I want to do X, y, z, and then we go back and we go, okay, we close our eyes and we're like what are all the things we could possibly do that could facilitate that objective right?

Speaker 1: 6:23

And then we open our eyes and we go, okay, this is impossible, this is, this is viable, this isn't going to do anything, it's gonna be a waste of time, right. And then we come back to the client we say, okay, here it is Right, and I think from you know, that's the why is it that we limit what we can or should do with our CRMs? What do you think?

Speaker 2: 6:51

Why do we limit what we can do with it?

Speaker 1: 6:53

Yeah, like when we're working with clients. How many times we work with clients that are just like well, I only needed to do X, y, z, right. It's like why are we? Why is it that you think that most people limit what they even want to do or could dream to do with their CRM?

Speaker 2: 7:10

Well, I think a lot of it has to do with understanding or fear right. So, unless, unless a client or a business owner kind of has an understanding of what they need, what they want and how want you, you know, have somebody to help them guide them through that then, the idea of trying to manage that on their own becomes a nightmare and like you've said, crm systems are so jam-packed with uh, tools, resources, you know, automations, whatever it might be, it's like the sky's the limit when you go into this, this CRM.

Speaker 2: 7:46

So it's overwhelmed too, and you know what we usually do is, you know, piece by piece, let's implement one piece at a time. It's it's not the full Monty, if you will. You want to make sure that you you touch on the pieces that are most important first. Once you get that done, you move to the next one, so on and so on.

Speaker 1: 8:05

Yeah, I think that you hit the nail on the head when you talk about overwhelm, right, and I think overwhelm is such a cliche nowadays, right, everybody's like. Are you stuck on overwhelm? Another marketing, another word that has been killed by marketers? Right? But, yes, I think that if we, if we think like we were talking about, if we think about it just one step at a time, right. And so Stephen Covey has a statement that says start with the end in mind, but first things first, right. And so, if we do start with closing our eyes and saying where are all the things? We, if I could have whatever I wanted automated for me in my communication ecosystem, what would it look like? And I wrote all of that down and then prioritized that list and then just went from the top and worked my way down as I was able, right, because some of the stuff, yeah, some of the technology, is a little more expensive than others, right. So, yeah, some of it's gonna have to wait, so it goes on the bottom of the list.

Speaker 1: 9:03

But as you get better and better with the stuff that you can start with, you're going to be making more and more money and you're going to be setting aside a little bit more and more so that you can have a more robust ecosystem, so that you can leverage your technology in a way that is going to increase your close rates is increase your retention rate, right?

Speaker 1: 9:25

It's going to increase your attribute, your attribution tracking, right. You're going to know what it takes to get a client. How many meetings does it take, what, what messages resonate, what follow-up sequences actually work and which ones don't. I mean, there's all of these things that serums do and I think that's like you said, it's just so overwhelming because one as a, as a user, you, you know how to run your business and unless your business is CRMs, you, like, I don't know what you don't know Right, so right. So when we look at like, when we talk about first things first, what would you think, like the first thing somebody must do with their CRM? What do you think the like, the absolute first thing is in a CRM and implementing a CRM for a small business?

Speaker 2: 10:16

Yeah, so I mean obvious, the obvious right, the CRM system. The base of it is managing your contacts. So you have to put your contacts in there so you can start to see what those contacts are doing. It also helps you to to understand who you have on your list, right, so you can. You can organize and categorize your contacts based on, you know, referrals or past clients or prospects, whatever that might be. It gives you a way to sort and organize your list in a certain way that you can use for marketing. So next thing, right once you have your contacts in there, automate your marketing emails.

Speaker 2: 10:55

I mean that's the easiest thing to start with because if there are, for example, a couple of cases you know examples, newsletters People do monthly newsletters or quarterly newsletters. Well, usually they'll take, you know, hours to put this content together where in a CRM system, they have a consistent template or consistent layout that they use. They have a consistent template or consistent layout that they use and if they build that within their CRM system, it will automate and optimize the time that you use to create and generate those newsletters.

Speaker 2: 11:30

So, that saves you so much time. And then you can create batch, create right, that's another thing, that's really cool about it is you can sit down for an hour and put two, three newsletters together and then schedule them out over the next two to three months right um another. Another really cool piece of it is is is um, if you have somebody sign up for um, you know to receive a uh free pdf of whatever it is that you offer.

Speaker 2: 11:56

you can have an automated email that sends them that PDF, so you don't have to wait and see it in your inbox. Make sure that you go back and respond in time to send them that PDF. It can automatically be sent to them, and then you can, you know, have a thank you or whatever follow-up sequence you want for that type of a marketing campaign.

Speaker 1: 12:15

Yes, I'd love that.

Speaker 1: 12:16

Like the follow-up sequences I think are the yeah, I mean, even if you don't have a newsletter, because a lot of people are like they were, like I'm never doing a newsletter, okay, that's fine, don't do a newsletter.

Speaker 1: 12:24

But if you have a phone call, if you have a VTC or video to video meeting with somebody, if you left a message and you know you, all of these things can have automated follow ups, right? And in some of these CRMs, like we have a CRM, the BuzzHub CRM, and it allows us to where, when we schedule an appointment, that they get an SMS text message the day before to remind hey, we're looking forward to meeting with you tomorrow at XYZ, right, and then one more and an email to follow up with that, and then another, another text message right before hey, uh, uh, really looking forward to seeing you in about an hour or a half hour, wherever you time it, to like, how, if you could do that for every one of your meetings so that you had a higher show rate, because, like, nine times out of 10, people just forget it's yeah, it's in their calendar.

Speaker 2: 13:20

Especially if they book further in advance right Anything more than-. If they book like a month out yeah, oh, that's even worse, right.

Speaker 1: 13:27

And then okay, so say you are. I mean, here's a, that's a great. Another case study would be creating a sequence, for we just did this for a client. They had the same problem, like sometimes their consults are over seven days away. So we created a email and sms sequence that alternated over that time, and the first one was some initial information that we're going to have to say in the meeting anyway, right? So yeah, let's go ahead and educate them a little bit. All right, awesome.

Speaker 1: 14:01

The next one was another piece of good, like a little tidbit of information and really getting them like ready to talk about and be excited about that conversation. And as it got closer, it moved over to the SMS right, and how we're excited, and those types of things. And we actually even automated the or not automated, but used variable data to fill in the blanks. So it became um, personalized specifically to that person, not just their name, like yeah and name, whatever, but what they're going to actually talk about, right? Yep, I got telling you guys like this stuff can do pretty much anything you can imagine, and that is going to change how you look and how soon you start looking if you don't already have one, a crm because I don't think that any successful business has ever reached seven figures without a crm in this day and age, like in the day we didn't have this technology.

Speaker 1: 14:59

When I first I made my first million, my Google inbox, my Gmail, was my CRM, right, I had follow it Like I would like make tasks and follow up and snooze when they, when they first came out with snooze, that was the coolest thing for me, cause I'm like I'm going to follow this person, so I'm just going to snooze it till it comes back into my inbox, right, and it goes away, but it's not archived and it doesn't disappear. But then it pops back up when I need it there and it has my whole conversation with them. That thus far Right. So I had a system that got me to seven figures that way and I'm sure you could. But I'm telling you right now, now that I CRM system and for the years that we've had it 10 times easier, like, oh my gosh, like there's so much time wasted looking for conversations and missing key appointments because you forgot to follow up.

Speaker 1: 15:50

And follow up, I think, is like the number one thing. There's a study that says that it used to be it takes seven follow ups, the average. The average, what was it? I'm going. It takes seven follow-ups, the average, what was it? I'm going to mess this up, guys, so don't quote me, but it's very close to this. Like the average salesperson and if you're an owner who sells your stuff, you're a salesperson gives up after three no's or three follow-ups, right. And then the above average was like seven, right.

Speaker 2: 16:22

But I was just reading a book where they talked about something like this.

Speaker 1: 16:25

It was interesting right, and so I don't know what the number in your book was, but I want to say it like the, the top performers there's like 16 is where they. They'll be like okay, it's dead by then. Now they have different. You know certain metrics that get them to that point. But what if you but the night? The worst thing is is that without a crm, you forget to go ask for the next no, yep, right, because you have to ask enough. You have to ask for enough no's to get yes, like all people like go ask for the yes, no, go figure out why it's no again. And so because if they said no, that just means you haven't given enough information to say yes. So all you're doing is adding to the conversation and seeing if it's still no is it still no?

Speaker 1: 17:18

right. It's pretty cool. It's a pretty cool way of looking at right. Like a lot of people are like, I'm always looking for the yes, yeah, but if they're telling you no all the time, why? If you could just answer?

Speaker 2: 17:27

that question. Why are they saying no?

Speaker 1: 17:29

Oh, okay, and sometimes it's hey, it's not the right time shooting. Last week I've I did a couple of demos for some of our softwares and it's like I love this software. I'm going on vacation, like August is the month that, like, business owners go on vacation, it's like end of the season and all that stuff, and so it's the worst time for sales, right, but does that mean so that means that I'm going to have a bunch of sales in September waiting for me because my CRM is going to tell me, hey, it's time to come back, it's time to do this Time to do that. Some of them are already, uh, now, some of them have made their appointments in September. So, going back to what you're saying, you know, hey, we're going to have the little there's going to be follow-up that says, hey, we're really excited about seeing you in a week. That what that does, like all people, why a week out? Well, if it's been a month, there's a yeah, you're just reminding them, then putting it back on the radar.

Speaker 1: 18:22

And number two, their, their situation might change by then. Oh crap, you know what? Something just can't. You know, the next two weeks we're gonna be working. Xyz, I'm not gonna be ready for that meeting. I'm not gonna be able. Xyz, I'm not going to be ready for that meeting. I'm not going to be able to sign up. I'm not going to be able to do whatever. It is Right, you know, especially if they've already said they want to sign up, right?

Speaker 1: 18:37

So yeah that's a perfect time to get on instead of waiting until that day. Maybe there's a day before that that can work, or maybe we just need to push it out one more week. Right, but the worst thing to do.

Speaker 2: 18:50

And without the tool yeah, without the tool you wouldn't have been able to find out until the day of.

Speaker 1: 18:55

And now you're sitting there with a no-show because they're buried in something else, right, and they forgot. Yeah, people are not ignoring you. I would say 99% of the people are not ignoring you on purpose, right? Yeah, I agree, nobody wants to leave or feels good about leaving people hanging right to leave or feels good about leaving people hanging right, but what does it do to your day and what opportunity costs you have by having that hour or 45 minutes or even 30 minutes tied up with somebody who can't take that call. And if you knew that a week ahead of time, that's a lot of time to fill that time, what am I missing?

Speaker 2: 19:32

Yeah, and I think, well, I mean there's so many nuances to this, but I mean we touched on just a little bit of it. But one of the biggest things of or benefits I would say for the CRM is consolidating resources. A lot of times people have a CRM, a calendar booking software or app that they use. They have an email marketing third-party app that they use, they have forms, and so you can have like five different pieces that you need to utilize for communicating with clients or having them book appointments or communicating via email. But one of the best CRMs will have that all in one place, so you eliminate additional costs, you have everything centralized and it just everything talks to each other. So that's you know. One of the huge benefits of the CRM is to have it all consolidated into one ecosystem and leverage all of those tools for each other.

Speaker 1: 20:30

I love that. The tech stack, centralizing your tech stack, I think, is so important. Now, not that this was all a pitch to talk about buzz hub, but unless you go true, unless you check it out, check one out, you're not gonna know right now. And there's, there's a bunch of them out there.

Speaker 2: 20:48

We happen to like ours because it's ours, but we've mentioned a few all the others right, used and tested all of these other platforms and have gone through these trials of disconnect and not quite there and almost has it but doesn't quite have it. We've done the heartache for you, the.

Speaker 1: 21:12

Trellos, the Zoho's, the HubSpot's, the Salesforce's, the. I'm giving you guys a list of all the ones that we have been through for the last 19 years. Check them out, yeah.

Speaker 2: 21:24

I mean, if you want to check them out.

Speaker 1: 21:26

you know, if you're an enterprise level company, I totally get it, but if you're, you're a service based business under 10 million dollars. We really want to encourage you to go check us out at buzzhubbiz. We have a 14-day free trial on there and if you email support at buzzworthybiz after you sign up and say, hey, I signed up after listening to the podcast, you're going to get a free, complimentary does not happen for everyone a complimentary one-to-one onboarding with your free trial, so that you can get the most out of those 14 days and check it out, and we'll show you around. Peek under the hood. We'll help you close your eyes and imagine all the things you could do with your communication ecosystem.