In the United States we  celebrate Independence day this weekend. Happy Independence day to all!  Make this weekend a wonderful time of celebration of the freedom of not only thought but of action too!  Even with all the challenges our country faces today, freedom is the catalyst for greatness and I wish every human on the planet had freedom.

As I prepare to celebrate independence day with softball,  water fights,  BBQ, root beer floats and fireworks, I think about tapping the spirit of independence in marketing, taking hold of your destiny.

My message today is about independence in your marketing and sales. The world of internet marketing has changed and no longer can you build a website, execute  some nice Search Engine Marketing /Key word  (SEM) work and all the sudden the world comes to you, throwing their money at you.  I don’t know if many readers remember the old IBM commercial that ran in the early days of the internet where a team of co-workers is huddled around a PC monitor to look at a website and they kick it off live and the order counter just starts spinning?  The workers are excited at first as the numbers trickle in and then begin to fret at the order counter starts spinning out of control.  Great commercial, but not reality, not then, and certainly not now.

The reality of today is that your business must still build a great internet presence, must still have strong SEM but you better also be list building, targeting and then hunting down your prospects through automated drip marketing and sophisticated Customer Relationship Marketing. There are over  3 billion people using the internet . Truth be told, there is a customer for everyone and every product. Just doing some SEM is a passive aggressive approach and is not enough.  You better be hunting in the social media streams to find your prospects.

Take control of your destiny and create independence like the patriots did in America 233 years ago by seeking out change, finding your audience, connecting  with them and inviting them into a dialog about becoming your customer for life.  Build an Attention Connection. The founding fathers of the nation would not have broken free if they had taken a passive approach.

Don’t be a pacifist waiting for customers to find you with a bit of SEM, take action and hunt them down.

To get attention, you must pay attention. Happy Marketing Independence day!

I spend 100% of my professional time working with clients to help them automate their sales and marketing processes. Yesterday I had an “ah ha” moment that I have to admit is an oversight, especially when you consider workflow automation has been a part of my life since 1992.

The internal customer.

For small and medium sized businesses our firm loves Infusionsoft, a great CRM/Sales Automation/Marketing Automation tool.  My firm and our consultants get myopically focused on the sales and marketing processes and over look automating processes for the internal customer.

A great example of this would be to use the workflow automation tools to manage any process in the company which requires reminders, follow up, accountability and automated sign off.

Example #1 – Benefits enrollment – Each year most of us are required to re-enroll in our employer’s benefits programs. Without automation, this requires the HR representative to send out countless emails, chase you down at your desk all to make sure you get enrolled.

Why not automate these “internal customers” in a workflow follow up sequence to enroll them? Let the software chase the employees down! Set up an enrollment page, follow up sequences, then set it and forget it.

Example #2 – Training Certifications – Most all of companies require some sort of training for their employees. Again, a manager or HR person ends up being some sort of hunter tracking down people, partners, franchisee partners to enroll and complete these vital processes. Again, this can be tackled with a set of web forms and follow up sequences.

Reminds me of this great clip from a few years back, “Terry Tate the Office Linebacker”. This is a must view, spend a few minutes, you wont regret it, especially if you have a sense of humor.

Maybe you need a Terry Tate office linebacker in your firm but my guess is you will be better off letting the software increase your productivity.

You can leverage your CRM tools to automate your communications and processes for your internal customers.

An Attention Connection™ has no boundaries and for small business, workflow automation can be a life saver on so many fronts.

Stay connected.

Connect with you later.

Until now, most companies have considered their Customer Relationship Management systems  (CRM) as a separate system from their website, Internet marketing, social media and communication with their prospects, customers and partners.

Those days are gone.

Dont have a fence in your organization.

Your CRM strategy and resulting systems should be driving the design of your website, your social media, your Internet marketing and all communications with your stake holders. The overload of information we all receive each day, the result is the attention span of customers is so short these days, your organization needs a database and automated sequences to manage the process of communicating with your customers.

Our world is changing so fast with the tools of communication rapidly evolving (social media,text messaging, lexicon survelance, brand monitoring, etc) that you can not place your bets on any one form of communication medium as “the channel” to reach your clients. You need to segment your clients, refine focus your message and select the tools to delivery that targeted message.

At the heart of all this is your CRM database and the technology exists to integrate every communication into complete customer interaction history that can be tracked. You can drive your sales and marketing blind without the data and facts.

Smart companies who stay ahead of the competition will have their CRM system driving and tracking every communication with your customers.

Some questions to ask your team:

1. Is my website a integrated with my CRM and is this integration two way to both push and pull content?
2. Is my content integrated? Meaning all content is driving customers and partners to a sale, regardless of the medium?
3. Does my current customer database include a field for social media ID’s and addresses? ( Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc)
4. Am I using my CRM system to push communication to and from my social media presence?

If you  are going to attract and maintain the Attention Connection™ of your prospects and make them a customer for life, you will need a CRM system that is driving it all.

Stay connected and have a great weekend! Spring is here.