3 Things You Can Do Now to Make Your CRM Data Better

We analyze CRM data a lot and we talk to countless teams about their CRM data. One consistent thing we find is that teams aren’t confident in that data – it’s messy, inconsistent, and a big pain point for their internal teams. We agree. We also know that CRM data adds a powerful layer to an organization’s understanding of their fans and the best way to get a good understanding of CRM data is to see the patterns in the data. CRM data is a key factor in knowing how engaged your fans are and gives you valuable insight into where they are in the fan lifecycle and how your outreach efforts are helping or hurting.

To make this realistic in a sales team’s day-to-day, you need to decide on the minimum viable set of data that you need all your reps to input, all the time. A good starting point is to make sure you include the below:

1.     Log touch points consistently. One of the biggest things we see organizations struggle with is having sales reps enter the same information, in the same place, consistently. To be successful at this, you need to have a minimum viable set of information that all your reps need to fill out so that it’s realistic:

• Touchpoint type and channel (email, call, SMS, meeting)

• Touchpoint purpose/outcome (see “Categorize the touch points” below)

• Date and time

• Touchpoint notes – a simple description of the interaction and client response

It’s a small list but these alone are enough to get some really good insights, such as how many touchpoints does it typically take for different customer profiles to engage or close? More importantly, every touchpoint (e.g. call made, call received, email sent, email received) must be logged by the rep. Automating this is easier than you think on many common CRM platforms which integrate with email, digital calling, and SMS thereby removing the need to transcribe notes.

Finally, consistent logging of every touchpoint won’t happen unless the expectation is set and reinforced with your team. For example, some teams don’t pay commissions on deals until the data in CRM is complete.

2.     Categorize the touch points. When reps email, call, SMS, set a meeting, what was the ultimate purpose or outcome of that interaction? What happened in that touchpoint beyond sending an email, for example, that is easy and quick to understand? Using some simple categories can really help clarify the interaction. This can get out of hand quickly, however, so we suggest deciding on no more than 10 categories and creating a drop-down list directly in your system. The categories should tell you something about why the touch point was important. A few categories for sales reps could be:

• Prospecting/Generating Awareness

• Discovery/Relationship Building

• Closing/Proposal

• Upselling

Likewise, service rep categories could be:

• Service Issue

• Relationship Building (e.g. in seat visit)

• Personalized Experience (e.g. VIP experience, Event, Birthday, Fan-aversary)

• Notice/Reminder (e.g. Renewal notice, playoff reminder, home opener reminder)

3.     Was the touchpoint  significant and was it positive or negative? This one is pretty self-explanatory. Did you successfully connect with the customer? Was the customer actually happy and sharing a positive experience or was there an issue that needs to be resolved and this fan is now at risk? Knowing this helps your team understand if your service reps are generally dealing with happy, engaged fans or struggling to solve issues with unhappy fans. And we all know that unhappy fans don’t renew, at least not in the long term.

Here are two different examples and how to achieve all 3 of the points above:

A service rep calls a season ticket member about renewing their tickets, they connect with the member and the member ends up renewing.

• Log the call in CRM (consistency)

• Categorize this call as a reminder (as mentioned above, we suggest a drop-down option built into your CRM properties to make this quick, easy, and consistent across all reps)

• Significant and positive touch point – the season ticket member was contacted and the member paid for a renewal

A service rep calls a season ticket member about renewing their tickets, but the call turns into the member telling the rep about a negative experience they had at the last game.

• Log the call in CRM (consistency)

• This ended up being a Service Issue, rather than renewal conversation (categorize according to what actually happened, not the original purpose of the call)

• Negative touch point – the season ticket member is sharing a negative experience

• Bonus points: the service rep logs that a case has been created

Ultimately, you don’t want to add too many items your reps need to log after every interaction or else the likelihood that all reps will enter all the information is woefully unrealistic. A good CRM implementation should make reps lives easier not harder over the long-term. Find that minimum data set you need, and make sure that all your reps enter it in. Every. Single. Time. Patterns will emerge from that data which will help make your team better and more efficient. There are tools that can help you do this in an automated way, like our customer data platform. It will also help you better understand your customers and what’s important to them as package holders, which you can use to improve overall benefits.

We’re focused on helping teams maximize the potential of their data via our machine-learning powered Customer Data Platform that leverages CRM data in conjunction with other customer data points to segment your audience and identify the why behind customer engagement and conversion. We do this in an automated way, so you get answers to your questions when you need them most.  Ready to get started? Contact us today to learn more.