I Wrecked My CRM!
No, it wasn’t me driving but I did get called to send a tow truck this week.
There should be something like OnStar for CRM implementations! If so this customer would not have spent several very frustrating months behind the wheel rocking their system back and forth trying to get out of that ditch.
This was textbook case on how not to deploy a Customer Information System (aka CRM). I have written before about my NASCAR approach to CRM – this time they missed all the targets and drove their CRM right into the ditch.
If your CRM system were a car you would have a pretty good idea what to do:
- Put the title on dash, leave it there and walk home.
- Call a tow truck to carry it to a garage for repairs
- Sell it for junk and buy another car
Now the really bad part about this story is that the customer lost a lot of time and opportunity during the 6 months that their CRM system was sunning itself in that ditch. They had the title in hand ready to abandon CRM and go back to their old manual systems. Luckily someone referred them to me so they will be back up and running fine pretty quickly.
So what did they miss?
- Planning – No business requirements were taken into account
- Customization – No planning = no customization needed
- Training – None, zip, nada
Planning is always the key… if you don’t have your CRM journey mapped out you could end up lost or in one of those implementation ditches like the guy in this picture.
