I’ve been thinking about maps a lot lately. Not the maps you find on Google or Mapquest, but the kind you might find on the whiteboard of many successful or fledgling SaaS companies today, a map of the Customer Journey.
Customers today come in to services in many forms, freemium, trial or paid users. But getting the sign up, long the purview of sales and now quickly become the territory of marketing, is only the first step in delivering and capturing value. Customer must onboard, they must get value, and they must grow if the SaaS provider is to win and prosper.
It’s so easy to try, buy and leave! services today, that we must totally rethink our model. Monthly recurring revenues only grow when customers successfully onboard, utilize and grow their usage of features and add-ons.
How can we manage this? Well, have we mapped the customer journey? Do we understand all the milestones of service adoption, from onboarding to first value to growth? Have we thought about usage signals that can indicate customers likely to leave, or even better, ready to grow? Have we put engagement programs in place that drive customer through the journey so we deliver and capture the most value possible?
I’ve been working with my partner Totango and we’ve built a new Customer Journey Mapping Workshop which we will be holding on May 7th in San Francisco in conjunction with All About the Cloud. You can learn more about the workshop here!
I’ve been wondering a lot lately about the Technology Adoption Lifecycle and Geoffry Moore’s classic Crossing the Chasm. I believe that we are seeing the Chasm obliterated by technology and cultural changes. I see three inter-related trends that are driving this collapse, none of these in and of themselves will surprise any readers, but I think when taken together, there is a compelling argument that the Chasm is collapsing, and smart marketers can speed time to adoption by understanding this dynamic. These trends are 1) The consumerization of technology and its impact on the speed of diffusion 2) the commoditization of the creation and distribution of content and 3) the lower barriers and risks of technology solution adoption.
Before I continue, I do want to note that Crossing the Chasm might be the most dog-eared book in my fairly extensive marketing library. It is a CLASSIC, and has guided much of my thought and practice of marketing over the last 2 decades. It still has tremendous value and incredible teaching and learning in it. The concepts of bowling pins, whole product and positioning are beyond their worth in gold. End of story.
But, I think we need to take a hard look at the chasm today. On page xi of his revised edition of 1999, Moore states: “The Chasm Model itself represents a pattern in market development that is based on the tendency of pragmatic people to adopt new technology when they see other people like them doing the same. This causes them to band together as a group, and the groups initial reaction, like teenagers at a junior high dance, is to hesitate and watch.” Let’s take a little time and dissect this statement.
1) “the tendency of pragmatic people to adopt new technology when they see other people like them doing the same” – Since the Chasm was “discovered” by Moore, technology has infiltrated our lives, as Marc Andreessen says, “software is eating the world.” Early adopters now surround everyone, kids and consumers often lead the way. In addition, the technology continues to get hidden behind better and better and easier and easier user experience. Today’s professionals are more comfortable with and better and faster adopters of technology. From the secretary, to the CEO, from the line worker to the general manager, adoption patterns have compressed and changed. CIOs and Business Managers who wait for “the mainstream” to adopt a solution will quickly find themselves in the late majority, falling behind competitors.
2) “… This causes them to band together as a group” – Which group? How many affiliations do you have on Linkedin? How many communities do you belong to? What technology did the PTA just adopt that has you thinking, boy, why aren’t we doing that? It used to be information was held by vendors. Customers and buyers depended on information brokers, such as Gartner, IDC and others to get aggregated views of this information. Now they can go to Quora, or LinkedIn, or just plain Google. Vendors now invest FORTUNES in content creation and distribution, because they must inform buyers now, or lose to competitors who do. The group of peers has expanded dramatically and the information available to these groups has become free, available and subject to peer review. One of the main reasons the group effect put brakes on mainstream adoption was the difficulty of obtaining and evaluating vendor claims. We’ve entered the era of transparency and visibility, where the early adopters can more effectively share and make their informed views and experiences real to the mainstream.
3) “…and the groups initial reaction, like teenagers at a junior high dance, is to hesitate and watch” The new reaction is to try at small scale, fail and scale successes. The speed and cost dynamics of the cloud have fundamentally changed the economics of trial and the risk of failure. The risk and fear of failure is now lower than the odds of success and upside.
I still believe in vertical marketing, I still believe in delivering whole products, I still believe in the power of positioning, but I believe the Chasm is closing and will continue to do so. I hope this posts is controversial, and creates a discussion, I expect it will do so! What do you think???
When I talk about Viewpoint, the first question I usually get is, “well, who does this well?”
The godfather of Viewpoint in the new era of cloud computing is clearly Salesforce.com. As I have written here, SalesForce.com’s “The End of Software” created a unique and compelling Viewpoint that aligned with the aspiration and frustrations of their target customers who needed faster and easier visibility into sales pipeline and performance. As they and the market have matured, they have adeptly shifted to “The Social Enterprise”, seeking to capitalize on the technology, environmental and business shift to social computing. So far, this seems to be a big win again for Benioff and team as even conservative Gartner Group now calls this category “Social CRM” .
But everyone calls out Salesforce, so I wanted to find a few maybe lesser know examples of companies who are staking out a Viewpoint which gets them attention, leads and business. Here’s a few:
Zuora – The Subscription Economy – By building the business around the Subscription Economy, Zuora has created a fertile ground for discussing their billing solutions in a context that matters. Rather than simply an accounting solution for selling term licenses, Zuora has effectively planted a flag of leadership. They’ve even committed a whole website to the discussion of this Viewpoint.
FireEye – Sometimes a Viewpoint is as simple as saying “the world around you has dramatically changed, have you responded?”. This is exactly what FireEye has done with their Next Generation Threat positioning. By elegantly articulating what their clients already knew, that the bad guys were changing faster than their current defenses, FireEye positioned themselve as the expert to define and deliver what a next generation threat protection solution.
VirginAmerica – Flying should be painful, crowded, stressful and miserable. Right? Wrong says VirginAmerica. Experience the difference. A great example of a Viewpoint which takes conventional wisdom and throws it out the window. Backed by delivery of the promise of a new and differentiated service. Cool! Let’s book today!
By creating a unique Viewpoint, we create the space or the context to deliver our unique value, creating impact, the first stage of accelerating to Velocity Marketing. What’s you Viewpoint? (check out this blog for a starting framework… or join me for my Velocity Breakthrough Marketing Workshop in Boston on October 25th…)
Sometimes the things we forget are as important as those we remember. Well, here’s 3 things I think we would all do to forget in our B2B go to market strategies…
1) Demo only when qualified – NO – Buyers come in MANY shapes and sizes, with MANY email addresses, and in MANY states of readiness. In all cases, they have come to expect to be able to see the service or product experience. Since so many sales cycles are now ‘hidden’, if you don’t “show me the money” early, you could lose and not even know it…
2) Enterprise sales are top down, always – NO. Just ask Yammer, Atlassian or even Salesforce.com and others. Many enterprise sales cycles are now driven bottoms up by the line manager who has the problem to solve. Now enterpise sales has ALWAYS been a combination of top down and bottom up selling, but today, the scales are tipping to the bottom up. Velocity now requires trial, demo and value delivery EARLY and OFTEN.
3)Qualified leads matter most – NO, marketing must now deliver qualified buyers to sales. Sales then must slam the door shut. Marketing used to be the warm up act, and sales the concert giver. Now it looks more like Marketing plays the first 2 acts and sales ends the show. With hidden sales cycles and self directed buyers, marketing must not just find qualified leads, they must find the active buyers.
Each of these things to forget have broad and significant sales and marketing implications, on tactics, measurement, roles and org structutres…more of that to come in another blog…
Jim Barksdale is a pretty quotable guy, work for him for a few years like I did at Netscape and you leave with a small library of “Barksdalisms” that just stick with you. One of Jim’s sayings was, “It ain’t dogfood unless the dog comes off the porch to eat it…”.
While Jim was making the point that you can love your product, but if the customers doesn’t buy it it aint worth much, I never think Jim was intending to be taken literally. German pet food manufacturer GranataPet did. Watch this video of a mobile enabled dog food dispensing billboard.
Kinda gets you hungry doesn’t it? OK, maybe not, but it will sure make your dog happy.
Ever feel like escaping the doldrums of your computer, sitting down by a mountain lake and skipping stones? Sounds like fun. That’s exactly the experience that the SkipTown promo for Sun Valley created by San Francisco design firm 11 did. And while Skippy has since retired, check out the video of the world’s first (and maybe only?) web controlled stone skipping robot from Sun Valley Idaho.
When I hear software, SaaS and other B2B companies hide their product or services experience behind a myriad of rationalizations and excuses I want to fire up these two videos. If Sun Valley and Granata can do it, so can you!
KJR client WhiteHat Security recently launched it’s new RiskCheck program. WhiteHat probably knows more about Website risk and attacks than anyone in the world. But how do you give prospects a taste of that experience. The RiskCheck, just launched last week is their answer. Just complete this short web survey and receive a customized report comparing you to your industry and companies of your size. A small but highly valuable experience of the value that WhiteHat can deliver.
Experience and engagement create velocity. So whether you are selling dog food, mountain vacations or website security, there’s a way to accelerate your pipeline today.
Now excuse me while I take Fido for a walk, skip some stones and futureproof my website.
Talking about his new book, “That Used to Be Us,” at a recent speech at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, best selling author Thomas Friedman said, “Average is over. Everyone must define and develop their extra, that unique value add that justifies, in this world of rising curves why they should be hired or promoted.” Friedman goes on to make a case that to win in the global market, American education must nurture students to become more creative and unique.
Friedman goes on to discuss the emergence of the “hyper-connected world” one where you cannot only outsource labor, but you can outsource “genius”. This is clearly one of the driving forces that create the glut of solution providers in every imaginable niche in the market today. While Friedman deals with macro nation level competitiveness issues, every day, the battle against average determines the micro level winners and losers in competitive markets. The companies that win, rise above the mean because they don’t stop at average, they consistently go outside the mean in at several if not all of these key areas –
1)Frame the problem in the customer’s view
2)Drive experience
3)Execute with focus, data and speed
4)Maximize Customer satisfaction
5)Iterate rapidly and successfully
Let’s take a quick look at why being above average matters, and how to achieve it.
1)Frame the Problem – With the dramatic overload and availability of content, Breakthrough is critical. Winners do an above average job of setting the CONTEXT for the market conversation, or framing the problem. One way to win, is to create a compelling Viewpoint as I discuss here. Average companies look to ride trends, above average ones create them.
2)Drive experience – Buyers are now driven by experience over evaluation. Average companies have product or brand managers building screen capture or other quick hit videos. Above average companies find ways to create highly engaging, real or near real product or service experiences. Experienceis the new selling reality, you better be great at this or you will never build a high velocity sales execution engine…
3)Execute with focus, data and speed – Driving pipeline today, is all about execution and learning. We’ve entered the era of A/B testing and we aren’t leaving. Average companies understand basic data and use it to adjust execution, while above average companies drive operations and optimization from realtime data and analytics , using new and innovative tools and techniques like Totango’s Customer Engagement Management solution.
4)Maximize Customer Satisfaction – We’ve left the world of purchase and support a long time ago, but many organizations have not adjusted their approaches and organizations. Average companies measure customer satisfaction with survey and support metrics. Above average companies have fundamentally changed their mindset and restructured their whole organization around the customer lifecycle, surrounding the customer and maximizing customer lifetime value.
5)Iterate rapidly and successfully – Average companies run on release cycles measure in quarter or longer. Above average companies release features and cycle in weeks, days or even hours. In the world of realtime data (see 3), the new rule is iterate or lose.
Are you still average, if so, you need to invest or lose to the start up in Bangalore, Budapest, Sao Paolo or next door. Friedman is right not just about people when he calls out to find that extra, but this is true of companies too. What’s your strategy to be above average?
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