Digital Technology Adoption Survey Findings

Digital Technology Adoption Survey Findings

Digital Transformation

Digital Technology Adoption Survey Findings

The CRM Team, in partnership with ITWeb, conducted a Digital Technology Adoption survey in May 2022 to find out how effectively South African companies and people are adopting technology in different industries.

The survey was met with great participation with a total of 209 valid responses recorded.

From these captured responses, the key findings were that only 53% of the respondents stated that they had the right software to serve their customers, and 32% said they did not.

49% of the survey respondents stated that they had a digital adoption strategy for at least three years. While 20% of respondents reported having a digital adoption strategy for one to three years, and 13% of respondents said that they are not currently planning to deploy a digital adoption strategy. 12% said they were just about to roll out a digital adoption strategy, while 6% said it had been in place for less than a year.

The survey asked participants how familiar they were with the ADKAR model of change management. 57% said they had no idea what it was. 25% of respondents are aware of ADKAR but have never used it, while 12% stated that they use ADKAR to manage change on various projects.

According to the respondents, when asked which factors assisted their organisation’s adoption of digital technologies, 22% said online training, 14% said cross-functional collaboration, 14% said integration with customer experience, and 12% said change management practices.

There were five main points cited by respondents as the primary drivers for adopting digital technology: increased agility (15%), easier customer service (14%), better innovation (14%), improved departmental collaboration (12%), increased revenue (10%), and reduced non-value-added work (10%).

Within their digital adoption strategies, respondents plan to implement the following technologies:

According to the survey findings, the top 3 drivers for digital technology adoption are customer experience improvement innovation, and process improvement.

Respondents responded that the most common barriers to digital transformation are: economy (29%), lack of resources (21%), and lack of digital business skills (17%).

The survey results indicate that CEOs are most likely to adopt digital technology (32%), followed by CIOs (21%).

 

Thank you to everyone who participated in the survey we value your feedback and we received quite insightful results. The participants who completed the survey stood a chance to win a R3000 Takealot voucher. A draw was conducted from the 209 valid participants, and Riaan Myburgh won the voucher! A huge congratulations to Riaan.

 

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Youth Month Special: Hearing from the Youth of The CRM Team.

Youth Month Special: Hearing from the Youth of The CRM Team.

Inspirational

Youth Month Special: Hearing from the Youth at The CRM Team.

Youth Month is tied in with remembering the young people who partook in the Soweto Uprising and celebrating the young people of today. To end off youth month, we spoke to the youngest member of The CRM Team, Johan Nel, to hear his thoughts on the present status of the young people of South Africa and what he trusts the future will bring for youngsters in this country.

 

What has kept you headed to prevail quite early in life?

I would give a great deal of credit to my father. My father has been my wellspring of motivation to succeed – he imparted in me that nothing comes free in life and that hard work pays off.

 

What does success look like to you?

Success to me is waking up every day and looking forward to going to work. Money does not measure success – a sound working environment means the most to me.

 

Being a young person with a job and knowing how high youth unemployment is in South Africa, how does that make you to feel?

Privileged without a doubt, yet additionally sad. Having a steady work and a rooftop over my head causes me to feel special yet miserable that there are individuals out there who do not have similar privilege.

 

How would you think the government needs to fix the unemployment rate among youngsters?

The government, first and foremost, has to make a more straightforward way for individuals to become business visionaries. There has to be a simpler way for individuals to begin their businesses.

Secondly, the community should work together to drive employment. Perhaps if the community would help the less privileged to apply for work, help the less fortunate to get access to sites such as LinkedIn and help them apply for work then surely that will make some sort of difference.

Tertiary institutions also need to furnish studies with experience. When we finish our studies all we get a piece of paper, meanwhile organisations insist that we should have experience, even for entry-level positions.

There is no guidance to prepare students for what comes after finishing your studies, you are left in the deep end to fend for yourself.

 

In your opinion, how does the future of youngsters in this country look?

Difficult. There is insufficient support for young people in this country. Employment seemingly will become more difficult. The competition in the workplace is becoming tough, employers now seek individuals with multiple expertise to do various tasks rather than employing many people to do those duties.

 

In the event that you could offer the young people of South Africa any advice, what would it be?

  1. Do what you excel at. Play on your strengths and be open minded to enter the unknown and to learn new skills.
  2. Understand what you are great at and learn what is else you need to excel along the way.
  3. Try not to fear change.
  4. Follow your passion.
  5. Be creative. Utilise every asset you have, if all you have is a cell phone and internet use it for your potential benefit.

 

What change do you want to witness in the young people of South Africa?

I might want to see youngsters be versatile. To face challenges and advance as much they can.

 

Where do you see yourself in the future, and how do you intend to get there?

I want to further my studies so I can bridge the gap between being a delivery manager and a developer. Developing is what I am currently inclining towards.

 

Like Nelson Mandela once said, “The youth of today are the leaders of tomorrow.” At The CRM Team, we celebrate our young people and seek to uplift those who are struggling to find direction. We hope you will be inspired by this article.

 

Johan Nel – Delivery Manager

Johan is a Dynamics 365 Delivery manager with experience in various industries in the last 5 years. He specializes in Agile processes and has been running projects with this methodology for the last 5 years. He has played various roles ranging from Analyst to Project Management.

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Drive Change And Adoption Of Your Technology Investments

Drive Change And Adoption Of Your Technology Investments

Digital Transformation

Drive Change And Adoption Of Your Technology Investments

The CRM Team will be hosting a free webinar titled Adapting To Change: User Adoption & Technology, helping business leaders optimise their software investment through effective change management.

This topical session will illustrate how effective change management and training improve user adoption and help maximise investment in new solutions. Whether one is planning to implement a new solution or already has a solution that users are failing to embrace, this user adoption, training, and change management session will outline how to improve adoption through proven methodologies.

Mark James, head of training at The CRM Team, says new technology solutions may promise to improve your business, however, without user buy-in and adoption, your ROI and business impacts may be disappointing. “Imagine you have to complete a series of tasks in a dark room. The fact that there is low to no visibility makes it almost impossible to execute your tasks effectively.” 

“At the risk of stating the obvious, it might be easier if you could simply flick a switch and light up your playing field. Creating the ideal systems solution for all your users and stakeholders can be just as challenging, but you can light up your playing field by consulting and involving key users in the process, from planning, through execution, all the way to realising a return on your investment,” he explains.

Discover what works and what does not in change management and user adoption programmes. Join The CRM Team and get an overview of the most effective Adoption and Change Management strategies to accelerate one’s digital transformation.

Delegates will see first-hand how to rapidly release the value from your technology investments as these change management specialists share their insight and practical tips for maximising user adoption.

The webinar will be held at 10:00 on 21 June 2022, for more information visit https://www.itweb.co.za/webinar/crm-team-adapting-to-change-user-adoption-technology/

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Tried-and-True Tips for Sales and Marketing Alignment

Tried-and-True Tips for Sales and Marketing Alignment

Dynamics and Power Platform

Tried-and-True Tips for Sales and
Marketing Alignment

Firstly, What Is Sales And Marketing Alignment?

Sales and marketing alignment, or “smarketing” as some like to call it, is essentially getting these two teams to cooperate as one; working towards a common goal – generating and increasing revenue in the long run.

Think of your business as one big family. As with real families, there are usually two or more relations (like siblings) who are constantly bickering, and in this instance, Sales and Marketing can be considered the corporate siblings.

Aligning these two teams is an opportunity to grow your business. As a sales or marketing manager (or parent in this instance), it can be frustrating to constantly try and keep the peace between the two teams, especially when your time could be better spent on more productive tasks.

Getting these “siblings” to collaborate and listen yields a brand new invention – or simply creates a much more harmonious working environment. Which in turn leads to a healthy impact on organisational growth (see more on this infographic by Wheelhouse advisors).

 

Did you know that $1 trillion of revenue is lost annually due to marketing misalignment?

Let’s explore some ways on how to better align your marketing and sales teams.

 

Spot The Difference

Sales and marketing teams are often siloed through different offices, technologies and goals. By (literally) breaking down the walls between these two teams, you can combine the sales and marketing funnels into one process for both teams. How? With Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Sales and Marketing. Both of these software solutions are based on the same platform so that both teams can share and access data and business processes – simplifying the alignment between sales and marketing teams.

 

Practice What You Preach

As the leader of your team, you should practice what you preach. Openly praising (or criticizing) another team in front of your own will set the precedent for them to do the same. Small, simple ways to start the alignment process are by giving credit where it’s due; openly collaborating with other team leaders and carrying their contributions back to your own team. When your team sees your cooperation with the other, the effect will trickle down.

 

Check-In Regularly

Another way to align the sales and marketing teams is to simply communicate with one another. It can be as quick as grabbing a coffee together or through scheduled meetings.  This essentially helps the team gain in-depth knowledge of one another’s challenges. Attending meetings together lets teams know how each one is doing with their goals and how they can support one another. For example, the marketing team can share what content they’re creating and promoting, while the sales team can help marketing improve their lead-generating skills.

 

Generate Quality Leads Together

In order to generate strong quality leads, both the marketing and sales teams need to align on what the ideal client looks like. If this is not clear, marketing campaigns could be skewed and sales will waste time chasing misinformed leads. Assessing your buyer persona together ensures more accurate marketing campaigns and higher close rates for the sales team, and ultimately increased revenue. A win for everyone!

 

Feedback Drives Improvement

Smarketing needs to head toward the same goal with the same coordinated messaging, and as long as each department is doing this, everyone will be aligned. Keeping an open feedback loop to ensure everyone is on the same page is imperative to achieving alignment and organisational growth. For example, should a prospect or customer ask for content that doesn’t exist (yet), there should be a simple way for marketing to receive this nudge and add it into their content strategy. Similarly, sales should ensure they’re using defined brand tone/messaging when prospecting. This type of open communication drives improvement across both teams.

 

Be A Motivator

Though it may seem to be the most obvious route to alignment, motivation hardly seems to be the first thought that comes to mind. By motivating everyone on your team – from the CEO to the new intern – you’ll get a better understanding of the financial value of their work.

 

Set Common Goals

Creating similar KPIs and goals is a great way to align smarketing. Having the same goal gets both teams working and strategising together, providing a more holistic approach to marketing. This also creates a seamless transition from marketing to sales, preventing broken messaging that could result in losing a potential lead. When conversion rates and lead value is measured and influenced by both teams, this would be a great key performance indicator (KPI) smarketing can work towards.

 

Understanding What Each Team Wants

There will naturally be different KPIs for each team and colleague, but for true smarketing alignment, there needs to be a general understanding of what each team wants to achieve and how they can work together to achieve it. Perhaps it comes down to the sales team reducing the number of touchpoints between converting a lead to a sale. By collaborating with the marketing team, they can create succinct workflows that allow leads to pass between marketing and sales, as and when necessary.

 

So, there you have it – tried and true tips for aligning your sales and marketing teams; these tips should help your teams get along effortlessly. But remember, implementing the same tools such as Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Sales and Marketing, having the same processes and aligning your goals is key. When one team is working with leads from the other, data can get lost on both sides and teams can’t see where the lead originated from, track its progress or provide feedback on trends surrounding these leads.

Now that there’s virtually nothing holding you back, see what you can do to improve smarketing alignment today – we suggest starting with a coffee, a chat and Microsoft Dynamics 365.

 

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Assimilating Change Management and Project Management

Assimilating Change Management and Project Management

Inspirational

Assimilating Change Management and Project Management

Resistance is futile…

(A tribute to the “Trekkies” out there)
When the Enterprise first engages the Borg, Locutus says: “Resistance – is futile. Your life, as it has been, is over… Strength is irrelevant. Resistance is futile. We wish to improve ourselves. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own.”
Captain Picard’s response? “I will resist you with my last ounce of strength.”

Every organization has its own biological and technological distinctiveness. When we are invited to make changes to this distinctiveness, be sure, we will encounter varying degrees of resistance. It is therefore absolutely essential that we meticulously plan and execute both the project and the people aspects of any systems implementation.

We could engage potential system users with an aggressive “Resistance is futile – you will be assimilated”, but in my experience, the human is an obstinate species and our aggression will be met with a resounding “I will resist you with my last ounce of strength.” In my experience; we are doomed to lose that battle. There is a better way.

Complementary Disciplines…

Project Management is focused on the Technical aspects of systems implementation, while Change Management is focused on the People aspects. Project Management seeks to design, develop and deliver technology. Change Management seeks to engage users to help them adopt and use this technology to the benefit of their clients, their organization, their team and themselves. Success can only be achieved when we give enough attention to both.

According to Prosci.com; “they each provide focus, processes and tools for moving through the transition toward the future state”. They go on to say: “The Unified Value Proposition of applying both Project Management and Change Management is actually quite simple: delivering intended improvement through successfully implemented change programs.”

In a recent article entitled “Change Management and Project Management: A Side-by-side Comparison” Tim Creasey – Chief Innovation Officer at Prosci – states: “Each discipline brings the critical structure needed for effectively implementing change and achieving the results you want. Yet, Change Management and Project Management must work together to achieve successful change. Doing so creates a unified value proposition, which sets the foundation for tactical integration and delivers value across all aspects of the project, including both the people side and technical side.”

The bottom line is that there is immense benefit in assimilating these two disciplines. However; this is much easier said than done. You will have to plan your approach carefully and with some degree of agility, knowing that each project will present unique challenges and rewards. Learn to adjust your course on the fly, without losing focus of the milestones and the desired outcomes.

Assimilation…

According to merriam-webster.com/dictionary: ”Assimilation refers to the process through which individuals and groups of differing heritages acquire the basic habits, attitudes, and mode of life of an embracing culture.”

Project Management is already a universally accepted discipline for introducing new systems in an organization. Change Management – not so much!
Traditional Project Management approaches often do not account for essential elements like effective communication, sponsorship, coaching, training and resistance management.
It is only when we successfully integrate Change Management disciplines into our Project Management activities that we help the people in the organization to ”understand, internalize and support a change throughout the project’s lifecycle”.

“Research shows that the earlier Change Management is started on a project or initiative, the more likely the project is to meet or exceed objectives.” “… when Change Management is started at the beginning of a project, the activities can be fully integrated.”

The calamitous reality is that Change Management is too often slapped on in an attempt to cauterise the wounds on an already injured and dying project. These wounds are most often inflicted by employees, supervisors and managers resisting the changes imposed on them. The wounds could be in the form of a decline in productivity, point-blank resistance to change, and even a possible loss of valued employees. So; when we stand at ceremony to lay to rest our beloved systems implementation, we cannot help but think that this death was so unnecessary. We could so easily have prevented this tragedy – if only we had acted early.

Having said that – with all the prior hyperbole added merely for emphasis – it is important to add that Change Management can add value even at a late stage in the project. Obviously, the earlier you start with Change Management, the greater the chances of success.

 

My Advice…

Develop an assimilated strategy where both Project Management and Change Management strategies can be managed in the optimal sequence, to ensure that the users, their teams, the organization and its executives, and customers can derive maximum benefit in as short a time as possible. You would need a good understanding of the Project Management processes and the Change Management process. Then begin to merge the stages and steps to create a hybrid process that works for your team and your customers. Good luck.

It might not be an easy or enviable task, but it will not do itself. To quote the great body-builder, Ronnie Coleman, just before attempting to lift 800 pounds with his legs: “Ain’t Nothing To It, But To Do It”.

You might instinctively resist the call to exert all this effort, but might I remind you that “Resistance is futile!”

Mark James

Mark has been a Microsoft Certified Trainer for many years and has been training Dynamics since CRM version 4.0.

He specialises in Dynamics 365 end-user training and has trained across the UK, Africa, and the Middle East. Mark is proficient in Microsoft Dynamics 365: Sales, Service, Deployment, and Customization & Configuration.

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The CRM Team welcomes changes to the Microsoft Cloud Partner Program

The CRM Team welcomes changes to the Microsoft Cloud Partner Program

Digital Transformation

The CRM Team Welcomes Changes To The Microsoft Cloud Partner Program

Microsoft continues to evolve its partner program and will be rolling out a new Microsoft Cloud Partner Program. This change reflects the vast transition of business operations to the cloud, and Microsoft plans to support its partners in the future.

Microsoft is terminating its Silver and Gold competencies, achievements that partners could earn to help differentiate their businesses to customers beyond a baseline partner network membership status.

The CRM Team Head of Delivery Operations, Bertha Musanhu, says Microsoft is simplifying its partner programs with solutions partner designations, anchored on the Microsoft Cloud in six solution areas aligned to how Microsoft goes to market.

“By attaining these designations, you can demonstrate your organisation’s capabilities in delivering customer success in the solution areas. That’s valuable for you, because it’s where we see customer demand, and where the opportunity is for partners to scale to meet customer needs,” she explains.

The Microsoft Cloud Partner Program will be open to Microsoft’s current partners including managed services providers, resellers, systems integrators, independent software vendors (ISVs) and device partners.

However, Microsoft is changing the way it categorises its partners to signal their cloud capabilities and experience. Microsoft will have six solution areas that partners can specialise in. Solutions Partner is the first new partner qualifying level.

The new partner program opens the opportunity to grow and develop as a Microsoft Partner. This model provides two qualifying levels: solutions partner and specialist/expert. The partner designations will be aligned to the six Microsoft Cloud solution areas including:

  • Data & AI (Azure)
  • Infrastructure (Azure)
  • Digital & App Innovation (Azure)
  • Business Applications
  • Modern Work
  • Security

Musanhu says a new partner capability score will rank partners’ performance and technical skills based on their certifications, new customers, successful implementations and overall growth.

“Microsoft’s new program will be mainly focused on several different areas: Azure data and AI, Azure infrastructure, Azure digital and app innovation, business applications, modern work, and security,” she concludes.

Microsoft continues to invest its partner ecosystem and continues to grow its Azure cloud offerings. These changes to the partner program certainly reflect their cloud-first approach. The new program introduces three levels of competency for partners who demonstrate expertise in the various Azure offerings. This partner status will solidify their authority as Microsoft experts.

 

Bertha Musanhu – Head of Delivery Operations

Bertha has been with The CRM Team for 5 years overseeing Delivery Operations, she is a Prosci Certified Change Management Practitioner, a Microsoft Dynamics 365 Marketing Functional Consultant Associate and she holds a BCOM in Marketing Degree. She is currently busy with an Advanced Project Management Certification and is equipped to deliver projects using Agile Principles. Her Favorite workplace Moto is  “When our Customers Win, We win! ”

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Our vision for the Microsoft customer data platform

Our vision for the Microsoft customer data platform

AI & Data Analytics

Our vision for the
Microsoft customer data platform

Realizing the Largest Benefits of Using Customer Data Platforms

Customer Data Platforms (CDPs) are a modern solution to a modern problem: disconnected customer data. We’re currently living in a world full of data, but data is useless unless you have the tools to interpret it. This is the value that a CDP can bring to your organization. This guide will explain the benefits of CDPs to everyone in your business, with examples from Microsoft Dynamics 365, so you can get ahead with understanding your customer data.

 

Why You Need A CDP

With so many brands, products and services on the market, and millions of new businesses opening each year, customers can become overwhelmed with choice. When multiple organizations offer high-quality products or services, customers begin to pay more attention to how brands interact with them. Customers want to feel recognized, valued, and understood by the brands they interact with and the only way for you to create this feeling is to have data about them. Lots of data.

It would take a long time to manually collect data for each of your existing and potential customers across all platforms, not to mention how resource-intensive it would be. AI-powered CDPs have the capability to collect masses of data, including behavioral data from customer interaction, demographic data, and transactional data. Not only this, but the AI in a CDP can analyze this data for you, creating a unified customer database that can be used to personalize customer touchpoints and increase engagement.

There are three main ways CDPs can help you understand your customers better:

  1. Centralize customer data, creating a single view of a customer using data from each step of the buyer’s journey.
  2. Analyze data to provide insights and recommendations.
  3. Empower businesses to deliver personalized experiences, which are now expected by customers, in response to customer desires and needs.

 

Benefits of CDPs

Implementing the use of a CDP in your businesses can benefit all departments but especially the marketing, sales and customer service teams. Marketing teams benefit from the ability to deliver targeted marketing across channels, using content they know is relevant to a specific audience to stand a better chance of a conversion. This in turn raises the company’s marketing ROI.

Sales teams benefit from personalized information on customers such as their loyalty, buying frequency, spending and recent purchases. Sellers can use data like this to optimize sales opportunities by delivering personalized sales engagements.

Meanwhile, customer service reps can view complete profiles for each customer, allowing them to provide proactive support to customers in a way that makes them feel understood.

 

Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Insights

One example of a powerful customer data platform is Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Insights. Dynamics 365 Customer Insights provides a single view of customers by connecting data from a full range of sources. In addition, Microsoft’s CDP ensures all data is managed securely and in compliance with GDPR regulations. Its capabilities can be split into Audience Insights and Engagement Insights.

 

Audience Insights

Microsoft Dynamics 365 combines both B2C and B2B data to generate real-time AI-powered insights that marketing, sales and customer service teams can all use to make informed decisions about customers.

 

Predict Customer Desires and Needs

Built-in AI and analytics help to predict customer lifetime value and transactional and subscription churn. The same models the CDP uses for these predictions can also identify opportunities for cross-selling and upselling with recommendations of products and services, increasing the value that each customer may bring. The AI makes recommendations for dividing your audience into demographic segments you can target separately, though you can also define your own audience divisions.

 

AI-powered Insights Deliver Meaning

Marketing, sales and customer service teams benefit from real-time customer data collecting from Dynamics 365 Marketing, Sales and Customer Service. This comprehensive data allows them to deliver personalized journeys to clients across marketing, advertising and engagement platforms.

 

Deliver Personalization for Your B2B Clients

The Microsoft Dynamics 365 system allows the sales team to shorten sales cycles with unified account profiles, complete with client activities and insights. On top of this, third-party integration means data from other sources can be used to increase the accuracy and quality of leads, while AI models will identify at-risk accounts so you can respond with a proactive retention strategy.

 

Build Customer Trust

Data itself is a sensitive topic. Customers want to know they can trust brands to keep their information safe. With Microsoft’s customer experience platform, customers are linked to their consent preferences, which refresh automatically so you can honor them easily. It also has tools to easily secure customer data so you can achieve your marketing goals while complying with GDPR and CCPA.

 

Engagement Insights

The other side of the capabilities of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Insights helps businesses understand customer behavior with cross-channel analytics.

 

Optimizing the Sales Funnel

Built-in features allow marketing, sales and customer service teams to view how many and what type of customers are moving through each step of the customer journey so that you can optimize your website and mobile app for conversion. These insights can be even more specific with the ability to carry out funnel analysis on different customer segments.

 

Understand Customer Behaviour

AI-driven insights from your website and mobile help marketing teams understand customer engagement. The system tracks customer behavioral data and creates real-time reports so teams can easily identify patterns and make informed decisions to increase engagement and conversion rates.

 

Set Up Customer Insights Today

With such a comprehensive view of each and every one of your customers, you almost can’t go wrong when it comes to delivering great customer experiences that will keep customers coming back to your brand. Contact us to help optimize Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Insights today.

 

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Dynamics 365 and Power Platform 2022 releases

Dynamics 365 and Power Platform 2022 releases

Dynamics and Power Platform

Dynamics 365 and Power Platform

2022 releases

Businesses constantly face new challenges and the pace keeps increasing. As priorities change and new opportunities emerge, the future of every business depends on how well it can empower its teams to adapt and innovate.

Microsoft recently held its Business Applications Launch Event where it published its release plans for the next cloud update wave across the Power Platform and Dynamics 365. It released hundreds of new features, enhancements, and innovations that will help businesses become more agile and customer-centric.

The CRM Team managing director Wynand Roos warns that competitors are transforming their business models and customer expectations are evolving.

“Businesses need to embrace change and be ready for disruption.”

The 2022 release wave 1 for Dynamics 365 and industry clouds brings new innovations that provide businesses with significant capabilities to transform. The release contains hundreds of new features across Dynamics 365 applications, including Marketing, Sales, Customer Service, Field Service, Finance, Supply Chain Management and Supply Chain Insights.

It also includes Human Resources, Commerce, Fraud Protection, Business Central, Connected Spaces, Guides, Remote Assist, Customer Insights, Customer Voice, and Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare, Financial Services, Sustainability, and Non-profit.

 

Roos points to some of the exciting releases.

“Dynamics 365 Commerce continues to invest in key B2B commerce scenarios, including sales agreements, on-behalf-of ordering, and partner-specific product catalogues and pricing. This release also introduces customer segmentation and targeting with Dynamics 365 Customer Insights, and out-of-the-box A/B experimentation and analytics tools. The new Store Commerce app streamlines point of sale deployment and servicing while improving performance,” he explains.

 

More importantly, he says new workflows in headquarters, bulk image upload, and manifest-driven upload simplify the management of media assets across channels.

“Customer service functionality is easily enabled on customers’ e-commerce sites with Power Virtual Agents and Omnichannel for Customer Service.”

 

 

Dynamics 365 Sales focuses on enabling sales professionals to harness the power of data and intelligence which will help them to forecast, compare annual projections, and measure performance using predictive scoring.

“Sellers can collaborate using Teams from within Dynamics 365 to accelerate their pipeline, while managers can track team performance and provide coaching to increase customer satisfaction. Our goal is to help the seller close more deals, faster, while being as productive as possible,” he adds.

 

Dynamics 365 Marketing is empowering Marketers to leverage the power of data and AI in order to improve marketing content creation and delivery. Make every interaction count, by responding at the right moment with new event triggers based on data changes in any Dynamics 365 app.

 

Marketers can now take action from journeys in more ways, using no-code conditional text to easily personalise content and taking immediate action on SMS replies through personalised experience based on responses using custom keywords.

 

 

Dynamics 365 Human Resources will equip HR professionals with the ability to tailor experiences and automatically complete processes when employees are joining, leaving, and moving within an organisation. Intelligent talent management capabilities enable companies to understand the skill set gaps to ensure the right people are in the jobs and to plan for future investments.

 

On the security front, Dynamics 365 Fraud Protection is delivering new capabilities that allow operators of payment service providers to offer fraud protection as a service to their businesses, including those that have a multi-hierarchy business structure.

 

 

Industry solutions like Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare continues to commit to healthcare providers in enhancing patient engagement, improving data-related functionality, and further automating deployment experiences while expanding the global availability of our Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare solutions.

 

Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services provides capabilities to help manage data to deliver differentiated experiences, empower employees, and help combat financial crime while facilitating security, compliance, and interoperability of financial data.

 

“This helps in enhanced collaboration, automation, and insights to streamline processes, personalises every customer interaction, improves customer experience, and delivers rich data insights,” says Roos.

 

Microsoft Cloud for Non-profit is updated to reflect our commitment to delivering a great onboarding experience to new and returning Cloud for Non-profit partner and non-profit customers.

 

Finally, Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability has launched an extensible SaaS solution that provides comprehensive, integrated, and automated sustainability management for organisations. It automates manual processes, enabling businesses to more efficiently record, report, and reduce their emissions on a path to net zero.

 

The Dynamics 365 and industry clouds release plan for the 2022 release wave 1 is available here.

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How Data Plays A Role In Customer Experience

How Data Plays A Role In Customer Experience

AI & Data Analytics

How Data Plays A Role In Customer Experience.

Businesses can no longer just offer the best product or service at the best price and be done with it. Consumers are now choosing to spend their money with companies that provide the best Customer Experience. It is possible that by investing and implementing Customer Experience programs and strategies, you could potentially double your revenue in three years.

 

More than two-thirds (around 86%) of buyers will spend more on a product or service if it means that they are receiving an excellent and memorable Customer Experience. More than that, nearly half of people have made impulse buys because they received a personalised experience from a brand.

 

What is Customer Experience?

Customer Experience is sometimes simply referred to as CX. In an eCommerce setting, this could be referred to as User Experience or (IX).

In general, Customer Experience is how your customers think you are treating them. The reality is: if customers feel like ‘just a number’ to your business, your business will likely be ‘just a business’ to them. Offering tailored and personalised experiences mean customers link interactions with your brand or company with pleasant emotions and memories. This, in turn, drives their loyalty, which could generate repeat sales and lead to new acquisitions as these happy customers spread the word.

 

How data can be used to enhance your Customer’s Experience.

In the past, many companies used surveys to gather data on their customers’ experiences. A survey conducted by McKinsey & Company in collaboration with AlphaSights and Gerson Lehrman Group in 2019 and 2020 found that nearly all of their respondents (93%) used survey-based data to track their customer’s experience. However, only 15% thought that surveys were the best way to measure their customer’s experience. Very few (6%) believed that using surveys provides them with the data they need to make informed decisions.

Today companies have access to vast amounts of customer data. This data can be ethically sourced and combined with a Customer Data Platform (CDP) to improve your Customer Experience.

The data that is sourced and used by a Customer Data Platform is usually first party data. That means the information is gathered directly from individuals who interact with your company, business, or brand. Gathering data directly from persons who have interacted with your company means the data closely reflect your target demographic.

By harnessing this data, you can make informed decisions to improve your customers’ experience in general. More than that, a customer data platform creates profiles of individual people who have engaged with your brand. That means you can tailor marketing messages and experiences to speak directly to each specific customer. These tailored experiences make each interaction with an individual and unique customer an opportunity to provide them with a personalised and custom Customer Experience.

Customers want to be important to you. They do not want to be just another order number. So much so that they are willing to give you permission to gather their data in order to make their interactions with your brand more personalised.

 

What kind of data can be used to better understand your customers?

When you use data to better understand customers, it is generally referred to as Customer Analytics. This involves everything from gathering to storing, analyzing, and then making decisions from what you’ve learned from the data gathered on your customers.

When you collect information on your customers, you are primarily interested in how they interact with your different marketing channels and how they interact with your products or services. Bear in mind that every interaction with your company or brand that does not directly relate to an interaction with your product or service is a marketing interaction.

Everything from a like on Facebook to reading an article on your blog or searching the location of your brick-and-mortar store are steps along the customer journey. A journey that would potentially and hopefully end with them making a purchase from you.

Suppose you know how your target audience (or, better yet, any specific customer) prefers to interact with your company. In that case, you can generate highly targeted marketing messaging specifically aimed at that group or individual.

More than knowing how customers interact with your brand, you need to know which products or services are the most and least popular. Even then, you cannot stop there; you need to know why this is the case.

This is because products or services that are selling well could potentially do better if marketing efforts for these products or services are tweaked according to customer feedback (both directly and indirectly).

Products or services that sell less well may need to be dropped from inventory. On the other hand, harnessing your customer data and improving your Customer Experience could see these products or services selling better as they are strategically marketed to particular individuals.

In today’s marketplace, it is vital to gather and harness not only digital data but also real-life information on your customers. Real-life data could include information about their trips to your brick-and-mortar store, what they purchased, and the overall experience of their visit. It could even be as specific as what they thought of your window dressing, their interaction with your sales staff, or whether they tried any samples while at your store.

Businesses often have multiple platforms and databases where they gather information on their customers. That means they often have vast amounts of data to store, process, and analyse before they can use it in a logical and strategic way. In many cases, the data is so much that businesses only use a fraction of the data available to influence their customer’s experiences.

Using a customer data platform allows you to integrate all the first party (and sometimes second and third party) data that you gather on your customers or even potential customers. You can then use this to cultivate highly unique and personalised Customer Experiences and give your customers exactly what they want or need, when they want and need it.

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Teamed up for Success – IAMCP South Africa

Teamed up for Success – IAMCP South Africa

Thought Leadership

Teamed up for Success-  IAMCP South Africa

The International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners (IAMCP) is a high trust community that bring Microsoft partners together. The IAMCP is dedicated to help Microsoft partners grow and broader their business opportunities through partnering with other IAMCP members.

To effectively serve customers in today’s demanding business environment, partners must build strong complementary partnerships.

At The CRM Team we are passionate about how digital transformation is shaping the world and our aim is to help businesses innovate and continue to expand.

We are proud to be part of the IAMCP South Africa board and strongly believe that by partnering with other like-minded IAMCP members we will continue to be innovative and collaborative within our sectors.

Why join IAMCP?

  • Develop business partnerships and opportunities.

IAMCP encourages its members to work together. A network of Microsoft partners, each specializing in a certain expertise, allows to create value that would otherwise be impossible to generate.

  • IAMCP serves as a voice for Microsoft partners, providing valuable feedback on how they collaborate.

Benefits for South African partners joining IAMCP?

  • Leveraging each other skills sets and strengths
  • Partner 2 Partner opportunities
  • Discover how to best navigate the Microsoft eco-system
  • And more…

Become an IAMCP Member

With an IAMCP chapter membership, you can be a part of that change all while fostering the important personal and business relationships that lead to mutual growth.

IAMCP offers three types of membership. For the details of these membership types and the pricing information, read the IAMCP FAQ or reach out to your local chapter.

 

Bianca Kruger – Marketing Manager

Bianca Kruger is the Marketing Manager at The CRM Team, with responsibility for marketing programs, brand management, strategic marketing campaigns that drive business objectives. Bianca has over 10 years of experience in B2B and B2C marketing and holds a qualification in Business Management.

Innovative, Dynamic, and Passionate is what best describes Bianca.

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