Growing Your Practice Through Exceptional Communication and Community
September 2013 Inside Tech Services
Written by: Jodi Cicci
“Isn’t there a saying, ‘If you build it, they will come’? Whoever coined it definitely was working off of a known customer community!”
Customers demand more industry and best-practice knowledge from software vendors and software tool consulting firms today as technology continually enhances the business process and operations experience. Successful vendors and consulting firms are ones that anticipate customer needs by having a level of understanding from the customer viewpoint. Customer viewpoints captured in surveys, trade magazine, and analyst reports support industry trending but lose the dynamic of direct customer interaction. Building or participating in a customer community can provide valuable, real-time reactions, promotions, and interactions for your organization and allow quicker services offering development and customer adoption to meet changing customer needs.
Think about your customer base. How did the initial introduction happen? By a sales cold call? By a request for more information from your website? From a technology or services based conference? A Google search? If you run a product company with services, then the product itself may have prompted the initial conversation. If you run a services-only organization, then reputation or specific unique skill sets may have been the motivation.
As you close the deal and deliver the services and/or product, what is your takeaway for the customer? Think about your engagement closure procedures. What are you putting in place to continue success for the customer? Is there a community they can join and exchange ideas with? Is there an ongoing education series they can take advantage of? How do they provide feedback to you on your services and products for improvement? What you leave a customer with at the end of the engagement can strengthen the customer-vendor relationship just as much as completing a successful project.
Our consulting firm is in a niche marketPSA implementation and consulting of the NetSuite OpenAir product. Were small, but we feel we make a big impact on the customer base, even if they are not our customers, simply because we focus on building an interactive community. And weve got plenty of feedback to this point. What is our focus? Three main areas:
- Monthly webinars to provide information and education on everyday PSA needs.
- Local user groups, in many cases hosted by a customer.
- Promotion of a LinkedIn user group specifically for the niche market.
The monthly webinars started with a small following that has tripled over time and provide a solid introduction to our organization to prospective customers. The local user groups provide an introduction to us in a more casual environment, but also connect customers locally for interaction. And finally, LinkedIn user groups give access to a wider audience and discussion contributions from all over the world.
By building up a community in this fashion, we have been able to identify and create offerings that meet the needs and demands seen in the community. Public class development, system usage tips book, release management insights, and more. Introducing new offerings is always a tricky business, but when it comes from the community, you have more confidence that it will hit the mark with your audience. You are essentially building service offerings from the customers point of view. Isnt there a saying, If you build it, they will come? Whoever coined it definitely was working off of a known customer community!
