Why "ServiceForce" is a bigger deal than SalesForce
04.07.09
Target Audience:
Entrepreneur
As I was about to write about one of the many deceptions in the technology industry, such as the creation and herding behind hollow acronyms like CRM (Customer Relationship Management), SalesForce.com appears to have beaten me to a much more holistic implementation of that definition.
Many times in this blog have I written about the notion that companies are actually selling a customer experience, rather than a product. Needless to repeat here that most are not.
But Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff, (in full disclosure, was one of the Oracle executives who wrote an e-mail to Larry Ellison inviting me to come work at Oracle headquarters some 14 years ago) perhaps realized (or read here) his short-sighted attachment to CRM by which he implied that sales would actually create a lasting relationship with a customer after the deal is closed. We know better from our Oracle days.
But great entrepreneurs out-innovate themselves and Salesforce.com recently stitched together a comprehensive proposition (on their beta website) designed to pay close attention to whether in essence, a sales promise - in actuality - is met in a satisfactory manner.
Now, I have not reviewed SalesForce.com's specific technology proposition, but merely their entry in the market is a big deal and here is why:
- This SaaS (software-as-a-service) strategy will enable the meritocracy of customer satisfaction and create better value for consumers, directly or indirectly.
- Not all companies rely on a sales force, but all companies rely on managing the experience related to their brand.
- Companies with new products should probe their conversion rates through this new service, before turning on the marketing floodgates. Marketing a product that has unacceptable user satisfaction, spurred by the negative power of social networking, has the potential to damage its reputation forever.
- High conversion rates from trial-to-buy (especially in this economy) are key to lowering the cost-of-sale and dramatically improves operational efficiency.
- Many companies rely on happy return customers to grow at a sustainable rate. Companies that don't keep their customers happy will not be able to sustain the cumulative growth its investors and shareholders are banking on.
- The satisfactory customer experience is the real market differentiator of any product or service in a competitive industry, products with great service win over products with bad service anytime.
- The investment in call-center equipment finally makes sense now. Companies now have access to a killer application (and platform) that runs on the telephone hardware that moves support from an afterthought to an integral part of the brand experience.
I advise any company, and especially cash conscious startups, to verify SalesForce's new proposition in this space and gain immediate clarity of their product-promise early on. I bet that the way developers look at a product will dramatically differ from how consumers perceive it. Now is the time to cost-effectively validate product assumptions and use marketing and sales to extrapolate the successful validation of your promise.
I get excited by the surprising discovery of a technology proposition that can actually make this world a better place.
BTW: I have no relationship with SalesForce.com that prompts me to write this. As most of you know, I only write what I truly believe in.
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