Many of us are in the lucky position to sell products that we ourselves can use in our own business operations. SFA, CRM, ERP, business intelligence, web analytics, email marketing and marketing automation are all great examples that aim to make the life of the sales/marketer easier and can be demonstrated in anger by the companies making them.
By how often have you dug deeper into these companies and come up with the old "Cobbler's Children" adage. Turns out the producers of the tools are just as immature in the use of their own tools as the companies they're trying to sell to. Sales people in some CRM vendors don't update the system with their activities and BI companies use Excel for analysis & reporting. You get the idea.
Which is why I'm extremely proud that the all new silverpop.com is a model example of what behavioural marketing can be. The site demonstrates what is possible from a behavioural marketing approach, listening out for behavioural cues from individuals and self-optimising to deliver the perfect, individualised customer experience.
Or put more simply, the more you use it, the more it learns and the more it serves up a personalised experience built just for you.
Here are just six things (and one "...and finally") I love about the site:
1. Social Sign-In which allows individuals to automatically populate a form with their Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google and, most importantly for B2B organisations, Salesforce.com account.
2. A personalised sidebar which serves up relevant content based on information gained through progressive profiling:
3. A resources section that displays case studies and other pertinent content based on my specific industry:
4. Personalised contact information on who to speak to in Silverpop, based on data in our CRM system (in my example BTW i get a generic contact)
5. A view of my interaction history with Silverpop (downloads, emails received etc.):
6. The opportunity to self opt-in to nurture programs (wow!):
...and finally:
I love that our company website has become a living, breathing commercially active demonstration of what we can achieve. No canned demo or screen show. A powerful message to our prospects that we practice what we preach. And also an open, honest, transparent view of what we do. Something I believe all brands in a similar position should try & do.