Video Transcript
Rokture Ramblings – Episode 9 – Technology Not Really Needed
Hello everyone, and welcome to Rokture Ramblings, where I discuss topics around digital
marketing, marketing technology, and marketing operations for the financial services industry.
My name is Fernando Pena, and I’m the founder of Rokture, where I can help you master the digital
channel. Today’s topic is in response to what I hear from a lot of leaders in terms of their challenges
and what they’re looking to do going forward. And really a lot of that conversation focuses
around technology. And one of the first things that I come back with them or to them with is that
you don’t need technology, you need solutions. Now that might sound a little unusual coming
from someone who’s such an advocate for digital marketing, but it’s true. You really should
not make decisions just based on the need for a technology, but more so an overall solution to
your problems or your challenges. So what I’ll be going over today is that technology really
just is a tool, how to align your strategy and your
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goals, informed selection of those tools, technology should complement the process and also
deploying those solutions as a whole. So let’s get started. So again, as I mentioned before,
technology really is just a tool. And the reality of it is, is that no matter what technology
you bring in, and whatever these providers may say, these platforms do not generate revenue
or growth. They are tools that if properly utilized, they actually can help with achieving
both of these goals. But they don’t do this all on their own. And they’re not the magic sort of
solution that will automatically bring your organization to exceed your objectives. Another
issue too, is that inadequate use of technology might actually hinder your organization more
than help. And I often see this where a platform is brought in, and now all resources are dedicated
to trying to understand and work through that platform. And ultimately, they lose sight of
why they’re really trying to achieve these potential metrics that they
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put in front of them. And it’s not so much that the platform itself is flawed, but it’s just that
too much emphasis is placed on that tech, and not necessarily meeting those organizational
objectives. And that leads to the next point here, which is that resources that are traditionally
budgeted for marketing or operational use, are then devoted to these technologies. And ultimately,
that does then create a slowdown in terms of being able to achieve the objectives that you have
stated. So again, technology is not a bad thing here. That’s not what I’m saying, because ultimately,
it is something that is beneficial when used properly. But it’s just that by saying, I need a
CRM, the question that you should really be asking is, why do you need a CRM? What is it that you
notice that there’s a deficiency in, and where the CRM might be able to address that deficiency?
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So the most important thing when you’re considering technology is to make sure to align your
strategy and goals. And this has to come all the way from the top. So as an organizational leader,
what are the objectives of that company? Oftentimes of financial services, it’s either growth
of some sort, or maybe cross -selling and increasing and deepening a relationship, or it could
be revenue -based. But it all has to be agreed upon, because ultimately, that’s what you will
use to base your decisions on, whether that technology is needed or not. And what does your organization
have to do to meet those objectives? So is it something that can be created, a more efficient
process by using technology? If so, then you should absolutely look for it. But in some cases,
maybe it’s something where there’s an internal process that is broken and just needs to be improved
upon in order to be able to meet your needs. What resources are needed to meet those goals? This
is important, because again, dedicating
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too many resources to a particular project could be detrimental to the organization as a whole.
And what functionality do you need to achieve those goals? And I’ll get into this a little bit
more in the presentation. But what’s important is not so much a platform type or a platform category,
but what do you need this technology to do? And that’s ultimately where you then make the decision
as to what platform you might need going forward.
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So informed selection of tools. Now, what’s happened lately, or not lately, but really in recent
years, the technology categories have pretty much blurred. So what used to be like, let’s say,
a CRM or a sales automation tool has now morphed into a complete marketing solution. And that’s
great, because you’re getting a lot more bang for your buck. But also at the same time, there
might be some functionality that may not necessarily align with what you need. And so therefore,
it’s still a good idea to look at individual functionalities and not necessarily a platform
type. So it’s possible that a CRM tool might be able to do everything for you, but you may then
find that the email capabilities of that tool are insufficient for your needs. Now, you have
to also understand how this tool can help you reach your organizational objective. So assess
that particular function, and not necessarily that it’s a good system, but it’s a good system
in your particular use case. When you’re assessing these
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tools, make sure to use your actual metrics and not theoretical, because that will help you
in making sure that this is actually going to move the needle when it comes to your needs and not
just this magical use case where everything falls into place. And of course, it’s not really
reflecting reality. The other important part is to involve all relevant stakeholders and
parties on the decision. Now, it’s not to say that you need this huge committee to make these
decisions, but make sure to involve your IT team, make sure to involve sales, make sure to involve
customer service and support, as ultimately they’re all going to be impacted by this technology
decision. So you want their feedback and you want to be able to understand and really be able
to draw out of them the needs that they have and make sure that they’re met by whatever it is that
you’re considering.
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Now, technology really should complement a process. Now, if there’s processes that are broken,
then obviously they need to be fixed. But really what you should do is to build your processes
independent of technology. So if you have a way of fulfilling a certain campaign or doing something
that is done within your organization today, make sure to build that process where technology
plugs into it within the specific scenarios where it’s needed. Now, you’ll want to make sure
to optimize these processes, of course, so that you have more productivity and benefit to your
organization. So, again, if it’s a broken process, by all means, fix it. But make sure that you
are working the technology into your process and not the other way around, because then that
means you become dependent upon a particular tool or a particular sort of platform. And in the
event that that platform goes out of business, changes functionality, or for some reason you
outgrow it, then you have difficulty in trying to rein
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in your process and make sure that it works for your needs. So adopt the technology into the process
and not the other way around. The other thing, too, is that continually track your key performance
indicators and metrics to determine if the technology is properly performing. That way you
can, in time, especially during contract renewals, use that as a negotiation tactic with your
vendors saying that, hey, you know, we are tracking everything very closely and ultimately
we’re not meeting the sort of expectations of this platform and we may have to reconsider going
in a different direction.
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And finally, is deployment of the solutions. So when you’re doing this, a lot of times many stakeholders
or project leaders, when they’re deploying technology, will basically go into the project
discussing how this technology is beneficial. But really what you want to do is to package solutions,
because what this does now is that it sort of breaks down the barriers where instead of this being
a black box, it’s something that is comprehensive and it’s able to achieve this metric or this
goal or this objective that you’ve stated. So package your strategy, your tactics, your processes
and your technology as a solution. And that is ultimately where you’ll see successes so that
you can make sure that this entire movement is being utilized and properly adopted by the organization
because it’s widely accepted that this is not just a software. This is something that’s actually
helping the organization as a whole because we’ve looked at the entire big picture. So tie all
the outcomes of the solution
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directly to the organizational objectives. So this is important as well, because if you have
a tool that helps to bring in extra phone calls, but yet phone calls aren’t necessarily the metric
that you’re trying to increase, it’s deepening a relationship, then it’s time to change the
metrics that you’re tracking to the deepening of the relationships. Granted, the tool isn’t
necessarily doing that itself, but it’s helping to as part of that process to meet that end objective.
And the last thing here is really avoid being penny wise, pound foolish. And this is easier said
than done oftentimes because budgets are highly scrutinized. But keep in mind that there’s
a lot of disruption when you try to implement a new solution, especially a new technology. And
you don’t want to be doing that again in a short period of time. You’re hoping that when you implement
something, it will be the solution that can be leveraged for the foreseeable future. So a little
bit more of an investment up front and
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studying exactly what is needed and and how it’s going to be utilized is it pays dividends in
the end. And that would be much better than rushing and implementing something to try to to meet
some salesperson’s quarterly quota and and get the better deal on it. So I would forego the deal
instead and make sure that you’re getting the right solution and that it’s properly implemented
for your sake. So that is it for today’s discussion. Obviously, this is something that we can
spend months discussing. But if you do have any questions on this topic or any others related
to digital within financial services, give me a call or reach out to me by email. All my contact
information is on this page. And and until the next topic, I will see you again in the next video.
Thank you so much for your time. Bye bye.
