Email Interview with Christopher Carfi
We’re starting a series of email interviews here at the Lexnet blog. We’ll be talking to CRM, email marketing and inbound marketing experts to get insights on their respective industries. Christopher Carfi, who has one of the top CRM blogs of 2008, helps us to kick off the series.
Name: Christopher Carfi
Company/Title: Cerado, CEO
Website: http://www.cerado.com
Blog: http://www.socialcustomer.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/ccarfi
How did you get involved with CRM?
I’ve always worked at the place where customers, sales & marketing, and engineering have come together. The most interesting problems are the ones where the complexities of customer’s problems need to be wed with available and envisioned solutions. In 2002, I co-founded Cerado, with (at that time) a focus on listening to the customer by using research. Since then, I’ve been increasingly involved in all of the three “traditional” pillars of CRM vis-a-vis marketing, sales and support.
What’s the most powerful tactic or strategy for which CRM can be used?
It’s simple. Listening to the customer. Many marketers become enamored with telling the customer what she should think. Listening is a much more powerful tactic. It eliminates the guesswork!
What’s the most common CRM mistake?
Focusing on technology. Ultimately, CRM is about people and how you interact with them.
What’s the biggest CRM trend on the horizon?
I would say the biggest trend that’s on the horizon is Vendor Relationship Management, a project headed up by Doc Searls that’s being run out of the Berkman Center at Harvard. The biggest trend that’s here today is mobile, and how the mobility of both customers and individuals who work in vendor organizations are taking advantage of always-available information, regardless of where they are.
What job would you do if you weren’t a CRM expert?
Whitewater river guide.
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We are looking for to bring our sales process on CRM, nice questions and answers here
-Aman Khan
360logica software testing services
http://www.360logica.com