It goes without saying that in my role we have to be a fan of people, and that is one of the main reason I chose this type of role. I love connecting with people, and making them reflect on their situations and ideas. The thought and reality of helping people to make their roles / jobs easier brings great satisfaction to me, and that’s why us account managers ‘cold call’ – even though I don’t particularly like the phrase. We have bundles and bundles of technology to hand and it’s a shame not to share it right? This is why in my recent podcast that I reiterated this to us at risual, being more like Business Consultants. Here to aid and guide our customers on their journey and advise on the best course of action, even if it lies outside of risual’s portfolio and agenda.
I joined risual just after finishing my University Degree in Business Management from the sunny Wolverhampton and dark Helsinki. The days of studying in the library and working on my Dissertation are long gone and what a change this has made. Technology played a pivotal role in my education, as I researched and looked to online blogs and eLearning to aid my discussions, connected with my peers online, held discussions and arranged meetings. I can see that some of my prior learning helps me in my role, as I learn how an array or organisations work in their many different quirky ways. The on boarding processes, their individual business challenges, the set ups and even sometimes just getting through to them. Each Customer is completely different, and no day is ever the same.
We hear and see the buzz word ‘Digital Transformation’ plastered all over the net, and it frustrates me. This doesn’t have to be a full-blown Cloud roll out, or a full Dynamics or Windows 10 piece. Organisations can start small and make changes to their business My colleague Jason Gardner recently wrote a blog around his local pub making leap and transforming by implementing a phone application to manage their Pub Quiz… something so simple can make a huge change (https://www.risual.com/2018/04/25/quiz-night-topic-digital-transformation/).
Simple things like implementing Skype internally, and being able to see status alerts and instant messaging. This can then be taken a step further to replace the current phone system All in tiny measurable steps. We don’t believe in handsets at risual, however connect and call with our customers daily using Skype for Business to call, Instant message, conferencing, and sharing screens while demoing products over the world wide web… all at the push of a button. Something so simple can lead on to endless transformation. Take it one more step forward, and report on Skype statistics to see who’s calling out, how many inbound calls do we get, even track area codes… it’s kinda endless!!!! At the end of the week the leadership team can see the activity of the Account Team Unit. All this to hand and all this tech, just makes my role simple. I know on a daily basis who I haven’t spoken to in a while, where I need to focus, and if I wanted to run a campaign on Skype for example… in a dashboard using Power BI, I can see exactly that, and then this gives me focus for the day.
The whole world now surrounds technology, and recently Facebooks AI engine was closed due to the fact it generated its own language without human input to improve efficiency. Whilst this feels like something out of a Sci-Fi film, the advances we have all made are now coming to reality. Things we dreamed of seeing in films are becoming true… well… not the Hoverboard from Back to the Future… however we do have the Self-lacing trainers!! But things like the ability to make a phone call from our wrists which personally as a James Bond fan and seeing the digital messages pop up on the classic Seiko from ‘Your Eyes Only’ – amazed that we finally got watches that double up as phones. Self-driving cars – again the dreams of controlling your car surpassed the ‘Tomorrow Never Dies’ Bond film as he controls his 7 series BMW from his phone. We shall forget the part that he drives it off the edge of a carpark…. However, these small advances have played a huge part in our lives, why not change the way your work is done… why not make use of the tools we have at our disposal?
‘If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything’ (Marty McFly – Back to The Future 1985).
Don’t be afraid to make change. It’s less painful than you think, and more often than not, less painful then remaining the same. Try something small and just try it :).
Jack Thompson
Account Manger
I also tried my hand at a recent podcast about inside sales:
