Welcome to another episode of Digital 4 Productivity, the podcast for meaningful digitalization. And as you know, I regularly invite guests who have something to say on this very topic of meaningful digitalization and I’ve known the colleague you see next to me, Stephan Heinrich, for a few years now. Don’t be surprised, we’re on first-name terms. We’re not going to change that now. I will continue to address you as my podcast listeners. We won’t always use gender either. We’re relatively pragmatic about that. More important is the topic of why digitalization is so important, dear Stephan, why is it so relevant? Well, one thing is clear: anything that is simpler, cheaper and more convenient will prevail in the end. And many of the things that have emerged in recent years, which we might not now have under the heading of digitalization or automation, we are already using just like that! So perhaps you can still remember the saying, “I’ve made my fingers sore”, which comes from the good old dial, yes, where you actually made your fingers sore. Hardly anyone knows that anymore. But very few people even type the number into the telephone keypad. Most people do it with a click from the address book or maybe even with the voice assistant. In other words, if you take this aspect of sales work. We are already working with digital and automated tools. Some people always put up a bit of a fight when it comes to digitalization because they think it has something to do with less humanity. But it’s exactly the opposite. It’s more humanity because automation and digitalization give us more time to do what we do best, namely talk to each other and understand what the other person actually wants. Super. So as you can see, we’re right in the middle of the topic here. We always listen to podcasts and watch them. And that’s why the first question I always ask myself is, do I like the two faces? I hope you have already answered this question positively for yourself. If they listen to us, then hopefully they have judged it by the voice. The second question is always, is this a relevant topic? And both of us, we always deal with the question of sales and technology, how can they be dovetailed sensibly? And the third question is always, does Stephan Heinrich know anything about the subject? And believe me, he really knows his stuff. He has been a successful sales trainer in the business-to-business sector for many years. That’s where I got to know him. I’ve also seen him live in a seminar. So he can sell and he can also teach people how to sell. And my second passion is IT and how IT can be used sensibly for this purpose. And dear Stephan has just written a new book, which I read. And when I finished reading it, I read it in one go and there were lots of points where I said aah, exactly. And then we said, now we have to talk about this book. What is the title of this book, Stephan? Yes, of course I prepared it. Digital in one quarter is the title and this, this is a bit of a provocation, can you really finish digitization in one quarter, in three months? Probably not. But my approach was to provide a concrete proposal, a project to show how you can actually manage to digitize within twelve weeks, at least to the extent that a typical medium-sized company can already enjoy the first successes, i.e. to get the essential core processes in marketing and sales up and running. To ensure that marketing is highly digitized, that the resulting leads are more or less automatically transferred to sales, and only those leads for which it is reasonably worth investing any time at all. Everyone who works in sales is familiar with the situation of receiving so-called leads. But then, when you actually make contact, you realize that they’re garbage. Yes, most of them just raised their hand at the wrong time and were then immediately sold as leads. And that’s where marketing automation is a great way to start, of course, and ensure that this kind of interest is checked out first. Then only those who really want to go to the sales department, ideally even only those who have already pressed the button and said, yes, I would like a consultation appointment and perhaps even have already selected it in a virtual calendar, so that this conversation, this appointment is then directly in the calendar of both the salesperson and the customer. That would be such a wonderful result for me if you could achieve it within three months. That lead generation in marketing is automated and sales only receives leads that work and at the same time sales has a tool with which they can process these leads methodically and sensibly so that they can measure them after a very short time. Is all the stuff we’re doing actually worth it, or what adjustments do we need to make to make all the effort worthwhile in the end? Very exciting. I always have my own perception. I’d be interested to know what your perception is. What do you perceive in sales organizations when it comes to digitalization? Well, that’s because I always perceive two things. On the one hand, I perceive that a lot of things are done hand to foot, where I say that it could somehow be done much better digitally. And then, on the other hand, I somehow perceive digitalization for the sake of digitalization, saying that we are now making the office paperless, where I then always ask yes, and are you better or are you faster now? So I’d be interested in your perception of your experience on this topic, how you perceive it with your customers? Because you don’t just write books, you also help companies to put this into practice, you’re out in companies all the time. Yes, my saying is that before we have a paperless office, we’ll probably have a paperless toilet. But I don’t think it will really work. Yes. People simply need the tactile experience of writing something down, crumpling it up again and throwing it away. So I still like working with paper. I also encourage my participants to work with a specific tool, namely the conversation map, which can also be done wonderfully on a piece of paper, for example, because it is then usually less complex, i.e. because it is somehow digital and if you still want to record it digitally, everyone has a smartphone, one click and the thing is there as a PDF, where it belongs. So I’m not a fan of doing this on a religious level. Digitalization means that you don’t do anything analog anymore, but digitalization means that you do things digitally that are, as I’ve said before, easier, cheaper and more convenient. And, for example, making appointments electronically is a game changer in this industry, because who hasn’t had the experience of a customer saying, “Make three appointment suggestions, then three come back, none of which fit, then three come back, none of which fit either. And you waste time with such nonsense. How clever is it then, instead of saying, look, here’s a link, if you open it, you can look in the empty spaces in my calendar and choose an appointment there, according to my specifications of course, which is automatically in my calendar and automatically in your calendar. Now it’s suddenly possible to send something like this as a link, perhaps even on LinkedIn in a message, and say I’ll give you an example. Many of my customers are currently working on topic X, and they also seem to be very experienced in this area. Let’s reserve ten minutes and talk about it. And that’s very exciting. And then I have the link and then it’s something that can produce an immediate result. But if I say, if you’re interested, we can talk on the phone. Yes, fine, but I might not be able to make a phone call right now when I’m reading this message. Should I write it down now? It’s not going to work. But if I can click right away and see, hey, when do I have time? And then I can choose a ten-minute or fifteen-minute appointment and get an immediate result. That’s a game changer. If you don’t do that, it’s your own fault. And then we come back. And the nice thing is that this is a functionality that many companies already have. There are various services, but when I look at Microsoft 365, for example, a tool like this is already included. There are alternatives to it, but that alone is a good example of the fact that many already have it but don’t use it. Or the other way around, I recently sat in a meeting with four board members and then at the end they said for the follow-up appointment, yes, let’s plug the assistants together somehow so that they can get the new appointment together. Then I said, guys, you’ve all got your diaries in front of you right now, let’s do it the old school way. So sometimes, I think it’s too complicated to say that now we absolutely have to do it digitally. So now we have a tool that makes it easier to quickly check the calendar when I’m sitting together in person. So I always find this, this extreme in both directions and where I always say, first switch on the brain, then the technology. And what I find excellent in your book, which you also have right at the start, is this topic of the three dimensions of digitalization. What do you mean by these three dimensions of digitalization? Well, the simplest thing is transmission. So if you used to fill out a form on paper, you can now do it electronically. There are still a few minor improvements that can be made. So maybe check whether the e-mail address is valid or only ask for certain data if it makes sense. And that’s the simplest form. Yes, that’s easy. Then you use a form instead of a paper form. And that’s a relief because it doesn’t have to be sent again or copied somehow. The second stage would really be the optimization of processes. And this example of scheduling is wonderful because it significantly reduces the workload and makes things possible that we don’t even think about today. For example, if I have an internal sales team and it doesn’t matter who makes the initial call, I could set up a so-called round robin, i.e. put several people in a virtual calendar and the system would then offer the customer a large number of free appointments and ensure that the load is automatically distributed roughly equally among the individual employees. This makes it very easy for the customer to arrange an appointment. And on the other hand, it’s also very easy for the employees to simply check a calendar. And when it makes its ding-dong, then I have the next appointment. It’s the second stage of optimization. This makes it more cost-effective. It makes it more efficient. And the third stage would actually be transformation. And that is something that is painful for most people. It’s inherent in the process. A transformation is what a caterpillar goes through when it becomes a butterfly. It dies and wakes up with new DNA. And I could well imagine if you could now ask a caterpillar like that. Hey, do you want to die and become a butterfly? Most caterpillars would say no, don’t bother, I don’t need it. Yes, that’s why, that’s why transformation is the most difficult thing, so to speak, because most companies naturally resist and block it. Let me give you an example. If I sell devices for something today. So I gave an example in my book of industrial heating systems that are suitable for large halls and then heat them with infrared heaters from the hall ceiling, because warm air rises upwards and then it’s warm upstairs and there’s no one upstairs, they’re all downstairs and that’s why you need a different technology. In the past, we used to say, come on, we’ll go to the hall when the customer asks, then we’ll measure the others. We come into the hall and say, oh, how incredibly surprising a hall is. Yes. Then we check, okay, how big is the hall? Then you find out, okay, how many radiators do we need, then you can perhaps think again, do we have to make another breakthrough here for the exhaust gases or is there another way? And in the end, you’ve put a lot of time into it, then you make the customer an offer and they accept it or not. If you now think about transformation, you could look at the correlation between the size of the hall and the number of radiators or other installation costs in the past. And then you will probably find that there is a very strong correlation in a certain area. In other words, you could develop a kind of formula: tell me the size of the hall and I’ll tell you what it costs, without knowing in advance exactly how many spotlights of what quality I need, how many cables, how much installation work? Because you just say, gosh, sometimes we might have a little less effort, sometimes a little more. But that’s kind of the average. So that you can transform the sales process. In other words, you could basically say to the customer, enter your hall size here and bang, you’ll get a quote. And that would of course simplify things considerably, because you only have to go there once the customer has accepted the offer in order to consider exactly what technology we need now to actually realize the order that the customer has placed. When people hear that now, they will probably immediately block it internally and say, that’s not possible, we have to go there first and see. And if it doesn’t work, then what? And if you already have a certain amount of experience, you’ll see. That’s not even necessary, because the probability calculation shows us that it always fits somehow. And now you could even think one step further and now it gets really blatant. Now you could say that such a system normally runs, and this is an example for the heating system, but it also applies to many other things, it may run for eight years, ten years, twelve years, until it is written off or until it needs significant maintenance or changes. And then you could convert that into rent. And you could perhaps include financing in the calculation. Because of course the manufacturer wants the money immediately. I could well imagine that they would say, “Man, give me your size, your hall, and we’ll give you the amount you have to pay each month, plus gas, of course, or however this heating system is fired. And you can immediately work out whether you want it or not. And then the customer gets what he actually wants, namely heat. Heat for money and not something complicated where they have to make a big decision. And you can see that if you think things like this through and say, let’s build something like this in a process. That is a considerable intervention in the way of thinking, perhaps not even in the way of working or the way of making products usable for the customer. But in the way we think about how sales works. I also find that exciting. On the one hand, we have the topic of technology and sales, but the keyword here is also marketing. In your book, you write that marketing is a toothless tiger. What did you mean by that, Stephan? Well, most companies understand marketing to mean doing good things and talking about them. And that used to be the standard for a sub-discipline of marketing, namely PR. But now we’ve undergone a change in the last 15 years. Nobody feels that they are lacking information anymore. We all know that. We all have one of these things here and at any given time, even if we’re sitting in a pub somewhere and someone says something, I have the opportunity to look it up immediately. Is it even true what he’s saying? Or if a question arises, say, did February 30th ever actually exist? Then it takes about 20 seconds and then you find out, yes, it actually did exist in 1700 something, Sweden had to readjust its calendar and that’s why February 30th actually existed. So that means. Nobody needs or has the feeling that they are missing information at the moment. So it’s nonsense to say that I’m doing marketing by informing customers. Because that’s something nobody needs. It’s annoying. This call for information is annoying. I want to make decisions as a customer and that will become more and more prevalent as the younger generations move into professional life. Tagesschau is not at 20:00, but when I feel like it. I don’t need one, I have a media library. I don’t need a program planner. So this idea that we have to tell the customer something they didn’t know before is totally nonsensical. So in marketing, we have to move away from the idea of telling the customer something about my product so that they know it and move towards the idea that I am an exciting provider of information about what my target group is ideally interested in. And that’s new. So if, my favorite example is rose fertilizer. If I want to sell rose fertilizer, I talked about my rose fertilizer in the old world. Why is it great? What kind of components are in it, what awards it has won. Lalalalalala. But it’s boring, because for the target group of rose growers, rose fertilizer is boring in itself. No rose grower gets up in the morning and thinks, oh God, which rose fertilizer should I use? But they have other issues. For example, as a private rose grower, he has the question: how can I protect my garden from pests without chemicals so that the children are not poisoned? And a professional rose grower asks himself the question, for example, how can I optimize the shelf life of roses during cold transport? So they already have an interest. And if I want to make contact with my target group, then I can’t talk about what interests me about my products, but what interests them. I have to find that out and produce content to do so. And then a relationship develops. And this relationship can lead to subsequent sales contact. In other words, from your point of view, is the entry point more likely to be through marketing, more likely to be through sales, the sales channel, through both? In your experience, how is it connected? Well, when I talk to customers and try to find out where there is a problem, I use a process diagram, which is of course also in the book and which you can also find on my website, where I show that there is a marketing process and there is a sales process underneath and there is a clear interface, which is the so-called sales qualified lead. So if I have a sensible marketing process, then marketing produces directly usable contacts for sales. Let’s call them sales qualified leads. If I don’t have this or don’t have it yet, for whatever reason, it can of course also make sense for me to have this needs assessment meeting beforehand, which happens automatically when I get a song like this. But if I don’t have the leads, then I have to provide them myself. So then I have to make an approach. In other words, the sales department would have to contact a certain selection of people via LinkedIn or perhaps there is an address list or I go to a trade fair and visit the individual stands. It almost doesn’t matter how I get to these target persons. And then I have to think about what I can offer as a topic that will interest these people. And certainly not, I’m an XY and I’d like to introduce them to our services. Yes, most of us get these stupid approaches all the time via LinkedIn. Where I say, I don’t need them, because if I’m looking for an XZ, yes, for example a company that does corporate IT, or someone who has no idea how to deliver raw materials, then I’m sure I’ll find them. So I don’t need someone who steals my time and says hello, by the way, I’m one of them and … . So as a salesperson, I have to think about something other than talking about my services. And I could pick out one topic, for example. So, if I want to talk to sales managers or managing directors as a sales trainer, for example, then I pick a topic. The topic could be, for example, do we still need the sales force? Do we still need people who, by definition, drive around? Or do we not rather need salespeople with a mobility background, i.e. who can also drive out sometimes, but who do not see driving out as the core of their job? And this is of course a topic that interests many people. And so if I approach someone and say, I have topic XY here, and you seem to me to be someone who really knows your stuff and I’d like to hear your opinion on it, that could lead to a much greater willingness to talk. So if I say I’m a sales trainer and would like to introduce you to my sales trainer methodology. Hm, well, I just don’t. I’ve taken the customer’s perspective, so to speak, and think about what they might be thinking about right now. And we talk about that together. And if that results in a need, that’s wonderful. In other words, it doesn’t change the success rate at all. Because it’s always possible that a need arises during the conversation. So it will, but I reduce the rejection from those who say I don’t need a sales trainer right now. So I get a response about the topic, so to speak. Then we talk to each other and maybe something will turn out much better than if I’m already rejected because I just deliver the first stimulus word. And if I’ve understood you correctly, then the idea is also to make this process structured and clear, i.e. the marketing process, sales process, even in a haptic form for the time being, because I know the diagram is also great. So sometimes a smartphone might not be the right device to work through this, but then the idea is to automate it in certain steps. What is your approach, your idea on how to automate this process in the next step? The easiest thing to automate in marketing is filtering the many contacts who are interested in a topic in order to identify the few who are now ready to talk to sales. Yes, so it could be that I am now. Let me take my example as a sales trainer and say that I am now addressing medium-sized mechanical engineering companies on the topic of productization of services or the question of how can you still sell machines today? Or do people actually want packaged medicines if they are packaging machines for medical technology, for example? And this results in certain problems for the performance of the salesperson. Then it could be that many people are interested in the topic, but few are looking for new sales trainers right now. In other words, I am docking on to the topic. Many people are interested in it. I know the names and email addresses of these people. There is an automated process that provides them with information, that perhaps also asks them questions, that makes a poll and ultimately gives them the opportunity to press a button and say, yes, I would like to talk to Heinrich. And now listen, out of 100 people who are interested in the topic and who come into this funnel at the top, maybe two or three at the bottom come up with the idea of saying, yes, I want to talk. So that means 97 don’t want to talk. Many people would interpret that as a failure. I say, why, it doesn’t matter. As long as the two or three who want to talk are enough to secure my business, everything is wonderful. And what’s more, of those 97 who aren’t pressing the button at the moment and aren’t willing to talk, some of them will no doubt unsubscribe and say, “Gee, Heinrich, he’s getting on my nerves, he sends me so much stuff. But perhaps 80 or 75 of these 100 will simply read my information regularly because they find it fundamentally interesting. And the probability is very high that this constantly growing group of people, let’s call them an audience or a following, will develop a demand within this group over the coming weeks, months and years. And because of the relationships that I have built up and maintain, they will then come to me and press a button again. In other words, over time I build up a group of like-minded people who, if they have a need for my services, come up with the idea of contacting me relatively quickly. I learned that from you too. As part of my newsletter, I also have regular unsubscribe campaigns, now on the schedule, where I always say who hasn’t opened my stuff x times, doesn’t read it. I actively kick them out of my newsletter. I recently had a discussion with Jörg Knoblauch, who you also know from Tempus, who said, “Gee, how big is your list? And when I showed him mine, which was bigger, I said yes, but now we’re talking about the open rate, I have 59%, what do you have? So maybe you’d like to say a few more things about cleaning up your open rate. What your experiences are in this area. Exactly. So, of course, there are more and more algorithms on the recipient side, and the fact that the focus is very much on Google, on Microsoft, as far as email addresses are concerned, and on a few providers, means that they also check which senders have which spam potential. In other words, if I have a large number of Office 365 recipients or Google Mail recipients in my list and a large proportion of them don’t even think about opening or reading my emails and simply click away or are irrelevant. And that’s why they never open them, in which case Microsoft or Google are now learning. What Heinrich sends or what Jekel sends is usually not read and therefore the sender’s reputation drops, so to speak. If, however, I remove those who never open anyway directly from my list, perhaps warn them again beforehand and then remove them, then, as you have rightly recognized, I have a smaller list but a greater response and therefore a better reputation with these recipients and thus prevent me from ending up on some spam filter at some point and being considered a spam provider in general. And now there are the statements that you hear again and again – oh, email marketing is so 1980, Facebook is dead, so now it’s all about TikTok, why don’t you do the new things? What do you think about these topics? So you can, yes, basically it’s a good idea to be where your customers are. And it’s now 2023 and I’ve been actively involved with TikTok since this year. So I have content running there because I’ve noticed that my target group is also on TikTok and less and less on traditional Facebook, for example. Instagram and YouTube are still going strong, too. And this format of short videos definitely works. So you can watch them very closely, even for specific age groups. The target group that sees my content on Tik Tok, for example, is 20% aged 45 and over. So you can see that there’s a very, very interesting swing. And of course there are also 13-year-olds. But it’s similar to the podcast. I often get people calling me and saying, hello, I’m the managing director of XY and I’ve just discussed with my people that we want to do a sales training course, then they raise their hands and say yes, but then we call Heinrich because he’s had a podcast for three years. So that means I don’t always have to get the content directly to the decision-maker. Sometimes it’s also a good idea for it to end up with the recommender. And the decision-maker is then made aware that there is an interesting source. So I’m a big fan of thinking about where my target group is and then positioning the content there. I would neither demonize the medium itself nor praise it to the skies. I should be where my target group is at the moment. And if I take a look at every company, the target group is certainly a little different. The channels that work are different. For one company, the target group is more likely to be on LinkedIn, for another it’s more likely to be trade fairs in person, for another it’s Tik Tok in that area. How do you go about it when you accompany companies that say, “Man, now I have so many opportunities here, uh, I have this and I know the store. And how do I avoid the Nutella effect, I always say, when you’re standing in front of the jam shelf. That’s 125,000 types of jam, that’s where I get the Nutella. So the other question is, how does a company manage to get structure into it, even with your support? Say, what’s right for me? Because I think you’ve outlined a very good approach in your book, for example. Yes, there are a few central systems and tools that you simply need. Um, the two main systems you need is a sales system. Let’s call it CRM. But CRM is an extremely flexible term. People understand it to mean very different things. For me, it would be a system that provides the sales department with the operating system for its own work, so to speak. In other words, where I have contacts, where I have the associated companies, where I primarily manage sales opportunities and support their development. Including all associated activities. So appointments, emails, replies to emails, etc. . Hmm, for me that would be a central system and either detached from it or integrated into it marketing automation, i.e. a system with which I can program certain processes in marketing, for example if someone has clicked on it, then they receive an email with an offer, with three more reminders. Unless they have bought it in the meantime, in which case it goes straight on. So where you can program such processes. And where certain things are thought through once and then implemented without anyone having to actively work with them all the time. Ideally, these two systems work together so that things that come from marketing are fed back into sales and perhaps information about the success rates of certain approaches in sales is also fed back into marketing. In other words, you need just like 5-6-7 providers who are market leaders. And my approach would be, if you already have one of these market leaders, stick with it. If you’re in the process of picking one, flip a coin, pick any one of them. And if you don’t have an idea yet, go with something you can order and bill monthly, like ActiveCampaign. So take a very pragmatic approach. If I’ve got it, take it, do it, if you’re in the process of choosing something and you have three or four on the shortlist and can’t decide, toss yourself a coin. And if you don’t know what to do, go for something like ActiveCampaign with monthly billing. You can also get out of it every month if it turns out to be a bad decision. And my thought is that when we write a letter in business today, nobody would think of starting a project to determine the optimum letter size. But figuratively speaking, companies do this when they want to choose IT software. But that’s actually nonsense, because as a layman I want to define which tool I need. It makes much more sense to say, what does everyone else use? And that’s what I use too. So if I need a truck today, I don’t come up with the idea of designing the truck, I look at what trucks are available on the market, who is the market leader, can I afford it, then I buy it ready-made. I don’t have to think about it for long. And I advise my participants and customers to do the same. Just take the market leader, don’t worry about it and start implementing it. And save yourself this selection project. In the end, it’s much more expensive than what you could achieve by differentiating yourself in this selection process. And I also think that what you describe in your book is also a great strength of ActiveCampaign, for example, that you have a system where you have the email newsletter world and the CRM world in one system, so you explained it so well as an operating system earlier. Because what I often notice is that we have a CRM system on the one hand, you have the newsletter system on the other and they somehow have nothing to do with each other and it’s always extremely difficult to ensure that they don’t diverge. So I don’t know, you’ll probably notice that in companies too. But there are several providers, from Salesforce, to Hubspot, to Pipe Drive and probably many others that can do the same. In this respect, my pragmatic advice is that I wouldn’t say that one is significantly better than all the others. In modern software that is billed as software as a service, the systems are constantly expanding and adapting to customer needs anyway. In other words, what I have as a comparison today may be irrelevant tomorrow. So it’s simply not worth orienting yourself to your own requirements. It would be much smarter to say, come on, let’s go with one of the market leaders. And of course I have a list of them in my book and that’s it. Yes, and then we’d probably be done faster than if we spent another three months thinking about what to choose. And only then make a decision. You can save yourself those three months. Yes, I think so too. Especially as the market leaders usually either offer fully integrated options or have an interface to Zappier, for example. Or how is it actually pronounced correctly? Some say Zappier, others say Zepper, how is it pronounced correctly, do you know? Well, we have also agreed on Zappier. Yes, could you perhaps say three more sentences about that, because I think that’s also interesting for some people, because not all systems, systems have everything, there aren’t always direct interfaces. What is the idea behind this, as I call it, Swiss army knife, Zappier? Yes, well, I was born in 1964 and in my youth you had to make the decision if you wanted an integrated stereo system where everything was in one box and perfectly coordinated. Or do we build it ourselves from components? Amplifier, preamplifier, tape deck, record player, etc. And there was the philosophy, yes, let’s integrate everything, then maybe we’ll do without every single element being the best of greatest, i.e. the best in the category, but at least it works or I’ll put it together myself. But then I have to know how to plug it together at the back. So now, of course, there are many market leaders. That’s why I tend towards market leaders that recognize each other as market leaders in their respective categories and offer good interfaces. For example, Shopify as a store system naturally has a direct interface to ActiveCampaign. This means that if someone buys a training course in my Shopify store, their sales will automatically be visible in my CRM system because both are market leaders. But now I might want to connect other systems as well. And the nice thing is that almost all systems, I would say 99% of all systems I know, have a Zappier interface and Zappier is a data hub. In other words, I can program processes there without one of the two manufacturers of the other systems having to monitor it. For example, I could say that whenever something happens in ActiveCampaign, i.e. someone subscribes to a certain thing or someone subscribes to my Deep Ocean test, let me give you a concrete example. It runs in another system, at the institute that does the assessments for the industries, then there is a message there that someone has now subscribed. Once they have actually taken this test, I want the process to continue in my ActiveCampaign. But the two systems don’t talk to each other. But both systems talk to Zappier. So I can program a process in Zappier that ensures that the whole thing works in a fully integrated way without the two systems talking to each other directly. Zappier is a kind of data hub, standard interface, programmable interface, whatever you want to call it. And this means I can generally always ensure that systems talk to each other. That’s great. I really wouldn’t want to be without it, I have to say, because every now and then I find that a system doesn’t have an interface and things like that. If I have a new contact, it is automatically entered in the system straight away, for example. I wouldn’t want to be without things like that. And we have now talked about data hubs. In this case, the word data protection comes to mind. So that’s usually what it is in Germany. Officially, I think it’s spelled with a D. How do you see the topic of data protection in this context? Data protection is extremely important and data protection has a certain significance in the hierarchy. So I would say that data protection must be adapted to the business purpose and vice versa. If data protection suddenly prevents me from running my business, then something is wrong. Then we’re at the scene of the crime, yes 🙂 I think that you have to design the data protection ear so that it meets the requirements of the data worthy of protection without getting hysterical and doing things that are not even in this law. And that’s why I always recommend consulting an expert. I did the same in my book. There is a guest author, Achim Barth, who is a data protection expert and, for example, my data protection expert and the data protection expert we recommend to our customers with BAT-Datenschutz. Because this is someone who, on the one hand, is a certified data protection expert and, on the other hand, also has business glasses and less business prevention glasses. And that’s why I would recommend seeking advice. In any case, make sure that the data protection regulations are complied with, but at the same time look for ways in which you can still fulfill your business purpose without becoming hysterical. Yes, exactly, a very, very important topic. So I always see it too. But I always like the image of crash barriers, where I say that data protection is a crash barrier to the left and right. And I often find that the data protection officers, who sit across the road like this and, funnily enough, are on the left and right, are not guard rails at all. In other words, I see even less security in the solutions that I sometimes see, and I can 100% support bringing in professionals, which is of course also an issue, which is why it often happens. People are also sometimes involved in this topic, and there are sensitivities. We have now talked about systems, sales and marketing structures. How important is this whole topic of change management when you tackle a digitalization project like this in a quarter? Well, you can imagine that many people like to turn back on the journey and I think there’s a wonderful image for this. Things get worse before they can get better. Hmm. As an old person, when I type my messages on this thing, I type them with one finger. Of course, I can see that many others, including my children, can do it much faster with two thumbs. And I also realize that if I could do it with two thumbs, I would be faster. But every time I start the project now I’m learning to type with two thumbs, I get worse at first, even though I can see that I’ll get better if I keep it up long enough. And I’ve always done the opposite so far. So there is what I call the valley of tearful reversal. In every project, in every IT project. Things first get worse when you introduce a system like this. Before it can get much better. And those who don’t adjust to this and who are not prepared for it will then, when the cries get loud, yes, it’s worse than before. They will then turn back. And as a result, they will fail to take advantage of safe opportunities for improvement. In my opinion, a sensible change project requires you to be prepared for the fact that it will be more difficult at first, that problems will arise, that people will block things, perhaps even resist and say I don’t want to do it now or it can’t work like this. Or it used to be much easier or I’m used to it working like this. You have to adjust to this and you need to have lots of conversations along the way. It has something to do with coaching. People are very strong. If someone has been walking around with their paper notebook for 20 years and writing down their appointments in it. Of course, it’s a real change for them to do it differently now. You have to respect that, even if it’s not good to accept that someone doesn’t want to change. So the truth lies somewhere in between helping people to rethink and supporting them on this journey, on this effort that they have to make in their own minds so that it can succeed. It’s not the case that a digitalization project just works and nobody has to contribute anything, but it’s usually the case that I also have to change people’s daily habits. And anyone who doesn’t have that on their radar and doesn’t accept it will probably fail. If I now take a look at your process, which you described very well in your book, and ideally include you as a supportive sparring partner, what is realistically possible at the end of a quarter, based on your experience? So if I now say I have a starting situation, I have a target situation, what is realistic from your experience to have already implemented after a quarter and what are the next sensible steps from your experience? Yes, if you approach it pragmatically and don’t waste so much time thinking about how it should work, but simply start with the concept, you will have achieved at the end of such a quarter at the marketing level that the first posts, which function as magnets for customer interest, so to speak, are already live and a recursive process for regular post creation is underway, based on a previously made analysis. What kind of posts would we need? In other words, we set up the marketing process so that it runs recursively, so that we always know what we’re doing next week, what we’ll do in three weeks, what we’ll do in five weeks, if we have a fortnightly publication rhythm. That would be something that works, including the technology. In other words, if someone presses the button in this article and says, “I would like more information on this,” a window really opens to see if they enter their name and e-mail address and if the entire automatic dispatch mechanism and all the processes are clear. On the sales side, I then have a CRM system running. Regardless of whether I already have one today or whether I have to keep the same one or change it. That allows you to view the individual sales opportunities in clearly defined states. So the simplest, the simplest model would be three-stage. I have a request. I have a needs assessment. On the way to the third stage, I make an offer and have a closing phase. That would be the simplest. If the preparation of the offer itself is a more complex process, then I might have four phases: inquiry, needs assessment, offer preparation, closing. So that I can always see, as a manager and also as an individual employee. How many sales opportunities do I have and in what state? And what does it mean in monetary terms and what can be achieved after a certain period of time? A quarter is definitely a reasonable period of time. What can be calculated for the future? So how many initial opportunities do we need to have a certain number of concluded contracts? So that the whole thing then becomes less of a, but we need to sit down and talk about it. It’s more of a Zack, I take a look and immediately see what is the effective status? The sales success in my company? That’s something you can achieve. And if you have created this basis, i.e. automation in marketing and a strong process orientation in sales, then you can make wonderful adjustments to the individual set screws, to the individual key figures, which are all available, and then I can continue to optimize and think about it. What would it be like if we had a little more here now? Or if we were to increase the implementation rate a little, or if we were able to turn a screw, so to speak, and thereby significantly change the overall performance. That is what is possible within a quarter. That’s great. And that’s what I like so much about your sales. There are a lot of companies I say, but they are dying in beauty. To say you could do this, you could do that and then think about doing perfect, a better than perfect to say. Get started first. And that’s why, on the one hand, the title of the book is certainly a bit provocative, but it’s not pure provocation, it’s the way I understood it in the book. We’ve known each other for years and the interview confirms that you can really have a wonderful first step in the implementation in one quarter, which is already more than just the shell of the building, I’d say. So if I stick to building a house. I’ve already finished building my house, so I can already move in. Maybe the pictures aren’t on the wall yet, not all the furniture is finished, but at least I’ve got a house, the doors and windows are in, there’s heating, hot water and cold water. I’ll do the decorating afterwards. But at least I already have a house that I can move into, which is functional for now and then I can put a nice flower bed around it at some point. But at the end of the day, I have a place to move into. So that’s kind of the image that came to me when I read your book, where I also said, man, we should definitely do an interview about that. And those who have known Stephan Heinrich for a while know that he has three real strands that logically come together here. One is the real sales trainer for B2B, the other is the topic of content marketing. Perhaps you are familiar with the topic of Content Marketing Star and this whole topic of IT and process optimization. And for me, this is simply a wonderful example of bringing the three things together as an integrated overall concept. Yes, this interview was very exciting for me. We are also in the mastermind, so I always enjoy the exchange I have with Stephan Heinrich. If people want to connect with you more deeply and further, what is the best way to do this, Stephan? So my name is Stephan Heinrich, Stephan is spelled with a “ph” and anyone who can’t find me doesn’t deserve to get in touch with me. But it’s as simple as entering the name somewhere, on Google or anywhere else. And then you’ll find me. And depending on what deeper interest you want to pursue. In any case, you will then find a way to get in touch with me. Yes, wonderful. And I can only tell you this much Stephan Heinrich He Walks his Talk, he has his processes under control. So you can also make appointments electronically. But also by human, because human and digital, I think best of both worlds, maybe as one more thing at the end. What is your personal assessment of this current AI hype? If AI replaces people, we won’t need any more salespeople. So what is your personal assessment of the current topic of AI? It will not replace people. When I was at school, there was a huge fuss about the introduction of calculators because everyone said that students would be able to work everything out with the machine. Today there’s a lot of hype, so they can write their essays using AI. And I say yes, of course they can, and they should. And in the meantime, they’d better learn something sensible, because as soon as the machine can write an essay, humans no longer have to deal with it. And I have an agency that deals with text creation. Of course you can use AI to gather inspiration, let me say, to do the dirty work. Whether a good text is written by a computer or by a human being, you might not notice the difference with a bad author, but with a good author who appeals to the soul and emotions, this difference will probably remain. So long story short, AI is a great tool, we should use it and not demonize it. Wonderful. And to use the whole thing with structure, to pack it into processes. That’s exactly what you can do with Stephan Heinrich. As always, I’ll put the links in the show notes. With this in mind, I wish you continued success as a person with digital support and also a very warm thank you in your direction, dear Stephan, and much success. Thank you for the invitation. See you next time! Thank you! See you again. Bye.
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