1st Apr 2022 | Autoresponder, Charity, Consultancy, Email, Event Bridge, General Information, Salesforce, Support, Training
Finding support can be difficult… so that is why we have launched our support portal.
The idea is that people will be able to help themselves before checking in with us. For many people, this ‘instant result’ saves them a load of time.
However, there will still be many times when you do need our personal support, so, for our customers, it is possible to raise new cases.
But… won’t that mean learning ANOTHER username and password? Fortunately, that answer is ‘no’.
As long as you have your own Salesforce instance and we have you as a contact in our system then you don’t need a password at all.
(For those of our customers who do not have Salesforce, we can still set you up, but you will need a username/password.)
The portal is at support.cloud-genius.com
Here is a video on how to access the Knowledge articles:
Access Knowledge Articles
Here is one on how to log in (without a password), raise and monitor a case.
Raising Cases
This is a new venture… so while we have been having our techies check everything out… I am sure you will find some things that could be improved. I would love to hear from you!
30th Sep 2021 | Lunch and Learn, Salesforce, Training, Training Club
What on earth are they doing?
One of the scariest moments of going from being a successful ‘minion’ to a manager is that moment when you realise that you don’t know what is happening.
You can look very carefully at the folk you are managing, but you cannot watch every mouse click and keyboard tap and screen flick. You don’t want to be one of those managers who thinks that you can do everything better than your staff. A manager who micro-manages, picks up on every detail of every piece of work done by their staff.
This situation is unpleasant for the staff, unpleasant for the manager and inefficient, as every piece of work is being done twice.
Similarly, how do you know what is happening with your resources? Are your finances in a good state? Is money coming in?
For charities there are questions like… did the people who donated last year donate this year? If not, why not?
If they did give this year, did they increase their donation?
So many questions, so little time.
To manually go through every piece of data takes forever.
That is why I am running the next Salesforce Lunch and Learn. To look at reports…
In Salesforce, once you have written a report, it will keep on running with current data. So you can run it against the last 3 months of data and it will update so that no matter what data you run it on, you will get the last 3 months of data.
Within the Salesforce Non Profit Success Pack there are a number of reports that are particularly aimed at donations and comparing this year to previous year.
21st October from 12noon to 12:45 we will be looking at these reports and how you can use them.
Book Here is where you can sign up.
Use the code SALESFORCE to get your ticket for free. (This is to stop the ‘bots signing up and taking the valuable places.)
See you there.
24th Apr 2021 | Charity, Consultancy, Customer Engagement, General Information, Recycling, Training
It is a common misconception that in order to talk with technical people, you need to talk their language. It’s wrong and it’s dangerous and it’s expensive… let me explain.
This might feel painful, but you will understand more of the process at the end.
When you are talking to a (good) consultant they will have a breadth of knowledge about their specialist area. They also want to find the best solution for you within your budget. Let’s use cars as an analogy. Everyone knows about cars?!
You sit at home and you know that the ‘best’ electric car is a Tesla.
You also know that you want to carry a lot of luggage, so you want a Tesla Cybertruck
You go to your car consultant and tell them to source you a Tesla Cybertruck in green. A friend down the pub/coffee shop/round the water cooler had told you that you wanted a green car.
You live in a difficult area, so you also want strong windows. (See this video if you want to see why this is a funny request.)
Your consultant explains to you that that Cybertruck only comes in bare metal and there are ‘issues’ with the windows.
At this point there are typically 4 responses. The potential customer:
1) Mutters about how useless the consultant is in not being able to source a green Cybertruck. Cost zero, but time wasted… which is money.
2) Splashes the cash for a Cybertruck ($70,000), and then paints it green. Cost >$70,000
3) NHS response: there are no products in the market that 100% fit the list of requirements, so employ a very expensive set of consultants to set up an Electric Vehicle research department, a manufacturing facility and end up with something way over budget, that doesn’t work and another NHS funding fiasco is born. (Thinking in a few years the NHS can achieve what it took Tesla 10 years to achieve.) Cost millions and millions and millions. Rinse and repeat. I worked in the NHS in the 80’s. They were doing it then, and they are still doing it in their IT systems.
4) Continue to engage with the consultant…
At this point, a consultant should ask.
WHY?
Why do you want a Tesla Cybertruck in green?
You start to explain that you want to be part of the ‘green revolution’. You discuss this further with the consultant and they explain it is about using energy responsibly and from renewable sources. You like the idea of this. They explain how by choosing the right car you can significantly reduce your running costs.
They ask you about the sort of trips you do. You tell them your driving is around the city. It is just you who ever uses the car. By ‘luggage’ space, you mean enough for 3 bags of groceries every week. So they are just about to suggest a Renault Twizy. A ‘car’ for 1.5 people with a very limited range. Job done… and you have exactly the WRONG car.
In a flash of honesty, you also explain that you also like to make trips of around 200 miles on these trips you need to comfortably fit 2 adults and 2 children in the car. A Twizy would not have been right, at all! In this case the consultant might suggest a Renault Zoe – a car with great range and good seating. You decide that now you have a green car, you would like the paint job to be black.
(When the consultant asked the question, ‘Do you EVER do long trips?’ the temptation is to say ‘no’ in order to save money. In this case, it would have been a costly mistake that the consultant would probably have been blamed for. Try to answer honestly. If you do long trips, but rarely, the answer might be to buy a Twizy and use the money saved to hire a vehicle for the rare times you do very long trips. See how variations in your answers can vary the proposed solution.)
Oh, and that problem with the ‘difficult’ area… you still have room in your budget for an armoured garage and security system 😉 On the other hand, it might be cheaper to move.
That all said, I have no associations with Tesla or Renault. My expertise is in Salesforce… I love it when people tell me what they are trying to achieve, and their budget. I can often save them money and get them something better than they asked for.
When a proposal comes through, the temptation is to scrimp on the section that says, ‘training’. Your people will pick it up. (Like they still don’t know how to use styles in their word processor, after 25 years?) Would you really want to be driving around in a car with an unlicensed driver? Oh! The stories I could tell.
Talking of training… we have some free training coming up… see our front page for details.
15th Apr 2021 | Charity, Consultancy, General Information, Salesforce, Security and Safety, Training
One of the bigger, if not the biggest business decision is purchasing a new CRM system. (Customer Relationship Management system)
This information is not Salesforce specific!!!
While I do consult on Salesforce, this guide is deliberately about what a CRM can do for your business or charity. It is not about Salesforce!
So, grab a cuppa, sit back and watch the video. It’s about 20 minutes long.
At the end you should know what to consider before looking for a CRM system.
Good luck!
18th Mar 2021 | Business Ownership, Charity, Consultancy, Customer Engagement, General Information, Salesforce, Training
On of the advantages of the current crisis is that it has allowed us to meet virtually, at a moment’s notice.
No travel time. Distance is no longer an object.
It is a tiny sop, out of a global crisis.. but it is very real.
Running on cloud-based technology, my clients have been all around the world. When I spoke of learning, everyone thought of a classroom.
One of the side-effects of the crisis is that people are much more familiar with Zoom. So, now we can bring everyone together in a new and wonderful way. Rather than having to hire a classroom, have everyone travel to the same place AND put on food we can just spend some time together.
I was able to experience this at the first Cloud Genius ‘Lunch and Learn’ event on 11th March.
So, it set my mind thinking… perhaps we could have more of this.
What I am proposing is a monthly Lunch and Learn, where we look at different aspects of Salesforce and learn together.
Expect details to be posted here, soon.
Together, we can make amazing things happen.
19th Jul 2018 | Business Directory, Training, Training Club
What is the easiest business to win?
Anyone who has been in business knows that word of mouth is the easiest to win.
Do you have a referral strategy?
You mean you CAN have a strategy for word of mouth?
Most business women and men do not have a business strategy for referrals. If you build your referrals then you make more word of mouth business.
I am now setting up a Training Club that will address just these issues… but I am not an expert. So, I have Sarah Owen who is a world-renowned expert in building businesses through a referral strategy.
The Training Club will meet once every month. We will have two high-quality speakers. Each will speak or train for an hour on some aspect of building your business. In between there will be a break for networking or doing what you have just learned.
Sarah Owen will be presenting her training materials at each of the first six meetings.
Meetings will run from 9am to 12noon at the Beacon Centre in Llanelli (SA14 8LQ).
First meeting is on 21st August 2018.
Get your tickets and more details here: Book a ticket
