|
Server : Apache/2.4.62 System : FreeBSD fbsdweb2.web.rcn.net 14.1-RELEASE FreeBSD 14.1-RELEASE releng/14.1-n267679-10e31f0946d8 GENERIC amd64 User : www ( 80) PHP Version : 8.3.8 Disable Function : NONE Directory : /domains/efusion1/e-visory/ |
Upload File : |
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd">
<html>
<head>
<title>Four Dangerous Diversions Every Customer Educator Should Avoid.</title>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
<link href="/esfusion.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css">
<script src="/SpryAssets/SpryMenuBar.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
<link href="/SpryAssets/SpryMenuBarHorizontal.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
<script type="text/javascript">
<!--
function MM_preloadImages() { //v3.0
var d=document; if(d.images){ if(!d.MM_p) d.MM_p=new Array();
var i,j=d.MM_p.length,a=MM_preloadImages.arguments; for(i=0; i<a.length; i++)
if (a[i].indexOf("#")!=0){ d.MM_p[j]=new Image; d.MM_p[j++].src=a[i];}}
}
function MM_swapImgRestore() { //v3.0
var i,x,a=document.MM_sr; for(i=0;a&&i<a.length&&(x=a[i])&&x.oSrc;i++) x.src=x.oSrc;
}
function MM_findObj(n, d) { //v4.01
var p,i,x; if(!d) d=document; if((p=n.indexOf("?"))>0&&parent.frames.length) {
d=parent.frames[n.substring(p+1)].document; n=n.substring(0,p);}
if(!(x=d[n])&&d.all) x=d.all[n]; for (i=0;!x&&i<d.forms.length;i++) x=d.forms[i][n];
for(i=0;!x&&d.layers&&i<d.layers.length;i++) x=MM_findObj(n,d.layers[i].document);
if(!x && d.getElementById) x=d.getElementById(n); return x;
}
function MM_swapImage() { //v3.0
var i,j=0,x,a=MM_swapImage.arguments; document.MM_sr=new Array; for(i=0;i<(a.length-2);i+=3)
if ((x=MM_findObj(a[i]))!=null){document.MM_sr[j++]=x; if(!x.oSrc) x.oSrc=x.src; x.src=a[i+2];}
}
//-->
</script>
<meta name="keywords" content="customer training, IT training, customer education, professional services marketing">
<meta name="description" content="How to achieve your customer education financial goals even if the core business units you are supporting are in a funk.">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" onLoad="MM_preloadImages('/assets/subscribe_f02.gif')">
<a name="top"></a>
<table width="720" border="0" align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0">
<tr >
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="225" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="7" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="30" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="18" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="8" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="71" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="8" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="78" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="9" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="43" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="8" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="64" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="8" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="37" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="8" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="64" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
<td><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="14" height="1" border="0" alt=""></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="18" valign="top"><img src="/assets/apples.jpg" alt="apples" align="right" width="85" height="47" hspace="4" vspace="4" border="0"><img src="/assets/logo.gif" alt="FUSION (tm)" name="logo" width="220" height="47" border="0" align="top"><br>
<img src="/assets/tagline.gif" alt="Helping education companies teach better and sell more." name="tagline" width="485" height="17" hspace="10" vspace="6" border="0" align="texttop"><br>
<div align="right"> <img src="/assets/red.gif" alt="" width="720" height="1" hspace="4" vspace="2"><br>
</div></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width="10" align="left" valign="top"> </td>
<td rowspan="2" align="left" valign="top"><h4><br>
<img src="/assets/e-visory_sm.gif" alt="Training Business E-Visory" width="227" height="15"></h4>
<h4><a href="/subscribe.asp"><img src="/assets/subscribe_f01.gif" alt="Subscribe for Free!" width="122" height="75" hspace="6" vspace="6" border="0" id="Image1" onMouseOver="MM_swapImage('Image1','','/assets/subscribe_f02.gif',1)" onMouseOut="MM_swapImgRestore()"></a></h4>
<p><span class="greenBlurb">Training Business E-Visory's 3,000 subscribers include more than 400 training company owners and CEOs.</span></p> <p><a href="/subscribe.asp">Shouldn't you join them?</a> It's free! </p></td>
<td> </td>
<td colspan="15" align="left" valign="top" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" >
<!--#include virtual="/incl.dropmenus.html" -->
<br>
<br></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="left" valign="top"><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" alt="" width="10" height="100"></td>
<td background="/assets/dots-vert.gif"><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" width="20" height="100"></td>
<td colspan="14" align="left" valign="top" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" ><h1>Four Dangerous Diversions Every Customer Educator Should Avoid.</h1>
<!--#include virtual="/incl.sharethis.html" -->
<p>TO: VP Customer and Professional Services<br>
FR: Mgr. Customer Education<br>
RE: Your Annoying and Unreasonable Demands</p>
<p>Dear Boss, </p>
<p>Get real! There's no way I'll commit to grow our customer
education business 20% next year - not when sales of the products
I'm supposed to support have tanked. You should kiss my feet
for just staying on the job, you unappreciative jerk.</p>
<p>That's what you'd like to say.</p>
<p>But you want to keep your job. So you acquiesce and decide
to forage around for education-related revenue streams that
aren't dependent on the success of your core software and
systems products business. Just watch out. Following are four
"breakout" opportunities that resourceful customer
educators frequently get seduced by -- and why they can get
you into trouble, big time.</p>
<h2>1. Offer Your Customers Other People's Training</h2>
<h4>If customer appetite for training on your core IT product
offerings has declined, why not reload with courses that may
address more timely customer training priorities. For instance:</h4>
<ul>
<li> Training on SW applications offered by your key alliance
partners</li>
<li> Executive level seminars on leading edge IT topics User
and technical training on popular desktop applications</li>
<li> Training on business skills like project management and
selling</li>
<li> Training on all of the above -- in a one-stop-shopping
training portal</li>
</ul>
<p>After all, you already enjoy a warm relationship with your
customers. So surely they'll consider you for their other
training needs.</p>
<p>Not so fast! Just because your customers are interested in
purchasing training on the above topics doesn't mean that
they'll buy it from you. Why buy a sales training course from
an IT company when you can buy it from a firm that specializes
in sales training? You've got a hard sell there -- particularly
since the folks who make decisions about sales training aren't
the same people who decide to purchase IT training.</p>
<p>Don't count on selling your customers industry standard IT
technical and end user training, either. Chances are this
decision long ago migrated to a centralized training purchase
authority where you don't have any clout and that a pack of
piranha-like competitors has got there before you.</p>
<p>As for selling the training offerings of your software alliance
partners, this may sound good in concept. But if your partner
has their own customer education function they will fight
like blazes to keep you from competing with them. And if you
win, you lose. Because you wind up with a tremendous learning
curve understanding the intricacies of their layered software
solution offset by a meager niche training revenue stream.</p>
<p>High end seminars? It's always chancy for a technology provider
to try and sell intelligence on the state of the art. Folks
will figure you have an axe to grind. Plus you'll wind up
competing with consulting companies that are giving this expertise
away. What's more, the half life of these trendy topics is
extremely short. So you'll always be behind the curve in keeping
your courses up to date.</p>
<p>Finally, for all of the above reasons -- and more -- don't
even think about trying to be a training portal. A number
of firms have tried to offer a one-stop training shopping
experience, and most have lived to regret it. See our "Training
Superstore" article in the back issue area of our Website
(<a href="090501.html">http://www.sellmoretraining.com/090501.html</a>)</p>
<h2>2. Offer Your Training To Other People's Customers</h2>
<h4>Chances are that 90% of the training you offer is specific
to your company's proprietary technology offerings. So you
can forget about selling it to firms that haven't already
purchased your software or hardware. But let's say that you
do have a few courses that could be easily repurposed to external
audiences -- for instance UNIX or Linux training -- or training
on IT project management skills. Why not give it a shot?</h4>
<p>Here's why. Because gearing up to promote to and call on
other people's customers will cost you an arm and a leg.</p>
<p>Most independent training companies spend 30% to 50% of revenue
on sales and marketing. In moving beyond the comfort of your
installed base, you'll have to do that too. Chances are you
only budget 5% or so for selling and marketing now. How will
your bottom line look minus 40 margin points? Book too much
of this kind of incremental revenue and you'll be in the poor
house for sure.</p>
<h2>3. Sell The Tools You Use To Author, Deliver And Manage
Your Training</h2>
<h4>It's tempting. You've developed a nifty authoring tool that
lets you turn around new courses in half the time -- or slick
<a href="http://www.cornerstoneondemand.com/lms-learning-management" target="_blank">learning management system software</a> to mastermind all of your delivery
channels. So why not put a price on them and sell them?</h4>
<p>For the same reason that carpenters don't sell hammers, that's
why. When training companies start selling training tools
they wind up in a totally different business -- the software
business.</p>
<p>Oops, the customer wants a feature your software doesn't
deliver. Oops, your software doesn't work in the client's
computing environment. Oops, your software has a bug in it.
Oops, you need a 24x7 help desk to field customer questions.
Oops, your software isn't compatible with the latest operating
system or Web browser. Oops, your software is a generation
behind and needs to be rewritten. Oops, the people you call
on to sell training courses don't make purchase decisions
on training software. It's not long before the oops and the
gotchas begin to mount up.</p>
<p>So, who cares -- if sales are mounting up, too. Problem is,
they aren't. Few customers want to buy training tools and
infrastructure software from the same company they buy training
content from. They are looking for a content neutral solution,
and suspect a spin. What's more, there are dozens of independent
software vendors out there looking to eat your (and each other's)
lunch, and undistracted by the demands of supporting a training
content business.</p>
<p>It gets worse. Training content people and training software
people tend to mix like oil and water. So you wind up with
two opposing cultures competing for resources.</p>
<p>Maybe you will be successful in adding training software
to your learning content mix. If so, you'll be the first.</p>
<h2>4. Become A Training Consulting And Customization Shop</h2>
<h4>If your mainstay courses aren't selling, why not help customers
with their out-of-the-ordinary needs. Gear up your consulting
and customization capabilities and go after the workforce
retooling initiatives corporations are fond of undertaking
during periods of transition.</h4>
<p>Some of these opportunities can scope out at $10 million
and more -- which can offset a lot of empty $1200 classroom
seats for sure. Plus, here's your chance to get even with
your professional services counterparts who have been grabbing
those juicy "reskilling" and "change management"
assignments all these years. Hey, we can do that!</p>
<p>So you transfer in a dozen program managers your professional
services organization was about to lay off, pull your instructional
designers and media specialists off of core course development,
and hit the road after the Big Ones.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, you're more likely to find Big Trouble. Here's
why:</p>
<p>Trying to scope these one-off reskilling projects can be
next to impossible. Each time you think you've got a grip
on things, the client reorganizes their people and their priorities.
Accountability is lost in a maze of self-directed work teams.
Nobody can even agree who should sign the P.O.</p>
<p>Soon you have ten $15-million proposals out there, hoping
that they don't all close at once. Then you worry than none
of them will close. Finally, one does. A fast food chain wants
to provide touch screen training to 10,000 short order cooks
on how to use a new high tech fryolator.</p>
<p>Uh, oh. The program manager you assigned to the project badly
underestimated the dimension of the need. What's worse, the
project requires content and delivery expertise you don't
have on staff -- so you have to outsource it -- while your
own people sit idly on the bench.</p>
<p>Soon you're missing delivery mileposts, wrestling with scope
creep and defending yourself against hate letters from your
new client to your CEO.</p>
<p>And, providing you are able to deliver the goods without
totally losing your shirt, what have you got to show for it?
A project that did nothing to benefit your core software or
systems business, and that is both unrepeatable and non-transferable.</p>
<p>It's no picnic being a customer education manager. But most
of the folks I know who run education consulting and customization
shops would gladly trade places with you.</p>
<p>So, where does that leave you? How can you make your customer
education goals if the business units you are supporting are
in a funk? Here are a few ideas:</p>
<p>a) Call on your software and systems business unit counterparts.
Offer to help them dig out of their current period of distress.
Explore imaginative ways to use education to help them win
new business and more deeply penetrate the installed base.</p>
<p>b) If helping them offers you an uncertain financial reward,
try working out a creative quid pro quo. For help on how to
do this see "<a href="/e-visory/032900b.asp">How To Take On Good Works Customer Education
Assignments Without Taking It In The P&L</a>."</p>
<p>c) Step up your customer education marketing programs and
campaigns directed at the installed base. For example, perhaps
you can offer a "Level Two" certification to try
and encourage IT professionals to go deeper into your curriculum.</p>
<p>d) Consider reducing your cost base so you can achieve your
profit targets on flat or even reduced education revenues.
Everyone wants to be "creative" on the revenue generation
side. Challenge and reward your people for being equally creative
on the cost containment side.</p>
<p>For customer educators, tough times are no time for dangerous
diversions. Instead, apply every ounce of your energy and
creativity to supporting your core business. You (and your
boss) will be glad you did!</p>
<p>^ <a href="#top">TOP of page</a> </p></td>
<td align="left" valign="top" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" ><img src="/assets/spacer.gif" alt="" width="10" height="100"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="left" valign="top"> </td>
<td colspan="16" align="left" valign="top"> </td>
<td align="left" valign="top" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" > </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan="17" align="right" valign="top" class="margin"><!--#include virtual="/incl.footer2.html" --></td>
<td> </td>
</tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>