The CRM is Always Greener…

If you know me well, you know I’m passionate about music. The modern-day poets running around writing little-known music share wisdom of almost every variety every day. A band I’ve been listening to a lot lately is Make Do and Mend and one of their songs jumped out at me this weekend as I was running. The lyric goes, “Believe me when I say that there will always be cold days, but the grass is only greener here if you plant it that way.”

I love the sentiment in those lines and especially love the viewpoint on the “The grass is always greener…” colloquialism. It’s easy to believe, especially when things are difficult, that the “other way” is easier/better/quicker/more efficient, but that’s not always the case. We know it’s not always the case too, but just like the song says, the reason it’s not the case is that we haven’t planted the right kind of grass and maintained it on our side of the fence.

(I know the tendency here will be to say that this sentiment disputes my position that companies should begin adopting Social CRM systems within their organizations, but hopefully I’ve established thus far the reasons that change isn’t simply a “want what I don’t have” mentality.)

Change is Hard

So, you’ve decided that switching over to a Social CRM is the way to go and you’ve even established some of your preliminary objectives and put together your internal team and marketing round. Your next step will be the internal education and internal rollout of your systems and this is where things can get tricky. The education process will be long and difficult for those driving it and along the way you may even butt heads with some C-suite executives.

That’s all okay, don’t worry. You have your team in place and you know where you’re going, so you’re not flying by the seat of your pants (we’d never send you out that way here at SocialCRMInfo.com).

It’s at this crest that looking back and seeing how comfortable everyone was with the old CRM system will try and convince you that just leaving things the way they were is the best way to go. It isn’t.

Just like in life, there will be growing pains to any major change, but also just like in life, if you simply stop that growing process you’ll be a 2-foot-9, 35-year-old with baby teeth who can’t walk, ride a bike, swim or generally do much of anything besides what made you “cute” in the beginning. Okay, that analogy may be a bit long, but it holds true.

If you’ve decided to make the switch, know that you’ll be tested, and if you’ve already made it and are experiencing the very growing pains I’m talking about, know that you’re planting that greener grass and you also have support along the way.

Hold firm the path and pretty soon, people will be looking through their own peepholes wondering how you have such green business pastures.

Thoughts?

[P.S. I've truly enjoyed writing some of the previous posts that were based off movie analogies and I'd like to extend the challenge for you to pick my next one. In the comments, leave a movie that you think there's no way I could make a Social CRM analogy from and I'll choose the most random/hardest one and write a post on that topic just to prove you wrong. : )]

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