Alexie Glover

#discussions - October 22, 2024 at 08:51 PM

You don’t want what I have 😅

#discussions - October 21, 2024 at 06:42 PM

@Andru Creighton and I built [these](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cXp3rxq0EgGrBHfEhH-RpeGWBBoXiejHn7WY7Y_2YCs/edit?usp=sharing) last year!

#discussions - October 18, 2024 at 01:36 PM

So many free resources dropping on Tuesday!

#general - October 17, 2024 at 03:43 PM

@Jeanne Talbot has just run a pretty cool campaign on her LI with quick video interviews with her stakeholders about how customer marketing impacts their role. Might be a good reference point for you!

#open-share - October 11, 2024 at 05:35 PM

How to advertise the value of customer education to your cross-departmental colleagues! I'm always interested in what productive collaboration across departments looks like.

#general - October 09, 2024 at 03:51 PM

Yay!! See you there @Ciana Abdollahian ❤️

#discussions - September 27, 2024 at 04:53 PM

Not to mention that if you have some hot advocates (big logos, etc.) that make them desirable for all kinds of marketing asks, you're putting that information right in the hands of anyone in your org who wants it. Which can lead to easily overburdening your advocates—often without your knowledge.

#discussions - September 27, 2024 at 04:52 PM

I've done this 🙂 it really depends on how you want to manage your program. In the past, I've had a client who had a checkbox for Referenceable and a notes section. The challenge we faced there was that the reference information was editable by anyone with access to edit Account and Contact records - so the CSMs would just turn it off without sharing the reason. If you have multiple people putting out multiple asks to your referenceable customers, this method gets tricky. I personally haven't seen a good way to track ongoing asks and historical activities inside of SFDC. I've always seen this done in a spreadsheet ... and if you have competing asks, you need to ensure all those making the asks are also referring to the spreadsheet. I also haven't seen a good example of tracking for different activities/referenceability types (such as speaking engagements, content development, sales references, etc.). That said - starting at this point is a great way to get your customer reference data in your CRM!

#general - September 26, 2024 at 07:24 PM

Definitely ensure you're maintaining enough budget reserve for a full year of review incentives and customer thank-yous! These always seem to pop up as running low on budget, and when you need them, you need them!!!

#jobs - September 24, 2024 at 04:21 PM

Boston based?

#reviews - September 24, 2024 at 03:09 PM

Reviewflowz does this. The founder is @Axel Lavergne - so I'm sure he can tell you more!

#general - September 17, 2024 at 04:05 PM

As Ryan and Kristin have said, your awards should also be considered as a connector across your other customer programming (community, events, CABs, etc). Because award programs are literally the best 🥹 the hill I will die on for sure

#general - September 17, 2024 at 03:24 PM

I strongly believe that awards programs are the best way to maximize your advocacy efforts. With an awards program, you can: 1. Uncover new advocates 2. Tap into accounts that have previously declined advocacy (they might not want to do a case study, but they do want to win an award, for example) 3. Fill your yearly content pipeline from award winners 4. Develop numerous kinds of content (case studies, blog posts, quotes, KPIs/metrics, videos, etc.) 5. I focus on "industry best practices" so the content from the awards program can be evergreen for your company (outside of just the awards program) I would hesitate to recommend a condensed timeline, as even a scaled-down, or I would recommend calling it an _emerging program_, will take time to plan and execute. But when you consider that it could be your lead/pipeline generator for all advocacy activities, even as a team of one, I think it becomes an obvious place to invest your time and energy!

#general - September 12, 2024 at 02:45 PM

Congratulations Kevin and team!!

#general - September 11, 2024 at 02:21 PM

For the past few years we've used this Etsy vendor: <https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/UDAwards?ref=shop-header-name&amp;listing_id=1209672502&amp;from_page=listing> We're currently evaluating a shift in the look/feel and looking at this vendor: <https://www.bennettawards.com/>

#open-share - September 09, 2024 at 05:29 PM

@Christine Nielsen is with Planhat and can likely help!

#general - September 03, 2024 at 03:52 PM

Hi folks! There is a scheduled call today for References, but I'm still recovering from Covid and won't be available to host. I apologize for the late notice—I was hoping to be back and at it by today!

#general - August 22, 2024 at 03:12 PM

Be careful of state laws when gifting in addition to your award - there are some states that prevent employees from accepting gifts of particular value (especially if your gift has financial value, like flights or vouchers).

#general - August 13, 2024 at 05:38 PM

I've had success with a leaderboard - but I think this is really dependent on your company culture. I've also had success with company swag prizes and just basic cash - but again, this really depends on your company culture. We recently found that company swag was more influential than cash ... which was surprisng! The folks at Sage also recently shared their success in building their reference program in a Customer Marketing Alliance webinar. They leveraged internal celebration by calling out deals that used the reference process and closed their deals in an internal comms channel (echoed by company leaders). They also reach out to recent closed-won deals that didn't use the process and do 1:1 enablement, which requires a big lift but based on their case study worked well for their team!

#general - August 07, 2024 at 07:07 PM

We did not opt to use the API integration. It wasn't part of the active subscription and we didn't feel there was enough proof that the API integration drove more reviews than the email interface. We also used our own emails with direct links to the Trustpilot site. This decision was made in February/March of this year. It might be something worth revisiting now if there have been significant changes to the Trustpilot subscription model (I haven't personally investigated). Truly, the differentiator for us with Trustpilot was sending it to the correct audiences. We had much more traction with European and non-English-speaking customers on Trustpilot—because it's much more popular for _everything_ in Europe. We also had the benefit of localized language support in-house, so our messaging was always on point for our non-English-speaking audiences.

#general - August 07, 2024 at 04:58 PM

Hey Liza! My experience is that the investment didn't equal success in terms of generating reviews. I did not see value in investing to "unlock" their API integration. We have had success driving reviews on this platform as part of a larger campaign though! And have especially had success with European customers.

#random - August 02, 2024 at 08:50 PM

Oops, here's the link: <https://www.linkedin.com/company/planwellco/posts/?feedView=all>

#random - August 02, 2024 at 08:49 PM

I've recommended the folks at Planwell in the past! I believe @Rachel Ward used them recently? They're based in Indianapolis but might have some folks in Austin?

#reviews - July 31, 2024 at 04:54 PM

I think reviews are a common avenue for frustrated customers to raise concerns ... but having a solid review response strategy should help alleviate concerns from your internal stakeholders. As someone owning reviews, responding to those reviews should be part of your purview (or maybe your social team's purview). Responses should let folks know you're looking into it, actioning it further, etc., etc. but I've never encountered an internal team that didn't want to take action on the feedback received in reviews. That's new to me! Are they maybe thinking more about product feedback or suggestions? Again, I think your review response is the key to setting expectations. Something along the lines of "that's a great idea/suggestion. We appreciate your feedback and have shared your suggestions with the appropriate teams." That style of response lets your customers know their ideas are heard but doesn't put any pressure on you to actually action those suggestions.

#open-share - July 29, 2024 at 04:55 PM

Huge congratulations, Daniel!! Hope you and your sweet little family are enjoying this special time together! Can't wait to see more Jacob x Grot collabs in the future!!! 💚

#general - July 23, 2024 at 07:02 PM

PS - I did give a shoutout to @Perri Chaikof's slick set up with Deeto. Perri, you've got some folks who are interested in seeing how things work at Ada!

#general - July 23, 2024 at 07:02 PM

Had so much fun tackling the crazies of sales references today with everyone 🤪 Thank you to those who joined and thank you to those are who are interested in catching the recording! We talked about getting in front of sales, enabling sales to use your process, and figuring out how to solve the tricky challenge of getting the black book out of the hands of sellers who just don't want to share their contacts. [We'll be back at it next month! ](https://lu.ma/p1q03tjk)Hope you can join and bring some questions/topics for us to discuss! We'll also be getting an update from @Kaelie Lund (they/them) @Meg O'Hearn and @Maura Frost on their progress! 🥹

#discussions - July 22, 2024 at 09:54 PM

These are SO fancy!

#general - July 11, 2024 at 08:17 PM

Me? Saying that hesitantly because this is one of those “it depends” CMA topics 😂 😅 With some clients using a CMA tool makes this super easy. With others we’ve got spreadsheet workflows. What are yall working with? Happy to share.

#general - July 11, 2024 at 03:59 PM

Hey Melissa! Thanks for the tag, Shannon. This is something I've done but not to the exact scale and format. We've had both review options and testimonial options at conferences, but never as a swag marketplace. I think it sounds like a great idea if you know your audience is motivated by your swag offerings! I've found review collection to always be successful. I like the option of offering a few different engagement choices (QR code and on-site tablet, for example). This helps to appeal to the different kinds of conference attendees. Some really want to engage with a person and make a connection - others are looking for an opportunity to _not_ have to talk to someone for a change. Also, the DIY method allows you to collect reviews for multiple platforms. Testimonials should rely on a big feeling of FOMO to really drive interest, in my experience (as you're competing with the wild world of the conference floor with distractions and attractions everywhere). Really try to make participating _look_ fun! Also, I highly recommend your interviewer be someone experienced with customer interviews and creating soundbites. I've found that sometimes the energy of the conference floor can bleed into your testimonials with the interviewer chiming in during responses (with phrases like "yes" "of course" "that's so cool", etc.). Not the end of the world if this happens, but makes it a whole lot easier if you have someone who asks a question, waits for the response to be completed, and then engages in conversation about the response.

#discussions - June 28, 2024 at 02:57 PM

I was also going to share that Testimonial Hero is a good resource for this kind of thing. If you're instead looking for an agency, the team I work with at Porter Consulting can also help. Not local to Seattle, but travel globally for these.

#discussions - June 27, 2024 at 11:19 PM

Are you just capturing the spokesperson or also b-roll of the office site?

#discussions - June 27, 2024 at 11:14 PM

What are you looking to create? On-site, virtual? Single spokesperson, multiple?

#general - June 26, 2024 at 04:13 PM

1. Revenue influenced 2. Sentiment/account temp

#general - June 25, 2024 at 06:02 PM

@Mary Green (Owner CMAweekly) is this still on? Zoom says waiting for host to start the meeting.

#general - June 25, 2024 at 05:57 PM

We'll catch you next time! 💚

#general - June 25, 2024 at 05:50 PM

Happy to share 🙂 Drinking my own champagne a bit here. But [Talkdesk's CX Innovators Awards](https://www.talkdesk.com/about/cx-awards-submissions/) do a great job! Other examples I like to keep my eyes on: • [Slack Spotlight Awards](https://slack.com/customer-awards) • [Grafana Lab's Golden Grots](https://grafana.com/events/grafanacon/2024/golden-grot-awards/) • [Databricks Data Team Awards](https://www.databricks.com/blog/announcing-winners-2024-databricks-data-team-awards) • [Adobe Experience Awards](https://www.adobeexperienceawards.com/) • [Google Customer Awards](https://services.google.com/fh/files/misc/customer_awards_guidebook.pdf) (from 2023)

#general - June 25, 2024 at 05:37 PM

@Amy Are you looking for criteria specific to an advocate award? If so, I don't have anything available off hand. If you're looking for criteria for an overall customer awards program, there's lots! I'd be happy to dig up some of my fav examples.

#general - June 25, 2024 at 02:54 PM

I run awards programs for a few clients and we actually had a CMA Weekly adhoc chat on Awards last week! I would hesitate to create anything where you are essentially awarding your favourite customer. For example, if your internal marketing team identified an advocate you wanted to win an award and just pushed ahead with it ... as it gives the impression of your company choosing its favourite customer which is never ideal. Instead, I'd recommend you come up with some criteria (number of engagements in community or advocacy asks, number of organic advocacy posts, etc.). This way you can demonstrate how you determined your winner. However, I do always think it is a stronger move to build out a full criteria + nomination form + judging process so your customers feel part of a program versus that they are just receiving a participation award. If you're just looking to do something to recognize their participation, I'd look at something along the lines of what Emily suggests above OR doing a thank-you gifting campaign with an award tied to it (ie. most sales reference calls, most amount of content, etc.).

#general - June 20, 2024 at 09:29 PM

Hey @Megan Donaldson at Zoom just confirmed with my team. Our experience has never been that customers are asked to reach out to Gartner proactively. If customers are connecting with the Gartner analysts it's always in response to a report where Gartner is requesting specific references, which we provide. With GPI serving as the avenue for customers to provide "proactive" feedback. Sorry to not be of more help!

#general - June 20, 2024 at 08:16 PM

@Megan Donaldson at Zoom this is a new one for me, personally. I'm going to touch base with my larger team though! I'll let you know if I hear of any advice for folks in your situation.

#general - June 19, 2024 at 09:52 PM

Thank you for everything you have done for this community and industry! I am so lucky to count so many people here friends and that is thanks to the work you've done to cultivate and protect a space for genuine connection. Big hugs, Mary! Can't wait to see what is next for you and this space. 💚

#general - June 18, 2024 at 07:50 PM

@Daniel Palay just redesgined Grafana Labs page! Looks great!

#general - June 18, 2024 at 05:26 PM

@Brittany Burgess absolutely not! Connection info is above!

#general - June 17, 2024 at 03:12 PM

I've scheduled for Tuesday! Awards Program Chat Tuesday, June 18 · 1:00 – 2:00pm Time zone: America/Vancouver Google Meet joining info Video call link: [+1 587-688-6279](https://meet.google.com/szh-ewnc-dvk> Or dial: ‪(CA) <tel:+1587-688-6279)‬ PIN: ‪820 882 372‬# More phone numbers: <https://tel.meet/szh-ewnc-dvk?pin=2288535106360>

#general - June 14, 2024 at 07:46 PM

I recall @Katlin Hess talking about this at CustomerX Con last year? I think she looked at onboarding and internal comms as part of the lifecycle mapping she did.

#general - June 14, 2024 at 05:54 PM

Happy to!

#general - June 14, 2024 at 05:08 PM

Some options: Mon, June 17 @ 11am PT/2pm ET (💚) Tues, June 18 @ 1pm PT/4pm ET (💙) Thurs, June 20 @ 9am PT/12pm ET (❤️) Share your availability with the emojis? I'll do my best to get a time everyone can attend. Also, I'm in Canada so not off on Wednesday for Juneteenth but know that's a holiday for the Americans. Could do an option that date if others are available?

#general - June 14, 2024 at 03:05 PM

Happy to arrange a call for next week if y'all want to discuss?

#general - June 14, 2024 at 03:04 PM