Onboarding Tips

Take a second to put yourself in your customer’s shoes. If you got dropped off into your onboarding experience what parts of the onboarding, if any, would:Blow your socks out of the water? (In a good way) Leave you confused, wishing you had better communication? Get you lost, wishing you had more guidance?I’d love to hear your thoughts on the questions above. (No need to go in detail, but I bet your customer’s pain points are similar to other’s pain points!)Let’s compile a list of things that customers would deem a good customer onboarding! Drop your thoughts, questions, and challenges below so we can cover it in our weekly livestream: 

I’d love to hear what challenges you’ve faced when trying to effect change in a customer’s organization!  What tips and tricks do you have to help customers change? Drop your challenges, tips, tricks and questions below so we can address them in this week’s livestream!  RSVP here: 

I used to follow the customer’s lead whenever I hopped on a virtual call. Do I turn my camera on or off??? Ahhh my hair looks crazy and my eye bags have bags! I used to worry a lot of how I’d be perceived, but over time I realized that the benefits to showing my face on camera will always trump the cons.Keeping your camera on during customer onboarding calls can offer several benefits that contribute to a positive and effective onboarding experience. Here are my top two reasons to consider:1. Build Trust and Rapport: Visual communication allows for a more personal connection. By having your camera on, you can establish a stronger sense of trust and rapport with the customer. Seeing a friendly face can make the interaction feel more genuine and build a foundation for a productive and collaborative relationship. It also helps the customer put a face to the name and role, making the interaction more memorable.2. Non-Verbal Communication: A significant portion of communication is non-verba

Happy Monday! This week’s question of the week goes out to all those who are looking to build an onboarding team!Drop your pro-tips below for insights on:How you know you’re ready What you should take into consideration when building What pitfalls are there to avoid? 

I have a working theory, but I want to see what you vote! Do customers come into the kickoff call super excited, then walk out like they just saw a ghost? 👻👻👻Do they come in reluctantly, but then leave super pumped? 💪💪💪I want to see if there’s something happening in Kickoff calls that’s exciting/overwhelming them! Vote below!

Please respond to the poll :) Thanks!

Several of our team members have been talking about PMI certification courses available online.  We’re curious which courses you may have taken, who offered them / costs, and your overall objectives for doing so in your careers.   Here are some conversation starters on the subject from one of the websites I visited yesterday.    Why get a project manager certification?1. Demonstrates that you are capable and knowledgeable in project management2. Gives you an edge over other job applicants who don’t have a certification3. It helps you land a higher-paying job4. It helps you get promoted quicker5. Encourages continued learning6. Provides a network of other professionals7. It gives you access to exclusive resources8. This can lead to other opportunities The best certifications to get for project managers.1. PRINCE2 Practitioner.2. PMI Professional in Business Analysis (PMI-PBA).3. Certified Project Manager (IAPM).4. eCornell Project Management Certificate Program.5. Certified Associate in

I’m curious if anyone has examples of ways they celebrate or acknowledge when customers have completed the onboarding process? I’m in the beginning stages of developing an agenda and deck for a ‘launch celebration meeting’ to demonstrate the value we’ve delivered and also use it as an opportunity to introduce the CSM who will take over the account from the Onboarding team. I would love to hear what folks do already or ideas you might have!

What is it? When should you use it? What are the pros? What are the cons? How do you go about building it out? Let’s hear your thoughts!!!

This is a question I hear all the time. Now it’s time for you to make your voice heard! It’s common practice, especially within SAAS, for sales reps to discount/remove the onboarding fee to close the deal. I’d love to hear why you think we should or should not continue doing that!I’ve also see onboarding cost upwards of half the product price so that brings up the price 150%!  I’d love to hear everyone’s thoughts below. If you would like to tune in and help me dissect this topic, then RSVP to the weekly livestream where we’ll cover this:  

Hi everyone How do you measure success in implementation and onboarding?  

Over the past 10 years I’ve led Implementation and Onboarding team in Healthcare, Services, and SaaS companies and while each role was vastly different and had varying requirements for skills, I found there was an underlying set of skills and abilities that are core to the role.Fundamental project management skills Time management Communication Problem SolvingThere are others that will be role specific like technical skills or system or platform experience but for the most part, the above has served me well as a foundation. The problem I’ve found recently is looking at hiring requirements through the today vs tomorrow lens. I have been in my current role for about 7 months and there was a large hiring initiative just before I joined the company. What I’ve found was that a significant number of our recent hires were made because they had the skills, abilities, and experience we needed then, not what we would need in the next year or two. I’m in the process of hiring a new Implementation

I’d love to hear about how you take customers from sales to onboarding successfully. 

@Mark Mitchell has a saying that’s gotten popular around here. He says “If your process is set in stone, it may as well be your tombstone.”That’s why I love working with him, he’s got all sorts of nuggets of wisdom to share! I think that quote resonates strongly when talking about VOC (Voice of the customer). It’s so important to hear what customers are saying and also implement updates according to their feedback. So… please share what methods you’ve found most successful to capture/implement customer feedback! PS if you’re interested in chiming in on the topic, join our livestream!

It’s undeniable. The power of AI is here to stay and the question is how are you adapting to using AI in your onboarding/implementation experience?In case you haven’t heard, ChatGPT is an AI chatbot that was developed by OpenAI to handle conversations and answer queries from users in a human-like manner. Its potential is limitless, it’s been used to design apps to even passing medical school exams! I encourage everyone to sign up for a ChatGPT account and check it out! https://chat.openai.com/auth/login?next=%2F

THE CURSE OF KNOWLEDGE: cognitive bias that occurs when an individual, who is communicating with other individuals, assumes that other individuals have similar background and depth of knowledge to understand. ☝I’ve been thinking more and more about this and how it relates to onboarding and customer enablement.  How do you personally go about mitigating this risk?  What are ways we can constantly remind ourselves of this danger? Would love to hear everyone’s thoughts!  

We are driving towards more onsite kickoffs for our larger clients and I’m curious about who currently does that and what it looks like. For us our goal is to use the onsite kickoff for multiple factors to include configuring the integration, importing data, and providing a solid foundation for our implementation discovery. With these clients we will assign all resources immediately (rather than just in time) and work on several aspects of the project in parallel instead of consecutively.  What are your thoughts here?

I was just speaking with our leadership team and one topic brought something home I thought I would share. We have a very defined implementation process in which we work through three stages of implementation:PM Staging Integration ImplementationWe follow this process almost religiously where each step is followed so we know we have all the data, structure, and requirements for a successful implementation. Overall it works great but we occasionally need to deviate, especially for some of our larger customers. As we were talking we had to reiterate to some individuals when it is appropriate to make those modifications and why. For example, we normally won’t assign an Integration Consultant until PM Staging is complete and an Implementation Specialist isn’t assigned until Integration is complete. However there can be value, especially with a strategic client, to deviate and assign both the IC and IS early so progress can be made even though we are still gathering initial documentation. I

Anyone care to share their thoughts or experiences with self-serve client onboarding? Essentially, this entails creating a digital platform that allows the client (Emerging/SMB) to input much of the configuration items thru a guided module.  Pros:Frees up essential time and resources for onboarding team members Allows client to get familiar with self-serve platform Allows onboarding team members to devote time and effort to more complex task and take on other more demanding projectsCons:Limits client interaction Familiarity with client self-serve platform may be challenging based on technical proficiency of client Potential risk of error creation or inaccurate configuration due to lack of familiarity with self-serve platformUltimately, if layout is intuitive and helpful, this could be prove beneficial for both the client and the onboarding team.

A really good way to lose your customers’ engagement is to overwhelm them with information. Think back to your school days. The best professors never gave you the “fire hydrant” experience. They broke things down into easy to consume bits and they met you where you’re at. On the other hand, teachers who just recited information were more likely to lose your interest. Same rule applies for customers!So… question of the week is what are some techniques you employ to ensure your customer is getting enough value, but not too much where they get overwhelmed? Comment below with your thoughts and/or join us in our livestream to collaborate!

“How are you providing an integrated onboarding experience for your customers?”☝ This is a question I’ve been thinking a lot about recently. I thought it would be fun to brainstorm some different ideas for automation/integrations. What is everyone working on right now??I’ll start!Right now, I’m experimenting with slack bots that trigger recipes in our Workato account. For example, once an opportunity gets marked ‘closed won’, do the following: Create an onboarding project in GUIDEcx with a specific template Send a slack message to our director of CS, giving them a list of CSMs they can assign to the account. User then clicks a button to assign the CSM. Update the CSM assignment on the Salesforce account and related systems   What are you currently working on!

The exact opposite question to someone else’s post this week - focusing on our larger enterprise clients and wanting to provide a little more consistency in the delivery of our Kickoff Meetings. They are a necessity due to number of players and complexity of work to be completed.Curious how you’re handling this part of the process?How long is your kickoff meeting? How far “in the weeds” do you take the conversation? What tool(s) are you using to get things going? Power Point / Prezi / other? Strictly the GuideCX Gantt Both? Something else? (I’d love to bring us into the 21st century but not going to get more software spend for 2023 so free tools are always appreciated.)

It’s an analogy that has been made more than once. You have a new customer, you want to wow them so they stay with you long-term. What have you done or seen happen where someone tried to wow their date? There’s a lot of parallels that can be drawn. So….Comment below with some funny dating stories that relate to onboarding! 

Our company is getting ready to roll out a new implementation/onboarding plan for our smaller customers. Because our product (SaaS) can be set up in just a couple of weeks with standard tools, features, and industry best practice material, it seems like the right way to go to pull our teams into a more ‘hands off’ approach to onboarding in these instances.What this means for us is:No kickoff call! Are we nuts? 😬  The call will be replaced by a kickoff email. All of our ‘to do tasks’ are going to be housed in GCX which will be sent to the customer team. All account set up to be done by one of our implementation specialists and information collected from customer would be done via a form/checklist sent out via GCX. All back and forth communication/questions would be handled via GCX. The final sign off for account go live may include an actual final wrap up call just to be sure we have all our ducks in a row for flipping the ON switch but we are trying to automate this completely so th

Every company should know how much their implementations/customer onboardings are costing them.Here’s why: Budgeting and Resource Allocation: By understanding the cost of conducting an onboarding experience, you can allocate your resources and budget more effectively. You can determine how much money and time you need to invest in onboarding new customers. Customer Lifetime Value: Knowing the cost of onboarding a new client can help you determine the lifetime value of that client. By understanding how much you need to spend to acquire and retain customers, you can make informed decisions about pricing and customer retention efforts. Process Improvement: Knowing the cost of onboarding a client can help companies identify inefficiencies in their onboarding process. If you or your team is spending an exorbitant amount of time on the same task then you can look at ways to streamline it! We talked about why it matters, now I want to hear from you on HOW you measure it! It’s definitely e