
Ask HN: What is the best way to initiate conversation with Enterprise customer? - pavlakoos
We have tons of Enterprise users (they register with their corporate email address), but when we send them follow-up email, the response rate is not as high as we would like it to be. Any advice?
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brudgers
[random advice from the internet]

The proven method of talking to individuals in enterprise is a 'meat eating'
sales team walking into the lobby of the building where people work and
talking to the receptionist. This is probably worth doing outside of
enterprise, too.

It is expensive. It is time consuming. It is valuable.

On the other hand, I think most people hate most emails because every email is
an item on their TODO list because every email must be processed and
processing emails takes time. The most time efficient way to process emails is
to mark them as spam and never see an email from that source again. For me, if
a company sends me an automated email, that's usually what happens because if
and when I want more information or to learn about updates, I can just visit
the website (and odds are that the content of an autogenerated company email
consists of links to the website).

Good luck.

~~~
pavlakoos
Thank you for your comments. Still, I don't think what I should do is to go to
a lobby. When I'm in the lobby I still need to figure out which person I need
to speak to...

In my situation that person has already come to me. But I cannot convince him
(it's usually him, not her) to talk to me. He is window shopping. He is just
looking around and playing by himself, but whenever approached acts as if he
wasn't there.

These guys are on my website because they need a custom app. But I don't know
what app, with what features and how I can help them.

I'm looking for a hint on how to approach these guys and make them talk.

Anyone?

~~~
brudgers
In the lobby, the person to talk to is the receptionist. The receptionist is
the gatekeeper and can be an ally. Be nice. Make their job pleasant. Ask for
information. Be polite. Thank them.

Maybe you get a lot of useful information. Maybe very little. At least you
know what getting past the front door entails.

------
CyberFonic
Do you track the usage of the free trial to the email addresses used to
activate them? Better still do you track any interactions on your forum, wiki,
etc?

It is very easy for staff to create fake email addresses to get a free trial
and kick the tyres. Unless they end up using your product they won't be
interested in demo-calls, etc. Most technical staffers hate sales calls, so
offers of demo-calls are more likely to be seen as pushy sales calls.

BTW what is your conversion rate from free-trial to paid plans?

~~~
pavlakoos
Actually yes - it is "technical staffers" who come and check our platform. Is
there a good way to reach out to this "type" of people? We really want to help
them, by saving a lot of their time.

~~~
CyberFonic
I am intrigued by your product and marketing problem. I did a quick Google
search and found several firms that are taking a consulting approach to your
solution space. Ok, so you have some sort of on-line web app that lets you
create mobile apps?

So does Intercom tell you that people have tried using your product once,
deemed it too confusing and have ditched it?

Since I don't know which of the many products that the Google search came up
with is yours -- you do have paid ads? -- I can only broad brush presume that
the product promises more than it can deliver and thus is quickly discarded
after one failed attempt. If the persons trying out your product wanted
consulting services, then there are number of firms who explicitly are
offering that approach to solving the mobile app creation requirement.

Perhaps you could provide a wiki / FAQ / forum which is only accessible using
the email that was used to activate the free trial. Then with a bit of
instrumentation you might be better able to discern the steps that evaluation
users take.

~~~
pavlakoos
Yes, it is a web app, which allows to create mobile apps.

I wouldn't say it promises too much, because it indeed enables developing
mobile apps. But I have to fully agree with another sentence you wrote: the
product is quickly discarded after failed attempt.

The product is good. But because it is powerful, it comes with a learning
curve. Imagine Photoshop - nobody is a master right after starting to use it.
How long would it take a human being to learn how to develop apps? Let's say a
few months or years - because it requires to learn how to code. With our
product learning how to create an app and actually creating it, takes a few
hours in total. But still, this is a few hours you need to invest.

So what I would like to achieve with those enterprise prospects, is to get
them speak to us right after they fail, instead of discarding.

Any advice on how this can be done?

~~~
CyberFonic
[random marketing advice from internet]

Psychologically people will not admit to failing, they will blame the product
instead and most won't be wanting to speak to anybody about it. I might be
over-generalising, but many techies prefer to avoid telephone calls.

There isn't much you can do about past subscribers to your free trial.
Possibly a bulk email about a "new version".

You could revamp your website, include your bit about "Powerful Product
requires some learning curve to become proficient." AND include a video to
developing a mobile app with your product. I would go about this by coming up
with an example mobile app, then video tape the entire spiel as you would do
it over the phone, but this time to a video. Make it easy for new users as
well as returning users (invited by above email) to follow along. Then include
in the video an invitation to call for "your complimentary one-on-one ramp up
session".

It would be an idea to update your app as well. Include the link to the video,
etc in the splash screen. If possible detect when a session has been exited
quickly and display the offer of consulting.

I would even go as far as suggesting that you recruit a friend who has never
used your product to have a go and video their attempt, etc. You could even
then come to their aid. In the past usability studies often used videos to
identify problems with products, you could go further and use it not just to
improve your product, but to also demonstrate its ease of use.

~~~
pavlakoos
Thank you very much, your advices sounds like good points to me. Although the
video is there (app from scratch in 10 minutes), I guess it might not be
convincing enough.

All the best to you. If there's anything I could do to return the favor,
please just let me know.

------
pedalpete
It's difficult to give feedback without knowing what your emails look like.

What specifically are you trying to get them to do? Why do you want to
initiate a conversation? How are you getting them to sign-up? Clearly you're
doing something right in getting the sign-ups, maybe you can tweak that
process to get them to expect or initiate the conversation themselves.

~~~
pavlakoos
Sign-up is super-easy: just give your email (or anything that looks like
email) and here you start the free trial.

Our follow-up email is professionally-styled. And short. Offering a personal
free demo-call on how to operate our platform. The email is based on examples
by other successful companies.

So perhaps someone has gone though these roadblocks and can give an advice?

