Crappy UX in your business apps will erode the Customer Experience (CX), too.💔
I came across a photo from my eXtremeCRM 2016 Warsaw session. As it sometimes happens, I was impressed by how smart words I was able to put on my own slides.😁
Back when I was working with #CRM systems exclusively (before Power Platform became a thing), I used to be obsessed about UI design. Which is a strange focus area, given how little room there was/is for changing the UX of Dynamics 365 CRM apps (aka model-driven Power Apps). As the icing on the cake: I was doing everything without custom code.😮
The constraints give you focus, though. When Dynamics CRM 2013 "reimagined" the user interface of Microsoft's CRM system, I wanted to make the most of it. I even wrote a book chapter about "Designing a great user experience" in the CRM 2013 QuickStart - a joint effort by several Microsoft BizApps MVPs.📘
It's not because I studied UX design or anything like that. I never have. Rather I observed the real world challenges that users of enterprise CRM systems encountered. Partially inflicted upon them by business requirements that turned the systems into monster forms with hidden business logic and layers upon layers of process details invisible to the poor end users.😥
But what's the connection to CX, though? The customers aren't using the CRM system, are they? Not directly, of course. My reasoning on that slide was:
1. Bad UX in business apps
2. User adoption is low
3. Customer data isn't captured
4. Processes cannot be automated
5. CX cannot be improved
6. Customers switch to competitors
The big issue with low CRM adoption isn't the inaccurate sales funnels and forecasts. You can do those with Excel. Often that's what ends up happening anyway, when the CRM system doesn't support real-life sales mgmt needs.📊
What you CAN'T do with Excel data is automate your business processes. Including ones that directly affect the paying customers. You face a hard limit on innovation and improvement that companies with better customer data assets can aim for. Competitors will outpace you.🏃♀️
It's rarely about the lack of systems, i.e. not having enought IT. It often is about the lack of true fit between what the systems could do and what the business actually does. Despite of big CRM projects and digitalization initiatives, the machine as a whole delivers subpar outputs - which may even decline after launch.↘
This is a difficult subject to address. Admitting that just building systems to meet requirements doesn't solve the problem - especially when both parties are professionals in their field. The domain experts for business processes & the system experts for business apps. Who's to blame for the failure?⚖
No one pushed me into obsessing over the UX details back in my CRM career. I was never really rewarded for going the extra mile. I did it on my own time, for the customer & for the community. I was just one guy who was empathetic towards the end users.🙇♂️
The Original Power Platform Advisor. 11x Microsoft MVP. Low-code 4 life.
1yIn case anyone is interested in seeing a statement that confirms the Dynamics 365 App for Outlook being the email tracking app that's within Power Apps licensing model scope, here's an example from the Microsoft Partner Community forum: https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Pricing-Licensing-Incentives/Outlook-app-license-requiremnts/m-p/47750/highlight/true#M3567 A really long thread where MS licensing concierge keeps arguing with MS partners who are presenting evidence on the commercial connection between Power Apps and App for Outlook. Luckily there are knowledgeable and stubborn partners out there who are able to help the licensing professionals discover the true "Spirit of the Licensing Guide" 😄 Without having a direct channel to engage with the Power Platform product team members through the MVP program, as well as an amazing group of fellow BizApps MVPs who keep asking them the tough questions - I would have never dared to start writing about licensing topics out in public either. Yet when I've seen the struggle that many brilliant technical experts have to endure when confronted with Dynamics 365 & Power Platform licensing related questions, I felt like "well somebody's gotta do it". And so here we are 😅