Our first #FinnemoreFireside of this academic year is with Lyndon Stickley (CEO) and Sam Curtis (Customer Service Director) from iplicit where they discuss, amongst other things, their company’s growth in the education sector.

iplicit offers a cloud-based finance and management software solution, tailored for frustrated on-premise legacy software users and establishments that have outgrown entry-level software. It’s a really insightful discussion and we cover topics including:

• The importance of change in the education sector, and the need for flexibility and adaptability in finance and management systems.
• The evolution of MATs and whether they should be expanding on their requirements when going out to tender for a Finance system – or any system – to include areas of their strategy
• 3 pillars of change
• The challenges of moving from on-premise systems to cloud-based solutions and the importance of post-implementation support.
• How systems need to continue to disrupt, innovate and develop to stay ahead of the game, and how this can be difficult for large or incumbent companies
• Maintaining partnerships with customers and reducing any friction to ensure the customer has the best experience.
• The significance of listening to the market and customers’ needs for successful change and growth in the education sector.

Enjoy!

As it’s Valentine’s Day it seems only right to tackle the issue of love and, specifically: is your company any good at it?  Many, many companies will say they ‘love their customers’ but do they really?  Or are they guilty of bad love?

Bad love is where you really absolutely genuinely love your customer . . .  based on the fact they provide you with £XX revenue per year.  Would you still love them and spend so much time on them if they didn’t provide that income?  If you were being honest, would you say it’s the money you love, not the customer?

Good love is where you absolutely genuinely love your customers and if it ends a fruitful financial relationship then great!  And even if it doesn’t then your business will still gain in brand and reputation as you build a network of contacts who regard you as helpful, professional, willing to go the extra mile and not just interested in the next order.  Yours will be the sort of business they recommend to others even if they don’t need your services themselves right now.

Love your customers for who they are, not how much they are worth to you financially.  As with all relationships, the stronger they are the happier you will be.

Happy Valentine’s Day!