Marketing your RIM program: when selling a RIM program or program component to employees or management, applying marketing principles can increase the likelihood of success.

At the Core

This article

* explains how to apply marketing principles when "selling" a RIM program

* discusses the "Four Ps" of marketing in relation to RIM

* examines RIM customers and how to market to them

When you have a valuable and useful new records and information management (RIM) program or policy that you want employees to use because it will benefit them and help improve organizational efficiency and effectiveness, you cannot just sit at your desk and hope that they find out about it or stumble over it. You must "sell" it to them, and that requires marketing.

When marketing a RIM program or program component (e.g., a policy for managing e-mail), applying marketing principles can increase the likelihood of winning employee buy-in. Unfortunately, marketing is not an activity that many RIM professionals have been exposed to or even feel comfortable with. Thus, it is helpful to begin the exploration of marketing RIM with a few definitions.

   Marketing is "a social and managerial
   process by which individuals and
   groups obtain what they need and
   want through creating, offering,
   and exchanging products of value
   with others," according to Philip
   Kotler and Ronald Turner's book
   Marketing Management. This definition
   focuses on the following core
   concepts, which are vital elements of
   successful marketing: identifying and
   understanding needs, wants, and
   expectations; developing and offering
   products; providing value and
   assessing cost and satisfaction; and
   exchanging products of value with
   others in transactions.

   Product, according to Kotler and
   Turner, is "anything that can be
   offered to a market for attention,
   acquisition, use, or consumption that
   might satisfy a want or need." The
   RIM "product" is often a tangible
   good, such as a records retention
   schedule. It is also often a service
   (sometimes called a service product),
   such as operating a central file room.
   Frequently, the RIM product is a
   combination of both goods and services,
   such as consulting with employees
   to identify RIM needs (a service)
   and developing tools such as a classification
   scheme (product) to help
   them meet those needs. The term
   "product" will be used here to refer to
   a RIM program, product, or service.

   Promotion is how one informs customers
   and potential customers about
   a product. RIM tends to use methods
   that are more targeted and more individual
   (e.g., one-on-one meetings), as
   opposed to using mass media promotion
   methods like billboards. RIM
   practitioners--like marketers of other
   products and services--must guard
   themselves against focusing so heavily
   on creative promotional methods that
   they ignore the importance of the
   other three marketing elements--product,
   pricing, and place.

   Pricing is what customers pay for a
   product. RIM customers rarely pay a
   fee to RIM for its products (though
   some organizations assess charge-backs
   for services such as inactive
   records storage). However, the organization
   as a whole pays for the RIM
   product because the RIM budget is
   part of its administrative overhead.
   At the same time, RIM customers
   often "pay" through time and other
   resources devoted to RIM, such as
   employee time spent providing information
   for retention scheduling or
   money spent on filing equipment.

   Place, refers to the distribution channels
   by which customers gain access to
   products. For an internally marketed
   service like RIM, "place" means anyone
   outside the department involved
   in promoting or delivering RIM services.
   Distribution channels might
   include senior management or a RIM
   "champion" promoting RIM services
   to other departments; external vendors
   or consultants used to educate or
   train customers; or existing customers
   who recommend RIM services to
   other departments. It might even
   include other departments if RIM
   services are part of a larger program
   driven by another part of the organization
   (such as knowledge management
   or risk management programs).

Why Market Your RIM Product?

RIM often is viewed as a support service that must compete with other services for scarce resources. However, "service" should not equal "passive." Even though RIM usually is considered a "corporate service" or benefit to the organization as a whole, RIM professionals still need to sell recorded information management to their customers. They should get in front of their customers--and potential customers--at every opportunity, talk up what they do, keep the WIIFM factor (What's in it for me?) in the customer's mind, and expound on the benefits RIM can provide.

RIM professionals also need to ask for the necessary resources, both financial and human, and ensure that RIM gets a fair share of the resources that are available. But before others will listen and agree to provide those resources, they need to know who RIM professionals are and they need to know why they should care about RIM in the first place. RIM professionals also need to ensure that they influence the right individuals.

Marketing the RIM product also has a self-preservation aspect, both for the RIM program as a whole and for RIM professionals. If they successfully market their RIM program (and themselves), demonstrate its importance, and provide products perceived by customers to have value, they may be able to stave off budget and headcount reductions the next time their organization wants to cut its administrative/support functions.

If RIM professionals do not care enough about what they do to go out and promote RIM's values, no one else will do it for them. If they focus their marketing energies on RIM employees and existing customers--the converted --they are only communicating with those individuals who already know and appreciate the benefits of RIM. RIM professionals need to put themselves in front of potential customers who need the product that they can provide but don't know about it or use it yet.

Who Are RIM Customers?

RIM customers can be divided into two main categories: internal and external, each of which contains distinct groups.

The internal customers include three groups: top or senior management, department or line management, and all other employees. Depending on organization type, the external customer category may include such groups as legislative and regulatory authorities, shareholders, taxpayers, customers (and potential customers) who buy the goods and services sold by the organization, and allied partners or service providers.

Much attention is given in RIM literature to the importance of marketing RIM to top or senior management. Marketing at this level usually addresses the broad-based ideas or concepts used to sell the value of RIM and secure approvals and necessary resources such as staff and budget. Unfortunately, little attention has been paid to the importance of marketing to internal departmental customers, particularly those employees whose jobs will be most affected by RIM initiatives. Marketing to this group is usually challenging and often frustrating, particularly if RIM professionals propose changes to the status quo, but RIM practitioners who ignore this group when crafting a marketing strategy do so at their peril. The RIM practitioner must target marketing efforts and apply marketing elements differently to each customer group.

The Four Ps of Marketing

The Four Ps of marketing (product, promotion, pricing, and place) must be kept in mind when marketing a product to a customer group. Marketers need to understand the needs, wants, and expectations of each group and then design targeted messages to communicate with them--a level of precision that often results in the Four Ps being applied differently from group to group.

The following examples illustrate how different RIM products could be marketed to specific customer groups and how a RIM practitioner could apply the remaining three Ps (promotion, pricing, and place) to each product.

* Example 1: Top/senior management--This customer group is often interested in a product that controls records to reduce costs and minimize legal risk. RIM professionals marketing such a product to this group might apply promotion, pricing, and place as follows:

   Promotion: presentations (e.g.,
   RIM benefits with cost justifications)

   Pricing: the overall cost (budgeted
   funds and lost-opportunity cost)
   of the RIM program

   Place: the RIM program "champion,"
   external vendors or consultants,
   current customers, executives
   from other organizations willing
   to promote RIM to your senior
   management

* Example 2: Department/line management--These customers are often focused on effecting improvements in their own functional areas. When marketing a RIM product to this group, RIM professionals would likely focus on recordkeeping improvements to reduce cost and improve efficiency and productivity within a department. They might apply promotion, pricing, and place as follows:

   Promotion: one-on-one meetings

   Pricing: time taken away from
   employees' regular duties and distraction/disruption
   of day-to-day
   activities during product implementation

   Place: the RIM program "champion,"
   external vendors or consultants,
   current customers, senior
   management

* Example 3: The external customer--When marketing to an external customer, such as a taxpayer, product development will likely address tools and processes to ensure that the organization has efficient information retrieval and responsible information practices. In this situation, a RIM professional might apply promotion, pricing, and place as follows:

   Promotion: providing good customer
   service

   Pricing: taxation and personal time
   to interact with the organization to
   obtain the information required

   Place: frontline staff (information
   desk/reception), senior management,
   public relations department,
   sales and marketing staff

While the RIM champion, head of the RIM program, and RIM employees are usually involved in marketing RIM to internal customers, it is important to remember that RIM in many organizations has little or no contact with external customers. Instead, RIM helps ensure that the organization effectively manages its recorded information, information that is used and disclosed by other employees who interact directly with external customers such as frontline employees who respond to access to information requests.

The Marketing Process

The marketing process consists of four steps:

Step 1: Research the Market

Completion of the first step requires customer segments to be determined and data collected from each customer group to answer the following questions:

* What do they need?

* What do they expect?

* What are their current perceptions of the value of RIM?

* What do RIM professionals want their perceptions to be?

There are several ways to conduct this research. First, feedback should be obtained from the customer segments using a direct market research method such as direct mail questionnaires or focus groups comprised of representatives of each customer segment. Second, valuable input also can be obtained from third-party research (an indirect research method) through such activities as surveying RIM programs in similar organizations. Ideally, a combination of both research methods will be used to ensure a comprehensive assessment is undertaken.

Step 2: Develop a Marketing Plan

A marketing plan is a collection of marketing programs that accomplish overall marketing goal(s) in order to increase demand for RIM services within the organization. A marketing plan weighs the importance of the customer segments and overall marketing objectives and shows where RIM professionals will focus most of their activities. A marketing program is a discrete project to accomplish specific goals in an overall marketing plan.

Marketing plan development requires the completion of two steps:

* development of the overall marketing goal(s)

* development of specific marketing goals and messages for each customer segment. The goals are the actions one wants a customer to take as a result of the marketing messages. The marketing messages are what RIM professionals want a customer to think, feel, or perceive about the RIM product so that the customer takes the desired action (executes the goal).

After completing these steps, RIM professionals are ready to develop marketing programs for each customer segment to achieve the goals they have set and convey the messages they have selected.

Below are some examples of goals and messages RIM professionals might convey to different customer segments.

* Example 1: Top/senior management--For this customer segment, RIM professionals may identify goals such as the provision of RIM program funding for development, ongoing operations, and future expansion, as well as the provision of top-down support such as the endorsement of policies to improve RIM practices. In order to encourage this group to act on the goals set, RIM professionals might develop messages to communicate the following:

* The RIM program is the most cost-effective way to reduce recordkeeping costs and minimize legal risks.

* Productivity improvements can be achieved through sound RIM practices.

* Example 2: All other employees--All other employees in the organization will likely be interested in the RIM product if RIM professionals can demonstrate how it will assist them in fulfilling their RIM responsibilities. Therefore, set goals for this customer segment that include using the RIM product on an ongoing basis and perceiving value in it. To encourage the employees to act on those goals, marketing messages could be developed to convey the following:

* RIM will make their lives easier, thereby answering the WIIFM factor (saving them time and providing automation where none now exists).

* The application of RIM principles also will make them more valued in their role in the organization.

When marketing to employees, it is important that the RIM product is not seen as a cost-reduction or downsizing strategy lest employees fear job loss and shun the product accordingly. RIM professionals should try to market RIM in a way that ensures a positive WIIFM factor (e.g., providing employees with additional skills and freeing up their time to perform higher level activities).

Step 3: Develop and Implement Marketing Programs

During Step 3, the RIM practitioner should examine all possible programs that will help accomplish the overall marketing goal(s). Because they are unlikely to be able to dedicate an employee to marketing, RIM professionals will have to pick and choose which programs will help them the most.

The diagram on page 46 illustrates an example of the relationship between marketing programs and customer segments and their relationship to an over all marketing plan.

Each marketing program should support the overall RIM marketing plan and the goal(s) set for each customer segment. When choosing individual marketing programs, RIM practitioners also must consider their overall impact relative to their costs and the resources needed for implementation.

Step 4: Evaluate the Marketing Plan's Success

Success can be measured in two ways. First, compare the original measurable and quantifiable goals to the outcomes achieved. Second, obtain customer feedback using survey methods such as questionnaires and one-on-one meetings.

Success will depend on the RIM practitioner's ability to avoid several marketing pitfalls:

* Failing to deliver on marketing messages. This will negatively impact the credibility of the RIM product and the RIM employees. Indeed, nothing destroys the credibility of the RIM product faster than not being dependable.

* Becoming complacent. Realize that marketing must be an ongoing effort. If marketers think they can market a product once and then wait for customers to contact them, they can think again.

* Using RIM jargon in marketing messages. What may seem second nature to a RIM professional (e.g., the meaning of the terms "active" and "inactive" when describing records) may not have any meaning for potential customers. In fact, the use of such jargon may prevent them from understanding the marketing message and/or frustrate them to the point that they resist future marketing efforts.

Through careful analysis of the Four Ps, customer segmentation, and the development of specific marketing goals and messages tailored to individual customer segments, a RIM professional will increase the likelihood of meeting his/her marketing goals. Success could translate into increased resources (or at least continuation of the status quo), higher profile, and greater perception of the value and benefits of RIM.

[ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED]

References

Kotler, Philip and Ronald E. Turner. Marketing Management. 7th edition. Scarborough, Ontario: Prentice-Hall Canada, 1993.

Heather Richmond, CRM, has been a records and information management professional for more than 17 years. For the past eight years, she served as Vice President, Marketing and Sales, for CONDAR Consulting in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. She may be contacted at [e-mail].

Sheila Taylor, CRM, is General Manager, Southern Ontario, for CONDAR Consulting. She may be contacted at [e-mail].