Lily’s career path is an interesting one. She joined the ApostleTech team as a Client Services Consultant nearly 2 years ago. Before making the leap into client service, Lily was the Chief Operating Officer for Universal Language Service, a leading provider of interpreter referral services. It was there she began her Salesforce journey and realized her passion for process evaluation and problem solving. She is a 7x certified Salesforce consultant with 8 years of Salesforce experience.

We recently spoke with Lily about her experience and learned what inspires her.

How did your previous experience help prepare you for your position as a Salesforce Consultant?

I spent 12 years as the Chief Operating Officer of a contact center, which prepared me for my current role as a Salesforce Consultant. As the COO, I analyzed, developed, implemented and optimized operations for numerous departments with varied needs. When the company decided to adopt a new CRM, I was tasked with leading the implementation of a highly customized Salesforce solution. My strong foundation in operational strategy and in-depth understanding of Salesforce capabilities allows me to support ApostleTech’s clients, understand their needs, and make the best possible recommendations for a solid and scalable solution. I also draw on my experience working as a substitute teacher. I love teaching and sharing my knowledge. When I work with my clients on their Salesforce solutions, I get to share my tips, tricks and lessons I learned over the years.

What do you enjoy most about working at ApostleTech?

Working at ApostleTech is wonderful and I find that consulting really suits me. I get to relive the process of analyzing goals and objectives for a business and develop a Salesforce solution that works seamlessly as part of the overall operational strategy with each client I work with. To me it’s like putting a puzzle together, ensuring that all of the pieces are there and work together as a well-oiled machine. One of the things I enjoyed when I was managing multiple teams in my former position was solving the challenges that they were facing by implementing a Salesforce solution and then seeing an immediate boost in morale and productivity. I now get to experience that with each of my clients. I know from my own experience the impact that a well-designed CRM has on a business and this is what I now make sure to deliver.

What are some of the challenges your clients face and how do you help them overcome those challenges?

One of the biggest challenges clients frequently face is a deficiency in their existing CRM solution due to design limitations and/or the way it was configured. This is what I love about Salesforce – virtually anything can be done and with the right partner (ahem, ApostleTech). You won’t need to come up with inefficient workarounds just because your CRM doesn’t do what it should. Deep-dive discovery sessions and gap analysis are an important part of the process, which helps me determine what key components are missing. My approach in designing Salesforce solutions includes making sure the architecture and data model is scalable and sustainable, and that the user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) is straight-forward, intuitive, and supports each of my clients’ business processes. Lastly, execution of the solution and a systematic approach in the testing and gathering of client feedback helps ensure the solution solves the client’s challenges.

Can you share an example of a recent project you worked on how ApostleTech’s CRM solutions helped a customer improve its sales and marketing operations?

I recently worked with a homebuilder that needed help handling their inbound leads and a CRM solution that could streamline their communication. To expedite the timeline of the project, ApostleTech leveraged our proprietary homebuilder accelerator solution (HCP) to properly handle new leads, homebuyer and real estate agent information, and related business processes in Salesforce. The exciting addition is a custom Marketing Cloud solution that allows the builder to create customer journeys (email drip campaigns) for their communities. Every time a person completes a form requesting information about a community, they receive timely emails about the community, available homes for sale, floor plans and other valuable information. The automation is extremely beneficial, it eases the burden of manual follow ups, and delivers consistent and targeted messaging to increase interest from potential buyers. Now the sales teams can easily respond to emails and questions from leads and focus their energy on closing sales, resulting in hitting and exceeding their sales goals.

What are three key factors that contribute to a successful CRM implementation and why?

The top three factors that immediately come to mind are finding the right partner, securing executive sponsorship and establishing a data strategy.

Teaming with the right Salesforce implementation partner is essential for guiding your company to meet its CRM objectives. Great consultants have a systematic approach to and make sure they understand your goals. They gain insight on the logic of your business processes to help you achieve your goals. Proper and scalable architecture of your solution depends on a team that understands the capabilities of the CRM and can recommend and implement a reliable and efficient solution because they know what works and what doesn’t.

Executive sponsorship and buy-in demonstrates a commitment to dedicate internal teams and/or resources needed for a successful implementation. The most successful projects have a sponsor or lead who remains involved from inception through buildout, testing, training and go live. When there is a leader involved, it helps ensure user adoption upon implementation and for years to come.

The most frequently underestimated factor of any CRM implementation is the data model. Data integrity is vital. Having high integrity data paired with the right solution helps teams at every level of an organization perform better at their jobs and provide valuable insights that drive business growth. On the opposite end of the spectrum, bad data impacts automation, integrations and general functionality; it skews reporting and directly affects end users working in the CRM. That is why I start talking “data” early on in a project. Having a clear vision of the plan for handling data is the best way to avoid surprises at the end of any CRM build.

When you are not working, what do you enjoy doing?

I love to cook and enjoy a well-made dish. When I figure out what I want to make, I look up and compare tons of recipes to discern what ingredients and techniques are going to excite me. I shop for the healthful and highest quality ingredients I can find and make an event out of it. My goal is to make something worthy of a Michelin rating and have my husband tell me that I need to remember what I did with the recipe (whether I achieve this is another story, but the important thing is I try).

If we checked your recently viewed list on streaming services, what would it tell us about you?

Gosh, I’m all over the place – practically every genre. I watch a lot of documentaries, cooking shows, science fiction, comedies (I’ll never admit to how many times I’ve re-watched The Office) and a healthy dose of 80’s movies. The ApostleTech team teases me about it, but I believe everyone loves a good 80’s movie, even if they deny it. 

If you are interested in learning how your company can convert leads to sales and work more efficiently, contact us for a demo.