The Importance of Alignment and How to Get There, With Vernon Johnson

Clever marketing campaigns are fun, but they are ineffective unless staff and sales processes are aligned behind them.

Creators and Guests

Host

Andy Johns

Vice President of Marketing

What is The StoryConnect Podcast?

StoryConnect features interviews with marketers, communicators, CEOs and other leaders at cooperative and independent broadband companies, electric cooperatives and municipal power providers. The goal of the podcast is to help listeners discover ideas to shape their stories and connect with their customers. It is produced by Pioneer Utility Resources.

Intro:
A production of Pioneer Utility Resources.

StoryConnect, helping communicators discover ideas to shape
their stories and connect with their customers.

Andy Johns:
What are some things you can do to make sure your organization
stays in alignment?

That's what we'll be talking about on this episode of The
StoryConnect Podcast.

My name is Andy Johns, your host with Pioneer, and I'm joined on
this episode by Vernon Johnson, who is the marketing and sales

manager at CLtel.

VJ, thanks for joining me.

Vernon Johnson:
Thank you, very happy to be here.

Andy Johns:
So we are here at the epicenter of rural broadband providers at
the Calix ConneXions Conference in Las Vegas.

It's been a good couple of days for us.

I've learned a lot. I hope you have too.

Vernon Johnson:
Definitely, without a doubt.

Just a lot of eye opening information and a lot of stuff I can
take back and immediately start implementing.

Andy Johns:
Definitely. Now the session everybody is talking about, or at
least some people are talking about, is a session that you're

doing tomorrow talking about alignment and new product rollouts.

So go ahead and let's define it kind of.

When we're talking about being in alignment for an organization,
whether that's a rural broadband provider or whoever, what do we

mean when we're talking about alignment?

Vernon Johnson:
Well, I mean, the way that we're thinking about it here at CLtel
would be when we're going to market with a product as an example

or a service, just ensuring that throughout the company,
throughout the company and throughout the organization,

everyone's in lockstep understanding.

You know, the messaging that's going to go out, how we're going
to share the information, ensuring that if necessary, if needed,

that we have meetings and/or presentation just to ensure that,
again, everyone understands the expectations behind

this. And it's the scary part also from a marketing perspective
is, you know, what are our goals?

You know, the number of "widgets" we might sell as an example.

What kind of penetration we might expect if we're going out into
a new area, those kinds of things.

And what will we do, or what is the backup plan, if for some
reason we're hitting the mark after two weeks, three

weeks or so?

Andy Johns:
Yeah. Both in the positive direction and in a negative direction,
I guess.

Vernon Johnson:
Correct. Just to make sure all those bases are covered.

Andy Johns:
Got it. So, you know, as we're talking through, all the topics
there, when you're looking at alignment,

and you guys have rolled out a few new products.

There have been a few over the years.

I guess that's the part that folks don't realize about
marketing.

I know that's the thing I didn't realize about marketing
communications when I first got into it is, is you get excited

about the external stuff.

The things that go out into the, you know, the very clever
things that you've designed to go out into the world and get

people to buy your product.

But it's so important.

The number one way that we see people stumble a lot of the time
is when people aren't brought on board.

That's not necessarily obvious, but it's so important to do
that.

Vernon Johnson:
Yeah, I agree. In fact, when I first started at CLtel, and I
don't traditionally, I don't have the traditional

broadband background.

So I came from a B2B environment, and I came into CLtel
thinking, "All right, I'm gonna wear this Superman

cape, create this magnificent strategic marketing plan
specifically for the product that we're

trying to push out," at that time.

And I remember I didn't include the CSRs.

Andy Johns:
Oh, okay.

Vernon Johnson:
They let me know immediately.

"Hey. Sorry.

You gotta let us know, because the great thing, we're getting
some phone calls about this.

But unfortunately, we're unable to truly explain the benefits
or, you know, we're missing out on some potential sales."

And from that point on, they have been included in this process.

So I agree with your statement there.

Andy Johns:
Yeah. The thing that I always try to say at the beginning of a
marketing campaign is, "Okay, what if this works?" You know, what

if we do get the calls, just like we're expecting.

What's the next step? And then what's the next step, and what's
the next step?

Vernon Johnson:
Correct.

Andy Johns:
So, and we've seen it before.

I've used this example on the podcast.

There is a rural broadband provider, a telco who will remain
nameless.

But they were rebranding, and they put up a billboard and kind
of like a big fanfare.

The new name of the company, and they had staff reach out to the
marketing people and say, "Hey, have you heard about this new

company that's coming into town?

We got, we better be, they sound pretty good.

We better worry." That's kind of the nightmare scenario, but
obviously you've got employees who are busy.

You got folks that are in different departments, different
priorities.

I imagine when you're making sure to talk to those folks, it
takes a few different efforts and a few different channels when

you're talking, trying to get your coworkers and fellow
employees to know what's going on.

What are some of the ways that you reach different people in
different ways internally?

Vernon Johnson:
Yeah, I mean, you're spot on with that.

One of the major things that I do is I try to pull people from
different areas of the company, bringing them in early, and then

ensuring that they're, whatever the crazy idea that I may have
or that someone has given me, I'm sharing it with others

who either have had experience with the audience we're going
after to tell me, is this the right path?

Has this been tried before?

What was the success that we had with that, or what didn't work?

And then I'll go back and, you know, replay that or reframe it.

And again, bring it back to that larger audience.

I mean and when I say larger audience, it's probably 3 or 4
people.

From that point on, massage it a bit, and then share it with the
management and leadership team.

And that at that point, that's when we start implementing it
within the company, testing it as an example with employees, and

then from that point, getting feedback from them and moving it
into, you know, a live scenario.

Andy Johns:
I think that was an important part that you touched on.

And I believe you said this is part of the presentation for
tomorrow.

But getting that feedback, getting that information back, not
just as a one-way pumping this information out.

But you guys are doing some stuff too both through surveys and
sounds like listening to folks internally to kind of get that

feedback and improve the process even as you're rolling things
out, right?

Vernon Johnson:
Yes, that's correct. In fact, one of the things that we worked
with Calix with was, and I mean plug for y'all too, this is

something that we work with y'all as well.

They meeting Calix.

We worked with them for a survey, a loyalty analysis survey.

They brought back just probably an 18 to 25 page document of
nothing but metrics and statistics.

Andy Johns:
Wow.

Vernon Johnson:
Broke it down for us.

We sat back and looked at, you know what of these measurements
are truly important to us that's going to move the needle for us?

And from that information, we decided to update some of the
images that we're using for speed

upgrades and for new customers.

We created, you know, an additional landing page, a shorter
form.

And I remember this was 30 days after, again working with the
team from Calix, working with Pioneer as well.

I'll give a plug to Julie and her work in pushing some of this
stuff through.

Andy Johns:
Yay, for Julie.

Vernon Johnson:
Yes, but it turns out within 30 days, we reached subscriber and
speed upgrade levels that

we hadn't seen since Covid times.

Andy Johns:
Oh, wow.

Vernon Johnson:
And when I remember, when I first started, everyone said, "You
know, no matter what we do, it's going to be difficult for us to

recreate any of the magic that happened during Covid times." And
I'm going to attribute a lot of what we did from

the metrics that we received and from the work that was done by
y'all to that success that we had.

I mean, we're talking it's a top ten month of all time for
CLtel, and CLtel has been around –

Andy Johns:
For a long time.

Vernon Johnson:
Yeah, very long time. So very proud of that and very proud of the
work that we did internally and working with y'all on that.

Andy Johns:
I appreciate that. And when we're talking about the magic of
COVID, because you don't hear that phrase very often.

I think all the broadband providers probably know what we're
talking about when, just because there were so many sign-ups.

Everybody working remote.

Everybody learning remotely.

Those were, yeah, like you said, kind of all time months for
sign-ups and everything there.

Vernon Johnson:
Yes.

Andy Johns:
I did want to ask you, and I may be putting you on the spot here,
but when you're talking about looking at that study, you know,

looking at the survey results, what were some of the metrics or
the benchmarks or what were some of the particular items, if you

remember those key performance indicators, maybe that you all
were looking at as, okay, this we have, I think you said 18

pages. We can't process all 18.

But what were some of the really key ones that you all were
looking at to determine success in where you were?

Vernon Johnson:
Yeah, sure. I mean, one was a bragging moment.

Just we had a score of 86 for the NPS score.

Andy Johns:
Net promoter score?

Vernon Johnson:
Yes. Net promoter score.

Andy Johns:
That's fantastic.

Vernon Johnson:
Yeah. It's amazing.

We were told that that's out of this world fantastic.

Andy Johns:
Yeah.

Vernon Johnson:
So we're very proud of that.

And the other aspect that really puts us – and I hate using the
term unique – but in a unique spot is anyone that's been a

customer of ours for over 30 years.

Everyone that again, has been a customer for CLtel for 30 years,
gave us a Net Promoter score of 90.

Andy Johns:
Wow.

Vernon Johnson:
Again that's unheard of.

Ten years, you know, is decent, but 30 years for us to have that
kind of loyalty from customers and

for them to think of us that way, incredible.

Some of the other –

Andy Johns:
That means you're doing something right.

Vernon Johnson:
Correct. And I mean, part of that is the DNA, the culture, that's
been at CLtel for, you know, all this length of time here.

The other things that we really focused in on.

So here at Calix, they're really talking about, you're not going
to differentiate on speed.

And I totally agree with that.

So from what we ascertained, from the feedback we got from
customers was what they appreciated about us was that we were a

local business. We support the community.

That was one. Another one was our reliability, where they felt
that we were more reliable than any other carrier in

that area. In fact, for our local area of north central Iowa,
there's an annual survey that goes out to, I think, about

20,000 people for seven straight years.

CLtel has been voted favorite, most, you know, liked internet
subscriber.

And then the last thing was customer support.

I've heard, you know, anecdotally, I've heard customers walk in
and say, "You know, I love you" to our CSRs.

I've seen our CSRs hugging folks.

Andy Johns:
That doesn't happen everywhere.

Vernon Johnson:
No, no, not at all.

And so I think it's, you know, those kinds of things married to
what, you know, we found

in the analysis that Calix provided us.

So, yeah.

Andy Johns:
So how do you think you will use.

Because I know you well enough to know that every, every
campaign, every new effort, you're looking to get better, tighten

things up, tweak things here and there.

Are there some things that you've learned these last few rounds
of new products or new initiatives that you'll use

next time? What are some things that you hope to implement to
even refine processes and get even better next time?

Vernon Johnson:
Yeah, I mean, we both are big on writing.

One of the things I want to do with our writing or our
communication is to tell more customer stories.

So I think we've done a great job of telling stories in general
about how you can take advantage of your internet services,

explaining how to do these types of things.

But we haven't told, in my opinion, enough of the customer
stories, and we have enough customer comments to be able to do

that.

Andy Johns:
To start building that together, yeah.

Vernon Johnson:
Exactly. And I think that will drive more interest and people
wanting to visit the website.

I do feel that that's going to be a trigger for people to truly
understand who CLtel is, especially from out of town markets for

people that move to Clear Lake because that is one area that I
do want to focus in on.

Most people that come from out of the area, like Des Moines,
which is about roughly an hour and a half away from us, they

don't know about CLtel.

So how can we tell customer stories?

How can we share content that they're going to be able to get
when they're doing their research, as far as an internet service

provider?

Andy Johns:
Perfect, and that can help you out in a lot of different areas.

So it makes a lot of sense.

Yeah. Well let's close here.

Let's wrap up on this question.

And it's how I end a lot of the podcasts.

But what advice do you have for somebody who's listening to this
and is like, oh, you know, we don't do some of those things, but

this is something we can do better.

What advice do you have for somebody who's kind of where you
were a few years ago and starting to think about, "Okay, to do

this, right, I need to implement some of these processes." What
advice would you give them?

Vernon Johnson:
A former boss once told me.

Progress over perfection.

Andy Johns:
Yeah.

Vernon Johnson:
And I have taken that to heart here.

And it started just because I was afraid to actually publish
something or send it to him for a review,

thinking, "Is this going to get red ink to death?

And I'm going to be so embarrassed." You know what?

Just move forward with it. I mean, get your idea on paper.

Share the idea out.

Get it to where you know you like it, even if it's not perfect.

If it's close to perfect, get it out there because you're going
to get feedback.

Andy Johns:
Right.

Vernon Johnson:
And then you can make changes off that and build off that.

I mean, this is a tiny plug for us.

We've started podcasting like you have.

And do I think the podcasts are great?

No. Absolutely not.

However, I think there are things that we can do differently,
and we're going to do that.

Andy Johns:
Oh, sure. Tell us the name of the podcast so that anybody who's
out there is listening, who wants some of it, they can go find

it.

Vernon Johnson:
Well, thank you for that.

It's called "Show and CLtel." "Show and CLtel."

Andy Johns:
I like it, I like it.

Well, VJ, thank you so much for for joining me on this episode
and for taking the time to share your story with the folks at the

panel here at Calix ConneXions tomorrow.

Vernon Johnson:
It's been a pleasure, Andy. Thanks a lot for the opportunity.

Andy Johns:
He is Vernon Johnson with CLtel in Iowa.

I'm Andy Johns your host with Pioneer.

And until we talk again, keep telling your story.

Outro:
StoryConnect is produced by Pioneer Utility Resources, a
communications cooperative that is built to share your story.