Gathering Intelligence for Discovery — Purposeful Architect

A new client is replacing their marketing system with the Salesforce Marketing Cloud. You will lead the implementation and need to learn about their marketing processes. The client gives you sample marked-up reports, showing the information they want from Marketing Cloud. The reports show their expectations of the solution, and provide insight into their terminology and metrics. You focus on the reports that fit within the scope of the project.

A marketing manager provides user guides for their current marketing system. You requested the guides to see how data gets into their system, and how it’s processed to generate reports. The sample reports contain some information not covered in the user guides. You ask the marketing manager about the gaps, and she suggests George, the marketing information technology analyst, would know about them.

When you first meet with George, he seems wary. He expresses skepticism about Marketing Cloud, seeing it as marketing throwing away their investment in the current system. George has invested a lot of effort into customizing and managing the system. Perhaps he’s concerned that Marketing Cloud will eliminate his role.

You reassure George that his investment in their marketing system won’t be lost in Marketing Cloud. Marketing will still need to run campaigns, generate leads and run reports in the new system, like they do now. George looks stunned. He starts to recognize the value of his experience to the ongoing success of their new marketing solution, as well as discovery.

You ask George:

1. What additional documentation does he have for their system, especially to fill in the gaps between processes in the user guides and reports?
2. How has the company customized their marketing software? Do they have a document outlining the customizations?
3. Do they have any process flow diagrams?
4. Could he come up with a list of problem tickets for the marketing software?

George ponders the first question. He acknowledges the process-report gaps, and doubts that anyone has written down what fills them. The second question has the same answer. George knows the marketing system customizations, and hasn’t documented them. Assuring him it’s OK, you ask him what he knows about the gaps and customizations. George also provides some useful information on other topics relevant to discovery.

George has process flow diagrams he made years ago, but now they’re out of date. You both create new diagrams that include improvements from Marketing Cloud. George gets excited about the improvements.

Your last question puzzles George. He says, “I can get you a list of the tickets for our system, but what do you want them for?” he asks. You reply they will give you hints about pain points in their current system. You’re also looking for requested system improvements to include in discovery. George pulls the list of marketing system problems and improvement requests. You show him where Marketing Cloud fulfills some of their improvement requests, and what will need additional customization.

The more George works with you, the more engaged he becomes with Marketing Cloud. He recognizes the value his experience brings to the new solution. You express appreciation for all his help. He looks forward to working with you through discovery and implementation.

Learn as much as you can about customer needs, outcomes and processes before leading any discovery session.

Originally published at https://www.purposefularchitect.com on May 18, 2020.