Basic company information
The first step in getting to know your customer is getting to know what the company does. A good place to find out that information is on the About page on their company website. For example, go to LinkedIn's About page. Search for information, such as product, services, and general company information. You should be able to find out some of the following information:
Company size - Determine whether they're a 100-person company or 10,000-person company.
Industry - Find out if they're a financial, healthcare, education, or other type of industry. Each industry comes with its own challenges and regulations.
Locations - Establish if they're in a single location or spread out across the globe. This information can give insight into considerations for potential language and currency issues. Projects in multiple locations can have different regulatory challenges to consider.
Your customer's customers - Learn about who and where their customers are. The company might be in a single location but could have customers across the globe.
Offerings - Determine if they have multiple products/services. Often, this information will connect to your specific Dynamics 365 project. For example, you might be implementing Microsoft Dynamics 365 Field Service to handle service calls for a specific product line.
Sales cycle - Find out if they're spending 12 months trying to sell an airplane or 12 days trying to sell a bicycle. Even if you're not implementing sales-oriented solutions, this information can provide valuable insight on the relationships that they have with their customers.
Vision and mission - Use this information to gain a better idea of what's important for the customer and what they're trying to accomplish. As you meet with your customer, you might learn that they have a more targeted vision and mission for the specific project or department that you're working with.
Additionally, news and press releases about the company might give you some further insight. If the information is available to you, having an awareness of the company's financials and strategy will help you better understand their business goals.
If you're new to doing work in the company's industry, you should become familiar with some common industry vocabulary, processes, and regulations. Also, it would be beneficial to have a basic understanding of Dynamics 365 industry solutions for that industry. For more information on Dynamics 365 industry solutions, select the following links: