Customer Satisfaction:

E-Business

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

Management of Customer Communication Over a Relationship Continuum

Modern Customer-based Relationship Approach

In today's customer-driven economy, corporations must move from product-based campaign marketing to a customer-based relationship approach. Customer relationship management is the management of customer communication over a relationship continuum. It includes relationship strategy and multi-channel relationship programs that produce both business value and customer experiences on a scale not seen in traditional marketing.¹... More

What is CRM?

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is an approach that can assist organizations to serve their customers better. CRM helps to identify valuable customers, assess their needs, and provide more personalized service. It also streamlines the handling of enquiries and requests, resulting in higher operational efficiency and more rapid responses to customers.

CRM software provides highly automated tools to generate and track sales lead, the performance of individual products or sales professionals and the results of sales campaigns on a wide range of parameters.

Attracting the right customers with the right offer at the right time is critical to corporate survival. Now, when the number of customers online reached critical mass, the need for integrating customer data stores became an imperative.

Technology in the form of interactive software and pervasive Internet is changing the way we manage our customers. The widespread use of information technology (IT) in the contemporary workplace is enabling organizations to draw together technical and industry knowledge, along with skills and expertise, to improve knowledge and understanding of customer needs and requirements.

Value Innovation

According to a recent survey³ of over 100 companies, Best-in-Class retailers are 60% more likely than their peers to possess an enterprise-wide CRM application. Additionally, they are 21% more likely than industry Average and 73% more likely than Laggards to possess a loyalty mailing application, and are 41% more likely than the industry Average and twice as likely as Laggards to possess a loyalty database hosting application. All of these enablers are connected through an enterprise-wide CRM system that allows associates and managers across the organization to gain visibility into the customer database, and helping to promote loyalty campaigns at the store level by aggregating data from multiple sources.

CRM Implementation – Not Just a Software Package Installation

Building better and deeper customer relationships requires new enterprise-wide business process management approaches, new analytics, and new integration of systems (as well as new strategies and tactics) to enable employees to work harder and smarter to capture customer information.

Need for Executive Sponsorship

"CRM rollouts fail because they don't have executive sponsorship," concluded I.T. managers on panels at Oracle's OpenWorld user conference. Without a business strategy for CRM, companies can rarely gain any return on a CRM investment, said users.

Facilitating Teamwork

The processes within CRM create a system where everyone works in a team to harness resources for maximum effectiveness. Such teamwork contributes to efficiency and to consistency of standards and quality throughout the organization. This fosters faster, better solutions to customers' problems, and generates greater customer value. CRM also assists in improving focus on high value customer segments. Enabling CRM permits the workforce to own the means of production.

Integration, Process Key to CRM

A strong business process, robust application integration capabilities and solid management buy-in are key factors in any successful CRM installation. In a small- or medium-sized business, one of the keys to succeeding with CRM is nailing down the process and ensuring process compliance.

 Case in Point  Sealing Devices Inc.

Sealing Devices Inc., a Lancaster, N.Y.-based manufacturer, failed in two efforts to implement CRM systems before succeeding on its third try, said CIO Patrick Harris. The two failures were primarily the result of a lack of integration with other applications.

The failed CRM systems – the first homegrown and the second a package from an undisclosed vendor – required much redundant input of data, which led to mistakes. The company's current system, which is based on Oracle CRM and other Oracle applications, allows users to enter data once for all systems.

Sealing Devices expects its latest project to deliver an ROI of 153% over five years.

 Case in Point  Dell Computers

"Customers can't help noticing the difference between what a traditional product-focused organization offers and what we can provide," says Michael Dell, the Founder of Dell Inc. "In a word, it's service. Whether it's anticipating their technology needs or supporting them with fast, reliable delivery and on-site service, we've been able to create a feeling of personalization – of a relationship – that comes with buying a PC from Dell. And while some have expressed concern that as we grow, we'll lose touch with them, we have found that the opposite happens. Each time we segment, we learn a little more about a customer's unique set of needs. It's our goal to know our customers' needs as well as or better than they do." ... More