INTRODUCTION-CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MGT UNIT I

INTRODUCTION

Definitions - Concepts and Context of relationship Management Evolution - Transactional Vs Relationship Approach CRM as a strategic marketing tool CRM significance to the stakeholders. Definition of 'Relationship Management' A strategy employed by an organization in which a continuous level of engagement is maintained between the organization and its audience. Relationship management can be between a business and its customers (customer relationship management) and between a business and other businesses (business relationship management). Relationship management is a focus of the financial and investing industries as a way to identify potential cross-sales of products and services. 'Relationship Management' Relationship management aims to create a partnership between the organization and its audience rather than consider the relationship merely transactional. Consumers who feel that a business responds to their needs are more likely to continue using the products and services that a business offers. Additionally, maintaining a level of communication with consumers allows the business to identify potential sources of costly problems before they come to a head. Customer Relationship Management Evolution CRM - Customer Relationship Management encompasses the methodologies, software, and communication capabilities that help organisations to structure and manage their customer relationships and interactions, with the objective of increasing customer satisfaction with the organisations' products or services. Evolution CRM is the foundation for adoption of a customer-centric business strategy, which can drive changes in functional roles in the company, demand re-engineering of your work processes, which is supported, not driven, by CRM technology. Evolution CRM provides the business strategy, process, culture, and technology to enable organisations to optimise revenue and increase shareholder value through better understanding the needs of customers. Evolution CRM technology can bring significant benefits to the improvement of relationships with customers, and assist with streamlining business processes. One of the greatest challenges facing business today remains how to access, manage and distribute the business information locked away in their corporate databases and secreted in the minds of their employees - intellectual capital. As the world moves from an
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industrial society to an information society, the value and volume of corporate information is growing exponentially. For organisations that are unable to rationalise the problem, the outlook is bleak - loss of vision, agility, and eventual paralysis will ensue. Evolution CRM with tools to help users manage data and information, sorts the useful from the useless in order to make rapid and accurate decisions to achieve the goal of competitive advantage. Evolution customer management solutions expand the definition of CRM to include all of the business processes and associated systems that touch a customer. Our collaborative commerce CRM application is a customer orientated, modular, B2B solution for optimising your marketing, sales, planning, fulfilment, delivery and service. It recognises that billing and delivery are every bit as important as sales force automation in terms of the overall customer experience. B2B Customer Feedback: Relationship Vs Transactional approaches

Selecting between the two styles of customer feedback survey, relationship and transactional, is relatively straight forward for most business to consumer organisations. Use Transactional feedback surveys for understanding what drives day to day customer loyalty. Use Relationship feedback surveys to benchmark yourself against your competitors. However, it is not nearly so simple in a business to business (B2B) or business to government (B2G) environment. Relationship Vs Transactional: What is the difference? There are two key differences: Timing Transactional (or Bottom-up) surveys occur shortly after a customer has interacted with your organisation. This could be completing a sale, receiving an invoice, contact a service centre, etc.

On the other hand, Relationship (or top down) surveys occur on a regular timeframe: say monthly, quarterly or annually. Content Transactional surveys are very short; often just 2 or 3 questions. They rely on a high number of responses and lots of qualitative data in order to be successful. Relationship surveys are longer (20 or more questions) and rely on getting more information from each customer to be successful. Neither approach is right or wrong and both have their advantages. B2B: When would you use Relationship? Relationship surveys can almost always be used in a B2B business. In fact this is the type that is most often used. On an annual or other regular basis, the company will contact their clients to gather their feedback. Data is collected analysed, reported and actioned. This style of survey also work well for B2B companies because it can handles a range of influencers and decision makers within the client organisation: economic decision maker, technical influencer, etc. Using the Relationship approach allows you to collect input from each of the perspectives and integrate them together. B2B: When would you use Transactional? Transactional surveys are not always applicable in a B2B situation. They key attribute required for this approach is, not surprisingly, a regular, high volume, stream of transactions. You might think that all organisations have a good stream of transaction but this is not the case. Many B2B companies have only a relatively few, very high value transactions. For instance, consider a company that performs mainly project based work (IT companies, engineering companies, construction companies) or companies with relatively large per customer sales (heavy equipment suppliers). If you are one of these companies it may be difficult to identify meaningful transactions against which you can implement a Transaction style survey. So which should you use? My overall preference is to use Transactional surveys whenever possible. This is for several reasons:

1. I have seen this approach very quickly drive customer focus into an organisation; its hard to ignore the feedback when customers are telling you every day what you are doing right and wrong. 2. The constant stream of feedback informs ongoing tactical change in the company, which in turn demonstrates the value of feedback to the whole organisation. 3. Rather than a once a year hit of feedback that can get forgotten, the constant stream of feedback keeps it top of mind for all staff and management. Having said that, in a B2B company there are sometimes just not enough transactions or they are not of the right sort to make transactional approaches work. In these cases relationship approaches are invaluable. They give deep insight into what is motivating the customer and can provide an excellent understanding how to help you make changes to improve customer loyalty. What is the impact on your NPS program? Not much actually. Net Promoter Score can be used in both Transactional and Relationship approaches.You should note that the scores from each approach are not comparable but you can, and should, use the Net Promoter Score questions and approach in both Relationship and Transactional feedback approaches. Customer relationship management (CRM) is a widely implemented strategy for managing a companys interactions with customers, clients and sales prospects. It involves using technology to organize, automate, and synchronize business processes principally sales activities, but also those for marketing, customer service, and technical support The overall goals are to find, attract, and win new clients, nurture and retain those the company already has, entice former clients back into the fold, and reduce the costs of marketing and client service. Customer relationship management describes a company-wide business strategy including customer-interface departments as well as other departments. Measuring and valuing customer relationships is critical to implementing this strategy.

1 Benefits of Customer Relationship Management 2 Challenges o 2.1 Complexity o 2.2 Poor usability o 2.3 Fragmentation o 2.4 Business reputation o 2.5 Security concerns 3 Types/variations o 3.1 Sales force automation o 3.2 Marketing
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3.3 Customer service and support 3.4 Appointment 3.5 Analytics 3.6 Integrated/collaborative 3.7 Small business 3.8 Social media 3.9 Non-profit and membership-based 3.10 Horizontal Vs. Vertical 4 Strategy 5 Implementation o 5.1 Implementation issues o 5.2 Adoption issues o 5.3 Statistics o 5.4 Increasing usage and adoption rates o 5.5 Help menus 6 Development o 6.1 Clarity o 6.2 Test users 7 Privacy and data security system 8 Market structures 9 Related trends 10 See also 11 Notes

o o o o o o o o

Benefits of Customer Relationship Management A Customer Relationship Management system may be chosen because it is thought to provide the following advantages Quality and efficiency Decrease in overall costs Decision support Enterprise ability Customer Attentions Increase profitability.

Challenges Successful development, implementation, use and support of customer relationship management systems can provide a significant advantage to the user, but often there are obstacles that obstruct the user from using the system to its full potential. Instances of a CRM attempting to contain a large, complex group of data can become cumbersome and difficult to understand for ill-trained users. Additionally, an interface that is difficult to navigate or understand can hinder the CRMs effectiveness, causing users to pick and choose which areas of the system to be used, while

others may be pushed aside. This fragmented implementation can cause inherent challenges, as only certain parts are used and the system is not fully functional. The increased use of customer relationship management software has also led to an industrywide shift in evaluating the role of the developer in designing and maintaining its software. Companies are urged to consider the overall impact of a viable CRM software suite and the potential for good or bad in its use. Complexity Tools and workflows can be complex, especially for large businesses. Previously these tools were generally limited to simple CRM solutions which focused on monitoring and recording interactions and communications. Software solutions then expanded to embrace deal tracking, territories, opportunities, and the sales pipeline itself. Next came the advent of tools for other client-interface business functions, as described below. These tools have been, and still are, offered as on-premises software that companies purchase and run on their own IT infrastructure. Poor usability One of the largest challenges that customer relationship management systems face is poor usability. With a difficult interface for a user to navigate, implementation can be fragmented or not entirely complete. The importance of usability in a system has developed over time. Customers are likely not as patient to work through malfunctions or gaps in user safety,[ and there is an expectation that the usability of systems should be somewhat intuitive: it helps make the machine an extension of the way I think not how it wants me to think. An intuitive design can prove most effective in developing the content and layout of a customer relationship management system.] Two 2008 case studies show that the layout of a system provides a strong correlation to the ease of use for a system and that it proved more beneficial for the design to focus on presenting information in a way that reflected the most important goals and tasks of the user, rather than the structure of the organization. This ease of service is paramount for developing a system that is usable. In many cases, the growth of capabilities and complexities of systems has hampered the usability of a customer relationship management system. An overly complex computer system can result in an equally complex and non-friendly user interface, thus not allowing the system to work as fully intended.] This bloated software can appear sluggish and/or overwhelming to the user, keeping the system from full use and potential. A series of 1998 research indicates that each item added to an information display can significantly affect the overall experience of the user. Fragmentation Often, poor usability can lead to implementations that are fragmented isolated initiatives by individual departments to address their own needs. Systems that start disunited usually stay that way: [siloed thinking] and decision processes frequently lead to separate and incompatible systems, and dysfunctional processes.
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A fragmented implementation can negate any financial benefit associated with a customer relationship management system, as companies choose not to use all the associated features factored when justifying the investment.Instead, it is important that support for the CRM system is companywide The challenge of fragmented implementations may be mitigated with improvements in late-generation CRM system Business reputation Building and maintaining a strong business reputation has become increasingly challenging. The outcome of internal fragmentation that is observed and commented upon by customers is now visible to the rest of the world in the era of the social customer; in the past, only employees or partners were aware of it. Addressing the fragmentation requires a shift in philosophy and mindset in an organization so that everyone considers the impact to the customer of policy, decisions and actions. Human response at all levels of the organization can affect the customer experience for good or ill. Even one unhappy customer can deliver a body blow to a business. Some developments and shifts have made companies more conscious of the life-cycle of a customer relationship management system. Companies now consider the possibility of brand loyalty and persistence of its users to purchase updates, upgrades and future editions of software.] Additionally, CRM systems face the challenge of producing viable financial profits, with a 2002 study suggesting that less than half of CRM projects are expected to provide a significant return on investment. Poor usability and low usage rates lead many companies to indicate that it was difficult to justify investment in the software without the potential for more tangible gains. Security concerns A large challenge faced by developers and users is found in striking a balance between ease of use in the CRM interface and suitable and acceptable security measures and features. Corporations investing in CRM software do so expecting a relative ease of use while also requiring that customer and other sensitive data remain secure. This balance can be difficult, as many believe that improvements in security come at the expense of system usability. Research and study show the importance of designing and developing technology that balances a positive user interface with security features that meet industry and corporate standards. A 2002 study shows, however, that security and usability can coexist harmoniously. In many ways, a secure CRM system can become more usable. Researchers have argued that, in most cases, security breaches are the result of user-error (such as unintentionally downloading and executing a computer virus). In these events, the computer system acted as it should in identifying a file and then, following the users orders to execute the file, exposed the computer and network to a harmful virus. Researchers argue that a more usable system creates less confusion and lessens the amount of potentially harmful errors, in turn creating a more secure and stable CRM system. Technical writers can play a large role in developing customer relationship management systems that are secure and easy to use. A series of 2008 research shows that CRM systems, among others, need to be more open to flexibility of technical writers, allowing these professionals to become content builders.] These professionals can then gather information and use it at their preference, developing a system that allows users to easily access desired information and is secure and trusted by its users.
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Types/variations Sales force automation Sales force automation (SFA) involves using software to streamline all phases of the sales process, minimizing the time that sales representatives need to spend on each phase. This allows a business to use fewer sales representatives to manage their clients. At the core of SFA is a contact management system for tracking and recording every stage in the sales process for each prospective client, from initial contact to final disposition. Many SFA applications also include insights into opportunities, territories, sales forecasts and workflow automation, quote generation Marketing CRM systems for marketing help the enterprise identify and target potential clients and generate leads for the sales team. A key marketing capability is tracking and measuring multichannel campaigns, including email, search, social media, telephone and direct mail. Metrics monitored include clicks, responses, leads, deals, and revenue. Alternatively, Prospect Relationship Management (PRM) solutions offer to track customer behaviour and nurture them from first contact to sale, often cutting out the active sales process altogether. In a web-focused marketing CRM solution, organizations create and track specific web activities that help develop the client relationship. These activities may include such activities as free downloads, online video content, and online web presentations.[citation needed] Customer service and support CRM software provides a business with the ability to create, assign and manage requests made by customers. An example would be Call Center software which helps to direct a customer to the agent who can best help them with their current problem. Recognizing that this type of service is an important factor in attracting and retaining customers, organizations are increasingly turning to technology to help them improve their clients experience while aiming to increase efficiency and minimize costs.[16] CRM software can also be used to identify and reward loyal customers which in turn will help customer retention. Even so, a 2009 study revealed that only 39% of corporate executives believe their employees have the right tools and authority to solve client problems.[17] Appointment Creating and scheduling appointments with customers is a central activity of most customer oriented businesses. Sales, customer support, and service personnel regularly spend a portion of their time getting in touch with customers and prospects through a variety of means to agree on a time and place for meeting for a sales conversation or to deliver customer service. Appointment CRM is a relatively new CRM platform category in which an automated system is used to offer a suite of suitable appointment times to a customer via e-mail or through a web site. An automated process is used to schedule and confirm the appointment, and place it on the appropriate person's calendar. Appointment CRM systems can be an origination point for a sales lead and are generally integrated with sales and marketing CRM systems to capture and store the interaction. Analytics Relevant analytics capabilities are often interwoven into applications for sales, marketing, and service.
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These features can be complemented and augmented with links to separate, purpose-built applications for analytics and business intelligence. Sales analytics let companies monitor and understand client actions and preferences, through sales forecasting and data quality. Marketing applications generally come with predictive analytics to improve segmentation and targeting, and features for measuring the effectiveness of online, offline, and search marketing campaigns. Web analytics have evolved significantly from their starting point of merely tracking mouse clicks on Web sites. By evaluating buy signals, marketers can see which prospects are most likely to transact and also identify those who are bogged down in a sales process and need assistance. Marketing and finance personnel also use analytics to assess the value of multi-faceted programs as a whole. These types of analytics are increasing in popularity as companies demand greater visibility into the performance of call centers and other service and support channel in order to correct problems before they affect satisfaction levels. Support-focused applications typically include dashboards similar to those for sales, plus capabilities to measure and analyze response times, service quality, agent performance, and the frequency of various issues. Integrated/collaborative Departments within enterprises especially large enterprises tend to function with little collaboration.[18] More recently, the development and adoption of these tools and services have fostered greater fluidity and cooperation among sales, service, and marketing. This finds expression in the concept of collaborative systems that use technology to build bridges between departments. For example, feedback from a technical support center can enlighten marketers about specific services and product features clients are asking for. Reps, in their turn, want to be able to pursue these opportunities without the burden of re-entering records and contact data into a separate SFA system. Small business For small business, basic client service can be accomplished by a contact manager system: an integrated solution that lets organizations and individuals efficiently track and record interactions, including emails, documents, jobs, faxes, scheduling, and more. These tools usually focus on accounts rather than on individual contacts. They also generally include opportunity insight for tracking sales pipelines plus added functionality for marketing and service. As with larger enterprises, small businesses are finding value in online solutions, especially for mobile and telecommuting workers. Social media Social media sites like Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Google Plus are amplifying the voice of people in the marketplace and are having profound and far-reaching effects on the ways in which people buy. Customers can now research companies online and then ask for recommendations through social media channels, making their buying media to share opinions and experiences on companies, products and services. As social media is not as widely moderated or censored as mainstream media, individuals can say anything they want about a company or brand, positive or negative.
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Increasingly, companies are looking to gain access to these conversations and take part in the dialogue. More than a few systems are now integrating to social networking sites. Social media promoters cite a number of business advantages, such as using online communities as a source of high-quality leads and a vehicle for crowd sourcing solutions to client-support problems. Companies can also leverage client stated habits and preferences to "Hypertargeting" their sales and marketing communications. Some analysts take the view that business-to-business marketers should proceed cautiously when weaving social media into their business processes. These observers recommend careful market research to determine if and where the phenomenon can provide measurable benefits for client interactions, sales and support. It is stated that people feel their interactions are peer-to-peer between them and their contacts, and resent company involvement, sometimes responding with negatives about that company. Non-profit and membership-based Systems for non-profit and membership-based organizations help track constituents and their involvement in the organization. Capabilities typically include tracking the following: fundraising, demographics, membership levels, membership directories, volunteering and communications with individuals. Horizontal Vs. Vertical Horizontal CRM manufacturers offer the same non-specialized base product across all industries. They tend to be cheaper, least common denominator solutions] For example, a bakery would get the same product as a bank. Vertical CRM manufacturers offer specialized, specific industry or pain-point CRM solutions. In general, horizontal CRM solutions are less costly up front, and more costly in the future, due to the fact that companies must tailor them for their particular industry and business model. On the other hand, Vertical CRM solutions tend to be more costly up front and less costly down the road because they already incorporate best practices that are specific to an industry and business model. Major CRM vendors offer horizontal CRM solutions. In order to tailor a horizontal CRM solution, companies may use industry templates to overlay some generic best practices by industry on top of the horizontal CRM solution. Horizontal CRM vendors may also rely on value added reseller networks of systems integrators to build vertical solutions and sell them as 3rd party add-ons or to come in and customize the solution to fit into a particular scenario. Vertical CRM vendors focus on a particular industry. As a general rule of thumb in CRM, it is ten times as costly to build a vertical solution from a horizontal software program than it is to find a particular vertical solution that is already tailored to your business model and industry. Strategy For larger-scale enterprises, a complete and detailed plan is required to obtain the funding, resources, and company-wide support that can make the initiative of choosing and implementing a system successfully. Benefits must be defined, risks assessed, and cost quantified in three general areas:

Processes: Though these systems have many technological components, business processes lie at its core. It can be seen as a more client-centric way of doing business,
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enabled by technology that consolidates and intelligently distributes pertinent information about clients, sales, marketing effectiveness, responsiveness, and market trends. Therefore, a company must analyze its business workflows and processes before choosing a technology platform; some will likely need re-engineering to better serve the overall goal of winning and satisfying clients. Moreover, planners need to determine the types of client information that are most relevant, and how best to employ them.[3]

People: For an initiative to be effective, an organization must convince its staff that the new technology and workflows will benefit employees as well as clients. Senior executives need to be strong and visible advocates who can clearly state and support the case for change. Collaboration, teamwork, and two-way communication should be encouraged across hierarchical boundaries, especially with respect to process improvement.[21] Technology: In evaluating technology, key factors include alignment with the companys business process strategy and goals, including the ability to deliver the right data to the right employees and sufficient ease of adoption and use. Platform selection is best undertaken by a carefully chosen group of executives who understand the business processes to be automated as well as the software issues. Depending upon the size of the company and the breadth of data, choosing an application can take anywhere from a few weeks to a year or more.[3]

Implementation Implementation issues Increases in revenue, higher rates of client satisfaction, and significant savings in operating costs are some of the benefits to an enterprise. Proponents emphasize that technology should be implemented only in the context of careful strategic and operational planning.[22] Implementations almost invariably fall short when one or more facets of this prescription are ignored:

Poor planning: Initiatives can easily fail when efforts are limited to choosing and deploying software, without an accompanying rationale, context, and support for the workforce.[23] In other instances, enterprises simply automate flawed client-facing processes rather than redesign them according to best practices. Poor integration: For many companies, integrations are piecemeal initiatives that address a glaring need: improving a particular client-facing process or two or automating a favored sales or client support channel.[24] Such point solutions offer little or no integration or alignment with a companys overall strategy. They offer a less than complete client view and often lead to unsatisfactory user experiences. Toward a solution: overcoming siloed thinking. Experts advise organizations to recognize the immense value of integrating their client-facing operations. In this view, internallyfocused, department-centric views should be discarded in favor of reorienting processes toward information-sharing across marketing, sales, and service. For example, sales representatives need to know about current issues and relevant marketing promotions before attempting to cross-sell to a specific client. Marketing staff should be able to leverage client information from sales and service to better target campaigns and offers.
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And support agents require quick and complete access to a clients sales and service history.[24] Adoption issues Historically, the landscape is littered with instances of low adoption rates. Many of the challenges listed above offer a glimpse into some of the obstacles that corporations implementing a CRM suite face; in many cases time, resources and staffing do not allow for the troubleshooting necessary to tackle an issue and the system is shelved or sidestepped instead. Why is it so difficult sometimes to get employees up to date on rapidly developing new technology? Essentially, your employees need to understand how the system works, as well as understand the clients and their needs. No doubt this process is time consuming, but it is well worth the time and effort, as you will be better able to understand and meet the needs of your clients. CRM training needs to cover two types of information: relational knowledge and technological knowledge. Statistics In 2003, a Gartner report estimated that more than $1 billion had been spent on software that was not being used. More recent research indicates that the problem, while perhaps less severe, is a long way from being solved. According to CSO Insights, less than 40 percent of 1,275 participating companies had end-user adoption rates above 90 percent.[25] Additionally, many corporations only use CRM systems on a partial or fragmented basis, thus missing opportunities for effective marketing and efficiency.[26] In a 2007 survey from the UK, four-fifths of senior executives reported that their biggest challenge is getting their staff to use the systems they had installed. Further, 43 percent of respondents said they use less than half the functionality of their existing system; 72 percent indicated they would trade functionality for ease of use; 51 percent cited data synchronization as a major issue; and 67 percent said that finding time to evaluate systems was a major problem.[27] With expenditures expected to exceed $11 billion in 2010,[27] enterprises need to address and overcome persistent adoption challenges. The amount of time needed for the development and implementation of a customer relationship management system can prove costly to the implementation as well. Research indicates that implementation timelines that are greater than 90 days in length run an increased risk in the CRM system failing to yield successful results.

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Unit II-UNDERSTANDING CUSTOMERS UNIT II 9 UNDERSTANDING CUSTOMERS

Customer information Database Customer Profile Analysis - Customer perception, Expectations analysis Customer behavior in relationship perspectives; individual and group customers - Customer life time value Selection of Profitable customer segments.

Information selection Deciding what you want your database to do will generally dictate the information it should hold. Essential information will include: Name and address Salutation Use or otherwise of first name Job title/company name Contact details (home/work/mobile numbers, fax, e-mail) Date information was last updated Consumer demographic Industry/commercial sector Details of last purchase Other relevant details to your business Last contact made with customer (and marketing material sent)

The more you break down the information, the more flexible your database will be. For instance, put the first and last name into two fields, with the salutation in the third. Another field should be created for 'use or otherwise of first name', which can be selected when you are sending a letter to all those on your database. Some contacts will be unfamiliar to you and should be addressed formally, while others will be offended if you didn't use their first name. Using held information Whether you are using the database as a marketing tool, mail merging with sales letters and producing labels, or gathering information on the purchasing trends of your customers, you should be able to sort and view the information in an easy format. This will enable you to produce printed reports for your staff and sales force to work from. Database security It is likely that you will want the majority of your staff to view the database and run simple reports, however it is important to have only one or two people managing and inputting information. This will help to maintain the integrity of the information held within the database.

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It is good practice to set up password access to the database, this way you will prevent unwanted users from looking at your customer information - this is particularly crucial if your staff use laptops. Back up the database frequently and keep the backups in a safe place. Recreating an up-to-date database is impossible and lost or damaged data could prove a serious setback to your business. Backing up your database Customer Information Database CIDB The Customer Information Data Base (CIDB) Interface is a new Hedberg Web Service that retrieves and validates Customer Site ID numbers from Steelcase's CIDB. The Benefits of this Enhancement Allows you to inquire on the existence of a Customer Site ID in Steelcase's CIDB Allows you to validate that a current Customer Site ID on your Hedberg System is in Steelcase's CIDB Automatically updates the Customer Site IDs in the Customer Master File Automates the changes that Steelcase makes to the Customer Site ID Increases the accuracy of reporting Steelcase Sales Reduces errors Provides accurate reporting of Steelcase changes to the Customer Site ID or Steelcase Account Number in the Customer Master File Gives you control over updates to the Steelcase Account Number The Hedberg Interface to CIDB Data In order to use this web service, the company Request web service must be active. Your System Manager can activate the service for you. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. Select System Utilities > System Setup. Choose [Connect Info]. Choose [HWS Configuration]. Choose HWS Service Management]. Highlight the Partner ID SCS and choose [Partner Services]. Highlight the Service Name companyRequest. Activate the Active indicator for the companyRequest web service.

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8.

Choose [Close] to exit the program.

The Hedberg System has been enhanced to allow you to validate and inquire on a Customer Site ID. CIDB Request In order to accommodate this enhancement, the STC Cust Site ID field and [Site ID Info] button have been moved from the More Detail window to the Customer Detail window. You start the validation/inquiry on the customer's Detail window.

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While in Modify mode, you can highlight the STC Cust Site ID field and zoom or choose [Site ID Info]. The Steelcase Customer Site ID Request window appears.

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Use this window to validate Validation Request a Customer Site ID or inquire (Query Request about one. The "Validation" Request Option sends the Customer Site ID to Steelcase for verification. The Steelcase CIDB returns a status that the Site ID is valid, invalid, or has been replaced with a different Site ID. If the Site ID has been replaced, the Steelcase CIDB returns the new Site ID and supporting information. You can accept a replaced Site ID and optionally accept the supporting information returned by the Steelcase CIDB. Click here for details. The "Query" Request Option allows you to enter one or more search parameters and have all matching Site IDs and supporting information returned from Steelcase. You then select one of the returned Site IDs to accept the supporting information (field by field) returned by the Steelcase CIDB. Click here for details. If there is a Customer Site ID in the STC Cus Site ID field on the More Detail window, the Hedberg System defaults the Request Option to "Validation". This disables the Query Criteria fields. If the STC Cus Site ID field is blank, the Request Option defaults to "Query". The Query Criteria fields are filled in with as much information as the Customer Master can provide for this customer. However, if there is a DUNS number for the customer or you enter one in the Query Criteria, the Hedberg System disables the remaining Query Criteria fields. If you send a CIDB query without the Country Code, the CIDB defaults it to US.
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The Query Criteria is strung together with "and" statements. Therefore, when you submit the query, if any single item is not found, the entire query is thrown out and no results are returned. It is better to enter only as much information - as accurately as possible - as you need for the query. The Response Option determines the amount of information the "Query" Request Option returns. The Basic information is: Site ID Ultimate Site ID Site Name Physical Street Address Physical City Physical State / Province Physical Postal Code Physical Country Code Physical County Code Phone Number DUNS Number The "Extended" Response Option returns this information: Identity Group Site ID Site Name (Customer Name) Also Known As Phone DUNS Number Operator Site (Parent Site ID and Name) Ultimate Site (Ultimate Parent Site and Name) Physical Address Group Street City State / Province Country Postal Code County Company Data Group NAICS code and description SIC code only Government Segmentation (Yes, No, N/A) D&B Credit Score Marketability (Yes or No) Updated By Steelcase (Date) Updated By D&B (Date) Number Of Family Members Site Office Employees
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Mailing Address Group Street or PO Box City State / Province Postal Code Country Code County Code Sales Related Data Group Continuing Agreement (Yes or No) Customer Status The [Ciweb] button is a link to the Ciweb site at Steelcase (http://ciweb.steelcase.com ). CIDB Response After submitting your CIDB request the CIDB returns its response. What the CIDB returns depends upon your Request Option. First we will show you the Validation request responses and then the Query request responses. Validation Response

Validation Request Response Messages To validate an existing Customer Site ID, make sure the "Validation" Request Option is selected and choose [Submit]. If you are prompted for your IN2 Steelcase username and password, enter them. The CIDB returns the following responses when you validate a Site ID.
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If the Site ID currently held in the Customer Master is found to be invalid by the web service request, the following message appears.

If you choose [OK], the Hedberg System clears the Site ID from the Customer Master. If you choose [Cancel], the invalid Site ID remains in the Customer Master. The Site Comparison window does not appear because there is no supporting data returned from Steelcase. The program returns to the Customer Site ID request screen. If the Site ID currently held in the Customer Master has been replaced with a different Site ID, the following message appears. After choosing [OK], the Site Response Comparison window appears with the Site ID field marked for update.

If the Site ID is valid, the following message appears and choosing [OK] displays the Site Response Comparison window.

Validation Site Response Comparison Window Choosing [OK] displays the Site Response Comparison window. This window allows you to select the fields you want to change. If the Response Option is set to "Expanded" the [More Details] button appears. Choosing [More Details] allows you to see more information returned by the query to verify that this is the site ID you want.

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The Hedberg System highlights the differences between your customer master information and Steelcase's CIDB information in red. The Update indicator only appears when there is a difference. However, if the Site ID returned field is different than the one stored in the Customer Master (a replacement), the Update indicator for the Site ID is automatically activated. You can de-activate it if you want to. In the example above the update indicator is not active because there is no Site ID for this customer. Therefore, this situation indicates an addition, not a replacement. Choosing [Update] updates the Customer Master fields that you have indicated to be updated with the information from the Steelcase CIDB. Choosing [More Details] displays the Query Response More Detail window. Choosing [Select All] activates all the Update indicators. This button toggles to [Unselect All] when you choose [Select All] and vice versa. Query Response Depending upon the number of matches the query finds, the CIDB interface will return one or more site IDs. If the query returns one site ID you have the opportunity to update your customer master information with the information returned from the Steelcase CIDB. If the query returns more than one site ID, you have the opportunity to select the site ID you need and update it. When the query sends back multiple site IDs, the Select Response window appears.

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If the Response Option is set to "Expanded" the [More Details] button appears. Highlighting a response and choosing [More Details] allows you to see more information returned by the query to verify that this is the site ID you want.

When you highlight a response and choose [Select] (or the query returns only one site ID), the Site Response Comparison window appears. This window allows you to select the fields you want to change.

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Query Site Response Comparison Window

The Hedberg System highlights the differences between your customer master information and Steelcase's CIDB information in red. The Update indicator only appears when there is a difference. However, if the Site ID returned field is different than the one stored in the Customer Master (a replacement), the Update indicator for the Site ID is automatically activated. You can de-activate it if you want to. In the example above the update indicator is not active because there is no Site ID for this customer. Therefore, this situation indicates an addition, not a replacement. Choosing [Update] updates the Customer Master fields that you have indicated to be updated with the information from the Steelcase CIDB. Choosing [More Details] displays the Query Response More Detail window. Choosing [Selection] returns the program to the Select Response window. Choosing [Select All] activates all the Update indicators. This button toggles to [Unselect All] when you choose [Select All] and vice versa. CUSTOMER PROFILE ANALYSIS: How much do you really know about your markets? In customer and prospecting databases there often is a wealth of information, but it may lack some critical elements. By exploring other essential attributes, be they demographic, psychographic (activities, interests, opinions, attitudes, values), or behavioralistic (usage rates, brand loyalty, benefits sought, purchase intent), complementary survey research can help companies to more effectively leverage their existing data foundation.

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Adding customer profile research data to your companys mix will help you to Improve profitability among existing customers and to find new ones through more effective cross-sell and retention strategies. This will allow you to adapt to changes at each stage in a customer's relationship with you, from acquisition to retention to long-term growth. Apply your new knowledge across your entire organization, cultivating and engaging customers on the one-to-one basis they want and expect. Understanding the demographic characteristics, lifestyle behaviors, and purchase preferences that drive buying decisions leads to successful marketing strategies. Customer satisfaction, a business term, is a measure of how products and services supplied by a company meet or surpass customer expectation. It is seen as a key performance indicator within business and is part of the four of a Balanced Scorecard. In a competitive marketplace where businesses compete for customers, customer satisfaction is seen as a key differentiator and increasingly has become a key element of business strategy.[1] However, the importance of customer satisfaction diminishes when a firm has increased bargaining power. For example, cell phone plan providers, such as AT&T and Verizon, participate in an industry that is an oligopoly, where only a few suppliers of a certain product or service exist. As such, many cell phone plan contracts have a lot of fine print with provisions that they would never get away if there were, say, a hundred cell phone plan providers, because customer satisfaction would be way too low, and customers would easily have the option of leaving for a better contract offer. There is a substantial body of empirical literature that establishes the benefits of customer satisfaction for firms. Contents 1 Measuring customer satisfaction

2 Methodologies 3 See also 4 References 5 External links

Measuring customer satisfaction Organizations need to retain existing customers while targeting non-customers.[2] Measuring customer satisfaction provides an indication of how successful the organization is at providing products and/or services to the marketplace. Customer satisfaction is an abstract concept and the actual manifestation of the state of satisfaction will vary from person to person and product/service to product/service. The state of
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satisfaction depends on a number of both psychological and physical variables which correlate with satisfaction behaviors such as return and recommend rate. The level of satisfaction can also vary depending on other factors the customer, such as other products against which the customer can compare the organization's products. Methodologies American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) is a scientific standard of customer satisfaction. Academic research has shown that the national ACSI score is a strong predictor of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth, and an even stronger predictor of Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE) growth. On the microeconomic level, research has shown that ACSI data predicts stock market performance, both for market indices and for individually traded companies. Increasing ACSI scores has been shown to predict loyalty, word-of-mouth recommendations, and purchase behavior. The ACSI measures customer satisfaction annually for more than 200 companies in 43 industries and 10 economic sectors. In addition to quarterly reports, the ACSI methodology can be applied to private sector companies and government agencies in order to improve loyalty and purchase intent. Two companies have been licensed to apply the methodology of the ACSI for both the private and public sector: CFI Group, Inc. applies the methodology of the ACSI offline, and Foresee Results applies the ACSI to websites and other online initiatives. ASCI scores have also been calculated by independent researchers, for example, for the mobile phones sector,[5] higher education,[6] and electronic mail.[7] The Kano model is a theory of product development and customer satisfaction developed in the 1980s by Professor Noriaki Kano that classifies customer preferences into five categories: Attractive, One-Dimensional, Must-Be, Indifferent, Reverse. The Kano model offers some insight into the product attributes which are perceived to be important to customers. Kano also produced a methodology for mapping consumer responses to questionnaires onto his model. SERVQUAL or RATER is a service-quality framework that has been incorporated into customer-satisfaction surveys (e.g., the revised Norwegian Customer Satisfaction Barometer[8]) to indicate the gap between customer expectations and experience. J.D. Power and Associates provides another measure of customer satisfaction, known for its topbox approach and automotive industry rankings. J.D. Power and Associates' marketing research consists primarily of consumer surveys and is publicly known for the value of its product awards. Other research and consulting firms have customer satisfaction solutions as well. These include A.T. Kearney's Customer Satisfaction Audit process,[9] which incorporates the Stages of Excellence framework and which helps define a companys status against eight critically identified dimensions. For Business to Business (B2B) surveys there is the InfoQuest box[1]. This has been used internationally since 1989 on more than 110,000 surveys (Nov '09) with an average response rate of 72.74%. The box is targeted at "the most important" customers and avoids the need for a blanket survey.
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CUSTOMER PERCEPTION: Customer perception is an important component of our relationship with our customers. Given that 90% plus of our orders at some point involve the phone, how we handle the telephone is essential to creating a perception for our customer that aligns with the company mission of service. The following is a great way of handling the phone. 1. The greeting is: Good Morning/Afternoon this is Joshua with (your company name). How may I help you? 2. Always ask and receive a response from people before you put them on hold: Would you please hold...? Then be sure they are not on hold very long otherwise offer to call them back. 3. Remember to smile on the phone. Slow down and speak plainly and clearly. Smiling stretches your vocal cords, and gives a more upbeat presentation to the customer. Slowing down ensures that the customers perception is of an organized systematic company that can handle their project. Getting it done right and on time consistently. 4. If you transfer a call and know who is calling, tell the name of the caller to your co-worker so they can greet the person by their name. 5. Under no circumstances should any interaction with a client be used to express any sense of overwhelm that you may have. We are swamped, we are so busy, etc. may be acceptable office banter in most companies but it really should not be! If I am a customer and I am looking to get a rush project done, this type of comment tells me that I might want to consider looking elsewhere. Customers do not care how busy we are when they call and ask: How busy are you? What they really care about is can we take care of another project they have for us. We know from talking to clients that often they feel that they are bothering us or have a concern that they might be overloading us. It is curious to know that sometimes these are our best clients that have this concern. Therefore, anything that might reinforce this is something we want to avoid (you do not need to send your work to other vendors even though you have given us a lot of work already, we can handle it). One possible response to: Are you busy? - is to say: We are busy, but never too busy to help you - what can I do for you? or words to that effect. They are the customers. They do not want to hear about our situation they want to talk about what we can do for them. 6. If we have to contact a customer with bad news of any kind realize that your tone of voice and approach to it set the tone. We do not want to be nonchalant as if it is not big deal. Nor do we want to act like a terrible calamity occurred. Here are keys to contacting customers with bad news: * Prepare rehearse and organize what you are going to communicate to them and how you are going to communicate it to them.
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* Be sure there is no hint of blame or avoiding responsibility. Customers do not care about the folder being broken, the copier jamming or any other things. That is our problem. It is not their problem and they actually do not want to hear about it. Certainly, later in the conversation if they ask what the source of the delay or problem is, you can share that with them, but it should not be something that you want to volunteer early in the conversation. * Be absolutely certain that you have options to give the customer in these situations. This allows them to be more in control rather than a victim. What are options? What are solutions? Do not call them with the problem unless you are also providing solutions to them. * Learn what you could have done to prevent this problem from occurring and do so next time. Again, the customer is calling us to take on their problems and to solve their problems. They really do not want (nor do they care) to know about our problems. 7. Remember to always thank the customer. Thank them for calling. Thank them for their business. Thank them for cooperation and understanding. Thank them for a well prepared electronic file. Thank them for a referral. Thank them for the professional manner in which they and their company interact with us. customer lifetime value (CLV) In marketing, customer lifetime value (CLV), lifetime customer value (LCV), or lifetime value (LTV) is the net present value of the cash flows attributed to the relationship with a customer. The use of customer lifetime value as a marketing metric tends to place greater emphasis on customer service and long-term customer satisfaction, rather than on maximizing short-term sales. One of the first accounts of it is in the 1988 book Database Marketing, and includes detailed worked examples.[1][2] Customer lifetime value has intuitive appeal as a marketing concept, because in theory it represents exactly how much each customer is worth in monetary terms, and therefore exactly how much a marketing department should be willing to spend to acquire each customer. In reality, it is difficult to make accurate calculations of customer lifetime value. The specific calculation depends on the nature of the customer relationship. Customer relationships are often divided into two categories. In contractual or retention situations, customers who do not renew are considered "lost for good". Magazine subscriptions and car insurance are examples of customer retention situations. The other category is referred to as customer migration situations. In customer migration situations, a customer who does not buy (in a given period or from a given catalog) is still considered a customer of the firm because she may very well buy at some point in the future. In customer retention situations, the firm knows when the relationship is over. One of the challenges for firms in customer migration situations is that the firm may not know when the relationship is over (as far as the customer is concerned). CUSTOMER LIFE TIME VALUE :

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Calculation in customer retention cases CLV (customer lifetime value) calculation process consists of four steps: 1. forecasting of remaining customer lifetime in years 2. forecasting of future revenues year-by-year, based on estimation about future products purchased and price paid 3. estimation of costs for delivering those products 4. calculation of the net present value of these future amounts[4] Forecasting accuracy and difficulty in tracking customers over time may affect CLV calculation process. Most models to calculate CLV apply to the customer retention situation. These models make several simplifying assumptions and often involve the following inputs:

Churn rate, the percentage of customers who end their relationship with a company in a given period. One minus the churn rate is the retention rate. Most models can be written

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using either churn rate or retention rate. If the model uses only one churn rate, the assumption is that the churn rate is constant across the life of the customer relationship. Discount rate, the cost of capital used to discount future revenue from a customer. Discounting is an advanced topic that is frequently ignored in customer lifetime value calculations. The current interest rate is sometimes used as a simple (but incorrect) proxy for discount rate. Contribution margin. Retention cost, the amount of money a company has to spend in a given period to retain an existing customer. Retention costs include customer support, billing, promotional incentives, etc. Period, the unit of time into which a customer relationship is divided for analysis. A year is the most commonly used period. Customer lifetime value is a multi-period calculation, usually stretching 37 years into the future. In practice, analysis beyond this point is viewed as too speculative to be reliable. The number of periods used in the calculation is sometimes referred to as the model horizon.

Thus, one of the ways to calculate CLV, where period is a year, is as follows [5]:

, where is yearly gross contribution per customer, is the (relevant) retention costs per customer per year (this formula assumes the retention activities are paid for each mid year and they only affect those who were retained in the previous year), is the horizon (in years), is the yearly retention rate, is the yearly discount rate. It is often helpful to estimate customer lifetime value with a simple model to make initial assessments of customer segments and targeting. Possibly the simplest way to estimate CLV is to assume constant and long-lasting values for contribution margin, retention rate, and discount rates, as follows [6]:

Uses and Advantages of CLV Lifetime value is typically used to judge the appropriateness of the costs of acquisition of a customer. For example, if a new customer costs $50 to acquire (COCA, or cost of customer acquisition), and their lifetime value is $60, then the customer is judged to be profitable, and acquisition of additional similar customers is acceptable. Additionally, CLV is used to calculate customer equity. Advantages of CLV:

management of customer relationship as an asset monitoring the impact of management strategies and marketing investments on the value of customer assets determination of the optimal level of investments in marketing and sales activities
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implementation of sensitivity analysis in order to determinate getting impact by spending extra money on each customer[7] optimal allocation of limited resources for ongoing marketing activities in order to achieve a maximum return a good basis for selecting customers and for decision making regarding customer specific communication strategies measurement of customer loyalty (proportion of purchase, probability of purchase and repurchase, purchase frequency and sequence etc.)[8]

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UNIT -3 CRM STRUCTURE: UNIT III CRM STRUCTURES

Elements of CRM CRM Process Strategies for Customer acquisition Retention and Prevention of defection Models of CRM CRM road map for business applications. ELEMENTS OF CRM: Every business expects their customer relationship management (CRM) deployment to deliver rapid results enhanced productivity; increased customer acquisition, satisfaction and retention; improved profitability. But, CRM is more than just a software application that requires installation and a little training. It is a vital business strategy that impacts processes across an entire company, and requires a drastic shift in the way employees understand and interact with both existing and potential customers. So, what are the critical success factors for a CRM implementation? In order for businesses to derive as much value as possible from their CRM solution, they must: 1. Develop a Customer-Centric Strategy The first major step in any successful CRM project is the creation of a strategic plan. This plan should clearly define the organizations goals and objectives for delivering value to customers, and outline the specific actions that will be taken to help achieve them. Employee and client feedback should be solicited to help identify which interactions and services are most important and which are most in need of improvement, as well as to help determine the expected impact of the CRM initiative on the customer base. 2. Create a Customer-Centric Culture Change management is a crucial component of any CRM project. Once an initial plan has been put together, customer-facing teams and departments must be brought into the loop, to ensure they work collaboratively to deliver the highest quality service and support to both existing and potential customers. This may call for extensive changes in a companys culture, structure, and

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behavior, and will likely require resources to be re-allocated, and key customer-facing processes and activities to be re-engineered, so they are aligned with new goals. 3. Harness the Power of Customer Information When it comes to CRM, knowledge is power. Ensure that up-to-date customer information flows freely throughout the company, and is readily accessible to all key stakeholders whenever they need it. This can be accomplished by choosing a CRM application that collects data at every critical customer touch-point, and transforms it into vital intelligence that staff in customer-facing roles can leverage to understand customer needs and preferences, and deliver better, more personalized service. 4. Integrate Technology In order for CRM to allow for effective coordination and enhancement of service delivery, it must align the fragmented, disjointed processes and technology systems that likely exist in different departments such as accounting, sales, marketing, call centers, and field support. The CRM solution must integrate with other enterprise applications in the IT environment, to allow for seamless execution of customer-facing processes across the entire business. 5. Conduct Continuous Measurement and Improvement Without stringent performance management, a CRM implementation can deliver below-average results or even worse, fail. Be sure that, early on in the CRM planning processes, a set of measurable performance metrics (both internal and external) are defined, so the success or failure of the CRM initiative can be periodically assessed. Use those metrics to track actual results against goals, identify areas in need of improvement, and make ongoing enhancements to customer-facing activities. By using these five essential elements as a guide, you can put your companys CRM initiative on the path to success. CRM PROCESS:
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Clients are crucial for the progress of ones company. Gaining an improved quantity of clients each day is one particular of the crucial methods to preserve profitability. When a customer has been misplaced it is very difficult to acquire her again because the business itself has already thrown away her have confidence in. The (Consumer Partnership Management) CRM procedure has been produced in purchase to assist companies acquire new customers and maintain their present clients. CRM can be merely explained as a customer method. This is a strategy or a approach that any company can use. Like any strategy the CRM method has its personal method. The implementation of this process should be carried out stage by step following the right concepts of CRM. The CRM process is not an event that has a starting and ending part it is a process that has methods and has no definite stop. In easier terms CRM is a constant method. This step by step process wants to be executed correctly in purchase to stop difficulties in the final results. This procedure should commence with a study that ideally need to be done by a unique

Crm Process image Crm Process image marketing crew. Hiring a particular marketing and advertising crew can be a great deal simply because the members of the team are really focused on doing and examining the buyer info for the enterprise. The team is the 1 who will carry out some of the most important methods of the process. They will also function with the staff because CRM implementation wants group work. The business entrepreneurs and professionals such as the group are the ones who will formulate targets connected to the overall strategy of the enterprise. After setting goals the study can be began by selecting customers that can be integrated. The clients will be asked to give feedback regarding the company. The group and workers will participate in gathering customers information they can get in touch with customers through emails cellphone calls and even individual interactions if achievable. The crew can also perform surveys and interviews.

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The final results of the customer examination will be shared with the business entrepreneurs and staff. Ideally all of this leads to a CRM method that the business can implement for a long time. Having an successful CRM strategy and process can truly carry a big impact for the enterprise. When a business understands the CRM process it is now ready to formulate its own efficient techniques on how to offer effectively with their consumers. Certainly the process of CRM is really an essential portion in the success of ones company. Customer acquisition Customer acquisition is a process of identifying, approaching and developing new customer relationships. It is important that new relationships formed are acquired from the right type of customer, in order to ensure a sustainable future. Acquiring customers is one of the most important factors in the success of a business. The importance of acquisition not only lies in the volume of customers acquired, but the profitability and value that the customer will bring. Adopting a strategic approach is advised when it comes to acquiring customers. Determining what type of customer best suits the business needs, enables you to target customers which will be profitable and add value to the organisation. Some companies will take the decision of land-grab customers in order to secure new business. It is inevitable that this strategy will acquire customers but not necessarily the customers who will best suit the business needs. A successful customer acquisition strategy is that of which adopts a fully integrated multi channel approach. Giving customers the choice to utilise their preferred channel, instantly creates a positive impact on potential customers. Also, this fully integrated method means businesses increase availability to their potential customer base. Companies with successful acquisition strategies recognise that consumers; communication channels evolve throughout the customer lifecycle. This enables the company to prepare to adapt to such changes in a responsive manor. Another important factor of customer acquisition is ensuring that a companys brand immersion methodology is aligned with their customer acquisition strategies. Cultural beliefs and values of the company need to be highlighted in any acquisition campaign a business implements in order to not only acquire but retain high value and profitable customers. This will not only create a positive experience for the customer, but have a positive impact on the overall brand of the business, heightening its brand awareness to the customers.

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The Basic Small Business Customer Relationship Management Model Model The basic customer relationship management model for a small business Any business for that matter contains a set of seven basic components. The following dicusses each component: A database for customer activity - Ideally the database should contain information about the following: Transactions - including a complete purchasing history with accompanying details Customer contacts from multiple channels and contexts Descriptive information for segmentation and other data analysis purposes Response to marketing stimuli - whether or not the customer responded to a direct marketing initiative, a sales contact, or any other direct contact o This data should also be collected over time. 2. Analyses of the database - For many years customer databases have been analyzed with the intent to define customer segments. However, taking a larger number of customers and forming groups or segments presumes a marketing effort towards an 'average' customer in the group. With the range of marketing tools available that can reach customers one at a time through personalized messages, there is less need to consider the usual market segmentation schemes. Instead there is an increase in attention being paid to understanding each "row", or customer, of the database, and what he or she can deliver to the company in terms of profit. The idea is that each row/customer of the database should be analyzed in terms if current and future profitability to the firm. 3. Given the analyses, decisions about which customers to target - Looking at past and current purchases a model of the profitability of a customer can be used by the marketing manager to target specific customers. The profit that a customer has produced for the firm is the sum of the margins of all products purchased over time less the cost of reaching that customer. These costs include any that can be broken down at the individual customer level such as direct mail, sales calls etc. Cross-selling is also becoming of interest to marketers, with complementary products being displayed on the same physical page in a hard-copy catalogue or virtual page on a Web site. 4. Tools for targeting the customers - Once the construction and analysis of the customer information contained in the database has been completed, the next step is to consider which customers to target depending on the firms marketing programs. This could be through segmentation, with the customers in the most desired segments targeted first. Individual customers could be targeted that are projected to be profitable for the company. 5. How to build relationships with the targeted customers - The overall goal of relationship programs is to deliver a higher level of customer satisfaction than competing firms deliver. Research has shown that there is a strong, positive relationship between customer satisfaction and profits. Relationship programs include:
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o o o o

Customer service: With more choices available for customers today, customer service must receive a high priority within the company. Any contact or "touch point" that a customer has with a firm is a customer service encounter and has the potential to gain repeat business and help CRM or have the opposite effect. Loyalty/Frequency Programs: Loyalty programs provide rewards to customers for repeat purchasing. However, a recent McKisey study identified the three leading problems with these programs: they are expensive, mistakes can be difficult to correct as customers see the company as taking away benefits, and also there are large questions about whether they work to increase loyalty or average spending behavior. A further problem is that due to the ubiquity of these programs, it is increasingly difficult to gain competitive advantage. Customization: This notion implies the creation of products and services for individual customers, and not simply communicating with them as with 1-to-1 marketing. Community: The Internet is allowing both online and offline businesses to build a network for exchanging product-related information and to create relationships between the customers and company or brand. The goal is to take a prospective relationship with a product and turn it into something more personal. This allows the manager to build an environment which makes it more difficult for the customer to leave the "family" of other people who also purchased this product.

6. Privacy issues - A CRM strategy as described in this paper depends upon a database containing customer information and the analysis of this data to achieve more effective targeting of marketing communications and relationship-building activities. With the increase in the popularity of the Internet, many consumers and advocacy groups are concerned about the amount of personal information necessary to enable this delivery. The current debate about privacy centers around how much control Web surfers should have over their own information. 7. Metrics for measuring the success of the CRM process - As more attention is paid to CRM, the traditional metrics used by managers to measure the success of their products and services in the marketplace have to be updated. Some of the CRM-based measure in both Web and non-Web based businesses are as follows: o Customer acquisition costs o Conversion rates (from lookers to buyers) o Retention /churn rates o Same customer sales rates o Loyalty measures o Customer share or share of requirements (the share of a customer's purchases in a category devoted to a brand).

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How to Develop a CRM Road Map Is it any wonder that the new mantra in business today is to become a customer-driven organization that develops enduring relationships with its consumers? An Accenture study, "How much are CRM capabilities really worth? What every CEO should know," established for the first time, a strong link between excellence in a company's overall interaction with customers, what we call CRM, and financial performance. It showed that companies that have not invested in developing specific CRM capabilities are leaving millions of dollars in profit on the table. That difference in performance in executing specific CRM capabilities accounts for roughly half the inequality in financial performance between top and average performers. 1 It is no surprise that companies are investing an enormous amount of effort and money in CRM technology that aims to get them closer to their customers. In fact, some studies have estimated that the overall CRM market will exceed $180 billion by 2002 (including services, applications tools and outsourcing) and is growing at 35 percent compounded annual growth rate. It is also no surprise that the main concerns of many CEOs and CIOs about CRM are how to improve loyalty (customer retention and development) as well as the bottom line (acquiring new and profitable consumers). These two concerns summon the need for organizations to consider a holistic view of their customers. This can be achieved through an innovative approach known as the CRM road map. How are companies presently responding to this challenge in an environment where customers are much savvier, harder to please, more informed, have more choices and have limited loyalty? Some companies are implementing point-to-point technology solutions; but, while technology can play an important role, it is only a fraction of the overall solution. Companies need to ensure that technology solutions complement their overall strategic approach and are flexible enough to work with an evolving strategy. Organizations, therefore, need to think more broadly about the potential of CRM (e.g., viewing the enterprise as a cohesive unit rather than fragmented divisions, improving critical customer processes, etc.). Constructing a CRM road map that includes a comprehensive customer strategy is the first step in achieving the full potential that CRM has to offer in becoming a customer-driven enterprise. What is a CRM Road Map? A CRM road map is a strategic plan that identifies how an organization can meet and exceed its customers' needs. This includes, but is not limited to, assessing how the sales, marketing and service entities work together to 1) gain insight from their customers (e.g., purchase history, desired products/services), 2) produce valuable offerings/products (e.g., personalized product) and 3) provide the ultimate customer experience (e.g., multiple touchpoints, 360 degree view of the customer). The Figure 1 provides a "line of sight" that links the business strategy to customer expectations and is described in the following pages. Following these steps can ensure that your company meets its CRM goals.

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Figure 1: Link Business Strategy to Customer Expectations As illustrated in Figure 1, dWhile eveloping a CRM road map involves aligning an organization's business strategy with its prioritized CRM capabilities are identified. For example, if a company's business strategy is to become more customer-centric or develop products faster to gain unique market positioning; the capabilities that the company needs to master should be aligned with that strategy and might include:

Leveraging customer information from the service process (e.g., integrating customer feedback during service calls with the marketing department), Effectively managing product mix (measure success by campaign), and Effectively managing sales channel strategy (eliminate conflict between distribution channels). How do organizations know which CRM capabilities they have and which they need to realize their strategic goal? The primary steps (which have been used cross-industry including financial services, electronics and high tech, consumer products, manufacturing, etc.) to follow when developing a CRM road map include:

Step 1: Gain Senior- Level Sponsorship The sponsor for a CRM road map effort must have a vested interest in the project and ideally have P&L responsibility for the group to be impacted. This helps develop buy-in from the senior management team and the operations staff. A road map effort without senior-level sponsorship and with little cross-unit influence can diminish the returns of such an effort. As with any project an organization undertakes that involves significant change to business processes, organizational structures or roles and responsibilities, the lack of key, influential sponsorship reduces the effectiveness of the project since there is no driving force for implementation. Step 2: Gather Information It is critical to gain insights of various key stakeholders and decision- makers within the organization. These insights can be acquired most effectively by holding one-on- one meetings. We use an "interview template" that consists of more than 30 questions. This template serves as the foundation for framing initial discussions with the client.
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Examples of questions that help us gauge the health of the client's CRM include:

How would you define What does CRM mean to you? What types of customer information are captured/tracked (acquisition/retention costs, churn, cost to serve, etc.)? What information would you like to know about your customers that you currently do not?\Depending on the scope and effort of the project, these meetings may include not only executives, but also individuals all the way to the front line. Given their more frequent and direct interactions with the customer, front-line personnel may know more about customer needs, preferences and concerns that may not have been communicated to the executive level. Step 3: Assess Current State and Define Future State Gaps

Through these meetings, we gain an understanding of the client's current CRM capabilities and significant opportunities to improve their customer relationships and map out our findings. We also strive to understand their company's future direction (usually between six months and two years).

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UNIT -4-CRM PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTATION

Developing a CRM Strategy A common mistake for many organisations is to think of CRM in terms of isolated pockets of technology. However, a successful CRM programme needs a proper strategy to knit it together, make it cost-effective and focussed. This page outlines some key resources to help your organisation craft a successful CRM strategy. To access the articles in full click here for your free MyCustomer.com account The ten steps to CRM strategy development Understand the importance of a robust strategy in planning CRM. Learn the key elements of a successful CRM strategy. Apply the Ten Steps strategic process for CRM strategy development. For a 46-page extract from the Institute of Direct Marketing's 'Guide To CRM Mastery' click here. The reader will find case study examples of all kinds to compare experience with. This is a report that has application to every size of organisation, operating in every sector. It can be read for background understanding, or could provide the manual for your own organisation's strategy development. The report introduces the Ten Steps strategic process - a simple methodology used by some of the world's most successful companies to ensure a logical approach to strategy development. The report covers:

Using the Ten Steps Strategic Framework Aligning Strategy and Technology Aligning Business Practice with Business Strategy CRM Strategy in Action - Case Study Examples Developing a CRM vision and strategy

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"What is a CRM strategy? This is common question and it does not help when answers differ. There is a lot of confusion between a CRM business strategy and a CRM implementation plan. A CRM strategy is the blueprint for how an enterprise is going to turn its customers into an asset by building up their value." Jennifer Kirkby explores what CRM techniques enterprises can use to build real customer value. A strategic framework for CRM "Power and choice are moving to the customer as never before and leading to the commoditisation of products and services in most situations. In this environment, product quality and features are a given, and in many industries are now so undifferentiated as to provide no significant competitive advantage. As a company, you must choose whether to compete on the basis of price in a cutthroat commodity market, or on the basis of customer relationships created through a superior value proposition." This paper proposes a framework from which a CRM strategy can be developed or analysed from a business perspective. The framework highlights the linkages between specific CRM initiatives and desired outcomes. It shows, at a high level, how CRM can contribute to increased revenues, decreased costs, and ultimately to increased profits Evolving your customer strategy to meet changing needs "It is time to dust down the leadership device of strategy, build it around customers and add a strong flavouring of adaptiveness to suit the modern market environment. Combine this with good programme management and you have the tools for success." Jennifer Kirkby discusses the challenges associated with creating CRM strategies and how the strategy must be flexible. CRM's Challenges - What's going wrong? CRM, despite all the talk about it being one of the most 'profitable' customer strategies of the decade, still allows room for failure. The most important aspect of CRM problems is its excellent ability to achieve customer retention but its failure to do so. This is indirectly responsible for CRM collapse. What actually is CRM failure and why does it occur? Generally one of the reasons this happens is because most organizations that actually employ CRM, experience a lot of confusion about its attributes and what it really is. Some would define it as a business strategy while others view it as something to do with technology.
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The statistics show that only one in every six companies that have installed CRM have been successful. CRM has lost its appeal as it has failed to meet expectations. Almost 75% of projects have not succeeded in delivering the expected ROI and have faced numerous problems with CRM. However the absolute failure rate is just 5%. It's mostly the larger corporates that fail. This happens generally because smaller projects fair better. Mid size organizations also have a higher success rate. What are the Problems with CRM? Exorbitant Costs One of the problems with CRM is the huge investment needed to maintain a customer database. The additional expense comes because of the money needed for computer hardware, software, personnel etc. The costs involved are enormous and most often than not the resultant ROI from the CRM implementation fail to cover the costs involved. This leads to a negative feeling within the company about CRM and it's so called successes and ultimately results in CRM collapse. Inadequate Focus on Objectives Secondly when starting off on a CRM strategy the objectives are clearly established and followed. Management and employees know fully well what is needed to work towards organizational goals. The goals themselves are clearly laid out after meticulous planning. However midway during the CRM implementation, when hard times hit, the organization loses sight of its goals and ultimately steers away from it. At times goals get interchanged and lose their importance. Companies find themselves work at home directory towards goals that are less important and forgetting the ones that really are. This is one of the fundamental and mostly felt problems in CRM. Insufficient Resources Sometimes in phased implementation of CRM, if conditions worsen within the company or without, organizations start lessening their budgets for the current phase. When funds are less, budgets strained, the necessary costs required for CRM success are not employed. As a result CRM starts failing midway. The most important aspect- that of maintaining consistency is lost. Organizations fail to utilize the necessary resources for success and thus result in failure. Inappropriate Metrics Organizations have basically failed to use the right metrics. Failure to choose the right method of measurement and implement it is one of the chief reasons why CRM fails. Different metrics have to be employed for the calculation of different goals. Companies seldom pause to analyze which metric is needed for which element and ultimately use the wrong one. This results in faulty
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measurement and CRM disappointments. Complex Systems CRM simple? The hype says so, the experts agree. Is this really the case? Organizations who have employed it though have a different opinion. They are witness to the fact that CRM packages can be highly complex, with vast amounts of intricacies. If this is the case then how do simple employees cope? The answer lies in sufficient training being given in order that they are able to comprehend and deal with the difficulties easily. Business Needs Most Important One of the chief mistakes companies make is letting the technology drive their CRM functionality. What's happening is that companies are endeavoring to go to the industry leaders, gain the technology needed and then apply it to the business problems only to find that it isn't solving any of them. Instead they need to analyze their business problems first and then find the appropriate CRM solution for it. This backwards step is responsible for CRM failure. No Customer Focus Customer oriented strategy? Yes, CRM does play the part. Customer oriented employees? Now 'that' requires an effort on the part of the organization. It needs to motivate employees to be absolutely customer centric. This involves tremendous effort on the part of the company but is highly essential. CRM problems arise because of employee reluctance to be more customer focused. The result is a highly expensive customer strategy being adopted by the company in an effort to retain customers, with reluctant, unfocussed employees implementing it. Slow Returns Another failure of CRM is its inability to provide quick returns on investment. Organizations find themselves waiting for years before they are able to see actual returns on their investment. Most experts view the low ROI as a major problem with CRM but fail to see that the long wait is just as difficult. Waiting for years to see their investments show results, tests patience and leads to both employees and management slackening their efforts in the implementation. Most CRM problems can be mitigated, resolved and ultimately obliterated. What is highly required is the ability to focus on the business needs, choose a CRM package that works towards it, employ the right resources and assume the right metrics. Adopting these measures would go a long way in alleviating CRM problems. CRM Implementation - What you should know CRM implementation differs from organization to organization but there are a few common steps one needs to follow to ensure a successful implementation.There are many factors that
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could influence the success of CRM implementation. Some of them are: Organization Objectives Clear cut objectives are essential and they need to be communicated effectively to the entire organization. Business goals are absolutely essential and need to be clearly defined. Similarly goals of the CRM implementation and how it supports organization goals should also be intimated to employees. Let employees know how important CRM success is to the organization. Solution to Suit Business Objectives A business needs to look for a CRM solution that fits its needs, not the other way around. This step is vitally important and spells success. When choosing a CRM solution every business organization has to ensure that it chooses a CRM solution that fits into the organizations requirements. It is wrong to try and adjust organization requirements to the chosen CRM solution. If this is done organization goals will not be achieved and the CRM process will have disastrous results. Focus on All Business Aspects In most cases the technology will have less to do with the CRM success. Therefore it is important to focus as much importance on communication training and other aspects as much as the technology involved. It is important to involve management at several levels, focus on communication need and indulge in adequate training of the concerned employees throughout the organization. If these items receive a level of focus comparable to the technical system, CRM implementation stands a better chance of succeeding. Define the Business Problem A business needs to clearly define the business problem see what benefits it wants to achieve and adopt the required measures. It is imminently important to clearly identify the business problem that the company needs to resolve. An organization needs to absolutely identify the desired benefits and make sure that the expected returns are generated at every stage. It is important to break down the entire process into smaller pieces that can be individually handled effectively. Establishing Proper Metrics Since companies normally wait for a five year period to see a return on investment. Every organization has to compulsorily define performance metrics to ensure that it measures the return on investment adequately.
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Business Processes not Technology In order to succeed at CRM all companies need to understand that it is not about technology alone but about business processes as well. While CRM changes a company's business processes technology supports the processes. Most businesses make the mistake of actually assuming that the CRM is only about technology alone. This hampers business process development. Implement Change Most employees tend to stick with their old ways and are reluctant to adapt to changes, It needs to be understood that the implementation of CRM involves immense changes and employees need to adapt themselves to it. From the very beginning of the implementation employees will have to adopt new attitudes to help deliver the customer experience properly to customers. Organizations need to make sure that their employees are provided with sufficient training to ensure that they handle this aspect of the customer experience adequately and efficiently. Using Skilled Managers Organizations need to make sure that they use the most highly skilled and experienced group of professionals possible. CRM aspects are complex and what is needed most is a team that has CRM expertise and business knowledge. The team should be adequately trained and sufficiently equipped both intellectually and technologically to carry out the CRM implementation successfully. Choose the Right Methodology Decide whether to use the classical or modern methodology bearing in mind that ease of usage, cost effectiveness and efficiency need to be gained. This is an important step in the CRM implementation as it has a bearing on the entire process. Choose the Right Vendors Companies need to know the vendors through looking at them from this perspective alone. This involves the process of scrutinizing the vendor and seeing whether or not the vendor can fulfill the requirements of the business. Only if this is possible can the vendor be selected. You may not find a vendor that basically fulfills every single objective but at least an organization will be aware of it. Ease of Usage The entire objectives of the CRM process are hampered if the CRM choice is difficult to use. It is highly essential to ensure that the system speaks of ease of usage and the ability to be easily customizable. Employees implementing CRM and forming a part of the CRM process range
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from the mediocre level right to management and to the employee at the very forefront. It is imperative that the business ensure that the CRM software chosen is easy to use and implement not only by a few employees but by everyone using the system. This is a step that needs to be taken at the time of choosing the CRM technology. CRM TOOLS: Choose the right CRM tool and generate more sales. Choosing a good CRM tool for your business is as important is choosing a good employee. As your CRM tool should provide your business with everything that you and your employees need to take your sales from start to finish. The right CRM tool can help your salespeople to convert more consumers into customers and turn one time customers into repeat clients. To understand how a CRM tool like the Prophet CRM tool can help your business build and close more sales, you must understand everything that a CRM tool can accomplish. Once you know what a CRM tool does, it will be easy to see just how a CRM tool can boost your business. CRM Tool for Customer Data. One of the most important features of a CRM tool is its ability to record and analyze customer data. While there are a variety of ways to accomplish this, a good CRM tool allows you to keep all the information about your customers in one convenient location. The days of flipping from screen to screen in various different programs are over once you have installed a CRM tool. Everything you ever need to know about a customer is in one place. A CRM tool records contact information, purchase history, service plans, and even notes and information collected when contacting your customers. A CRM tool will allow you to personalize your customers experiences and drive repeat business through the roof. CRM Tool for Organization. Another convenient feature of a CRM tool is the ability to organize various aspects of your business. From assigning tasks to maintaining client contact at regular intervals, all of this can be accomplished using a CRM tool. Once glance at the information for a salesperson will tell you how many pending sales they have or if they have followed up with their last client after the sale. A CRM tool can help you to manage your staff, increase productivity, and create and act on sales opportunities that would have slipped through your fingers without the use of a CRM tool. CRM Tool for Reports. All of the information you have recorded about your customers and salespersons is useless if you cannot analyze the information within the CRM tool. A great CRM tool will allow you to make customized reports that will let you know what your sales outlook is, what your conversion rate looks like, and where your employees are not utilizing the CRM tool to its fullest. Everything within the CRM tool database can be analyzed and organized for you to review with your employees or other management staff to create a better business plan going forward or reward the team members who are producing. A CRM tool is crucial to the effective management of your business and your sales staff. Using A CRM Tool to Close Sales. The actual closing of a sale may seem completely unrelated to the use of a CRM tool, however it
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is yet another benefit of using this type of software. Once the initial contact with a customer is made, the key to closing more sales with a CRM tool is follow up and direct marketing. A good CRM tool will schedule the follow up tasks for you and even send out emails at specified intervals to clients. The CRM tool can also alert you when a customer is due for service or if a warranty is soon to expire, allowing you to contact the customer and gauge their needs, marketing products directly to them. Above all, a CRM tool allows you to provide the personalized service and excellent customer commitment that brings customers back, every time. Why the Prophet CRM Tool Works. The Prophet CRM tool is one of the most effective CRM tool on the market. It can provide your business with all of the best features of a CRM tool while keeping the simple, organized, and easy to use. The Prophet CRM tool works in conjunction with Outlook, making a product that many businesses use already, so double duty as a contact manager and CRM tool, all rolled into one. The Prophet CRM tool provides everything a business needs to increase and close sales. ROLE OF CRM MANAGERS: Customer relationship management (CRM) is a widely implemented strategy for managing a companys interactions with customers, clients and sales prospects. It involves using technology to organize, automate, and synchronize business processesprincipally sales activities, but also those for marketing, customer service, and technical support. The overall goals are to find, attract, and win new clients, nurture and retain those the company already has, entice former clients back into the fold, and reduce the costs of marketing and client service. Customer relationship management describes a company-wide business strategy including customerinterface departments as well as other departments. Measuring and valuing customer relationships is critical to implementing this strategy.

Contents

1 Benefits of Customer Relationship Management 2 Challenges o 2.1 Complexity o 2.2 Poor usability o 2.3 Fragmentation o 2.4 Business reputation o 2.5 Security concerns 3 Types/variations o 3.1 Sales force automation o 3.2 Marketing o 3.3 Customer service and support o 3.4 Appointment o 3.5 Analytics o 3.6 Integrated/collaborative o 3.7 Small business o 3.8 Social media o 3.9 Non-profit and membership-based o 3.10 Horizontal Vs. Vertical 47

4 Strategy 5 Implementation o 5.1 Implementation issues o 5.2 Adoption issues o 5.3 Statistics o 5.4 Increasing usage and adoption rates o 5.5 Help menus 6 Development o 6.1 Clarity o 6.2 Test users 7 Privacy and data security system 8 Market structures 9 Related trends 10 See also 11 Notes

Benefits of Customer Relationship Management

A Customer Relationship Management system may be chosen because it is thought to provide the following advantages Quality and efficiency

Decrease in overall costs Decision support Enterprise ability Customer Attentions Increase profitability.

Challenges
Successful development, implementation, use and support of customer relationship management systems can provide a significant advantage to the user, but often there are obstacles that obstruct the user from using the system to its full potential. Instances of a CRM attempting to contain a large, complex group of data can become cumbersome and difficult to understand for ill-trained users. The lack of senior management sponsorship can also hinder the success of a new CRM system. Stakeholders must be identified early in the process and a full commitment is needed from all executives before beginning the conversion. Additionally, an interface that is difficult to navigate or understand can hinder the CRMs effectiveness, causing users to pick and choose which areas of the system to be used, while others may be pushed aside. This fragmented implementation can cause inherent challenges, as only certain parts are used and the system is not fully functional. The increased use of customer relationship management software has also led to an industry-wide shift in evaluating the role of the developer in designing and maintaining its software. Companies are urged to consider the overall impact of a viable CRM software suite and the potential for good or bad in its use.

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Complexity

Tools and workflows can be complex, especially for large businesses. Previously these tools were generally limited to simple CRM solutions which focused on monitoring and recording interactions and communications. Software solutions then expanded to embrace deal tracking, territories, opportunities, and the sales pipeline itself. Next came the advent of tools for other client-interface business functions, as described below. These tools have been, and still are, offered as on-premises software that companies purchase and run on their own IT infrastructure.

Poor usability
One of the largest challenges that customer relationship management systems face is poor usability. With a difficult interface for a user to navigate, implementation can be fragmented or not entirely complete. The importance of usability in a system has developed over time.] Customers are likely not as patient to work through malfunctions or gaps in user safety, and there is an expectation that the usability of systems should be somewhat intuitive: it helps make the machine an extension of the way I think not how it wants me to think. An intuitive design can prove most effective in developing the content and layout of a customer relationship management system.[ Two 2008 case studies show that the layout of a system provides a strong correlation to the ease of use for a system and that it proved more beneficial for the design to focus on presenting information in a way that reflected the most important goals and tasks of the user, rather than the structure of the organization. This ease of service is paramount for developing a system that is usable. In many cases, the growth of capabilities and complexities of systems has hampered the usability of a customer relationship management system. An overly complex computer system can result in an equally complex and non-friendly user interface, thus not allowing the system to work as fully intended. This bloated software can appear sluggish and/or overwhelming to the user, keeping the system from full use and potential. A series of 1998 research indicates that each item added to an information display can significantly affect the overall experience of the user.

Fragmentation
Often, poor usability can lead to implementations that are fragmented isolated initiatives by individual departments to address their own needs. Systems that start disunited usually stay that way: [siloed thinking] and decision processes frequently lead to separate and incompatible systems, and dysfunctional processes. A fragmented implementation can negate any financial benefit associated with a customer relationship management system, as companies choose not to use all the associated features factored when justifying the investment. Instead, it is important that support for the CRM system is companywide. The challenge of fragmented implementations may be mitigated with improvements in late-generation CRM systems.

Business reputation
Building and maintaining a strong business reputation has become increasingly challenging. The outcome of internal fragmentation that is observed and commented upon by customers is now visible to the rest of the world in the era of the social customer; in the past, only employees or
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partners were aware of it. Addressing the fragmentation requires a shift in philosophy and mindset in an organization so that everyone considers the impact to the customer of policy, decisions and actions. Human response at all levels of the organization can affect the customer Some developments and shifts have made companies more conscious of the life-cycle of a customer relationship management system. Companies now consider the possibility of brand loyalty and persistence of its users to purchase updates, upgrades and future editions of software. Additionally, CRM systems face the challenge of producing viable financial profits, with a 2002 study suggesting that less than half of CRM projects are expected to provide a significant return on investment.] Poor usability and low usage rates lead many companies to indicate that it was difficult to justify investment in the software without the potential for more tangible gains.

Security concerns
A large challenge faced by developers and users is found in striking a balance between ease of use in the CRM interface and suitable and acceptable security measures and features. Corporations investing in CRM software do so expecting a relative ease of use while also requiring that customer and other sensitive data remain secure. This balance can be difficult, as many believe that improvements in security come at the expense of system usability.[13] Research and study show the importance of designing and developing technology that balances a positive user interface with security features that meet industry and corporate standards.[14] A 2002 study shows, however, that security and usability can coexist harmoniously.[13] In many ways, a secure CRM system can become more usable. Researchers have argued that, in most cases, security breaches are the result of user-error (such as unintentionally downloading and executing a computer virus). In these events, the computer system acted as it should in identifying a file and then, following the users orders to execute the file, exposed the computer and network to a harmful virus. Researchers argue that a more usable system creates less confusion and lessens the amount of potentially harmful errors, in turn creating a more secure and stable CRM system.[13] Technical writers can play a large role in developing customer relationship management systems that are secure and easy to use. A series of 2008 research shows that CRM systems, among others, need to be more open to flexibility of technical writers, allowing these professionals to become content builders.[15] These professionals can then gather information and use it at their preference, developing a system that allows users to easily access desired information and is secure and trusted by its users.

Types/variations
Sales force automation

Sales force automation (SFA) involves using software to streamline all phases of the sales process, minimizing the time that sales representatives need to spend on each phase. This allows a business to use fewer sales representatives to manage their clients. At the core of SFA is a contact management system for tracking and recording every stage in the sales process for each prospective client, from initial contact to final disposition. Many SFA applications also include insights into opportunities, territories, sales forecasts and workflow automation, quote generation

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Marketing

CRM systems for marketing help the enterprise identify and target potential clients and generate leads for the sales team. A key marketing capability is tracking and measuring multichannel campaigns, including email, search, social media, telephone and direct mail. Metrics monitored include clicks, responses, leads, deals, and revenue. Alternatively, Prospect Relationship Management (PRM) solutions offer to track customer behaviour and nurture them from first contact to sale, often cutting out the active sales process altogether. In a web-focused marketing CRM solution, organizations create and track specific web activities that help develop the client relationship. These activities may include such activities as free downloads, online video content, and online web presentations.[citation needed]
Customer service and support

CRM software provides a business with the ability to create, assign and manage requests made by customers. An example would be Call Center software which helps to direct a customer to the agent who can best help them with their current problem. Recognizing that this type of service is an important factor in attracting and retaining customers, organizations are increasingly turning to technology to help them improve their clients experience while aiming to increase efficiency and minimize costs.[16] CRM software can also be used to identify and reward loyal customers which in turn will help customer retention. Even so, a 2009 study revealed that only 39% of corporate executives believe their employees have the right tools and authority to solve client problems.[17]
Appointment

Creating and scheduling appointments with customers is a central activity of most customer oriented businesses. Sales, customer support, and service personnel regularly spend a portion of their time getting in touch with customers and prospects through a variety of means to agree on a time and place for meeting for a sales conversation or to deliver customer service. Appointment CRM is a relatively new CRM platform category in which an automated system is used to offer a suite of suitable appointment times to a customer via e-mail or through a web site. An automated process is used to schedule and confirm the appointment, and place it on the appropriate person's calendar. Appointment CRM systems can be an origination point for a sales lead and are generally integrated with sales and marketing CRM systems to capture and store the interaction.
Analytics

Relevant analytics capabilities are often interwoven into applications for sales, marketing, and service. These features can be complemented and augmented with links to separate, purposebuilt applications for analytics and business intelligence. Sales analytics let companies monitor and understand client actions and preferences, through sales forecasting and data quality. Marketing applications generally come with predictive analytics to improve segmentation and targeting, and features for measuring the effectiveness of online, offline, and search marketing campaigns. Web analytics have evolved significantly from their starting point of merely tracking mouse clicks on Web sites. By evaluating buy signals, marketers can see which prospects are most likely to transact and also identify those who are bogged down in a sales process and need assistance. Marketing and finance personnel also use analytics to assess the value of multifaceted programs as a whole.

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These types of analytics are increasing in popularity as companies demand greater visibility into the performance of call centers and other service and support channels,[16] in order to correct problems before they affect satisfaction levels. Support-focused applications typically include dashboards similar to those for sales, plus capabilities to measure and analyze response times, service quality, agent performance, and the frequency of various issues.
Integrated/collaborative

Departments within enterprises especially large enterprises tend to function with little collaboration.[18] More recently, the development and adoption of these tools and services have fostered greater fluidity and cooperation among sales, service, and marketing. This finds expression in the concept of collaborative systems that use technology to build bridges between departments. For example, feedback from a technical support center can enlighten marketers about specific services and product features clients are asking for. Reps, in their turn, want to be able to pursue these opportunities without the burden of re-entering records and contact data into a separate SFA system.
Small business

For small business, basic client service can be accomplished by a contact manager system: an integrated solution that lets organizations and individuals efficiently track and record interactions, including emails, documents, jobs, faxes, scheduling, and more. These tools usually focus on accounts rather than on individual contacts. They also generally include opportunity insight for tracking sales pipelines plus added functionality for marketing and service. As with larger enterprises, small businesses are finding value in online solutions, especially for mobile and telecommuting workers.
Social media

Social media sites like Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Google Plus are amplifying the voice of people in the marketplace and are having profound and far-reaching effects on the ways in which people buy. Customers can now research companies online and then ask for recommendations through social media channels, as well as share opinions and experiences on companies, products and services. As social media is not as widely moderated or censored as mainstream media, individuals can say anything they want about a company or brand, positive or negative. Increasingly, companies are looking to gain access to these conversations and take part in the dialogue. More than a few systems are now integrating to social networking sites. Social media promoters cite a number of business advantages, such as using online communities as a source of high-quality leads and a vehicle for crowd sourcing solutions to client-support problems. Companies can also leverage client stated habits and preferences to "Hypertargeting" their sales and marketing communications.[19] Some analysts take the view that business-to-business marketers should proceed cautiously when weaving social media into their business processes. These observers recommend careful market research to determine if and where the phenomenon can provide measurable benefits for client interactions, sales and support.[20] It is stated[by whom?] that people feel their interactions are peerto-peer between them and their contacts, and resent company involvement, sometimes responding with negatives about that company.

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Non-profit and membership-based

Systems for non-profit and membership-based organizations help track constituents and their involvement in the organization. Capabilities typically include tracking the following: fundraising, demographics, membership levels, membership directories, volunteering and communications with individuals.
Horizontal Vs. Vertical

Horizontal CRM manufacturers offer the same non-specialized base product across all industries. They tend to be cheaper, least common denominator solutions.[citation needed] For example, a bakery would get the same product as a bank. Vertical CRM manufacturers offer specialized, specific industry or pain-point CRM solutions. In general, horizontal CRM solutions are less costly up front, and more costly in the future, due to the fact that companies must tailor them for their particular industry and business model.[citation needed] On the other hand, Vertical CRM solutions tend to be more costly up front and less costly down the road because they already incorporate best practices that are specific to an industry and business model.[citation needed] Major CRM vendors offer horizontal CRM solutions. In order to tailor a horizontal CRM solution, companies may use industry templates to overlay some generic best practices by industry on top of the horizontal CRM solution.[citation needed] Horizontal CRM vendors may also rely on value added reseller networks of systems integrators to build vertical solutions and sell them as 3rd party add-ons or to come in and customize the solution to fit into a particular scenario.[citation needed] Vertical CRM vendors focus on a particular industry. As a general rule of thumb in CRM, it is ten times as costly to build a vertical solution from a horizontal software program than it is to find a particular vertical solution that is already tailored to your business model and industry.[citation needed]

Strategy
For larger-scale enterprises, a complete and detailed plan is required to obtain the funding, resources, and company-wide support that can make the initiative of choosing and implementing a system successfully. Benefits must be defined, risks assessed, and cost quantified in three general areas:

Processes: Though these systems have many technological components, business processes lie at its core. It can be seen as a more client-centric way of doing business, enabled by technology that consolidates and intelligently distributes pertinent information about clients, sales, marketing effectiveness, responsiveness, and market trends. Therefore, a company must analyze its business workflows and processes before choosing a technology platform; some will likely need re-engineering to better serve the overall goal of winning and satisfying clients. Moreover, planners need to determine the types of client information that are most relevant, and how best to employ them.[3] People: For an initiative to be effective, an organization must convince its staff that the new technology and workflows will benefit employees as well as clients. Senior executives need to be strong and visible advocates who can clearly state and support the case for change. Collaboration, teamwork, and two-way communication should be encouraged across hierarchical boundaries, especially with respect to process improvement.[21] 53

Technology: In evaluating technology, key factors include alignment with the companys business process strategy and goals, including the ability to deliver the right data to the right employees and sufficient ease of adoption and use. Platform selection is best undertaken by a carefully chosen group of executives who understand the business processes to be automated as well as the software issues. Depending upon the size of the company and the breadth of data, choosing an application can take anywhere from a few weeks to a year or more.[3]

Implementation
Implementation issues

Increases in revenue, higher rates of client satisfaction, and significant savings in operating costs are some of the benefits to an enterprise. Proponents emphasize that technology should be implemented only in the context of careful strategic and operational planning.[22] Implementations almost invariably fall short when one or more facets of this prescription are ignored:

Poor planning: Initiatives can easily fail when efforts are limited to choosing and deploying software, without an accompanying rationale, context, and support for the workforce.[23] In other instances, enterprises simply automate flawed client-facing processes rather than redesign them according to best practices. Poor integration: For many companies, integrations are piecemeal initiatives that address a glaring need: improving a particular client-facing process or two or automating a favored sales or client support channel.[24] Such point solutions offer little or no integration or alignment with a companys overall strategy. They offer a less than complete client view and often lead to unsatisfactory user experiences. Toward a solution: overcoming siloed thinking. Experts advise organizations to recognize the immense value of integrating their client-facing operations. In this view, internally-focused, department-centric views should be discarded in favor of reorienting processes toward information-sharing across marketing, sales, and service. For example, sales representatives need to know about current issues and relevant marketing promotions before attempting to cross-sell to a specific client. Marketing staff should be able to leverage client information from sales and service to better target campaigns and offers. And support agents require quick and complete access to a clients sales and service history.[24]

Adoption issues

Historically, the landscape is littered with instances of low adoption rates. Many of the challenges listed above offer a glimpse into some of the obstacles that corporations implementing a CRM suite face; in many cases time, resources and staffing do not allow for the troubleshooting necessary to tackle an issue and the system is shelved or sidestepped instead. Why is it so difficult sometimes to get employees up to date on rapidly developing new technology? Essentially, your employees need to understand how the system works, as well as understand the clients and their needs. No doubt this process is time consuming, but it is well worth the time and effort, as you will be better able to understand and meet the needs of your clients. CRM training needs to cover two types of information: relational knowledge and technological knowledge.

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Statistics

In 2003, a Gartner report estimated that more than $1 billion had been spent on software that was not being used. More recent research indicates that the problem, while perhaps less severe, is a long way from being solved. According to CSO Insights, less than 40 percent of 1,275 participating companies had end-user adoption rates above 90 percent.[25] Additionally, many corporations only use CRM systems on a partial or fragmented basis, thus missing opportunities for effective marketing and efficiency.[26] In a 2007 survey from the UK, four-fifths of senior executives reported that their biggest challenge is getting their staff to use the systems they had installed. Further, 43 percent of respondents said they use less than half the functionality of their existing system; 72 percent indicated they would trade functionality for ease of use; 51 percent cited data synchronization as a major issue; and 67 percent said that finding time to evaluate systems was a major problem.[27] With expenditures expected to exceed $11 billion in 2010,[27] enterprises need to address and overcome persistent adoption challenges. The amount of time needed for the development and implementation of a customer relationship management system can prove costly to the implementation as well. Research indicates that implementation timelines that are greater than 90 days in length run an increased risk in the CRM system failing to yield successful results.[12]
[edit] Increasing usage and adoption rates

Specialists offer these recommendations[25] for boosting adoptions rates and coaxing users to blend these tools into their daily workflow: Additionally, researchers found the following themes were common in systems that users evaluated favorably. These positive evaluations led to the increased use and more thorough implementation of the CRM system. Further recommendations include[28]

Breadcrumb Trail: This offers the user a path, usually at the top of a web or CRM page, to return to the starting point of navigation. This can prove useful for users who might find themselves lost or unsure how they got to the current screen in the CRM. Readily available search engine boxes: Research shows that users are quick to seek immediate results through the use of a search engine box. A CRM that uses a search box will keep assistance and immediate results quickly within the reach of a user. Help Option Menu: An outlet for quick assistance or frequently asked questions can provide users with a lifeline that makes the customer relationship management software easier to use. Researchers suggest making this resource a large component of the CRM during the development stage.

A larger theme is found in that the responsiveness, intuitive design and overall usability of a system can influence the users opinions and preferences of systems.[29] Researchers noted a strong correlation between the design and layout of a user interface and the perceived level of trust from the user.[30] The researchers found that users felt more comfortable on a system evaluated as usable and applied that comfort and trust into increased use and adoption.

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UNIT -5
TRENDS IN CRM
e- CRM Solutions Data Warehousing Data mining for CRM an introduction to CRM software packages
This Data Warehousing site aims to help people get a good high-level understanding of what it takes to implement a successful data warehouse project. A lot of the information is from my personal experience as a business intelligence professional, both as a client and as a vendor. This site is divided into five main areas. - Tools: The selection of business intelligence tools and the selection of the data warehousing team. Tools covered are: Database, Hardware ETL (Extraction, Transformation, and Loading) OLAP Reporting Metadata

- Steps: This selection contains the typical milestones for a data warehousing project, from requirement gathering, query optimization, to production rollout and beyond. I also offer my observations on the data warehousing field. - Business Intelligence: Business intelligence is closely related to data warehousing. This section discusses business intelligence, as well as the relationship between business intelligence and data warehousing. - Concepts: This section discusses several concepts particular to the data warehousing field. Topics include: Dimensional Data Model Star Schema Snowflake Schema Slowly Changing Dimension Conceptual Data Model Logical Data Model Physical Data Model Conceptual, Logical, and Physical Data Model Data Integrity What is OLAP MOLAP, ROLAP, and HOLAP Bill Inmon vs. Ralph Kimball

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- Business Intelligence Conferences: Lists upcoming conferences in the business intelligence / data warehousing industry. - Glossary: A glossary of common data warehousing terms. Different people have different definitions for a data warehouse. The most popular definition came from Bill Inmon, who provided the following: A data warehouse is a subject-oriented, integrated, time-variant and non-volatile collection of data in support of management's decision making process. Subject-Oriented: A data warehouse can be used to analyze a particular subject area. For example, "sales" can be a particular subject. Integrated: A data warehouse integrates data from multiple data sources. For example, source A and source B may have different ways of identifying a product, but in a data warehouse, there will be only a single way of identifying a product. Time-Variant: Historical data is kept in a data warehouse. For example, one can retrieve data from 3 months, 6 months, 12 months, or even older data from a data warehouse. This contrasts with a transactions system, where often only the most recent data is kept. For example, a transaction system may hold the most recent address of a customer, where a data warehouse can hold all addresses associated with a customer. Non-volatile: Once data is in the data warehouse, it will not change. So, historical data in a data warehouse should never be altered. Ralph Kimball provided a more concise definition of a data warehouse: A data warehouse is a copy of transaction data specifically structured for query and analysis. This is a functional view of a data warehouse. Kimball did not address how the data warehouse is built like Inmon did, rather he focused on the functionality of a data warehouse.

Data mining: The non-trivial extraction of novel, implicit, and actionable knowledge from large datasets. Extremely large datasets Discovery of the non-obvious Useful knowledge that can improve processes Can not be done manually Technology to enable data exploration, data analysis, and data visualization of very large databases at a high level of abstraction, without a specific hypothesis in mind.
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 Sophisticated data search capability that uses statistical algorithms to discover patterns and correlations in data.

Data mining evaluation:

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CRM PACKAGES:

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Information Technology and CRM: Examples

Here are examples of how technology can be used to create personalised services to increase loyalty in customers:
Phone calls, emails, mobile phone text messages, or WAP services (2): Having access to customers contact details and their service or purchase preferences through databases etc can enable organisations to alert customers to new, similar or alternative services or products - Illustration: When tickets are purchased online via Lastminute.com, the website retains the customers details and their purchase history. The website regularly send emails to previous customers to inform them of similar upcoming events or special discounts. This helps to ensure that customers will continue to purchase tickets from Lastminute.com in the future.

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Information Technology and CRM: Examples

Cookies A cookie is a parcel of text sent by a server to a web browser and then sent back unchanged by the browser each time it accesses that server. HTTP cookies are used for authenticating, tracking, and maintaining specific information about users, such as site preferences and the contents of their electronic shopping carts (5). - Illustration: The online store, Amazon, uses cookies to provide a personalised service for its customers. Amazon requires customers to register with the service when they purchase items. When registered customers log in to Amazon at a later time, they are greeted with a welcome message which uses their name (for e.g. Hello John). In addition, their previous purchases are highlighted and a list of similar items that the customer may wish to purchase are also highlighted.

Information Technology and CRM: Examples

Loyalty cards the primary role of a retailer loyalty card is to gather data about customers. This in turn leads to customer comprehension and cost insights (e.g. customer retention rates at different spending levels, response rates to offers, new customer conversion rates, and where money is being wasted on circulars), followed by appropriate marketing action and follow-up analysis (6) Illustration: The supermarket chain, Tescos, offers loyalty cards to its customers. When customers use the loyalty cards during pay transactions for goods, details of the purchases are stored in a database which enables Tescos to keep track of all the purchases that their customers make. At regular intervals, Tescos sends its customers money saving coupons by post for the products that the customers have bought in the past. The aim of this is to encourage customers to continually return to Tescos to do their shopping CRM software- Front office solutions Many call centres use CRM software to store all of their customer's details. When a customer calls, the system can be used to retrieve and store information relevant to the customer. By serving the customer quickly and efficiently, and also keeping all information on a customer in one place, a company aims to make cost savings, and also encourage new customers (7)

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