Customer Relationship Management
What I learned in Customer relationship management (CRM) is the combination of practices,
strategies and technologies that companies use to manage and analyze customer interactions and
data throughout the customer lifecycle. The goal is to improve customer service relationships and
assist in customer retention and drive sales growth. CRM systems compile customer data across
different channels, or points of contact, between the customer and the company, which could
include the company's website, telephone, live chat, direct mail, marketing materials and social
networks. CRM systems can also give customer-facing staff members detailed information on
customers' personal information, purchase history, buying preferences and concerns.
CRM benefits businesses
The use of CRM systems can benefit organizations ranging from small businesses to large
corporations, through:
Having customer information such as past purchases and interaction history easily accessible can
help customer support representatives provide better and faster customer service.
Collection of and access to customer data can help businesses identify trends and insights about
their customers through reporting and visualization features.
Automation of menial, but necessary, sales funnel and customer support tasks.
At the most basic level, CRM software consolidates customer information and documents it into
a single CRM database so business users can more easily access and manage it.
Over time, many additional functions have been added to CRM systems to make them more
useful. Some of these functions include recording various customer interactions over email,
phone, social media or other channels; depending on system capabilities, automating various
workflow automation processes, such as tasks, calendars and alerts; and giving managers the
ability to track performance and productivity based on information logged within the system.
Marketing automation. CRM tools with marketing automation capabilities can automate
repetitive tasks to enhance marketing efforts at different points in the lifecycle for lead
generation. For example, as sales prospects come into the system, it might automatically send
email marketing content, with the goal of turning a sales lead into a full-fledged customer.
Sales force automation. Sales force automation tools track customer interactions and automate
certain business functions of the sales cycle that are necessary to follow leads, obtain new
customers and build customer loyalty.
Contact center automation. Designed to reduce tedious aspects of a contact center agent's
job, contact center automation might include prerecorded audio that assists in customer problem-
solving and information dissemination. Various software tools that integrate with the agent's
desktop tools can handle customer requests in order to cut down on the length of calls and to
simplify customer service processes. Automated contact center tools, such as chatbots, can
improve customer user experiences.
Geolocation technology, or location-based services. Some CRM systems include technology that
can create geographic marketing campaigns based on customers' physical locations, sometimes
integrating with popular location-based GPS (global positioning system)
apps. Geolocation technology can also be used as a networking or contact management tool in
order to find sales prospects based on a location.
Customer Service Management
Another thing that I learned about customer service management is in the past, an organization
was expected to provide a product or service to the customer, and then that transaction was done
-- the activity was done to the customer. The customer was more or less at the mercy of the
organization. Today, that is changing dramatically. Customers have a much wider range of
organizations, products and services to choose from, and they can access them instantly.
Customers can also access numerous sources of useful opinions or reviews about the product or
service even before they buy them thus, it is more important than ever those organizations
remain very good at attracting, satisfying and retaining customers. Customer service has moved
beyond being merely transactional to being highly relational.
A customer becomes a consumer once the recipient begins to use the product or service. A client
is a recipient who buys services from an organization, particularly a professional service. For
example, nonprofit organizations typically use the term "client" to refer to anyone who benefits
from their products and services.
The topic of customers and customer service can seem so broad that it is difficult to get a good
grasp on understanding them and how to best serve them. It helps a great deal to understand that
there are different types of customers. You should recognize them, prioritize them and use that
ranking in your product development, sales, marketing and customer service.
Organizations can have internal and external customers. An example of a internal customer is a
department in an organization that receives services from another department. For example, the
Human Resource Department might get its budget managed -- that is, serviced -- by the Finance
Department. An example of an external customer is a person who buys shoes from a shoe store.
Your organization, regardless of its type or size, cannot survive unless it is meeting the needs of
its customers. There is a saying in marketing that customers come to a product or service based
on what they want, but they stay based on what they need however, there is a vast array of
different types of needs that different types of customers have. Also, customers' needs can
change rapidly as they grapple to adapt to a rapidly changing world.
There is a difference between knowing the typical needs of customers compared to actually
meeting their needs. To begin meeting those needs, it is important to consider what different
types of customers typically value in meeting their own needs. To some customers, value is the
lowest price. To others, value represents prestige. .
The implementation of the guidelines in each this section should be managed by an
Implementation Team comprised of at least one member from general management, and
management in the functions of sales, marketing and customer service.
It is conventional wisdom among experienced marketers that one existing customer is worth five
new ones. Bain & Company found that, “increasing customer retention by just 5 percent can
increase profits by 25 percent to 95 percent.” Yet, conventional wisdom is also that a typical
business loses around 20% of its customers per year.
Manage Customer Relationships
You can understand why the most important aspect between your organization and its customers
is the quality of the relationship between the organization and its customers. That quality
determines how loyal your customers are to your organization. Fortunately, there has been an
increasing amount of research about best practices to manage the relationships. The field has
come to be known as Customer Relationship Management (CRM). Various software packages
make it much easier to collect, organize and reference a vast range of information about
customers.
