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Customer Relationship Management Explained
Most managers of small to medium-sized
organizations have probably heard about the millions of dollars larger companies
have spent on systems for customer relationship management.
Many have no doubt asked, ‘What’s the point?’, or even, ‘what is it?’.
For consumers, there is so often little evidence that the expenditure has
achieved anything.
In fact, the aim of CRM is a seamless organization. It is designed so that no
matter how a prospect or customer contacts you, the information coming out of
the contact will be coordinated internally to give the business a complete
picture of the individual.
A customer can enter a competition on your website, pay a bill through the post,
phone for information about a new product and send in a newspaper coupon, and
the perfect CRM system will track all such contacts and provide a single client
view. That’s the theory.
With such information, the marketer should then be able to make relevant offers
and up-sell to customers in a manner and at a time that suits them and meets
their needs.
Well, we all know that in many places and in many cases, CRM has failed to
deliver. However, that is not to say there is no value in it at all. Essentially
it is all about dealing with customers and that’s at the core of all business.
As the name, ‘customer relationship management’ implies, this new buzzword
refers to looking after your customers.
If CRM can help us deliver friendlier and more efficient personal service, we
are all for it. After all, a business only remains in business if the frontline
team members (be they owners, managers or juniors) can relate with customers -
preferably in a manner that suits the customers.
CRM systems are tools for integrating data and activities relating to customers,
so that everyone in the business can keep track of what customers are up to.
Recognizing that not all customers are equal, a practical CRM system is able to
identify segments and aid in the delivery of suitably weighted marketing to each
segment.
Obviously, effective segmentation demands that a customer who has regularly
provided profitable referrals should be placed in a separate segment and treated
quite differently from an unknown prospect, who has made only an initial
enquiry.
Such thoughtful marketing and segmentation is a worthwhile aim for any business,
but for small operators looking to go down that path, it is important to
remember that maybe 80 percent of all CRM relates to the quality of your people.
If your receptionist receives a call from an unhappy customer and the relevant
account manager is out of reach, then a user-friendly CRM system should enable
the receptionist to pull up the client’s data to begin the recovery process.
However, the best system in the world is of little use if the receptionist is
not adequately trained nor sufficiently proactive to get into the system and
start asking the right questions.
Before spending a bucket full of money on a new CRM system, managers should know
that there are certain critical factors that have a big bearing on determining
results. These include:
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setting measurable goals with team
members input and communicating these goals to everyone,
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obtaining support from all team members
at all levels and ensuring that everyone sees how any new system will
benefit customers and the business,
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selecting technology functions only
where they are in line with business goals,
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cutting set-up costs by limiting the
amount of customization to what is essential,
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using only team members who are trained
properly for customer contact roles,
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rolling out any new system only
gradually so that bugs or defects can be managed early before spreading
negative impacts to your whole customer base, and
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measuring, monitoring and tracking at
every point along the way in order to check the results being achieved.
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