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Customer Relationship Management

1. BIRTH OF CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT

Throughout the 90s businesses were focused on improving internal operations. CEO’s
tried to distinguish their company through operational excellence and product innovation. Middle
management focused on automating departmental functions such as sales and help desk support.
They believed that automation and better management of their sales and customer service
process would lead to increased revenue and customer satisfaction. Vendors were all to happy to
support this belief and raced to the scene with independent solutions for sales force automation,
help desk and customer service functions. While many of these applications provided increased
productivity, the approach of using independent solutions to address departmental needs served
only to created islands of information and database duplication. Furthermore, the lack of system
integration and workflow between these departments meant that vital customer information was
unavailable to sales and support personnel without jumping from system to system. This did little
to support cross selling opportunities or increase customer satisfaction.

By the time customers walk into your business - or log-on to your website or call your
sales center - most already know what they want and how much they're willing to pay. With easy
access to mountains of information, today's customers do their homework, and they now have
the upper hand in most purchase transactions.

In response, sellers are bending over backwards to improve offerings and services.
However, rather than adopt a streamlined "you-want-it-we've-got-it" approach, sellers have
created a marketplace where products and services are sold, serviced and marketed in an
increasingly fragmented and ultimately frustrating way.

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Never before has so much "clutter" bombarded consumers from so many online and
offline sources. Trying to be all things to all buyers, sellers face a harsh reality that brings an old
adage to life: You can please some of the people most of the time andmost of the people some
of the time, but you can't please all of the people all of the time.

It wasn't supposed to be this way. Customer Relationship Management (CRM), which


swept through the business landscape in the early 1990s, brought the promise of helping sellers
please most of the people most of the time. Riding the coattails of customer satisfaction would
come increased organizational efficiency and, better still, increased revenues.That dream has
been slow in coming. While incremental improvements have occurred, CRM has not yet
delivered its ultimate promise - the transformed customer experience.

Yes, companies have implemented call centers and sales force automation software and
customer sales representative training. However, while improving the sales and service
components of customer transactions, companies have largely ignored the very piece required to
attract customers in the first place. It's the piece that ensures sales and service efforts are
effective and integrated. It's the piece that allows sellers to segment and analyze their customer
information in order to create a more personalized,

long-term relationship. It's the piece called "marketing" (see Figure 2.1).

Figure 2.1 - Completing the CRM vision

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We're not saying that the last decade's investment in CRM has been wasted. Quite the
contrary: what began as a solution for providing more efficient customer transactions evolved
into a process by which companies could foster more meaningful customer interactions (see
Figure 2). This was the right direction to take. However, companies haven't reached the end of
the CRM road. Today, the challenge is to take this evolution one step farther - to focus on
building lasting and profitable customer dialogues at all interaction and transaction touch points
to build customer and brand value.

Figure 2.2: Evolution of CRM

As CRM evolved, many companies assumed that just bolting on new technology (e.g.,
client/server, call centers, salesforce automation software, data warehouses, etc.) or adding new
services would enhance customer relationships. This assumption was as pernicious as it was
false. After all, you can't sell what people don't want to buy, no matter how efficient and service-
oriented your sales channel. And as for gathering customer insights, be careful what you wish
for. Many companies faced the unsettling paradox of having advanced data availability and
analytic techniques that quickly outpaced their ability to absorb and apply the information. They
were left with sophisticated tools that offered little real value.

The belief is that the third wave of CRM will bring about the ultimate transformation of
customer experiences - not just by strengthening sales and service or even promoting interactions

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with your customers - but by creating a series of "intelligent conversations" that build over time
into a long-term, meaningful dialogue.

In this next evolutionary phase of CRM, information will be exchanged and acted on in
real time. Consumer history will be recorded (and remembered) and the expectations of both
parties will be met. Naturally, not every conversation will be profitable. But the series of
conversations and the ongoing knowledge transfer will continue to grow, creating a memorable
and differentiated customer experience, and, in the long run, a profitable relationship

CRM became popular from the early 1990’s. Over the years , it has evolved from operational to
collaborative to analytical CRM. Operational CRM focuses on combining service, marketing and
sales automation. It gathers data from customer interactions like service calls, sales transactions,
website activity, etc.
Collaborative CRM uses more versatile software to give 360 degree view of the customers.
Business intelligence applications turn the operation data into strategic information that is used
by decision makers to analyze, plan, communicate and measure business performance.
Analytical CRM links data from any enterprise management or CRM system to analyze
customer’s buying habits and navigates buyers on online interactions. Analytical CRM can
correlate and report on information such as customer’s past, present and future revenue, together
with customer satisfaction levels, drawn from different sources. Companies can get greater
insights about customers which will ultimately help them acquire new customers and further to
retain them. Companies can evaluate the data and use it to design their marketing strategy.

CRM analytics is an important part of any company’s e-business strategy. Financial institutions
gain advantage through analytical support using systems that can quickly organize and retrieve
information stored in their centralized data base. For example, PeopleSoft CRM analytics
provides a company with metrics that enables it be more strategic about allocating the resources
to marketing, sales and product development.
CRM supports a company’s strategy, business planning and enables it to measure progress on an
ongoing basis. CRM system tracks customer interactions with the business and facilitates
workflow management, which ultimately leads to better performance and better customer
retention levels. The first step in CRM is to accumulate the data into repositories. The next step
is to use CRM analytics, such as PeopleSoft CRM to transform that data into profitable actions.

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Emergence of the CRM practice:

The Past:

Looking back at a snapshot history of marketing, we can see the following clear
developments and progression over the last four decades:
1. 1960’s – the era of Mass marketing, when Gibbs SR toothpaste began the first marketing of
this kind with its black and white campaign.
2. 1970’s – saw the beginning of segmentation, direct mail campaigns and early telemarketing
(such as publishing)
3. 1980’s – where Niche marketing made millionaires of those who were best at it.
4. 1990’s – Relationship Marketing. The explosion of telemarketing and call centres, all set up
to develop relationships with customers. The recognition of the true value of customer
retention and the use of Lifetime Value as a business case.

The term CRM was first coined in the mid-1990s. CRM in those days referred to the
software used to help businesses manage their customer relationships. From sales force
automation software (SFA) that focused on customer contact management to integrated
knowledge management solutions, these were the early foundations of CRM.  The last couple of
years have seen the term broaden to encompass a more strategic approach and the investment of
billions of dollars worldwide into CRM solutions and services has followed.In addition to this,
the shift of focus from product-oriented to customer-oriented services helped in the development
of CRM over the years. Profit must be the consequence of delighting customers (Kotler) and thus
satisfaction of customers is seen today as a prime objective.

Developing customer relationship has historical antecedents going back into the pre-
industrial era. Similarly artisans often developed customized produce for each customer. Such
direct interaction led to relational bonding between the producer and the consumer. It was only
after industrial era’s mass production society and the advent of the middlemen that there were
less frequent interactions between producers and the consumers leading to transactions oriented
marketing.
In recent years however, several factors have contributed to the rapid development and
evolution of CRM. These include: -

1. The growing de-intermediation process in many industries due to the advent of sophisticated
computer and telecommunication technologies that allow producers to directly interact with
end-customers. For example, in many industries such as airlines, banks, insurance, software
or household appliances and even consumables, the de-intermediation process is fast
changing the nature of marketing and consequently making relationship marketing more

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popular. Databases and direct marketing tools give them the means to individualize their
marketing efforts.

2. Advances in information technology, networking and manufacturing technology have helped


companies to quickly match competition. As a result product quality and cost are no longer
significant competitive advantage.

3. The growth in service economy. Since services are typically produced and delivered at the
same institution, it minimizes the role of the middlemen.

4. Another force driving the adoption of CRM has been the Total Quality Management. When
companies embraced TQM it became necessary to involve customers and suppliers in
implementing the program at all levels of the value chain. This needed close working
relationships with the customers. Thus several companies such as Motorola, IBM, General
Motors, Xerox, Ford, Toyota, etc formed partnering relations with suppliers and customers to
practice TQM. Other programs such as JIT and MRP also made use of interdependent
relationships between suppliers and customers.

5. Customer expectations are changing almost on a daily basis. Newly Empowered customers
choose how to communicate with the companies across various available channels. Also
nowadays consumers expect a high degree of personalization.

6. Emerging real time, interactive channels including e-mail, ATMs and call centre that must be
synchronized with customer’s non-electronic activities. The speed of business change,
requiring flexibility and rapid adoption to technologies.

7. In the current era of hyper competition, marketers are forced to be more concerned with
customer retention and customer loyalty.

8. As several researches have found out retaining customers is less expensive and more
sustainable competitive advantage than acquiring new ones.

9. On the supply side it pays more to develop closer relationships with a few suppliers than to
develop more vendors.

10. In addition several marketers are concerned with keeping customers for life than making one
time sale. There is a greater opportunity for up selling and cross selling. In a recent study,
Naidu, et al (1999) found that relational intensity increased in hospitals facing a high degree
of competitive intensity.

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11. The globalization of world marketplace makes it necessary to have global account
management for the customers.

2. NATURE AND SCOPE OF CRM

What is Customer Relationship Management?

The center of CRM Universe is your customer

Customer Relationship Management involves the implementation of a single integrated


system, which will allow an organization to effectively and consistently manage prospects and
customers, regardless of where the interaction takes place. This spans outside sales, call centers,
telemarketing operations, direct marketing operations and Internet applications.

Customer Relationship Management puts the customer at the heart of the


organization. Tailoring communications, systems, processes and procedures around your
customer needs are vital building blocks that define CRM.

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A Narrow perspective of customer relationship management is database marketing


emphasizing the promotional aspects of marketing linked to database efforts.Another narrow, yet
relevant, viewpoint is to consider CRM only as customer retention strategy in which a variety of
after marketing tactics are used for customer bonding or staying in touch after the sale is made.
The core theme of all CRM and relationship marketing perspectives is its focus on co-operative
and collaborative relationships between the firm and its customers, and/or other marketing
actors.

CRM is based on the premise that, by having a better understanding of the customers’ needs and
desires we can retain them longer and sell more to them.

CRM is defined as:


“Customer Relationship Management is a comprehensive strategy and process of
acquiring, retaining and partnering with selective customers to create superior value for
the company and the customer”.

As is implicit in the above definition, the purpose of CRM is to improve marketing


productivity. Marketing productivity is achieved by increasing marketing efficiency and by
enhancing marketing effectiveness

In CRM, marketing efficiency is achieved because co-operative and collaborative


processes help in reducing transaction costs and overall development costs for the company.
Two important processes for CRM include proactive customer business development and
building partnering relationship with most important customers. These lead to superior value
creation.

CRM is ‘a simple philosophy that places the customer at the heart of a business
organization’s processes, activities and culture to improve his satisfaction of service and, in
turn, maximize the profits for the organisation’.

Developing and maintaining CRM is increasingly critical for achieving competitive


advantage or providing superior public services. In the commercial world these relationships can
make or break customer loyalty and acquisition, with direct effect on revenues and growth.
While in the public sector, citizen relationships affect everything from league tables to e-
government targets.

The Customer is King! This credo is more powerful, relevant and true today than ever
before. In a truly customer driven economy, success depends on a company's ability to be with
the customer on a round the clock basis… satisfying all their product and service specific needs.

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Simply stated, Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is about finding, getting, and
retaining customers.
Peter Ducker had said” true business of every company is to make and keep customers.”
What has given CRM such a boost in recent years is modern information technology that allows
companies to deal with customers individually. CRM should be there even if a business has one
customer and one competitor. If the employees know the customers more personally than
employees, it’s easier to delight them. Spending more time and money on customers is
profitable. CRM implementation involves re-engineering the front office, a process that grows in
difficulty in direct relationship to the number of people, departments and business units involved.
On the downside business spend relatively more on implementing and profiting from CRM than
their larger counterparts. CRM requires a learning curve: reshaping customer processes, selecting
CRM systems and developing training programs.

CRM is all about building long term business relationships with your customers. It is best
described as the blending of internal business processes: Sales, Marketing and Customer
support with technology. CRM solutions empower businesses to more efficiently and
effectively manage the activities that affect their relationship with their customers. The ultimate
goal of CRM is to meet and exceed customer expectations, create a positive customer experience
and build customer loyalty.CRM changes all of this and represents a continuing evolution in
managing front office operations. With CRM, traditional departmental applications for sales,
marketing and customer service are consolidated into a single unified system capable of
managing the entire customer life cycle. This approach allows employees throughout an
organization to have immediate access to a complete profile of important customer information.
Organizations who are implementing CRM solutions feel confident that providing access to this
level of information will assist their sales and support staff in better understanding the needs and
buying patterns of their customers.

CRM (customer relationship management) is an information industry term for methodologies,


software, and usually Internet capabilities that help an enterprise manage customer relationships
in an organized way.CRM is at the core of any customer-focused business strategy and includes
the people, processes, and technology questions associated with marketing, sales, and service. In
today's hyper-competitive world, organizations looking to implement successful CRM strategies
need to focus on a common view of the customer using integrated information systems and
contact center implementations that allow the customer to communicate via any desired
communication channel.

CRM isn’t for the big boys. Any company who sells one product to one customer over one
competitor needs CRM. And as a small or medium sized enterprise, you have drawbacks and
advantages that the big boys don’t have.

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Customer Relationship Management

Customer Relationship Management has been the oldest concept that had taken shape in India
when business had started. According to the perception of businessmen many companies would
invest a huge amount of money in CRM. To make effectively managed customer relationships
through any direct or indirect channel a company opts to use CRM. CRM is a process of
targeting and acquiring new customers, convincing customers to buy the products or services and
then taking care of them after the sale so they come back again and again! Traditionally these
functions are called marketing, sales and service. Together they form a lifecycle of Customer
Relationship Management.

What exactly is the definition of Customer Relationship Management? Ask a dozen


professionals, get a dozen different definitions. Here's a general overview:

 CRM is used to learn more about your key customers needs in order to develop a stronger
relationship with them.

 Customer Relationship Management can be defined as a companies activities related to


increasing the customer base by acquiring new customers and meeting the needs of the existing
customers. CRM is about building partnerships with your customers. It uses internal business
processes from Sales, Customer Service and Marketing.

 The philosophy of CRM is the recognition that your long-term relationships with your
customers can be one of the most important assets of an organization, providing competitive
advantage and improved profitability

 The most important part of CRM is the "customer-focus".

CRM uses technology, strategic planning and personal marketing techniques to build a
relationship that increases profit margins and productivity. It uses a business strategy that puts
the customer at the core of a companies processes and practices. It requires this customer focused
business philosophy to support effective sales, marketing, customer service and order
fulfillment.Regardless of company size or industry, businesses have begun to recognize the value
and importance of customer retention and are embracing new technology for automating
customer service and support. For the new millennium, it seems that the customer has finally
become King!!!

CRM Basics:

Vendor Scrutiny Essential

Industries need to know that most CRM solutions are far from easy to implement and that they
need acute understanding of CRM services and vendors before its actual implementation.
Vendor scrutiny is absolutely essential to ensure that an organization chooses the most

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appropriate solution for its business activities. This step although the first proves to be as much a
perquisite as the actual implementation.
CRM systems basics focus on the idea that customers hold the key to success and this is easily
evident from their phenomenal impact on sales, marketing, and market trends .While choosing a
solution it is important to scrutinize each vendor and make sure that the chosen solution
contributes to organization goals.

Technology vs. Customer Strategy

Merely focusing on the implementation of varied technology would not suffice. It is evident that
personal contact, employee knowledge of customers, establishing an excellent rapport with the
customer himself all contributes to the success of the organization. With the installation and use
of technology alone customer pitfalls cannot be overcome.

CRM Rewards

CRM also provides the customer with a much needed avenue to vent his problems, ideas and
suggestions. Hundreds of sales leads are lost yearly as disinterested employees pay slack
attention to customer suggestions. A venue is required for these suggestions. This is supplied by
CRM implementation.

The Net Result

Observing an excellent response from the organization , the rapport established with them and
the interest paid to their suggestions and ideas,boosts customer interest in the organization itself
along with the products and services it carries , with the net result being a hike in customer
retention and customer loyalty. CRM services are vital to an organization and are a perquisite
that needs to be adopted.

What CRM Offers:

CRM has a lot to offer most industries but it is the mode in which it is actually implemented that
holds the key to actual CRM success. It is the common misconception that technology comes
before customer strategies but in reality it is the other way around. Customer strategies are the
keystone to business activities and technology is the latter half. There can be such a thing as
CRM collapse if the organization fails to do what it needs to in order to ensure success and use
adequate management and other resources required .

The basics of CRM require a comprehensive study of the customer, collation of his data and
provision of this data to the organization. It is imperative that organization employees gain
access to this data especially those that are engaged in direct dealings with the customer himself.
This collated data proves rewarding in that it is an insight into the customer and thereby provides
the person / persons using it to find solutions to customer problems.

Financial product marketers need to manage their product portfolio in response to the changing
environment and consumer needs, in addition to managing customer relationships effectively

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for achieving long-term profitability. The concept of a product can be understood in terms of
the following four terms – actual product, expected product, augmented product, and potential
product. For a financial product, the product strategy is greatly influenced by customers,
competitors, technology, and government & legislation. Depending on these factors, the
product mix strategy could be product mix expansion, product mix contraction, and product
modification.

Branding in financial services is done more at the corporate level than at the product level.
Branding should start with a clear strategy for targeting and positioning. The brand image
should be consistent with the marketing strategy. Advertising can be successful in building the
brand only if the financial product caters to the requirements of the consumer and the entire
service experience is consistent with the brand image that is communicated.

In the financial product sector, brands can occur in three tiers -- master brand, core brands, and
sub-core brands. When there are multiple tiers, the brands in all the tiers should convey the same
organizational values. These values can be communicated through brand logos and taglines.

CRM is a strategic tool for marketers to acquire customers, retain them, and maintain long-term
profitable relationships with them. It uses information technology to achieve these objectives.
Competitive pressures have led marketers to realize the necessity of customer retention to
survive in a deregulated economy. CRM has enabled the shift in approach from being product-
centric to being customer-centric. In addition to maximizing customer value, CRM helps
marketers to cross-sell products, achieve long-term profitability, and build the brand.

Relationship marketing is concerned with relationships that exist between any two stakeholders
of a business. It involves relationship building with both external customers and internal
customers. In an organization, relationship marketing can be at one of the following five levels --
basic, reactive, accountability, proactive, and partnership levels. One-to-one marketing
essentially involves knowing about each and every possible need of the targeted customers and
developing tailor-made solutions for them. To implement one-to-one marketing, the marketer
needs to identify the target customers, differentiate them into groups, interact with each customer
group, and provide customized products and solutions in a cost-effective manner. This can be
done using the technique of mass customization.

Customer knowledge, customer loyalty, and customer switching are three important concepts in
CRM. The components of customer knowledge can be classified into three broad categories:
knowledge about the customer, knowledge to support the customer, and knowledge from the
customer. Customer loyalty can be either affirmative loyalty or reluctant loyalty.

The level of affirmative loyalty is influenced not only by traditional factors, such as customers,
product offerings, employees, and measurement systems, but also on emerging practices such as
electronic customer care. Eight different reasons have been identified for customer switching.
They include (a) core service failures, (b) service encounter failures, (c) price failures, (d)
inconvenience, (e) employee response to service failures, (f) attraction by competitors, (g) ethical
problems, and (h) involuntary switching.

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WHY CRM ?

Keeping in mind the pace at which technology is changing today, any company which is
a step ahead of others because of some web product or service will not be able to hold on to that
advantage for long. Key to stability in today's dynamic marketplace is forging long-term
relationships with the customers.

Customers can be divided into three zones:

1. Zone of defection where customers are extremely hostile and have the lowest level of
satisfaction.
2. Zone of indifference where customers are not sure. They have a medium level of
satisfaction and loyalty towards the company.
3. The third level of customers is in the zone of affection described as "Apostles". CRM
focuses on bringing customers from level 1 to level 3 and retaining apostle customers.

Customer demands for customization is increasing with every passing day. This has made
companies shift their focus from "mass production" to "mass customization". The present
scenario of companies using "poorly implemented" multi channel strategies for living upto the
expectations of customers is bringing both customer satisfaction and customer loyalty down the
ladder.

Today any company can copy products or services offered by other companies. If the
new entrant adds features like less order turn around time and direct communication then
established players are bound to have sleepless nights. Organizations that implement CRM and
turn their business into e-businesses will find their competitors' customers ready to welcome
them with a "smile".

Take the example of a small enterprise. Here hard work reaps high quality service and over the
years develops a database of loyal customers. In this enterprise computers are optional. Then
why is the CRM industry attracting investments of millions and billions of dollars? The reason is
simple. The concept of "Seller's Customer" has just rotated 180 degrees to become "Customer's
Seller". This simply states that, now the customer is more powerful than the seller. Options for
customers have increased with the cycle of innovation-to-production-to-obsolescence gaining
momentum. On the other hand companies are finding it difficult to differentiate them in the
marketplace. These factors are pushing companies into taking a closer look at their customer
relationships.

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Organizing business to satisfy customer demands organizes/simplifies internal functioning of the


organization. Implementing CRM brings to the front the "pits" that the organization had dug over
the years, passing work from one pit to another. Workflows are reduced, cycle times become
shorter, information flow of non-productive things gets eliminated and the most important thing -
"pits" get covered automatically with all the positive features. Compact sized organizations get
into a position of making more money. This in turn enables them to please more customers.

For large enterprises, CRM has become a strategic initiative because of its potential for increased
revenues and improved customer service. Smaller businesses are forging ahead as well, and are
using CRM solutions to capture and share customer information across multiple departments and
job functions.

CRM principles:

1. Differentiate Customers:

All customers are not equal; recognize and reward best customers disproportionately.
Understanding each customer becomes particularly important. And the same customers’ reaction
to a cellular company operator may be quite different as compared to a car dealer. Besides for the
same product or the service not all customers can be treated alike and CRM needs to differentiate
between a high value customer and a low value customer.

What CRM needs to understand while differentiating customers is:


1. Sensitivities, Tastes, Preferences and Personalities.
2. Lifestyle and Age.
3. Cultural background and Education.
4. Physical and Psychological characteristics.

2. Differentiating Offerings:

 Low value customer requiring high value customer offerings.


 Low value customer with potential to become high value in near future.
 High value customer requiring high value service.
 High value customer requiring low value service.
 Keeping Existing Customers.

Grading customers from ‘very satisfied’ to ‘very disappointed’ should help the
organisation in improving its customer satisfaction levels and scores. As the satisfaction level for
each customer improves so shall the customer retention with the organisation.

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3. Maximizing Life time value:

Exploit up-selling and cross-selling potential. By identifying life stage and life
event trigger points by customer, marketers can maximize share of purchase potential. Thus a
single adult shall require a new car stereo and as he grows into a married couple his needs grow
into appliances.

4. Increase Loyalty:
Loyal customers are more profitable. Any company will like its mindshare status to
improve from being a suspect to being an advocate.
Company has to invest in terms of its product and service offerings to its customers. It
has to innovate and meet the very needs of its clients/ customers so that they remain as advocates
on the loyalty curve. Referral sales invariably are low cost high margin sales.

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CRM - crucial to business success

It is estimated that it is far more costly to obtain a new customer than retain an existing one. In
such a situation, investing in CRM makes sense for companies. Creating Value through
Relationship Marketing was the theme of the Marketing Continuum held at the Shailesh J Mehta
School of Management, IIT Bombay on October 15. The event was a part of the school’s yearly
lecture series ‘Continuum’, which focuses at building a strong industry linkage with what is
being taught at classrooms and features talks by experienced people from the industry who share
their perspective and views with the students. The event was well attended by students of other
business schools as well as working professionals from the corporate world.

Inaugurating the event, the Head of SOM Prof. Mangesh M Korgaonkar, emphasized the role
which technology can play in Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and marketing
innovations but lamented the fact that the Relationship Marketing has not been deeply
understood and applied in India. Speaking on the various CRM activities undertaken at the SJM
School of Management, Dr. Sanjaya S Gaur, Professor of Marketing at the school pointed out
that the school was one of the first to start a full-credit course on CRM for the Post Graduate
Management students. Dwelling on the importance of CRM, he added that it is an organization’s
effort and not just that of one salesperson that can ensure effective CRM initiatives.

Customer Retention and the ways to address Customer Churn was the theme of the talk by Mr.
Ashwin Yardi, Associate Director, CapGemini Consulting India Pvt. Ltd. Describing customer
retention as one of the biggest challenges facing maturing companies in their race for industry
leadership, he talked about global trends in this regard with specific focus on the telecom
industry. “The vision to retain customers at a senior level and translating this vision to the lower
levels is one of the key aspects of customer retention,” he observed. It was then followed by a
talk by Mr. Arun Choudhari, Head of CRM and SCM at Mahindra and Mahindra Ltd., who
shared a real life experience in implementing CRM in a large engineering company like M and
M. “The prerequisite for effective CRM is mindset change for true customer focus by all
functions of company,” he added.

Mr. Bijay Jayarajan of Jet Airways spoke about the role which loyalty programmes can play in
customer retention by extensively discussing the example of Jet Privilege programme, a frequent
flier incentive scheme of Jet Airways. He also shed light on some of the CRM approaches
adopted in the airline industry and the value it generated for customers. The talk by Mr. Vinay
Patkar, Head of Centre of Excellence for CRM at I-Flex Solutions revolved around the theme of
how technology manifests in CRM initiatives with a specific focus on the banking sector.
Mentioned Mr. Patkar, “Technology by itself is not the solution. You have to have it in your
heart that you need to respect your customer.”

Mr. R. B. Sahi, President of Retail Petroleum Business at Reliance India Ltd., who focused on
the various CRM activities initiated by Reliance Industries in the Petroleum Retailing business
venture. Commenting on he need for trust and ability to keep up promises made to the customer,
he emphasized the importance of aligning processes and integrating the whole organization
around the customer promise.

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Case Study

Why firing your worst customers isn’t such a great idea


For the overwhelming majority of companies operating in a competitive environment,
firing low-value customers can be counterproductive, says a new study by Wharton marketing
professors.

Fire your bad customer.

That advice has become widely accepted in recent years as companies have sought to
manage their relationship with customer in more sophistical ways. The rationale is clear-cut: low
value customers such as the ones who hardly spend any money on your service or product yet tie
up costing more money than the customers provide. So why not jettison them and focus on your
customer relationship efforts and more profitable individuals? OR. As an alternative, why not at
least try to increase the worth of the low-value customers to the firm?

It sounds quite rational and many corporation have jumped on the bandwagon. But a new
study by two Wharton marketing professors, Jag Mohan Raju and Z. John Zhang and Wharton
doctoral student Upender Subhramanium cautions that firing your low- value customers may

actually decrease firm profits and that trying to increase the value of these customers may
be counterproductive.

The notion that firing unprofitable customers is a smart thing to have emerged out of the
broad acceptance of a practice usually referred to as customer relationship management (CRM).
With CRM, firm qften use information technology to quantify the value of individual customers
and provide better privileges, discounts or other inducements to customers identify as having
high value.

In their study,Raju and Zhang have coined the term customer value based management
(CVM) described this central component of CRM. This customer analysis have often shown that
a small proportion of customers contribute to a large percentage of profit, and that many
customers are unprofitable.

The financial institutions are best known for treating low value customers differently
from good ones. For instance, bad customers at fidelity investment are made to wait longer in
queues to have their calls taken by call centers. But other types of firms have inbreeded CRM
and are giving low value customers a cold shoulder. Continental airlines emails only it’s high
value customers apologizing for flight delays and update them with frequent flier mails.In July
2007, CNN reported that sprint had dropped about 1000 customers who are calling the customer

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Customer Relationship Management

care centre too frequently—40 to 50 times more than the average customers every month over
and extended period.

In the study, “customer value based management : competitive implications,” Zhang,


Raju and Subramanium break ground by analyzing CVM in the context of a competitive
environment. The researchers acknowledge that firing bad customer may make some sense in
industries where there is little or no competition.

If the firm treats all customers equally the argument goes, not only does the company
waste resources on attracting and retaining unprofitable customers , it also underserves profitable
customers, who may become unhappy and leave for overwhelming majority of companies
operating in a competitive environment, however firing low value customers can be
counterproductive. The key reason is companies that try to get rid of these low value customers
or take steps to turn low value customers into high value ones --- leave themselves open to
successful poaching by competitors. If the competitor knows that you have fired many of your
low value customers, they are likely to intensify their efforts to take your roaming customers
away from you because they know that all, or most, of those roaming customers are of high
value variety.

Instead of firing unprofitable customers some companies have tried to turn them in to
high value customers by giving them inducement to change their behavior , such as teaching
them to spend more or to use low cost support channels. But Wharton researchers found that this
idea is also wrong headed. Raju said that if you make low value customers more valuable, this
can also be counterproductive because it also encourages your competitors to poach more
intensely.

So what is proper way to manage relationships with low and high value customers? “The
research finds that a better approach is to improve the quality of your low value customers at the
same time that you keep your low end customers, but you should find other , cheaper ways to
manage the low value customers, such as encouraging them to use automated phone response
systems or offering minimal discounts or other benefits.you have to keep your competitor
confused about who your good and bad customers are”.

Raju says that you should focus on good customers and try to improve their quality and
not just to get rid of the bad ones.firms should find cheaper ways to keep low value customers
because they are confusing your competition to your advantages and there’s a change someday
that they will become good customers.

(Referred from Hindustan Times

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Customer Relationship Management

3. ROLE OF MARKETING IN CRM

To continuously attract and retain the most valuable customers, companies must act
aggressively to increase the economic value of both their brand and customer relationships. In
addition, they must sustain bottom-line performance in the face of skyrocketing marketing costs.
To realize these goals, companies must continue their efforts to maximize their investments in
the sales and service technologies that help reach, understand and interact intelligently with
customers. But they must also extend this traditional scope of CRM to reach a higher standard of
excellence in three distinct disciplines: analytical, creative and operational marketing.

Figure 3.1 -The revitalization of marketing

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Customer Relationship Management

Once these improved marketing processes are linked with core CRM capabilities, companies will
be able to drive seamless, consistent and real-time response across marketing, sales and customer
service. The result will be a sustainable process that not only enables lasting customer
relationships but also harnesses that elusive construct: superior brand value.

Customer relations are often confused with marketing, and in fact it is important that the public
relations professionals work with the marketing professionals when developing goals for a
customer relations program.However, customer relations differ from marketing in that the goals
of the program are to develop positive relationships with the customers rather than to sell certain
number of products.

Analytical Marketing drives market segmentation and identifies your most profitable
customers. Information from each customer interaction channel is collected, analyzed and used
to develop predictions of your individual customer's behaviors. Analytical marketing utilizes
those processes and sophisticated technologies that allow businesses to direct their overall
marketing investment across the brand and customer. In a sense, analytical marketing tools are
the "nuts and bolts" of the marketing engine.Specifically, analytical marketing converts customer
data, gathered at various touch points, into relevant insights that direct market segmentation
activities and feed into more effective campaign design. Through predictive modeling, analytics
lead to a more robust understanding of customers and markets and an improved ability to make
strategic and operational decisions about customer treatment. The ultimate outcome is increased
profitability, based on customer differentiation, and more informed decisions related to the
development of product, pricing, promotion, packaging, and channels.

Without analytics, companies will keep investing in CRM without ever knowing where
their money is having the greatest impact. In short, analytical marketing puts customer insights to
work for the organization and prevents the company from delivering the wrong content to the
wrong person at the wrong time.

Creative Marketing relies on analytical tools and customer insight capabilities to


improve marketing programs, optimize the overall marketing investment and deliver the brand
promise. As the number of customer channels has exploded, so has the need for creative
marketing, which involves all the activities associated with building and sustaining a compelling
brand and ensuring that customer interactions reflect a satisfying brand experience.

In the past, creative marketing efforts have been applied to CRM efforts in much the
same way as technology. It's been far too easy for companies to develop a host of messages -
from ad campaigns to customer service representative scripts - that are unintentionally
inconsistent. Such inconsistent messages delivered via a number of different channels - when
coupled with poor understanding of why brand and message consistency is so critical to the
customer experience - often produce fragmented experiences that frustrate the customer who
probably won't come back. Fortunately, companies are changing the way they approach creative

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Customer Relationship Management

marketing. By integrating its processes with those of analytical and operational marketing, and
by focusing on the total customer experience, creative marketing can now be used to build a
unified brand across all of a company's online and offline channels. In other words, creative
marketing is no longer considered an "afterthought".

Operational Marketing relies on customer insight information to personalize


interactions, differentiate sales and service across segments, drive continuous improvement
across customer interaction processes and generate revenue lift. When these marketing
disciplines work in tandem with your existing sales and service capabilities, your entire CRM
effort becomes revitalized. Information becomes dynamic. Insights become powerful barometers
of customers' likes and dislikes. Comprehensive marketing campaigns become targeted and
compelling. The result is a customer base that is pleased with the unique and personalized
interactions you provide. Customer loyalty rises, as does your brand value and, ultimately, your
revenue.

Its efforts encompass all the activities of data mining and data warehousing, which
continuously harvest customer information from a variety of contact points. Leveraged by
creative and analytical marketing capabilities, this information is assessed and converted into
meaningful insights that drive ongoing, personalized marketing efforts. The goal of operational
marketing is to enable ongoing "conversations" with individual customers across all channels.

CRM in Financial Services Marketing

Globalization, technology, deregulation and intensive competition are changing the


pattern of the financial services industry in terms of market geography, product offerings and
distribution channels. The success of a financial service primarily depends on how effectively
customer’s orders are recorded and carried out. The article focuses on the changing pattern of
financial services industry and outlines the way in which solutions like Customer Relationship
Management (CRM) can help financial organizations to acquire new customers and retain them
and in the process, increase profitability and market share.

“It is often said that companies with the best people win. While this may be true, it is
certainly true that the companies with the best customers win. How to win, grow and retain those
loyal high value customers which make all the difference between a market leader and the other
players in a category is so crucial to the success of any business, that every manager must at least
know the fundamentals of customer management.”
--- Reimer Thedens [ Chairman|CEO,]

OgilvyOne Worldwide Ltd.

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Customer Relationship Management

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is definitely not only a technology solution


but an important strategic business and process issue. The CRM approach includes all the
business processes which organization employees to identify, select, acquire and retain
customers. Organizations must integrate all the processes and technology that support and
coordinate customer interactions. Successful organizations always keep the customers at the
center- stage. According to Peter Drucker, “Customer is profitable only from the second year.”
This explains that to earn real profit, retention is a must. In the first year, the organization spends
more money to attract customers through promotion and research activities.

The changing landscape of the financial sector is posing new challenges to the
organizations. There is a sea change in the way the businesses were carried out earlier. People
these days prefer an automated Teller Machine (ATM), a kiosk or a website to personally
visiting a bank or an insurance company. The development of technology has empowered
customers with multiple options to interact with the company and also to check their stock
portfolio or compare insurance rates online. Customer’s expectations from the companies have
increased substantially. With the availability of increasing array of financial products and
services, customers are expecting more offerings, greater value, ease of access and personalized
service.

Some Tips for CRM success

Some important tips are given below as to how CRM may be used for improved
marketing of financial services:

 At first, companies should have clear picture about their CRM business goals and
then go for appropriate technology to implement CRM.

 Information must be shared amongst all concerned. This becomes an issue in the
case of insurance industry, where brokers represent more than one company and
do not share the information.

 Companies must develop the right contact strategy. They need to know which
type of offers and incentives to be given to the customers. If this is done right, it
will build loyalty and retention.

 Customer interactions need to be consistent across multiple touch points like


direct contact, call centre, telephone, Interactive Voice Response (IVR), e-mail,
fax, Internet, ATM, kiosk, etc.

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Customer Relationship Management

 The data collected from multiple touch points, should be analyzed, refined and
finally used to design the marketing strategy.

 CRM should be used to gain greater insights into customers and design suitable
incentives and loyalty programs to create brand loyal customers.

 CRM must be used to identify the most profitable customers and nurture them for
long-term business and profitability.

CRM should be backed by adequate security and privacy. Unauthorized persons


should not be allowed to access the system. CRM should be used to streamline
customer communications and link customer accounts over telephone or Internet
banking.

In today’s competitive market place, financial institutions require comprehensive CRM


strategy that integrates every department of the company. This not only includes call centers but
also sales, marketing and support functions. CRM must provide a single window view of the
customer to anyone in the company with appropriate security permission. Authorized employees
should have access to the information about the customers from any place with the use of
internet\intranet. This will enhance the company’s performance and profitability.

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Customer Relationship Management

4. CRM TO ICRM (Integrated Customer Relationship Management)


 
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is developing into a major element of
corporate strategy for many organizations. CRM, also known by other terms such as relationship
marketing and customer management, is concerned with the creation, development and
enhancement of individualized customer relationships with carefully targeted customers and
customer groups resulting in maximizing their total customer life-time value. Industry leaders are
now addressing how to transform their approach to customer management. Narrow functionally-
based traditional marketing is being replaced by a new form of cross functional marketing -
CRM. The traditional approach to marketing has been increasingly questioned in recent years.
This approach emphasised management of the key marketing mix elements such as product,
price, promotion and place within the functional context of the marketing department.
The new CRM approach, whilst recognising these key elements still need to be
addressed, reflects the need to create an integrated cross-functional focus on marketing - one
which emphasises keeping as well as winning customers. The new CRM paradigm reflects a
change from traditional marketing to what is now being described as ‘customer management’.

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Customer Relationship Management

The adoption of CRM is being fuelled by a recognition that long-term relationships with
customers are one of the most important assets of an organisation and that information-enabled
systems must be developed that will give them 'customer ownership'. Successful customer
ownership will create competitive advantage and result in improved customer retention and
profitability for the company.
In many companies there is still confusion as to what CRM is all about. To some it is
about a loyalty scheme, to some it is about a help desk. To others it is about a relational data base
for key account management and for others it is about mass profiling the customer base without
undertaking detailed segmentation. Relatively few organisations have implemented an integrated
approach, which addresses all the key strategic elements of CRM. Only a small number of
businesses have a clear idea what should be done with information technology in order to
successfully implement CRM.

INTEGRATED CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT (ICRM)

The development of the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) marketing practice has
made more and more people realize the importance of strong customer relationship in building
sustainable competitive advantages in their market competitions and in generating sustainable
profits in the long run.

However, the currently popular CRM marketing practice often produces disappointing outcomes.
Surveys after surveys, a surprisingly high rate of failure has been reported for CRM practices.
The failure rate of CRM systems ranges from 50% to over 80%. The major CRM system
developers received much lower Customer Satisfaction scores than companies in other industries
did. The more popular this marketing practice gets, the more people who realize that the current
CRM practice hardly manages customer relationship.

The current CRM practice was originated from a combination of database technologies and
database marketing (analytical techniques), so unavoidably, it inherits database as its only focus.
When it gets into the spotlight and becomes a major marketing practice, its inherited
characteristics become its limitations. It incorrectly defines customer purchase and contact
behaviors as customer relationship, restricts its marketing scope within a company's database and
ignores customers needs by focusing on purchase correlation in a company’s database.

Any good customer relationship management practice should start by answering the
following 6 critical questions:

1. What is customer relationship?


2. What drives customer relationship?
3. How to measure customer relationship?

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Customer Relationship Management

4. Which customers should you build relationship with?


5. How to improve customer relationship?
6. How to develop effective customer relationship management strategies?

However, no existing CRM system is able to answer (or is designed to answer) these
questions. Without clear answers to these critical questions, how could a company know what
customer relationship it needs to manage? How could it know if it has a strong relationship with
its customers under market competitions and how could it know with which customers it needs
to build strong relationship?

To effectively manage customer relationship, one should follow the following rules:

 Rule 1: Building strong customer relationship should be set as the primary goal of a
company’s marketing practice and all marketing functions should serve to the enhancement of a
company’s customer relationship;
 Rule 2: Customer relationship should be defined and constructed based on customers’ basic
needs. In the “Customer Centric” customer relationship management practice, needs construct
value and value determines customer relationship;
 Rule 3: Customer relationship should be measured and improved under market competitions.
Customer relationship is competitive and a company should manage its Competitive Customer
Relationship.
 Rule 4: Customer relationship management practice should not be a sub-function of a
company’s IT department. Customer relationship management should be an INTEGRATED part
of a company’s marketing practices.

Integrated Customer Relationship Management (ICRM) is the latest marketing strategy,


which has developed to meet the challenges raised from our daily marketing consulting services.
It is our solution to overcome the limitations of the current CRM practice. ICRM provides a
theoretical framework to define and to construct customer relationship based on customers’
needs under market competitions. ICRM also provides a practical guideline of a standard process
for effective customer relationship management.

ICRM is based on the very fact that by building a strong customer relationship, a
company can build sustainable competitive advantages in the long run. Therefore, in ICRM
practice, building strong customer relationship is set as the primary goal of a company’s
marketing practices and it requires all marketing functions in a company to serve to the
enhancement of its customer relationship.

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Customer Relationship Management

ICRM puts customer needs in the center of marketing practices and defines customer
relationship based on customers’ basic needs under market competitions. It integrates all major
marketing functions in the process of building strong customer relationship. ICRM manages
Competitive Customer Relationship.

5. CUSTOMER LIFE CYCLE MANAGEMENT

CLCM is a three-domain business system, aligning business processes, technologies, and


the customer life cycle. This business system must integrate sales, service, and marketing
processes as well as the CRM technology environment with the customer. To fully realize the
potential of CRM, business systems must align these three domains in ways that are predictable,
repeatable, and measurable. These systems should be clearly defined, thus enabling predictable
business activities to be automated and leveraged by technology.

Customer Life Cycle Patterns

 Engage

This is where advertising or marketing efforts create initial awareness of the organization
or product offering. The Engage process is fundamentally about "funnel management," or
generating leads and converting them into customers. However, there is a very important Engage

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Customer Relationship Management

activity that may start in the service process: cross-sell/up-sell. What may start as a service
request may end as an Engage activity.

This discipline falls predominantly into the domain of CRM, with sales automation and
campaign management the principal technology applications. There are Engage activities,
including Web-based personalized interactions and electronic catalogs, which primarily support
the e-channel. However, some Engage functions cross all customer channels.

In the customer engagement phase of the relationship life cycle Customer Relationship
Management supports the following key functional areas:

● Marketing Planning and Campaign Management -- Enables complete marketing


campaigns, including content development, audience definition, market segmentation, and
communications
● Telemarketing and Lead Generation -- Facilitates customer segmentation, lead
qualification, call list management, and monitoring of campaign progress by using integrated
analytical CRM functionality
● Opportunity Management -- Provides sales tracking and sales forecasting; helps plan sales
approaches, identify key decision makers, and estimate potential-to-buy and potential closing
dates
● Sales Activity and Contact Management -- Organizes daily workloads and customer
contact information for display in calendar application; provides links to Business Intelligence
reporting capabilities

 Transact

In the transact process, customers actually purchase the product offering. Related
Transact activities include product and sales configuration, pricing, and order management.
Tightly coupled, bi-directional integration with order management applications is a requisite
technology step in the Transact process pattern to provide a seamless commerce environment,
whatever the channel.

In the business transaction phase of the relationship life cycle Customer Relationship
Management supports the following key functional areas:

 Order Acquisition -- Enables planning, organizing, and implementation of sales strategy;


monitors sales pipeline, sales portfolio, and sales budget; facilitates coordination of budgets,
forecasts, and reports on product and pricing trends

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Customer Relationship Management

 Internet Pricing and Configuration -- Delivers online systems that allow users to configure
products online and compare prices across different catalogs and marketplaces; includes
shopping basket functions
 E-Selling -- Provides solution for selling products and services via the Internet; covers all
phases of sales cycle, including one-to-one marketing, catalog browsing, search, order
placement, payment, contract completion, and customer support
 Telesales -- Manages inbound and outbound calls; handles high call volumes; provides
efficient user interface; integrates sales information from back-office systems and product
information from online catalogs
 Field Sales -- Delivers key customer and prospect information to sales personnel at any place,
at any time; facilitates planning and maintenance of sales activities, such as appointments, visits,
and calls, and provides activity reports; creates quotations and takes orders; includes support for
mobile and wireless devices

 Fulfill

The Fulfill category is where the offering is delivered to the client. This may consist of a product
being physically shipped to the customer, or in the case of an electronic product, this may simply
be an electronic transfer. Fulfilling a service may involve consultants coming onsite to complete
a project, or a utility offering such as telephone phone or electrical service being turned on.

In the order fulfillment phase of the relationship life cycle Customer Relationship Management
supports the following key functional areas:

 Complete Order Life Cycle Process -- Provides the ability to track and trace orders at all
points along order management, manufacturing, distribution, and service processes; proactively
notifies customers of changes that affect delivery
 Real-time Availability Checks -- Enables allocation of resources in real-time at the front-
end; includes real-time access to inventory levels, production capacity, and lead-time
requirements across the entire supply chain; enables visibility into product and service delivery
dates
 Contract, Billing, and Financials Management -- Provides information about customer
contracts, billing status, and accounts; integrates back-office functions
 Fulfillment Visibility and Order Tracking -- Enables real-time tracking of order fulfillment;
provides unique, customized and "guided" content for customers; allows sharing of information
with customers via the Internet

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Customer Relationship Management

 Service

Another process predominantly in the CRM domain, Service is the final stage of the
customer life cycle and typically involves helping the customer work with the product offering.
To do this, the organization must provide support functions ranging from troubleshooting to
replacement. Other Service activities include issue tracking/resolution, self-service, and cross-
sell/up-sell. CRM technologies supporting this process pattern must support multiple points of
interaction, so customers can use whatever interaction capability they find most appropriate. The
notion of "continuous customer satisfaction" is fulfilled in this stage as well.

The fundamental point here is that when a business interacts with its customers,
customers inherently perceive the business as being able to support these four life cycle patterns.
They also expect this support to be consistent, and the flow among the patterns to be transparent
- in other words, they don't even realize it's happening.

In the customer service phase of the relationship life cycle Customer Relationship
Management supports the following key functional areas:

 Interaction Center -- Provides inbound and outbound call processing, e-mail management,
and activity management to track, monitor, and enhance all customer contact; supports multiple
channels for customer communication, including telephony and Web; integrates industry-leading
eFrontOffice call center applications from Nortel Networks Clarify; provides certified interfaces
to leading computer telephony integration (CTI) solutions
 Internet Customer self-service -- Offers customers and prospects access to information and
customer service functions via Internet; supports effective customer self service; includes case-
logic system featuring advanced decision support for problem determination and resolution
 Service Management -- Meets varied demands of service management business; handles
customer installations; facilitates simple and complex services; supports services carried out at
customer site or in-house repair center (depot); supports involvement of external service
providers; integrates contract management; checks customer warranties when services are
performed; calculates services charges; integrates information from materials management, cost
accounting, billing, and accounts receivable; monitors day-to-day operations; helps decision
makers with strategic management issues
 Claims Management -- Facilitates handling of entire claims process
 Field Service - (Mobile Service) -- Delivers and tracks customer and account information
for field service personnel; provides service planning and forecasting, scheduling, and
dispatching functionality through tight integration with fulfillment systems; includes support for
mobile and wireless devices

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Customer Relationship Management

 Field Service - (Dispatch) -- Enables rapid allocation of service engineers and materials to
meet incoming service requests
 Integration of Marketplace Services -- Provides access to a broad range of applications and
services hosted on virtual marketplaces

The next very stage in the cycle is

 Repeat customers
At this level focus is on getting customers to return for a second, third, or fourth time.
Customers may come back for the same purchase. The customers may turn for variety of
products and services. For e.g. car insurance customer may come back to the agent for disability
and life insurance. Repeat customers develop greater economic and emotional ties with you.

 Customer Advocates
This level represents those customers who are not just satisfied and are willing to do
business with you again. These customers actively tell others about their positive experience.
They spread the good word. They maybe considered as active participants on your marketing
team.
Each level is build upon the level before. Without quality initial transactions, customers
won’t want to do business with you again. And it’s the customers who sees himself or herself in
a positive relationship with you who can provide the strongest advocacy for you and your
products and services.

CRM cycle:

The CRM cycle can be briefly described as follows:

1. Learning from customers and prospects (having in depth knowledge of customer).


2. Creating value for customers and prospects.
3. Creating loyalty.
4. Acquiring new customers.
5. Creating profits.

Learning from
Creating
customers &
Profits prospects
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Acquiring new
5
Customer Relationship Management

3
Creating value for
4
customers

Creating loyal 2
customers

6. IMPLEMENTATION OF CRM

STEP I:

Needs Analysis

STEP II:

Project Planning

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STEP III:

Implementation

STEP IV:

Testing & Quality Assurance

STEP V:

Deployment & Training

Figure 6.1 -- STEPS IN CRM implementation

STEP I: Needs Analysis

This phase of the implementation consists of reviewing the strategic objectives of the
CRM implementation and gaining management acceptance and commitment to the project.
During this phase you will define the policies and procedures for managing customer interaction.

Authority: Top management

Duration: 12 - 16 hours per person

Schedule: 15 days

Concerned dept: Marketing, EDP(IT), finance, HR

STEP II: Project Planning

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Customer Relationship Management

The implementation plan will be created and finalized during this phase. A system
administrator will be selected, as well as team members from each department, who will work in
conjunction with the vendor or system integrator managing the implementation process.

Authority: Middle management

Duration: 8 - 12 hours per person

Schedule: One month

Concerned authority: Marketing, EDP (IT), Customer Support

STEP III: Implementation

It is during this phase that the software implementation will begin. System configuration
and administration will be completed and customization will be identified.
Authority: middle / lower level mgmt

Duration: 8 - 12 hours per person

Schedule: 15 days

Concerned authority: Marketing, EDP (IT), Customer Support, Corporate communication

Software: Oracle, SAP

STEP IV: Testing & Quality Assurance

An operational prototype of the system is up and running at this time. Operational issues
are identified and resolved and basic modifications will be made.
Duration: 12 - 24 hours per person

Authority: lower level mgmt

Schedule: 15 days

Concerned authority: EDP (IT), Quality Control, Marketing

STEP V: Deployment & Training

During this phase the CRM system will be completely operational. There are no
additional installation activities. Training will begin for all end users. The system administrator

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Customer Relationship Management

should provide ongoing support with telephone assistance from the vendor or system integrator.
Duration: 24 - 40 hours

Authority: Middle & lower level managers

Schedule: 8 day

Concerned authority: EDP (IT), Marketing, Call center operators, HR

One of the most important aspects of implementing a customer relationship


management (CRM) system is ensuring that it meets the expectations of a variety of
audiences within your company.

Implementation of CRM includes customer knowledge management, technology adoption and


implementation, and performance measurement. The customer knowledge management process
(journey) is a cycle with four inter-related steps – developing a customer-focused strategy;
developing the customer buying process; implementing actions, tactics, campaigns; and customer
learning. Technology implementation has become the key to CRM implementation in an
organization as huge volumes of customer data can be stored, managed, and retrieved using the
latest technologies. CRM software tools can be categorized into operational CRM tools and
analytical CRM tools. When the performance measurement of the CRM activities is done using a
carefully defined basket of metrics, it helps in managing and controlling the CRM initiatives in
the organization.

More than 65% of CRM projects fail to meet expectations, so all of these concerns are
valid. To make sure failure isn't the outcome of your hard work in building a CRM system, think
through the consequences of the system from every angle. Here are some ways to do just that.

Start with a clean slate, as if you're designing and selecting your first system

Don't try to fit your current system to your new needs. If you do, you'll end up with quick
fixes rather than true solutions. When designing your system, think about what will make the
most difference in your organization. What's missing now? Are you looking for speed, ease of
use or low maintenance costs?

CRM systems track sales contacts and potential sales schedule appointments and calls so
they don't fall through the cracks, keep notes and print out reports. They can also play a part in
product development, targeting the right audience and shortening the sales cycle, and they can
help your salespeople give dynamite presentations. Identify the most important of these features
and priorities for your new system.

Write down exactly what you want your system to do for you

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Write your list from the perspectives of everyone affected by the system -- salespeople,
sales managers, the CEO and the IT department. Look at your sales processes as well as the
technology.

Take time to put yourself in the shoes of people in your organization

In order to design your new system from the perspectives of everyone affected, you need
to get their input. Live a day in the life of several of your salespeople. Go with them for a whole
day, if possible. Watch them work. Ask questions. Choose at least one sales star, someone who's
been there a long time and one new salesperson. Do the same for your sales managers, regional
managers, CEO, CIO, customer service people and telemarketing people. Ask them their ideas,
and take them seriously. You may want to ask the following questions:

 What do you want the system to do for you that the current one doesn't do?
 What are the top three challenges you face in your work?
 What are the top challenges your customers face?

Be as complete and detailed as you can. Then, after you've made your notes about their answers,
call in your CRM team and compare notes. Only after you and your team have done your
homework can you call in consulting and software companies for sales presentations.

Getting everyone's perspectives is important also because you will be "selling" them the
new system, software, consulting company and your implementation plan at some point. Sales
are a major component in CRM system implementation and project management. Your job is to
sell the system throughout its implementation. A workshop, course or refresher in selling skills
will give you tremendous payoffs as you go ahead with your new CRM system.

Identify the success criteria for the project

Define exactly what the system and the implementation will be measured on. For example, you
might write:

 Do salespeople like and use the system?


 Is management getting the reports they want?
 Are there increased sales? By how much? How will these happen?
 Will there be more calls and more meetings?

Be careful here. "Increased sales" is too vague. To build success into your CRM implementation,
you want to include specific, measurable goals. For example, you could decide one criterion
should be "Sales should increase by XX% one year after implementation," or "Salespeople
should contact twice as many people as they did last year."

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Customer Relationship Management

Identify the project killers

List them so you will be more aware if these red flags appear. To carry through with our
example, if salespeople liking and using the system is important, a project killer would be that
the salespeople aren't using the system. There could be other project killers that aren't part of
your success criteria, too: There might be interdepartmental synchronization problems (i.e.,
projects not done on time or according to plan).

Once you've designed your "ideal" system on paper, find out how other companies
managed their projects

Learn from their experiences. Look for descriptions of successful projects. Look for companies
in similar businesses or companies that have solved some of the challenges you want to solve
with your system. Call them up and ask questions such as:

 What advice would they give as you start your project?


 What would they have done differently?
 What were their key reasons for selecting the system, software and consulting company?
 What were they most satisfied with?
 Who did they include on their implementation team?

Ask to visit and see exactly how their systems work. Talk about their projects and how they
made their decisions. Ask their advice.

Unique
CRM
7. E-CRM benefits

The rules of the game have changed for CRM. Customer demand for increased value,
greater convenience, and more control over products and services, along with heightened
pressure from competitors, have increased customer acquisition costs and decreased customer
and brand loyalty. At the same time, advancements in technology have enabled the cost-effective
distribution of huge amounts of customer data, the delivery of customized products, and the
efficient use of interactive channels. These technology developments are creating major
opportunities to collect and use customer information to gain a better understanding of customer
needs and to strengthen customer relationships. To take advantage of these opportunities and
address the escalating demands of customers, companies are shifting the focus of their efforts to

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Customer Relationship Management

adopt a customer-centric approach. Product excellence, innovation, and operational efficiency


are still important; however, successful companies are building on these existing business
strengths as they shift their attention to their customers.

E-CRM refers to the set of activities that enable a firm to utilize the power of the Internet
and the electronic medium to implement CRM.  Firms all around the world have realized the
potential of the Internet as a medium for CRM and have been actively pursuing e-CRM
strategies.
In simplest terms eCRM provides companies with means to conduct interactive,
personalized and relevant communications with customer across both electronic and traditional
channels. It utilizes a complete view of the customer to make decisions about messaging, offers
and channel delivery. It synchronises communication across otherwise disjoint-customer facing
systems.

 The following statistics highlight the importance and potential of the e-CRM industry.
 General Motors (GM) receives about 100,000 emails from its customers, every day.

 According to IDC and Forrester worldwide investment in ecrm solutions will reach $11
billion to $14 billion annually by 2003. And the payoff is significant.

 Jupiter Communications survey of companies who have implemented eCRM solutions found
that, on average, companies were able to recover their investments in seven months. Even more
impressive, the average return after one year was 300%.

 Cisco Systems automated customer interactions with its one-to-one website, saving $270
million in annual operating expenses and significantly reducing the time required to place an
order.

 Amazon.com was able to achieve a repeat purchase rate of 78%, more than double the industry
average, by building one-to-one relationships with its customers and targeting their individual
needs. This customer loyalty has enabled Amazon to remain a viable e-commerce company at a
time when so many other dot-coms have failed.

 Sears demonstrated the cross-channel benefits of eCRM by increasing Web shoppers'


subsequent offline purchases by 27%.

 The volume of customer related email traffic is so much that almost 42% of the queries never
get answered by the companies.  To achieve positive results like these from
their eCRM efforts, companies must develop a comprehensive strategy for managing and
utilizing customer knowledge. This strategy should include three key objectives:

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Know Your Customer

Reach Your
Customer

Grow Your Customer CHANGING NEEDS

Figure 8.1 --- Key Aspects of e-CRM

Know Your Customer

Know Your Customer is about understanding your individual customer's value and
needs. This understanding comes only from collecting information that customers provide in
their interactions with your company, and developing a 360-degree view of customer behavior
across all touch points. As you begin a dialogue with individual customers, you create a learning
relationship with your customers; each interaction becomes an opportunity to build and extend
your relationship with that customer. The more extensive the learning relationship, the more
invested the customer becomes in the relationship and the more difficult it will be for the
customer to switch to a competitor.

Reach Your Customer

Reach Your Customer is about reaching the right customers with the right offer at the
right time through the right channel. Based on your knowledge of each customer, you are able
to reach specific customers with targeted offers, information, products, and services. You reach
each customer with a personalized message based on his or her needs, behaviors, and value.

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Customer Relationship Management

Grow Your Customer

Grow Your Customer refers to your company's ability to effectively execute Marketing
strategies based on your knowledge of customer share and customer lifetime value. You must
use scarce investment dollars to target your efforts to your best, most valuable customers.
Increasing the total value of your customer base by retaining and growing your best customers, is
significantly less expensive than trying to generate the same amount of value by acquiring new
customers. Focusing on your best customers requires you to re-examine and re-allocate total
Marketing and sales investments from less profitable customers and the acquisition of new
customers.

A complete e-CRM architecture would comprise of the following components


 
1. Sales Force Automation (SFA)
2. E-Mail Management System (EMS)
3. Interactive Voice Response (IVR)
4. Knowledge Management (KM)
5. Call Centers
6. Instant online querying through Chat

Managing a full range of customer relationship involves two related objectives


1.      Provide the firm and its customer-dealing personnel, a complete singular view of each and
every customer
2.      To provide the customer with the same singular uniform level of service in every
interaction with the company through every channel.
 

Additionally, IT is expected to support the selection and implementation of the best management
tools that not only provide an
integrated solution, but also leverage prior and future IT investments. For both IT and Marketing,
resource constraints make it critical that the technology solution enables Marketing to manage its
increased responsibilities with minimal intervention and assistance from IT

8. CRM IN INDIA

In India, CRM satisfies three basic objectives for companies that are keen on retaining
customers and increasing market share.

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Customer Relationship Management

1. It offers a 360-degree view a company should have a clear understanding of clients and their
needs. It means that whoever the company speaks to, irrespective of whether the communication
is from operations, sales, systems, finance or support, the company is aware of the interaction.
This is one of the key steps in a CRM implementation. CRM give a complete set of tools that are
required to improve efficiency. There are numerous channels of communication e-mail (eCRM),
fax, telephone, Personal Data Assessments and many other wireless devices. In order to get a
complete picture these must be integrated and tracked.

2. CRM optimizes processes and functions related to the customer All operations can be
optimized and systematized to enhance efficiency and effectiveness. It is a matter of continuous
improvement. This is why sales force automation became important and critical. Corporates
began to realize that in the face of increasing competition, sales force automation is critical.
The problem lay in convincing the sales guy who believed in his personal abilities. Sales
automation results in more accurate predictions as well. Sales operations have to be organised to
make customer-facing systems efficient and effective.

3. To learn from integration-The learning process should be focused on bettering marketing,


sales and any other function that interacts with the customer. The interaction will help an
organisation to bring out better products that target potential and existing customers. The
whole idea is that if you know your customer better, you can target them better.Their
operations are aimed at getting the right customer and then retaining them by giving them the
service they require. Some customers have preferred channels of communicating. Some
customers may not like to transact over the Net and may prefer physical transaction. This varies
from customer to customer. All these differences lead to the importance and need for CRM.
Survey report on Indian CRM market
• The need for improved customer service and high global adoption shall drive the Indian CRM
market
• The high cost of implementation and low awareness of benefits is going to prove a major
deterrent
The next two charts indicate the factors our respondents feel will drive acceptance of CRM in
India, and the factors that will hold back acceptance.

Figure 9.1—Acceptance of CRM in INDIA

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Customer Relationship Management

Observations and Inferences

 A need for improved Customer Service shall be the main driver for Industry sectors that depend
on the quality of their customer interactions to retain existing customers and win new ones.
High Global adoption is likely to drive the MNCs to adopt CRM first in line with Global
implementations.
 While the first hurdle holding back the market is a lack of awareness, respondents have put high
cost of implementation as the main inhibitor. Complete and comprehensive CRM packages such
as those of Siebel and Oracle costing in the range of Rs. 1 to 2.5 Crores (and more) are too
expensive for most Indian firms. However, with software vendors bringing down prices and
offering relatively affordable packages bundled with integration and consulting services, this
could soon change.
 In the Indian context, lack of customer orientation and poor existing IT infrastructure can
prove major factors. Firms need to evolve their customer thinking by a significant extent before
they accept CRM as the strategic imperative it is, and internal systems and database management
practices need to be upgraded before CRM software can be used to any effect.

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Customer Relationship Management

Another major inhibitor indicated by respondents was that Indian firms lack the skills and
strategic vision required to successfully implement CRM.

Factors favourable for CRM in INDIA

In order to meet the growing international demand for cost-effective, customer-interaction


centers, many organizations worldwide are outsourcing these services from locations like
India. India has intrinsic strengths which have made it a major success as an outsourcing
destination for CRM.

 A booming IT industry, with IT strengths recognized all over the world (65% of the CMM
level5 companies are in India).

 The largest English-speaking population after the USA.

 A vast workforce of educated, English-speaking, tech-savvy personnel: A boon in a high-


growth industry faced with a shortage of skilled workers.

 Cost-effective manpower: In a call interaction center operation, manpower typically


accounts for 55 to 60 percent of the total cost. In India, the manpower cost is approximately
one-tenth of what it is overseas. Per agent cost in USA is approximately $40,000 while in
India it is only $5,000.

 Technical support: India graduates about 100,000 engineers each year. These can be used
in call centers for troubleshooting/tech support as the salaries are dramatically lower than
in Europe or the US.

 The Government of India has recognized the potential of IT-enabled services and has taken
positive steps by providing numerous incentives like Software Technology Park (STP), under
this scheme Ministry of

information and Technology gave 10 year of tax holiday on software product and subsequent
technology required for CRM.

 The presence of most international technology vendors and solutions would enable creation
of most advanced set-ups in this technology- intensive segment.

IT is a major thrust area for the Government of India

 IT is one of the Government of India's top five priorities.

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Customer Relationship Management

 The National IT Task Force submitted its 108 point Action Plan to promote IT in the
country. The Government of India has approved the plan and is in the process of implementing
it.

 A separate Ministry of Information Technology is set up to expedite swift approval and


implementation of IT projects and to streamline the regulatory process.

 Information Technology Act 2000: The Information Technology Bill that was passed in the
Indian Parliament in May 2000, has now been notified as the IT Act 2000. The IT Bill brings
E-commerce within the purview of law and accords stringent punishments to "cyber
criminals". With this, India joins a select band of 12 nations that have cyber laws.

As India emerges as a global outsourcing hub, the industry is forecast to explode at


exponential rates - from 23,000 people and $ 10 million pa in 1998 to over a million people
and revenues in excess of $

20 billion by 2008. Pivotal segments are going to be back office operations, medical
transcriptions, insurance claims processing, customer interaction centers and content
development. Current trends suggest that the country is well on course for achieving the above
target.

Some Outsourcing Success Stories of India.

 American Express processes internal financial transactions for all of Asia and employs 600
people - in country finance organization has shrunk by 60%.

 GE Capital employs 10,000 people and is expected to have 20,000 by the end of 2003-04
- Manages global payroll, call centers, mortgage and insurance claims.
- Call center makes inbound and outbound calls for credit card collections and response to
customer queries.

British Airways employs 750 people to handle an array of back office applications.
Strategy for small Indian companies who find CRM is good, but its expensive too…

There is an inherent imbalance in the scheme of things in the world. And this imbalance
is captured very well by 80/20 principle. Ever wondered why you wear only 20% of the clothes
80% of the time or why people spend 80% of their time with just 20% of their friends? Or the
more popular example of unequal distribution of income across the world- 20% of the world
population holds 80% of the wealth. This is where 80/20 principle comes to play.
But this rule has extreme relevance in business. Most business would agree that 20% of
their products bring in 80% of the revenues, 80% of the organizations salary budget goes to20%

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Customer Relationship Management

of the executives, 80% of the quality problems can be assigned to 20% of the causes and 20% of
the customers bring in 80% of the revenues.
The 80 and 20 are not a hard and fast set of numbers but the basic idea is to understand
the imbalance between the things and that to your advantage.

80%
20%

CUSTOMERS REVENUES

Figure9.2— 80\20 principle

One ready application to this rule is customer relationship management.

Everybody knows how difficult it is to get a new customer than to retain a existing one.
Wireless companies in US are spending more in finding new customers but 40% of their
customers defect every year this has made bussines extremely difficult for them. Not only do
they have to replace the defected 40% but also add more to show some growth.

Another example of expensive customer service is in the banking industry. Most


customers cost more than the returns on their deposits. Banks are figuring out how toserve their
more valuable customers and retain them and cut the cost of serving the less valuable ones. CRM
deployment is exorbitant and prohibitive for a small company.The 80/20 principle is a solid start
for any company. One look at the customer file would separate your customers into the most
valuable 20% and the other 80%. Most companies do not understand this imbalance and pay
equal attention to every customer.
This way they do disservice to those who deserve most attention and waste excessive
time on less value-adding customer.This is not discrimination against certain set of customers. It
is just proportional distribution of organizational effort. Companies are better able to retain their
customers.
Small companies don’t have resources to invest in CRM solutions and then to maintain
them. What they need is a simple but yet effective way just to differentiate between their value
adding so that they know where to concentrate their limited resources and energy. Identifying the
most revenue generating 20% customers would immediately reduce the task to a more
manageable level.

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Customer Relationship Management

Companies can further know more about what they buy, where they buy, how much do they pay,
etc. Based on these answers, companies can then decide on their distribution, product
development and pricing strategies.Companies consider in advertising and distributing equally to
all the market. This has also created incentive issues with sales people who get assigned to the
less valuable 80% customers. This has helped them to retain their profitable clients. There are
standard services available to the other 80% customers.

There is no technology investment required for some basic analysis on customer file which can
unravel tons of knowledge about customers. Simple mean and standard deviation of a normally
distributed set of customer data would give important on pricing strategies. In the future, large
enterprises in India are expected to opt for CRM applications which have pre-built interfaces
with standard ERP applications, while the small and medium business enterprises may still
continue to use stand-alone CRM applications. The usage of CRM in India is expected to evolve
from ensuring operational efficiency (in customer handling) to yielding strategic benefits --
through real-time customer segmentation, and co-creation of products with customers.

It would seem that big companies already analyse their customer files and use data for
customer service. But that surprisingly not the case. Multi-million dollar companies often fail to
do this simple analysis. But they have money to spend on CRM products.
Companies should think beyond merely selling products or services to their customers.
They need to play the role of a customer’s consultant, problem-solver, coach, motivator and
partner. Every company no matter what it sells, must adopt proven strategies and best practices
to differentiate its selling efforts…..
Nowadays, customers are demanding more while paying less for products and services.
All companies are facing new and ambitious competitors. Moreover they are being challenged
unusually to differentiate their products in a “commodity” market. The relationship between
buyers and sellers is constantly changing. Sales personnel assume that lowering prices is the only
way to attract customers. However, what customers are actually looking for is better value, better
solutions to their problems, rather than doing business with the low cost provider. Smart
companies must offer competitive prices and focus more on their value-added services to win
and retain customers.

9. CONCLUSION

The Secrets out - CRM is the Best Customer Strategy to Implement

The basics of CRM include a business strategy that focuses on developing and retaining
the relationships existing between customer and organization. The general perception is that
CRM is but a hype and the chance of CRM failure is high. Despite this, experts have speculated
that billions of dollars are going to be poured into the CRM industry making it one of the fastest
growing sectors in the market.

It used to be that one could think of marketing as totally separate from the rest of the
business enterprise. But with the advent of CRM or one-to-one marketing or loyalty marketing,

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Customer Relationship Management

the dynamics have changed. CRM involves knowing your customers individually and having
some mechanism for interacting with them or hearing from them, and customizing your business
for them. This is an inherently integrative operation. If a company is going to treat a customer
differently on what he is, then the back-end of the enterprise has to be capable of modifying its
behavior on what the front end finds out about what the customer wants. So back end functions,
such as product or service delivery, must be integrated with front-office functions such as sales,
marketing, and customer service.

One of the benefits of CRM is that it would make a company’s customers more loyal.
Every time a company interacts with a customer, the company customizes its service to be a bit
more closely suited to the customer’s needs. The company is getting a little higher up on the
customer’s learning curve. Moreover the company is making the product more and more
valuable to the customer. The relationship with the customer is developing in its own context.

The future requires a new mindset. It will take nontraditional thinking for you to look at
the way in which your company does business with your customer. Traditionally, customers
have had to do all the work to get their problems solved. In many companies, the business units
designed to serve

the same customers rarely interact, and when they do, they seem at odds about how to handle
problems or complaints.

To remedy this lack of agreement, you need to look for ways to improve cross-functional
communication. Some assign customer accounts to teams of employees from various areas
where contact with customers is paramount--for example, sales, marketing, product design,
customer service and accounts receivable. A single company contact might have responsibility
for all inquiries regarding credit, purchasing and order fulfillment.

One of the major challenges in implementing CRM is resistance to change. Change does
not occur in isolation. Only committed people implement CRM successfully. For a collection of
people cutting across organizational boundaries to create the coordinated set of actions necessary
to implement CRM, they must feel connected to each other. Building relationships across
functions increases trust, and when trust is increased relationships are increased. This is a
mutually reinforcing pattern. If the people that impact the customer improve their relationships
by working effectively across functions, they learn how to do that with the customer too.

Ultimately every organization must address what it's going to do differently so it can
respond more effectively to its customers. This understanding cannot be spoon-fed. It occurs
when people are actively engaged. It is seen repeatedly that as people come to understand the
issues that are affecting them, they become excited about the possibilities for doing things
differently. Creating this environment equalizes power. That's what makes CRM work. If you

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Customer Relationship Management

want to implement CRM successfully, you have to create this environment. There are no "ifs,"
"ands," or "buts."

To implement CRM successfully, you'll have to reorganize your customer and change
your organizational mindset. There are three important criteria.

First, it is necessary to have a good design interface. It has to be easier for a customer to
give a company its information and for the company to capture that information. Second, is to
have a good memory. The company has to remember what the customer told them so that they
don’t need to ask the customer same question again. And, Third the company has to have the
ability to integrate the information into the way it handles that customer. These three criteria
apply both on and off the Web.

In the end, it is more than just technology. With CRM, one is operating in a different
dimension of competition – finding products and services for customers, as opposed to finding
customers for the products and services the company sells. The technology is crucial, but it’s
also important to have managers with the vision to imagine what this technology enables the
enterprise to accomplish ………..

BIBLOGRAPHY

1. Public Relations Management (SYBMS) ------ Romeo Mascarenhas


2. Hindustan Times
3. Marketing Mastermind magazine (September 2008)

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Customer Relationship Management

WEBLOGRPHY

1. www.bmscampus.com
2. www.google.com
3. www.wikipedia.com
4. www.bmsparadise.com

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