An Analysis Report On Customer Relationship Management at

Aptech Ltd.

Submitted By: Abhishek Anand Abhishek Dwivedi Anshul Kumar Deepak Soni Himanshu Chaudhry Nikhil Raj Priyanka Singh Sengar (Group: CRM) . Batch: 2009-11 IILM Institute for Higher Education, Gurgaon

Acknowledgment

We express our hearty gratitude to our course instructor Mrs. Kavita Shukla, Assistant Professor, Department of Marketing Management Institute for Higher Education, Gurgaon on her excellent guidance, constant advice and granting personal freedom in the course of this work.

Abhishek Anand Abhishek Dwivedi Anshul Kumar Deepak Soni Himanshu Chaudhry Nikhil Raj Priyanka Singh Sengar

Contents

y y

Executive summary Introduction o Introduction to information technology Education Industry o Structure of information technology Education Industry

CRM at Aptech Ltd o Customer care at Aptech Ltd o Classification of CRM at Aptech Ltd

Customer Response System (CRS) of Aptech Ltd o Technology behind CRS o CRS interface o Knowledge management module

y y y y y y y y

Customer feedback system How does CRM work at Aptech Ltd CRM implementation Customer s point of view Profitability analysis for CRM at Aptech Ltd Conclusion References Annexure

Executive Summary

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 in which a variety of after marketing tactics is used for customer bonding or staying in touch after the sale is made. An important facet of CRM is customer selectivity . As several research studies have shown not all customers are equally profitable (In fact in some cases 80% of the sales come through 20% of the customers). The company must therefore be selective and tailor its program and marketing efforts by segmenting and selecting appropriate customers for individual marketing programs. In some cases, it could even lead to outsourcing of some customers so that a company better utilize its resources on those customers it can serve better and create mutual value. However, the objective of a company is not to really prune its customer base but to identify appropriate customer programs and methods that would be profitable and create value for the firm and the customer. Two important processes for CRM include proactive customer business development and building partnering relationship with most important customers. These lead to superior value creation.

The case of APTECH Ltd. Deals with an organization in the intensely competitive information technology education and software services industry. In such markets where technology is changing by the minute, organizations take initiatives to obtain even the slightest competitive edge. The company described in the case is in the process of implementing a Customer Response System across its 1500 odd centers. The impact of such a move is being felt on customer satisfaction ratings and the critical word of mouth that attracts new inquiries. There

are of course certain implementation issues to be tackled. In order to evaluate the system implementation at test centers, and to work through the implementation in the remaining centers. APTECH is considering some cultural and organizational issues within the organization. Also, besides its relationships with customers, it is working on its relationship with business partners and employees. This report is an effort to list of the all essentials of Customer relationship management at APTECH including tools such as a skilled customer care staff and leading edge automation and workflow management software platforms. With these tools, it is possible for APTECH to track sales enquiries, trouble tickets, emails, telephone calls, and customer satisfaction surveys. Keeping in view the conceptual framework, it is also analyzed whether the heavy investments in Information technology education sector, have been making to achieve long-term goals are the best CRM strategies or whether less-costly projects with faster paybacks might make more sense. An by using secondary sources of data collection it was found out that APTECH is in the early stages of implementing CRS, the only two parameters currently that they are looking at is the response time and the resolution time on a feedback. As the system matures, two of the major metrics that will be looked at is product delivery and time for delivery.

Introduction to Information technology Education Industry

Today, computers are not restricted to computer software field only; in fact they have become a necessary part of every business industry. This has led to tremendous rise in the demand for trained computer professionals. With the increasing focus on computer software development by the Indian government and NASSCOM along with many software export houses, this demand is bound to increase even further in the near future and in the years to come. The Indian computer software industry itself has grown from a mere 0.3 billion ten years back to 70 billion today. The rapid growth of this industry has led to high growth in the computer education and training business. Private institutes today produce about 65% of the software professionals and remaining by government affiliated institutes. The growth in the demand in future is expected to be spurred by the growth in the information technology sector both domestic and international, which is growing by the rate of 30-40%.

The demand for computer software professionals has shown an increasing trend over the years. As a result of this many entrepreneurs took to this opportunity and opened computer-training institutes. Over the years these institutes have developed rapidly to become huge in terms of their spread and the number of students churned out. Notably among them are companies like NIIT, APTECH, SSI, TULEC, BITS, IEC, LCC, SOL-STAR etc.

Structure of information technology Education Industry

The information technology education industry in India is estimated to be around 625 crores. Although there are many players, it is mainly dominated by NIIT and APTECH in the organised sector. This sector is growing at the rate of 20%.

Market Shares
Others 30% NIIT 40%

APTECH 30%

NIIT

APTECH

Others

CRM at APTECH

There are tow sides to APTECH s business: student education, and corporate consultancy, training, software, etc. Eighty percent of the students enroll at APTECH because of word of mouth. There is qualitative and quantitative research. However, what experience was shared is not documented. Therefore, we now have a system known as Customer Response System (CRS) that captures any suggestion, complaint or query made by a student. As far as reusable templates are concerned, they are widely used in e-commerce and ERP solutions. For ERP solution we have an e-link template that reduces development time by sixty percent. We also have a service portal where plug and play solutions can be downloaded. As far as students are concerned CRM is providing unlimited access to anyone in the organisation.

Aptech CRM: customer care

Firstly, APTECH was in the knowledge management business. There was a need to be able to practice what one preached. Secondly, there was the business imperative. The need to be at the vanguard of the quality initiatives was recognised. There were already manual systems in place, both formal and informal. Formal mechanisms included feedback forms, while informal channels included faculty interaction and open houses. However, these contained an element of subjectivity. If a student had a good rapport with the centre staff his/her feedback, complaints, suggestions, and queries were paid cognisance.

A need was felt for more quantifiable metric. Students, being young, are wary of expressing their concerns. An element of monotony had crept into the manual systems students said

what they were expected to say. In the feedback forms emphasis was placed on the contents of the course.

Classification of CRM at APTECH

There are two units of CRM

CRS and CAS. Using CRS, a student gives feedback on the Centre,

Product, People, and Specific Issues, Product Design, and General Management for Monitoring Centre Performance, Improving or revamping the product, making policy decisions, and for Overall improvement in delivery process using this feedback. Where policy decisions are taken, they affect CAS (Centre Automation System) and RAS (Regional Automation System) and changes are incorporated as necessary.

The second unit CAS (Centre Automation System) is the database of the students. Currently this database is used by Centre Personnel for student tracking and by the R.O. for monitoring centre performance in terms of product delivery. The plan is to have a web interface, so that students can access their information on a limited basis. This will help the student o judge his/her current status and accordingly plan if any corrective action is required. E-mail facility is already available for APTECH members, so that the student can consult the respective Faculty/Centre Personnel in case any assistance is required for planning. It is also planned to use the available information and extend the concept to a call centre., so those inquiries can be directed to the nearest point, as convenient to them. Company also plans to use the database being built up for alumni, so that students placed by them can be given value added inputs on a time to time basis, depending on their requirements and current job profile.

Customer Response System (CRS)

CRS at Aptech is a customer service solution and not a data crunching operation. It covers three locations: centre, regional office, and head office. In the centers and the regional offices CRS consists of Client Service Module, while in the head office it consists of Client Server as well as Knowledge Management modules. There are multiple objectives of CRS: y Provide sufficient information, through an easy to access interface, to the customer for

judging their current status and make a plan for the future based on the same y Provide an interface for the customer to communicate his/her views on the service received

by them. y Have a mechanism in place to capture warning signals at an early stage to enable proactive

preventive action.

Technology behind CRS

At Aptech , the Client Server module has a back end developed in Oracle, and a front end developed in Powerbuilder. The Knowledge Management module is developed in Lotus Notes. In each centre CRS is linked to the Centre Automation System. In the regional office it is linked to the regional automation system. The Client-Server module has various screens like review categories/notifications Pending Closure. Exception, Today s Feedback, Awaiting Rectification, Ratified and

New FEEDBACK by student

Exception Notification to SRO/CH Today s Feedback Awaiting Ratification Actions/Investigation Ratified Pending Closure Inform Student to ratify

Awaiting Ratified Ratification

Over 15 days Pending Closure

Satisfied

Ratified

Close Complaint

Closed

CRS Interface
At the centre level, students, student relationship officer (SRO) and administrators interface with the system. Features at the centre level there is a complaint registering facility for

students. The system provides accessibility to all students. It enables ease of complaint retrieval by centre management. Analysis report on the complaints can be generated. Also, exception reports can be produced. There is a complaint closure facility. The student ratifies all complaints. The student receives a complaint acknowledgement. A facility to send reminders/repeat a complaint has been provided. The student receives intimation for ratification of redressed. The SRO/Centre Head is notified of all complaints. There is facility to request for immediate regional office/head office intervention by SRO/Centre Head. Dynamic querying on complaint data can be done. A facility to query on complaint status and for forced closure of feedback has been provided. Features at the regional office level Complaint entry by regional office personnel is possible.

The feature of automatic escalation of complaints has been provided. Analysis reports across centres and analysis reports can be generated. The regional office has access to complaint information from all centres, updated weekly. There is a facility to find out details of complaints logged earlier by a student while receiving a complaint. Dynamic querying on complaint data and query on complaint status are possible. Personnel at the regional office level can participate in discussions to resolve complaints and be informed about action taken at the head office. They also have access to knowledge repositories at head office. CRS reports The different reports generated by the CRS system are: Complaint Category wise Frequency Analysis, Cycle Time for Redressal Analysis, Status Report, Status Statistics, Complaint Details, Exception report, Complaint recurrence analysis, and Root Cause Analysis

Knowledge management module

The Knowledge management module can be viewed from two perspectives

User and

Knowledge administrator/integrator. The architecture of the Knowledge Management module is shown in Exhibit 3. Mr. Jahangir Kazimi, Solution Architect of the Knowledge Management Module says that from users, perspective it consists of six links: y y y y y Discussion Group Knowledge Repository Latest Updates Best Practices FAQs

Oracle Application

Authors/ Experts Exception Reports Contributors

Knowledge Discussion Groups Outcomes Repository

Users

Customer Feedback System at Aptech Ltd

Discussion group: feedback is grouped by category, by centre, region, or author. It is possible

to trace the thread of a compliant. Where it originated, who responded first, next and so on? The status of a feedback can be discerned. One of the options under discussion group is Priority Issues - This contains complaints that are not resolved for a certain number of days. Once a discussion is concluded more responses are not required.

Knowledge Repository: Once a feedback is closed it may or may not be knowledge enriching.
If it is generally applicable it undergoes a process of cleansing and filtering and is then stored in the Knowledge Repository. The default view is my view. This consists of the tasks allotted to the user by the knowledge integrator. There is a blank format tat the user can fill in. the user can also initiate a request to the author. All documents go through a two-stage validation process. Each document has to have an approver. The approved document is then forwarded to the knowledge integrator for incorporation in the Knowledge Repository.

Latest Updates: Contains complaints by category e.g. by author. There are various ways of
presenting information.

Best Practices: There are various document forms such as Best Practice, root cause, and
problem-solution. Besides these five options there are search mechanisms. There are different search features. One way is to search for a key word in the entire document. Another way is to search for keywords assigned by the author.

How does CRM work for Aptech Ltd

The knowledge integrator validates the structure and the content of Best Practice, Root cause, and Problem Solution documents. The knowledge integrator acts as a link between the Knowledge management and the Client Server modules. The functions of the knowledge integrator are two fold. First, he/she acts as a facilitator, ensuring that the right people interact to find the correct solution. He/she acts as a moderator discussions. The knowledge integrator can notify employees, with a date by which to contribute, if they are not participating on a certain issue. Second, the knowledge integrator drives what is happening in the forums. Whether a feedback is knowledge enriching or not is not a black and white issue. Therefore, there is the concept of a brewing tank. Knowledge is created, captured and stored. No immediate decision is taken on putting it in the Knowledge Repository. It is possible that after the review of the expired discussions, some knowledge item is placed in the Knowledge Repository. closing, declaring and concluding

Implementation of CRM at Aptech Ltd

There are Faculty, Counselor, Administrative Staff and other category of members in a centre. It was imperative that all members of the Centre were convinced about this system. To achieve this an exhaustive session was conducted to all members of the Centre covering the various aspects of the system and the advantages of the system. The main challenge was to remove the phobia of COMPLAINT and replace this as a suggestion for improvement. This cannot be achieved in one round of training. atleast 2 to 3 rounds of training are conducted, which was reinforced by the top management, whenever a communication took place. Once the centre

staff was convinced, and then the second step of introducing the system to the students was undertaken. This was 2-step procedure: (a) Publicise the existence of the system for the usage of the students. This was done (i) (ii) (iii) By putting up posters in the centre Announcing in the classes by the faculty Informing them during informal meeting by counselors, Centre Head, etc

(b) Encourage the students to use the system, by promptly attending to the feedbacks received. Since the CRS was coupled with CAS no additional infrastructural requirement was there to implement CRS in the Centre. The whole process of implementation in the Centre took roughly one calendar month time.

The Customer s viewpoint:

Few students of APTECH franchised centre where CRS had not yet been installed and few students from a centre run directly by APTECH where CRS where CRS went online were interviewed to understand its immediate impact. Students from the first type of centers were highly dissatisfied because their basic expectations in terms of service and facilities were not met, they didn t know anything about CRS or any system by which they can give the feedback on which some meaningful action can be taken. They were also not at all sure if the franchised centre would act on the feedback. While students from APTECH run centers were highly satisfied with the facilities and services as they exceeded their expectations. They started using the system in the 4th week of April 2000 and have found it very useful. They have seen the actions been taken very fast on the issues raised by them in the CRS.

Analyzing Profitability for CRM at APtech Ltd

There are organizational constraints encountered in execution of CRM programs. Mainly they are as follows: y A mismatch between resource allocated and service levels desired for building customer relationship y Absence of financial business case and ROI for investments in Customer Relationship y Horizontal non alignment of organisations to customers line of sight y Balance to be achieved between maximisation of revenue and customer satisfaction.

Direct selling machinery would have costs that are significantly higher than referral sale hence the need to invest in customer relationship with an eye on acceleration of referrals so as to bring down costs or increase productivity of sales. Figure1 illustrates the phenomenon that Aptech ltd can drive referral sale line in a manner that can reduce time T1 and with that in figure 1(a) the overall unit selling cost (average of direct sales cost + referral sale cost) can be reduced with higher sales productivity.

Figure 2 illustrates that with a given investment in direct sale channel the productivity can at best be only slightly increasing line, while a referral line will be an exponentially increasing trend line with growing subscriber numbers. Aptech s dependency on direct sale can gradually be reduced since they stand to account for reduced numbers in the overall sums.

Direct sale

Sale Unit

Referral Sale

T1 Time

Figure 2

Benefit Parameters:
y Reduction in staff cost y Enhanced productivity (subscriber to agent ratio) y Quicker turnaround times y Saving due to call handling by alternate channels y Better Customer Relations y Churn Prevention y Segmented Promotions

Conclusions

The primary requirement for any system to get implemented successfully is the buy in process of the end user. The complete success depends upon how much the user is convinced about the benefits of the system to be implemented. For CRS at Aptech, there are 3 users namely: Student, Centre Head and Student Relation Officer. Through word of mouth among the students the usage of CRS as a platform for communicating the feedback to the centre is increasing on day-to-day basis. Since APTECH is in the early stages of implementing CRS, the only two parameters currently that they are looking at is the response time and the resolution time on a feedback. As the system matures, two of the major metrics that will be looked at is product delivery and time for delivery.

References

Books

Sheth, J. N. and Parvatiyar, A. Relationship Marketing in Consumer Markets: Antecedents and Consequences', Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science

Jagdish And Sheth, Atul Parvatiyar, G Shainesh, CRM Emerging Concepts, Tools and Applications

Websites

Official website: Aptech Global Learning Solutions: Retail & Corporate education: www.aptechworldwide.com/: Accessed on 17 January, 2011 at 6.09 p.m.

Other Websites:

 www.crmassist.com  www.crmguru.com  www.crmfoundation.com  www.crmindia.org  www.crmsearch.com  www.crmcommunity.com  www.CRM-forum.com

Annexure

Sample Questionnaire asked to 10 employees across Aptech Ltd in order to analyze their CRM system they are working on.

1. What are the various CRM initiatives undertaken by the firm? 2. How do they develop these programs? 3. How do they measure the effectiveness of these programs? 4. How successful are these programs in retaining customers? 5. What are the quality and customer centric processes that they follow? 6. How do they decide the technology that is to be implemented? 7. What steps have they undertaken for employee empowerment? 8. What strategy do they follow to acquire more knowledge about the customer?