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| How Can I Help You? |
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If you dropped in from another planet, you might think that customer relationship management (CRM) refers to intensive training courses on how to treat customers (a) respectfully and (b) helpfully. These courses would include sessions on developing problem-solving and resource-locating skills and, for call center operators, a tailored simulation for enhancing telephone answering management (TAM) techniques.
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In the Buzzwhack Tradition
Buzzwhack is a Web site tirelessly dedicated to the exposing jargon and defining buzzwords. Here's what Buzzwhack has to say about CRM:
"A fancy term that means you should treat customers as individuals and customize what you do to make them happy. Large companies do this with multimillion-dollar computer systems. Small companies generally do it with a handshake and a smile.
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Actually, CRM is a multibillion-dollar software tools industry led by Siebel Systems (Nasdaq: SEBL) and heading for dizzying market heights. The Gartner market research group predicts a $64.3 billion market by 2005, and in a recent benchmark study conducted by Forrester's, 82% of the 1,026 companies surveyed reported that they are planning, or have implemented, CRM systems.
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| What Does CRM Do? |
Globes reporter Eli Landau offers this simple explanation. "CRM systems are used to operate customer service centers in various companies, in combination with billing systems."
CRM systems integrate technologies that record every customer contact and track every preference, then consolidate the information so it's accessible to all who need to know. For example, the system tracks what Ms. Peldt of Peoria, Illinois, ordered the last time she clicked around the OneClickStick.com Web site, and the number of times she complained about delivery delays and credit card complications.
So, when a disgruntled Ms. Peldt from Peoria calls to describe the difficulties she is having with her OneClickStick Word-a-Day fridge magnet, the call center operator can access her history in real time and provide informed assistance. Going beyond providing helpful assistance, the accumulated data enables sales and marketing teams to target Ms. Peldt for new, improved products. Ultimately, company executives can make their important "where do we go from here" decisions from an analysis of the data.
The reality of CRM belies the hype. The technologies are there and in place, the software developers are busy trying to improve on perfection, and the providers are raking in the dollars, but something still does not gel.
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| Parallel Lines |
It seems that a CRM system has not yet been perfected to integrate data accumulated via the online service with the bricks and mortar outlet. If I walk into a FashionFull store with a too-tight twin set I ordered from the FashionFull.com website, the sales assistant might exchange it but he/she sure won't know what I'm talking about, what my FashionFull.com history is or record the information in a way that will be useful for future online sales and marketing efforts. (Unless I leave my e-mail address and it gets passed on to the right people but that is a "lower-tech" and not particularly seamless approach.)
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| "You're Only As Good As Your People" |
This is a mantra that company executives should recite three times a day. While originally intended to increase productivity and cut costs, both tech-savvy and tech-wary employees perceive CRM systems as job-threateners, so a type of passive-aggressive determination emerges, as employees pretend the system doesn't exist. In an Industry Standard feature on CRM, the sales tools manager of a networking hardware company reported that only 20% of her sales force was using the CRM system four months after its implementation. She had more expensive improvements installed and then announced "no order would be processed unless filed through the CRM system." It worked, but "breaking down the resistance wasn't easy."
It makes sense for a company planning to invest maybe millions of dollars (CRM systems are costly) to integrate CRM to get that staff training course up and running, both to teach people how to use and make the most of the tools, and to reassure them that the system complements their physical presence and skills.
| | When It's Good— |
One example of maximizing CRM technology that is widely admired is Amazon.com. They have CRM down pat when it comes to tracking preferences. Devoted Amazon.com customers to first-timers —
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| |  | Can create wish lists so fellow Amazon.com addicts can send them their must-have gifts
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| | | Can note preferences and receive updates on new products tailored to their likes
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| | | Receive e-mails on every subject they ever expressed an interest in
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| However, Amazon.com tactfully takes the hint and will halt all superfluous inbox-jamming missives upon request.
Properly integrated, implemented, utilized, and introduced into company practices, CRM is an overachiever. It leads to increased profitability by lowering operational costs, greater productivity, and, of course, higher customer satisfaction. And that is why the market is booming in spite of the hitches, glitches, and (some) bitching. However, it is not a panacea. Even the largest companies would be wise not to forget the simple effectiveness of a handshake and a smile.
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The Trendletter team welcomes your comments.
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