CRM helps businesses to gain an insight into the behaviour of their customers and ensures that customers are served in the best possible way. CRM allows a business to recognise the value of its customers and to capitalise on improved customer relations. The better you understand your customers, the more responsive you can be to their needs. In order for CRM to work effectively there has to be information capture at every touch point with the customer from marketing to delivery.

If a company does not invest in CRM it is increasingly difficult in today’s competitive environment to manage all the important information. For example, if you sent out an email campaign and then made a follow up call, this is an opportunity at the level of customer interaction to gain knowledge of the customer but it’s imperative that you know what has been said and acknowledge that the data has been obtained. With the accumulation of knowledge you can build a relationship with a potential prospect for effective targeting. Without a centre resource of information it’s extremely difficult to control, unless you are a SME.

If a company has an established business model with only a small number of high value customers its easier to manage the relationship more effectively without extensive use of technology. With large volumes of customers it’s increasingly difficult as there is a consistent need for more products.

Majority of people expect all the touch points to be well managed if you are dealing with client etc they expect information to be shared with the company, the support team are vital in handling information and there should be a slick process in place, which is significantly difficult without technology.

Having accurate, clean data is pivotal here. If your data is fit for purpose then it’s perfectly feasible to implement a CRM approach without expensive technology, on the condition that that you also solve the disconnect that exists between your sales and marketing functions – and there’s the rub.

It’s an old problem that has been the downfall of many an otherwise successful CRM programme. It’s no good the marketing team pumping out prospecting information if this is done in isolation of the sales team and in turn the sales team isn’t feeding back into the same CRM loop. ‘It’s good to talk’ was one of the most memorable and successful marketing strap lines of the past 10 years, but it’s one that many sales and marketing teams would do well to remember.

If that disconnect is solved then there are plenty of plug in tools that can use data on demand to bring sales and marketing together and create effective CRM.

Marketing products are available that combine enriched prospect and customer data pools with tools that allow users to understand the customer’s behaviours and profile prospects more accurately.

When these data pools are coupled with a sales engagement tool for example salesforce.com,this can create the virtuous circle between sales and marketing that is essential for success.

Not all CRM technology is complex and expensive. Some are extremely simple and will be instantly familiar to the user – and this is actually a very important factor to consider. For example, using Microsoft Dynamics CRM products are like using Microsoft Excel for doing analysis, or Word for Mail Merge. The whole CRM system is available through Outlook, so the user is already at ease with the format.
The important factors to consider are: how easy is it to use? How flexible can it be to meet requirements? And how familiar will it seem to your users?

Jason Nash, Product Solutions Marketing Manager CRM for Microsoft Dynamics

I've seen companies invest a lot (sometimes too much...) in CRM technology over the years, with the expectation that it will magically provide them with a platform to deliver effective CRM programmes. This simply isn't the case. Technology itself doesn't deliver a defined CRM strategy, or elicit complete buy-in to that strategy from every part of a company (from the top to the bottom). Without both of these elements, CRM is just a meaningless buzz-word without any substance.

The key word here is 'Customer'. It doesn't take expensive technology for a brand to step back from it's own corporate aims and look at it's business from the CUSTOMER'S perspective. How and when do people want to be communicated with? What are the natural triggers that will allow communication that is relevant, timely, and (hopefully) unobtrusive. True CRM is understanding the customer journey from acquisition through to retention, and carefully handling their expectations. This is why you need buy-in from everyone in a company - marketing, sales, call centres, point of sale, order fulfilment etc. Everyone of these disciplines can damage a customer relationship if they don't deliver a consistent CRM approach.

Good CRM is using customer insight (via data planning and research) to deliver customer-centric communications and a matching operational focus.

If you know exactly what it is you want to achieve, CRM technology can provide the tools to deliver it. It can give the Data Planners a single customer view and extra insight variables to work with. It can allow point of sale and call centre staff to see who they're talking to, and how valuable that customer is to your brand. Most importantly, it can provide measurement and metrics that justify the investment in the board room.

At the end of the day, relationships (all relationships...) are about listening and understanding - something a technology platform isn't equipped to do.

Yes, it is completely possible. All too often with CRM programmes the cart is put before the horse. In other words, so much work is put in to developing the systems or platforms, that the most important part of the process is forgotten – the customer! Some of the most effective programmes are not those that that are driven by complex systems, but those that understand, engage and relate to the customers in the most relevant and engaging way. Whether it is a consumer or B2B audience, we have found that there are some straight forward things that should be considered and used as a checklist:

• Make sure it fits in to how they live their lives – make it relevant.

• Make it easy for the consumer to take part – remove the barriers to participation.

• Connect with consumers when and where they want – understand and use every touch point.

• Make it bespoke - customise and personalise.

• Deliver added value – make it worthwhile for them to belong.

• Be explicit – clearly state the benefits of engagement.

Of course the very best are those that do all these things, and bring them to life using the best technology available.

Generally speaking - the bigger the customer base, the more complex the segmentation, the more sophisticated the approach, the more important a solid data and technology platform becomes.

Gyro work with Virgin Atlantic and Shell to develop strategies and communications plans that create value out of their ‘millions of’ customers and their systems and processes are as impressive as you might expect.

But that doesn’t mean things have to start that complex.

An approach we have taken with several clients is to start small with the bare minimum of technology in place - introducing a pilot CRM programme that proves the ‘roll-out’ business case within a small segment of the customer base. A few key things to get straight:

- Set clear objectives and understand how success will be measured
- Be clear that through the programme you are offering customer’s value – it’s all too easy to drop into ‘sell, sell, sell’ mode
- Establish a clear testing framework – make sure you explore and learn from each and every avenue
- Have a plan to roll-out … and a plan to close the pilot down if things don’t work out

We launched the UK’s first loyalty scheme in the bookmaking category using this approach.

In B2B markets where customer volumes are often far smaller this simpler approach can also be implemented. CRM often becomes blurred with lead management and account based marketing but in the end the desired outcome is always the same – a closer relationship with customers that results in more value for the client brand.

Richard Mabbott, Group Head of Planning at Gyro

David Jefferies, Marketing Director, Pitney Bowes, comments:
The answer must be to implement. Businesses may still feel daunted by the all-encompassing CRM moniker but there is really no need to fear adoption of this strategy.

Today, any implementation of CRM can be tackled in a modular fashion. Gone are the days when CRM required a business to rip out its IT infrastructure and completely rebuild. Each stage can be built as company needs dictate and, crucially, existing legacy systems can be adapted to suit today’s customer-centric programmes.

One much mentioned drawback of previous CRM strategy was that businesses spent considerable time and money on capturing customer data and analysing that data to provide a holistic customer view – only to then be unable to apply this knowledge to the communications that were being despatched. In many cases, the mail and messaging creation cycle was overlooked and did not have the sophistication that was apparent at the data collection and analysis stage.

Now, however, businesses are recognising the importance of full departmental integration in ensuring that customer data can be used to communicate in a more sophisticated way with those customers. Again, this can be achieved in a modular fashion, ensuring departments such as marketing and finance are connected. Legacy print and mail applications can be transformed using today’s software to enable personalised messages to be created cost effectively.

Only through sophisticated communications can CRM be said to be truly working. How else does a company convince customers that it is listening, that it is responding, that it is interested in building two-way relationships?

Not all CRM technology is complex and expensive. Some are extremely simple and will be instantly familiar to the user – and this is actually a very important factor to consider. For example, using Microsoft Dynamics CRM products are like using Microsoft Excel for doing analysis, or Word for Mail Merge. The whole CRM system is available through Outlook, so the user is already at ease with the format.

The important factors to consider are: how easy is it to use? How flexible can it be to meet requirements? And how familiar will it seem to your users?

CRM technology does not have to be expensive or complex. High costs and complexity is an artificial construct of the software industry that can be avoided through the use of open source technologies.

Proprietary application vendors have a vested interest in keeping prices high and making technology difficult to use. By doing so, they maintain control over the client / vendor relationship by locking customers into proprietary systems. If a customer wants to make a significant customization of a proprietary application, they have to work through the vendor because the code is not visible. If they want to integrate the technology, they must work through the vendors proprietary APIs. If they want to improve the product or fix a bug so other customers do not experience similar pain, they are unable to do so.

Fortunately, this is changing. Customers are choosing open source application and supporting technologies that give customers more control over their CRM application. They can try the software before buying; make deep or cosmetic customizations without relying on the vendor; and contribute fixes, improvements and extensions back to other users so that product quality is not dependent only on the vendor.

This is what we are seeing at SugarCRM, where we have a community of over 80,000 people in 195 countries reporting bugs, translating the application into over 75 languages and building over 500 product extensions to the product. This kind of innovation only occurs through an open community, not a proprietary ‘ecosystem’.

Commercial open source application companies like SugarCRM are taking a similar approach to Consumer Web companies such as Google, YouTube, Facebook – all of which are based on the LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP or Python) stack. Is it any coincidence that the most innovative companies are choosing open source? I think not.

It all depends upon your definition of CRM – I’ve heard so many that I’ll define my version: CRM= Using data about a contact to make the best decision as to the correct and appropriate communication. Given this definition then of course it need neither be complex nor expensive but a lot depends upon your expectations.

The first question is “how real time do you need your systems”. If you need a view for call centre’s, web or outbound channels that is no more recent than 24 hours then you can work wonders with limited resources. The heart of what you need to implement is a robust single customer view. To achieve this, the basics are good matching routines within a robust and well thought out database architecture along with useful categorisation of data and transactions.

Given these basics then you can know who a customer is, their purchasing behaviour, browsing, firmographics relating to their business, their market potential and a host of other data. This can then be summarised into either campaigns for mail or email, call centre prompts for inbound activity or even (if you knit the customer U|RN into cookies), different web experiences based upon customer logins to a purchase site. The fact that the database is batch driven and re-populated nightly is immaterial. It’s the synchronising of useful outputs along with the depth of analytical understanding and segmentation that drives the value.

In many ways that’s nothing new to any direct marketer from 20 years ago. The challenges then would have revolved around turnaround time, processing capacity and the postal system. These days we have more speed and more channels. The principles are the same

Technology is important, but what you put into the technology, how you apply the technology, and how you build relationships with your customers are far more important. In tough times such as these, all companies have to work harder than ever to understand their customer’s needs. Implementing expensive and complex technology unfortunately doesn’t guarantee a good CRM approach; often a CRM strategy will be of no use if the data within the technology is of poor quality.

Businesses must understand that technology can only ever be as good as the data which sits within it. Regardless of how sophisticated the software is, if the data has decayed, the out put activity will simply yield low results. It is therefore vital companies introduce clean and up to date data. This will ensure analysis activity can be accurately undertaken, defining customer preferences and highlighting opportunities.

As a result I would urge any company who is looking to invest in CRM technology to also invest in implementing a data strategy. This should see a company introduce fresh data to the database, but would also ensure that every department within the business understands the importance of collecting and storing data in a unified manor.

What is important for organisations to understand is that it is possible to build strong customer relationships, with customers, through the simplest of database solutions. However, if you don’t have fresh and accurate data you will damage your brand and turn clients off.

The CRM that is undertaken will depend on the size of the company and the number of people that are employed. Whatever the size, a sophisticated software system has to be implemented effectively and must be fully understood and managed efficiently to get the desired results. This does not need to be an expensive CRM software package but a simple database platform can deliver the same results.

Companies must review the cost involved in creating and developing a new system compared to the return on investment. Companies will need to consider if the system is worth implementing and whether it will add significant value to the company. With the current financial climate companies need to be able to objectively evaluate their actual spend, while achieving the desired results and ensuring cost effectiveness.

CRM is often mis-interpreted as being far too complicated. In reality, it is simply trying to understand the customer, how to talk to them and understand what they want and then provide products and services that are targeted and customised to theirs wants and needs.

If you are looking for an inexpensive solution that is easy to use check out Etelos CRM for Google.

It's a simple CRM that integrates into the google homepage or your home page hooked upto goggle apps framework...

Definitly worth checking out. It wasnt the solution for us as we require an offline/online solution at the moment. However Google Gears could make that happen. That may be a factor for you to look into as alot of crm companies are adopting the online model...Offline Syncing!