06-27-2008
Who is in Charge Here? (From IT toolbox)
Customers In Charge
We all talk about “the customer is always right” and “the client is the boss,” but how often to we let technology choices force us into an opposite mode of behavior? In a clever book called “Why CRM Doesn’t Work,” Frederick Newell writes that Customer Relationship Management (CRM) failed to help companies meet expectations and achieve profitability. He suggests that Customer Management of Relationships (CMR) is the next logical step.
Technology in its Place
Mr. Newell explains that technology has a place in “CMR”, but it’s not the most important element. Instead, our relationships with our customers should dictate the right technological applications. He explains how to use two-way communication tools, like e-mail and web applications, to establish customer dialogues, but he warns that once we obtain customer data, we should use it only for relationship-building and only with the customer’s permission.
Has Technology Tied our Hands?
How often do you encounter technology “solutions” that seem to anger our customers? Have you ever been upset by how a company’s technology has treated you as a customer?
Additional Resources:
On the user-side, John Stevenson writes thought provoking blog entry about how “We All Hate our CRM.” Shouldn’t the technology make the users happy and have less work? Even further; besides employees, is the CRM ease of use issue being felt by customers (forcing relationships to be managed by business rules authored within the CRM, and not necesarily the way the customer wants their relationship to be managed)?
Paul Nussbaum is VP of Marketing for AMC Technology, a company that has been integrating Telephony and CRM applications since 1995.
Answers:
Paul, an interesting contribution.
Management of Customer Relationships is the original goal of the CRM system. The problem is that it is all too frequently assumed that the CRM system will resolve all the customer related problems faced. The corporation wanted the panacea, but did not do all the work necessary to reach nirvana.
1) a CRM on its own does not improve the quality of the customer data retained by the company. Garbage in is still garbage out.
2) A CRM is useless without an associated Business Intelligence component to identify the most effective marketing strategy.
3) The communications tools used need to be embedded into corporate systems. Dialogues for much of the customer communications should be driven by either the customer them-self or the demographic group that they fall into. I assisted a UK telecoms company to reduce customer churn through the use of such intelligence.
As an IT leader, but I am a strong proponent of systems providing a capability to allow business to work more effectively. Business must be in control and not have its hands tied by the use of technology. IT should be a facilitator for improvement of business results.
If you hate your CRM, then it is either not been correctly implemented or the business is not leveraging it correctly.
I am happy to connect and can be contacted at my email or on LinkedIn.
By Peter B. Giblett.
Posted by webmaster in Answers, Enterprise Solutions | RSS 2.0
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