CASE STUDY PROJECT (II SEMESTER)
CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
By
SARESH N
Roll Number: xxxx
Explain the modalities of marketing and customer relations if you are to succeed as a marketing manager in a firm.
National Institute of Business Management
AG, Anandraj Villa, 7,Second Canal Cross Road Gandhi Nagar,
Adyar, Chennai-600020
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CERTIFICATE
I Saresh N (Register Number xxxxx), hereby certify that this is a bonafide Case Study Report submitted by me as a part of second semester executive MBA study. This case study project is being submitted to the National Institute of Business Management in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the award of the degree of Executive Master of Business Administration.
Saresh N
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I wish to express my deep sense of gratitude to all the staffs of National Institute of Business Management chennai for giving me an opportunity to carry out the degree in Executive MBA.
I would like to thank the authors of the study material-Customer Relationship Management for the informations provided in the material.
I express my sincere gratitude to the authors of all books and web sites, which I have referred for the study. In addition to that I am thankful to all the scholars and teachers who have given their sincere support to complete the study.
I would like to express my sincere gratitude to all my friends who have helped me while doing this work.
I would like to thank my family who are always with me in all ventures I participate in and bless with a wholehearted mind.
Above all I thank the almighty for his immense blessing and guidance in every way to choose the right information at the right time.
SARESH.N
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Note: Please add the following too :
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NOTE: Please add Numbers to the Main headings and sub headings...
For eg : 1 Introduction
1.1 Overview
2.0 Types/Variations of CRM
2.1 Operational CRM
2.2 Sales Force Automation (SFA) ....and so on .
==>Include the page numbers in the Contents.
==>Add a conclusion and references.
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INTRODUCTION
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is an information industry term for methodologies, software, and usually Internet capabilities that help an enterprise manage customer relationships in an organized and efficient manner. In many cases, an enterprise builds a database about its customers. This database describes relationships in sufficient detail so that management, salespeople, and customer service repsentatives can access information; match customer needs with product plans and offerings; remind customers of service requirements; know what other products a customer had purchased; etc. In other words, Customer relationship management (CRM) is a term applied to processes implemented by a company to handle its contact with its customers. CRM software is used to support these processes, storing information on current and prospective customers. Information in the system can be accessed and entered by employees in different departments, such as sales, marketing, customer service, training, professional development, performance management, human resource development, and compensation. Details on any customer contacts can also be stored in the system. The rationale behind this approach is to improve services provided directly to customers and to use the information in the system for targeted marketing and sales purposes. While the term is generally used to refer to a software-based approach to handling customer relationships, most CRM software vendors stress that a successful CRM strategy requires a holistic approach. CRM initiatives often fail because implementation was limited to software installation without providing the appropriate motivations for employees to learn, provide input, and take full advantage of the information.
Figure 1-CRM
Overview
From the outside, customers interacting with a company perceive the business as a single entity, despite often interacting with a variety of employees in different roles and departments. CRM is a combination of policies, processes, and strategies implemented by a company that unify its customer interaction and provides a mechanism for tracking customer information.
CRM includes many aspects, which relate directly to one another:
• Front office operations — Direct interaction with customers, e.g. face to face meetings, phone calls, e-mail, online services etc.
• Back office operations — Operations that ultimately affect the activities of the front office (e.g., billing, maintenance, planning, marketing, advertising, finance, manufacturing, etc.)
• Business relationships — Interaction with other companies and partners, such as suppliers/vendors and retail outlets/distributors, industry networks (lobbying groups, trade associations). This external network supports front and back office activities.
• Analysis — Key CRM data can be analyzed in order to plan target-marketing campaigns, conceive business strategies, and judge the success of CRM activities (e.g., market share, number and types of customers, revenue, profitability).
Types/Variations of CRM
There are several different approaches to CRM, with different software packages focusing on different aspects. In general, Campaign Management and Sales Force Automation form the core of the system .
Operational CRM
Operational CRM provides support to "front office" business processes, e.g. to sales, marketing and service staff. Interactions with customers are generally stored in customers' contact histories, and staff can retrieve customer information as necessary. The contact history provides staff members with immediate access to important information on the customer (products owned, prior support calls etc.), eliminating the need to individually obtain this information directly from the customer. Operational CRM processes customer data for a variety of purposes:
• 'Managing Campaigns'
• Enterprise Marketing Automation
• Sales Force Automation
Sales Force Automation (SFA)
Sales Force Automation automates sales force-related activities such as:
• Scheduling sales calls or mailings
• Tracking responses
• Generating reports
Analytical CRM
Analytical CRM analyzes customer data for a variety of purposes:
• Designing and executing targeted marketing campaigns
• Designing and executing campaigns, e.g. customer acquisition, cross-selling, up-selling
• Analyzing customer behavior in order to make decisions relating to products and services (e.g. pricing, product development)
• Management decisions (e.g. financial forecasting and customer profitability analysis)
Analytical CRM generally makes heavy use of data mining.
Figure 2-Analytical CRM
Sales Intelligence CRM
Sales Intelligence CRM is similar to Analytical CRM, but is intended as a more direct sales tool. Features include alerts sent to sales staff regarding:
• Cross-selling/Up-selling/Switch-selling opportunities
• Customer drift
• Sales performance
• Customer trends
• Customer margins
Campaign Management
Campaign management combines elements of Operational and Analytical CRM. Campaign management functions include:
• Target groups formed from the client base according to selected criteria
• Sending campaign-related material (e.g. on special offers) to selected recipients using various channels (e.g. e-mail, telephone, post)
• Tracking, storing, and analyzing campaign statistics, including tracking responses and analyzing trends
COLLABORATIVE CRM
Collaborative CRM covers aspects of a company's dealings with customers that are handled by various departments within a company, such as sales, technical support and marketing. Staff members within the departments can share information collected when interacting with customers. For example, feedback received by customer support agents can provide other staff members with information on the services and features requested by customers. Collaborative CRM's ultimate goal is to use information collected by all departments to improve the quality of services provided by the company.
Geographic CRM
Geographic CRM (GCRM) combines geographic information system and traditional CRM. Geographic data can be analyzed to provide a snapshot of potential customers in a region or to plan routes for customer visits.
Strategy
Several commercial CRM software packages are available, and they vary in their approach to CRM. However, as mentioned above, CRM is not just a technology but rather a comprehensive, customer-centric approach to an organization's philosophy of dealing with its customers. This includes policies and processes, front-of-house customer service, employee training, marketing, systems and information management. Hence, it is important that any CRM implementation considerations stretch beyond technology toward the broader organizational requirements.
The objectives of a CRM strategy must consider a company’s specific situation and its customers' needs and expectations. Information gained through CRM initiatives can support the development of marketing strategy by developing the organization's knowledge in areas such as identifying customer segments, improving customer retention, improving product offerings (by better understanding customer needs), and by identifying the organization's most profitable customers.
CRM strategies can vary in size, complexity, and scope. Some companies consider a CRM strategy only to focus on the management of a team of salespeople. However, other CRM strategies can cover customer interaction across the entire organization. Many commercial CRM software packages provide features that serve the sales, marketing, event management, project management, and finance industries.
Successes
While there are numerous reports of "failed" implementations of various types of CRM projects, these are often the result of unrealistic high expectations and exaggerated claims by CRM vendors.
Many of these "failures" are also related to data quality and availability. Data cleaning is a major issue. If a company's CRM strategy is to track life-cycle revenues, costs, margins, and interactions between individual customers, this must be reflected in all business processes. Data must be extracted from multiple sources (e.g., departmental/divisional databases such as sales, manufacturing, supply chain, logistics, finance, service etc.), which requires an integrated, comprehensive system in place with well-defined structures and high data quality. Data from other systems can be transferred to CRM systems using appropriate interfaces.
A well specified system is of vital importance before starting any implementation, as it can lead to a significant reduction in the time and cost of implementation, as well as highlighting any unrealistic expectations.
Privacy and data security
One of the primary functions of CRM software is to collect information about customers. When gathering data as part of a CRM solution, a company must consider the desire for customer privacy and data security, as well as the legislative and cultural norms. Some customers prefer assurances that their data will not be shared with third parties without their prior consent and that safeguards are in place to prevent illegal access by third parties.
Simply implementing a solution intended to achieve organizational goals is not enough to achieve CRM success. The process should ensure that these goals are achieved. More importantly CRM optimization should be encouraged through the
right practices, optimization of resources and the ability to adapt to change.
How to achieve CRM optimization:
Identifying CRM goals
Objectives need to be identified and CRM goals need to be fixed before embarking on a CRM project. Business processes need to be integrated with the CRM solution before actual implementation. The chosen solution should fit organizational objectives to the hilt.
Phased Implementation
Start a pilot project and set goals for the organization. Then go ahead with CRM implementation in phases to ensure CRM success. Phased implementation is always easier to implement and the rewards are higher.
Objective focus
The net result or the ultimate objective of the business process needs to be taken into consideration while implementing .The ability of the CRM solution to contribute to this has to be considered. If the objective is increasing overall profit or simply contributing to customer retention than this should be achieved by the CRM choice.
Customer focus
The CRM process sometimes gains department coordination and success but fails to focus on the customer. Hence although companies may succeed internally they fail to achieve customer retention on account of unsatisfied customers.
Data consolidation
What happens here is that information needs to be corrected before putting it into the CRM system so that bulk data is assessed, corrected and placed together so as to be easily assessable.
Change Incorporation
Since change is unavoidable and CRM is a continuous process, information becomes outdated very quickly. Changes required need to be implemented periodically.
Customer flexibility
CRM processes need to be suited to the customer needs. Adopting stringent rules that affect the customer due to its inflexibility will hamper the ability of the organization to find appropriate solutions for its customers.
Data Assessing
Assessing data quality issues is essential. Companies need to measure data quality before embarking on a CRM implementation.
Holistic Approach
It is important to create a single holistic view about a customer with the collation of all the information available about him. This information should be available to every one in the organization. An integrated view of the customer with entire company access is absolutely essential.
CRM Consultants
Outside resources need to be brought in if required. The need for outside resources has to be carefully studied and adopted if essential.
IT's Involvement
Dynamic changes are possible only when sufficient technology is in place. IT enables this as it facilitates change within the organization and enables it to adapt. Hence the IT department needs to be incorporated in all respects.
Data Cleansing
Since all information needs to be cleansed before it enters the system a data quality solution must be used from initial analysis to identification, cleansing, and consolidation.
Cost Restraints
It is imperative to understand the existing problems customers are facing and not endeavor to find solutions that suit the companies budget alone.
Identifying CRM goals
Objectives need to be identified and CRM goals need to be fixed before embarking on a CRM project. Business processes need to be integrated with the CRM solution before actual implementation .The chosen solution should fit organizational objectives to the hilt.
Integration
It is essential to actually collaborate the IT departments and the other departments. Their combined efforts are essential for CRM success.
Employee involvement
It is important to get the customer facing employees personally involved in the activities of the business. It is they who should initiate this and be involved in all aspects of its implementation. CRM success is a sure result if this is implemented.
Oracle
Oracle provides CRM solutions for sales, service, marketing, contracts, E-Commerce etc. Oracle CRM boasts of excellent storage and usage of customer information besides an amazing ability to streamline processes and the ability to improve the quality of data as well. Accurate information is Oracle CRM's best offer. One other noteworthy feature in Oracle CRM is its functionality. It provides for the best kind of support for partners, customers, agents, call centers etc. Oracle's CRM solutions also vehemently support back office operations like supply chain, finance, personnel etc.
Sales force
Salesforce's CRM options are based on customers' needs and offer excellent integration with all non CRM business applications. Some of them for instance provide for data sharing that helps to support sales. This in turn provides additional access to partners, suppliers, and customers.
Appforce OS for example is an on-demand CRM option that allows organizations to share CRM applications all within a single environment. Salesforce's CRM solutions are extremely flexible, adaptable and can be changed to suit organization needs. Salesforce achieves an integrated, holistic approach to CRM.
RightNow
RightNow CRM solutions are built on experience in customer service that accounts for their excellent customer approach. RightNows main achievement is an ability to increase customer loyalty. It manages to do this while cutting down costs as well. Profitability increases greatly with use of their on-demand solutions. They offer customer service software, sales automation software and marketing automation software. These are crucial for providing business information and increasing overall productivity. RightNows CRM software serves to utilize complete customer data and achieves a shorter time frame for results.
Siebel
Siebel boasts of both on premise CRM and as hosted solutions. These solutions can be used for large and small industries. Siebel solutions boast of shorter implementation time. They are customized to fit industry needs. Siebel solutions provide employees and customers with accurate, relevant and up-to-date information. Simplicity and functionality are the keywords when dealing with Siebel's CRM solutions. Since your customers deserve the best Siebel offers customer centric options suited precisely for them. Siebel's solutions improve agent productivity as well.
SAP
SAP offers a vast range of solutions from the traditional to the more offbeat ones most of them encompassing a huge range of functions and applications. MySAP CRM for example offers a variety of devices ranging from laptops, PDAs etc. SAP's CRM solutions serve to maximize sales efficiency and improve sales productivity. SAP's sales offerings for instance transcend to sales forecasting, task management, quotes, sales orders etc. Customer interactions are improved vastly as SAP's solutions can be customized to the organization to suit needs and size. The solutions are easy to use and provide the opportunity to increase revenue more effectively.
Choice of CRM Software depends entirely on the organization. In choosing a CRM solution it is imperative to take into consideration the fact that there are vendors like the above who offer the advantage of both experience plus the ability to meet organization needs. This additional experience can go a long way in alleviating CRM pitfalls and organizations should try their best to avail of it.
Figure 3- Comparison of CRM Softwares
Related Resources
Aplicor
Aplicor Enterprise is a subscription-based and hosted CRM and ERP web-based software solution designed for high growth, mid-market and enterprise organizations. The company's business applications distinguish themselves by providing unique and fundamental shifts from data management to process automation, from reporting to Business Intelligence (BI), and from a one-size-fits-all shared hosting platform to an isolated tenancy hosting model. Aplicor is the most independently awarded hosted solution, has achieved the highest average user count in the hosting industry and is the only CRM & ERP hosting provider with a 100% uptime history.
Holistic gains of CRM - The Rewards are Huge
Why opt for CRM? The staggering statistics show that up to 70% of customers who walk away from a relationships with a company do so due to poor customer service. What can your organization do to stop happening?
CRM the customer strategy of the decade has the answers. It offers several advantages. CRM benefits include the following:
CRM Helps You Help the Customer
CRM is the business strategy that understands, anticipates and manages the needs of an organization's customers. It puts the customer at the focal point of the business. CRM can improve an organizations service to its employees and serve to add more customers, resulting in creating the competitive advantage for an organization as it stimulates growth and customer/employee retention.
Customer retention the assured by product of customer relationship management is one of the many benefits of CRM. CRM helps to increase customer loyalty and brand retention. Customer Relationship Management ensures that customers are happy and that they keep coming back again and again thus contributing to long term profitability since CRM assists in improved customer service and support CRM implementation is essential in almost all the departments in the organization to have a complete view of each of their customers.
CRM Increases Efficiency
CRM enables an organization to make quick decisions and indulge in personalized customer care. CRM manages to bring change into the organization and its business processes. It manages to achieve reengineering. CRM promises more effective reach and thus aids the sales and marketing department. It aids in providing for greater efficiency and cost reductions. It accomplishes all this with an ever increasing dedication to efficiency.
CRM Gives you the Competitive Edge
CRM is definitely a better stand against global competition. SME's for example while implementing CRM have a greater advantage over large corporations as increasing the effectiveness of one employee can contribute significantly to the overall success of the organization. CRM offers great opportunity to provide better products for the customer and does this at cost savings. Reducing costs or keeping costs under control can be termed as one of CRM's main functions.
CRM improves ability to manage customer relationships and enhance customer satisfaction. CRM serves as the company's anchorage that boosts revenue. More and more companies are opting for the customer centric strategy of the decade and those that opt to stay away from it will definitely face a disadvantage. Companies that fail to implement CRM will lose the competitive edge.
CRM Boosts All Round Development
CRM helps to increase financial results and helps few people manage a large quantity of customers. CRM meets the needs of salespeople and marketing specialists in a single application. It provides immediate access to customer and product information. CRM can improve an organizations service to its employees and add more customers. There is a considerable reduction in mishaps in the organization with the implementation of CRM. It allows and encourages the business owners/management to concentrate on new business.
CRM provides up-to-date information to end-customers at every possible place and at all times. Customer Relationship Management is a prerequisite for today's business and organizations simply cannot afford to bypass this customer strategy.
Customer satisfaction is directly related to positive interaction with employees. Period. In today's competitive market your advantage comes from your customer's belief that your employees want to meet and exceed their expectations. Providing world-class service is the key to increasing your profit.
The longstanding reputation for incredible service and friendly employees at our destinations is not magic, it is sound ideology consistently applied in business.
Modalities Of Marketing.
Marketing is the process of making customers aware of the products and services of a company. It helps keep existing customers interested in a product or services. Advertisements play a potent role in projecting not only the credentials of a company but also helps in catering a product to the end users.
In other words, marketing is the process of planning and executing the pricing, promotion, and distribution of goods, ideas, and services in the marketplace. There are two major characteristics of marketing - expanding the existing customer base and the retention of existing customers.
The modalities of marketing depend on the audience the product or service is being targeted to. The budgets and use of marketing tools are made concurrent to the end users. Marketing depends on the theory of the Four Ps—product, price, promotion, and placement. Pricing is a process by which the price of a product is determined, while promotion refers to the various methods of promoting the product, brand, or company. Placement or distribution is a method that ensures that the product reaches the marketplace. Place refers to where a product or service is sold.
Advertising is the paid promotion of goods, services, and ideas by an identified sponsor. There are various methods by which a company can advertise their products; some of them include publicity, public relations, personal selling and sales promotion. Advertising is used to convey the availability of a ""product"" and to provide information regarding the product. There are three objectives of advertisements: communicate information about a particular product, persuade people to buy the product, and keep the organization in the public eye.
The major objectives of advertising include increasing short or long-term sales, market share, awareness, product trial, mind share, brand name recall, product use information, positioning or repositioning, and organizational image improvement.
Business Description
Marketing is a full-service marketing communications firm, specializing in small-sized and mid-sized manufacturers. It is a home-based, sole proprietorship
It relies heavily upon project management skills gained over a period of thirty years in business-to-business marketing communications, as many of the service tasks are performed by known and ed suppliers and vendors.
What Are Its Services?
In general, marketing planning, communications program planning and implementation. Implementation consists of the creation, production and distribution of marketing communications which consist of all or any combination of the following:
• Advertising
• Direct Marketing
• Sales Literature
• Catalogs
• Public Relations
• Web Site Design
• Sales Promotion/Merchandising
• Product/Service Names
• Trade Show Exhibits
• Engineering Presentations
• Sales Presentations
• Point-of-Purchase Displays
We will do all planning and as much of the creative writing as possible. We will always do the planning. We may do less of the creative writing as the business expands and requires more planning and project-management time.
What Makes Marketing Unique?
We believe that a major factor which separates Marketing from other marketing communications endeavors is our depth and breadth of experience.
Marketing is also developing a Resource Line which will allow our target manufacturing firms to more effectively use their customer and prospect lists.
Marketing Strategy
How Has Marketing Positioned Itself?
Marketing has positioned itself to be primarily a niche-market service supplier. Most established marketing communications firms, because of their overhead, cannot afford to spend time on the lower end of our annual sales volume objective.
The proprietor has an extremely varied background in terms of different kinds of clients served. This experience encompasses virtually all marketing venues and media.
We have an excellent grasp of technical processes, both in terms of product manufacturing and product application.
Marketing represents an excellent match for the small-sized to medium-sized manufacturing firm that doesn't have a large enough budget to attract an ad or PR agency with equal experience and expertise.
What Is the Nature of the Target Client?
Many of the target firms are entrepreneurial in nature. Their principal(s) wear many hats. They are intimately familiar with their business milieu. If they are successful, they figure they're doing just fine and don't want or need advertising. The old saw is, "we know who our customers and prospects are, we talk to them regularly."
To a degree, they are right. They may be selling in a niche market. Their customers and prospects may be small in number. The nature of their product(s) may be self-localizing, i.e. shipping costs and time may help define their geographical marketing area, hence its size. Almost everyone has local competition, however.
What Is the Precise Marketing Geography?
The counties of Wayne, Oakland and Macomb constitute the primary marketing geography.
Secondary geography is Washtenaw, Livingston and St. Clair counties.
After these, out state areas along the I-94 corridor would be tested.
Business opportunities from any source in neighboring areas would certainly be evaluated.
Marketing Assumptions
Information on which potential clients have ad and/or PR agencies is not readily available. This information must be obtained in order to reduce the number of prime prospects.
Many potential customers do not recognize the need for regular marketing communications activity. This may suggest the availability of more per-project work.
The target first contact, the Sales/Marketing Manager, is an extremely busy person and may be difficult to reach.
If there is no Sales/Marketing person, the CEO will be contacted, although he may be even more difficult to reach.
In the Detroit metro area, there are many North American headquarters for off-shore automotive suppliers. Most off-shore companies are not serious users of advertising and sales promotion.
Sales Strategy
Make cold contacts via letters of introduction followed by telephone calls. The approach will be made to the Marketing and/or Sales Manager where no Ad Manager can be identified.
Marketing/Sales Managers are extremely busy people who are responsible for the generation of sales materials where no Ad Manager exists. Some may rely upon an ad or PR agency.
If there is an Ad or Communications Manager, this person should be approached first.
The existence of such a person usually means one of two situations:
1) The company already has an agency, or;
2) They have an in-house operation.
Whatever situation is uncovered, contact should still be made. They may be dissatisfied with their present agency or in the process of disbanding their in-house operation. Even with an in-house operation, they may still go outside for some services including creative.
In addition to this formal effort, all opportunities resulting from networking and referrals must be followed up on.
Sales Tactics
1. Commence sales efforts with letters to 25 Fee-Based prospects per week, every other week. Use the two-week period to follow up with telephone calls for appointments.
2. Commence sales efforts with letters to 10 Project-Based prospects per week, every other week. Use the second week in the cycle for telephone follow-up.
3. Commence development work on the Resource Line. Prepare a best-guess time line for completion of a saleable program.
4. Re-evaluate sales efforts near the end of June for adjustment, if necessary.
The first-contact sales letter must introduce Cornelius Marketing as the assistance the busy person needs to help simplify his or her busy life. It must identify with the prospects milieu. It must back up CM's claim to be an experienced, versatile service partner. It must get across the fact that CM will work on either an annual-fee basis or on a per-project basis. The letter will close stating that a telephone call will follow within one week of receipt of the letter. It is important to follow up as stated as this will be the first indicator of performance, that we are dependable.
