Search results matching tags 'CRM' and 'customer loyalty'

Dovetail Links 2009-09-14

Dovetail Software — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 20:21:00 GMT

Customer Respect Management: It's About Time

"Time is money for your company. The same holds true for your customers. Respecting their time is an essential aspect of great customer service that leads to long-term customer retention. Failure to respect their time can result not only in the loss of customers, but also in angry outpourings in the blogosphere that can embarrass and damage your business."

The Rise of the CRM Architect

"I think there’s a close parallel between how the construction industry changed and how the CRM industry will evolve. If we look at the CRM market today it’s apparent we’re still in the pre-architect era. If you want a CRM system, in the main you go to a CRM vendor. This is fine if the approach worked well, but I think realization is setting in that vendors may be pretty good with their technology, but applying it in a way that adds value just isn’t their forte. In tougher markets this situation seems unsustainable."

Trying to Get Smarter about Business Intelligence

"This lack of analytics has not gone unnoticed. Partially as a result of being caught unaware by the recent downturn and a desire to be more efficient, BI is at the top of everybody’s priority list. The problem, of course, is that it has been on the top of everybody’s priority list for over three years now, which in turn has started to create a certain amount of BI fatigue. So obviously, while the business spirit is willing, the skills are weak."

Looking for Loyalty?

"Customer experience management (CEM) is the latest buzzword to buzz saw its way through the thicket of customer-focused acronyms. The term is newly important: In a recent survey we conducted of 200 professionals, 63 percent said that CEM was very important to their organizations in 2009, up from 47 percent in 2008."

CRM, Meet Your Future

"It is really difficult to discuss CRM today without addressing some component of social media. Web 2.0 and social media practices have created the Social Customer. Companies that are not in a position to embrace their customers through social CRM strategies will quickly lose touch. Social media is not a separate entity but a blend of CRM interactional tactics. The same issues that caused CRM failures in the past will rear their ugly head in social media if the fix is to simply throw technology at them."

Dovetail Links 2009-04-28

Dovetail Software — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 22:22:00 GMT

A Worldwide Cauldron of Disloyalty, Dysfunction and Disconnects: Business To Business Customer Service

"Many of these businesses providing customer service grade their service quality much higher than their customers do. Credibility gone. These businesses also under perform in delivering the support services their customers value most. Customer satisfaction gone. In addition, these companies lack necessary technologies and training resources. Prowess gone. Disconnects and deficiencies run amok."

The Tough Get Going

"Like their innovative forebears, today’s customer-loyalty leaders understand that it’s not how much you invest during a recession, but where you invest and to what end that counts. Now more than ever, companies must invest in marketing initiatives that focus on the right customer groups and provide measurable returns. Here are two areas of investment that can help you sooner rather than later..."

CIOs: Here are 10 ways you can support your CEO

"The pressures on business leaders today are enormous: surviving the recession, being transparent and accountable while still growing and creating revenue streams, engendering customer loyalty and killer customer service, complying with growing regulations, pleasing shareholders, and inspiring employees amid layoffs and pay reductions. Here are a few ways you can help..."

CRM Offers Opportunity in Recession

"In an era, where issuing pink-slips, talking of cost cutting and re-thinking IT strategies have become the norm, one question that is constantly disturbing the CIO, or the IT organization in any enterprise, is: Should I opt for an on-demand or on-premise CRM solution?"

Six Smart CRM Strategies for Meeting Sales Quotas in a Down Economy

"There's no question that when the economy tanks, the job of the salesperson gets a whole lot harder. Sales cycles get longer, it's tougher to close, and negotiations are more difficult, leading to lower prices -- and thus lower sales commissions. But that doesn't mean you can't sell, and sell well. It just takes more focus and a smarter use of CRM and sales force automation (SFA) tools to keep the leads coming and meet sales quotas."

Dovetail Links 2009-04-14

Dovetail Software — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 15:02:00 GMT

Top Tips To Build and Keep Customer Loyalty With CRM

"Customers typically interact with an organization at two key points: when they buy products or services, and when they need help. Meaningful and effective communication at these points is critical, but many CRM systems only provide a shallow view of the data that would really support a quick response, meaning problems often get passed down the line until a scarce and costly expert source is found to help the by-now frustrated customer. The answer is to integrate CRM closely with fulfillment and inventory systems so that ‘real’ data can be fed to customer service in a transparent and easily accessible way."

Six Trends Changing Customer-Feedback Programs

"In a recent report entitled 'Voice of the Customer: The Next Generation,' Forrester Research found that analysis of unstructured and unsolicited data, inclusion of social media and more continuous feedback were among the trends changing how companies implement customer-feedback programs."

Risk-Proofing Your CRM Initiative

"Despite the recession, the need to create differentiation through unique customer experiences, strive for deeper insight into customer needs and behaviors, and serve customers cost-effectively remains. To support achievement of these goals, leading-edge CRM Relevant Products/Services technologies are much easier to use and offer faster time-to-value -- driving higher user adoption -- compared to solutions available three or four years ago."

BI Tools to Increase Customer Loyalty

"In the present economic downturn, organizations are attempting to increase customer loyalty as customer relationship may be the only source of revenue that can be counted on, the report said. David Hatch, VP and group director, Aberdeen, said, "'While traditional Business Intelligence (BI) solutions continue to address the strategic information needs of decision-makers with analysis of historical data and period-based trending, organizations are realizing the potential of applying BI technology and approaches to more immediate information needs.'"

It’s Time for a Balanced Scorecard for Customer Data

"The volume of customer data is proliferating at an ever-increasing rate. There is data from transactions, from website visits, from social networks and of course and from many other sources. And there is hidden data about customers fundamental needs that drive successful innovation. All of this data needs bringing together intelligently, so that it can be used by customers and companies to co-create value together."

Dovetail Links 2008-08-24

Dovetail Software — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 21:19:00 GMT

Customer Experience Management: Rx for the Top and Bottom Lines

"CEOs across companies and industries have become focused in 2008 on the critical role that customer experience plays in keeping their companies competitive and driving profitability. These same CEOs are challenging their CMOs to move beyond CRM (a transactional, inside-out approach) to Customer Experience Management (CEM), which takes an outside-in approach to the customer experience by providing the right touch to the right customer at the right time, every time."

Customer Loyalty: The Customer Loyalty Myth

"Customer loyalty is one of many topics generating discussion this week in the world of CRM-centric blogs. What's customer loyalty worth? Many might instinctively respond to that question by saying loyalty is worth quite a lot, but is loyalty in and of itself a worthy goal to pursue? It's awfully difficult to measure, and it doesn't necessarily have much bearing on a company's bottom line."

Reporting and the Two Great Fibs of the CRM Industry

"Fib number one – 'The CRM system comes with 200 standard reports which will meet most of your needs' (cue the salesperson to point to a long and seemingly exhaustive list of reports on the screen). In reality each organisation’s processes and informational needs are unique and are rarely met by the out of the box standard reports. This is exacerbated by the fact that many CRM software developers seem to have been rather more rather more focused on developing the long list of standard reports, rather than ones that might be useful or insightful."

Baby Steps with SOA Governance Can Avoid IT/Business Power Plays

Great roundup of blogger opinions on the role of human politics in SOA governance.

The Olympic Standard of World Class - for IT

"IT is not an individual sport like swimming. It is even much larger and more complicated than a 4-person relay event. While Michael Phelps is 100% responsible for his own dedication, it is much more difficult for a 25+ person IT organization to achieve a uniform degree of focus and discipline. To my mind, this really begs a few questions about 'World Class.'"

Are CRM and Customer Service Strangers to Each Other?

admin — Tue, 08 May 2007 21:19:00 GMT

CRM will continue to be an unsatisfying investment to executives until it enlarges its focus to include customer service and support. Merging analytics and the customer loyalty paradigm into the sales force automation model disguises the fact that enterprise culture doesn’t really understand customer service, and remains tightly focused on top-line revenues that derive from the actual sale.

“Customers are asking for technologies to enable them to accomplish four things: quickly understand a customer’s intentions in contacting the contact center; locate the information that pertains to the service request; analyze the best “next step” to take with the customer; and capture an opportunity or lead where appropriate. To this end, analytics and business rule engines will play a more significant role in this process, and collaboration technologies will be essential to connect employees and customers as part of the service experience.” – Service and Support Leader Corner

But customer loyalty offers can only work with customers who stay with you in the first place, and customer retention itself follows from genuine service and support. Despite some rhetoric, the CRM development industry as a whole remains locked in its focus on SFA and analytics, and the Forgotten Space of customer service and support continues to fall outside of development plans.

“Companies give lip service to the issue and say they want to improve customer service, but budgets for training and salaries remain static,” – Five Tips To Optimize New Service-Rep CRM Training

The market remains fragmented, with differing degrees of service and support capabilities offered from the major CRM vendors. Siebel has in recent years been the strongest in this area, appearing top in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant report covering CRM customer service and support suite vendors. Amdocs also figured as a strong competitor, with the drawback that the company targets the telecommunications vertical.

”’There’s more of a fragmentation in the marketplace,’ said Michael Maoz, distinguished analyst with Gartner and author of the report. ‘The idea that there’s a customer service and support suite, that hasn’t panned out. It’s too complex an issue the way a business achieves customer service excellence. We’re not seeing any one vendor or any one vendor type able to create a full suite.’” – Gartner ranks customer service software

Owners of Amdocs Clarify owners, who by and large are neglected outside the telco space, can make great gains in service and support with Dovetail CRM, which is developed specifically to enhance the Clarify install overall. Dovetail supplies replacement applications for all the Amdocs products, leaving only the database core, with which all Dovetail apps seamlessly interact.

The greatest sea change in CRM development is the shift in the call center from cost center to profit center, and the concurrent technological challenge to rewire the enterprise to customer-centricity. Corporate culture remains the hardest thing to change, and focus on top line revenues forces customer-centricity into a front-office model, rather than a whole-company service approach.

“Customers expect a seamless experience, one that reaches across channels, whether they contact a company first via the Web or online, they want to be able to continue that process in the other channel. Additionally, “secret” service is enabling this process, acting as an unseen person in the communication loop aiding the experience, whether it’s through proactive chat when someone abandons an online shopping cart or a premier customer struggling with the IVR. Service avoidance is also emerging as customers are turning to communities of their peers to help solve problems.” – Social networks forcing customer service change

Analysts and experts continue to lecture the enterprise in the nature of customer service, and the nature of the customer. Companies learn slowly, and even though it is well demonstrated that scrimping on customer care backfires, in the end, as we suggest often, it may be the saturation of the enterprise in collaboration systems that changes the culture into one of truly caring for customers.