Chapter 9: Customer Relationship Management and Business Intelligence

Common features included in contact management centers

1. automatic call distribution 2. interactive voice response (IVR) 3. predictive dialing

Operational CRM technologies for customer service

1. contact center 2. web-based self-service 3. call scripting

Operational CRM technologies for marketing

1. list generator 2. campaign management 3. cross-selling and up-selling

CRM benefits

1. provide better customer service 2. improve call center efficiency 3. cross-sell products more efficiently 4. help sales staff close deals faster 5. simplify marketing and sales processes 6. discover new customers 7. increase customer revenues

Business benefits of CRM

CRM is a business philosophy based on the premise that those organizations that understand the needs of individual customers are best positioned to achieve sustainable competitive advantage in the future.

Back office- analytical CRM

Collaborative CRM system <> Data warehouse, Data mining

strategic BI

helps with planning, results in marketing campaign

Customer relationship management

involves managing all aspects of a customer's relationship with an organization to increase customer loyalty and retention and an organization's profitability

Employee relationship management (ERM)

provides employees with a subset of CRM applications available through a web browser

Operational CRM

supports traditional transactional processing for day-to-day front-office operations or systems that deal directly with the customers

Reporting (Asking what happened)

what is the total revenue by customer? How many units did we manufacture? where did we sell the most products? What were total sales by product? How many customers did we serve? What are our inventory levels?

Operational CRM technologies for sales

1. sales management 2. contact management 3. opportunity management

unpredictable benefits

are the result of discoveries made by creative users

business intelligence (BI)

refers to applications and technologies that are used to gather, provide access to, and analyze data and information to support decision-making efforts

Front office-operational CRM

sales systems, marketing systems, customer service systems

categories of BI benefits

1. quantifiable benefits 2. indirectly quantifiable benefits 3. unpredictable benefits 4. intangible benefits

Three phases in the revolution of CRM

1. reporting 2. analyzing 3. predicting

Analyzing (asking why it happened)

Why did sales not meet forecasts? Why was production so low? Why did we not sell as many units as last year? Who are our customers? Why was customer revenue so high? Why are inventory levels so low?

sales force automation

a system that automatically tracks all of the steps in the sales process

call scripting systems

access organizational databases that track similar issues or questions and automatically generate the details to the customer service rep who can then relay them to the customer

Sales management CRM systems

automate each phase of the sales process, helping individual sales representatives coordinate and organize all their accounts. Features include calendars to help plan customer meetings, alarm reminders signaling important tasks, customizable multimedia presentations, and document generation.

List generator

compile customer information from a variety of sources and segment it for different marketing campaigns. Information sources include website visits, website questionnaires, online and offline surveys, flyers, toll-free numbers, current customer lists, and so on.

intangible benefits

include improved communication throughout the enterprise, improved job satisfaction of empowered users, and improved knowledge sharing

quantifiable benefits:

include working time saved in producing reports, selling information to suppliers, and so on

up-selling

increasing the value of the sale

contact management CRM system

maintains customer contact information and identifies prospective customers for future sales, using tools such as organizational charts, detailed customer notes, and supplemental sales information

CRM predicting technologies

Help organizations make predictions regarding customer behavior such as which customers are at risk of leaving

How can organizations using BI find the root cause of problems?

The process is initiated by analyzing a global report, say of sales per quarter. Every answer is followed by a new question, and users can drill deep down into a report to get to fundamental causes. Once they have a clear understanding of root causes, they can take highly effective action.

Data latency

The time duration to make data ready for analysis and loading the data into the database

Analysis latency

The time from which data are made available to the time when analysis is complete

decision latency

The time it takes a human to comprehend the analytic result and determine an appropriate action

automatic call distribution

a phone switch routes inbound calls to available agents

web-based self-service systems

allow customers to use the web to find answers to their questions or solutions to their problems

click-to-talk

allows customers to click on a button and talk with a representative via the internet

predictive dialing

automatically dials outbound calls and when someone answers, the call is forwarded to an available agent

Indirectly Quantifiable Benefits

can be evaluated through indirect evidence- improved customer service means new business from the same customer, and differentiated service brings new customers

interactive voice response (IVR)

directs customers to use touch-tone phones or keywords to navigate or provide information

campaign management systems

guide users through marketing campaigns by performing such tasks as campaign definition, planning, scheduling, segmentation, and success analysis

CRM reporting technologies

help organizations identify their customers across other applications.

CRM analysis technologies

help organizations segment their customers into categories such as best and worst customers

tactical BI

helps with daily analysis, results in refined campaign

operational BI

helps with immediate actions, results in sales revenue

CRM as a business strategy

our experience tells us that CRM is in no way, shape, or form a software application. Fundamentally, it is a business strategy to try to optimize profitability, revenue, and satisfaction at an individual level. Everything in an organization, every single process, every single application, is a tool that can be used to serve the CRM goal.

cross-selling

selling additional products or services to a customer

Analytical CRM

supports back-office operations and strategic analysis and includes all systems that do not deal directly with the customers

Opportunity management CRM systems

target sales opportunities by finding new customers or companies for future sales.

data mining

the process of analyzing data to extract information not offered by the raw data alone

Predicting (asking what will happen)

what customers are at risk of leaving? What products will the customer buy? Who are the best candidates for a mailing? What is the best way to reach the customer? What is the lifetime profitability of a customer? What transactions might be fraudulent?

contact center (call center)

where customer service representatives answer customer inquiries and solve problems, usually by email, chat, or phone