Overview of Relationship Marketing

Basis of Building Relationship

Types of Relationship Marketing
Customer Life Cycle

Re ionship m r e ing is f ce of cus omer re ionship m n gemen (CRM) h focuses

on cus omer o nd ong- erm cus omer eng gemen r her h n shor er- erm go s i e
cus omer c uisi ion nd individu s es. The go of re ionship m r e ing (or cus omer
re ionship m r e ing) is o cre e s rong, even emo ion , cus omer connec ions o br nd
h c n e d o ongoing business, free word-of-mou h promo ion nd inform ion from
cus omers h c n gener e e ds.
Re ionship m r e ing s nds in con r s o he more r di ion r ns c ion
m r e ing ppro ch, which focuses on incre sing he number of individu s es. n he
r ns c ion mode , he re urn on cus omer c uisi ion cos m be insufficien . A cus omer
m be convinced o se ec h br nd one ime, bu wi hou s rong re ionship m r e ing
s r eg , he cus omer m no come b c o h br nd in he fu ure. Whi e org niz ions
combine e emen s of bo h re ionship nd r ns c ion m r e ing, cus omer re ionship
m r e ing is s r ing o p more impor n ro e for m n comp nies.
Re ionship m r e ing invo ves hose oo s needed o inform he cus omers bou
he new offers nd v ri n s of he br nd. so es o e rn referr s from exis ing
cus omers nd m e s rong cus omer re ions. does no invo ve s r egies on o
incre se he number of consumers, bu o more hings h n his.
invo ves processes or s eps i e cus omer experience m n gemen , e d gener ion
m n gemen , rge ed inform ion, u om ion oo s for m r e ing, in er in ing of
cus omer re ionship m n gemen oo s, e c. hese processes b end oge her o give he
desired re ionship m r e ing s r egies nd oo s. The effec is no specific o produc or
service h he br nd h s o offer whi e i h s i s effec on he comp n s who e. is
upon he comp n ’s br nd im ge nd rus h re ionship m r e ing c n m e or bre .
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cus omer. is c ering o he ch nging needs of he cus omer nd m ing him/her h pp .
es in o ccoun ever s ep h wou d e d o re ining nd g ining new cus omers.
so h s o be in s nc wi h he comp n ’s vision nd ide ion. The cus omers shou d fee i
s burden bu shou d genuine connec o he comp n nd he br nd. is m ing
me ningfu , ong- s ing wi h re ion ppro ch ow rds cus omer re en ion.

 Communicate frequently
 Offer customer rewards
 Hold special events
 Build two-way communication
 Enhance your customer service
 Launch multicultural programs
 Implement omnichannel marketing experiences

Examples of Brands that uses Relationship Marketing Strategy :

1. Starbucks
Starbucks changed the way the world drinks coffee. The company taps into the
power of social media to connect with their loyal customers, using their social
channels and app to send special offers to their followers and build anticipation for
product launches. When they bring back seasonal favourites, they have long lines of
returning, loyal customers patiently waiting. They also share quick videos and images
of customers drinking their product on Instagram. Sharing user-generated content
shows that you appreciate your fans, and those fans will come back for more.

2. Amazon
Amazon is the master at making things easy for their customers, which drives loyalty
and repeat business. They drive sales through customer wish lists, make the
purchase and shipping process easy, and offer lightning fast, free delivery for
 customers who pay for prime membership. They also make returns easy – and free –
with their drop-off locations or return shipping labels. People like simple. Amazon
makes things simple.

 Basic Marketing
 Reactive Marketing
 Accountable Marketing
 Proactive Marketing
 Partnership Marketing

1. Long-term customer retention

2. Reduces marketing and advertising expenses
3. Raise sales volume
4. Provides valuable feedback
5. Offers competitive edge
6. Provide sustainability

Relationship marketing is based on the tenets of customer experience management (CEM),

which focuses on improving customer interactions to foster better brand loyalty. While these
interactions can still occur in person or over the phone, much of relationship marketing and
CEM has taken to the Web.

With the abundance of information on the Web and flourishing use of social media, most
consumers expect to have easy, tailored access to details about a brand and even expect
the opportunity to influence products and services via social media posts and online reviews.
Today, relationship marketing involves creating easy two-way communication between
customers and the business, tracking customer activities and providing tailored information
to customers based on those activities.

For example, an e-commerce site might track a customer's activity by allowing them to
create a user profile so that their information is conveniently saved for future visits, and so
that the site can push more tailored information to them next time. Site visitors might also be
able to sign in through Facebook or another social media channel, allowing them a simpler
user experience and automatically connecting them to the brand's social media presence.

This is where CRM and marketing automation software can support a relationship marketing
strategy by making it easier to record, track and act on customer information. Social CRM
tools go further by helping to extend relationship marketing into the social media sphere,
allowing companies to more easily monitor and respond to customer issues on social media
channels, which in turn helps maintain a better brand image.
 1. Establish trust and loyalty with customers.
2. Improve customer retention rates.
3. Increase word-of-mouth marketing
4. Gain a competitive advantage
5. Enhance customer lifetime value
6. Improve customer satisfaction levels
7. Boost brand awareness and equity
8. Reduce marketing costs
9. Generate higher quality leads
10. Increase sales and revenue

1) Showing genuine concern for your customers

2) Building trust and commitment
3) Providing excellent customer service
4) Prioritizing customer retention (not acquisition)
5) Focusing on how a product/service benefits the customer
6) Maintaining ongoing communication with customers
7) Offering multiple ways customers can get in touch for support
8) Rewarding customer loyalty with gifts, discounts, etc.

Building a relationship marketing strategy with a solid foundation is possible when you follow
relationship marketing best practices. Here’s what to focus on when adding relationship
development strategies in marketing:

1) Focus on the needs of your customers

2) Listen to your customers’ feedback
3) Be available on your customers’ terms
4) Be authentic and informative with your content and message
5) Add a personal touch to your customer experience (i.e., personalized offers)
6) Offer ongoing support to customers
7) Show customers you appreciate them (i.e., send gifts or use loyalty programs)

 Adopting omnichannel methods if you don’t have the staff or tools to do so

 Responding to customers questions and concerns quickly
 Personalizing content and campaigns based on data
 Trying to rekindle interest from an old customer
 Getting company-wide adoption of a relationship marketing approach
 Dealing with complex software tools
Definition :

Customer lifecycle refers to the steps a consumer passes through on the path to becoming a
loyal customer. A customer goes through various steps regarding product discovery,
purchase, and loyalty to the brand. A consumer goes through various stages before, during,
and after they complete a transaction is called a customer’s journey.

You have to put efforts to nurture customers throughout these stages that allow you to grow
customer loyalty. It is good to document these stages in a customer journey mapping, a
documentation presentation of the consumer’s touchpoints with your brand.

Stages in Customer Life Cycle :

 Reach
 Acquisition
 Conversion
 Retention
 Advocacy
 CRM - Overview and Evolution of the Concept
CRM and Relationship Marketing
CRM Strategy
Importance of Customer Divisibility in CRM

History
It’s no secret that customers and customer satisfaction drive the growth of your organization.
Since the pre-PC era, business owners and entrepreneurs have been forging ways to
capture and capitalize on invaluable information of their customers. Let’s take a look at how
their CRM journey has progressed from being a mere necessity for data entry to becoming a
boon for their business.
The 1950s
Businesses recorded their day-to-day tasks on pen and paper. File cabinets were purchased
in bulk to support the documentation process while tracking information and updates
became increasingly frustrating. Later in the year 1956, the first rolling index or Rolodex was
invented to store contact information of business prospects.
The 1960s
Most businesses reached out to their customers by scheduling on-ground meetings. Sales
executives would sell products either by engaging with people in one-on-one sessions or
cold calling.
The 1970s
With the emergence of early mainframe computers came the ability to register customer
information such as name, address and transaction history on a standalone digital database.
Database marketing enabled businesses to customize communications to their customers
with targeted messages and monitor business relationships as they progressed, on a
screen.
Customer databases were created to enable business-to-customer(B2C) marketing, and
business databases were created to allow business-to-business(B2B) marketing.
The 1980s
In the year 1987, a digital version of the Rolodex called ACT! was launched by Conductor
Software. It had a contact management tool built-in and paved the way for Content
Management Systems or CMS prototypes to be developed.
ACT! Was earlier known as Activity Control Technology and later renamed as Automated
Contact Tracking before settling on the acronym.
The 1990s
Database marketing expanded its set of features like tracking and analysing customer data
while allowing trivial tasks to be automated, transforming itself into Sales Force Automation
(SFA). By 1995, SFAs were capable of converting leads and automating marketing
campaigns at the click of a button, and the term Customer Relationship Management or
CRM was coined. In 1999, Salesforces launched the first cloud-based CRM as an affordable
alternative to on-premise CRM.
2000s: The Age of Start-ups and Innovation
CRM matures to incorporate all business interactions and processes on a single platform.
Cloud adoption was catching up and Mobile CRM was a revolution. Social CRM was
famous.
The 2010s - Modern CRM Systems
With the advent of mobile computing and Big Data in recent years, CRM solutions are now
fully equipped to manage sales pipelines and deliver outstanding customer experiences for
small businesses, mid-size enterprises, and large multinational corporations. Modern CRM
tools can project pragmatic sales forecasts for every quarter and can be integrated with
social media platforms and a surplus of applications, including Zapier and Gmail.

1) Customer centricity is the key: CRM will focus on creating engagement and
experiences that delight the customer.

2) A Voice- for both customers and sellers: Smart voice assistants will be a demand not
only for back office support but also to help reps with tedious tasks.

3) AI and ML will become a norm: For higher customer success, CRMs will increasingly
to smart algorithms and neural networks to assist humans with better decision making.

4) Blockchain technology: For security-related capabilities blockchain may find a huge

application in protecting customer data.

5) IoT: Data produced everywhere will improve customer success. Connected CRMs will
help users significantly improve customer service/success efforts.

6) Mobile: Complete sales engagement via mobile can be empowering.

7) Personalization: One-size-fits-all CRMs will find it more difficult to close a deal.

Customizations and personalization are an increasing demand among the tech-savvy
sales teams.

8) Social Network Component: CRMs without a social network component are dead.
Customer relationship marketing (CRM) is a technique based on client relationships and
customer loyalty. Using customer data and feedback, companies utilizing this marketing
strategy develop long-term relationships with customers and develop laser-focused brand
awareness. Customer relationship marketing varies greatly from the traditional transactional
marketing approach that focuses on increasing individual sale numbers.

Companies that prioritize customer relationships, on the other hand, strive to create strong
customer connections, which may be emotional, to their brand to promote customer loyalty
and increase customer lifetime value. They benefit from word-of-mouth promotion and
develop brand ambassadors.

In general, relationship marketing is a sales and marketing method, while the CRM concept
refers to the software and processes used to manage the marketing methods. Relationship
marketing is implemented as a strategy and includes activities such as identifying long-term
sales and retention goals, public relations, marketing and advertising campaigns.

The use of customer relationship management includes the operational tasks that support
the relationship marketing strategy. Activities may include gathering data about the
customers, then organizing and analysing it to create target customer profiles. CRM data is
also effective in finding opportunities to create special offers to reward long-time customers
for their loyalty, further building the relationship.

Relationship marketing seeks to increase sales by building trust and engaging customers. A
CRM guide notes that by using a customer relationship management system effectively, a
salesperson can quickly and consistently deliver what customers are looking for with each
and every interaction, because their preferences and buying history are recorded.

The system benefits the customers, in a way, because they see the business "knows" them.
CRM systems coordinate, automate and deliver online and offline advertising and marketing
activities that help build long-term customer relationships. This is the essence of modern
marketing, and it is by using these methods that companies can create a successful
relationship marketing strategy.
 Customers’ Needs
 Customers Response
 Customer Satisfaction
 Customer Loyalty
 Customer Retention
 Customer Complaints
 Customer Service

 Acquiring & Storing Information

 Customer Management
 Management Of Marketing Policies
 Increase Sales
 Proper Communication Network
 Cost Controlling
 Improve Quality

 CRM for sales management

 CRM for marketing
 CRM for customer service
 CRM for business intelligence

 Better customer service

 Increased sales
 Improved customer retention
 Detailed analytics
 Higher productivity and efficiency
 Centralized database of information
 Managed communications with prospective leads
 Improved customer segmentation
 Automated sales reports
 More accurate sales forecasting
 Streamlined internal communications

Top Management Commitment and Support

Define and Communicate CRM Strategy
Culture Change
Inter-Departmental Integration
Skilful Staff
Key Information on Customers
Manage IT Structure
Customer Involvement

Proper Business Strategy

Suitable Interaction Medium
Train Employees
Proper Sales Process & Channel
Set Target for Team
Establishing Data Management Techniques
Choosing Proper CRM Software
The more a company knows, or can find out, about its customers and then apply, the better
it's able to personalize and customize each experience, and so influence to loyalty
behaviour. Every customer touching process comes down to gathering, managing, and using
data to optimize loyalty. At the peak of customer insight is the opportunity to make the
customer 'divisible' down to an individual level.

Most customers have some customer data, drawn principally from transactions. The
feedback they get is largely reactive, where the customer initiates contact. There are
tremendous gaps between information and insight. Insight : An understanding of customer
needs, problems, expectations and complaints that is thorough enough to provide value in
the relationship with each customer. Companies need disciplined techniques to gather,
store, share and apply customer data so that it can be distilled into strategic insight.

When they do this optimally, they often find that customers have multiple identities, different
demographic, lifestyle, purchase, and other characteristics which can be leveraged
depending upon the marketing, communication, or promotional program, new product
development effort, or process improvement or modification activity being conducted. We
can say that the customer is divisible. Applying customer divisibility techniques in the pre-PC
days was pretty primitive stuff, more about blending art and science, data availability, data
management and warehousing, and software sophistication for profiling has made divisibility
much more possible today.

A good example of an industry which illustrates customer divisibility on a fairly large scale is
the gaming business. This industry is both highly competitive and pretty advanced in how
they gather and use customer data. Loyalty cards, with data generated when the players first
become customers, and then updated at cashless slot machines and gaming tablets enable
them to overlay casino play with changing customer profiles. With a clear understanding of
each customer's likes and dislikes, patterns and preferences, can deliver targeted offers and
incentives, and use the information to improve our operations.

Knowing customer better will give company a distinct competitive advantage in the
marketplace. And that advantage will mean increased customer loyalty. Some people are
known to have multiple personalities. Multiple personalities are useful metaphor for
considering the opportunities represented by customer divisibility. The same individual may
save several identities, depending upon the marketing, communication, promotional program
planned, product or concept being developed, frequency and type of contact desired, or
customer-related process being created or modified. This is the essence of personalization.

With sufficient detailed information about each customer, supplier’s marketers, sales and
service should treat divisibility as a competitive advantage. They can parlay customers data
into the insight which enables them to optimize value for each customer, no matter what
aspect of the customer's individual profile, or personality, is involved.
 Sales Force Automation
Contact Management – Concept
Enterprise Marketing Management – Core Beliefs
CRM in India

Automation is essential in CRM considering the requirement of handling a huge size of

customer base and the level of complexity in each sales force related or marketing related
tasks. CRM makes use of three types of automation: Sales Force Automation (SFA),
Marketing Automation (MA), and Services Automation (SA).
CRM needs to be accessed by various people in the business. It is most frequently
accessed and used by salespersons and managers of the sales activities at various ranks of
seniority. Salesforces is a software that works as a supporting system for the salespersons
and managers to achieve their work related objectives. SFA technology helps a business to
collect, store, modify, analyse, and transport the sales related data. SFA is the strategy used
to drive efficiencies in your sales processes.

SFA Solution Providers

Some SFA providers are specialists focus on a particular functionality of SFA. They compete
against enterprise solution providers (who provide a complete range of business solutions
such as Supply Chain Management (SCM), Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), and
CRMs) and also some providers of CRM suites that include SFA modules. Some renowned
SFA specialists are as given below –

SFA Specialist SFA as Part of CRM Suite SFA as Part of Enterprise Suite

Cyberform Microsoft Dynamics IBM

Salesnet Salesforce.com Oracle

Selectica SalesLogix SAP

The CRM solution providers also come up with configurators, the software engines that
allows the customers to customize their products. Since the configurators help to build
customized products, the stress on the salespersons of handling complex data without errors
is reduced. In turn, their training cost is also reduced.
For example, Dell computers allows its customers to interact with the configurator. The
customers can select devices of their own choice and specifications, and build their own
computers.
SFA software is used by various salespersons such as salespersons in B2B and B2C
contexts, door-to-door salesmen, direct sellers, online sellers, etc. It is used by managers to
track customers, manage sales pipelines, customize the offers, and generate reports, to
name a few.

Functionalities of SFA Software

1. Account management
2. Contact management
3. Contract management
4. Document management
5. Event management
6. Incentives management
7. Lead management
8. Opportunities management
9. Order management
10. Pipeline management
11. Product Encyclopaedia
12. Product Configuration
13. Product Visualization
14. Quotation management
15. Sales prediction

Benefits of SFA :

1) It increases accuracy
2) It allows your sales team better use of their time
3) It ensures no lead is forgotten
4) It fosters smart sales forecasts
5) It boosts employee engagement and retention
6) It reduces the cost of workforce resources
7) It allows quick responses
Contact management is a means of entering customer and lead data for storage, quick access,
editing and tracking. Contact management can be as simple as a spreadsheet or as complex as
customer relationship management (CRM) software.

By digitizing contact management, you can give your employees access to valuable customer
data. All departments can view the same data, so you speed up communication and streamline
processes. When you make communication more efficient, you can focus less on business tasks
and more on your customers.

In today’s business environment, you have to do more than just personalize a sales email with
someone’s name in order to make a sale. Customers are loyal to companies that remember their
specific preferences, and they expect a stellar experience every time they place an order online
or receive a package in the mail. Going above and beyond not only creates repeat sales but also
encourages referrals, which could significantly decrease your overall customer acquisition
costs.

Contact management software

Contact management software can keep information about your prospects and current
customers organized in a searchable format. The software can handle basic information,
such as names, phone numbers and email addresses. It can also track fundamental
interactions between the company and the contact, and keep track of important calendar
events.
How can contact management within a CRM help your business?

 Updated contact information

 Targeted customer interactions
 Lead progress monitoring
 Higher returns via analytics
 Omnichannel communication
 Centralized data platform

Enterprise Marketing Management in CRM is a module that helps in providing, maintaining, and
monitoring the structure of promotional campaigns by an enterprise. It is like a marketing
assistant for enterprises. Enterprises are large organizations that generate $100 Million+ in the
Annual Recurring Revenue. So, for these enterprises, enterprise marketing management module
works as a single platform to fulfil all their marketing needs such as omnichannel campaign
management, campaign analysis, managing marketing resources and customer experience
management. EMM in CRM ensures excellent customer experience from presales to post sales
stages.
Enterprise Marketing Management (EMM) is closely related to Customer Relationship
Management (CRM), but it supports majorly the marketing related activities. Apart from
maintaining the customer database, it also assists in generating new leads.

Components of Enterprise Marketing Automation in CRM :

1. Market Segmentation
2. Campaign Management
3. Retargeting
 4. Promotional Partnership
5. Call Centre Management
6. Response Management
7. Event Marketing

Tips for Successful Enterprise Marketing Management

 Find a balance between account-based and enterprise-based marketing

 Diversify and scale

 Always take a helping hand

 Networking is the key

 Go beyond your Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Examples : Monday.com, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Adobe Workfront, Oracle CX Marketing,

Wrike, HCL Unica

Core Beliefs :

1. Integration of data at every touchpoint. Information is critical in the marketing decision

process and as such it must flow freely at every point in the process.

2. Collaboration—not just within the internal marketing value chain but also with the
external value chains of suppliers and vendors.

3. Availability of data, resources, materials, and documents. It is important that marketing

resources are available to all when needed to complete their job.

4. Proactive tracking and management of marketing strategies, tactics, campaigns, and

initiatives. You need to know where everything is; what is on time and what is late; who
has too much work and who doesn’t have enough; what has worked and what hasn’t.

5. Key marketing performance indicators defined within a balanced framework available

to all. This entails a disciplined approach to defining objectives and facilities to allow
team members to understand cause and effect. It also entails providing managers with
information on performance through either lead or lag measures.

Store data The CRM or Customer Relationship Management is a great strategy for the
business and in the world, where there exists cutthroat competition. The CRM is a
discipline that allows the companies for identifying and also for targeting the profitable
clients and customers. The Impact of Customer Relationship Management in
India incorporates advance and new marketing strategies for retaining the existing clients
and customers, and also for acquiring new clients and buyers. The concept and practice
to maintain one to one relationship with the clients was originally introduced in the 90s,
when the financial services, and some other industries as well as the airline sector stated
for rewarding for retaining the existing clients and service users by introducing various
loyalty programs.

The various facets of CRM in India

Nowadays, several financial organizations are the pioneers in creating strategies for
retaining the clients as well as the customers. Institutions such as banks, now hire
dedicated team of relationship managers. Many institutions have felt the need and Impact
of Customer Relationship Management in India for providing the customers with the variety
of customized or personalized services. Most of the time driven by reasons such as
improving the satisfaction of the clients and also retaining the older customers, Customer
Relationship Management aids to understand the customers or even segmenting the focus
to sales and also for various marketing activities. Individuals will notice that their
profitability increases in the cross-selling promotions, pricing of the products and also
anticipated information of the clients, customers as well as service users.

More about Customer Relationship Management

The life-time value of an organization escalates or increases if one allows for thinking about
the probable prospects and also over-all returns on relationship, which is developed over
a period of time. The CRM systems should perfectly blend with the operational and back
office systems for providing seam-less, real-time data of the customers. The Customer
Relationship Management not only serves the customers far better, but also serves the
clients in the most excellent and interesting ways as well. Well, the Impact of Customer
Relationship Management in India helps the businesses for thinking about and considering
ways for re-establishing their businesses. The future is bright for the Indian companies,
and CRM would bring new methods and ways for mid-sized as well as small businesses
for communicating, operating and managing the strategies for the businesses.

The future is bright for the Indian companies

After-all, each and every business aspires for earning big! The aim of Customer
Relationship Management is for evaluating and creating ways for building strong bonds
between the company and its employees, or the clients and the customers. Nowadays,
the companies slowly understand the strong and positive Impact of Customer Relationship
Management in India.

Choose Impact of Customer Relationship Management in India and know the details
If you are looking for the best deal then you will have to understand the need for different
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Relationship Management in India and perhaps that can take you a long way. So, finally,
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Get basic ideas about what would work for you

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 The other method can be to transcribe the data from the questionnaire to a coding
sheet.
 Whatever method is adopted, one should see that coding errors are altogether
eliminated or reduced to the minimum level.

to each other and helps further in statistical research and interpretation. In other words,
tabulation is a method of arranging or organizing data in a tabular form. The tabulation process
may be simple or complex depending upon the type of categorization.

Tabulation is defined as the process of placing classified data in tabular form. A table is a
systematic arrangement of statistical information in rows and columns. The rows of a table are
the horizontal arrangement of data whereas the columns of a table are the vertical
arrangement of data.
 Value Chain – Concept
Integration Business Management
Benchmarks and Metrics
Culture Change
Alignment with Customer Eco-system
Vendor Selection

The concept of a value chain was derived by Michael Porter. He put forth the idea of the
value chain as a means of identifying all actions, processes or stages that are involved in
creating outputs from inputs. These outputs are offered to a customer who is at the end of
the line of the value chain. The amount a customer is willing to pay for a product or a service
is its value. The revenue for a business is the total value less the cost that it has incurred in
providing the product to the customer. CRM Value Chain Model is a set of strategies that a
business ought to follow when developing their CRM strategies. Most modern businesses
work on the principle of Customer Relationship Management as it helps to deliver value to
customer and creates, as well as, manages the relationship of a business with its customers
in a more effective manner. A valuable relationship with one strategically significant
customer can lead to customer loyalty, retention and finally to referrals to other potential
customers.
Who is a strategically significant customer?
A customer who creates great value for a business is deemed to be a valuable customer for
the business. In order to retain such a customer for a period of time, the business has to
follow some strategies. Only about 20% of all the customers of a business can be said to be
strategically significant customers. They generate more revenue, value and loyalty for a
business and the business has to deal with them in an entirely different manner than the rest
of its customers. Strategically significant customers (SSC) buy more, are trend setters, and
act as referrals for the business.

There are four types of SSC. The one on top is the High lifetime value customer as these
customers create the greatest value for the business. Lifetime value potential of a customer
is derived by calculating the present value of all future profits that a business might earn
from one single customer. One thing to consider is that not all high volume customers can be
regarded as high lifetime value customers. The next type of SSC is known as Benchmarks.
These are the well-known customers, and that other consumers are likely to emulate. The
third type is the Inspirations. These are customers who inspire a company to change its
products or reduce costs. The last of the SSC are what are referred as the cost magnets.
These customers pay for a large percentage of fixed costs so that the product can be sold to
smaller consumers at a profitable margin.

5 Primary Stages for Implementation of CRM Value Chain

1. Customer portfolio analysis,
2. Customer intimacy,
3. Network development,
4. Value proposition development and finally
5. Manage customer lifecycle.

What Is Business Integration?

The shape of business is changing, and this change is being driven by digitization. Today’s
global business ecosystem both requires and enables companies to digitally connect,
communicate and collaborate with customers, suppliers, partners, service vendors, and all
other players in the supply chain. Indeed, the modern supply chain has become a digital
ecosystem in itself, through which closer collaboration and new joint work practices are
made possible.
Why Do We Need Business Integration?
The foundations of business integration stem from companies needing a way to exchange
information quickly and efficiently. The simple fact of the matter is that in the digital world,
faxes and emails don’t cut the mustard anymore. But of course, as organizations have
moved along their own digital transformation journeys, they each have taken their own
approach to exchanging messages and files with trading partners. However, this results in
each business in a supply chain using its own distinct blend of applications, cloud resources,
and various other systems, all of which rely on differing formats and platforms, and are
subject to different security, compliance and governance considerations. These disparate
systems don’t necessarily communicate with one another, and it is simply too inefficient and
costly to deploy a multitude of solutions to contend with the sheer diversity of communication
standards, data formats and security frameworks each business deals with. And so,
business integration solutions, strategies and technologies are required to manage the
chaos, and enable separate companies to seamlessly communicate and exchange
business-critical information between each other quickly and efficiently.

The ultimate goal of business integration, then, is to improve upon the speed and
productivity of conducting digital transactions across the supply chain and value chain. In
addition, business integration reduces the need for error-prone, costly, and time-consuming
manual processes.

For example, most companies now receive purchase orders from other businesses
electronically, often via email. In the past, processing these purchase orders was a manual
affair – an employee had to conduct a review, and then manually enter the information into
an order fulfilment system of some kind. But with a business integration solution, when the
company receives a purchase order, it is automatically reviewed and passed along into the
order fulfilment system, minimizing delays for orders being fulfilled.

Competitive Advantages
As working with external companies is fundamental to practically every business operating
today, business integration essentially represents the digital transformation of these external
relationships. Business integration solutions present a clear competitive advantage – they
make it easier to share and receive mission-critical information between an organization and
its trading partners.

More specifically, key advantages include reduced costs through eliminating human handling
in areas such as data entry, clerical document preparation and mailroom sorting. In addition,
the risk of human error is reduced, thereby avoiding costly corrections in business
documents.
Organizations can also expect improved operational efficiencies within their trading
community. The secure, fast, and effective transmission of data means trading partners can
cooperate, collaborate and communicate more effectively. And with better collaboration,
spending visibility is improved, as is visibility into inventory pipelines, and supplier activity.

Business integration solutions also lead to better data quality, again, as there is less chance
for human error from employees manually entering data. The error rate for manual data
entry is around 1% – which can be very damaging and costly for businesses. If an order is
incorrect, it has to be rectified, and a new order must then be issued, slowing the whole
process down, while increasing the costs involved for all partners. Business integration
solutions improve data quality not only by reducing the risk of human error, but also by
creating a “virtual quarantine” that ensures the integrity and accuracy of data flowing from an
organization’s trading partners before it enters enterprise applications. In this way,
organizations can have full confidence in data quality, and thereby in the business
integration system to facilitate the end-to-end data exchange required to automate business
processes

Benefits of Integrated Business Management :

 Information security best practice.
 Efficiency
 Scale more easily
 Alignment
 Strategy
 Whole-brain thinking
 Consistency

What is benchmarking?
In business, benchmarking is a process used to measure the quality and performance of
your company’s products, services, and processes. These measurements don’t have much
value on their own—that data needs to be compared against some sort of standard. A
benchmark.
The objective of benchmarking is to use the data gathered in your benchmarking process to
identify areas where improvements can be made by:
• Determining how and where other companies are achieving higher performance levels than
your company has been able to achieve.
• Comparing the competition’s processes and strategies against your own.
• Using the information, you gather from your analyses and comparisons to implement
changes that will improve your company’s performance, products, and services.
Why is benchmarking important?
The goal of your business should be to grow, improve processes, increase quality, decrease
costs, and earn more money. Benchmarking is one of many tools you can use as part of any
continuous improvement model used within your organization. Consistent benchmarking can
help you:
 Improve processes and procedures.
 Gauge the effectiveness of past performance.
 Give you a better idea of how the competition operates, which will help you to identify
best practices to increase performance.
 Increase efficiency and lower costs, making your business more profitable.
 Improve quality and customer satisfaction.

Types of benchmarking
 Internal benchmarking
 Competitive benchmarking
 Strategic benchmarking

8 steps in the benchmarking process

1. Select a subject to benchmark
2. Decide which organizations or companies you want to benchmark
3. Document your current processes
4. Collect and analyse data
5. Measure your performance against the data you’ve collected
6. Create a plan
7. Implement the
8. Repeat the process

Metrics play a vital role in the development and success of any business. Talking about
CRM, we use the term metrics for tracking the complete performance and success. It allows
us to have appropriate control over the marketing and selling efforts. Using CRM metrics, we
can react effectively by tracking the happenings closely. It gives us dedicated precision to
our efforts in marketing and sales. Metrics are exceptionally good for tracking CRM success.
But which particular metrics we should track depends completely on our sales and marketing
objectives.

Types of CRM metrics

 Business performance metrics
 User adoption metrics
 Customer perception metrics
5 Essential CRM Metrics to Track
1. Net promoter score
2. Customer effort score
3. Rate of renewal
4. Customer churn
5. Customer retention costs

Cultural change is the process in which an organization encourages employees to adopt

behaviours and mindsets that are consistent with the organization's values and goals.
Cultural change may be necessary to better align the behaviours of employees with current
and future business objectives (such as, for example, after a merger of two organizations
with distinct cultures).

Successful cultural change initiatives are often gradual and must be done at a sustainable
pace so that employees can acclimate and adjust to the change without becoming
disengaged.

Implementing a CRM Culture

 Make Sure Everyone “Buys in” to the CRM Implementation

 Know the Expectations

 CRM Implementation Should Support Strategic Decisions

 Not a Cut and Dry Solution

 Implementing a CRM Culture Takes Time

 Know the Right Size CRM to Get

 Stay with It

 Reward Employee Performance

 Listen to Employee Feedback

A customer ecosystem is a business network that’s aligned to help customers get things
done—both the things they want to accomplish and the things they want to manage.
What makes a customer ecosystem valuable to customers is that:
• It contains everything that customers need to be successful in a particular endeavour.
• Customers can add new activities as they discover new ways to simplify, streamline, and
transform how they reach their goals.
• The ecosystem attracts new suppliers and partners to the network to support customers’
changing activities and needs.
• It’s driven by customers’ needs and goals and optimized to achieve customers’ success
metrics, for example: to meet targets and deadlines, save time, reduce the number of steps,
save money, have the peace of mind that everything is on track, recover from the
unexpected within acceptable thresholds, build trust.

Six Critical Success Factors for a Viable Customer Ecosystem

1. Help customers achieve and/or manage something they care about.
2. Design for specific target audiences.
3. Provide a “secret sauce” that transforms customers’ ability to get things done.
4. Attract partners & suppliers who can contribute to these customers’ success.
5. Align the entire ecosystem to meet customers’ success metrics.
6. Embed, co-brand, and be ubiquitous so customers will encounter and use your
secret sauce no matter what their starting point is.

The vendor selection process is a series of procurement steps to determine product or

service requirements and match them with vendor capabilities and pricing. It includes
identifying potential vendors, obtaining quotes or proposals with competitive bids, evaluating
vendors by contacting references and applying a company’s vendor selection criteria
checklist, and contracting.

Factors to Consider Before the Vendor Selection Process