CRM-Turn Customers to Clients

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is the process of bringing the customer and the company closer together. Estimates show that just 20 percent of customers account for nearly 80 percent of total revenues in some businesses. While getting more customers is critical for the sustenance of any enterprise, optimizing returns by furthering relationships with the existing clients is a key business practice. Barry Stamos, in "Best Customers: More Profitable Relationships" points out, "Why spend resources attracting new customers until optimizing the profitability of your client relationships?"

"Successful CRM is about competing in the relationship dimension" explains Bob Thompson, CEO, CustomerThink Corporation, "Not as an alternative to having a competitive product or reasonable price- but as a differentiator. If your competitors are doing the same thing you are (as they generally are), product and price won't give you a long- term, sustainable competitive advantage. But if you can get an edge based on how customers feel about your company, it's a much stickier--sustainable--relationship over the long haul."

Customers come first in business. Managing relationships with them is very vital. Through cross-selling and up- selling techniques, you can continue to add more leverage to your business. High value referrals from them can also procure endless opportunities. Cutting down time and marketing costs through client network selling, you increase the profitability of your organization. Usually, a 'sale' converts a 'client' to a 'customer'. More and more sale transactions with him make him a client. By then, he has developed a liking for your service and has taken you in his confidence. The first transaction was just not a one-time event; it perpetuated continuing business through credible relationship building with the customer.

CRM has clearly defined roles:

? Focus on the customer and develop sustainable relationship with him.

? Manage the post-sale period well.

? Provide flexibility to your solutions in meeting customer requirements.

? Get qualified referrals for more business expansion within the network.

? Always keep in touch and have an explaining mindset.

Customers bring business. The more healthy relationships you have with them, the more is the value addition to your business. Continuous introspection about the level of service being offered and providing innovative solutions can help you to stay in the front. To quote former New York City mayor, Ed Koch, simply asking clients, "How am I doing?" is a great way to know where you stand. CRM provides you with tools and techniques to help you in nurturing healthy and dynamic client relationships and turning more customers to clients.

T Chakrabarti and his global colleagues write for KPO2INDIA (http://www.kpo2india.net), a premier Writing and Content Development Farm.

Crm - Eliminate Layers Of Complexity

Traditional approaches to system development include design of both the application and platform strategies. With on-demand CRM services it is possible to avoid the burden of complex application development and integration because they deliver multi-option,tightly integrated portal platforms for workplace collaboration.

When developing a proprietary architecture, it is necessary to go through a process of creating and developing models, that are worked and reworked, discarded and/or refined until they satisfy the desired result. A list of some typical models are listed below and they constitute the 'layers of complexity' in application development.

Concept Models

Requirements

Behavior (operational scenarios)
Structure: system hierarchy, interconnection, interfaces
Properties
Analysis
Detailed engineering models
List of deliverables

The process of bridging these layers together is complex and very difficult in trying to guarantee the exchange of underlaying data. Building these various layers, begets volumes of documentation, requires teams of programmers, architects, administrative support, and so forth. It is a process that becomes progressively time consuming and expensive.

Additional 'layers of complexity' in application development include integration of collaboration tools and partner portals while trying to maintain a consistent look and feel. Application development can address organizational needs, but it adds so many layers of complexity to integrations that it becomes less profitable as an option except in very specific situations. Using on-demand CRM solutions are a strategic and cost efficient alternative for most organizations to application development initiatives.

On-demand deployments offer easier integrations, have many standard collaboration tools and processes for sales and marketing activities already integrated, and are more cost efficient in terms of actual adding of content. With on-demand CRM it is also possible to incrementally deploy only the necessary parts of the application in strategic deployments for further cost efficiencies. On-demand CRM is the most evolutionary state of the portal market, it is a platform approach that brings together all the necessary content and applications from across the enterprise.

Salesboom.com delivers robust CRM services without the layers of complexity you would expect in a typical application deployment, instead you receive an integrated web platform and that includes standard tools for collaborative workplace success.

Benefits of Salesboom On-Demand CRM

Reduce complexity and cost ? Access standard tools for point integration and enable services for access to legacy data and current transactions. Modify and tailor user screens through local administrators.

Excellent process visibility and control ? Access mainframe data so it is transparently available to applications that require it. Use standard tools for management, audit and trace functions, browse and display so that specific processes spanning both distributed and mainframe environments can be easily and intuitively updated, contextualized and shared.

Fast deployment of new business processes ? create new processes or refine existing ones using workflow. Make customizations and updates easily through your local administrator.

SOA deployment ? Enjoy bi-directional integration between applications via Web services. Salesboom uses AJAX and COMET programming to enable fast processing. Salesboom CRM makes it possible to make mainframe and distributed systems peers within a standards-based SOA infrastructure.

Real-time results ? Access real-time information for business events, wherever they originate on the platform. View business processes in real time and participate in complex event processing from the dashboard within Salesboom.com.

Template-based configuration and tailoring of Salesboom.com. - Use templates to customize and tailor screens for many activities, eliminating the cost of custom modifications.

Katie Campbell, information/business analyst, particular interest in CRM, http://www.salesboom.com

How To Boost ROI through CRM Tools

Looking for ways to boost your CRM through ROIs? Let us discuss about some ways to achieve your goals. Whatever CRM solution you opt for, remember that its implementation needs to be quick, well planned and relevant to the target customers in order to be effective.

Boosting ROI through CRM:

1) Inbound Marketing: Inbound Customer Marketing, or ICM, is one of the most effective ways of boosting ROI. The latest development in ICM involves rewarding a customer when he or she calls to know about the products and services of the company.

2) Proportionate Spending: If you are spending more than 70% of the projected profits on software and consulting, then you should look again at the spending patterns. Most vendors overprice their services. Therefore, you need to keep the 70% ceiling in mind before reaching a final agreement with the vendor.

3) Vendor: Choose a vendor as quickly as you can. You should not take long to decide on your requirements and selecting a vendor.

4) Training: Training your employees on CRM should not take more than a few hours.

5) Implementation: Do not waste time trying to make the system perfect. By the time you have every part of the system in place, it will be outdated. Just start working on the areas of CRM that you think are crucial.

6) Plan: Have a plan in place. How long do you think the CRM implementation will take? Try to stick to the deadline that you have set for your business; otherwise, the system runs the risk of becoming outdated.

7) Customization: Every CRM application will need some amount of customization to yield optimal benefits to your business. This does not mean that you should spend days on customization. Calculate the amount of time you need on customization so that you can start with the implementation as soon as possible.

8) Relevance: The CRM plan should be relevant to your business needs in order to boost ROI. See if the CRM program complies with the following criteria: Breadth, repeatability, cost, knowledge and collaboration.

9) Relevance of Data: No CRM program, no matter how sophisticated, is of much use if the data it provides is not relevant. You should be able to use the inputs of the sales staff, customers and agents in a constructive manner in order to boost ROI.

10) Maintenance: If you have a small business, you should not need more than one dedicated staff for maintaining the program.

The guidelines above should help you jack up your ROI through some effective CRM tools. Only well-organized and effective use of the CRM tools will give you the results you are looking for. If you are a small business owner who needs to learn more about CRM tools, you can approach a small business consultant who will help you with the installation and implementation of the CRM program.

Alexander Gordon is a writer for http://www.smallbusinessconsulting.com - The Small Business Consulting Community. Sign-up for the free success steps newsletter and get our booklet valued at $24.95 for free as a special bonus. The newsletter provides daily strategies on starting and significantly growing a business.

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Turn Leads Into Customers With CRM

In order to turn leads into customers, you need to understand exactly what the customers want and rapidly set the wheels turning to provide what is wanted in the minimum of time. This, of course, is a simplistic view, so let?s have a look at more detail and how CRM can help achieve the desired end.

A good CRM system will rapidly analyze every lead and quickly and automatically route it to the right person to handle it. The fully customizable rules in Microsoft Analytics CRM 3.0 allows you to so on the basis of area, product, cash volume or any other rule that you want to apply. You can also apply different rules to different products or customers so that every variable is optimized. The familiar Microsoft architecture enables this to be achieved easily and integrated with other Microsoft applications.

By automatically passing new leads rapidly to the correct individual, CRM ensures that the customers? needs are met rapidly, which is one of the main requirements necessary to turn leads into customers. However, there are many other aspects of CRM systems which are important in making it simpler for you to turn leads into customers.

Microsoft CRM provides a complete range of communications applications which can be customized and automated, and their acquisition of Colloquis, the CRM communications company. should reinforce this. Entire email topic threads can be captured automatically: remember when you had to ?cut and paste? to keep tabs on specific threads? No more! And your sales reps can take their customers with them, all customer data being available in portable computers or PDAs.

Integration between sales teams is automatic, and your company?s complete sales force can be combined to provide the potential customer with every one of your products that meets his needs. Gone are the days when one customer would have to communicate with several salespersons or offices within your organization for his carious requirements. This provision alone can turn leads in customers in a very short time.

Due to the atomization of all of these functions ?short? is the word. The whole sales cycle is speeded up, and Microsoft CRM can meet the growing need for the rapid conversion of a lead to a customer which is a necessity in today?s cut-throat competitive business environment. If you don?t work fast you lose out. CRM provides this speed of reaction which is why its ROI is so quick. This is just one feature of the many in which Microsoft Dynamics CRM outperforms alternatives such as GoldMine and ACT.

The portability and accessibility of data is another area in which Microsoft Dynamics CRM excels. It does not matter where in the world the lead originated, or in what remote office the sales force is based, the full power of Microsoft CRM is available. All product data is available at the press of a button. All health and safety data, where applicable, and all information available on the lead or prospect can be accessed from anywhere in the world.

This can be done either through a company network or to remote hand held devices such as PDAs, wireless laptops, palm computers or even mobile phones. Wherever you are, whatever you are doing and whenever equipment you have to hand, product information, quotations, terms and accurate product stock and delivery dates can supplied directly to the potential customer immediately upon request. No ?I?ll get back to you on that?, or ?Head office will send you details?. All requested information can be supplied on the spot, immediately, from an integrated system available to any authorized employee, anywhere in the world.

So is it easier to turn leads into customers with CRM? You bet your life it is.

Syed Ali, is the lead CRM Analyst for a Toronto based company. His company, offers Microsoft CRM software Solutions www.crmsoftwareprovider.com Syed can be reached at Tel : (905) 815- 1995 ext 22, email :asyed@cqsolutions.com