CRM tools

Customer relationship management is certainly nothing new. The rapid evolution of CRM presents the market with an almost perpetual sense of newness. Today's CRM tools provide far more capabilities than traditional CRM technologies did, with features that make them indispensable for businesses.

For the enterprise, it's the advent of mobile technology and the cloud; better tools for instant access to information have made CRM a real-time need. And, from the customer side, social media is quickly expanding the buyer's role in market evolution, product development and the proliferation of effective marketing and sales channels. Increasingly, as social media opens up new ways to connect to existing and potential customers, it's becoming more important to refresh customer engagement strategies -- not just frequently, but on an ongoing basis. Managing customer relationships has become increasingly difficult in recent years, if for no other reason then there's much more customer data to manage. But more than that, it's the customer who defines how engagement takes place. Customers rely on social media tools, including Facebook and Twitter, to air their concerns, and it's up to sales and marketing executives to pay close attention.

CRM creates a more personal approach to attracting and retaining customers, while simultaneously aggregating big data that can more effectively represent the market as a whole.

The biggest recent shift has been towards a two-way customer engagement; not just reaching out with a better understanding of the customer and a better plan for meeting their needs, but also opening new channels of information. Technology has made these new channels into new paths to engagement, beyond simple marketing and selling. Mobile technology and cloud platforms have made this new communication relatively easy and pain-free. The challenge is coming up with the best strategy for putting it to work.

Customer relationship management tools do far more than aggregate customer profiles and analyse buyer behaviours. Here are a few of the latest customer engagement features.

As attention spans shrink in the age of the internet, CRM empowers marketers to target the right customers on social media, through a combination of analytics and social media demographics.

Social media check can create a map of the customer's journey through the internet, illuminating not only buying habits, but also social profiles. This provides insight into what interests customers and what they think is important.

Through social media, it's now possible to engage customers and potential customers directly, beyond the confines of the enterprise -- not simply listening in on what they tell one another about the brand, but also opening the door to product development input, customer service enhancement and peer-to-peer product support.

All of these variations derive not from the CRM market itself, but from its response to changing customer habits and technology usage. The rapid evolution of CRM, and the steady pace of new features in customer relationship management tools, represents a fast adaptation to growing consumer participation online.The tools of CRM keep pace with the evolution of social technology, expanding at the same rate (or close to it), with each shift in consumer social media behaviour and technology inspiring a corresponding improvement in CRM technology and methodology. Indeed, today's CRM tools look much different than traditional customer relationship management tools.

A lot of behind the scenes development has enhanced CRM technology in the past few years. This growth isn't obvious at first glance, but it makes a huge difference in the quality of the data going into CRM processes. Big data and analytics drive the intelligence behind lead generation and engagement strategies, and most of the major cloud platforms now feature baked-in artificial intelligence and analytics tools, making this functionality accessible to businesses of all sizes.

Sales CRM and e-commerce are rapidly emerging hybrid models for enhancing transactional efficiency across websites. Enterprise CRM data can be integrated with e-commerce sites to capture important client behavioural data, consolidating previously processes, such as ordering, tracking and delivery, inventory, and sharing that information with business partners.

The internet of things, evolving in its own right, hasn't been left out: Gartner has called it one of the five major drivers of CRM, as it expands the data that defines customer behaviors in ways that enhance predictive power and responsiveness. Retail stores will be able to respond on an individual level. Marketers will adjust their messaging to customers in real-time. And customer service will be able to call in advance of a failure.

Though the cloud is driving the CRM evolution, on-premises options continue to be offered, with the advantage of more integration with legacy systems. This is an important consideration for many organizations, as CRM data can be useful across the enterprise, even forming its informational hub. A strong on-premises deployment can serve as the bedrock of retooling in-house data management.

Okay, there’s no doubt that a CRM software is key to the long term success of a business, small or large, but back to the bottom line. There are no doubt investments and obstacles in your way, which is maybe why you have been putting off a CRM integration.

 The best CRM software can deliver those benefits because it organizes and records the institutional knowledge all businesses maintain about their customers. Employees might use a spreadsheet to pass on information about past sales or share email threads that show a customer has been a loyal patron. But such information is often left to casual word of mouth, which means it's often missing when needed or it's entirely forgotten. CRM software keeps this information in one place, efficiently organizes it, and makes it possible to take immediate action with it. Such actions can include sending a loyal customer a gift card on their birthday or offering an up-sell opportunity to a platform from which you know their business can benefit (based on previous conversations). It's also a great way to woo back inactive customers. The key is to select the software that's right for the way your team works. The last thing you want is to see employees fighting new software instead of interacting with the customer.

CRM software isn't just about tracking and maintaining contact information. While most look to CRM software as primarily a sales tool, it's moved beyond that space. Marketing and customer service departments can dramatically improve their offerings and operations with CRM as well by using its data to more effectively segment demographics and record and reuse customer incident information. CRM software also helps coordinate interdepartmental actions. For example, the sales team can take advantage of something a customer service representative discovered in a separate transaction. Depending upon the software you choose, you can set and measure sales goals, deliver and track email marketing campaigns, or keep an eye on what people are saying on social media.

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