Customer Relationship Management – Because People Should Always Come First
If you’re a business, you have customers. If you have customers, you want to keep them happy – because without them you have no business. Since the first Sumerian scribe scratched his accounts on clay tablets five thousand years 
ago, businesses have had to manage their relationships with customers. Today we might use a computer tablet to track our Customer Relationship Management (CRM) but the key element has stayed the same – people.
It’s tempting to think that finding the right CRM software will provide a magic solution, but selecting the right software is just the last and, in many ways, least critical part of implementing an effective CRM system. The three pillars of CRM are getting new customers, retaining customers and growing business with existing customers.
The three areas of your business affected by good CRM are sales, marketing and customer service. Success with CRM follows a 60-30-10 rule. Sixty percent of a successful CRM implementation is People. Thirty percent is a good Process. And 10 percent is the computer Program you use for CRM. SalesLogix is an Adaptable CRM program designed from the ground up to be customizable to different kinds of businesses.
People Always Come First
People are going to implement your CRM solution. People are going to help you as consultants in CRM. And your customers are people, too. Your CRM solution has to match up with your customers to really work well.
Strong customer relationships have always been the secret ingredient in successful businesses. That Sumerian merchant systemized his customer knowledge with stylus and clay. In today’s hyper-connected, high tech, competitive environment it’s even more vital to bring together, in a systemized way, all the available information about your customers. The goal is a system that allows your business to effectively identify, acquire, foster and retain loyal customers.
Loyalty is not a product of bytes or forms. It’s a human emotional response to a successful relationship between people. Factors such as trust, attentiveness and responsiveness build that loyalty. All those factors come from thoroughly knowing the customer, assessing that knowledge and then acting in accordance with it.
Having a Systematic Approach for Continued Business Success
Customer relationship management (CRM) is a way to use technology to make it easier for you to make your customers happy. A good CRM tool will manage your customer interactions by organizing, automating, and synchronizing the parts of your business that deal with customers – sales, marketing, customer service, and technical support.
Here at Success with CRM Consulting, Inc., we know our customer relationship management well and have successfully implemented Saleslogix in several types of client businesses. Read our ebook to learn:
- What CRM can do for you
- How and where to get the right professional help
- The things you need to know before choosing a CRM tool
- How to tailor the process solution to your needs
- How to tie everything together – the people and the technology – to make CRM successful for you and your business
We like to say that a successful CRM Implementation is not a destination, it’s a journey. Read our ebook to find out more.
