Social CRM: Are we making the same old CRM mistakes?

Spending on social CRM is set to go through the roof – but there are major concerns that much of the investment will be as impetuous as in the early days of CRM. So are businesses set to repeat the same CRM mistakes as they did 10 years ago?

On the eve of the Gartner Customer Relationship Management Summit, Summit chair and research director Jim Davies, describes the present scenario as a "significant time of change" for CRM. With smartphone and tablet sales overtaking the PC, the mobile touchpoint is having an increasing influence on sales, marketing and customer service processes. Elsewhere, new developments in analytics trends are also forcing their way into a next generation customer strategies.

But it has been the social phenomenon that has attracted the most attention and the most hype. And expenditure is set to follow suit, with Gartner recently forecast that by 2013, spending on social software to support sales, marketing and customer service processes will exceed $1 billion worldwide.

According to the Gartner report 'Emerging Technology Analysis: Social CRM for Customer Service' most deployments of social CRM are taking place in corporate marketing departments as an exercise in brand management, whether that be maintaining a presence on Facebook or Twitter or monitoring activity relating to the brand on social networks.

"A lot of this [expenditure] comes down to the fact that all businesses are more paranoid about what people are saying about them and social media is a great way of finding out what people are saying about them and their competitors," says Davies. "So even as a starting point, social media monitoring is a massive investment area because it gives that really quick unbiased independent voice of the customer view."

But to a lesser extent expenditure is also being driven by sales ("there is an interesting opportunity with lead generation and even just finding contact details and network analysis – so if Fred knows Harry can we sell to Harry as well," says Davies) and customer service ("On the social media side it could be Jim from Widgets ‘R’ Us reaching out to a customer in Twitter to show how to resolve a problem or support via communities... also on the support side there is a growing trend for communities providing self-support, rather than the business doing it.")


Social media perception
Davies spent much of last month travelling around Europe talking to hundreds of clients and prospects about social CRM. The discussions have provided interesting insight into the perception of social media within the business community.

"A lot of companies view it as just another channel - it allows them to sell to the customers and market to customers and support their customers. It is like ‘email 2011’," he explains. "Then there is another portion of the market that views it a little bit more strategically and profoundly - it is creating an opportunity to start to have a relationship with the customers and work with them and listen to their ideas and listen to their challenges and you evolve the business and the products and processes based on that relationship. But irrespective of what side of the fence the company is on, whether it is the more collaborative deeper relationship side or just needing to do some social media monitoring as a tool, both sides need some technology and that is driving up the market."

But Davies has been left concerned by the course that the expenditure is taking in many cases, and particularly so given the fact that social media investment in 2011 is only the thin end of the wedge. One point he raises is that while marketing, sales and customer services departments have – to a greater or lesser extent – been involved in social CRM projects, one department that has been conspicuous by its absence is IT.

"It is interesting that the one department that hasn’t had much involvement [in social media] is IT," he says. "Seeing as it is a technology investment it is scary the degree of times that IT has been completely bypassed in the decision-making, both in terms of vendor selection and in terms of the ongoing support of the application. It is almost like rolling the clock back to when Salesforce.com emerged and salesforces were bypassing IT and buying Salesforce.com for their sales processes and the same is happening now for a lot of the social media monitoring and social applications. It is all software as a service so they just bypass IT."


Building blocks
This is a somewhat ironic development given the tendency for businesses to view CRM as purely an IT issue in the early days of customer relationship management (a tendency which Gartner noted a decade ago was significantly contributing to disaffection with CRM projects). But there are other mistakes being made that are more familiar to CRM territory.

"I spoke to some very large international banks and they had no overarching strategy, nothing apart from acknowledging that there is something going on socially and that they should take a look at it. So their whole social media approach was to set up a team of relatively junior people who are in touch with the social world, just to work out what is the role for social media for that organisation. And that is quite a common thing, and it’s not the way to go about it at all," says Davies. "A lot of organisations have gone into it without really thinking it through."

To address this challenge with CRM 10 years ago, Gartner developed its eight building blocks of CRM which consisted of steps such as vision from the board, implementation of strategy and changes to organisational structures, processes and culture. Davies subscribes to the same approach to ensure that investment in social CRM isn’t wasteful.

"I was recently giving social CRM scenario presentations and talking with hundreds of prospects and clients at those events and I really got the sense that a lot of companies that are doing social CRM have actually forgotten about the building blocks. They may have had a CRM strategy and metrics and done all that in the past, but now with social they have forgotten about it and instead it’s all about playing with social monitoring platforms.

"There was a real sense that there wasn’t a social strategy in place that could then help steer them in terms of what technologies they need, what metrics they should be tracking, what data they need to collect, and what analytical tools they need to buy. All of that hadn’t been thought through. It was more of a ‘kids in a sweet shop’ approach. On the back of that I published a research note which was basically eight building blocks again, but applying it to social media, because I think it is such an important finding that people have forgotten about it and they are not approaching this the way that they would approach CRM – but they absolutely should be."


Fragmented vendor landscape
While past CRM excellence certainly does not equate to future CRM success, a robust CRM strategy does provide a strong platform for social CRM – and, conversely, if they have done a poor job with CRM then the foundations of social CRM are critically compromised. Davies warns: "If you look at the reasons for CRM failure in 2002, I think the same thing will come around again now."

A fresh challenge also exists, however. While traditional CRM was driven by the emerging technology, with the strategies and processes playing catch-up, the social phenomenon is being driven by consumer adoption – and social CRM technology is yet to catch up with consumer behaviour.

As a result of this, the recent Gartner social CRM Magic Quadrant provided a portrait of a fragmented vendor landscape, populated by the likes of community builders and social media monitoring firms, with the only significant representation from the traditional CRM vendors coming in the form of RightNow.

Davies notes: "It was a very difficult Magic Quadrant to get a lot of value from because if you looking at who is the best at doing social CRM well actually none of them are because nobody has got a social CRM suite. They are all good in certain aspects because of their backgrounds. Next year the true social CRM suites will start to emerge. As acquisitions happen and as R&D happens then they will start to get broader in their capabilities."


A learning curve
So what is the message for businesses that have done their groundwork on social CRM building blocks including vision, strategy, processes and information and are now fully prepared to contribute to the soaring investment in social CRM technology?

"Ultimately they should be able to turn to their incumbent CRM vendor for that – and if they haven’t got an incumbent CRM vendor then they are probably not necessarily doing a good job with CRM in the first place. If they have got a CRM strategy and they have gone through the eight building blocks of CRM, and done that, and are living and breathing CRM, then the chances are that their vendors will ultimately have a social capability that they can use," suggests Davies.

"In the meantime, if those vendors haven’t got it, they absolutely should not wait. Because there is going to be value to be had by buying SaaS-based, pay-as-you-go service for a tool that may be acquired in a year’s time or they may not want to use in year or two’s time. So they need to think about it strategically and long-term, but don’t delay investment in the software because they are incumbent and can’t do it yet.

"It is a learning curve. If they are running vendor X for their core CRM platform and are going to wait until 2015 for that vendor to come to market with that offering then there are three years of learning that they are not going to have benefitted from. They are going to start to lose out from a competitive point of view because if all their competitors are having social activity, talking to customers socially, using it as a lead generation or marketing tool, then they are going to start slipping behind. So there is a risk of choosing a vendor now that isn’t going to be around in two years time but I think the benefits outweigh those risks."

CRM的基本精神與實施 by馬智宏

一、 何謂客戶關系管理（CRM）？
◆CRM是英文Customer Relationship Management的縮寫。
◆CRM就是以現代信息技術為手段，以客戶為中心，以最大限度滿足客戶需求為目的，對企業的市場策略、各部門的功能職責、工作流程進行重新設計，從而使企業收益最大化的一系列的設計過程。

二、 為什麼要開發客戶關系管理(CRM)？
目前企業的競爭已經從產品質量、價格的競爭逐漸轉變為服務的競爭，這種競爭呼喚CRM。
1. Internet 改變了傳統的商業模式
(1) 客戶接觸方式
(2) 銷售方式
(3) 客戶服務方式

2. 客戶的期望值和需求越來越高
(1) 更好的產品與服務
(2) 隨時隨地的訪問
(3) 更便捷、更快速…

3. 短缺經濟向過剩經濟過渡

4. 壟斷經營向市場經營過渡

5. 從產品銷售轉向關系銷售

6. 3P(Product, Pricing, Promotion) aCRM

7. 永遠的商業驅動力

三. 客戶關系管理（CRM）的基本精神
(1 )什麼是客戶關系管理的基本精神？
方便(convenient)、親切(care)、個性化(Personalized)、立即回應(Real-time)即縮寫為CCPR(1) 讓客戶更方便(Convenient)要讓客戶更方便、更容易地取得企業的服務，就象住宅巷口的小店，想要什麼東西和服務可以隨時取得。

(2) 對客戶更親切(Care)這一點特別要注意。在實施CRM的過程中，如果過分重視科技和自動化，使得企業與客戶接觸的界面成了冰冷的自動販賣機，這就糟了。應該是人的"用心"和高新科技的結合，使顧客感到更親切。

(3) 個性化(Personalized)企業要把每個客戶當作一個永恒的寶藏，而不是一次交易，因此，必須了解每一個客戶的喜好與習慣，并適時提供度身定制的個性化服務。

(4) 立即回應(Real-time)企業對於客戶行為，必須透過每次接觸不斷學習，并且很敏感地立即回應。

四. 客戶關係的基本知識
1. 客戶關係的類型
(1) 基本型：銷售人員把產品銷售出去就不再於客戶聯係（賣冰棍）

(2) 被動型：銷售人員把產品銷售出去并鼓勵遇到問題或有意見時和公司聯繫（賣手機，移動通訊服務）

(3) 負責型：銷售人員在產品售出後聯繫客戶，詢問對產品和服務的意見，使之更符合客戶需求（賣電腦）

(4) 能動型：銷售人員不斷的聯系客戶，提供有關改進產品及服務要求信息（賣Unix服務器）

(5) 伙伴型：不斷的和客戶共同努力，幫助客戶解決問題，實現共同發展（賣解決方案）

五. 如何實施CRM？ 五步曲
1. 統一思想認識，建立相應項目組織機構；
2. 明確企業戰略（定目標，找差距、尋類比）；
3. 組織構架重組（以客戶為核心，市場為理念調整部門職責）
4. 調整工作流程（依據新構架，調整相適應的工作流程）
5. 選擇CRM軟件（新的工作流程需要先進的流程管理/客戶關係管理工具來支持）

六. 實施步驟 分為兩個階段：
第一階段：準備階段：對CRM業務流程和信息系統進行診斷；
第二階段：實施階段：按"五步曲"進行

七. 項目成功關鍵因素
1. 最高管理決策層的堅決支持；
2. 各部門的密切合作，理解和支持；
3. 業務管理人員的直接參與；
4. 業務骨幹的全時參與；需要業務骨幹的全時全程參與，并保持連貫性，避免頻繁換人。
5. 全員參與和上下的溝通。注意CRM體係建設理念在整個企業範圍內的溝通，形式可以有內部溝通雜誌，郵件，研討會等，以及時獲得反饋，使實施航運公司的CRM建設成為整個企業共同關心的問題。

八、 客戶關系管理的目標
1. 提高經濟效益
(1) 提高市場競爭力
(2) 留住老客戶，拓展新客戶
(3) 關注和發現利潤區

2. 密切客戶關係
(1) 與客戶成為伙伴型關係
(2) 進而結成客戶聯盟

3. 提高客戶的滿意度和忠誠度
(1) 提供多個渠道的客戶服務方式：網絡、電話呼叫、上門服務等，為客戶提供最大的方便；
(2) 加快客戶請求的響應時間；
(3) 為所有客戶需求建立一致性的聯系方式
(4) 針對性的客戶

九. 項目實施的成功經驗
1. 組織要落實
2. 計劃要落實
3. 經費要落實
4. 技術要落實
5. 監督和反饋要落實