Using CRM to Prevent Customer/Agent Backlash

As companies use the new year to set new standards for the relationships between customers and service professionals, another interesting thread has emerged in the mainstream media. What if the customer's not always right? What if the customer's wrong?

Books like Jeff Martin's The Customer Is Always Wrong and websites like NotAlwaysRight.com chronicle some of the more disastrous interactions between customers and service professionals. Meanwhile, sites like TheConsumerist.com track some of the more bizarre exchanges between customers and vendors.

Customer complaints pose problems for any manager. If the customer is telling the truth about receiving poor service, managers have to make hard decisions about staffing and development. However, if the customer is lying, a manager must weigh the consequences of caving in to demands for refunds or free services. Caving in to rude or angry customers can also cause front line professionals to feel unsupported by their supervisors, making relationships even more complex.

When used properly, CRM software helps managers track the long term relationships between customers and companies. In many call centers, audio recordings of conversations can now be attached to customer records within CRM software databases. In retail environments, cashiers can use club membership cards to track purchase histories. Some stores even allow front line service personnel the ability to attach notes to transactions, flagging questionable behavior or potential miscommunications.

The more information you have in your CRM software about a customer, the better a decision you can make when faced with a service recovery issue.

Can CRM Software Uncover Your Ideal Customer?

In Andrew Boyd's year-end recap for CRM Buyer, one of his top three tips for 2009 is to "profile both successes and failures." Digging a little deeper, he's really writing about understanding how to better identify the right customers for your team to be working with. And, by extension, he's challenging readers to think about their worst customers ever.

If you know what a bad customer looks like, you're more likely to avoid them the next time you see one. It can be tempting to use CRM software to start a customer profiling system that automatically alerts your sales team to cease working with potentially unprofitable prospects. Best Buy discovered this the hard way in early 2004 when it started labeling customers as "angels" and "demons" in an effort to weed out bargain hunters and return-prone shoppers. In 2008, leaked documents revealed a softer strategy that still used personas to identify good and bad customers.

Filtering customers after they're already customers often leads to challenging situations. Leaders at Best Buy found themselves explaining to both customers and the press a set of personas that some customers found condescending or oversimplified. For service providers, this process often means "firing a client," causing stress for team members and potentially damaging a company's reputation.

Instead, experts recommend using CRM systems to filter prospects before they can become customers. Web-based signup forms act as a filter to discourage "tire kickers" who may not want to be called upon by sales professionals. CRM software can interface with credit reports, partner profiles, or other databases to qualify prospects.

This strategy inherently works better for businesses that rely on agent-customer relationships, such as banks, mortgage companies, or service providers. In retail environments CRM systems are often more effective at inviting the best customers back, rather than trying to weed customers out.

Will CRM Software Identify Your Next Great Idea?

In the world of CRM, knowledge is power. When Starbucks launched what appeared to be a social networking site in early 2008, critics blasted the idea as a transparent PR gimmick designed to give the company the appearance of listening to its customers. While some hard-core detractors of Seattle's coffee giant are upset that their ideas haven't been picked up over the last year, the My Starbucks Idea is a very public version of the method many marketers use to tweak product offerings using CRM software.

By measuring customer satisfaction on a more frequent basis, marketers can easily spot trends ranging from problems in an individual store to the need to open new locations. However, many product development specialists have realized that carefully targeted surveys, over time, can help track suggestions that bubble up into viable, new products.

A long-running problem in market research has been that customers with an axe to grind can find ways to skew survey results. When I worked in radio, we often joked that a call from an unhappy listener reflected the silence of seven totally satisfied listeners. And that's just at a small-town radio station. Imagine how many customers rarely take the time to call or write with stories about how much they like your product, or what they would like to see next.

At Starbucks, some customers complained vocally about how they didn't like the idea of breakfast sandwiches. However, after looking at sales data and feedback from survey respondents, CEO Howard Schultz decided to refine the morning meals instead of scrapping them. Too many customers voted with their wallets, despite the chorus of informal protest.

Whether or not to make the process of idea generation public is a matter for marketers to decide. While some long-time customers dislike the ideas bouncing around on Starbucks' social network, the website is credited with generating or justifying recent modest successes. More importantly, the effort indicates a willingness among large brands to use CRM systems to weed out squeaky wheels from more influential, regular purchasers.

Has anything tangible come from MyStarbucksIdea.com? I'll report back soon.

Quick CRM Software Case Studies

If you're mapping out your marketing and IT budgets for next year, here are two quick CRM software case studies to show you how some large companies are making CRM software work for them...

Kimberly-Clark, the folks behind the popular Kleenex brand, want to grow their presence in Asia. According to a recent press release, they expect to expand rapidly by mobilizing a large field operation. And, like any growing company, they want the flexibility to work from the road and from the office, even if the office location moves from time to time. A hosted CRM application from Microsoft is at the heart of their strategy, allowing the company to view customer orders and fulfillment processes in real time. Dashboard tools will allow local sales managers to change strategies quickly, while brand managers chart overall progress.

Meanwhile, in the UK, one vacation company hopes CRM software can help them keep holiday makers booking trips despite a global recession. Sales managers at Thomson have gathered crucial data about vacationers into their CRM applications, in order to generate highly personalized, stylized brochures and marketing collateral. By using their tools to make the right recommendations to customers who are most likely to book trips next year, managers hope to avoid deep discounting while improving customer service.

Hosted CRM Helps Charities Ride Out Recession

Yesterday, I dipped into my past experience in public radio and television to show you how CRM software plays an important role in keeping PBS and NPR on the air. Today, I want to look at the methods non-profits from all walks of life are using hosted CRM to support their missions.

When I worked in public radio, CRM software was relatively expensive to purchase and required lots of regular database maintenance. We could justify the cost by looking at the additional revenue we generated by using the tools. However, when I consulted or sat on the boards of smaller non-profits, many of them couldn't even think about raising the kind of money required to manage a sophisticated CRM software solution.

Thanks to today's wave of hosted CRM applications, that's changing. Now, a very small broadcaster can stage an efficient fund drive by using web-based pledge forms. While audience members at home can donate directly through a station's website, operators at a studio can use backend web tools to transfer member information directly into a CRM database. Instead of ramping up staff to handle data entry and paper shredding, volunteers can use borrowed or rented computers to process a pledge online, in real time.

Hosted CRM applications allow charities to ramp up gradually as they grow. A small charity can acquire a single seat license for most hosted CRM tools inexpensively, while gaining the same kind of fundraising power that large organizations enjoy.

Utilizing hosted CRM allows organizations to unify their relationships with donors. In the past, donors would complain of fatigue when receiving newsletters from one branch of an organization, fundraising letters from another, and solicitation calls from a third. Today, hosted CRM tools let multiple departments get a full view of their relationship with a donor. By coordinating outreach efforts and factoring in a donor's history, fundraisers can save money while improving their renewal and conversion rates.

Finally, hosted CRM allows non-profits to tap into their most lucrative resource: the brain power of distributed volunteers. Since most hosted CRM systems can be accessed from any secure web browser, fundraising managers can open access to volunteers around the world for help with data maintenance or donor service. No longer tethered to a home office, non-profits can enable telecommuting volunteers to help provide mission-based services or to manage targeted campaigns. Because local contacts help national charities fundraise more effectively, hosted CRM tools have become a hit with organizations that stage charity events or neighborhood canvassing projects.

Thanks to vendor sponsorships and private donations, sophisticated CRM systems are within reach of most charities, churches, and community organizations. Using these tools effectively still takes effort, but the potential results dwarf the possibilities that existed just a decade ago.

CRM Applications Vital to Non-Profit Fundraising

Sophisticated charity organizations have used CRM applications for years. Public radio and television stations were among the first non-profits to spearhead technological innovations for donor relationship management. By tightly coordinating follow-up fundraising campaigns using donor databases, development directors converted one-time pledges into long term memberships.

Remember when pledge drives used to look like this?



Pledge drives were inherently inefficient, usually relying on station staff or community members to beg for funds. Today's pledge drives look very different:



Borrowing a strategy from professional marketers, public media programmers launched stunt programming with merchandise tie-ins that attracted first-time donors to their stations. Though tight on margins, pledge premiums like CDs, books, and DVDs helped development teams grow their databases. However, the practice has resulted in what some critics call "pledge drive fatigue." Many of the fundraising specials created for PBS have little or no connection to stations' regular programming. Analysts wonder if, during a recession, the same impulse shoppers that purchase self-help CD packs will still help public media make their annual budgets.

Therefore, CRM applications have become even more crucial to organizations that must rely on existing donors. By using donor management tools to track a member's history and response rate, smart development officers can craft exactly the right message in the right medium to maintain or grow giving levels. This practice prevents donors from hearing the same message too many times, which can cause burnout.

Some organizations have integrated CRM systems into their online services, allowing members to enjoy deeper access to special programming or to order tickets to member-only events. Integration with the CRM systems of corporate underwriters also allows donors to receive targeted, third-party marketing messages on an opt-in basis. All of these strategies help increase the amount of funds that actually go toward supporting a station's mission.

Tomorrow, I'll show you how non-profits from other sectors are using similar strategies, along with some of the ways that clever not-for-profit organizations get their CRM applications for free or for cheap.

As Entellium Leaders Take Plea Deals, Can CRM Software Vendors Make It Through 2009?

Last month, I offered some tips to determine whether your CRM software vendor deserves your business. This month, the Seattle technology community is buzzing with news about the plea deals and imminent sentencing for Entellium's former CEO and CFO.

* Paul Johnston, the former Chief Executive, has plead guilty to a single count of wire fraud. Attorneys estimate that he pocketed $1.4 million from customers and investors while inflating the company's profit statements.
* Parrish Jones, the company's former CFO, deposited about $865,000 of Entellium funds into his own account over his four years there. By managing a second set of books, Jones helped lure high profile investors and clients.

And the bad news doesn't end there. A hosted CRM provider that offered credit card transaction processing for youth sports teams and other not-for-profit organizations appears to have misplaced about a million dollars' of its customers' money. Coaches and development directors from around the country hope to recoup donations while executives at Count Me In claim to be restructuring their organization.

Fortunately, these cases offer examples of the extreme exceptions in the hosted CRM industry. Most CRM software vendors are doing well, even if they aren't all generating Google-style profits. Yet, these stories may scare off prospective hosted CRM customers. Therefore, I'll add another question to my previous list.

* Are they processing funds on your behalf? Many hosted CRM providers for small businesses and for charity groups also offer credit card processing services. Because merchant accounts can be especially hard to set up for non-profits, services like Count Me In attracted customers by promising quick setup and seamless payments in exchange for service fees. Experts recommend using an independent merchant account to prevent vendors from spending your funds during a "float" period. Failing that, vendors with shorter float periods pose less risk than vendors that sit on income for more than 30 days.

Can CRM Applications Revive the Old Fashioned Letter?

As marketing directors across the country look for line items to slash from their budgets, is anyone seriously considering spending money on postage stamps in 2009?

Actually, yes.

Thanks to CRM applications, sales and marketing professionals can target prospects by mail more effectively, while enjoying the benefits of both short-term and long-term tracking for mail pieces.

For companies that have loaded their existing CRM systems with deep customer information, snail mail campaigns offer an opportunity to connect physically with customers who have tuned out e-mail newsletters or mass media advertising.

Traditional mail marketers often get excited when response rates top half a percent. Some of the most successful mail campaigns of all time enjoyed response rates of over three percent. However, to justify the cost of printing and postage, marketers often push themselves to achieve even higher percentage goals.

Jay Rollins explains some of the technical requirements for successful mail marketing campaigns in his column for TechRepublic. Specifically:

• use CRM applications to generate unique offer codes for each customer and each offer.
• run any new captured data through a de-dupe filter -- existing customers may have moved, or may be trying to game the system.
• utilize CRM systems to measure differences in response rates, tracked along with a "control group" responding to a previously-successful offer

Every successful campaign should generate enough information about your customers to help you refine a future campaign. With incremental improvements each time, your marketing outreach efforts should continue to become more effective.

Counting Pennies with Small Business CRM Tools

The phrase, "in an economy like this one" has already become so overused in the mainstream media that it's reached cliche status. Still, hearing about the global economic crisis on a seemingly endless loop has made some small business owners nervous about implementing CRM software. After all, large companies are putting off spending on new software implementations, so why shouldn't small business owners redirect some of their budgets someplace else?

In reality, a strong small business CRM system may be exactly the investment that your company needs to make. Firms that have experienced layoffs in the past few months need tools to help remaining staff increase workload. Strong CRM software tools can automate tasks like reporting and compliance tracking, allowing staff to focus more attention on growing sales. And connecting a CRM system to a lead generating website can shorten the gap between first contact and final contract.

Hosted CRM systems really shine in troubling economic times. CRM software platforms that allow companies to pay per-seat license fees offer fiscally sound alternatives to flat-fee systems that require dedicated hardware or hosting. Zoho, an upstart provider of low-cost small business CRM, has even made this one of their strongest selling points. By allowing small companies to host their first three users for free, marketers at Zoho hope to attract growing companies that will evolve into paying clients. Meanwhile, the company encourages its users to utilize its CRM software to filter leads more effectively and to prioritize sales calls.

How App Engine Connectivity Enhances CRM Software, Part 2

Yesterday, I offered a brief introduction to the cloud computing services offered by two household names: Google and Amazon.

Companies that like the idea of hosted CRM systems but hate the idea of losing control of their code have started to investigate cloud computing. The recent announcement that Force.com has opened a version of its platform to users of Google App Engine has already started CRM software developers thinking about ways to leverage partnerships with two of the most trusted names in technology.

Developers using the Force.com platform have the ability to build applications that reach far beyond the CRM systems commonly associated with its parent, Salesforce.com. However, the appeal of using the platform lies in its tight connection to customer sales, tracking, and communication tools. The development platform allows companies the luxury of spending only a fraction of previous technology budgets on higher quality sales and service applications.

Meanwhile, the foundation offered by Google App Engine lets companies test new CRM applications and other tools without buying or leasing additional hardware. Best of all, as applications grow and mature over time, the cloud computing platform expands seamlessly to meet demand. Instead of frustrating users with slow server times, applications simply access more processing power on the fly. A taxi-like meter keeps track of the processing units expended by the software, meaning that companies no longer have to waste money on unused resources.

Over on the Amazon cloud, developers enjoy more flexibility to deploy CRM applications in their favorite operating environments. Virtualizing servers gives administrators the flexibility to host a single instance of a tool like SugarCRM, or multiple user desktops connected to a shared ACT database. Expect to hear lots more about CRM systems and cloud computing as we head into 2009.

How App Engine Connectivity Enhances CRM Software, Part 1

The announcement that Force.com has developed a version of its platform for Google App Engine sounds, to most of the sales professionals I know, like tech-speak for "you got chocolate in my peanut butter." Before you can understand how this innovation could impact your business, let's understand exactly what an app engine does, and why you won't find it under the hood of a Dodge.

Google App Engine and Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud are two of the fastest "cloud computing" platforms available for professional developers. Google allows developers to build standalone applications in Python that can be executed by the search company's massive server network. Amazon takes a different approach, offering subscribers the ability to create virtual server images on the e-commerce giant's extensive hardware collection.

In the early days of the web, running CRM software or other sensitive systems required a dedicated server, connected to a pretty hefty Internet backbone. I recall, looking at some old files, that a leased setup like this cost one of my clients about $14,000 per year back in 1999. And the processor in that server was not quite as powerful as the one in my current phone.

Over the years, servers have become smaller, cheaper, more powerful, and more reliable. Yet, when companies lease or buy servers for their CRM applications, they often open themselves up to security and maintenance issues. If the server is located in the office, who gets up at 3am to reboot it if it fails? What happens if someone breaks in and steals it?

Hosted CRM systems solve many of these problems for their subscribers. However, some companies that require full control over their software still need the ability to manage every element of their CRM applications. For these kinds of companies, cloud computing offers the best of both worlds: the convenience of hosted CRM with the precision of custom solutions.

Tomorrow, I'll show you how this combination can extend the reach of corporate CRM systems...

Why Write CRM Software from Scratch?

A quick scan of CRM-related tweets on Twitter usually reveals something like this:

Even with so many options for quality CRM software, some companies and developers still feel like they can get more bang for their buck by assigning internal staff to work on a totally original CRM system instead of hiring experienced vendors.

From my own experience, most of the companies that want custom CRM systems feel like existing software just "isn't them." (I once declined an RFP from a prospective client that absolutely refused to deal with any customer that had more than 22 characters in their address field, because it would blow up all of their mailing templates.)

In most cases, the drive for homebrew CRM software usually stems from staff members who want the benefits of customer relationship management tools, but can't afford them or won't budget them.

A few years ago, "build or buy CRM" was a legitimate question for most CIOs. Today, thanks to open source CRM suites and open-platform, pay as you go CRM solutions, companies don't have to reinvent the wheel to get what they need. Most CRM solutions now offer a great degree of customization, from special fields to unique style sheets. SaaS CRM systems let companies start out with minimal investment, allowing them to expand after a proof of concept. Companies determined to craft their own ultimate solution can still use open source code as a platform, shaving months from development time.

Instead of shooting for the "perfect" CRM and getting stuck in development for months or years, consider teaming up with an experienced vendor that can meet you halfway (if not more). The benefits of developing stronger relationships with customers far outweigh the frustration of dealing with that 23rd letter.

CRM Systems Target SMS Users

Remember the last time you had cable or phone installed at your home or office? Or the last time you had to wait for a furniture delivery, or carpet installers? You probably heard the infamous phrase, "we can slot you in for a window of arrival between 10 and 2..."

What if your service company used the power of SMS to narrow down that window for customers and give them precise details?

"Leaving last job now. B at ur office in 20 min."

SMS is already the dominant mode of communications for under-21s in America. Some of their parents, aunts, uncles, and grandparents are on board, but the real wave of expectation for SMS is probably going to hit American companies in a major wave over the next decade.

Business owners that invest in the latest CRM systems can harness the power of SMS. While no user wants to be bombarded with unexpected marketing messages -- those are received with as much glee as an inbox full of spam -- companies can redefine the customer service experience for deliveries and live appointments by engaging in live, interactive text messaging.

Fortunately, many CRM software vendors now offer modules that can both track and send SMS. For a text messaging platform to be truly effective, companies should be prepared to interact in real time with customers. The asynchronous nature of text messaging mirrors chat or e-mail, allowing clever service agents to potentially handle multiple conversations at once. As purchasing power shifts from aging baby boomers to Millenials and their offspring, expect successful companies to leverage CRM software to manage text messaging as another high profile point of contact.

Greenfield's CRM Software Forecast

Paul Greenfield's got an amusing blog post over at ZDNet where he pokes fun at year-end predictions while making eight of his own. Some key takeaways for me from his piece:

• Companies are exploring social CRM software for different reasons. Large companies and enterprise users are fascinated by using social CRM tools to crack customers' Facebook profiles. Yet they're still approaching this from a highly automated place, and not necessarily the genuine service approach that they'll need to succeed. Meanwhile, smaller companies want CRM systems that resemble Facebook and MySpace, so they can reduce training time among their web-savvy new hires. Crafty.
• CRM tools will look and work more like popular "Web 2.0" applications. Along the same lines, developers are discovering that they can crib great user interfaces from Flickr, Facebook, and Twitter. And if those twenty-somethings in the office can help veteran sales professionals understand the tools better, implementation rates can go up.
• APIs and plug-ins let CRM software do more with outside information. Instead of needing to find a vendor who can provide e-mail marketing, web analytics, and customer survey solutions, all you have to do is plug your CRM software solution into public APIs from third parties, like Emma, or Google, or Zoomerang. Costs plummet, because there are fewer cogs to design and dedicated support from outside vendors.

That's just scratching the surface of Greenberg's predictions and comments, and he promises more to come. You can read the rest of his post here.

Salesforce "Sigh of Relief" Rally Underscores Importance of CRM Software

Wasn't it great to close out last week with good news about a company? Not just good news, but great news. Over the moon news, if you're a shareholder or a customer of Salesforce.com, one of the leading providers of pay-as-you-go CRM software.

Last quarter, Salesforce generated $276 million from customers that use its CRM software to help their own companies grow their own business. That translated to a profit of over $10 million, making CFOs of other Internet companies blush, fume, or cry.

While analysts typically wish the company had held on to a little more profit, a CRM software company that's in the black telegraphs the strategies that smart sales professionals intend to use over the next year.

It's no surprise, since smart sales professionals understand that affordable CRM software can help them do a lot more with fewer resources in this kind of economy. If you can't spend money on lavish ad campaigns, you can at least find ways to mine you customer database, leverage strong relationships, and grow your orders in this critical quarter.

Salesforce isn't the only game in town, though. While I know plenty of sales professionals that love the service, I know many others that prefer to work with more established players, or prefer to use CRM software that lives on a server that they control completely. Whether you work with Salesforce or with another CRM software vendor, now is a great time to look for quotes from qualified service providers. With competitors looking to steal a little thunder from Salesforce, there are some good deals to be had.

Small Business CRM Tools Help You Focus on the Customer

Clare Dorrian offers some fantastic insight over at Inside CRM this week. As I wrote a little while back, economic pressure forces many CIOs to make sure that CRM software projects are not just totally justified, but are implemented flawlessly. Otherwise, they're likely to be among the first projects chopped by a CFO.

Dorrian offers a few key tips for CIOs to help justify CRM software purchases to CFOs. Among them:

• Build the case by focusing on clear business needs. Companies subject to SOX have little excuse not to document customer interactions.
• Emphasize a customer-centric approach. CRM software shouldn't just be about making life easier for managers or for marketers. There should be a tangible, measurable improvement in service delivery that makes your company more attractive to repeat customers.
• Use CRM software to respond to customer needs and requests. If you use your inbound communications tools to understand which customers have requested which products and features, you can more easily connect with them after you hustle their dream offerings to market.

The best news is that you don't have to be a big business to but Dorrian's ideas to work. Since many small business CRM systems offer pay-as-you-go pricing, you can easily implement these ideas in your mom-and-pop shop. This is especially important if mom is the CFO and pop is the CIO.

Read the rest of Dorrian's advice here...

How Can Your CRM Software's E-Mail Marketing Tools Impact Customer Retention

In this economy, small business owners need all the help they can get when it comes to encouraging repeat business from loyal customers. A quick check of your inbox bears this out: how many of your favorite online stores are using their own CRM systems to generate special offers right to your inbox?

However, an inbox crammed with very special holiday appeals spotlights the problem that many small business CRM administrators are facing. In an environment where large companies have the ability to send lots of glossy, carefully timed e-mails to customers, how can small businesses stand out?

The answer, according to a few recent studies, is by going low-tech.

Simple e-mail messages that come directly from company staff members receive far more attention from customers than regular newsletters or highly polished special offers.

Small business CRM systems can take two approaches to leveraging this strategy. First, CRM tools can be programmed to "ping" account representatives to send simple notes to customers at appropriate stages for followups. Writing a simple template with just a few lines of text -- no images and no Flash -- can help build rapport with customers and encourage replies.

A second strategy is to enable full e-mail automation within a small business CRM system. This tool may reduce the burden on account executives, but it also removes the chance of a more human interaction.

Either way, small business CRM systems must be able to track the response to these small messages. They shouldn't be sent from do_not_reply@yourcompany.com. When customers can simply hit reply and feel that they are reaching a dedicated service professional, you'll have hit the motherlode of modern marketing.

Will Your CRM Software Vendor Be Around Next Year?

If the Entellium situation doesn't make prospective CRM software purchasers nervous enough, the effects of the current economic downturn have them quaking in their boots. Last week's New York Times profile of the changes facing Silicon Valley puts the situation into perspective:

October “was like turning a switch,” said Robert Barbera, chief economist at the Investment Technology Group, a research and trading firm. “Everything pretty much shut down.”

Even Sun is laying off thousands of workers who would normally supply hardware to CRM software vendors. Therefore, it's important to find a great referral to a solid CRM software provider by focusing on a few key elements:

• Where did you learn about the CRM vendor? Was it from a reputable CRM software directory, from reliable reviews, or from a paid advertisement? The more you can find out about a CRM software vendor online, the more trust you can put in them.
• What kinds of clients do they service? Believe it or not, a company that serves a handful of Fortune 500 companies right now is actually less attractive than a CRM software provider that works with thousands of mom-and-pop businesses. A diverse income stream insulates a CRM software vendor from the failure of a large client.
• Do they have the interest of your business at heart? Is your CRM software vendor looking for a major up-front financial commitment, or are they willing to let you start small and grow? Big down payments are a sign of companies that struggle with cash flow.

Gadgets and Dashboards for Small Business CRM Users

Widgets, gadgets, and dashboards have made inroads into small business computing over the past few years. However, most computer users do little more with these tools than check the time, monitor stocks, or watch live webcams of puppies.

Widgets and gadgets can act as tiny windows into larger software applications. Launching a CRM application for every phone call can grind down a professional's workflow. Instead, a time tracking widget can log billable hours throughout the day, saving significant time and reducing errors.

Oracle pleased both users and analysts by unveiling a new set of gadgets to accompany the next versions of its hosted CRM systems under the Siebel CRM brand. With gadgets installed on company desktops, users can review core analytics, such as sales trends and pipeline deals. Users can also access and update contact details without launching a full application, addressing a major concern for sales professionals that think CRM systems will slow them down.

Widgets also allow functionality between separate applications. For instance, a web-based widget serves as middleware between Zendesk's help ticketing tool and the Highrise hosted CRM system from 37signals. While Zendesk is mostly customer-facing, Highrise is meant to be used internally, by small teams. Connecting data from the two can bridge the communication gap between sales and service professionals in a technical organization.

Many customized home pages now incorporate widgets (or "gadgets") that replicate the dashboard experience for mobile professionals or for users who want to check in on shared web kiosks. For some business professionals, home page dashboards provide a less intrusive way to check in on key metrics throughout the day.

Customer-Facing CRM Systems Could Change Retail Experiences

The idea of customer-facing CRM systems isn't new. Anyone who has booked a ticket on an airline's website or set preferences for their online banking has experienced at least a basic CRM application. And, for the past few years, many companies have wrestled with translating the copious amounts of data they have collected on customers into the kind of accessible system that makes shoppers feel welcome. After all, nobody likes that "Big Brother" feeling that a company is watching your every move.

So, it's with great trepidation that some retailers are moving into the realm of in-person, customer-facing CRM applications. For many companies, this kind of system might automate or enhance the role of a receptionist or a concierge.

For instance, when I got my most recent flu shot, I dropped in on one of Caremark's Minute Clinic locations. These low-cost, high volume health care facilities are located inside CVS pharmacy locations, Target stores, and other familiar retailers. Staffed by a single nurse practitioner, Minute Clinic automates the registration process for their no-appointment service by using a customer-facing CRM application hosted on a low kiosk. In about a minute, I entered my personal details and connected my health records to their national database. A few minutes later, I was on my way, and my insurance company had already settled the bill. A similar trip to the doctor's office might have resulted in an hour of forms and waiting, but the simple CRM system actually shared more information with me than I would have asked in less time than it would have taken in a traditional setting.

Customer-facing CRM systems can go deeper than appointment-based services, however. For instance, Nike extended the reach of their online customization service to many of their Niketown retail stores using a revamped version of their existing CRM application. Customers can experience an array of materials and colors, then select the elements of their personalized footwear using a special kiosk and the aid of a Nike staff member. It's an enhanced version of the online CRM system, but with the added benefit of real-time feedback and the ability to change personal information.

Now that many customers carry their own smartphones, CRM systems eliminate the need for expensive kiosks that remove customers from the flow of a store. The Body Shop recently demoed the first iteration of its own customer-facing CRM software. By connecting to customers' phones, Body Shop servers can feed product reviews, make recommendations, and even use customer purchasing records to push customized promotions that can generate impulse purchases. As retailers use customer-facing CRM systems to streamline common interactions, they can create strong word of mouth from repeat shoppers.

Does Economic Pressure Lead to More Effective CRM Software Implementation?

I've written before about the challenges of keeping CRM software implementations from failing. Project leaders run into problems, including:

• Delayed system installation
• Complex customization
• Training deficiencies
• Sales staff with little incentive to use the new CRM system

However, I'm starting to notice a trend among the business owners I speak with and on many of the industry blogs I read. Our current economic turbulence has shaken many sales teams to the core. A year ago, a veteran sales professional might not have been motivated to enter her customer data and pipeline deals into a CRM system. However, with strong coaching and guidance from sales leaders and company owners, sales professionals feel much more compelled to transition to new CRM systems.

According to some industry experts, this behavior can be attributed to a survival instinct. In years past, many companies failed to hold team members accountable for their lack of participation in new technology initiatives. As long as goals were met and commissions were paid on time, a contented crew was less likely to change their game plan or to think about using CRM systems to strive for higher levels of success.

However, if the boss drops in and tells everyone that their jobs depend on adhering to a new CRM system, you can bet that you'll see leads and contact details imported to a new platform almost instantly.

Sales leaders and CRM software project coordinators can exploit the current situation to make their preferred tools more popular among sales teams. By tying CRM software to success stories, sales professionals may become more open to the benefits of a new system. At the end of the day, strong leaders may simply have to lead from the top down and use basic economic pressure to shepherd CRM software innovation into their workplaces.

Small Business CRM Helps B&B Owners Compete Against Hotel Chains

As large hotel chains have centralized reservations and feedback systems, it's often difficult to tell whether you're speaking to a reservations agent in Cleveland or Chattanooga, even though you're trying to book a room in Chicago. However, CRM systems have become so sophisticated that reservations agents can access your entire history with a chain, no matter who you're calling. For many travelers, CRM applications populate reservation preferences at online booking sites, making it unnecessary to even speak to someone on the phone.

That may be fine for business travel, but what about for romantic getaways? Many vacationers love the idea of the scaled-down delights of a small bed and breakfast. At the same time, seasoned travelers often bristle, on ratings sites like TripAdvisor, about the challenges of tracking down a property owner to make a booking or to enquire about special services.

Small business CRM packages appeal to entrepreneurial B&B owners who want to provide the same level of customer service as a fully-staffed hotel without having to hire extra team members. Because many hospitality industry CRM systems connect to web lead forms, B&B owners can make it easy for prospective guests to request information online. By tracking leads through a small business CRM system, owners can follow up with prospects quickly, making sure they have enough information to make their decisions and secure bookings.

CRM software can help B&B owners organize guest information more effectively, as well. As guests select breakfast entrees or make special requests for their stay, CRM tools can flag reservations that require special attention. Best of all, hosted CRM tools can be linked to outside appointment-setting or telemarketing firms. There, flexible operators can answer calls around the clock to confirm reservations, accept credit cards, or make adjustments to travel plans.

Best of all, with the information collected about guests during their stay, innkeepers can follow up with satisfaction surveys and special offers that build top of mind awareness and generate additional bookings.

Of course, most B&B owners and innkeepers still encourage guests to sign a quaint registry book upon check-in. However, the real work of a savvy B&B is happening inside a small business CRM system.

Skydeck and Freshbooks blend cell phone records with CRM and billing.

When I was consulting full-time, I would have paid someone a ton of money for this new CRM software plug-in from Skydeck and Freshbooks.

Skydeck is a free service that can pull your cell phone records from your wireless provider's website. By building APIs into the service, developers at Skydeck have made it easy for the data to be sliced and diced in some interesting ways.

One of the first mashups for Skydeck is a tool that imports the records of calls made to or from clients into Freshbooks, one of my favorite hosted CRM and billing applications. If you bill your clients by the hour, you can seamlessly create invoices based on the exact amount of time spent on the phone with clients. You can even use Skydeck to measure the exact cost of speaking to your most frequent clients or customers.

Even without a connection to a third-party system, Skydeck offers some interesting CRM software features. You can sync your call records to your Windows or Mac address book, making it easy to stay organized regardless of whether you have a BlackBerry or an iPhone. You can even rank your contacts by the number of times you have called them, or vice versa. I can see folks using this as a small business CRM tool to measure the ROI of calling out to customers -- did those 300 minutes of calls result in a big sale?

This is a great, free small business CRM application, especially useful for consultants, coaches, and other time-billed professionals. Although the current offering is quite robust, Skydeck promises even more advanced functionality when they roll out their paid memberships over the coming months.

With Hosted CRM All the Rage, Is There Still a Place for Desktop CRM Applications?

Although I've been writing a lot lately about hosted CRM applications, today's news that AT&T has acquired Wayport reminds me that not all sales professionals are tethered to a 3G network. In fact, some folks operate in places where you can't always get to Wi-Fi, nor would you expect to.

I am reminded of growing up in the 1980s, working for my Dad in his mobile service unit. Our CRM application was a few milk crates full of service records and invoices tucked, behind the passenger seat. Many of the inner-city neighborhoods we served back then still don't have Wi-Fi, nor do they have the most reliable cell phone service.

Desktop CRM applications, like ACT!, GoldMine, and Daylite, aren't ready to be put out to pasture. In fact, for some professionals, they probably offer a better solution than web-based CRM systems.

For instance, solo professionals without support teams or virtual assistants can enjoy the full power of CRM software without paying monthly hosting or service fees. If you don't have to worry about syncing your CRM database to other users, keeping all of your data on the cloud becomes a less appealing option.

Likewise, mobile professionals who require fast access to small business CRM information can also get a lot from desktop CRM applications. If you're the only person working an account, you can wait until you get back to the office to synchronize with the rest of your team. The ACT! suite does this very well, especially for real estate professionals.

Of course, we're only a few more years away from nearly total network penetration. At that point, most sales and service professionals will be able to choose between totally hosted CRM applications and hybrid systems that sync to the cloud in the background. Until then, the right choice is whatever tool gets you the information and the insight you need, when you need it, wherever you happen to be working.

How CRM Software Can Help Banks Thrive in a Bear Market

For the past decade, banks have made money by offering bundles of credit and savings solutions, often tied to sophisticated web banking tools. However, even at many banks and credit unions that offer powerful online banking, many customers still can't get their questions answered unless they take the time to visit a branch. Banking industry experts hope that sophisticated, new CRM applications can help banks deliver the kind of world class customer service that keeps accounts from moving.

I had my own experience recently with a bank that does online service very well. Having just moved from one corner of the country to another, I was wondering if my current bank was still a good fit for my business account. I enjoyed four branches convenient to my old home. Now, I need to drive about fifteen minutes out of my way just to get to one of their branded ATM's. Because 99% of my banking is handled electronically, I can do just fine without those touchpoints. However, I felt like I should at least be able to leverage my dilemma into reduced account fees.

By wandering through my own bank's website, I found a bewildering number of options. I could sign up for a new account and enjoy no monthly fees for a year, or I could even create an account at one of my current bank's recent acquisitions and lock in a no-fee account for life. Both of these options would require me to spend time setting up new direct deposit and withdrawal plans -- not worth the hassle. I may as well move to another bank, if that's the case.

So, I opened up a chat window to see if I might persuade a customer service rep to give me a break. And that's when the disconnect between customer service and banking CRM applications hit me like a steam train. The helpful rep regretted that she had no access to my bank's CRM software, so she could not verify my account history or even make any recommendations about how to reorganize my account. I can understand her concerns about identity theft and personal privacy. After all, I could be anybody in my person to person chat.

However, isn't this the same bank that has developed a battery of passcodes, picture locks, and SMS-enabled transaction keys to keep impostors from getting into my online banking account? If I can initiate a $5,000 payment to a vendor from a secure website, why can't I get a chat agent to look up my account records?

That's the dilemma that many banks face, according to industry analysts. Many banks are not equipped with policies and procedures to cover interactions over e-mail and chat. Furthermore, privacy policies are already so overloaded, that they might not even permit banks to include the transcripts of chat sessions and e-mail in company CRM systems. Therefore, at most banks, chat and e-mail remain in the province of the marketing department. Reps are happy to talk about the principles of products and services, but they cannot delve deeper into the specifics of an account, the same way that branch representatives can.

If my chat representative had been able to connect to my account, she could have locked me in as a customer for life. Now, I'm still tempted to go to the shiny new bank down the street. And in this new era when deposits are once again paramount to the health of a financial institution, a consolidated CRM system that includes account-focused chat can make the difference for customers like me.

Will Social CRM Systems Let You Be More Than Facebook Friends With Your Customers?

Executives at Oracle recently made waves by unveiling a roadmap for that company's CRM software which focused heavily on social networking. While some companies are trying to find ways to let their CRM applications connect directly to Facebook and Twitter, others simply want their CRM systems mimic the look and feel of social networks to make work more engaging for customer service representatives.

Customer Experience

Already, banks and merchandisers have discovered the value of being accessible in the places where customers want to be. The same process that companies use to scout new brick-and-mortar locations is playing out again online. This time, companies leverage CRM applications to make presence on social sites like MySpace and Facebook meaningful, instead of leaving behind just another branding campaign.

Brand Control

Brand managers, marketing managers, and customer service managers have found themselves in conflict over companies' social CRM strategies. Brand managers have especially voiced concerns about the demands that social networking websites place on customer service personnel. Instead of having a single, consistent message, companies that adopt social CRM applications create individual experiences that flow from a common vision or credo. That may require taking a different approach to customer service elements like communication templates or e-mail policies.

User Adoption

Social CRM applications offer another major incentive to companies. Employees who use sophisticated websites like Flickr and Facebook often become frustrated when dealing with aging, text-based CRM systems at the office. By integrating some of the best practices of popular online applications, sponsors of CRM systems hope that they can speed up training and increase adoption across the enterprise. Even if CRM applications don't directly connect users to customers on Facebook, a growing hope is that a generation of socially-networked web surfers will be more likely to embrace highly attractive, functional, fun CRM applications.

Hosted CRM Systems Still Require Training, Implementation

Hosted CRM systems take a lot of the hassle out of deploying new sales and customer service solutions. In many cases, companies can use their existing hardware and operating systems by connecting to hosted CRM via web browsers. In fact, many companies are counting on "software as a service" to reduce their dependence on hardware upgrades over the next few years.

However, the speed of setting up hosted CRM inside a company doesn't always translate into faster implementation. According to a number of recent reports, hosted CRM implementations are starting to fail because company leaders neglect to invest in a comprehensive implementation plan.

In many organizations, team members take action based on the perception of risk and ROI. Most hosted CRM systems charge companies based on simplified seat license agreements instead of the complex, up-front costs that used to come with large system installations. This new pricing arrangement may, in some cases, encourage team members to take hosted CRM less seriously. After all, if the implementation fails, the company hasn't lost very much. Public price wars and free license promotions are becoming more transparent to end users, who may feel that they can sit out a CRM implementation in favor of an alternative solution that may be coming down the road.

Instead of letting hosted CRM systems fail, business experts advise company leaders to treat a new hosted CRM system launch with the same pomp and circumstance as if the company were investing in its own on-site hardware solution. Leaders should talk about the opportunity cost of remaining with older systems, and about the specific benefits to sales professionals who learn how to use new tools effectively. Helping team members understand the impact of hosted CRM on their personal bottom lines can help adoption rates soar.

Wanted: Profitable CRM Software Companies

With more fallout from the collapse of Entellium, the business IT community has started to worry about the fiscal health of other vendors in the CRM software space. After all, migrating from one CRM application to another isn't fun when you want to do it, let alone when you start to wonder if someone's coming along to shut the servers down.

How, exactly, can you determine whether a CRM software vendor is going be around for a while? After all, executives from Entellium managed to fool some pretty smart people for a few years, if the most recent press reports are to be believed.

According to industry experts and leading CRM software consultants, the very best CRM vendors actually walk their talk. They use their own tools as the backbone for policies and procedures that engage customers and develop relationships.

Here's one tweet I found that exhibits the problem:



If your clients don't actually want to speak to you when times are good, what does that say about how your relationship will weather the storm when times are bad?

A CRM software vendor should exemplify the best practices of modern sales. If you don't feel right about them in your gut, they probably won't be the right fit for your company.

Will SaaS Price War Color CRM Comparisons?

In my last post, I wrote about some potential CRM software buyers looking for bargains. According to the technology press, the economic changes over the past few months might make it even cheaper for new clients of hosted CRM platforms.

For instance, one report suggests that NetSuite is making a play for Salesforce customers by extending discounts of up to 50% for new customers of its hosted CRM system. It seems like Microsoft is taking the same tactic. Even some open source CRM software vendors are getting in on this action.

Meanwhile, the folks at Salesforce are eager to mention that customers should be nervous about companies that are willing to slash their prices so drastically. One writer notes that they're "not about to run a closeout sale," but that they're responding to the threats with some aggressive pricing of their own.

If there's a price war on CRM applications, that's a good thing for companies, right?

Maybe not.

For prospective buyers of CRM software, this is a great quarter to lock in a deal on an upgrade or a new implementation that you've already been planning. If, however, you're thinking about jumping ship from one provider to another just based on a special pricing deal, remember to factor in the opportunity costs of making the switch:

• Training staff on the new system.
• Transferring customer records between CRM applications.
• Updating web lead forms and other intake procedures.

If pricing incentives for hosted CRM tools can still save your company money over the next 2-3 years, then making the switch can be worth it. Otherwise, it might be a good time to talk to your account representative about new features or incentives that can make your decision to stay even easier.

Best CRM Applications for Non-Profits

A common question: if CRM applications can do so much for sales organizations, what can they do for non-profits?



It's interesting to see this question wrapped up in the distinction between small businesses and not-for-profit. That leads me to think this questioner is really after one thing: CHEAP.

What's great about today's batch of CRM applications? They actually are affordable for most types of organizations, even small businesses and not-for profits that don't have a lot of money. Having worked in the not-for-profit world as both a fundraiser and as a consultant, I have run across two types of folks who would be likely to set up their offices on CRM applications.

The first group believes strongly in Mission Based Marketing, and understands how to leverage their investments to bring in more donations. They're not afraid to spend $25,000 on a high-end CRM application if it means that they'll get a $250,000 return on that outlay. Like major corporations, they rely on solid marketing tactics, especially direct mail and online appeals. However, it's becoming harder to justify large overhead expenses to major donors. Nobody wants to see their big donation cover the cost of a very un-sexy software tool, even if that tool is pulling back nine or ten times its price tag in revenue.

The second group are the bootstrappers. These harried office organizers might not even be getting a paycheck for doing something they love to do. But they want to leverage software to help their causes. "Free" and "cheap" might be appealing to them -- it's easy to suck up a $12/month seat license on one's own dime. But lower cost CRM applications might not always have the right mix of features and support for charities.

Here are some of the low-cost CRM applications that are making great inroads into the non-profit sector:



GivenGain: Via the always-helpful eHub, I just learned about this new entrant in the race for "best CRM application designed for non-profits." This European team offers a donor management solution with two tiers: a fully-featured solution that includes e-mail outreach for $60 per month and a lite version with basic tools for $10 per month. Integrated payment processing is available for 3% plus transaction fees. Those fees are a little higher than PayPal's, but with all of the hassles of getting a non-profit set up with a merchant account, this structure is great for non-profits that are just getting started with online giving.



Zoho CRM: This little upstart has made a name for itself by cloning some of users' favorite elements from Google Docs and Salesforce, and blending them into its own CRM suite. Zoho lets teams of up to three users work the CRM application for free, making it ideal for budget-minded organizations. While Zoho offers web forms and other tools to import donor information, users must bring their own payment processing. This is good for groups with an existing web presence or a donor pool that loves writing checks.



Convio: The suite of tools offered by this specialist CRM software company might not appeal to folks looking for cheap solutions. However, Convio was one of the first programming companies that specifically addresses the needs of non-profits. They specialize in event-based donor management solutions, especially team fundraising activities. Best of all, they're not afraid to look outside themselves for inspiration -- some of their latest tools are actually built on the Salesforce.com application platform, bringing the best of both worlds to non-profits.

What happens when your team hates your company's CRM software?

Look at sites like Facebook or Twitter for more than a few minutes, and you're bound to find entries like this one:



That's the sound of passionate sales professionals frustrated by the inability to use CRM software to accomplish their goals. Reactions like this are one of the reasons that many CRM implementations fail. Successful, strong-willed sales professionals like to have a say in the way they conduct their business. And, in a market economy, they may head off to another job before letting their frustration be known.

When I wrote about six things managers can do to help CRM implementation go smoothly, I focused on using software to underscore the needs of the business. However, when I see comments like the one above, I know that someone has flipped the equation around -- the CRM software is driving the bus, not the sales professional.

It's important for anyone tasked with a CRM implementation to make sure there's a safe space to speak out about limitations of the software, and that it's not particularly disloyal or unhelpful to vent about what you want a CRM application to do. In some cases, additional training may help. Sometimes, the situation may require a workaround. And, especially when dealing with custom CRM applications, it might even be possible to engage the developers for insight or for a solution.

Facebook CRM Applications Track User Communications, Preferences

I’ve already written about how companies have started to integrate Twitter into the customer service environment. Now, I’ve got a press release on my desk about a company that is launching a Facebook CRM application for contact centers.

It turns out that they’re not the only ones trying to catch the trend of communicating with friends through Facebook instead of via e-mail. Programmers and CRM software developers have been tinkering with the ability to bring customer relationship management tools to the service’s open programming platform for at least a year.

Some of the Facebook CRM applications on the market work like middleware. They actually handle inbound Facebook messages the same way as incoming e-mail. Service agents can import customer requests from Facebook mail, open tickets, and even collect personal data provided by site members.

Newer Facebook CRM applications take advantage of API connections between Facebook and a company’s CRM software. By saving a user’s profile page as a field within a contact, agents can help automate the process of following up on transactions or scanning user status updates for alerts.

Privacy advocates have raised concerns about what happens when companies start logging the personal information shared through social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn. CRM software programmers note that Facebook’s API prevents them from violating the site’s privacy policy. Facebook users set their own privacy profiles through their personal preference settings. They also control the amount of information that “friends” can access. Therefore, companies can only review information that site users allow them to see. However, logging a customer’s live feed of data might inadvertently store information that might later be deleted from a site’s servers, creating potential copyright issues.

For companies that want to learn more about customers while responding to questions and concerns in a familiar context, tracking Facebook through CRM software appears to be a promising, new frontier.

Mobile CRM Systems Coming to a Hotel Near You

Product managers at CRM application vendors love to talk about web integration. After all, when customer make their own selections of products and services online, web servers capture the details and nuances of their requests in place of human agents or sales professionals. What might have once landed in the heads of clever field agents now resides in a master database of likes and dislikes.

Some organizations experience resistance over installing CRM applications because staff members fear they’ll eventually be replaced. In fact, companies that use CRM software and web-based tools effectively tend to expand their business far beyond the capacities of their current staff. And the evidence of this trend is popping up in some unexpected places, like your local hotel.

For years, major brand hotel chains have urged guests to shift their appointments from the phone to their company websites. Not only does self-service web booking offer guests a comprehensive view of the prices and options available, it allows key customer data to be fed directly into a chain’s CRM system. Savvy hotel managers can use CRM data to predict the needs of incoming guests, especially repeat visitors. Anticipating these needs can impact everything from hotel decor to the kind of food and beverage on hand.

Now, imagine the power of a CRM application that can track a hotel guest’s wants and needs throughout the duration of their stay. That’s exactly what Runtriz has created with a custom hotel CRM application that runs on an iPhone or an iPod touch mobile device. By putting the entire range of hotel services -- from room service to special requests -- at the fingertips of guests, hotel managers encourage more sales through increased interaction.

Over time, managers use the CRM software not just to streamline special requests, but to build profiles of travelers and the kinds of services they request the most. This kind of CRM application can influence everything from the kind of food offered on the menu to the types of amenities offered throughout a property.

How Easily Can You Export Data from Your CRM Software?

The recent implosion of Entellium has CIOs and sales managers talking. Despite all the benefits of hosted CRM applications, there’s always an outside possibility that a CRM software vendor might shut down entirely. Fear of losing customer data may prevent managers from pursuing a customer relationship management strategy at all, according to some industry experts.

When shopping for CRM software, purchasers must ask prospective vendors about their procedures for data access, recovery, and migration. In fact, Entellium’s own marketing material encouraged their prospects to ask tough questions about data migration. Unfortunately, this solid advice couldn’t save the jobs of the sales and marketing professionals who were laid off when the company suddenly ran out of money.

CRM software champions within a company must make sure that they have a data export strategy in mind, regardless of the stability of their vendor. This tip applies equally to clients of hosted CRM systems and to owners of site-specific CRM software. Just as a vendor on shaky financial territory could vanish overnight, a custom installed CRM solution might become worthless if a legacy hardware or software module cannot be serviced or replaced.

Fortunately, in this case, investors and other board members of the company have been able to keep the servers running. Over the coming weeks, the eSalesForce and Rave platforms -- each supporting groups of otherwise satisfied client companies -- might be sold off to new owners at bargain basement prices. Whether the existing CRM applications will remain as-is or will be integrated into competitors’ suites remains to be seen. Either way, this episode illustrates the importance of accessing and backing up data locally, regardless of how stable a vendor looks.

CRM Software Tracks New Prospects with Google Alerts

In an earlier post, I wrote about some companies who have found value in using Twitter to discover disgruntled customers. Of course, Twitter represents just a fraction of your company’s customers online. To help reveal other customer issues, many companies now rely on Google Alerts. These daily, automatic searches for key words and phrases can help customer service professionals get in front of a breaking situation before it gets out of control.

Like Twitter, Google Alerts can play a role in a company’s customer relationship management strategy. A team member tasked with tracking down customers with online complaints can use CRM software to triangulate their identities and locations based on data collected in-house.

Google Alerts are simple to use, but it may take some tweaking to get results that properly target real customer issues without catching irrelevant details. John Jantsch from Duct Tape Marketing has posted a list of ten Google Alerts shortcuts that can help your customer relationship management team find and resolve problems.

However, Google Alerts aren’t just for companies trying to solve problems. A handful of businesses have discovered that Google Alerts can actually be a pretty good prospecting tool. For instance, a gutter repair company in Chicago might run a Google Alert for blogs and Twitter messages that use keywords like, “gutter fixed.” Likewise, a Ford dealer in Tampa might register a Google Alert for blogs that include phrases such as, “want to buy a new Mustang.”

While not exactly warm leads, these hits on relevant blog and journal searches can turn up some prospective customers. A polite note via e-mail or Twitter can actually lead to an introduction and even a sale. Most CRM software will allow sales professionals to log the sources of these new leads using custom notes. However, Oracle and other CRM software developers are already testing new prospect search features that can automate the process of turning Google Alerts-style notifications into potential new buyers. With these new customer relationship management tools on the horizon, blogs can help generate sales in addition to serving existing customers.

Companies Test Twitter Inside CRM Applications

Twitter blends the casual communication of instant messaging with the permanence of blogging. Although it started off as a fairly simple website, this powerful tool connects to a variety of desktop and mobile clients. More importantly, your customers are starting to use it to document the quality of your products and services. Marketing experts believe that integrating Twitter into your company’s customer relationship management strategy acts as a distant early warning against product defects and underperforming service representatives.

In a society where frustrated customers tend to share their experiences online instead of contacting companies directly, top companies extend customer relationship management beyond inbound communication. Looking to Twitter for problems to solve can improve individual relationships with customers, while offering public evidence of a company’s commitment to quality. Companies already building strong, interactive presences on Twitter include:

* JetBlue
* Dell
* Southwest Airlines
* Kodak
* H&R Block
* Whole Foods

While it makes sense for technology companies like Dell to track customer comments on a niche publishing service, what draws the attention of businesses like General Motors and H&R Block? Twitter users include thought leaders from all walks of life. They represent the most vocal and connected customers for their companies, often helping to uncover entire pockets of discontent from an entire customer base.

Right now, many companies approach Twitter as a challenge for customer relations departments, responding to complaint tweets the same way that they would respond to angry letters or blog postings. However, a growing number of businesses have opened up to the idea of offering traditional customer support on Twitter by blending online tools with their CRM applications.

It’s no surprise that CRM application vendors are at the forefront of this trend, especially since many of their customers are well-connected CIOs and network administrators. SAP recently opened an early test of their new Twitter module to clients and to the press, while developers have launched numerous in-house projects to connect customers’ accounts to their Twitter streams. Heavy Twitter users may be more likely to request help via a “direct message” to a customer service center than by calling or visiting a company web site. Even passive compliments and complaints from customers can be logged into CRM applications by “following” a user’s account or searching for company references using Twitter’s search tools.

Along the same lines, some companies have discovered the benefits of using Twitter in their own enterprise. Other businesses are building their own private versions of Twitter tools, to enjoy the benefits of timely, but trackable, conversations. For company leaders who wonder whether Twitter has the traction to stay around for the long haul, experts point at AOL’s IM platform. Ten years ago, it was something that maybe the office intern had running in a background window. Today, IM and live chat are integral to numerous customer relationship management strategies.

Startup Depression Spawns Spike in Demand for Hosted CRM

Times like these can be especially tough for small and medium-sized businesses. To help SMBs weather the storm, business blogger Jason Calacanis has put together a list of ten things smaller companies can do to get through the credit crunch. At the top of his list is a challenge to “execute better.”

To me, that means making more of every opportunity, taking care of your existing customers, and looking harder for new sources of revenue. At the same time, there’s no easy business credit or venture capital floating around to cover the cost of expensive marketing campaigns or custom databases.

Hosted CRM systems offer tremendous ROI potential when they’re used effectively. Here are three of my favorite tips for business owners who want to save money by firing up a hosted CRM system:

• Don’t try to reinvent the wheel. Instead of spending tons of money to customize your CRM application with exactly the data fields you want right now, do what the folks at 37signals recommend: use simple workarounds and catch-all text fields to keep things moving. Capturing and using the data is crucial right now. Getting it to look exactly the way you want is something that can wait until you’ve got positive cash flow and angel investors banging down your door.

• Price your CRM application for today’s team and for tomorrow’s expansion. I love hosted CRM apps because many vendors will let you purchase licenses either by the employee or in small blocks. You don’t have to spend a huge amount of money up front to get the powerful tools your team needs right now.

• Make it work anywhere. If you’re looking at holding on to some of your team’s hardware for another year (or more), choose a hosted CRM system that runs on nearly any platform. That way, as you gradually replace desktop and laptop computers over the next few years, your entire team will still be on the same page.

Whatever industry you're in, an inexpensive, hosted CRM application can help bring more money in the door without tying up your credit lines or your cash flow.

Home Builders Unearth More Sales Using CRM Software

With all the recent news coverage of the subprime mortgage crisis and the Wall Street bailout package, home builders haven’t received the kind of attention they’re used to from the press. They’re not getting as much attention from speculators or from home buyers, either.

That’s a big problem.

With consumer banks tightening up on mortgages and commercial lenders reluctant to approve any new loans, home builders have to rely on tried-and-true sales tactics to keep construction crews busy. The past few months have seen an uptick in the number of CRM applications specifically designed for the home construction industry. By coaching home builders to convert more of their prospects into purchasers during this slow period, sales coaches and CRM application developers hope to help their customers weather the financial storm.

Until recently, many sales agents at home builders simply relied on “for sale” signs and newspaper announcements to attract new customers. In today’s tougher marketplace, agents have to work harder to capture sales. CRM software helps agents:

• provide personalized responses to queries
• track follow-up calls
• pass customer details to lending partners
• offer customized production schedules for buyers
• prompt consistent feedback and follow-up

Home builders that want to learn how CRM applications can improve conversion rates can download a free white paper from Pivotal:

Home Builder Survival Kit

The free report offers ten steps that home builders can take right now to implement CRM systems that boost sales. Even with the recent passage of the government’s financial rescue plan, it could take months or even years for home builders to return to the kind of steady business they enjoyed in the first half of the decade. When that happens, tight CRM systems will help smart home builders close even more sales.

Hosted CRM Can Protect Your Customers from Identity Theft

As someone who spends a great deal of time on the road, I always get nervous when I hear about a stolen laptop or a missing hard drive containing thousands of customer records. Where I grew up, anything stolen from a car just ended up at a pawn shop. You could safely assume that any data on a hard drive would either get wiped out, or just ignored by some future user.

Not anymore. Clever thieves now realize that they can extract more value from a hard drive's CRM data than from the equipment itself. Up until a few years ago, that could easily have been my laptop, with my customer data on it. I would hate to have to call up my clients and give them that kind of bad news.

That's one of the reasons I switched to hosted CRM for my own business, and why I often recommend it to my consulting clients. If someone breaks into my car while I'm running a roadside errand, the worst thing I have to deal with is borrowing or buying another laptop for the rest of the trip. All of my hard drive data is backed up at the office, and all of my customer data lives on the cloud. In the ultimate worst case scenario, I can stop by a Kinko's and rent a machine to get my work done.

If you're working at a company that doesn't use hosted CRM (and there are plenty of performance-related reasons why you might want to do that), you can still protect your customer data using encryption, hardware locks, or even by connecting remotely to your desktop computer using VNC, GoToMyPC, or LogMeIn. Still, with VPN, Wi-Fi, and 3G laptop connections, it's easier than ever to let your data live on a hosted CRM solution.

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Find Other Ways to Connect with Clients

CRM software helps you strengthen relationships with your customers. It is utilized and shared by customer service departments, sales representatives, and managers and executives alike.

Companies need to form solid relationships with their customers. Clients have many sources to choose from, so knowing the client's needs and satisfying those needs is imperative.

Besides the application of CRM software, what are other ways a company can connect to clients?

- Check out professional social sites such as LinkedIn. Many professionals use the service to network, find information, and get referrals.

- Clients appreciate both formal and informal contact with companies they engage in business with. Social sites such as Facebook and MySpace present the opportunity for your company to construct an account and share information with customers.

- Writing a blog helps your executives connect with their customers. What better way to have contact with clients than addressing their questions and comments directly from your corporate blog? You can create a blog with ease at the Blogger Web site.

- Host a charity event. Whether it be a race, contest, gala, etc., create a chance to socialize with clients for a good cause.

Sales Advantages of Using CRM Software

CRM software benefits many people in a business. Salespeople enjoy several advantages as a result of the system.

- The sales cycle gets shortened. All steps in the sales process becomes more efficient thus promoting its alacrity.

- Customer needs are better identified. CRM software aids in a business' attempt to personalize a consumer's account. Businesses can cater their services to their customers on a case-by-case basis.

- Customers can be analyzed in depth. Salespeople can see support, sales, and purchase history of each consumer.

- Salespeople can share information with others on their team in order to compare notes, share ideas, and give suggestions.

- CRM software enables salespeople to integrate cohorts from other departments into the sales cycle. This results in better efficiency and great communication throughout varying departments.

Use CRM Software to Find More Customers

CRM Software is highly celebrated for improving a business' relationship with current clients. In addition to this benefit, business CRM software also aids in finding new clients.

The findings show many characteristics about clientele. With this information, a company can make assumptions about similarities between existing and potential clients.

For instance, if a current client subscribes to a particular magazine, a business can deduce that other subscribers to the magazine may also be interested in their products or services.

View other news about CRM:

Do Your Customers Love You? - CNNMoney.com

Message for Electronics Retailers: Customer Service Sells - CRM Buyer

CRM Software Helps Create Loyal Customers

Customers are the most important element of your business; without them, you have no business at all. CRM software gives you the insight to create lasting customers. How does CRM software achieve this?

It creates an impact in four major areas of your business:

Customer service - Representatives will know more personal information about individual customers to create a 'personalized' rapport.

Sales - Your sales department will have more information to draw from when speaking with potential and existing customers.

Marketing - The department will understand how to develop current and future campaigns based on data elicited.

Management - Executives will receive a steady stream of information in order to make better decisions and allocate immediate resources.

Learn more about CRM Systems

CRM Software: Work Smarter, Not Smarter

Software That Attracts Business

CRM Software