The Difference between a CRM System and a CRM Strategy

The key ingredient for the perfect CRM recipe is that of a well-thought-out strategy. Though comparing CRM to a recipe might not align itself perfectly, the main point to be highlighted here is that fact that without a clear vision and direction, one’s CRM deployment WILL fail. Before beginning research, selection, adoption or deployment of any CRM system, businesses of all sizes must create a clear and concise CRM strategy that considers their current stance, their future goals and where the CRM system comes into play. Why strategize? Though the concept of strategizing can be both overwhelming and scary, it is one of the most crucial aspects of deploying a CRM system. Too often, companies adopt a new system with the hopes of it growing their business and making them money without understanding what they need the system to do in order to achieve those goals. What they are left with is a costly system that falls by the wayside because they do not know how to optimize on its features and more importantly, what purpose it serves for their organization. By developing a thorough CRM strategy that outlines the incremental goals that an organization wishes to achieve with the CRM system in place, businesses are then able to fully utilize the system and effectively reap its benefits. Lacking a strategy or having an underdeveloped strategy results in not using the CRM system to its full potential and therefore bringing the company right back to where they first started. With a firm CRM strategy in place, companies will notice that both managerial and sales buy-in will increase and that the company’s overall culture will shift to a more customer-centric focus. How to strategize To begin developing a CRM strategy, businesses need to set aside the technological aspects of the CRM and ask themselves: Why am I purchasing the system in the first place? Hopefully the answer to that question has something to do with better managing and optimizing customer relationships (after all, the first letter of CRM stands for customer). With that in mind, the customer then becomes the heart of the strategy, which results in the company using the CRM system as a tool to provide a memorable and valuable customer experience. The next step is to then zero in on how the company will provide an emotionally-driven experience for the customer. An example of this is to break down the customers into segmented groups based on individual wants and needs and then sort out a channel strategy of how to best communicate the product or service to these specific customers. Regardless of what approach companies may take to create a great experience for their customers, they must have a clear path of how to achieve it and furthermore remain consistent with their efforts. From there, businesses then need to reconsider the IT component of CRM by assessing the functionalities and features that the CRM system needs to have in order for their targeted and emotionally-charged efforts to prove effective. So in the case of segmenting customers into specific categories, a company would then look for a CRM system that would provide superior marketing automation features and the ability to slice and dice data to create targeted marketing campaigns. By creating a CRM strategy that heavily focuses on customer centricity, companies can set their organizational goals around striving for and strengthening customer loyalty. The effectiveness of the CRM system can then be assessed based on the creation of solid relationships, which result in closed business. As long as the businesses’ CRM strategy aligns with and accommodates the CRM system’s capabilities, reaching their end goals should be a piece of cake.