e-CRM Introduction

TRENDS IN CRM

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

– Focuses on providing and maintaining quality service for customers, by effectively communicating and delivering products, services, information and solutions to address customer problems, wants and needs

– Can include:

•      Call handling (the maintenance of outbound and inbound calls from customers and service representatives)

•      Sales tracking (the tracking and recording of all sales made)

•      Transaction support (the technology and personnel used for conducting business transactions)

e-CRM INTRODUCTION

• e-CRM is the application of CRM to an e-business‘   strategy

– Includes the personalization and custom interactions with the e-business

•      Relationship between merchant and customers is distant

•      Less expensive to keep customers than to acquire new ones

•      Repeat customers have higher lifetime value than one-time buyers

– A customer‘slifetimevalueis the expected amount of profit derived from a customer over a designated length of time

•      Evaluate the potential to profit from a customer

•      Tracking and Analyzing Data

•      Employ tracking devices

– Personalize   each   visitor‘s   experience

– Find trends in customer use

– Measure the effectiveness of a Web site over time

– ID cards

•      An ID card enables information to be sent to your computer from a Web site such as the numerical address of your PC on the Internet, your browser and your operating system

·        Click-through banner advertisements

•      Click-through advertisements enable visitors to view a service or product by clicking the advertisement

•      Advertisers can learn what sites generate sales

•      Tracking and Analyzing Data

– Web Bugs, or clear GIFs

•      A type of image file embedded in an image on the screen

•      Site owners allow companies, especially advertising companies, to hide these information-collecting programs on various parts of their sites

•      Every time a user requests a page with a Web bug on it, the Web bug

sends a request to server,thewhichWebthentracksbug‘s com where the user goes on the Web.

– Log-file analysis

– Data mining

– Customer registration

– Cookies

•      Log-File Analysis

•      When visiting a site, you are submitting a and the request is recorded in a log file

– Log files consist   of   data   generated   by   site   v

IP address, time of visit, frequency of visits and other information

– Log-file analysis organizes and summarizes the information contained in the log files

•      Can be used to determine the number of unique visitors

•      Can show the Web-site traffic effects of changing a Web site or advertising campaign

•      Customer Registration

– Requiring visitors to fill out a form with personal information that is then used to create a profile

– Recommended when it will provide a benefit to the customer

– When customers log on using usernames and passwords, their actions can be tracked and stored in a database

•      Require only minimum information

•      Give customers an incentive to register

– Free-trial run or a free demonstration to familiarize the user

•      After customer registration, send an e-mail including customer usernames and welcoming them to your Web site

•      Cookies

–  A text file stored by a Web siteallows a on an site to track the actions of a

– Information collected is intended to be an anonymous account of log-on times, the length of stay at the site, purchases made on the site, the site previously visited and the site visited next

– Does not interact with other information stored on the system

– Can only be read by the host that sets them on a person‘s computer

•      Cookies Benefits

– Record passwords for returning visitors

– Keep track of shopping-cart materials

– Register preferences

– Assist companies in address target markets with greater accuracy

•      Negatives

– Customer privacy

– Can be misleading to site that places cookie on a computer

•      Different people may use the same computer to surf the Web, and the cookie will not be able to differentiate the users

•      Personalization

– Uses information from tracking, mining and data analysis to customize a person‘s interactions with a company‘s products, services, Web site and employees

•       Allaire, Blaze Software, NetGenesis and  Personify

•      Establish relationships that improve each time visitors return to site

•      Customers may enjoy individual attention and become more loyal

•      Personalization

Collaborative filtering

– Compares ratings of a present user‘s in users to offer content relative to the

Rules-based personalization

–  The delivery of personalized content based on the subjection of a user‘s p set rules or assumptions

Intelligent Agents

– A program that can be used on the Web to assist a user in the completion of a specified task, including searching for information and automating tasks

•         Can be used as personalization mechanisms by providing content related to the user‘s  interests

•      Can observe Web-surfing habits and purchasing behavior to recommend new products to buy or sites to visit

•      Can help e-businesses offer a level of customer service similar to person-to-person interaction

Personalization vs. Privacy

•      Some people feel personalization represents invasion of privacy and others may not be aware that data is being collected and personalization is occurring at a site

•      Marketers must be discrete about the way they use personal information gained from data research

 Personalization Consortium

– An alliance of major Web sites attempting to accommodate those individuals who prefer to have their Web experiences tailored

– Released a study suggesting that most users actually prefer to have their information stored and actions tracked

Contact Centers

•      Traditional call centers house customer-service representatives who can be reached by an 800 number

•      Call center, e-contact center or multimedia contact center

– Purpose is the same—to provide a personal customer service experience that is individualized to each customer‘s needs

– Allow customers with Internet access to contact customer service representatives through e-mail, online text chatting or real-time voice communications

•      Integration of all customer service functions

•      Change the culture of customer service representatives

– More technically knowledgeable to handle all forms of contact

– Provide a highly personalized experience that satisfies customers

•      New forms of contact can decrease costs

•      Outsource contact center services

– May be appropriate if a company cannot afford to implement a contact center due to the costs of equipment, office space, service representatives and technical support.

–  Stream International, Inc. Sitel  Corporation and  TeleTech

e-Mail

•      E-mail can provide a less expensive customer service solution

– – Customers can use e-mail to ask questions or comment on your company‘s services or products

•      Only appropriate if you have resources to handle demands

•      Customers may be not be willing to wait long for an e-mail reply

•   • Ideally, a response to a customer‘s e-mail inquiry should be completed within forty-eight hours

•  Brightware RightNow  Technologies , Servicesoft  and  Delano

Online Text Chatting

– Provides a real-time form of communication between customers and service representatives

•      Service representatives may be able to handle more than one text chat at a time

•      Customers can continue to view the Web site as they chat with a service representative

– Allows the service representative to see what the customers are looking at as they pose their questions

•      ―Instantaneous‖

– If representatives are busy with many chat sessions, customer may experience delay in responses

•      Can lose the dynamics of human communication

•      The meaning of a message may be misinterpreted

•       FaceTime Communications, CLICKiCHAT and  LivePersonSM

•      Voice Communications

•      Internet provides another channel for human-to-human voice communication

•      Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP)

– VoIP products and applications allow people to communicate with speech over the Internet

•      Internet telephony allows people to make phone calls over the Internet

– Quality of transmission yet to match regular telephone

– Many companies are using PC-to-phone communication because it is of higher

– quality than PC-to-PC

•      A person speaks from a computer to another person who responds through another computer

•       PC-to-phone (computer-to-phone) voice communication

– Allows a visitor to a Web site to continue browsing while talking to a customer-service representative over the Internet

– Allows dial-up Internet users who have only one phone line to chat with a CSR without having to disconnect from the Internet

–  HearMe, RealCall, Web Call Back and  ITXC

•      Wizard

– Software program that walks you through the steps needed to complete a task on your computer

Sales-Force Automation

– Assists companies in the sales process, including maintaining and discovering leads, managing contacts and other sales-force activities

– Can lighten the administrative load on the sales force

– Important information about products and customers can be accessed in real time, allowing salespeople to keep current on company and client information

•      Customers may want human contact at some point throughout the purchasing process, especially with higher-priced items

•       Salesforce.com, Sales.com Sales Logix and  Clarify

•      Business-to-Business e-CRM

•      Key to (B2B) e-commerce is effective (CRM)

•      When selling to another business, you may be selling to someone who is not the direct user of your product

– Ask your contact to speak with the end users

•      Developing good partner relationship management (PRM) includes increasing efficiency in operations and processes between a business and its partners

– Partners can include resellers, distributors and businesses that improve your product or service

– Integrating systems to combine selling, buying and marketing operations of partners will streamline processes and provide technical conformity

–  ChannelWave Software, Inc., Allegis  and  Partnerware

•      Complete e-CRM Solutions

•      Solutions, software or services that use and integrate all the tools of CRM provide a single view of a customer

– Costs include the price of the software or service itself, the integration into the current system, the maintenance of the system and employing the service representatives

– Solutions will continue to become more efficient

•       E.piphany

•      eGain

•       Siebel Systems

•       Kana Communications

•       Oracle Systems