1. What's Customer Relation Management

Customer relationship management regularly referred to as CRM is could be defined in four words: “Treat different customers different.” (Peppers and Rogers, 2004). CRM, it about all the interactions a company has with existing and prospective customers. It includes business process, such as Marketing, Sales, as well as the software used to automate these business process (Buck-Emden, Zencke, and Emden, 2005).

The customer relationship concept can be traced to the 1950s when (Drucker, 2006)  argued that customers should be the foundation of an organization and the very reason for its existence.

The breakthrough occurs according to (Coltman, 2007)  during the mid-1990s, by the time the company’s strategy was focused on the approach inside-out, concentrating mainly on the products offered.

With the increasing of the competition, and the increase of turnover on the companies that focused only on market production. The customer satisfaction start becomes a vital factor in the financial goal. It’s no surprise that tracking all these factors is one of the most technology-dependent functions across all business. (Peppers and Rogers, 2004) .

2.The Scope of Solution on IT

The scope of functionalities is widely and vast since it cannot merely be based on a simple set of rules or mirror another Inc, P. (2016). Though each CRM strategy is unique, there are often similarities on the care of the solution the Marketing, Sales, Services and Analytics, thus providing the necessary tools and automated process to engage the customer, process and fulfill sales orders.

Below are the most significant features for a CRM solution. The list is based on critical capabilities evaluated by reports of research companies such Forrester and Garter as well as on the literature of Maoz, M. and Manusama, B. (2016), (Buttle, 2008) and (Peppers and Rogers, 2004)

2.1. Marketing

· **Segmentation and List Management **– Create targeted marketing lists based on user attributes; Mapping tools allow you to map between internal and external lists.

· Campaign Management - Plan, design, and execute coordinated, multi-channel Campaigns, like email templates. Centrally coordinate and control all marketing plans, campaigns, promotions, initiatives, etc., across the organization with a calendar framework.

· Lead Management - Mass generate leads from marketing campaigns or target groups. Automatically generate and qualify leads from surveys.

· Telemarketing - Enable agents to call prospects and qualify leads, using scripts or surveys


2.2. Sales

· Territory Management - Resources to optimize coverage and balance workloads across well-defined territories.

· Accounts and Contacts - Comprehensive view of all the information necessary to manage your sales accounts – including account history, detailed profiles, key contacts, service requests, orders, back orders, credit info, and campaigns running for the account.

· **Opportunity Management **– Resources to track, analyze, and optimize your sales opportunities from start to end, automatically assign partners, and leverage built-in sales methodology templates and extensive org charting.

· Pricing - Automatically provide pricing.

· Telesales** **- Tools to telesales agents with account facts sheets (which summarize all critical account information), alerts, and interactive scripts.

2.3. Service Management

· **Customer Service **– Provide customer with tools that helps manage customer interactions, service requests, quotes, appointments, and customer products and warranties.

· **Service Order Management **– Manage the entire service order process, from creating a service request to dispatching a technician, to confirming completion, through to billing and evaluating service

· **Service Contract Management **–Manage service contracts to ensure consistent service offerings, pricing, discounts and terms across a range of related service contracts

· **Complaints and Returns **– Manage the entire complaints and returns process—from capturing a customer’s complaint, to the inbound delivery of the defective product, through to the creation of a credit memo for the client. Customers can create and track their returns and requests for credit, exchange, or replacement.

· **Installed Base Management **– Enable your customers to register their products online—for each of their registered products, they can view the warranty or create a service request.

· **Warranty Management **– Track product warranties, which customers can see on the web for their registered products. When a service order is created, the system automatically checks whether a warranty exists,

· **Resource Planning **– Manage and optimize the service resources, using the scheduling engine, to provide customers with several appointment options and an accurate estimate of when their service technician will arrive.

3.Manufactures

There are many providers of software for this market that, the following analysis provides a comparative of leading CRM providers evaluated by CRM Magic Quadrant by Gartner (Maoz and Manusama, 2016)

Each of the leading vendors in this mature market offers a checklist of features and functions.(Leggett, 2017)  reminds that more is not better; many times, more is just more. In fact, when the organization don’t need or can’t use extra features, more is sometimes worse. CRM buyers must understand the market segmentation in order focus in on the right category of vendor that is the right size for their needs. Therefore, the vendors considered are those that are suitable for middle-sized firms.

3.1. CRM Vendors Considered

· Microsoft Dynamics CRM

· Salesforce.com

· SugarCRM

· SAP Cloud

3.2. CRM Evaluation Overview by Forrester

The first analyses are based on the Forrester Wave Methodology™ (Forrester Research, no date)  where they conduct primary research to develop a list of vendors that meet their criteria to be evaluated in this market. From that initial pool of vendors, they then narrow the final list based on: 1) product fit; 2) customer success; and 3) Forrester client demand.



Figure 1 - Market Leaders presence

Source: Adapted from Kate Leggett (2017)

4.CRM User’s review

User experience, and end usability are factors primordial as well for a CRM system (L, 2016) With this concept the figure show the average ratings of software satisfaction and features based on the most reviews available anywhere (G 2 Crowd, 2017)



Figure 2 - User Reviews

Source: Adapted from (CompareBusinessProducts, 2016)

The various pricing schemes can create confusion among buyers since the solutions are priced under various schemes.

Also there are still several companies offering license-based pricing models Also, some companies offer both a subscription option in addition to a perpetual license option.

The following analysis provides a comparative price analysis of the select vendors. The prices are based on the information available on the vendor’s websites. The solution are based on the cloud-based SaaS subscription model including user license or subscription costs.



Figure 3 - Price Comparation

Source: Adapted from (Sugar CRM, no date) (SAP Cloud, 2016) (Salesforce, 2016)

5.CRM Market

It’s no surprise that tracking all these factors is rapidly becoming one of the most technology-dependent functions across all business. Gartner has predicted that by 2018 a company’s chief marketing officer (CMO) would be spending more on technology than its CIO and that is becoming more credible every day as many CMOs have adopted technology in their everyday activities showing that technology became the core of marketing nowadays.

Figure 4 Large enterprises that have already implemented a CRM solution



· Source: (Inc, 2016)

Gartner has predicted that by 2017 a company’s chief marketing officer (CMO) would be spending more on technology than its CIO and that is becoming more credible every day as many CMOs have adopted technology in their everyday activities showing that technology became the core of marketing nowadays,

Thus, interest in deploying CRM technologies continues. Our data shows that almost two-thirds of technology decision-makers at enterprise organizations indicate that they have implemented a subset of CRM capabilities.1 Specifically, 41% have already implemented a customer service and support (CSS) solution; 34% have implemented a sales force automation SFA) application; and 26% have implemented marketing automation — and many are planning to upgrade their tool sets. An additional 30%, 31%, and 28% have plans to adopt a CSS, SFA, and marketing automation solution within the next few years, respectively (Inc, 2016)

6.Conclusion

In the age of the customer, good customer experiences are the only sources of competitive differentiation. Organizations use customer relationship management (CRM) as a foundational building block in their customer experience strategy (Review, 2011) . Digital CRM technologies that drive growth and elevate the customer experience top the list of CEOs' investment priorities for the next five years. Data and analytics tools that facilitate consistent, contextual interactions across all communications channels help provide market differentiation. Gartner CRM (2015)

It has become vital for every organization to develop a CRM strategy based on accurate and up-to-date information about its respective customers so that it is able to enhance its performance in the market. When information about the customers is collected on an ongoing basis, it helps a company to monitor its performance and unleash any unmet needs and demands of the customers  (Leggett, 2017)

7.Bibliography

Buck-Emden, R., Zencke, P. and Emden, R. (2005) MySAP CRM: The official guide to SAP CRM release 4.0. 4th edn. Rockville, MD: SAP PRESS/GALILEO PRESS.

Buttle, F. (2008) Customer relationship management: Concepts and tools. Amsterdam: Butterworth-Heinemann.

Coltman, T. (2007) Journal of Financial Services Marketing. Available at: 12, 102 – 114. doi: 10.1057/palgrave.fsm.4760065.

Compare Business Products (2016) Reviews, comparisons and buyer’s guides for CRM. Available at: http://www.comparebusinessproducts.com/DownloadAsset?ac=46843d786f1c4cb180347f8f318293e3&tk=1d5ac49ed6354d92a77a19d77d49fcd9 (Accessed: 3 February 2017).

Drucker, P.F. (2006) The practice of management. New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers.

Forrester Research (no date) THE FORRESTER WAVE™ METHODOLOGY GUIDE. Available at: https://www.forrester.com/marketing/policies/forrester-wave-methodology.html (Accessed: 4 February 2017).

G 2 Crowd (2017) Best CRM software in 2017. Available at: https://www.g2crowd.com/categories/crm (Accessed: 3 February 2017).

G2 Crowd, Inc. (2016) ‘Satisfaction Ratings - Grid℠ for CRM | Winter 2017’. Available at: https://www.g2crowd.com/grid_report/documents/grid-for-crm-winter-2017?tab=tab-id-243621– (Accessed: 3 February 2017).

Harvard Business Review (2011) Harvard business review on increasing customer loyalty. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press.

**Katta, S. (2013) **Discover SAP CRM. 2nd edn. Gloucester, MA, United States: Galileo Press.

L, B. (2016) The importance of user experience design. Available at: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2016-04-11/the-importance-of-user-experience-design (Accessed: 4 February 2017).

Leggett, K. (2015) The Forrester Wave™: CRM Suites For Large Organizations. Available at: www.forrester.com.

Leggett, K. (2017) Navigate The Future Of CRM In 2017. Available at: https://www.forrester.com/report/Navigate+The+Future+Of+CRM+In+2017/-/E-RES135927 (Accessed: 1 February 2017).

Maoz, M., Manusama, B. and Gartner (2016) Gartner - Magic Quadrant for the CRM Customer Engagement Center. Available at: https://www.gartner.com/doc/reprints?id=1-32AEZIA&ct=160331&st=sb (Accessed: 1 February 2017).

Pegasystems (2016) Forrester cross-channel campaign management report, Q2 2016. Available at: https://www.pega.com/forrester-cccm-2016 (Accessed: 1 February 2017).

Peppers, D. and Rogers, M. (2004) Managing customer relationships: A strategic framework. New York, NY, United States: John Wiley & Sons.

Salesforce (2016) Editions & pricing - sales cloud. Available at: https://www.salesforce.com/editions-pricing/sales-cloud/ (Accessed: 4 February 2017).

**SAP Cloud (2016) **Hybris C4C Pricing Overview. Available at: https://jam4.sapjam.com/groups/4lcZP7HVBybuyJTZHcWo2k/documents/00az7JYrUeLuArXXcYVNGb/slide_viewer.

Sugar CRM (no date) Online CRM pricing with sugar PurePrice. Available at: http://www.sugarcrm.com/products/editions-and-pricing (Accessed: 4 February 2017).