The Future of CRM is Mobile According to Survey

April 27, 2011 - PRLog -- A recent survey by business publication Computing, in association with software vendor Sage, looked at the way UK businesses manage customer records, the benefits achieved by their CRM systems and developments they would most like to see.

While the vast majority of SMEs and larger organisations are managing customers, sales and marketing with some kind of CRM software, the nature these systems varies widely.

One-quarter of the respondents are managing customers using contact management systems or spreadsheets, meaning that all links to marketing, order placement and finance are necessarily manual. At the other end of the spectrum, one-fifth are running a formal CRM that integrates with all back-office functions (finance, marketing, manufacturing, HR, order entry, warehousing and transportation) through their ERP system, while 25% have a CRM that integrates with marketing and finance functions.

Asked why they have not deployed a formal CRM system, those still relying on spreadsheets and contact management systems cited budgetary restrictions and concerns about integration with existing systems.

So, what are they missing?

In Sales & Marketing, most respondents using CRM said they have achieved better customer service and retention figures, while 43% cited the ability to target marketing as a major benefit.

Over the business as a whole, the ability of CRM systems to consolidate disparate customer data in a central repository thus cutting down on time wasting and duplication was mentioned by 59%, and improved communications between Sales and Financial departments - vital in reducing the risk of errors in areas such as account status and age of debt that will have a direct impact on the customer base - by 45%.

Over two-thirds reported an improvement in the quality of information available for strategic management decision making, with 34% saying that superior forecasting has led to better cash flow and business decisions. Sales forecasts are one of the key metrics on which critical decisions are made, and any tool that improves the accuracy and visibility of these figures is enormously beneficial to decision makers.

Businesses are changing and CRM must also adapt to the new decentralised, mobile world.

Asked about developments they would like to see in their CRM systems, more than half of the respondents chose deployment to mobile devices. This would allow sales teams to continually update customer information from their smartphones. Enhanced customer service options such as ticket tracking, service level reporting and customer web portals were another popular option, and 35% say they would benefit from enhanced support desk management.

Another change in the business environment is the way that social media have become part of the equation. This has given rise to “social CRM” software that has the ability to pull in information from the social web – websites such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Rather than solely handling data and information about customers, social CRM allows organisations to leverage conversations and relationships with customers and suppliers and also the customers of their customers, and so on.  

The future of CRM, it seems, is social and mobile.

Download the full report (PDF) http://www.ithound.com/abstract/crm-bring-business-6673?p...

# # #

Incisive Media is one of the world's leading B2B information providers, serving the financial and professional services markets globally.