CRM vital to business strategy

Previously the focus of organisations was to sell their goods, now this approach has changed as consumers realise their purchasing power, says Bryan Milton, CRM manager at SAP.

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Most organisations are taking an holistic approach to CRM management and see the value in offering customers a complete ERP solution, from procurement and manufacturing through to financials and accounting.

So says Bryan Milton, line of business manager for CRM at SAP, commenting on one of the key findings of the ITWeb-SAP CRM Survey, which ran on ITWeb Online for 14 days in August, attracting 135 responses.

Milton adds, "ERP solutions are considered the backbone of any organisation and with a sound ERP system in place and have begun focusing on add-on solutions, such as CRM. Many organisations use a silo approach whereby various departments act in isolation and the real value of integrating the entire business fails to be truly recognised."

More than half of the survey respondents agreed that CRM solutions are very important to their business strategy (46.56%). On the other hand, a mere 1.52% believed that it was not important.

Milton agrees with this finding, stating "Corporations have started seeing the value in keeping their customer base and introducing concepts such as loyalty programmes. Consumers are demanding to be treated as individuals with individual needs and unique concerns."

He also points out that organisations are realising the value in equipping their sales and service teams with offsite access to CRM systems.

When asked whether the respondents were satisfied with their organisation's existing CRM solution, most responded that they are 'moderately satisfied' (64.12%), while 13% responded that they were 'moderately dissatisfied'. Only 11.45% were completely satisfied with their CRM solution.

The survey revealed that the most motivating factor for organisations to upgrade or replace their current CRM system is increased sales (19.05%), with 16.67% choosing improved customer relations.

Commenting on this finding, Milton says that focus lies in assisting organisations to design a strategy going forward to resolve CRM issues and streamline the process through the most cost effective means.

The online study revealed that nearly half (49.62%) of organisations do not have their CRM solutions mobile enabled; with about a quarter (25.95%) doing so, while the rest (24.43%) were unsure.

"More 'smart' mobile device sales are fast surpassing the traditional desktop and even notebook globally," advises Milton and also notes, "having direct access to an organisation's CRM system from any location means that users have full visibility of customer accounts, stock availability and are able to place orders in 'real-time'.

He adds confidently, "An apt mobile CRM system gives your organisation a platform for managing these relationships by maintaining unique characteristics of customers."

The survey also disclosed that the most popular social network organisations are making use of is Facebook (53.17%), and there is a joint 41.27% making use of LinkedIn and Twitter.

It also emerged that the majority of these organisations (57.94%) are using social media networks for marketing purposes, while the next highest use is for customer service (29.92%).

In conclusion, Milton states, "The adoption of social media into everyday life has taken off much faster than anyone could have predicted, with nearly 5 million Facebook users in South Africa alone, which represents 92% penetration into the online population."