Martha Rogers, co-founder of the Peppers and Rogers Group, which touts itself as a thought leader in the customer relationship management (CRM) and one-to-one marketing field, is to host SA`s first Peppers and Rogers Group Executive Conference, organised by the group`s South African office.
The two-day conference, sponsored by CCH, will cover strategic aspects of CRM and will take place on 27 and 28 June at the CSIR in Pretoria.
The event will provide information that Andrew Clare, MD of Peppers and Rogers SA, says is in great demand. "Business strategists and visionaries are getting more and more interested in one-to-one marketing and CRM - in SA, and all over the world. That`s fundamentally the background to the conference next week - to give South African business leaders the overview of what it is, how to do it, and to show where it`s been used successfully."
Clare believes that while CRM has been around for quite some time, it`s only now that advancements in technologies such as database and call centre management programs are allowing CRM to move forward.
"Many of the companies that are supplying that technology today didn`t exist a few years ago, so we`re not that far behind [Europe and the US].
"I don`t think there`s a sense of urgency here yet [among business managers] as there is in the US and in some European countries - but the interest level is there, and a lot of people want to learn what CRM is all about. It`s certainly on most business executives` radar screens."
One of the main challenges facing the implementation of CRM solutions, says Clare, is that the very basis of a CRM programme requires a consolidated and up-to-date database of customers - and there is a legacy of disparate databases within organisations that cannot talk to each other, and duplication of information. "It`s really a question of consolidating current customer information and putting it into a format that is easily and readily accessible to people within that company.
"The other issue is that the development of the Web protocols and content has been the domain of the IT department and not the marketing department. Consequently, you have access points to customers from various vendors that are being driven by different units within a business, and that do not communicate with one another."
Clare believes that connection is going to come through technology. "There are companies working to achieve this goal, but obviously, there are billions of rands tied up in legacy technology, and you can`t just throw that out with the bathwater. So one has to go slowly and integrate so that the client has only one, seamless point of view of the customer."
Peppers and Rogers has operated in SA since January this year. Clare explains how its approach to the consultancy field is different from the widely accepted norm: "Most consulting practises, especially the big five, will put their people into a business. Once they`ve got their tentacles in, they`re like octopi. You really cannot get rid of them. We don`t have the resources and the staff to do that, but strategically, it`s not the way we wish to position ourselves.
"What we will develop with the company is a 'champion team` comprising employees of that company."
The team must be multi-disciplinary, incorporating representatives of all the business units within a company.
"We tend to duplicate people from various disciplines, because of the churn. Once we roll out a programme, we work with that champion team as the owners of the programme. They take ownership, and they are trained in the whole methodology and implementation of the programme. If we do our job well, and if they`re a good group of people, they should, after a period of six to nine months, be able to run with that programme and we will move out of their business."
Peppers and Rogers` global client list includes AT&T, Hewlett-Packard, Ford Motor Company, Lucent Technologies, Oracle and Xerox. Locally, the company is consulting to ABSA, CCH, Ixchange, PostNet, Sage, Siltek and Tarsus Technologies.
For further information on the conference, visit www.peppersandrogers.co.za/prg/conference.htm.
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