How Can We Determine Our CRM Readiness?

How Can We Determine Our CRM Readiness? 이원모 2004-05-26 23:07:37 조회: 19

How Can We Determine Our CRM Readiness? The first step in a CRM assessment is to start with business objectives that are specific, measurable, actionable, realistic and time-bound, or SMART One way to navigate through the complexities of CRM and the overwhelming array of CRM products in the marketplace is to perform a CRM readiness assessment. This assessment should include specific steps to help a company define its CRM initiative in a manner that constrains scope and ensures metrics are established by which the success of the CRM initiative can be continually measured and managed. Let's take a look at how this is done. The first step in a CRM assessment is to start with business objectives that are specific, measurable, actionable, realistic and time-bound, or SMART. For example, a CRM business objective to "increase customer satisfaction" would not qualify as a SMART objective; however, if our objective is to "increase customer satisfaction" with the online shopping experience by 10 percent over the next 12 months, the objective now becomes a SMART one. The goal is to derive the "vital few," or those objectives that the organization collaboratively and experientially define as their priorities, for the CRM initiative. Once we're armed with our most critical SMART objectives, it's important that our CRM readiness assessment examine the business processes that influence our ability to meet each objective, as well as the measures that we'll use to determine what types of results each of these processes is producing. In our example, the objective of increasing customer satisfaction with the online shopping experience by 10 percent over the next 12 months might be influenced by the customer's responses to two key questions that are asked at the end of each online shopping interaction: "Based on your shopping experience, would you come back again?" and "Would you recommend this on-line store to someone else?" In this very simplistic example, we could easily count the number of 'yes' and 'no' responses to these survey questions and monitor whether we are, in fact, improving satisfaction levels. At this point, we also want to think about how to make the business process results actionable. In our example, if a customer were to respond to the survey by indicating she would not come back again, we might identify the need to specifically determine what part of the shopping experience was not positive. For each item contributing to dissatisfaction, we would brainstorm specific corrective actions that could be taken to improve the related processes. This iterative process would produce an identified set of critical business processes that is most likely to impact our ability to meet the CRM objective, as well as how we intend to make their measured results actionable to influence outcomes in a positive manner. The next step in the CRM readiness assessment is to determine how we would measure the results of the business processes that have the most influence over the achievement of our objective. For example, if we determine that higher levels of customer satisfaction will result in increased purchase frequency or higher monetary value of purchases, it's important to measure these outcomes to validate both our initial premise, as well as the ROI of taking actions to improve specific elements of the online shopping experience. When we've been through the steps outlined above, the CRM readiness assessment will have helped us constrain scope, define objectives, identify key business processes, and establish measures for our CRM initiative. Note that by performing this assessment, we will have narrowed and refined our CRM scope to focus on only those customer-related objectives that we know will make a difference in the success of our business. By helping the CRM stakeholders align with and focus on the objectives that matter, a CRM readiness assessment can help ensure the ultimate success of a CRM initiative that is tailored to maximize value to your specific organization. The results of a CRM readiness assessment are designed to help companies make more effective CRM choices by ensuring their CRM initiative is targeted to specific and measurable success criteria. At this point, you should identify next steps and create a road map for your CRM initiative. It is important to understand that it is only after you've defined objectives, key business processes, and actionable metrics, that you should begin to evaluate any packaged product solutions. The readiness assessment results help remove much of the confusion resulting from large numbers of products. About the Author Brenda Moncla's career includes more than twenty years experience in management, leadership and organizational development roles for leading companies in the aerospace and defense sector, as well as the telecommunications, manufacturing, automotive and financial industries. Most recently, she held the position of Vice President of Strategic Planning for Pine Cone Systems, a Bill Inmon Company. Prior to that, Moncla served as Director of Data Warehousing and Senior Director of Corporate Information Services at US West Communications. She earned a BA from California State University, and an MS in software engineering from National University. Moncla is a published author and frequent contributor to leading business and trade magazines. Moncla is the vice president of corporate performance management and can be reached via email at bmoncla@thinkfast.com