Customer Relationship Management and Friend Relationship (CRM) 客戶關係不就是朋友關係管理嗎？

Customer Relationship Management and Friend Relationship (CRM)

客戶關係不就是朋友關係管理嗎？

客戶關係管理系統，英文簡稱CRM (Customer Relation Management System). 某本地藥房最近就在电視廣告宣傳，可以自動提示閣下回来買藥。這是一個典型的CRM應用。尖沙咀海旁某大型商場，每逢佳節，會發电郵通知各樣商場節目等。這也是CRM應用。他們怎樣得知訪客資料？甚麼VIP優惠咭是也。填表的時候把电郵地址奉上，搏着數。你的保險或財管客経理，也會在你生日時給你心意咭，也是CRM的應用。

客戶跟朋友關係的分別愈益模糊。客戶關係不就是朋友關係管理嗎？中國人有獨特的關係管理方式，就是没有國際知名的CRM。

十多年前CRM叫Contact Management System。換了名字後更强調關係，不單是人名。關係章顯在商業上，就是報價，訂單，項目，約會，産品，提示，承諾，各項記錄等。適當地把客戶的特質分類記錄，CRM可以做mix-and-match，把潛在客戶需要找出來，市場叫建議系統(Recommendation Engine)。

互联網改变了CRM的運用交網团隊銷售的模式。幾年前夕夕無名的salesforce.com, 今日变成商學院的成功個案，雖然他們進軍亜太区還是要兼顧本地商業模式，不能急進。大哥微軟也推出線上Microsoft Dynamics CRM，可見這市塲之吸引。

在另一廂，以開放技術為主的有SugarCRM (www.sugarcrm.com)。由他再衍生例如vTiger (www.vtiger.com)。基於開放技术，全球用戶及開發者也可参與改良，一般較大企業産品進化得更快更貼商業發展，但支援方面就相对DIY。這條路跑下去，两陣營的産品會共存，客戶最終都是看應用需要及服務商質素。

用CRM是需要有点堅持，否則效果發揮不來。Tips是多用滙入工具把客戶資料輸入，然後才慢慢整理。多利用系統的集体管理工能，例如自動分類，生曰提示，流程管理，mass mailing 等。資料項目愈多愈能見證自動化的好處。透個網上CRM，體會銷售团隊管理，也是用PDA, Excel等不能達到的。

最後，我認為CRM不單是為銷售經理而設，学生，老師，公關，醫生，會計師，律師，其他面对群象的專業人士也特別適合。

下期Useful Tips, 我們談Recommendation Engine。

讀者優惠(Reader's Special)

免費的CRM 試用戶口，可到http://accept.b2k.hk/web/crm (userid: demo/pass: demo)

免費的vTiger CRM Training，可email sales@uniforce.net

Customer Relationship Management and Friend Relationship (CRM)

CRM stands for Customer Relation Management system. A well known pharmacist chain in town lately advertises on TV their ability to remind customer to replenish their medicine and is particularly useful for patients with chronic disease. A large shopping mall at Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront also keeps track of their customers via VIP cards and send emails to announce major events. Your insurance manager or wealth management agent will also call you right on your birthday to send their best wishes. It's very personal and sweet, but to consider the amount of clients they need to look after, be! ing able to remember your birthday and call on time is a CRM feature.

The distinction between customer and friend is fuzzy. Friends can be customers and vice versa. Customer relation management becomes Friends Relation Management. This is why social marketing becomes increasingly important. Chinese is particularly strong in relationship based business, however, well known CRM is not yet made by the Chinese.

Before CRM, people call similar tools Contact Management System. However, today's CRM emphases on "Relationship", and less on "Contacts". Relationship is represented by customer activities, characteristics, potentials, events, leads, products, quotations, invoices, proposals, and all sort of activity records. CRM can do mix-and-match, with the detail data recorded, to find out the potential leads of your customers, and recommend new values. This feature is enabled by today's Recommendation Engine.

Internet changed the use of CRM from a standalone application to a groupware based collaboration system. It's usually a hosted web based application. For example, salesforce.com in a few years becomes MBA school's favorite success case. Though they want to get into APAC, the need to localize the service to a diverse range of biz models and languages is what make any good service/product a success in this region. Microsoft Dynamics CRM is also going hosted and live, though right now it's still in US only.

On the other hand, based on open technologies, SugarCRM (www.sugarcrm.com) is the leader. Based on SugarCRM, another platform vTiger (www.vtiger.com) is also getting inroad to other sets of users who like the feature set of vTiger better, and the pricing scheme. Because of open technologies, every user and developer in the world can freely participate in improving and customizing these systems, making them particularly fast in adapting to local biz needs. Compared with legacy major vendor proprietary CRM, the only drawback is support, but we're seeing more and more local support resource for these products in every part of the world. After all, it's good that customers have a choice, and open products vs. proprietary products wi! ll co-exist.

When you adopt CRM, you need to hold on to it for a while before you see the benefits. The tip is to import your customer data in batch to the CRM as much as possible, and then massage them from there. When you have more data, system based management ability becomes a lot easier to excel over large amount of data when compared with using your PDA and Excel. Plus the fact now you can collaborate over the web based CRM with your virtual sales team, you see how much easier it is then using legacy standalone tools.

In my opinion, CRM is not only for sales manager, but particularly suitable for students, teachers, public relation professionals, doctors, accountants, lawyers, and other professionals who interface with a lot of people.

Next Useful tips, we will talk about the technologies in Recommendation Engine and a demo.

Reader's Special

Free vTiger CRM Trial at http://vcrm.uniforce.net (userid: demo/pass: demo)

For Free vTiger Training, pls email sales@uniforce.net

Click here to unsubscribe