7 Steps to Enhance Your CRM Performance

A successful Customer Relationship Management initiative is about more than just the technology. Your CRM initiative touches people, both employees and customers, and changes the way they interact. A clear plan on how to optimize your entire CRM process is what will be explored below.

Successful Organizations Drive:
1. Processes
Determine the impact of current processes and identify new ones that will support the continued growth and goals of your business. With an introduction of new technology or business expansion, processes change and new ones are often needed. Identify organizational goals and objectives

2. Policies
Determine if the introduction of new technology or the expansion of your business requires changes to your existing policies and if any new policies need to be implemented.

3. Performance Metrics
Define specific performance metrics for your CRM initiative based on your objectives at the outset of the project and implement reporting to track progress.

4. Structure
Review your existing organizational structure to identify and determine if any changes or additions are necessary to support revised or new processes.

5. Skills
Audit existing skill-sets and plan for any new skills that are essential to support your CRM initiative and determine the process and technology training required to develop those skills.

6. Rewards
Implement a rewards program to encourage adoption of new policies and processes and maximize the effectiveness of your CRM initiative.

7. Culture
Cultivate a culture in which your CRM becomes the system that is used in the organization for all customer-facing activity to support the continued growth of your business.

The most successful CRM implementations are those where the whole organization collectively supports the “7 Steps” to leverage the full power of their CRM system.