Customer Relationship Management Basics

In order to maintain a successful business, the business must understand and maintain a positive relationship with its customers. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is the process of bringing the customer and the company closer together. There are many different areas in which Customer Relationship Management can be implemented. The goal of CRM is to help a company maintain current customers, as well as gain new customers.

Targeted Marketing

Targeted marketing is accomplished through collecting information about the customer. This information can be buying habits or simply demographics. The idea behind this is that a business analyzes what a customer buys and then markets specific products to that customer based on his or her buying habits. Businesses track buying habits using discount cards, and special store credit cards. Targeted marketing can also be implemented on the Internet. Amazon.com has product recommendations based on buying habits, and product ratings. Customers can also be sent e-mails that market targeted products. Marketing the right products to the right customers can significantly increase a business' sales with minimal associated costs.

Call Centers and Customer Service

Have you ever called a business to complain or ordered a product and encountered an automated call response (I.E. “please press 1 for questions, 2 for comments” etc.)? That’s CRM. Call centers that take calls and monitor customer/business interactions are often running on hosted CRM programs. CRM managers want to make call centers as efficient and customer-friendly as possible. A customer who can easily navigate through an automated system is more likely to do business with the same company in the future. In the case of a complaint, a customer whose problems are responded to immediately is more likely to forgive and forget a company’s transgressions. Customer service is the backbone of all CRM processes and strategies.

CRM Vendors

Not surprisingly, in order to successfully collect data, manage call centers, analyze data, and make changes, businesses need CRM software. There are many CRM vendors in the world. The most widely-recognized vendors are Siebel, Salesforce.com, and Microsoft. Each of these vendors has contributed to CRM in its own way.

CRM Applications

There are many different types of CRM applications. Some CRM applications are Web-based so they can be accessed via a browser. Other CRM applications have programs built in for integrating data entries and data management across several applications. CRM vendors also have specific strategies that are unique to every client. The goal of a CRM vendor is to not only upgrade a company with the latest CRM technology, but also to design the companies infrastructure in such a way that the customer/company relationship can flourish.

Conclusion

Knowing the customer is the key to a successful business. Customer Relationship Management is the process through which a business analyzes their customers and makes changes accordingly. CRM vendors provide applications and advice on the best CRM methods. Most observers believe that CRM practices will continue to flourish as new CRM strategies and technologies are developed. For any business, a successful CRM approach is a must-have.

Automating your customer support...

My regular readers will know that one of the things I highly recommend doing with any online business is automating as many of your day to day tasks as possible.

From a personal point of view, one of the tasks that takes up a lot of my time is answering emails. It isn't just answering email that eats up the hours - sorting through and deleting spam and junk mail absorbs a lot of time too. In the good old days, I used to get a couple of spam emails a day. Now it is closer to 1000 a day!

In fact, when you look at it, email isn't always the best form of online communication. Not only is there the junk mail issue to contend with but also the fact that email is not 100% reliable. Emails do 'go missing' far more regularly than you might expect. Often this is simply because the recipients email software has decided that a particular email is junk and has transferred it directly to the 'Delete' folder. Other times it may be because the recipients ISP has decided that the email is junk and deleted it BEFORE it has even been seen by the recipient! (Yes this really does happen - imagine if your postman sorted through your mail and made the decision of which letters you want and which ones he should throw away?!)

One way to help avoid the spam problem when dealing with customer support enquiries is to make use of a contact form on your website instead of posting an email address. This will certainly help to cut down on spam but it still means that you have the problem of emails not getting to their destination (and when you have a frustrated customer waiting for assistance this is not ideal).

Therefore, probably the best option on the market presently is a full-blown helpdesk system. Setting up a dedicated helpdesk is a superb way of automating your customer support and speeding up the process of dealing with enquiries and support emails. Not only that but if you use a system that allows customers to create 'tickets', you don't have to rely on email as your customers can login to a special web page and view both their tickets and your replies online.

Another feature of many helpdesk scripts is an 'FAQ' or 'Knowledgebase' section. This is simply a collection of the most frequently asked questions/queries/problems along with answers and solutions. This means that customers can search the knowledgebase and hopefully find the answer to their question without having to contact Support at all.

Some of the more advanced scripts will even scan the customers support ticket prior to submitting it and then list a few possible answers to their questions just in case they didn't read through the knowledgebase before typing the ticket out - very clever stuff.

These scripts are also very powerful in terms of how they can benefit you. Just think how much time you could save if, say, 40% of your customer support emails just stopped coming due to the fact that your customers were now able to find the answers to their questions automatically.

Having an online helpdesk is also of benefit if you travel around a lot or if you are away from the office on vacation etc. Instead of having to take a laptop loaded up with previous emails from customers, you can simply login to your helpdesk admin page and all of your previous correspondence will be online and at your fingertips. It also means that you won't have to spend hours in an Internet cafe deleting a days worth of spam at a time just to get to the important emails since only the important emails will have made it through to the helpdesk in the first place.

As with most things, setting up a customer service helpdesk is one of those tasks that is always better done when you first start your online business. That said, it is fairly easy to integrate such a feature into your existing set up and that is exactly what I have done for all of my websites...

Over the next few months, I will be phasing many of my email addresses out - I simply can't stand the spam any more! With immediate effect, all customer support issues for all of my products and websites will be handled via a central Customer Support Helpdesk.

I am confident that this will improve the overall 'support experience' for both my customers and me :-)

If you are interested in installing a similar helpdesk on your own website/s, there are numerous options when it comes to suitable software. I chose a product called eSupport (link below) and whilst this is a very powerful script, I am hesitant to give it my full recommendation since the installation/set up process was, how can I put this, slightly painful. It doesn't help that there is no manual for the software which means that new users are left to figure out how it works by trial and error or by trawling through hundreds of posts on the company forum. That said, I am advised by the software creator that a manual is in the process of being written and will be available soon. As I say, an excellent and powerful script once installed and configured but definitely not for those lacking patience (and indeed, some computer knowledge). If you opt for this script, my advice would be to get the publishers of the software to install it for you. You can find out more about eSupport at: http://www.kayako.com

Other alternatives (neither of which I have tried myself) include Perldesk ( http://www.perldesk.com ) and Cerberus ( http://www.cerberusweb.com ). One advantage of Cerberus is that there is a free version :-)

5 Key Marketing Questions

When you know the answers to these 5 key marketing questions, you can create effective web pages, sales letters and other sales generating communications. The answers to these 5 questions reveal how you can get your prospect's attention and motivate them to take the action you want.

1. WHO DO I WANT TO REACH?

Describe detailed characteristics of your ideal prospect. Be very specific.

Once you clearly define the characteristics your ideal prospect you can develop a powerful sales message appealing directly to their unique interests and needs. Prospects are more likely to respond when they feel you are talking directly to them about their individual needs.

2. WHAT ACTION DO I WANT TO GENERATE?

Decide in advance what action you are trying to stimulate. Do you want to get inquiries for your product or service? Do you want to produce sales directly from your promotion? Or do you want to build a list of qualified prospects willing to receive frequent offers from you?

You can develop an effective promotion in a short time when you have a clear understanding of the action you are trying to generate.

3. WHAT IS MY COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE?

Identify why prospects should do business with you instead of with a competitor selling a similar product or service. For example, do you provide faster results, easier procedures, personal attention or a better guarantee? If you cannot think of a reason - create one. Add something to your business you are not already doing.

Your competitive advantage can be responsible for fifty percent or more of your sales. Make sure you have one - and don't lose it. Keep checking on your competition and make any changes necessary to keep your competitive advantage.

4. HOW WILL I PROVE MY CLAIMS?

Don't expect prospects to believe what you say. Make sure you provide proof of any claim you make.

For example, collect and use testimonials from satisfied customers. Provide research data supporting your claims. Get endorsements from experts your prospects are likely to recognize.

5. HOW WILL I CREATE URGENCY?

Most prospects do not respond the first time they see your promotion. Instead, they delay making any response - then often forget about you.

You can convert many of these procrastinators into buyers by giving them a compelling reason to respond immediately. For example, give them a special price if they order now - or include a valuable bonus if they order by a specific deadline.

TIP: Develop a series of 4 or 5 different special offers. Use them one at a time with an expiration deadline. When one offer expires, replace it with the next offer and a new deadline. Continuously recycle through the same series of offers. This enables you to create urgency using special offers without taking time to create new ones.

You need to answer to these 5 key marketing questions before you can create a motivating web page, sales letter or other sales generating communication. The answers to these 5 questions will reveal how you can get your prospect's attention and stimulate them to take the action you want.

Simple Low Cost Marketing Methods Often Produce the Best Results

Simple, inexpensive marketing methods often produce the best results. I discovered this by accident many years ago while trying to find a better way to get sales leads. We were mailing hundreds of direct mail letters and brochures every week to new business owners promoting our service. Folding all those letters and brochures, inserting them into envelopes, sealing the envelopes, addressing the envelopes and putting stamps on them was expensive and time consuming. But, it produced enough qualified leads to be profitable.

AN EASIER WAY

One week I decided to test a simple and less expensive way to get my leads. I had the following benefit statement printed on 1,000 postcards: "I can help you increase your profits, save taxes and reduce financial risk." I added my name and phone number at the end of the message, addressed the postcards and mailed them. Printing and preparing the postcards took only 1/5th of the time it took for the letters and brochures. Plus, the Postage and materials cost only 1/3rd as much.

To my surprise, I got over 40 inquiries that week from the postcards instead of the usual 20 to 25 inquiries I got from my letters. Almost overnight my sales and commissions shot up by over 50%. I was soon getting so many inquiries every week that I began selecting only the best ones to use myself and passed the others on to reps who didn't have enough appointment for the week. They were happy to pay me a percentage of the commissions they received from sales produced by my leads. The results from that first postcard mailing taught me a valuable marketing lesson I never forgot. Simple, inexpensive marketing methods often produce the best results.

A LOW-COST WAY TO TEST CLASSIFIED ADS

About 5 years ago I discovered another simple and inexpensive marketing tool while looking for a quick way to test some new classified ads. The deadline for accepting ads submitted to printed publications is usually 3 to 6 weeks before publication. It often takes 2 months before the ad starts pulling... or before you find out it doesn't work.

I discovered how to reduce this 2 month delay to less than a week. Simply post the ad on one of the online services such as America Online and place it in several email magazines (ezines) distributed to your targeted market. A 3 line ad in a well-known ezine with over 300,000 subscribers costs less than $40. Many ezines with a smaller number of subscribers will accept ads for $5 or $10 per run. Best of all, your ad runs a few days after you submit it.

After developing a profitable ad online, place it in the print media. Be sure to use print publications read by people in the same targeted market you tested online. That's how you can be assured of getting the same successful results offline as you got online.

DON'T LIMIT YOUR MARKETING TO THE INTERNET

The low-cost and fast results of online advertising encourages some new businesses to restrict their marketing exclusively to the internet. They completely ignore traditional marketing methods. That's a serious mistake. There are a huge number of people without internet access. You're missing a large part of your potential market by ignoring these people. Use the internet to test new advertising. When you have a proven ad, continue it online and also place it in the print media. Don't limit your profits by ignoring any part of your potential market.

Link Exchanges - What can they do for your business! ( Part 1 )

For those of you who don't know the definition: Link Exchanges are 2 links back and forth between 2 individual companies that have linked to each other.

What is the purpose? To build "link popularity" within Search Engines!

How Does That Work? Well when someone types in your business within search engines, you will get 2 types of results.

1) Your optimized site & related topics listed by you into the search engines. 2) All the links back to you from other sites listed within the search engines.

Number 2 is the important one for this subject: If your site is NOT "optimized" for great search results, a popular link could do just the same.

"Optimized" - Look for articles on "Optimizing your site for search engines"

Martin, PLEASE TELL ME MORE!!!

Well, let's say that 80% of your visitors come from search engines. And let's say that the search engine just all of a sudden deleted you out of the engine! You will still get people coming to your site and searching your site with great link popularity. All the links back to you will STILL be listed in the search engines!

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Many professionals believe that you should only link to companies that have related discussions or information as your own! Me, always being the impartial one, I still try promoting link exchanges from all walks of life! You never know who will see your link and where!

It's not only good for search engines! Huh?

That's right, many link exchanges come from privately owned businesses, probably like yours. With this into account, once a visitor is satisfied with browsing the site, they may look for other resources! If you have links to your site all over the net, there's more of a chance some people will see it and visit your site!

Please Note: When giving other companies your description of your link (Company Title) please make sure to be specific on your sites information!

Here's an example of our text link:

Title: Smartads.Info : Advertising, Marketing Resources & Web Design URL: http://www.smartads.info

Description: Smartads :: Learn everything about Link Exchanges, Search Engines Submissions, Advertising & Marketing Tips, Web Design, Special Canadian Sites. Promotion & Traffic Resources ------------------------------------------------

That's it!

Here are a couple of companies that promote link exchanges between all kinds of other companies:

- http://www.linkpartners.com/ - http://www.addurlhere.com/ - http://www.marketzone.net/addurl-exchange.asp - http://www.smartads.info/links - http://www.reciprocallink.com/ - http://www.link-city.com/ - http://www.go4links.com/Web-Internet.htm - http://www.plainlinks.com/

-------------------------------------------------------------- These are just some examples. They are not listed here as the best there is, just some of the many companies out there! -------------------------------------------------------------

If your searching for companies to exchange links with, here's a couple of things to look for!

1. Look for buttons or links that say this:

- Links - Link To Us - Reciprocal Links - Link Exchange - Directory (add your site and link back) - Resources

2. When looking through other link programs, make sure they say something like this: "Link to us and well link to you" Many sites often only have "Help us promote our site, link to us!" and they don't even link to you!

Not to say this is a bad thing, but if i'm going to link to you, the least you can do is link to me!

I hope this article has opened your mind about Link Exchanges!


Source: http://www.marketingsource.com

Clone Your Best Customers

Two businesses -- a women's clothing boutique and a mail-order operation -- recently consulted me about the same dilemma. Each had achieved satisfying sales through channels that didn't allow for further growth. They needed a fresh marketing program that would yield a steady stream of new customers, and they were confused about where and how to advertise.

Like Dorothy with the ruby slippers in the Wizard of Oz, they already had most of what they needed for a solution, but they didn't know how to use what they had. They needed to investigate who their buyers -- especially their highest-spending and most frequent patrons -- were. In doing so, they'd learn how to clone their best customers.

The general principle: Discover the characteristics of your current customers and use that knowledge to reach more shoppers just like them.

The clothing store already knew the age range, income level and some cultural interests and hobbies of its clientele. I suggested that they find out which newspapers, magazines and TV and radio programs their buyers read, watch or listen to, as these might prove prime advertising vehicles. Once ads are running in many places, you can also ask customers which media outlet persuaded them to come into the store, although many buyers don't remember this information.

The mail-order operation had little knowledge of the income or the educational level of its purchasers, since orders so far had come in through the anonymity of the Internet. However, it was relatively simple for them to send a follow-up questionnaire by e-mail, which asked a buyer's age, educational background, employment status (employed or self-employed), income bracket and profession. The brief questionnaire also asked how satisfied they were with their purchase, generating glowing testimonials along with a few complaints. Questionnaire answers would help this business intelligently choose where to advertise.

To the clothing store, I suggested marketing strategies besides advertising for cloning its best customers. Since many store regulars were involved with charitable organizations, the store could let buyers know, through a postcard to its mailing list or a flyer slipped in with purchases, that it might produce a fashion show to benefit their favorite charity. Most likely, customers' dearest non-profit organization appealed to others who would also be attracted to the boutique's distinctive style of clothing.

Since many patrons had creative hobbies, like painting, music, weaving or writing, it made sense to appeal to others who spent spare time on the arts. I suggested selecting a different customer's creative work to feature in the store every month. I envisioned a display of one woman's pottery or poetry, with a color photo of her wearing the store's clothing. Surely the woman in the spotlight would bring in friends like herself and patrons would urge their creative women friends to apply for the honor.

Scientists say human cloning isn't quite on the horizon, but in marketing cloning techniques like these already produce new customers!

Link Exchanges - What can they do for your business! ( Part 2 )

TO AUTOMATE OR NOT TO?

For those of you who are trying to figure out if you should use an automated link promoter or just simply doing everything yourself:

Linking softwares are great (not really) I've tried 2 programs myself, and I must say that both attempts were a disaster! Now i'm not saying that eventually that there will be a perfect software out there to promote your link exchange program.

Right now, here are some of the problems

- The links that you will find are not relavant to your site's content.

- Some links tend to be "Link Farms" that only harm your search engine performance.

- You'll tend to get millions of porn sites!

and so on...

Here's a method that holds very strong when I look for link partners:

When I find a great resource that has similar content to my site, I will browse through their ENTIRE "Resourceful Links" listed on their site and see if It's a good idea to link to them!

Here's another method of doing this effectively for best results:

If you happen to find a great resource, enter their entire "URL" in www.google.com.

What you need to look for is this: "Find web pages that link to www.this-site.com"

The Purpose Martin?

Once you click on the "pages that link to that site" you will find sites that already have a great link program related to your site!

Take advantage of linking to all the sites listed within that search on google!

PLEASE TRY TO AUTOMATE YOUR LINK EXCHANGE PROGRAM!

It get's very fustrating for an entrepreneur like me who is trying to have a really good source of link exchanges, especially when I have to e-mail my companies information manually!

Try adding a "Mail Script" that takes the link exchange information right from your site! You'll find that more sites will want to link to yours!

Here's an example of what your form should ask:

1) Full Name: Martin Lemieux

2) WebSite URL: http://www.smartads.info

3) Title:

Affordable Web Design & Web Site Marketing

4) Description: (250 characters or less)

Smartads is here to help you expose your business to the world. SEO Services & Affordable Web Site Design for your online promoting needs. Web Site Marketing Articles to help you get more traffic to your site.

5) Our link on your site: http://www???

6) E-mail: youre-mail@yoursite.com

7) Comments:

8) SUBMIT

That's all you really need!!!

** TIP **

If you don't know how to install this form on your site, here's a paid link automation program that will suit any business out there!

Linksmanager will manage your entire link resources on your site! This service will help you cut your time in half!!! ENJOY!

Click here: http://www.qksrv.net/click-1-7204547

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Another little "Timbit",

Give visitors your link information!

Please add your "Link Information" that you would want visitors to add on their site! I've gone to too many sites were I had to spend over 5 minutes trying to find their "Link Exchange" information!

Now i'm not talking about a link on your site to your link program, i'm talking about the information you would give to other sites in order to exchange links!

Denying link exchanges!

Get ready, it happens to all of us! Don't get upset when a company you just linked to has just denied your link exchange! Many companies out there has STRICT guidelines they are looking for. You may have not read their specific rules they have! Don't worry about it, take a note and move on.

There's another 1,000 000 that will link to you so don't go have a drink from one denial! I know we all hate them but just remember, we've all got them!

In the future, when you're put in a situation were you will be the one denying another site for a link exchange, just remember how you felt at the time and be considerate to the other by telling them WHY they were denied. I often replied to the site that denied my site to ask why my site wasn't accepted and often I am surprised to hear the reason. what they had to say!

I hope this article has opened your mind about Link Exchanges!


Source : http://www.marketingsource.com