CRM - February 2008 - (Page 8)

REALITY CHECK BY MULTICHANNEL CRM A SPECIAL 2-PART SERIES PART 1 BARTON GOLDENBERG Multiplicity Means More Customers want it. Technology allows it. The Digital Client demands it. So why have so few companies mastered multichannel CRM? road service personnel who actually restart your car. So the potential to exploit multichannel CRM at AAA is plentiful. For example, customers can check availability or buy online and then pick up the product in the branch or store. But the back-and-forth between channels doesn’t stop there: AAA can make cross-channel offers or promotions, permit in-store browsing before an online purchase from its Web site, offer online registration for store consultation, allow cross-channel returns, provide online access to information or loyalty programs that draw data across multiple channels, and much more. Effective multichannel CRM not only delivers a strong return on investment, but also reinforces the “single brand” concept: consistently positive experiences regardless of the customer’s channel of choice. Retail customers using multiple channels for purchasing have two to four times the spend as those using only one channel. In TRUE MULTICHANNEL CRM REQUIRES PROACTIVELY IMPLEMENTING PROCESSES AND retail banks, multichannel customers are 25 percent to 50 percent more profitable TECHNOLOGY TO SHARE REAL-TIME INFORMATION ACROSS MULTIPLE CHANNELS. than their single-channel counterparts. In fact, within three years, in both the B2B and and General Electric and Gateway (now Acer) in manu- B2C sectors, 50 percent of customers—and typically the facturing. What makes these companies the best? First, highest-value ones, at that—will be multichannel. We’ve seen an increase in the number of quality softthey carefully segment their respective customer bases. Second, they know, within each identified segment, the ware applications enabling multichannel CRM: These exact channels their buyers prefer. And third, they have typically provide a common platform to manage sales and understood that multichannel CRM is a mandate for service processes and knowledge across multiple chanconducting business with the omnipotent Digital Client. nels; create common business rules and cross-channel To better understand the possibilities of multichannel workflows that permit continuous tracking of sales and CRM, let’s turn to the 105-year-old American Automobile service requests; and seamlessly integrate their CRM Association (AAA). Most folks know AAA as the tow- functions with information coming from the company’s truck company—but AAA is also one of the largest auto- back-office (e.g., financial, manufacturing) systems. To deepen your multichannel CRM, research the latmotive and property and casualty insurers in the country, one of the largest travel agencies, and an increasingly est offerings and case studies. Learn about your customers’ and prospects’ channel preferences. Then create important player in the financial-services marketplace. Moreover, unlike most companies, most AAA clubs a multichannel action plan that initially integrates already have multiple channels in place: the store processes and technologies across just two channels; (where you get maps or purchase AAA services); tele- later you can expand to more. phone (where you call into a membership, travel, or Barton Goldenberg is president and founder of ISM Inc., a CRM real-time emergency contact center); ATM or kiosk (both inside enterprise consulting firm in Bethesda, Md. He is the author of CRM and outside some AAA locations); direct mail (targeted Automation and the publisher of The Guide to CRM Automation. Contact him mailings, AAA’s magazine); online; and the emergency at bgoldenberg@ismguide.com. U LT I C H A N N E L C R M seems simple M enough, on its face: Allow a customer to start her experience in one channel and to complete it in another. The reality, though, can be complex: After beginning a purchase at a company’s Web site, the customer may call the company’s contact center (which should know, in real time, her pre-call Web-site moves); then, to finalize her purchase, she visits the brickand-mortar store (where the staff needs real-time knowledge of both her Web-site and contact center activity). In other words, true multichannel CRM requires proactively implemented processes and technology to facilitate sharing realtime information across multiple channels. Best-in-class, multichannel CRM companies include J.C. Penney, Eddie Bauer, and L.L.Bean in retail; Allstate, E*Trade, and ABN-AMRO in finance; AT&T, Verizon, and Vodafone in telecommunications; 8 CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT | FEBRUARY 2008 www.destinationCRM.com http://www.destinationCRM.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of CRM - February 2008

CRM - February 2008 Contents Front Office Reality Check Customer Centricity The Tipping Point The Loyalty Riddle CRM Drives Down-Market Out of the Gate: Marketers Rate ’08 Traits The Pulse Consultants Adapt to CRM’s Changing Landscape Required Reading Cover Story: CRM Gets Serious Contact Center Solutions Always On Rumble in the Office The Smallest Slice Tying Up Cable’s Loose Ends Burning Up the Paper Trail Sunny Skies for Knology No More Bumps for BlueRoads Secret of My Success Re:Tooling Scouting Report Pint of View

CRM - February 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.