Customer

Relationship
Management
Customer Relationship Management
processes implemented to manage a
company’s interaction with customers
and prospects.
CRM
CENTRAL UNIVERSITY OF
JAMMU

A PROJECT REPORT
ON
CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT IN RETAIL
SECTOR
SUBMITTED BY:
VISHAL MEHRA
Roll.no. 4501520
UNDER THE SUPERVISION
OF
Prof. ANJU THAPPA
 CERTIFICATE
It is to certify that Mr. VISHAL MEHRA, students of MBA
Marketing and Supply Chain Management Semester III, is the
bonafide students of CENTRAL UNIVERSITY OF JAMMU. He
has completed the project on the topic “CUSTOMER
RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT IN RETAIL SECTOR”
under the supervision of Prof. ANJU THAPPA. It is further approved
and certified by the following signatories: -

 Prof. Anju Thappa : ................................................

 GOVT. S.P.M.R COLLEGE OF COMMERCE
JAMMU

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

It is hereby certified that I, Vishal Mehra hereby submit, the project

report entitled “CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP
MANAGEMENT IN RETAIL SECTOR” to the best of my
knowledge and ability in lieu of the award for MBA MARKETING
AND SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT semester-III hereby thank
the project coordinators Prof. Anju Thappa for her effective
coordination and supervision of the project report.

VISHAL MEHRA.
(ROLL NO. 4501520)
 TABLE OF CONTENTS.

CHAPTER PARTICULARS PAGE

S NO.
1. INTRODUCTION OF THE TOPIC
1.1 HISTORY OF CRM 5-10
1.2 MEANING OF CRM
1.3 IMPORTANCE OF CRM
2. IMPLEMENTATION OF CRM IN
2.1 RETAIL SECTOR
10-23

3 CHALLENGES IN CRM 24-26

4. SUGGESTION AND CONCLUSION 27-30

BIBLOGRAPHY/SOURCES 31
 CHAPTER:-1
INTRODUCTION
HISTORY OF CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
While customer relationship management (CRM) can be traced back to the 1980’s the actual
term did not come about until the 1990’s. One reason that drove the CRM software boom in
90’s was the explosion of technology. As advancements in different database features came
about, it paved the way for early CRM adopters to truly improve the CRM software and make
it more effective for customers. Some of the earliest companies to really embrace this and
invest in the use of CRM software were the banking and telecommunications industry, as so
much of their business was customer-related. For them, this was the easiest way to do it. This
eventually led to other industries of all shapes and sizes, to get involved in CRM software. It
was not always an easy ascent for CRM software though. During 1990’s the CRM industry
rain into a few issues; fees of CRM use were very expensive and the buyers
were not getting as much bang of their buck as they would have liked. Customers thought
that for what they were paying they should be getting more and were underwhelmed with the
finished product they had purchased. This has all changed for the better over the past two
decades. Not only have developers made CRM simpler to use, but the price has also become
less expensive. Over the past two decades, CRM has changed from just a storage-based
system to evolve in to an all-around product that a company can manage every aspect of their
business data. Companies can now use CRM software to constantly track customer needs and
wants. The numbers follow the statement also; as of 2007 the annual sales CRM software had
multiplied over eighteen times as compared to what it was 10 years prior. In 1997. Many
other factors drove the CRM boom, including the enhancement of the internet.
When the internet came about, this helped companies who were not able to support a full
database at their own site. Offsite storage would be easier for many companies, and is also a
cheaper investment then on –premise solutions. The emergence of mobile technology has
also boosted CRMs as well. Now that CRMs are offering more mobile solutions, more
companies want to CRM to use since it gives them easy access at their fingertips when they
are away from their office with today’s CRM solutions, companies are able to incorporate
pretty much any section of them into one database. Whether it be a sale, marketing, customer
service, support etc. With today’s CRM solutions consumers are able to manage each of those
extremely effectively, under just one database. CRM solutions are now a great way to
combine your front office integration with your back office. This was something that was
only dreamed about when the idea of CRM originally came about. Now look how far it has
come.
 MEANING OF CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT.

CRM is an acronym that stands for Customer Relationship Management. It describes the
strategy that a company uses to handle customer interactions. One example of a common
CRM strategy is the rewards card program offered by many supermarkets. The store gives its
customers a free card that gives them access to special deals and discounts when they swipe
the card during checkout. But that card also tracks everything the customer buys and allows
the store to create an extremely detailed customer profile based on his or her purchasing
habits. Armed with that information, the store can then offer its customers targeted coupons
and other programs that will motivate its customers to buy more products from that store.

Many CRM software and/or service packages exist to help companies manage the customer
relationship process. In fact, salespeople tend to think of these computer programs as the be-
all and end-all of CRM. But CRM has existed for much longer than the computer – in fact, it
has been around in one form or another for as long as people have been buying and selling.
Computers have greatly enhanced the customer relationship management process because the
key to a good CRM is uncovering and storing information about customers. The more a
company knows about its customers, the better it can manage those relationships – as in the
above example of supermarket rewards cards.

CRM software can help by storing all this information in an easy-access format. With a
typical CRM program, new leads are entered into the program's database and salespeople add
notes throughout the sales cycle. It's then easy for a company to compile reports from this
data that help it to design a CRM strategy that's tailored to its customers. The CRM software
can also automatically send out emails to individual customers as designated by the
salesperson. For example, a salesperson might program his CRM to send out a thank-you
message whenever a customer reaches his or her one-year anniversary of purchase, or to send
an e-card on the customer's birthday.

Once a company has collected information about a customer, the next step is training its
salespeople and other employees in using that information to keep the customer relationship
strong. Because salespeople are often the 'face' of the company, theirs is an important role in
any CRM program. Frequently a customer who runs into a technical problem will phone her
salesperson instead of calling up the customer service team. She already knows her
salesperson and probably has good feelings about him, or she wouldn't have bought the
product from him. It's safer and easier to reach out to someone she knows than to try to
explain her problems to a stranger. So even after the sale is complete, salespeople often
continue to speak with customers on a regular basis.

These customer interactions can be a burden for a salesperson, but they can also bring a
blessing in the form of future sales. When a salesperson helps his customer overcome a
difficult problem, it's much more likely that she'll get in touch with him for future purchases.
And there's also a good chance that she'll send her friends and family to him as well. And this
is exactly what a customer relationship management system is trying to accomplish. It's
critical that the sales team understands and implements its company's CRM strategy.
IMPORTANCE OF CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT.

Customer Relationship management is the strongest and the most efficient approach in
maintaining and creating relationships with customers. Customer relationship management
is not only pure business but also ideate strong personal bonding within people.
Development of this type of bonding drives the business to new levels of success.

Once this personal and emotional linkage is built, it is very easy for any organization to
identify the actual needs of customer and help them to serve them in a better way. It is a
belief that more the sophisticated strategies involved in implementing the customer
relationship management, the more strong and fruitful is the business. Most of the
organizations have dedicated world class tools for maintaining CRM system into their
workplace, The success of any business relies significantly on its ability to manage and
nurture the relationships it has with its customers. Consequently IT systems designed to
rectify the issues of dealing with customers on a day-to-day basis are becoming increasingly
popular.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is more than simply an application of

technology, but a strategic means to develop strong relationships with customers by
providing a platform to assess their individual needs and behavior. From this perspective,
CRM can be perceived as more of a business philosophy than a technical solution to manage
one’s customer base. Nevertheless, an efficient and effective CRM system is dependent on
the use of technology.
Looking at some broader perspectives given as below we can easily determine why a
CRM System is always important for an organization.

1. A CRM system consists of a historical view and analysis of all the acquired or to be
acquired customers. This helps in reduced searching and correlating customers and to
foresee customer needs effectively and increase business.
2. CRM contains each and every bit of details of a customer, hence it is very easy for
track a customer accordingly and can be used to determine which customer can be
profitable and which not.
3. In CRM system, customers are grouped according to different aspects according to
the type of business they do or according to physical location and are allocated to
different customer managers often called as account managers. This helps in focusing
and concentrating on each and every customer separately.
4. A CRM system is not only used to deal with the existing customers but is also useful
in acquiring new customers. The process first starts with identifying a customer and
maintaining all the corresponding details into the CRM system which is also called an
‘Opportunity of Business’. The Sales and Field representatives then try getting
business out of these customers by sophistically following up with them and
converting them into a winning deal. All this is very easily and efficiently done by an
integrated CRM system.
5. The strongest aspect of Customer Relationship Management is that it is very cost-
effective. The advantage of decently implemented CRM system is that there is very
less need of paper and manual work which requires lesser staff to manage and lesser
 resources to deal with. The technologies used in implementing a CRM system are also
very cheap and smooth as compared to the traditional way of business.
6. All the details in CRM system is kept centralized which is available anytime on
fingertips. This reduces the process time and increases productivity.
7. Efficiently dealing with all the customers and providing them what they actually need
increases the customer satisfaction. This increases the chance of getting more business
which ultimately enhances turnover and profit.
8. If the customer is satisfied they will always be loyal to you and will remain in
business forever resulting in increasing customer base and ultimately enhancing net
growth of business.
9. of staff accordingly Every piece of data in a CRM system is stored in one central
readily-accessible program, thereby reducing the time taken to search and correlate
data for each customer and increasing the productivity
10. CRM offers an historical view of every piece of information about a particular
customer, allowing a full understanding of a customer’s position to be gained and
providing a solid ground for analysis.
11. .CRM also offers a segmentation feature with the ability to make
specifications according to a range of different fields, which is useful in terms of
comparing the performance of like businesses, or when concentrating on a particular
demographic or customer type.
12. Furthermore, CRM is good for the management of new business as it clearly records
and maps out the progression of the relationship throughout the entire meeting and
nurturing process
13. .It is a very cost effective option, not only in a sense that the CRM technologies
are very inexpensive and easy to administer and manage, but also in terms of the
reduced need of paper and manual work, which in turn means there are less staff
required and fewer resources to deal with.
14. Lastly but perhaps most importantly, CRM enables you to efficiently and effectively
manage your customers and provide them with the services they actually need, which
leads to an increase in customer satisfaction and in turn an enhanced level of customer
loyalty. This ultimately increases your chances of obtaining more business,
thereby improving your turnover, profit and growth.

In today’s commercial world, practice of dealing with existing customers and thriving
business by getting more customers into loop is predominant and is mere a dilemma.
Installing a CRM system can definitely improve the situation and help in challenging the new
ways of marketing and business in an of marketing and business in an efficient manner.
 CHAPTER:-2
IMPLEMENTATION OF CUSTOMER
RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT IN
RETAIL SECTORS

1.Introduction
As more and more brands are launched and introduced in Indian retail sector, their primary
focus is to define their position sharply. Their primary focus is to acquire customer. A
marketer knows that the customer acquisition is not an easy task because of high degree of
competition and accessibility of information of product and services. Here the role of
Customer Relation Management (CRM) arises. Retail industry is one of the growing
industries in India moreover the retail industry is based on the customer services. For the past
few year’s brands are not spending as much to their current customer than a prospective
customer. But the time has changed the organisation product centric approach to customer
centric approach. For customer centric approach the organization wants more data about the
customer, their needs, preference and taste, fashion and trend. So most of the organization
opting customer relationship management as a weapon to know more about the customer.
Customer relation management is a process that aims at maximizing customer satisfaction by
building mutually beneficial long-term relationship with customers. (Jagadish N Sheth, Ault
Parvatiyar and G Shainesh,2001).

2. ROLE OF CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT

(CRM)
In retail sector, marketers are focused on customer life time value. Customer Relationship
Management has a vital role in retail business. The customers are mostly looking through the
services which the company is providing. The customer can easily change their decision or
switching the preference to other. The marketers’ vital role is to predict the customer needs
before it arises in the mind of the customer. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) will
help the customer to predict the customer preference through the customer data or customer
profile which is available in company. Customer relationship management helps the marketer
to make different offer of different services and facilities to different segments of market
customer relationship management has the information about whole market trend and
customer buying behaviour and their response to their product. Acquiring a new customer
cost about ten times more than retaining an old customer, thus in retail stores people use to
implement their technology, strategy and process, dealing with market information and
changing business models, understanding customer value are the key values of the CRM. (V
Venkata Ramana and G Somayajulu, 2004) C.R.M Customer relationship management help
the organization to measure the service quality that which they are providing. It is very
difficult to measure the service because the services are intangible in nature C.R.M tools
helps to enhance the quality of the service they are providing. Customer relationship
management opted organization provides some offers like, sales ordering processing – allows
the customer to manage virtually all order types, including quotes, proposals, future orders.
Inventory management –classifies tracks and controls all types of inventories, including
stocked and non-stocked products and services, spare parts, tooling and suppliers, warranties,
repair and return. Channel partner management enabling distribution partners, field
representatives, regional offices and corporate headquarters to share retail information to
identify customer preferences and buying behaviour.

 Relationship Marketing The term relationship marketing is a very familiar term

among the market. It is a popular concept during the past few years and become an
important. In today’s consumer market. The marketing mix approach is too limited to
provide a usable framework for accessing and developing in industry and should be
replaced by alternative models where focus is on customers and relationship rather
than market and product. For developing and implementing the relationship marketing
programs the marketer should know abut the nature, strength and preference of the
market as well as customer. Adrian Payne identifies six markets which he claims to
relation market –internal marketing, supplier marketing, recruitment market, referral
market, customer market.
 Direct Marketing Direct marketing means direct communication of face to face i.e.,
person to person. Direct marketing provides complete information about the brands
and the product and disclosing how the product will care the customers need and
wands. The role of the direct marketing is to make the customer loyal to the product
and brand. If the company deals with the sales of the FMCG products, the mass
communication is needed to service the information of the product to the customer.
 Interactive Management Interactive management is a process to help the people
having complexity of problem to take a decision from the alternatives. the roles of
interactive management are to work as well-informed people who take good decision
after the evaluation of the alternative and guide the customer for wise decision.
  Customer Empowerment Customer empowerment where the customer decides
his/her choice by the mode of communication and also the price of the product and
desire service that the organization providing. Now the customers are deciding the
product by two factors one is the lost and other is quality of service. Now the
customer is driving the organization because of the availability of information. The
customer can access the complete information on his fingertips through the different
tools of CRM or CRM technologies. Information technology drastically changed the
market into customer friendly market by providing right information to right person at right
time. The accessibility of information forms the consumer more aware and it tends to shift
the power of the organization to the consumer.

 Customer Prospects Customer prospectus enables to locate areas with ideal

demographic characteristics for targeting new costumer. Costumer prospectus contain
the complete information about the sensitive, time of purchase etc. customer
prospectus contains complete information about the consumer. It helps the maker to
identify prospects having similar characteristics and to form market segment on the
basis of demography and geography. Customer prospectus helps the organization in
test marketing to a new target market. Geography information system is to allow the
client to get a better visual understanding of their customer and to take market
decision, customer analysis, competitor’s location and many other factors. Customer
prospectus helps the organization to target the marketing campaigns to the right
customer through right way. The customer can also enjoy with these tools because
they are getting the product which they will make them satisfied.

3.SIGNIFICANCE OF CRM
Early decades almost all the companies followed product–centric approach to the business.
Product–centric approach is mainly concentrated in market campaigns rather tan customers’
knowledge. In product – centric approach to business if a customer wants something, it is
customer to have to make effort to find out and get it. Soon the companies realized that it
took more advertising and reducing the cost to retain customer. Customers drive the company
from product–centric approach to customer– centric approach for getting maximum
satisfaction by fulfilling the needs of the customers that the customers early demanded. By
the help of Customer Relationship Management tools, the company retains the customers and
assures their loyalty. To maintain the loyalty is the biggest challenge in the organization. On
an average a company has only 5% to 20% profitability in a successful sale to a new prospect
but 60% to 70% profitability of selling again to active customers. An effective CRM results
in maximizing business and profits throughout the customer life cycle.

CRM helps the organization to find out the potential buyers and their needs and wants and
maintain relationships. The customer can change preference at any time because of high
growth of competition in the market. CRM helps the company to anticipate the needs and
wants of the customers before it arises. Customer Relationship Management improves
interaction and lasting relationship with each and every customer. Through the different
aspects of customer relationship Management, the organization can easily get the data of
different types of customers, viz., most valued customer, most growable customer and below
zero customer. Implementation of CRM – the marketer can know more about the nature and
strength of their relation with the customers and they can improve the relationships. The
success of the company will depend upon how well they can predict the customer needs.
CRM is the concept of customers’ life time value by making a good relation with the
potential buyers and the company can able to communicate the right message to attract and
retain the right customers at right time. CRM is the understanding of segment relationship
and ability to generate action plan to help the staff working in different segments of device to
plan maximize benefits to the customer. (R K Sugandhi, 2004) Customer Relationship
Management helps to assess all information to customers touch point. CRM gives all the
customers to access the information about the product and services. Information Technology
comes into picture to manage the relations in a mannered way. Impact of technology in
globalization is helping to reduce the distance between producers and end users. Application
of technology changes whole scenario of getting information about the products and services.
Technology induces all the equipment, software and communication links the organization
follows for improving the process. The most widely used tools are

a) Electronic Point of Sale (EPOS)

b) Sale Force Automation

c) Customer Service Help Desk

d) Call centres

e) System Integration Customer Relationship Management keeps the customer data in a

manageable manner.

CRM is the bridge from customer to the company and from company to the customers. It
provides equal importance to every department in the organization. It is very needed for
implementation of CRM to get reliable knowledge of customers and their needs from various
surveys and data warehouses. CRM applies this knowledge for developing the marketing
strategy and creating and maintaining relationships with the customers. Customer relations
and customer knowledge are the two pillars of CRM implementation.
 RETAIL SECTOR

Manage distributors, inventory, point-of-sale and increase customer loyalty. Integrate with
multiple systems to create a holistic view of customers to boost revenues.

Benefits availed by retail sector by implementing CRM: -

1. Maximize channel sales

 Analyse channel health by monitoring key metrics such as days of receivables, days
of inventory stock, capital adequacy, etc.
 Manage end-to-end partner acquisition process from identification to on-boarding.
 Track partner performance with accurate and updated data
 Enable single point partner portals to raise purchase orders, track order status,
delivery dates, back-orders, etc.
 Abide by regulatory global trade compliances

2. Become more customer centric

 Garner and incorporate valuable customer feedback to drive product innovations

 Implement customer portals to solve complaints and service requests
 Device up sell strategies by mining existing customer data
 Run loyalty programs to retain and reward repeat customers

3. Boost Campaign ROI

 Manage budgets and expenses with multi-wave campaign execution capability

 Facilitate execution of joint marketing campaigns & events with partners
 Improve target list with accurate data and updated data
 Create smart offers by understanding purchase trends

4. Contract and warranty management

 Manage license registration process and contracts with suppliers, distributors etc.
 Manage customer warranties, maintenance contracts, exchange and claims handling
 Issue timely alerts for lapses, renewals, contracts, licenses, claims etc. to avoid
contingencies

5. Simplify inventory management

 Anticipate inventory stocking needs by implementing smarter replenishment

techniques
 Generate automated system notifications to indicate time for reorder
 Track stocks and orders to ensure realistic commitments to distributors and customers

6. Strengthen workforce management

 Ensure accountability by deploying preventive alerts and escalations.

 Get insight into teams’ activities and ensure accountability
 Use in-built knowledge retention to combat effects of sales force attrition.
 Deploy best practices to manage workforces using action taken reports, reminders,
structured relationship programs, etc.
 Upgrade workforce & partner skill set using targeted self-paced training programs.

7. Advanced Reporting
 Get real-time reports across teams, products and geographies.
 Move from fragmented to a unified multi-system collated reporting.
 Establish an efficient analysis path using drill-down capabilities.
 Provide actionable insights
 Boost results by measuring and improving critical performance indicators

CHAPTER:-3
CHALLENGES IN CUSTOMER
RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
 CHALLENGES IN CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP
MANAGEMENT

Companies around the world have leveraged CRM strategies to gain competitive advantage.
As more and more companies rush to implement CRM, precautions must be taken to do it
right. It is approximated that 50-70% CRM implementations fail, depending on the Industry
vertical - it is essential to identify the key challenges, address risks and build a strategy that
can make your CRM successful. CRM talks about strategy, but at the end of the day,
someone has to lead the way and implement it. Listed below are some practical tips to
consider when building effective CRM strategies and implementation plans.

1. What is CRM?
CRM is not software: - it's a business philosophy. It is a strategy, implemented by an
organization using a software solution, that typically covers all customer facing departments
like sales, marketing, customer service, etc. "CRM" is a term, collectively used to refer to a
combination of strategy & software.
2. Getting Clarity on Objectives
What are the set of objectives the company wishes to achieve with CRM? Trivial as it may
sound, a majority of implementations don't have these goals spelled out. Ensure that these
objectives are listed and define a measurement metrics to be used to assess the success of the
implementation. Without these, companies can't calculate the benefits or ROI from the CRM
system.

3. No Core CRM Team

Unlike other software implementations, IT teams alone should not be expected to roll out a
CRM system. It is very critical for companies to form a core CRM team, which in addition to
IT draws participation from the top management plus senior executives of Sales, Marketing
and Customer Service departments and subsequently the end-users. Decisions related to the
implementation should be discussed in this forum.

4. The Costing Iceberg

It is not unusual for CRM implementations to overrun costs and timelines. When assessing
the costing, always calculate the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO). There are two ways of
implementing CRM - the license model or the ASP (hosted) model. In the former model,
licenses typically represent 9 - 18% of the TCO. The actual TCO will need to include the cost
of hardware, software, engineering, operations, AMCs, etc. On the other hand, in the ASP
model, a subscription fee represents the true TCO. Since, ASP models offer a fully managed
and a continuously evolving system, it also saves implementation time, upgrade costs and
ownership hassles. Any implementation delay also has a cost associated with it, in the form
of lost time and opportunities.
 5. Achieving User Adoption
User Adoption is the key to success for any CRM. It is important to design effective training
programs in order to provide an understanding to end-users for them to be able to effectively
use the system. Ensure that the user interface is kept simple. Consultants often underestimate
or miss the motivation required to get the end-users to start using the system. Consider the
sales executives; their motivation is to meet their targets to get large incentive cheques. They
are happiest when selling, to them everything else is a waste of time. Don't expect them to
navigate complex screens or enter detailed time-consuming forms, because it simply won't
fly.

6. Managing the Application

Once the CRM has been rolled-out, it is important to re-align the working culture of teams
around it. At times, the "as-is" bug bites people. To illustrate, the VP sales directs his sales
team to carry excel sheet print-outs of their pipeline when coming for a review. Here, either
the report was not configured well in the system, or users have not been updating it enough.
Such scenarios need immediate correction or else the CRM system will slowly lose its
relevance. The core team must review such anomalies from time-to-time.

7. Process
Clearly defined processes and their enforcement are critical to the success of any CRM
rollout. The objective is to cut out the ambiguity in the system. It is advisable to create a
central depositary, accessible to all, which stores all process definitions. Some key processes
that need to be defined are the Change Management process, Feature Re-evaluation process,
Success Evaluation process, Business Flows, etc. Any process implemented via the CRM
solution, must map your real-world process and vice-versa.

8. Finding the Right Partner

The results of CRM success go up considerably with the right solution partner. While
strategy consultants are good, it is the solution partner who will make it work. Ideally, select
a partner who can do both - strategy & implementation. It is important that your partner
shares the risks of your implementation. Pay only for success. While global knowledge bases
are impressive, local issues can often negate these learnings. Work with a vendor who
understands local work cultures, technology limitations cultural sensitivities and is willing to
listen.
 CHAPTER:-4
SUGGESTIONS AND CONCLUSION
 SUGGESTIONS.

Indeed, today, it is difficult to separate social media management from customer relationship
management (CRM)--hence the increasing number of social CRM services. But just having a
social CRM offering is not enough. Just like any technology, you have to first pick a
customer engagement and management solution that is right for your organization and create
a strategy and guidelines around using it.

1. Make sure you have a good platform for conducting social CRM: -

"Select a comprehensive social media management platform with rich listening, monitoring
and engagement capabilities," says Meg Bear, vice president of Product Development at
Oracle Social Cloud.

"Your social platform should also integrate seamlessly with other key enterprise applications
like sales, marketing, service and commerce for a holistic approach that covers all customer
touch points," she says. "It's a customer-centric world and your technologies should be
connected with the customer at the centre. No more one-off, point solutions."

2. Make sure you have the right resources: -"Social is an unprecedented opportunity to
deliver great service, but it is also a potential source of frustration for your customers if your
team is not equipped to solve problems," says Justyn Howard, founder and CEO, Sprout
Social, a social media management and engagement platform.

"Just as consumers have grown impatient with phone trees and hold time, there is growing
frustration when social help requests are mismanaged," Howard says. "A common approach
to social is to put marketing and PR professionals behind the wheel, but if they are not
equipped to solve specific problems, the efforts can do more harm than good."

3. Identify and engage your social influencers: -"Use social media tools like Simply
Measured or Peak Analytics to identify who is driving the most conversation about your
brand," says Katya Constantine, founder, Discophile Media. Then "reach out to [those loyal
users] and build a managed relationship with them."

4. Reward loyal customers: - "For those engaging exclusively with your brand on social
media, create a client loyalty code to retain those customers, a prospect discount code to
entice them to buy, and reward positive feedback with handwritten notes and snail-mailed
brand goodies," says Stacey Acevero, social media manager at cloud-based marketing
provider Vocus.
5. Use list and group features:-"The big three (Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn) make this
easy," says Acevero. "For example, create (private) lists on Twitter in these categories:
Clients, Prospects Who Have Considered Us, Positive Feedback from Clients, and Desired
Clients or Influencers. Add people accordingly, and create social campaigns to keep each
segment engaged."

6. Talk with your customers, not at them:- "If your brand is looking to build a social media
presence, make sure that you are having a two-way conversation with your customers," not
just pushing information at them, says Constantine.

7. Respond to customers in a timely manner:- "As important as the response itself is, you
need to make sure you engage the customer as fast as possible," says Brian Coughlin, an SEO
analyst at OpticsPlanet.com, an online seller of sports optics, hunting gear and sunglasses.

"If they have a question, you shouldn't wait hours before answering. If they have a complaint,
it should be minutes before they have a personalized response," Coughlin says. "It's not easy
to keep up to date on all your social accounts, but your customers will appreciate it and grow
to trust you more and more as you improve."

8. Put a human face (or name) on your social media conversations:- "In social media,
friends and fans want to interact with 'real' people, not with companies or nameless flacks,"
states Peter Friedman, chairman and CEO, LiveWorld, a social content marketing company.
"So when building relationships with customers through social media, be as human as
possible.

That means your representatives on social should be encouraged to bring their own
personalities to the table, within guidelines determined by your brand attributes and goals,"
Friedman says. "If you use a company username for Twitter, allow employees who tweet
from that account to put their name at the end of messages so that readers understand there's
an individual on the other end."

9. Make sure your social media messaging is consistent with your brand image:- "The
consumer wants to feel like they are talking to a real person, but you want to be sure the tone
on your social sites is still in line with your company," says Chris Apaliski, the social media
director at Dallas-based digital marketing agency Magic Logix.

"For example, a restaurant that derives a lot of profit from happy hour may be able to take a
casual, laid-back tone; however, a big data company [should probably] be informational yet
courteous," Apaliski says. "Know your business and audience and craft your strategy
accordingly."

10. Monitor what your customers are saying so you can quickly respond: - "One of the
best ways to solve a problem is to anticipate it before it is presented to you," says Adam
Root, CTO and cofounder of marketing software developer HipLogiq, parent company of
social media apps Social Compass and Social Centavo.
"By monitoring social media feeds [for your company name and products] your business can
immediately identify customer service issues and start to work on them before support tickets
come in, “Root says.

In addition, "use tools like Google Alerts, Twilert.com, Newsle.com or

CTOsOnTheMove.com (shameless plug) to be alerted when your clients get appointed,
promoted or quoted in media, so you can congratulate them on their success," says Misha
Sobolev, director, CTOs On The Move, which provides real-time sales leads to technology
companies. "These little acts of kindness will show you are human and that you care--and
will cement your business relationship better than a 100-page presentation."

11. Don't feed the trolls. "Trolls lurk in all corners of social media, waiting to stir up trouble
with companies," says Alex Bard, senior vice president and general manager at
Saleforce.com.

What or who is a troll? "A 'troll' is someone who posts provocative or off-topic messages
only to get an emotional response from readers," Bard says. So before responding to an irate
tweet or a nasty Facebook comment, "be aware of people's intentions and do not feed the troll
by responding to inflammatory statements," he says. "It's important to know the difference
between people encouraging controversy just looking to get a reaction out of others" and
those who may have a legitimate gripe.

12. Let customers know how and when to reach you. "Set customer service expectations
by ensuring your brand's social pages display a statement about the page's purpose, including
the hours in which the page is actively monitored and a timeframe in which customers can
expect a reply," says Jon Schepke, CEO and founder of SIM Partners, a provider of local
automated marketing solutions.

"If for some reason a customer is particularly displeased or requires extra assistance, take the
conversation offline by providing an email address or phone number they can contact for
direct support," Schepke says.

13. Use social profile data to augment contact information: - "Social profiles provide rich
demographic and psychographic information on your current customers," says Root. "By
mining customer data from social profiles your marketing department can identify trends in
your current customer base and target the right audience in future campaigns."

with your business prospects and existing customers happen everywhere including email,
Twitter, Facebook and even your help desk ticketing system," says Root.

"Problems surface when communication is inconsistent across those lines. For example, when
sales don’t know a customer had a bad experience in response to a help desk issue, or when a
customer doesn't get a reply back on Twitter," Root says.

"Having one portal where communication with your customers or prospects is available to
everyone paints a comprehensive picture and allows problems to be solved quickly and lets
your customer know that every department in your business is in tune.," Root says.
15. Post frequently asked questions on your Facebook page or provide links to your
FAQ page:- "Personally answering every question that comes through on social media can
be a daunting (not to mention time-consuming and expensive) task for companies," says
David Lloyd, CEO of Intelli Response, a virtual agent software provider. So "investigate
solutions that allow your company to automate company-approved answers to common
questions on social," he says.

"Stakeholders can get the company's official answers to frequently asked questions in their
channel of choice, allowing the company to remain at a distance, but jump in when necessary
to offer personalized online support," Lloyd says.

16. Remember that social media isn't always the answer or the appropriate way to
respond to a customer: - "Today's customer is omni-channel and organizations must
connect the experience and interaction sequence with every channel the customer is using,"
says Mark Smith, president, Provenir, the developer of customer lifecycle software for
enterprises.

"Companies should recognize that an appropriate response to social events may not always be
a social response but rather a cross-channel one. If a high-profile customer has a significant
issue, an immediate call to their mobile may be more effective than a tweet," Smith says.

17. Do not ignore basic CRM functions: - "Assigning tasks, logging call notes and
following up on meetings may be considered 'old-school,' but they are just as important as
ever," says Jon Ferrara, the founder and CEO of social CRM platform Nimble. "These are
what your CRM is designed to do: keep deal flow on track. Neglect them at your peril."

CONCLUSION
From this study it can be concluded that Customer Relationship Management is the device
which the organization used to retain the customer loyalty. For an organization customer
retention is the big and difficult task. The company gets more profitability in sales to the
existing customer than the new customer. Customer Relationship Management helps the
company to predict the customers’ needs before it arises in the customer. The customer data
which available in the organization makes the company the marketer right way at right time.
Customer satisfaction is the backbone of the loyalty of the customer. The company is trying
to make the customer to satisfy. Customer Relationship Management tools enhances the
company to interact with the customer in effective way customer relationship management is
satisfactory. Be sure to remember that no matter what size your company may be, Customer
Relationship Management is very important. New technology is available and using it to keep
your Customer Relationship Management techniques up to date is very important. As you use
new strategies and customer centered values your Customer Relationship Management will
improve. Evaluating and re-engineering work processes can also be helpful and finding a
Customer Relationship Management consultant may help you make these types of changes
easier. It is important to use good Customer Relationship Management to improve the
relationships between your company and your customers. Happy customers will result in
more sales for your company.

BIBLOGRAPHY/SOURCES.
WEBSITES:-
www.google.com
www.wikipedia.com
www.forbes.com

MAGAZINES:-
VALUELINE
EAGLEEYE
BUSINESS WORLD