thinking: relating- celebrating :-)

It may sound obvious, but not every CRM project has a plan or strategy in place.

Sometimes a business will ask its IT guys to implement a CRM program (they mean an application) when they should really be asking for a CRM programme of work.

If you are in the situation of being asked to investigate CRM for your business here are some of the things you might look for. 

1. What are the needs, objectives and goals for new business development? Customer acqusition is a key focus of CRM generally. The new business team will want as much help as they can get with managing leads, qualifying those leads into prospects and when the time is right transforming those prospects into customers. Acquisition=Growth

2. What does the business know about existing customers? How can your new system help with increasing “share of wallet” and improve levels of customer service so that you retain and keep customers (lower “churn” rate) sometimes measured as customer lifetime. (That is how long a customer stays with your business and what share of their Spend is directed towards your products and services.)

3. Is there a structure in place to recognise those customers who advocate for you and refer business to you? Referral business has a lower cost of sales and shorter time to profit so an effective CRM would want to look at this as well. 

The best fit system is part software and part culture – so the other thing you will want to do is to audit the company for supporting practises and customer centric thinking which would underpin any new system.

A CRM audit is best when it is completed in association with an outside party so that internal politics are minimised. This type of review is something we love to help you with. 

This post is part of series on CRM Made Simple. For earlier content please check earlier notes in this series.

• CRM as a Process Platform
• What is CRM Used For?
• CRM Thinking about Strategy 1a>

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On hearing the news that MTV are handing over control to viewers Ben McConnell remarked that – Control is really out of control.

“MTV says it will create thousands of new niche-oriented sites based on its programming and invite viewers to participate with shows and remix their content. Control is really out of control now”…..and later agreed this is a positive move

“This is exactly how big media companies should fight the third-party sites; not with lawyers but with vast amounts of free content, tools to play with that content and vast new forms of particpation. To out-do YouTube, big media should be encouraging joint ownership of content.”

I’d say that it’s about time. If the original yoof tv channel can’t work it out now it never will. According to a Pew Survey of Generation Next is made up of 18-25 year-olds (born between 1981 and 1988). Just 2 of the summary findings

They use technology and the internet to connect with people in new and distinctive ways. Text messaging, instant messaging and email keep them in constant contact with friends. About half say they sent or received a text message over the phone in the past day, approximately double the proportion of those ages 26-40.

They are the “Look at Me” generation. Social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace and MyYearbook allow individuals to post a personal profile complete with photos and descriptions of interests and hobbies. A majority of Gen Nexters have used one of these social networking sites, and more than four-in-ten have created a personal profile.

You can’t expect a generation that has replaced TV with broadband mashups to be satisfied with their current websites. And it’s not exactly rocket science to work out why myspace and youtube have been successful. 

It is not just younger people who like to slice and dice their media content. Engagement media has wide appeal – welcome to the web 2.0 world.

Back in February the Viacom Chairman was asked if they got Web 2.0?  in an interview. This was the viewpoint then.

“THR: Let’s talk about new media. There are some that say Viacom has missed the boat when it comes to the Web 2.0 revolution.
Redstone: Wait a minute, wait a minute. We don’t miss boats. Other people miss boats, and they may have missed the Viacom boat. The fact of the matter is, without copyright protection, there is no entertainment business. And so we instructed YouTube to remove 100,000 pieces of video from their site. Why? Because they were using it without paying for it. I don’t believe in that. If you want to use us, pay us. Or make a deal with us that is commensurate with the value of our product. We are the only totally content company, and our content has taken years and years to develop, with a lot of hard work. People who want to use it are going to pay us, or good-bye.”

In the news today there is a $1b lawsuit against Google based around the YouTube experience. This will certainly get people’s attention and ultimately it is another version of follow the money. MTV and Viacom are content owners and quite rightly want to leverage that value as directly as they can. Allowing some form of Web 2.0 engagement on their own sites , in a facilitated manner would seem a way to do that.

The impact on revenues won’t have escaped their attention – and sure enough at the end of the official story there is a note on how MTV owner (Viacom)  is expecting to double their digital business revenue this coming year.