Meaningful Metrics

Survey identifies successful CRM initiatives as cross-functional and metrics-driven

As new CRM solutions have yet to show a return on investment in many companies, people have begun to wonder if CRM is a big farce. A survey conducted by Fujitsu Consulting, formerly DMR Consulting, found that CRM can't be considered a failure just yet; the software is too young to measure and most implementations haven't been completely or correctly deployed. According to the survey, those implementations that have proven successful so far can pinpoint their success to key factors: implementing metrics, hiring a CRM czar, and deploying the solution cross-functionally.

"CRM implementation is still in the early stages and not a mature area at all," said Deborah Czerna, associate director of management consulting at Fujitsu Consulting.

What Czerna and her colleagues did find after surveying more than 200 IT professionals was that most implementations are lacking set metrics. Twenty-two percent of those surveyed had some metrics, while 56 percent had no metrics at all. Only 22 percent had metrics across sales, marketing, and customer service.

"Employing meaningful metrics is essential to evaluating how well your CRM efforts are paying off. Understanding whether you're actually achieving the measurable benefits you targeted when planning your CRM program enables you to make informed, proactive changes to that program over time," said David Yamashita, CRM practice director at Fujitsu Consulting. Czerna added that not only do companies that put metrics into place achieve their goals, they often also set more goals and get more from CRM.

In addition to setting metrics, the survey found that the success of a CRM implementation also depended on whether it was deployed cross functionally to the sales, marketing, and customer service departments. Companies that deployed a CRM solution in only one of these areas didn't reap as many benefits as companies that deployed across all three.

Successful implementations segmented customers according to their value to the company, and then rolled out a solution to a specific customer segment across all functions (customer service, sales, and marketing). Fujitsu concluded that, although successful implementations might initially be small, they were always cross-functional. According to the survey press release, "Survey participants [who] integrated their CRM approach across all of their customer-facing business functions were 100 percent successful in achieving two key strategic goals: selling more to current customers and creating new revenue streams."

However, a successful CRM implementation doesn't depend on software alone. Fujitsu found that two other main factors were hiring a "CRM czar" and training employees to be customer-centric as opposed to sales-centric.

"Many successful implementations had a CRM czar [who] had a level of responsibility as well as accountability across all functional areas," said Czerna. Fujitsu defined the CRM czar as a senior business executive who is accountable for all three customer-facing functions — sales, marketing, and customer service. However, only 34 percent of the respondents had a CRM czar. Of those that did, 84 percent had plans for an enterprise-level CRM architecture.

Also, companies that had a customer-centric philosophy, which Fujitsu defines as understanding customers and their value and creating consistent experiences for customers across all functions, met 71 percent of their implementation goals. Companies that weren't customer-centric only reached 53 percent of their goals.

Overall, the survey found that by deploying to one customer segment across sales, marketing, and customer service, and making the company more customer-centric, CRM has a chance to be successful. According to Czerna, "Once you [find out] what works and what doesn't, you can roll [the implementation] out to all your customers [when] you have more money to invest."

— Jeanette Perez

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