The World Is Turning: What Is The Future For CRM?

In  a downturn will good customer relationship management prove to be the asset we have always believed it to be?  Or will companies abandon the principal and go back to ‘the old ways’ they know best in the scramble to keep ‘heads above water’

The quick answer, is that across the globe customer relationships (we will call it CRM but mean the strategy not just technology) are the axis on which 2009 ‘battle plans’ will spin.  A view backed by an Economist Intelligence Unit global survey of 300 executives, which emphasised their belief that customers’ impact on growth will double over the next five years.  However, the world is unlikely to emerge from recession, as it went in.  The nature of CRM will have mutated, and the tectonic plates of competitive advantage will have pushed further towards Asia (and maybe Australasia) and away from Europe.

The strategy for 2009 will be a quest; to find customer segments with immediate value potential, and engage them with ‘new and improved’ value propositions.  Insight will be at a premium.  Current customers will be priority, but fluctuating export markets will kick off a worldwide hunt for opportunity.

Costs will be pared down, but it will be on extras and unproductive activity eg avoidable contact, rather than the ‘slash and burn’ of previous recessions.  Fewer twiddles and more good value basics will align price with consumer spending.  Opinion is that Europe stands in the greatest danger of ‘unfocussed’ price reductions, driven by a heavier regulation and compliance burden.