For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Craft Your CRM Investment Plans In Light Of Technology Adoption Patterns

by William Band, August 12, 2009

Navigating the multifaceted customer relationship management (CRM) technology landscape is challenging. To help CRM professionals make smart decisions, Forrester surveyed 286 companies to understand the adoption patterns for 19 types of customer management . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Eight Ways To Mine Value From Your CRM Systems

Now Is The Time To Dig For The Hidden Nuggets That Lead To Big Gains

by William Band, May 7, 2009

Now may not be the right time to ask for the resources to do a major IT project, including CRM. But CRM professionals can be smart and mine the applications they already own for untapped benefits without incurring high costs. Hidden value typically lies . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

The ROI Of CRM Application Upgrades

A Total Economic Impact™ Analysis Shows Favorable ROI Over Five Years

by William Band, March 6, 2009

With vendors like Oracle and SAP touting new releases of their CRM products, enterprises running older versions of CRM apps are mulling whether to take the upgrade plunge. However, in a down economy, CRM professionals are wondering if the benefits of . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

How To Risk-Proof Your CRM Deployment Strategy

Use Best Practices And Our Risk Evaluation Tool To Steer Clear Of Perils

by William Band, February 27, 2009

In today's difficult economic climate, CRM professionals cannot afford failed business process and technology projects. To pinpoint the real-world pitfalls that can trip up CRM initiatives, Forrester surveyed 133 organizations using one of 24 leading . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

How To Risk-Proof Your Culture For CRM

Use Best Practices And Our Risk Evaluation Tool To Steer Clear Of Perils

by William Band, February 27, 2009

In today's difficult economic climate, CRM professionals cannot afford failed business process and technology projects. To pinpoint the real-world pitfalls that can trip up CRM initiatives, Forrester surveyed 133 organizations using one of 24 leading . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

How To Risk-Proof Your CRM Business Processes

Use Best Practices And Our Risk Evaluation Tool To Steer Clear Of Perils

by William Band, February 27, 2009

In today's difficult economic climate, CRM professionals cannot afford failed business process and technology projects. To pinpoint the real-world pitfalls that can trip up CRM initiatives, Forrester surveyed 133 organizations using one of 24 leading . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

How To Risk-Proof Your CRM Technology Platform

Use Best Practices And Our Risk Evaluation Tool To Steer Clear Of Perils

by William Band, February 27, 2009

In today's difficult economic climate, CRM professionals cannot afford failed business process and technology projects. To pinpoint the real-world pitfalls that can trip up CRM initiatives, Forrester surveyed 133 organizations using one of 24 leading . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Forrester's CRM Risk Evaluation Self-Assessment Tool  (66 KB XLS)

by William Band, January 28, 2009

Use Forrester¿s CRM Risk Assessment Framework to anticipate and remediate problems and risks that can trip-up CRM initiatives.

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Trends 2009: Customer Relationship Management

Strategy And Business Value Are The Watchwords For The Next 12 Months

by William Band, December 11, 2008

In light of the sudden and dramatic economic downturn, what are the key trends that will drive customer relationship management (CRM) strategies and technology adoption in 2009? Our recent surveys and interviews with customer-oriented business and IT . . .

For Consumer Market Research Professionals

Best Practices: The Next Wave In Customer Satisfaction Studies Is CRM Integration

How Firms Move From Measuring To Fixing Customer Problems

by Brad Bortner, October 17, 2008

A rising tide of customer satisfaction research is also lifting the tide of another type of software enabled solution to harness these insights. They are enterprise feedback management (EFM) systems that combine elements of survey tools with tight customer . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Answers To Five Frequently Asked Questions About CRM Projects

Size Up Your CRM Program Compared Against 133 Projects

by William Band, August 29, 2008

How does your customer relationship management (CRM) project compare with those at other organizations? Forrester surveyed 133 organizations that are using one of 24 leading enterprise or midmarket suite solutions to understand their CRM solution purchase . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Inquiry Insights: CRM Customers Focus On Business Processes, Not Technologies

by Tom Grant, Ph.D., August 21, 2008

In the past 18 months, the questions we've received about customer relationship management (CRM) software show that people implementing these applications are more focused on business processes than technology. These results have important implications . . .

For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

Sales Success Needs Customer Advocacy

Sales Strategies For The German Retail Banking Market

by Vanessa Niemeyer, Ph.D., April 17, 2008

Sales strategies in the German retail banking market range from passive customer advocacy to extreme sales orientation. The sales success of some of the sales-oriented banks begs the question of whether sales success needs customer advocacy at all. We . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

The CRM 2.0 Imperative

Look To New Solutions To Keep Pace With The Emerging Social Customer

by William Band, March 10, 2008

Customer relationship management (CRM) is evolving from its traditional focus on optimizing customer-facing transactional processes to include the strategies and technologies to develop collaborative connections with customers, suppliers, and even competitors. . . .

For Customer Experience Professionals

The Strength Of Customer Relationships

Examining Consumer Loyalty To 112 Companies Across Nine Industries

by Bruce D. Temkin, February 21, 2008

How loyal are consumers? We examined this question by asking nearly 5,000 US consumers about their intentions for doing business with 112 firms across these nine industries: banks, credit card providers, health plans, insurance firms, Internet service . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Customer Strategy Best Practices Adoption

by William Band, January 10, 2008

We surveyed 74 business and technology decision-makers and influencers to discover their strengths and weaknesses compared to nine customer strategy best practices for customer relationship management (CRM). Fully 25% of those surveyed evaluate their . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

The Right CRM Metrics For Your Organization

by William Band, October 1, 2007

Forrester interviewed 58 executives about their best practices for getting more value from customer relationship management (CRM). They told us that it is critical to set clear CRM objectives and establish the right metrics before making a technology . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Forrester's Best Practices Framework For CRM

Use Our CRM FastForward Self-Assessment To Achieve Quick Wins

by William Band, August 24, 2007

By 2010, organizations around the world will spend $11 billion annually on customer relationship management (CRM) solutions. Smart companies are selective about how and where they invest resources. How can you make sure your company gets the best return . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Forrester's FastForward CRM Capabilities Best Practices Self-Assessment  (166 KB XLS)

by William Band, August 24, 2007

The Forrester Best Practices Framework for CRM defines the critical capabilities necessary for building high quality customer relationships. The framework distills findings from our interviews with 101 user companies, analysis of 33 CRM vendor solutions, . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Case Study: Big River Telephone Executives Lead The Charge For CRM Adoption

by William Band, Ian Schuler, June 27, 2007

Big River Telephone, an emerging telecommunications firm, needed to improve the consistency of its customer service interactions to forestall customer defections. It implemented a new customer relationship management (CRM) technology but faced tepid user . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Case Study: A Global Medical Products Company Promotes User Adoption Of CRM

by William Band, Ian Schuler, June 27, 2007

A global medical products company introduced a companywide CRM solution to consolidate customer data and improve responsiveness to customers. But users were slow to adopt the new tool. The sales organization had a low level of computer skills and did . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Best Practices: Getting The Most From Your CRM Deployment

Focus on Flawless Execution To Drive Higher ROI

by William Band, June 27, 2007

By 2010, enterprises will spend nearly $11 billion annually on customer relationship management (CRM) solutions to accelerate top-line growth, improve the customer experience, and boost the productivity of frontline workers. But success with CRM can be . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Case Study: A Diversified Chemicals Company Focuses On Improving Underlying CRM Business Processes

by William Band, Ian Schuler, June 27, 2007

Although customer relationships have always been important to a global diversified chemicals company, sharing processes and customer data was sometimes difficult across multiple lines of business (LOBs). To overcome this problem, the company assigned . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Trends 2007: Customer Relationship Management

by William Band, March 1, 2007

Customer relationship management (CRM) is now a core element of enterprise competitive strategy. Organizations of all types are striving to improve their customer experience. Decisions about new spending on CRM must take into account significant changes . . .

Customer Retention Is A Process, Not An Event

A Four-Step Cycle For Improving Customer Loyalty In Financial Services

by Mary Pilecki, January 9, 2007

Financial services institutions (FSIs) are once again focusing on retaining their existing customers, but with little success. Given a lack of clear metrics on what attrition is and no enterprise focus on the problem, FSIs are reactively rather than proactively . . .