When we talk about e-commerce, we don’t just refer to the design of web pages or the model of online shopping malls. All means that can promote the transformation from "mass production" to "mass customization" can be accommodated." In the scope of "e-commerce", CRM is only a subset.
When discussing CRM (customer relationship management) strategies and implementation plans with mainland companies, we found that many business managers are more willing to discuss some more macro-level "e-Business" Regarding the topic, some people even think that CRM is "e-commerce". In this article, we take a look at the connections and differences between e-commerce and CRM.
The development of information technology makes mass customization possible
The emergence and rapid popularization of the Internet is an epoch-making change. Many people compare its impact on human society to that of the 19th century. The advent of the steam engine was paralleled. But how exactly can the Internet change our lives? The short answer to this question is: the Internet will transform the core processes of the socio-economic model from mass production to mass customization. The so-called mass production refers to the extensive use of assembly lines, detailed division of labor and modern management to form the manufacturing capacity of socialized mass production. In his black and white comedy "Modern Times", Chaplin vividly showed how the assembly line turns everyone's activities into a process, and how each process is repeated at high frequency to achieve the purpose of mass production.
Today, both the degree of mechanical automation and the flexibility of assembly lines have been greatly improved. The inhumane operating method that treats workers as "robots" has generally been improved, but the core processes of socialized mass production have not Nothing has changed. If you visit large manufacturing companies such as Shanghai Volkswagen, Capital Steel Works or Haier, it is not difficult to find that these companies still have to organize and process into assembly lines based on product models. Mass production allows people to get rid of the operations of scattered manual workshops and enter the "machine age". The detailed division of labor creates a scale effect, greatly improves production efficiency, and allows everyone in "modern society" to obtain goods at a very low price. Subsistence materials and improved living standards. Without mass production, it is unimaginable that ordinary middle-class families can own cars, mobile phones, TVs, refrigerators... But this does not mean that mass production is perfect. An important flaw is that it reduces the range of choices for users, "Modern society "Sacrifice the rich personality and color and become monotonous and repetitive. The most fitting piece of clothing should be made to measure, but today most people can only choose to buy it at a clothing store on the street. If the store does not have a number that is particularly suitable for you, or if you require size 8 for tops and pants, It's size 4. Clothing stores may not be willing to sell it to you, because it may cause a backlog of inventory. The backlog of inventory will eventually have to be promoted at a high price, which means a reduction in profits, so sometimes manufacturers will choose to offend a small number of users in order to Maintain the economies of scale brought about by mass production and mass sales. For consumers, if your requirements are different from the average level of "most" people, you will not be able to get the most suitable products and services, and consumers who are completely equivalent to the "average" level do not exist, that is to say , everyone has made sacrifices to some extent for "socialized mass production." For example, if your left and right feet are not the same size, then you have to let the new shoes you buy "break in" for a period of time, and there is no other way.
In order to make users more satisfied while maintaining the low cost and high efficiency brought by mass production, people have made various attempts for a long time, including market segmentation, continuous absorption of user feedback, and adjustable designs. Assembly lines and the use of automatic control technology, etc., but so far, these efforts have not achieved amazing results. The reason is that every user is too special. To make the product "completely suitable for you" and "customized for you", there must be uninterrupted and rapid "one-to-one" information exchange between users and enterprises. On the Internet Before it appeared, this could only be science fiction. But now, the Internet provides a low-cost, fast information exchange channel, and mass customization is becoming possible.
For example, when buying CDs in the past, you may have to buy the entire CD for a song you like. Because you and the CD manufacturer cannot exchange information in a timely manner, they can only provide this combination option when making CDs. . MP3s on the Internet do not have this problem. Each MP3 is a single. You can choose your favorite songs from a huge song library and combine them across singers and categories. The order of combinations can also be decided by yourself. The mp3 song collection you set is "customized for you". IBM has also launched technical tools that can download customized CDs directly online. This "mass customization" does not sacrifice the low cost and high efficiency of mass production, but saves the social cost of printing unpopular singles.
This kind of "mass customization" is not just in manufacturing. From design to assembly to transportation to payment to maintenance, every link has the need to be "tailor-made" for users. What kind of organizational structure, what kind of business processes, and what kind of data processing platform can carefully complete each link of "tailor-making" for a large number of users at the same time? This is what "e-commerce" is meant to solve.
CRM is just a subset of e-commerce
When we talk about e-commerce, it does not just refer to the design of web pages or the model of online shopping malls. All can promote the transition from "mass production to The means of "transforming into "mass customization" can be included in the scope of "e-commerce". Digital information storage and exchange, wireless communications, information appliances, the Internet...these commercial activities that use bits as carriers to accelerate the flow of information are all e-commerce. Unless all aspects of society achieve the secure, rapid and seamless flow of information and cooperate in logistics and physical transmission, the "new economy" cannot be said to have taken shape. Therefore, it can be said that e-commerce is a very large concept, and CRM is only a subset of it.
CRM cannot "cure all diseases". At the same time, I also think that any claim that a certain kind of software can allow traditional enterprises to shed their burdens and immediately enter the "information age" is extremely irresponsible. CRM may be the best breakthrough for enterprises to transform. Its effectiveness has initially proved that accelerated flow of information can effectively reduce costs and add value to enterprises. But CRM is not an all-inclusive "e-commerce", it has a scope of application. This scope involves customer information integration in marketing, sales, maintenance, telephone service, interactive network contact and after-sales service. In other words, as long as it involves information exchange between enterprises and customers, CRM should be used. But things beyond this scope, such as design, research and development, logistics management, financial management, etc., cannot be completely solved by CRM.
The development of CRM abroad has a historical background of at least more than ten years. About ten years ago, the automatic sales system SFA (Sales Force Automation) and telephone computer integration CTI (Computer Telephony Integration) began to be widely adopted by foreign companies. The automatic sales system can help manage sales quotas, calculate sales staff commissions, predict profits, and coordinate sales staff activities; the integration of telephones and computers can provide customers with 800 telephone services, allowing users to quickly make decisions through automatic menu selection and interactive voice feedback. Talk to professional telephone service personnel directly and record the conversation data. In addition, the SSC set up for maintenance and after-sales service is also beginning to take shape. In recent years, online ordering has become a hot topic, which in turn requires companies to provide online instant quotations and an online communication environment. Under such circumstances, many companies find that fragmented customer information hinders the provision of overall services to customers. For example, a user fills out an order online and enters his basic information. When he calls to inquire about the order, the telephone salesperson needs to ask for his address, phone number, etc. again; when a salesperson makes an appointment with him When looking at the sample, he may not know that he has ordered the product online.
The reason for this incoordination is that the SFA queried by the sales staff and the CTI server relied on by the telephone service staff and the network backend database are unrelated to each other. The information of the same customer is stored in different information systems. Of course, This resulted in the separate actions of various departments. In this context, CRM integrates customer information as a total solution and has been proven to be effective in improving the company's overall operational efficiency.
When user needs become the center of business processes, many companies find that the "traditional" business operating methods are incoherent in many places. The implementation of CRM has brought many impacts to enterprises.
With the rapid development of CRM, many companies have discovered that when user needs become the center of business processes, the "traditional" business operating methods are incoherent in many places. These inconsistencies prevent an integrated CRM system from being fully effective. Because CRM changes the way of thinking for enterprise management directly from the "customer touch point", it often becomes the first attempt of "traditional" enterprises to move towards "e-commerce". In this attempt, companies began to feel an unusual impact.
The first impact came from marketing. In the past, users could only passively listen to the introduction. Advertising and promotion through mass media may become the most popular item if it can establish a unique product image. Companies do not have to consider the specific needs of each customer. As long as they can maintain regular exposure on television and newspapers, they can establish a brand image. Chinese entrepreneurs are very familiar with this story. In the early days of starting a business, a young man spent all his property to publish a full-page advertisement in "Computer World" for 30 days. Since then, he has received a large number of orders and spent the most difficult time in starting a business. A difficult stage. But will such advertising campaigns still be so effective in the future? When your competitors also start advertising heavily, and when consumers change channels when they see the ads, can advertising still have the power to make a difference? Are consumers on the Internet affected by advertising? How much information do manufacturers need to provide in order for them to decide to buy?
Procter & Gamble, a pioneer in marketing that has always been at the forefront, is also actively carrying out online promotions. It acquired a nonprofit website staffed by volunteers that helped young couples answer their infant and child care questions. It adopts a membership system. After you register as a member, it will automatically identify which age group of child care you are most concerned about. You can ask questions to other members and browse the products it recommends, such as which milk powder is best for people with iron deficiency. Which baby diaper is best for nighttime use in kids. In these product introductions, P&G can effectively provide targeted product information, unlike on TV where it must use a very short time to establish a brand; users have more specific requirements for products, and if they can be well Answer these questions and P&G can gain another loyal customer. If you have a suitable information system platform, the cost of such "one-to-one" marketing is not high, because it is user-driven, that is to say, when the user starts asking questions, he is already a potential consumer. , a single person without children or a retired couple may not sign up for this website at all. Mass marketing is untargeted. It is broadcast uniformly to many viewers at 7:30 pm. For 90% of the viewers, it may be a complete waste of information. However, this waste will be recorded in the marketing expenses in the end. It’s up to the consumer. Therefore, it can be said that users in the "new economy" era will require more targeted and effective information delivery, and only merchants that can do this will win the future market.
The second impact comes from competitors. Northeastern Airlines was once a large-scale aviation company with many fixed assets of routes and aircraft. But it had to declare bankruptcy in the 1980s. Its collapse was not due to service quality or other reasons, but because when other airlines adopted computer information systems to allow travel agents across the country to inquire, book tickets and change flights in real time, Northeast Airlines did not do so. It soon became apparent that they could not compete with other airlines in terms of price and service.
Other companies can provide customers with timely discounts or notify customers when flights are changed to keep every flight full, but they still have to use expensive long-distance phone calls to operate manually. By the time they decided to invest in a booking system, it was too late and they ended up going bankrupt. Companies that are running well today actually face such strategic choices. When those teenagers aged 17 or 18 who are currently keen on video games and online dating grow into consumer subjects, will they be willing to pay attention to merchants that do not provide online ordering? Dismissive? The channels through which they obtain information naturally include the Internet, wireless communications and digital imaging. To adapt to such consumers and maintain an advantage in competition, investing in information systems is often not the "icing on the cake", but a necessary means to maintain the survival of the enterprise.
The third impact comes from technology. The ever-changing technological means often dazzle enterprises. Tracking assessments is even more difficult. Every software provider emphasizes how effective and important their products are. How should they choose? How should they integrate existing enterprise advantages into information systems? How to evaluate whether investment in information systems has the expected return? These often make business managers without technical background at a loss, and it is sometimes not easy for IT personnel who are proficient in technology to also understand business management strategies. Corporate investments often fall into the trap of unrewarding due to the incoherence between strategies and means. At this time, consulting companies can often help companies set goals, select models, and carry out supporting organizational reforms with objective, impartial and large amounts of industry information, so that scientific and technological means can truly play their role.
Another impact comes from within the company. Whether it is an emerging Internet company like Amazon or a traditional company like Wal-Mart that is striving to carry out network transformation, the requirements of online customers are not just information exchange, but must still be implemented in products and services, which requires corporate processes to be It can match the accelerated circulation of user information in manufacturing, transportation, after-sales service and other aspects. Users who communicate with companies through the Internet and telephone are often more impatient. They require emails to be answered immediately, orders to be queried at any time, and updates and modifications to be made in a timely manner. Can the company's internal organizational management keep up with these greatly increased user expectations? "Experts" who understand CRM are beginning to talk about the interface issues between front-end solutions (Front-Office) and back-end solutions (Back-Office), and the readjustment of logistics management is also becoming a hot topic. Compared with Chinese software, Chinese advanced management ideas may be more important. If management experience cannot be localized in a timely manner and the impact of information technology on corporate culture cannot be adjusted, it is not a good idea to just follow the trend of "upgrading systems" and "upgrading software".
China's unique situation will make CRM bring more impact to enterprises, and our enterprises still have more "lessons" to make up for.
China's CRM will also bring more impact to enterprises. It brings impact in many aspects. Moreover, Chinese companies also have unique backgrounds. For example, automatic sales systems are not popular in China. Even larger companies only rely on "verbal notes" in sales management. The job change of a core salesperson can greatly change the company's revenue forecast. Each salesperson There are many loopholes in how much discounts can be given. Some sales staff privately share rebates with customers and the company is at a loss. This first shows the confusion and randomness of the internal management of the company; some companies were born out of the past "planned economy" and even Marketing, public relations, and market segments are all new terms. Companies have not accumulated experience in how to analyze purchasing habits in customer data and how to implement different marketing strategies for different customers; Chinese companies have truly used CTI. Not only are there few call centers for telephone switching systems; online shopping malls are still in their infancy. It can be said that when Chinese companies talk about CRM, they have surpassed the development process of more than ten years abroad. It is very challenging to achieve the goal of friendly and continuous communication with customers through multiple channels in one step based on manual operations.
For example, many companies are now developing their own B2B or B2C websites. However, once the website is established, it is discovered that backend management, such as the lack of an ERP system, is a big problem, which requires continuous investment to be truly effective; however, this leap can also make Enterprises can avoid many detours, and it is especially suitable for the overall design of CRM at the beginning. The next step of multi-system compatibility and interface issues will be easier to solve than foreign enterprises. At the same time, Chinese enterprises have been growing amidst rapid development and changes for the past 20 years. They have strong top-down driving force to catch up with the advanced and absorb leading technologies and management experience. There will be less resistance than foreign enterprises when reorganizing within the organization. , which is also one of the advantages of localization.
Although CRM is only a subset of "e-commerce", it puts customers at the core, which is in line with the "mass customization" characteristics of the "new economy". By implementing CRM, companies must make up for the "homework" they have missed in the past - it requires companies to better understand existing and potential customers, requires companies to accurately and timely judge the behavior of competitors, and requires companies to catch up with the ever-changing information technology, especially The internal management of enterprises is required to adapt to these changes. If an enterprise can well absorb the CRM concept, it will see improvements in profits, customer loyalty, customer satisfaction and other aspects, and will be more prepared for the coming of the future holistic "e-commerce era". When we not only talk about the macro "new economy" impact, but focus on specific enterprise process changes, we are one step closer to the "new economy".