Enhance your customer relations with an effective CRM strategy
Have you implemented a CRM strategy in your company? Or are you thinking about it and looking for advice and methods to get it right? Then you've come to the right place.
Implementing a CRM project in your company is no trivial matter. Not only does it make it easier for your sales force to boost your sales, it also speeds up the development of customer satisfaction and enables you to establish a healthy and lasting relationship between your customers and your company.
Did you know that acquiring new customers costs a company five to ten times more than retaining existing ones? That's why it's imperative to put in place a precise CRM strategy that coincides with your company's overall strategy.
What is a CRM strategy?
CRM strategy: definition
CRM strategy lies at the crossroads between a company's sales and marketing concerns. It involves defining processes so that the actions of all departments (sales, marketing, support, etc.) converge towards a single goal, at the heart of the company's concerns: the customer journey.
CRM (Customer Relationship Management) is based on :
- active listening, to precisely define your customers' needs, deal with their objections and know how to respond to them, provide them with a tailor-made offer and a pleasant customer experience that will help to win their loyalty,
- but also on a multi-channel approach to reach customers through different channels (emailing, website, social networks, telephone, etc.).
💡 CRM also refers to the software that helps manage customer relations.
CRM software: an integral part of your CRM strategy
CRM software is the best tool for establishing effective customer relations. It enables you to understand a customer's entire relationship with your company at a glance, from a single interface where all customer data is centralised.
It concentrates all your company's business processes in a single piece of software. It then becomes a collaborative workspace where each team defends the same customer relations policy.
It contributes to the company's overall development, through :
- customer acquisition
- building customer loyalty
- more precise definition of the commercial offer,
- cooperation between the various departments (sales, marketing, support, logistics, etc.),
- increasing sales, etc.
Put your CRM and customer relationship management at the service of your business strategy.
Examples of successful CRM strategies
Sephora's CRM strategy
Sephora has activated various levers to build its CRM strategy around its community:
- community spaces where customers can exchange opinions and advice on hygiene, beauty and make-up,
- an attractive loyalty programme,
- the possibility for in-store advisers to use customers' loyalty accounts to find out about their preferences and offer them the best possible service.
👍 Why is this a good CRM strategy?
- ✅ Creating excitement and commitment around the brand,
- ✅ in-depth knowledge of customers to better satisfy them,
- ✅ a loyalty programme that encourages purchases.
Airbnb's CRM strategy
Airbnb has perfectly managed to build a 100% automated customer journey, where customer service only intervenes when a lodger or user encounters a problem. Here's what's automated:
- sending emails of accommodation similar to the search performed, which can also be recommended by retargeting,
- the sending of notifications throughout the process (booking confirmation, reminder a few days before the start of the stay, activities to do in the vicinity, etc.),
- a programme that rewards referrals with discounts.
👍 Why is this a good CRM strategy?
- ✅ customer support benefits from having more time to give to those who need it,
- ✅ the referral programme helps the community to grow,
- ✅ inbound marketing actions bring users back to the site so that they become buyers.
Leroy Merlin's CRM strategy
Leroy Merlin has relied on content creation to bring added value to its audience. It offers :
- DIY and decorating tutorials with products available in shop, to show them in action,
- community areas for exchanging tips and advice between DIY enthusiasts,
- a loyalty programme to reward the most loyal customers.
👍 Why is this a good CRM strategy?
- ✅ Watching the videos allows you to make personalised offers afterwards,
- ✅ the content offered is of high quality and a guarantee of trust for prospects and customers,
- ✅ a loyalty programme that encourages purchases.
How do you set up a CRM strategy?
1. Define an overall corporate vision
This first step is crucial to the success of your CRM strategy. Before you go ahead, you need to lay the foundations, and that starts with a thorough understanding of your company's environment:
- What are its strengths and weaknesses?
- What are the opportunities and threats in the market?
- Who are its prospects? Who is your ideal customer or marketing persona? And so on.
Then you can calmly define the direction you want your company to take, and how you want to delight your customers and offer them the best possible experience!
To help you, you can draw up a set of specifications.
2. Set clear, shared objectives
Now that you've set the course, it's essential to set the objectives you want to achieve:
- determine a marketing plan and actions to achieve them,
- check that the CRM strategy is working
- motivate everyone to achieve them
- control ROI.
We recommend that you define SMART objectives, i.e. objectives that are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound.
💡 In addition, they must be shared and agreed by all stakeholders in the CRM strategy, to ensure that all efforts will be made in the right direction and in the right way, and maximise the chances of achieving them.
3. Review or determine processes and methods
It is crucial to review your company's internal processes to ensure that they are geared towards customer satisfaction. This can involve setting up a 360° customer file, personalising customer communication to better identify each customer's preferences and providing them with the best possible support at each stage of the sale:
- pre-sales: needs analysis, information gathering, prospect research,
- sales process: automation of tasks (making contact, follow-up, drawing up sales proposals, etc.),
- customer relationship management: a personalised relationship for each customer to offer a customised and satisfying customer experience, with the aim of meeting their needs and building loyalty,
- after-sales service (SAV): online assistance and support help to resolve customers' problems more quickly to, once again, provide them with a quality and comprehensive service, and build loyalty.
💡 What software can help you?
- The all-in-one, ultra-user-friendly monday.com CRM management solution, guarantees you complete, personalised support throughout your sales cycles (from prospecting to negotiation to after-sales service). Improve the productivity of your teams with real-time monitoring and reporting, so you can make more relevant decisions at every stage of your purchasing process!
- The French Webmecanik Pipeline software has all the features you need to structure your CRM processes properly: sales pipeline management, centralisation of customer data, dashboards, opportunity detection... But above all, it's 100% free, intuitive and easy to configure.
- Sales Cloud CRM, published by Salesforce, streamlines all your sales and customer relations processes. Thanks to this software, you get a 360° view of interactions with your contacts, your business opportunities and you can better project yourself into the future with sales forecasts. So it's a great ally for boosting productivity and achieving your sales targets!
4. Adopt a multi-channel approach
The growing number of new sales and communication channels has changed the customer experience. Companies are facing more competition, which makes it harder to retain customers. More options, more offers, easier to change... Customers are more volatile than ever before.
A multi-channel strategy allows you to multiply the points of contact with prospects and customers, via :
- emailing
- post,
- the website
- mobile phones, which are playing an increasingly important role in customer purchasing practices, particularly with SMS marketing,
- social networks, etc.
Emailing is still the channel most used by companies: 91% of advertisers use it almost systematically, whether it's a promotional or informative email, or a newsletter. (Source: comarketing-news)
A study published in 2017 lists the channels most used by companies in 2016: emailing tops the list, followed by the point-of-sale network and the website.
5. Exploiting your database
Customer data is becoming both a company's treasure trove and a priority, because analysing it enables personalised campaigns to be run, in terms of messages, offers and customer journeys, so that customers can be targeted and reached ever more effectively. Make sure you comply with the RGPD.
This is where using a marketing automation tool really comes into its own. The Mapp Cloud all-in-one marketing automation solution collects, analyses and exploits your customer data from different channels, in order to define customer insights and enrich your marketing campaigns (email, web, SMS, mobile push, social).
You can use predictive intelligence to anticipate the behaviour of your targets, segment your audiences, script the customer journey and ultimately support your CRM strategy and create cross-channel customer engagement.
Mobile is becoming a prerequisite for a successful omnichannel strategy. Integrating it with other channels is no longer an option for businesses today.
6. Equip yourself with a CRM
We've already seen a few examples, but if you want to stand out from the competition, there's nothing like CRM software. It is an infallible tool for attracting more customers thanks to the multiplication of online contact points, and, above all, for building and keeping customer loyalty.
-
The French software Webmecanik Pipeline has all the functions you need to structure your CRM processes properly: sales pipeline management, centralisation of customer data, dashboards, opportunity detection, etc. But above all, it is 100% free, intuitive and easy to configure.
- A CRM solution such as Simple CRM will enable you to stick to your strategy and drive your business forward. The collaborative aspect of this tool helps to unite all your teams to move from digital marketing to marketing for digital customers. All efforts are focused on the customer to establish a global strategy that combines the "physical" and the digital.
Looking for more choice? Discover more CRM software
What results can you expect from an effective CRM strategy?
Implementing an effective CRM strategy means that you can :
- Gather as much information as possible about your contacts,
- qualify prospects
- segment prospects,
- focus on the hottest prospects in the conversion tunnel,
- increase your sales,
- analyse customer expectations in more detail,
- formalise your business strategy,
- define the customer journey and lifecycle,
- improve your brand image, etc.
Tailor your strategy
CRM is an invaluable tool for sales and marketing staff alike. It is the key to successful customer relations, ensuring that your customers remain loyal.
However, this is only possible if a CRM strategy has been defined upstream, so that all efforts converge towards a common goal: customer satisfaction. The CRM strategy also helps to structure your internal processes and get your teams to work together to drive forward your overall corporate strategy.
To get as close as possible to your needs, why not consider an audit of your existing processes and strategy before developing your custom CRM strategy? That way, you'll be ready for a successful CRM integration.