The main difference of CRM from ECRM is that CRM uses phone, fax and retail stores to communicate with customers, whereas in ECRM, internet, email, wireless and PDA technologies are used. Various ways to get benefits from ECRM are as follows.

Tracking behavior of customers

The nature of a customer/client relationship has changed with the advancement of the internet. Examples of interaction with ECRM includes online shopping, hotel booking etc. Customer experience gets enhanced only through effective ECRM systems. Customers can maintain their own data with the help of this system.

Matching behaviors with offers

Customer usages are monitored by certain ECRM systems to build customer profiles. With the help of this profile, ECRM systems understand the needs of customers and offers them related items. Thus systems track each customer and record what and when they are buying.

Segmenting customer data

The information about customers are segmented and stored in databases. This helps in achieving a cheaper and efficient marketing and promotion. When information is collected, it will be large. It is automatically truncated by the ECRM system so as to make it inexpensive to run and maintain.

ECRM for membership organizations

Nowadays, various organizations are using ECRM to share the information of their members. An example is the International Bar Association. A lawyer can have his own web page with articles, documents etc of his interests. They can also update the details.

ECRM strategy components

When you integrate customer information, the ECRM strategy components should be checked. They are operational, analytical and collaborative. Redundant information collection from customers should be avoided. Sufficient analysis should be maintained to establish a healthy relationship with the customer. Collaborative work with different departments in your company can share information more efficiently.

Other benefits from ECRM include reducing costs with the help of effective marketing campaigns, customer satisfaction and retention can be increased, sales can be increased by knowing what the customer needs, productivity can be increased which results in revenue growth, etc.

ECRM features

The key features include managing customers, knowledge, accounts, back-end-integration and reporting and analysis. A server- based central database is used for storing information and contact of customers and it is accumulated under each customer. Reports can be generated faster because of this centralized database. Current status of all pending issues can be retrieved by service representatives, thereby creating faster and quality services. Contact management is a systemized one, so redundancy in contacts can be avoided.

Thus, the fast growing corporate world is finding new techniques to improve and manage their customer relationship. Information Technology plays a key role in achieving this. As a result, ECRM is a more targeted and user-friendly system among many systems of CRM.

More resources to read about eCRM and mobile CRM can be found here.

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