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Successful CRM Hinges On Data Quality
Customer Information Must Be Up To Date
With increased competition in online and offline marketplaces, companies are turning to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) to attract and retain customers. According to a recent study by Gartner Group, worldwide spending on CRM licenses and services is expected to reach $76.3 billion in 2005, more than tripling the $23.3 billion spent in 2000. In spite of this major investment in CRM, organizations continue to miss sales opportunities and lose valued customers due to corrupt data.
A comprehensive Customer Data Quality (CDQ) management program is the key to ensuring accurate customer information throughout the enterprise. The components of a CDQ program include data conversion and cleansing, continuous data quality maintenance and the sharing of updates throughout the enterprise.
Ensuring accurate customer information is not an easy task. Customers are dynamic and their information is dynamic. They move, marry, divorce and have changing relationships with other customers at both the individual and organizational level. Customers also have changing product and service needs throughout their lifetimes.
To anticipate and manage these rapidly changing customer needs and expectations, CRM applications need to present a unified, real-time view of the customer across the enterprise. To achieve this objective, organizations must develop a comprehensive Customer Data Quality (CDQ) management program designed to ensure that not only is basic contact information up to date but that more complex and even non-intuitive customer relationships are identified and represented in the CRM application.
For more information about developing a CDQ management program, contact O'NEIL Data Systems. Phone 866–659–0824, or email us at sales@oneildata.com.
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