case study on customer relationship management

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10 CRM Case Studies From the World’s Biggest Brands 2024

• Category : Case Studies , CRM , Marketing
• Last updated on August 2, 2023
• By Viktor. A
• No Comments

It is no news that customers are constantly demanding deeper and more meaningful relationships with their chosen brands. That’s why organizations are currently leveraging CRM software to serve their customers better.

Today, we’ve put together useful CRM case studies from some of the world’s biggest brands. This article highlights CRM case studies uses and vital lessons you can replicate in your business.

Before we proceed, let’s look at the meaning of customer relationship management (CRM)

There are two main definitions of a CRM:

• It refers to a business’s principles and strategies to engage better and retain its customers.
• It refers to a software system that helps businesses to manage client relationships, leads, contacts and campaigns. Also, it allows companies to automate their processes and increases productivity.

Examples of CRM Software for lead generation, contact management, and automation are:

Table of Contents

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Best CRM Case Studies

If you’ve ever looked at brands like Apple, McDonald’s, Amazon or even Zara and are wondering how they’re run such conglomerates and still efficient in customer service. Keep reading then; you’re about to find out.

Scott Cook said, Instead of focusing on the competition, focus on the customer. Most of these brands have no superpower. They’ve only learned to focus on only one thing – the customer.

When you’re obsessed with delighting your customers, you will devise creative ways of satisfying them. Let’s go right in.

1. Coca-Cola CRM

The Coca-Cola Company is one of the world’s oldest and most influential brands. With a presence in over 200 countries, Coca-cola started as a carbonated soft drink business. But today, they are a conglomerate with over 200 product lines servicing billions of customers globally.

Logically speaking, for them to exist across several decades and remain relevant and competitive says a lot about their customer service. That said, let’s examine their customer relationship management (CRM).

Coca-Cola CRM Case Study:

Coca-cola’s mission is “ to refresh the world in mind, body, and spirit, to inspire moments of optimism and happiness through our brands and actions, and to create value and make a difference .”

Inspiring optimism and happiness are at the core of Coca-Cola’s CRM strategy. This is evident in their  marketing campaigns , billboards, brochures, commercials, store locations, and products.

We have billions of transactions a day on Salesforce. And everything is connected collaborative, and mobile.

– Ulrik Nehammer, Coca-Cola Germany, CEO.

Coca-Cola uses several enterprise CRM platforms to manage its clients’ relationships and stores globally. They use Salesforce and SAP primarily for contact management. System Applications and Products (SAP) is a strategic enterprise management platform. It’s quite robust and feature-rich.

While they use SAP globally, they use Salesforce on some of their country divisions to manage their business flow, connectivity, and contact management.

Read our complete Coca-Cola case study here.

2. Zara CRM

When you hear the word “Zara”, what comes to mind is clothing, luxury, and lifestyle. Established in 1975, Zara is a Spanish multi-national retail clothing chain.

They specialize in clothing accessories, beauty, shoes, and other lifestyle products. Zara’s phenomenal success in fashion and beauty is a testament to its solid CRM strategy. They effortlessly delight their customers in a way that leaves them returning for more.

Zara CRM Case Study:

Zara’s mission is to “ give customers what they want, and get it to them faster than anyone else .” Deducting from their mission statement, you can see a wordplay that puts royalty and kingship on their customers.

Zara’s CRM case study aims at elevating their customer’s needs above the company objectives. Zara leverages transparency, incentives and perks, support, personalization, swift check-out, and social media to achieve this.

The success of your business is based in principle on the idea of offering the latest fashions at low prices, in turn creating a formula for cutting costs: an integrated company in which it is manufactured, distributed and sold.

– Amancio Ortega – Founder, Zara Fashion Chain

Zara CRM starts with their website, which has a simple UI and is highly personalized to suit the user’s needs. Then, they’re massively present on social media and contribute to social issues affecting their clientele.

Lastly, Zara’s CRM is not complete without transparency and incentives. They’re transparent in all their dealings and usually deploy incentive programs to delight customers.

3. Unilever CRM

Unilever is a British multi-billion dollar conglomerate that deals primarily in consumer goods and consumables. They are arguably the largest producers of soap globally.

Brands like Unilever that have stood the test of time in quality, customer service, transparency, and consistency are worth emulating. With over 400 brands in about 190 countries, Unilever’s CRM strategy is paying off.

Unilever CRM Case Study:

Unilever’s mission statement is “ to add vitality to life. We meet everyday needs for nutrition, hygiene and personal care with brands that help people feel good, look good and get more out of life .”

Unilever’s CRM strategy focuses on elevating people’s well-being and helping them enjoy life to its fullest. This singular aim is the driving force behind their great customer experience initiatives, marketing campaigns, products, and positioning.

It’s about digitizing all the aspects of Unilever’s business to leverage the world of data and increase our digital capability in everything we do.

– Alan Jope, CEO at Unilever.

Another main Unilever’s CRM strategy is centred around Value-Based Procurement. They are keen on supporting their suppliers with upfront value. And they achieve this by empowering their suppliers and distributors with the tools to better relate with them.

They use Salesforce to support their business community and build solid relationships with their partners.

Bayerische Motoren Werke AG, known as BMW, is Germany’s leading automobile brand. They’re a luxury car brand and the  fourteenth largest producer of motor vehicles . BMW cars are known for their standard, uniqueness, and luxury. Let’s examine BMW’s CRM strategy.

BMW CRM Case Study:

BMW’s mission is to “ become the world’s leading provider of premium products and services for individual mobility.”  You’ll agree that BMW has become the world’s leading provider of premium automobile products. But the big question is, how did they get there?

BMW CRM case study is not too distant from the others. Firstly, the focus is on treating customers fairly, which is clearly stated in their  Supplier Programme . Their suppliers and end-users are at the core of their CRM strategy, which has kept them going.

I promise our customers will never have to compromise between driving pleasure and sustainable mobility.

– Oliver Zipse, CEO BMW AG.

Secondly, BMW CRM is focused on producing premium cars to attract new customers and retain the existing ones. And fortunately, it works for them. I’ve seen a couple of folks switch car brands to BMW because their cars are more reliable and have the highest quality

5. Tesco CRM

Tesco PLC is one of the world’s leading grocery and general merchandise retailers. With operations in over 11 countries, Tesco is a hyper-growth company swiftly expanding across territories.

Although it started as a grocery store, it is now morphed into several industries such as banking, technology accessories, and a few others. Not just that, they’ve been named among the top customer-friendly organizations.

Tesco CRM Case Study:

Tesco’s mission statement is  “What we make matters better, together. This statement encapsulates Tesco’s aim to serve customers across cultures and backgrounds.

Tesco is among the first multi-national brand to adopt CRM software. In 2009, Tesco announced that they were adopting the RightNow CRM (now acquired by Oracle).

The key to Tesco’s success is the customer-focused culture that has permeated the company.

– Jeremy Garlick, Partner, Insight Traction.

Tesco’s CRM was primarily used in their call centres to support their electronics division. Aside from that, they used it to amplify their omnichannel communication strategy by managing customer data and interactions across phone, chat and email.

Adopting a CRM helped Tesco be present at all times for their customer when needed across channels. Most importantly, they were able to win the hearts of their customers.

6. Uber CRM

With a presence in 72 countries, Uber redefines how we move and eat. Uber is an American mobility provider allowing people to move conveniently from one location to another. One of the things that makes Uber special is that they’re a mobility startup with no cars. That means they’re servicing two main customer bases: drivers and passengers.

As of the time of writing, Uber has a 72% market share for ride-sharing in the United States, with about 122 million monthly active users

Uber CRM Case Study:

Uber’s mission is “ Transportation as reliable as running water, everywhere for everyone .” In other words, they aim to make transportation accessible at any time.

The big question is, what CRM does Uber use? Uber uses LiveRamp as their CRM anonymizer. Essentially, they LiveRamp CRM to segment users into specific life-cycle stages. It allows them to craft personalized and targeted campaigns that resonate with the customers.

There is a high cost to a bad reputation… it really matters what people think of us, especially in a global business like ours, where actions in one part of the world can have serious consequences in another.”  

– Dan Khosroshahi.

Furthermore, Uber uses CRM to gain deeper insights into how customers use their apps, the frequency, and overall interaction, and even sample their IDs. With these insights, Uber can better serve and delight its customers. More on Uber’s case study here.

7. McDonald’s CRM

As the name implies, McDonald’s is a fast-food conglomerate. They’re currently the leading food service organization operating over 30,000 restaurants in more than 100 countries. McDonald’s expansion strategy is bent on franchises and joint ventures. They also have some sister brands in the fast-fast industry doing incredibly well.

Mcdonald’s CRM Case Study:

McDonald’s mission statement is  to be our customers’ favourite place and way to eat and drink.  Their mission statements depict McDonald’s passion for differentiation, uniqueness, and class.

McDonald’s CRM case study is hinged on their passion for differentiation, which is evident in the architectural designs of their restaurants, food recipe and taste, service delivery, and mode of operation.

Our sustained performance gives us confidence that our strategy is working, as more customers are experiencing a better McDonald’s daily.

– Steve Easterbrook, CEO, McDonald’s.

McDonald’s uses PowerCenter CRM, which is powered by Astute Solutions. This CRM helps McDonald’s efficiently manage their huge volume of customer contacts, analyze data, and manage their store location.

The benefits of CRM software to a business are enormous, and McDonald’s is not left out. They’re equally using it to enhance their marketing efforts and close more deals.

8. British Airways CRM

British Airways is a UK-based carrier and one of the biggest airline groups in the world. They’ve built a reputable brand over the years, which has also given birth to several sister brands.

BA Group is the founding member of the Oneworld alliance. They have over 45,000 employees in 100 countries and assist about 40 million passengers annually. So how are they able to still maintain awesome customer service?

British Airways CRM Case Study:

British Airways’ mission statement is “ To ensure our customers fly confidently that together, we are acting responsibly to take care of the world we live in “. British Airways’ CRM case study is centred around “making their passengers feel confident.”

As we prepare for a safe return to travel, we remain focused on offering our customers the most convenient and affordable testing options to support and facilitate a seamless travel experience.

– Sean Doyle, CEO, British Airways

British Airways uses TCRM BA as its enterprise management solution. The company adopted it in 2002, and since then, they’ve been using it to do the following:

• Campaign management
• Management of loyalty programs
• Leisure database
• External requirements
• Cost savings

Best of all, they use this platform to efficiently manage and schedule all their marketing campaigns internally and externally. They also use for customer service across channels.

9. Amazon CRM

Amazon is an American conglomerate focusing on e-commerce, cloud computing, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence. They’re among the top 5 most valuable companies worldwide and one of America’s biggest employers.

Amazon, which started as an online book store, is currently dominating up to 7 industries. Not just that, they’re a customer-centric company famously known for their outstanding customer service.

Amazon CRM Case Study:

Amazon’s mission statement is “ to offer our customers the lowest possible prices, the best available selection, and the utmost convenience .” Amazon’s focus on the customer is truly remarkable.

Primarily, Amazon’s CRM case study follows these four guiding principles:

• Customer obsession rather than competitor focus
• Passion for invention
• Commitment to operational excellence
• Long-term thinking

We see our customers as guests at a party, and we are the hosts. It’s our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a little bit better.

– Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon

In fact, they aim to become Earth’s most customer-centric company, Earth’s best employer, and Earth’s safest place to work. That drive to become the best led them to create innovative products like I-Click shopping, personalized recommendations, Amazon Echo, and Fire TV, to mention a few.

So, what CRM does Amazon use? Amazon developed its CRM in-house, which they use to manage its customer data across divisions, countries, languages, and products.

10. Apple CRM

Famously known for their slogan, think differently. Apple is a technology company specializing in consumer electronics, software and online services. Apple is the world’s most valuable company and the first to hit a trillion in market capitalization.

Apple CRM Case Study:

Apple’s mission is “ to bring the best user experience to its customers through innovative hardware, software, and services .” Like Amazon, Apple is a customer-centric company that is truly obsessed with its customers.

Apple is also obsessed with its product quality. Their products are highly standardized and unique. And it’s the reason why they enjoy a high level of brand loyalty. Apple’s customers are one of the most loyal sets of customers globally.

Apple CRM case study is centred around four cardinal points: Apple customer-centric outlets, understanding customer needs, Apple ID, & irresistible branding that works. I explained them in detail  here .

Also, like Amazon, Apple uses an in-house CRM to manage its customer data, marketing campaigns, and customer relationships. Apple loves owning their processes, so most of its operations are usually in-house.

Wrapping Up!

These case studies show us the efficacy and formidability of a CRM software. When out to efficient use, it can be a very powerful tool. And it doesn’t matter the size of your business, whether big or small. All you need to do is to pick a CRM that aligns with your business goals and run with it.

Looking for a CRM to start with? Here are our recommendations:  Zendesk ,  Pipedrive ,  Hubspot ,  Zoho  and  Freshsales . Click on any one of them to claim your free trial.

Frequently Asked Questions

Customer relationship management use cases are real-life examples and applications of CRM software and strategies. Like the 10 use cases from big brands listed in this article.

There are tons of use cases for CRM systems, but here are three profound ones: CRM systems can serve as a contact management system, a pipeline system for attracting and converting them paying customers, and a workflow automation station.

Essentially, the main components of CRM are contact and database management, workflow automation, omnichannel marketing capability, and integration options.

Viktor. A is a writer and researcher with experience writing about various topics, including CRM software, SaaS, finance, and technology. When he's not writing, he's swimming and travelling

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12 Successful CRM Implementation Case Studies to Learn From

CRM implementation can seem like a monumental task to complete. From knowing which CRM to choose, to understanding how to fit it in with the rest of your sales stack , there’s a lot involved from pricing to convincing decision-makers to making sure it works well from the start.

If you’re looking for CRM implementation case studies to give you ideas and confidence to get started, then look no further.

12 CRM Case Studies

Want to get this done right (the first time)? Learn from the CRM case studies of companies that implemented a new CRM successfully to improve the customer experience, drive customer engagement , and increase revenue.

1. How Customer.io Uses Automated Handoffs to Enable Smarter Sales

Company: Customer.io

Customer.io is an established martech provider that needed a CRM to work better with both an inbound and outbound sales process. Plus, they needed it to fit well with their current tool stack and give them automated workflows.

This case study interview with Alex Patton, Director of Marketing & Operations at Customer.io, digs deeper into the technical setup the company uses with their CRM platform and how that process maximizes the team’s time and productivity.

2. 6 Tips for Assessing Your CRM + Optimizing Workflow—from a Revenue Coach

Company/Organization: High Kick Sales

Kyle Stremme’s consulting firm, High Kick Sales, enables sales teams to create an optimized process and tech stack. This case study digs into the insights Kyle learned from helping B2B and B2C companies develop their CRM system and process, plus details into how he helps managers analyze their current CRM and decide on a better system.

3. Implementing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) in Hotel Industry from an Organizational Culture Perspective

Company: Anonymous UK hotel chain

This study done by the International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management looked into a hotel chain in the UK as they implemented a new CRM, taking note of what worked and what didn't about their process for implementation.

They administered a questionnaire among 346 managers of a hotel chain and found that organizational culture readiness was one of the most determining factors in the success of a CRM implementation.

4. Choosing and Implementing a CRM for Small Business

Company: Bean Ninjas

Bean Ninjas is an accounting firm for eCommerce businesses. Their tech stack was dissonant and unconnected, and their ‘CRM’ (actually a project management tool) didn’t even have email built-in. The lack of functionality was impacting their business.

Their self-written case study goes through the entire process of choosing the right CRM, implementing the system into a more optimized sales workflow , technical integrations, and the end results.

5. How AAXIS Digital is Saving an Estimated $250,000 by Switching from Salesforce to the HubSpot CRM Platform

Company: AAXIS

This CRM implementation case study focuses on how an enterprise company chose to migrate from one large CRM to another, saving them lots of money on a system they weren’t using to the full.

The case study digs into how they chose their new CRM, and what they’ve been able to accomplish with it including increasing marketing automation and better aligning sales and marketing. Check out our list of CRM implementation resources for specific Salesforce resources.

6. Replacing HubSpot with Close: Scaling Trufan in a CRM Reps Love

Company: Trufan

Trufan (now Surf for Brands) is a fast-growing SaaS startup with a target market that is tech-savvy. So, they needed a CRM that could move quickly alongside their team, helping them build well-constructed automations that could scale as they grew.

This CRM implementation case study shows how a wrong decision slowed their progress, and how a new solution helped them scale faster.

7. A Successful CRM Implementation Project in a Service Company

Company: Anonymous service company from Slovenia

This academic case study by Piskar Franka and Armand Faganel digs into the process a service company in Slovenia took alongside CRM consultants to help them implement a new solution.

They concluded that a proper CRM implementation can improve the relationship with customers , achieve larger information sharing between employees, and lead to better strategic decisions. This is mostly interesting for historical purposes, as it gives you some insight into the complexity that were involved in implementing a CRM into a larger company in 2007.

8. Hownd Cut CRM Costs by 80% in 2 Weeks—While Saving SMBs During COVID

Company: Hownd

Hownd works with brick-and-mortar businesses to get more foot traffic, and their mission since the start of the pandemic is to help SMBs get back on their feet and recover. They needed a CRM that would help them cut their own costs in order to help others, and that would also help them move quickly to fill the needs of their customers.

This case study/COVID success story shows how Hownd found the right CRM for their business, cut costs, streamlined their process, and continues to help SMBs survive through hard times.

9. The Ultimate Team Effort: How the Close Sales Team Joins Forces to Build More Solid Deals

Company: Close

This unique case study is the story of our very own CRM software company and how we’ve implemented our own CRM tool into our sales stack. This case study digs into the nitty-gritty of technical setups and integrations, API, and how it all works together for a smooth, profitable process.

10. Switching to HubSpot Adds up for Casio

Company: Casio

This enterprise CRM implementation case study shows how consumer electronics company Casio switched from a custom-built CRM to one that was more inclusive for their marketing and sales teams. It shows how they updated their inbound marketing process and increased their new customer sales by 26%.

11. The Unique Sales Process ResQ Club Uses to Power It's Mission to Zero Food Waste

Company: ResQ Club

ResQ Club, a Finnish company on a mission to make zero food waste a reality, needed a CRM solution that would help them track customers and partners and scale quickly.

This case study shows how they used Close to build their own custom processes with Custom Fields , email sequences that are personalized to different European cities, and Smart Views that keep sales reps focused on the right deals.

12. Strategic Issues in Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Implementation

Company: Anonymous UK manufacturing company

This paper from 2003 by Christopher Bull from the Department of Business Information Technology at Manchester Metropolitan University Business School discusses the effects of a strategic customer relationship management process and how it affected this manufacturing company.

The results of this study highlighted that CRM implementations frequently failed. It also referenced a study of 202 CRM projects which concluded that only 30.7% of organizations said the CRM implementation achieved improvements in the way they sell to and service customers.

Testimonials that Highlight the Benefits of CRM Implementation

Once you’ve implemented a new CRM, what kind of benefits should you expect? It depends on your company and current pain points. If you'r considering switching to a new CRM or implementing one for the first time, here’s what real CRM users say:

1. Nick Parker, Founder at FTOCloud

“With Close, we're able to keep track of hundreds of deals and clients over the span of multiple months while simultaneously unifying our team's communication.”

2. Tim Griffin, Founder & CEO at Cloosiv

“ We didn’t start getting traction until we started using Close. I don’t know if the company would still be here if we hadn’t implemented it.”

Read the whole story here.

3. Maryl Johnston, CEO at Bean Ninjas

“The real benefit of Close is less about sales admin time and more about closing more deals. Because Close makes it very easy to stay in touch with customers and for Sales to manage their pipeline without needing a sales admin, we can now go into Close and see all the leads in a broad view.”

4. Aimee Creighton, Sales Administrator at Bean Ninjas

“ The biggest win for me is the cut-down in labor time of setting up leads in our task management system (not designed for lead management) and ensuring all fields are filled out. It significantly reduced the time-intensive manual process of documenting leads. I feel like Close has completely cut that down, and everything is right there from the dashboard. I think it’s been worth the investment.”

5. Monika Tudja, Business Development Manager at Now Technologies

“ I can't imagine my work-life without Close - I've been using it at my previous company and I 'demanded' implementing it on my first day at the current one. I'm useless without Close. Seriously thinking about getting an account for my personal life.”

6. Sara Archer, Director of Sales and Marketing

“ Since we've started using Close, we've QUADRUPLED our average revenue per user.”

Read how they did it here.

7. Sarah Haselkorn, Head of Sales at MakeSpace

“ You guys [at Close] have been a HUGE part of our growth so far, and with your support I have so much confidence that our sales team is set up to scale.”

8. Duncan Burns, VeggiDome

“I am able to stay on top of my outreach, correspondence, and follow-up seamlessly AND relax enough to do a better job, knowing that I'm not missing a beat!”

9. Michael Grady, Lazarus

“ This is a CRM that is all about focus with no bloat which is exactly what inside sales needs.”

10. Aubrey Lim, ThreeTrees

“My first time using a CRM. 8 months in and it's frictionless to use. My favorite features: being able to pull up colleagues' emails to a particular lead, bulk-uploading contacts, email templates.”

11. Timothy Corey, Director of Sales at Commonwealth Joe

“Close allows us to see where we should spend our time and effort. We can look at our sales for the same quarter last year and know what worked well and what didn’t -- this allows me to know where to put my energy, on what companies, and in what markets.”

Ready to Write Your Own CRM Implementation Success Story?

The right CRM helps you easily access customer information, track contacts, qualify leads, improve conversion rates and so much more. If you're ready to implement a CRM, we can help.

For a successful CRM implementation , you need a clear plan to follow. That’s why we’ve given you the right resources to make a better decision. Get our CRM implementation guide here:

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For sales reps:, 7 crm implementation case studies that every growing business can learn from.

Updated On: 05 Sep, 2023

“We are surrounded by data, but starved for insights.” ~ Jay Baer, Marketing and Customer Experience Expert

It doesn’t matter how much data is available unless we can derive meaning from it. As per a study, businesses are missing out on $5.2 million in revenue due to untapped data.

Certainly, every business is collecting plenty of data on a regular basis but not every business is using it properly. The difference lies in the fact that not every business is using a CRM that can become a game changer for them.

Also, every customer expects a lot from the chosen brand. So, it requires all businesses, whether growing or established, leverage the power of a CRM and serve their customers better.

CRM may mean different things for different businesses but the ultimate goal is to satisfy their customers through great customer experiences. The many features and functions of a CRM can play a crucial role in this and that’s why 91% of businesses with over 10 employees use a CRM.

However, CRM implementation can be a big task for growing businesses. From finding out what they need from their CRM to making a CRM choice, there’s a lot that needs to be done.  But you are not alone if this seems like a monumental task for you.

1. Omega Financial

2. vk ventures, 3. fitness bell india, 4. moneynotsleep, 5. ajay modi travels, 6. learn digital academy, 7. upanal cnc solutions, want to write your own story, 7 best crm case studies.

To give you the confidence and ideas to get your CRM implementation done right without any hassle, we have put together useful CRM case studies based on our own customers. Every CRM case study here highlights important CRM use cases and vital learnings that can help you in a number of ways.

Take a look at each CRM case study and learn how you can make the most of a CRM and get the implementation done right as per your business needs.

About the Company

Omega Financial is a renowned name in financial distribution that focuses on investment, particularly in mutual funds, and has been operating since 2010. They combine science, data, and technology with human expertise to deliver top-notch wealth management services.

🚩 Challenges They Were Facing

Being a part of the Fiserv sector, Omega Financial deals daily in bulk transactions and processes. Every transaction follows its distinct path and involves various customer touchpoints. Moreover, these transactions take place on a global scale, spanning both online and offline channels.

The main difficulty lay in overseeing the progress of these numerous operations, ensuring no task was overlooked, and assessing the overall business’s well-being. To address this issue, they required a centralized platform that could centralize all operational aspects and foster improved team collaboration.

How Kylas Helped?

Kylas has proven to be a game-changer for Omega Financial, leading to a remarkable enhancement in its operational efficiency. By implementing this CRM, the company has successfully streamlined its processes, enabling teams to work more efficiently and collaborate seamlessly. As a result, productivity has seen a significant boost across the entire organization.

One tangible outcome of this improvement is a remarkable 45% growth in sales. To effectively track and quantify sales performance , the company has adopted a system of assigning weightage points to each deal closed by salespersons.

Prior to implementing Kylas, sales executives were struggling to reach the target of 1500 points, typically achieving only 500-600 points. However, with Kylas in place, the average executive now consistently surpasses the target, scoring higher than 1500 points.  

Customer Testimonial ⭐

“We have seen a 45% increase in our sales in the past year- all thanks to Kylas. My team’s overall performance and productivity have improved because of the automation in the system. Even though Kylas is a Sales CRM all my departments use it on a daily basis. Kylas has helped us transition from hard work to smart work and I would like to rate it 5/5.” – Yogendra. S, Director of Sales, Omega Financial

Read more →

VK Ventures holds a significant position in the e-commerce and fintech sectors. The company has created a portal that facilitates merchants all over India to offer a wide range of financial and utility services. These services include account opening, cash deposits, withdrawals, recharge, bill payments, money transfers, micro-FDs, insurance, and more.

Through this portal, merchants can efficiently cater to their customer’s needs while earning a commission on every transaction they facilitate.

VK Ventures is an active player in the e-commerce and fintech sectors. The company has consistently emphasized providing exceptional services to its customers while prioritizing their needs. To support its operations, VK Ventures had an 80-member sales team utilizing a custom-developed CRM.

However, this CRM, developed in Ahmedabad, proved to be outdated and lacked essential features. As a consequence, the company encountered numerous challenges, particularly in effectively managing the large sales team and tracking leads generated from various marketing campaigns.

Thanks to Kylas, VK Ventures achieved a comprehensive customer view consolidated in a single database. This encompassed essential details like customer names, addresses, financial information, and more, readily accessible to the management.

The implementation of Kylas significantly enhanced operational agility for the company. VK Ventures successfully integrated with various external applications and ensured meticulous recording of every process in the CRM, thereby improving transparency.

The positive outcomes of this transformation manifested in increased sales and overall business growth for the company. VK Ventures now enjoys improved client management and better control over ad campaigns while making judicious expenditures across different sources.

“With Kylas, we have been able to track a plethora of fintech-related customer data with ease. Our sales reps can now instantly respond to customer inquiries, which has led to better conversion rates. The industry will witness growth in the times to come, and we are sure that with Kylas by our side, we will meet customer expectations and scale our business positively.” – Vinay Kedia, Director, VK Ventures

Fitness Bell India is a leading Fitness & Nutrition Consultation firm dedicated to helping clients achieve a healthier lifestyle. The company offers expert health advice, personalized diet plans, and tailored workout routines, all delivered through the collaborative efforts of a team of professionals, including dieticians, trainers, and healthcare experts.

With their guidance, Fitness Bell India can help you start your transformative journey towards improved health and a better physique.

Prior to adopting Kylas, Fitness Bell depended on Excel sheets to store customer records. Unfortunately, this manual data entry method was prone to human errors and consumed a significant amount of time.

As a consequence, data often became fragmented across multiple sheets, making it cumbersome to access historical information and past communications with prospects or clients. This disjointed flow of communication resulted in decreased customer experience and satisfaction.

Furthermore, the inflexibility of Excel sheets meant they couldn’t be customized to suit the company’s specific business needs, further hindering their operations. The absence of customized reporting capabilities also made it challenging to make data-driven decisions, adding to their business challenges.

Fitness Bell found the perfect fit for their needs with Kylas CRM, designed specifically for fitness professionals to efficiently engage, follow up with, and sell to clients. This user-friendly CRM empowered Fitness Bell to manage its sales process seamlessly, including contract renewals.

With Kylas, the sales team streamlined day-to-day operations related to data management, securely organizing all customer data for efficient nurturing and personalized touchpoints. Sales representatives tracked interactions with customers, while Kylas’s adaptability accommodated various membership options.

The sales manager easily assigned leads and tasks to specific staff members, ensuring timely follow-ups. The customizable dashboard provided comprehensive oversight for management, and Data Export functionality simplified data transfer.

Fitness Bell gained valuable insights for decision-making through crucial sales metrics and customized reports. Kylas’s multiple integrations fostered better relationships and faster conversions while linking WhatsApp business accounts strengthened customer connections.

Kylas played a vital role in promoting CRM adoption within the sales team, contributing to improved efficiency and success.

“With Kylas, we could scale up sales and improve customer engagement in the past 3 months. Features like Smart Filters helped us to filter data, identify hot and warm leads, and prioritize our leads. We are very happy to say that Kylas not just helped in team collaboration, but improved customer engagement as well.

Kylas does a great job of listening to its customers and keeping up with their feature-related demands. It’s a trustworthy platform that has helped in our path to success.” – Himanshu Kumar, Co-Founder, Fitness Bell India

MoneyNotSleep stands out as India’s pioneering Financial Media House tailored exclusively for Part-Time Traders. Established on December 8th, 2020, MoneyNotSleep is dedicated to delivering essential financial news updates, highlighting investment and trading opportunities, and providing market predictions for the best-performing stocks, equities, bonds, and companies.

Amidst the Covid challenges, MoneyNotSleep ventured into creating a platform for potential investors to build wealth through trading channels. However, as the business grew, it faced several hurdles. One major challenge was handling fragmented data stored in Excel, making it difficult to track leads and deals, impacting sales performance and growth.

The lack of team collaboration in closing deals was apparent, with internal communications suffering, leading to missed information by sales reps. Transitioning to a remote workforce during the pandemic added complexity in monitoring the sales team’s activities.

Recognizing the need for a comprehensive solution, MoneyNotSleep sought to reevaluate its technology strategy. They needed a scalable, integrated, and efficient platform to cater to bespoke needs while enhancing customer experience. Flexibility and adaptability were vital factors in their search for the right solution.

When the pandemic forced MoneyNotSleep to transition to remote work, coordinating with their dispersed sales teams became a challenge. However, Kylas proved to be a savior, facilitating collaboration among remote sales reps and significantly improving team performance.

Kylas brought about a revolutionary change by providing a comprehensive view of customers through centralized data management. The sales team could now track every interaction with leads, customers, and deals, gaining insights into customer behavior to cater to their needs effectively. This transformation from fragmented processes to a fully-integrated system empowered managers with complete control and visibility.

The multi-metric & multi-dimensional Reporting feature in Kylas enabled the sales team to generate performance and sales forecasting reports efficiently, surpassing the previous manual methods of progress tracking. Even while working from home, the sales manager could closely monitor the team’s activities and productivity.

Kylas streamlined data importing, particularly from external sources like their Leads databases, saving time and reducing manual tasks. With routine tasks automated, the sales team’s productivity surged, resulting in a faster sales process pipeline.

Inter-team communications improved significantly with Kylas, enabling a clear visualization of the entire customer journey and facilitating necessary corrections. The Kylas mobile app made curating client information more convenient, leading to better customer support on the go and enhanced satisfaction.

Reflecting on their journey with Kylas, Nishant appreciated the improved flow of information within the organization, directly impacting the end user’s customer experience positively. Kylas played a crucial role in helping MoneyNotSleep navigate the challenges of remote work during the pandemic and elevating their sales operations to new heights.

“After implementing Kylas, the sales team started leveraging the full potential of Kylas’s automation capabilities to take over a number of activities currently executed manually. Kylas has made our sales team more efficient and effective by automating their daily activities, reducing manual efforts, and saving time. Now our sales team can focus more on selling.

I am excited to say that with Kylas, the sales activity has increased by a whopping 150% in the last 3 months. Not just that, the revenue also went up by 20%. Kylas has allowed us to support clients better in the selling process, in turn, leading to greater customer satisfaction.” – Nishant Mishra, Co-founder, MoneyNotSleep

Ajay Modi Travels , based in Ahmedabad, is a well-established travel service company renowned for its diverse range of travel-related offerings across India. With over two decades of experience, the company remains dedicated to delivering top-notch services and tailor-made holiday packages to its valued customers.

The Indian travel and tourism industry took a hit during the pandemic, causing a significant decline in both domestic and international travelers. Ajay Modi Travels also experienced the adverse effects of this situation, leading to an unexpected slowdown in their business.

As the pandemic situation gradually improved, the travel industry began to witness signs of recovery, and Ajay Modi Travels saw a surge in inquiries. Recognizing the opportunity to capitalize on this increased interest and fortify their position in the market, the team decided to take action.

The influx of inquiries brought a diverse range of requests for customization, highlighting the need for a robust system to manage customer data and streamline all processes. Additionally, handling bulk data through manual entry became inefficient, prompting the search for an automated solution that could efficiently manage appointments and booking deadlines, ensuring no opportunities were missed.

Thanks to Kylas CRM, Ajay Modi Travels achieved a comprehensive 360-degree view of their customer database, including crucial details like names, addresses, booking history, and more. This enabled travel agents to efficiently manage customer accounts and handle bookings, saving valuable time.

The streamlined tracking of miscellaneous travel-related data made responding to inquiries easier, improving conversion rates.

Mr. Alaap Modi expressed satisfaction with Kylas’s support and customizable features. The platform seamlessly integrated lead capture forms, prioritized inquiries, and assigned them to the right agents. Workflow automation empowered in-house tour managers to create custom rules based on customer preferences.

With Kylas’s automation, concerns about missed appointments or inquiries vanished, as custom rules ensured prompt communication through emails and reminders. Mr. Alaap Modi also praised Kylas’s receptiveness to new ideas, making the partnership even more valuable for Ajay Modi Travels.

“Currently, we have 20+ users using Kylas, and let us tell you that they have not missed a single lead or call from any prospective traveler. Kylas didn’t just help us boost our sales; it also helped us build strong relationships with our clients. In fact, in the last 6 months, our sales increased to 30% and our customer satisfaction improved by 20%. This CRM is beneficial for businesses looking forward to scaling new heights. I would recommend Kylas CRM to everyone in the travel & tourism industry.” – Aalap Modi, Co-Founder, AjayModi Travels

Learn Digital Academy is a specialized training institute committed to empowering students with university certifications and on-campus placements. Distinguished as India’s sole awarded agency-based digital education institute, they offer a comprehensive learning journey encompassing training, certification, internships, and placement opportunities.

With a dynamic team of professionals, their mission revolves around upskilling aspiring individuals in cutting-edge disciplines like digital marketing, data science, artificial intelligence, and graphic design. As they continue to grow, Learn Digital Academy remains dedicated to providing a transformative learning experience for all.

As Learn Digital Academy expanded as an Ed-Tech business, its counselors found themselves handling a substantial amount of information daily. Initially, they utilized LeadSquared as their CRM for the sales team. However, when the management made the decision to downsize the sales team, they had to transition to using Excel and Google Sheets for data management.

The counselors at Learn Digital Academy regularly reached out to prospective students to identify suitable candidates and boost enrolments. Managing call logs for each call on Excel became a challenging task, leading to difficulties in following up on inquiries promptly, which ultimately resulted in a decline in the enrolment rate.

Recognizing that Excel sheets were no longer sufficient to meet their needs, Nishant realized it was time to explore alternative solutions for their data and customer management requirements.

Kylas CRM proved to be a game-changer for LearnDigital Academy, streamlining student enrolments and admissions with its comprehensive view of every contact and inquiry. The team seamlessly synchronized inquiries from various sources, efficiently tracked incoming students and stored all their details in one centralized location.

The Bulk Update and Bulk Delete features offered by Kylas CRM significantly reduced manual efforts, enabling the team to manage a large volume of student inquiries effortlessly and save valuable time.

Nishant highlighted the transformative impact of Kylas CRM on their counselors, who can now make one-click calls to candidates through IVR directly from the platform, greatly enhancing their outbound efforts.

Moreover, Nishant commended the seamless onboarding and adoption process for this new platform. The availability and responsiveness of Kylas’s Customer Success team through various communication channels, including Telephony, Chat, WhatsApp, and Email, impressed Nishant.

He further praised the team’s promptness in responding to queries within an hour and resolving issues within 24 hours, always handling their requests with utmost priority.

“Kylas’ notes, task reminders, and meeting updates have helped our counselors organize their daily tasks better. Our productivity has improved with this CRM system and most importantly- now we do not miss out on a single lead.

The productivity dashboard, multi-dimensional reports, and Smart Lists in Kylas helped us track inquiries that needed follow-up by our counselors .

I am delighted to say that due to timely follow-ups through Kylas’s automated messages and emails, our overall enrolment rate has improved significantly by 30%.” ­ – Nishant Jhunjhunwala, Co-Founder, Learn Digital Academy

Established in 2011, Upanal CNC Solutions specializes in offering service and maintenance programs for all CNC machine services. As a prominent wholesaler and dealer, Upanal provides a wide range of products, including Milling Machines, Turning Machines, CNC Machine Spare Parts, and more.

Headquartered in Bengaluru, Upanal is known for its tailor-made service and maintenance programs, catering to various needs, from simple care maintenance of technically challenging CNC machines to handling exceptional masterpieces in the industry.

Upanal CNC Solutions, a thriving business, upholds the belief of delivering top-notch service at competitive rates, all while understanding and catering to the unique requirements of its clients. As its clientele base expanded rapidly, Upanal recognized the importance of having a cohesive system that could provide a clear overview of its sales pipeline.

To meet their evolving needs, Upanal sought a CRM solution that would efficiently organize their sales team’s workflow and minimize errors in data collection. They required software that would enable their sales team to consistently follow up with clients, thereby enhancing the likelihood of lead conversions.

Thanks to Kylas, Upanal gained invaluable transparency, allowing them to access a comprehensive view of each customer’s activity log in a single place. The need for centralized information concerning clients, leads, and deals, including contacts, calls, past meetings, and opportunities, was fulfilled, significantly enhancing the visibility of their sales pipeline .

When asked about the top three features appreciated by Poonam, she highlighted Kylas’s ability to create custom reports and provide insights into sales performance. The automated workflows were also a standout feature as they allowed for streamlined sales processes. Additionally, the in-app notifications kept the sales representatives updated, ensuring no important updates or tasks were missed.

“Not only that, Kylas’ robust customer service helped us with quick training that helped our team get adapted to new business processes easily. Transitioning from one software to another was effortless.

It has been going great with Kylas and I am glad we made the switch. As a sales CRM, I would rate it 4/5.” – Poonam Anvedkar, Internal Sales Team Leader, Upanal CNC Solutions

With the right CRM in place, you can serve your customers in the best manner possible. If the CRM implementation is done correctly, it doesn’t matter how much your customer expectations evolve. You will always be on top of your sales.

If you want to understand how Kylas can help your business grow, Schedule your Demo with us and we will tell you how.

Shagun Sharma

Shagun is a content marketer at Kylas, extremely well-versed in all things Marketing. She works closely with the sales team to create best-in-class content for our readers. Her experience combined with her thorough research skills makes all her blogs very in-depth and insightful. In her leisure time, Shagun enjoys hiking, gardening, and immersing herself in music.

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Customer Relationship Management Software: A Case Study

• Post author: Maryliya M J
• Post published: January 18, 2024
• Reading time: 13 mins read

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Software: A Case Study

Table of contents.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software has revolutionized the way businesses manage and nurture their relationships with customers. In today’s highly competitive market, maintaining strong customer relationships is crucial for success. CRM software provides organizations with a comprehensive solution to effectively manage customer interactions, streamline processes, and drive growth.

Introduction to Customer Relationship Management Software

Definition and overview of customer relationship management software.

Customer Relationship Management software is like your personal assistant for managing and nurturing relationships with your customers. It helps businesses track and organize customer data, streamline communication, and improve customer interactions. Think of it as a digital Rolodex combined with a supercharged to-do list.

Importance of Customer Relationship Management Software in Today’s Business Environment

In today’s fast-paced and hyper-competitive business landscape, building and maintaining strong customer relationships is crucial. Customer Relationship Management Software provides a centralized hub for storing and accessing customer information, ensuring that no interaction slips through the cracks. It helps businesses personalize their approach, anticipate customer needs, and ultimately increase customer loyalty and satisfaction. Plus, it helps streamline internal processes, boosting efficiency and productivity.

Benefits of Implementing CRM Software

Enhanced customer data management.

Say goodbye to the days of sticky notes and scattered spreadsheets. Customer Relationship Management Software provides a secure and organized space to store key customer details, interactions, and preferences. This wealth of information helps businesses understand their customers better, tailor their offerings, and deliver personalized experiences. It’s like having a photographic memory for all your customer interactions.

Improved Customer Service and Satisfaction

Customer Relationship Management Software enables businesses to provide top-notch customer service by ensuring that no customer request or inquiry falls through the cracks. With quick access to customer history and preferences, businesses can deliver more personalized and relevant solutions. It’s like having a customer service superhero on speed dial.

Streamlined Sales and Marketing Processes

Customer Relationship Management Software acts as a collaborative platform for sales and marketing teams, streamlining their workflows and improving communication. It helps track leads, manage pipelines, and automate follow-ups, ensuring that no sales opportunity gets left behind. It’s like having a Swiss army knife for your sales and marketing efforts.

About the Client

Our client, a sales-centric organization, faced challenges in managing customer interactions effectively. With a growing customer base, they recognized the need for a solution to centralize customer data, automate lead management, and enhance communication with clients. To address these challenges, they embarked on the development of a tailored .NET-based Customer Relationship Management Software.

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Project overview.

The project aimed to develop a comprehensive Customer Relationship Management Software solution to centralize customer data, automate lead management, and improve communication with clients. The primary objectives included seamless integration with email and communication tools, automation of lead tracking, and the incorporation of analytics for a better understanding of customer behavior and preferences.

The Challenges

• Disparate Customer Data: Customer data was scattered across various platforms, making it challenging to have a unified view.
• Manual Lead Tracking: Manual processes for lead tracking were time-consuming and prone to errors.
• Limited Communication Tools: The absence of integrated communication tools hindered effective interaction with clients.

The Solution

Our team of skilled developers and project managers collaborated to design and implement a comprehensive .NET-based Customer Relationship Management Software. The solution included modules for centralizing customer data, integrating with email and communication tools, automating lead tracking, and incorporating analytics for a more profound understanding of customer behavior.

Key Features of the CRM Software

• Centralized Customer Data: The CRM centralized customer data, providing a unified view across the organization.
• Integration with Communication Tools: Seamless integration with email and communication tools enhanced client interaction.
• Lead Tracking Automation: Automated lead tracking streamlined the lead management process, reducing errors and accelerating response times.
• Analytics for Customer Insights: Robust analytics tools provided insights into customer behavior and preferences, enabling more personalized interactions.

The Outcome

The Customer Relationship Management Software was successfully deployed, resulting in significant improvements in customer interaction and lead management. Centralized customer data, seamless communication, and analytics contributed to a more customer-centric approach and enhanced sales processes.

Our team’s expertise in developing a tailored Customer Relationship Management Software using .NET technologies effectively addressed the client’s challenges. The implementation of centralized customer data, communication tools integration, and analytics tools contributed to a more efficient and customer-focused sales organization.

In conclusion, the implementation of Customer Relationship Management Software has proven to be a game-changer for businesses aiming to cultivate and strengthen their customer relationships. By harnessing the power of CRM software, organizations can effectively manage customer data, enhance customer service and satisfaction, streamline sales and marketing processes, and ultimately drive growth and revenue. The case study discussed in this article serves as a testament to the transformative impact of CRM software on a company’s operations and success. As businesses navigate the ever-evolving landscape of customer relationship management, embracing CRM software and its associated best practices will undoubtedly play a crucial role in achieving long-term success and sustainability.

Are you struggling with customer data management and lead tracking challenges? Contact us today to explore how our expertise in CRM development can transform your sales processes and drive customer satisfaction.

1. What is Customer Relationship Management ( CRM ) software?

CRM software is a technological solution that helps businesses effectively manage and strengthen their relationships with customers. It provides tools and functionalities for capturing, storing, and analyzing customer data, facilitating communication and collaboration, and streamlining sales, marketing, and customer service processes.

2. How can CRM software benefit my business?

Implementing CRM software can bring numerous benefits to your business. It enables you to have a centralized and comprehensive view of customer data, enhancing your understanding of customer needs and preferences. This, in turn, allows you to provide personalized and targeted experiences, leading to improved customer satisfaction and loyalty. CRM software also helps streamline operations, automate repetitive tasks, and improve collaboration between teams, ultimately driving efficiency and productivity.

3. How do I select the right CRM software for my company?

Selecting the right CRM software involves careful consideration of various factors. It is important to evaluate your specific business needs and goals, assess the scalability and flexibility of the software, and consider factors such as ease of use, integration capabilities, and pricing. It is recommended to involve key stakeholders, conduct thorough research, and even consider trial periods or demos to ensure the chosen CRM software aligns with your company’s requirements.

4. What are some best practices for implementing CRM software?

Successful implementation of CRM software requires proper planning and execution. Some best practices include clearly defining your objectives and goals, ensuring strong leadership and stakeholder involvement, providing adequate training and support to users, and continuously monitoring and evaluating the system’s performance. It is also important to regularly update and optimize your CRM software to align with evolving business needs and technological advancements.

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20 CRM Use Cases for Business Growth in 2023

Strong customer relationships are key to driving sustained revenue growth and profitability. That’s why, according to Grand View Research, more than 90% of companies with more than 10 employees use customer relationship management (CRM) solutions, which store all customer-related information and help to build enduring customer relationships by integrating sales force automation, marketing automation and customer service. There’s a vast number of ways to apply a CRM system to improve business operations, from automating routine tasks to analyzing customer behavior and tracking sales performance. Here are 20 of the most common CRM use cases that can help drive business growth.

20 Key CRM Use Cases to Explore

CRM solutions help companies increase productivity through automation, better understand customer behavior and deliver a better customer experience, among many benefits. Use cases span the entire customer life cycle, from initial contact to customer support and follow-up sales.

Automate Repetitive Tasks

One of the biggest benefits of a CRM solution is that it reduces the time and labor required for everyday tasks, thus increasing the productivity of sales, marketing and customer service teams. A CRM system can automate repetitive jobs such as sending routine marketing emails, for example. By creating email templates and then setting rules defining the triggers for sending those emails, you can ensure that every new lead automatically gets a welcome email introducing your product or service. Then, when the recipient opens or responds to the email, the CRM system can schedule a follow-up call for the assigned sales rep. Automating these steps frees the sales staff to spend their time on more valuable and productive activities, such as talking to potential customers who are close to making a big purchase decision.

A CRM can automate many other tasks, including lead assignment, tracking metrics and dialing and logging phone calls. Bailey International, a leading manufacturer of hydraulic components, used CRM and contact-center management software to streamline customer interactions by automating steps such as routing customer calls, retrieving customer information for agents and tracking information about each call. As a result, the company cut call-answer times by 15% and reduced call abandonment by roughly 60%-70%.

Build an Omnichannel Customer Experience

Since consumers can design their own coffee drinks and ringtones, it isn’t surprising that they also want to choose how to interact with companies they do business with. Customers often interact via multiple channels: They may buy from a web store, return goods to a physical location and contact customer service via online chat. A CRM can help build a unified customer experience across all these channels. For example, you can offer support to customers through whichever channel they prefer: email, text message, chat, social media or even face-to-face meetings. A CRM can also track all these interactions, so you have a complete record of every contact with the customer.

It’s important the system provides a seamless experience for customers. Without careful design, there’s a risk that customers may receive different information through different channels, or they may have to repeat the same information repeatedly. An integrated enterprise resource planning (ERP) software suite that supports CRM, ecommerce and other business functions can help companies deliver a unified customer experience. That approach helped Altex Computers & Electronics create a comprehensive omnichannel system for both digital and brick-and-mortar sales (opens in new tab) , with unified payment processing and an appealing online shopping experience.

Personalize Customer Experiences

Personalized communications can help customers feel more valued — and increase the likelihood that they’ll raise their level of engagement with the company. CRM solutions can gather information from customer records and their previous interactions to add relevant content to texts, chat, social media or email. For example, they can send special offers on a customer’s birthday or suggest additional products that complement a customer’s previous purchases. Enthusiastic home chefs who have been browsing high-end blenders might receive offers for add-ons like special-purpose blades.

Prioritize Leads

There’s no universal code for how to convert prospects into paying customers but prioritizing and targeting the right leads certainly increases the chances of success. A CRM system can help by lead scoring, a process that ranks leads based on their potential value to the company. The CRM does this by assigning points to each lead, based on predetermined rules that you choose. Lead scoring helps salespeople home in on the strongest leads.

In its most basic form, lead scoring assigns points based on demographics, such as the prospect’s industry or job title. But scoring is most effective when it is driven dynamically by the interactions between the lead and your company. If your firm launches a promotional email campaign, for example, all the leads who open the email would earn points, and those who followed a link in the email to your website would get still more points.

Develop Sales Prospects

While a good product, fair prices and skilled salespeople are all important, sales is ultimately a numbers game. The more prospects you start with, the more customers you’re likely to end up with. Those prospects don’t just appear out of thin air: Generating a large prospecting pool can take a lot of time and manual effort.

A CRM system can turbocharge that process by automating data entry and other time-consuming steps. Instead of manually entering every prospect’s name and address from a sales event or trade show, you can import a list into your CRM and automatically create a separate record for each prospect. The CRM can also capture email addresses that prospects enter on your website, so you can target them in marketing campaigns.

Conduct Sales Outreach

With prospects and leads identified, it’s time to introduce them to your product or service. A CRM solution can help automate outreach, then track and analyze progress. For example, the CRM can personalize outreach efforts, such as email messages, based on the prospect’s history. It can track each attempt to reach a prospect and record whether — and how — they responded. Outreach remains important even after someone has become a customer. A CRM system can flag customers whose contract is about to expire and send them reminders or prompt a salesperson to contact them.

Follow Up on Leads

The good news: Leads are responding to your outreach. The bad news: Manually filtering, organizing and following up on those responses is hugely time-consuming. If you have a CRM, you can use it to handle much of the heavy lifting. For example, some CRM systems can automatically schedule follow-up calls to anyone who responds within the first few days, while sending follow-up emails to those who have not responded at all. Given that prospects often must be contacted many times before they buy anything, automating these steps can save a lot of time.

Manage Sales Processes

A CRM system can help create efficient, consistent sales processes tailored to specific products and markets. Suppose you sell high-value personal care products, with one product line for businesses and another for individual consumers. Creating a single process for both makes no sense, since businesses typically perform a lengthy evaluation before buying in bulk, while consumers typically make snap purchases of single items. A CRM can help define different processes for each market and track them separately. For example, you may be able to:

• Define deal stages, automate each step and track each deal as it moves along the process.
• Create custom fields that store unique information needed for each process — not just name, email address and phone number but also information specific to each industry or company.
• Automatically assign leads to the appropriate salesperson or team.

Manage Salespeople More Effectively

CRM systems provide sales managers with insights into the performance of sales teams, helping them manage teams more effectively. Real-time dashboards enable managers to monitor performance at an individual and team level, tracking metrics such as total sales, percentage of quota achieved, average deal size and lead-conversion rates. Leading CRM systems let companies personalize dashboards for each salesperson, which can help them stay motivated and track progress toward their goals.

Analyze Sales Cycles

By consistently documenting and tracking each step in the sales process, a CRM system enables detailed analysis of the sales cycle. This helps the company pinpoint bottlenecks and take steps to eliminate them. These insights may be particularly helpful to companies that sell to other businesses and have a lengthy sales cycle. For example, if it takes so long to create proposals that prospects choose a competitor rather than waiting, you may need to streamline proposal generation. You can also analyze whether there are differences in how long each salesperson takes to complete different stages in the cycle, so you can address individual team members’ problems.

Onboard New Clients

One you’ve successfully converted a lead into a customer, an efficient onboarding process can help ensure a smooth customer experience and encourage customers to engage with your products. A CRM can automate onboarding workflows and reduce the time required, especially when the CRM is combined with other business applications and tools, such as robotic process automation. For example, information in the CRM could be used to automatically fill in the forms required to open a customer account and verify the customer’s information.

Analyze Customer Behavior

A deep understanding of customer behavior can be critical to retaining customers and winning new ones. The CRM contains a wealth of information about how customers behave. You can use that knowledge to improve customer engagement, promote add-ons or other products, and personalize services. For example, the CRM can help analyze:

• How you acquired the customer. A client who visited every page of your website and had extensive conversations with salespeople probably knows a lot about your product and may be more committed to it. In contrast, someone who made a quick purchase and hasn’t otherwise interacted with your company may need to be re-sold over time.
• How the customer is using your product. Your customer purchased a 35mm digital camera. If they’re asking customer service how to use the most advanced features and ordering additional lenses and other add-ons, they may be more likely to become a loyal customer. Some CRM systems can generate engagement scores so that you can either reward your core customers or reach out to the less-engaged to promote additional features, offer product education and so on.
• How the customer interacts with you. Does a customer read specific marketing or educational materials such as blog posts? How often do they visit your website — and which products do they look at? CRMs can track those interactions and target marketing and sales efforts accordingly.

Monitor Your Competition

Your CRM may help you track how you’re doing against key competitors — and take steps to win back customers you lose. For example, you may be able to record information such as which deals were lost to which competitors, so you can analyze common factors that may explain why. Then you can create campaigns that target those lost prospects and highlight new differentiating features you’ve developed.

Track Your Churn Rate

Every company would like to be able to say it never loses customers — but a zero percent customer churn rate usually isn’t realistic. Churn is often calculated as the percentage of customers lost during a specific period, although other formulas can also be used. A CRM can help companies automatically measure and analyze churn , so they can focus on investigating the causes and identify steps they can take to minimize it. A rising churn rate may be a sign of serious problems.

Engage in Strategic, Proactive Management

Because a CRM gathers extensive data about your interactions with customers, it can be a critical tool in supporting decision-making. Analyzing the data in the CRM can help you spot trends and problems sooner, so you can make decisions and act proactively to capitalize on opportunities and prevent minor issues from developing into serious challenges. For example, you can analyze factors associated with a drop in leads or a decline in customer engagement. You can analyze the most frequent problems reported to customer service and prioritize resources to address them.

Help Agents Help Customers

With a good CRM system, agents have a much more complete picture of the customer’s history, including all previous interactions with the company. That allows the agents to provide a better customer experience. When customers call, they no longer endure the frustration of repeating information from previous calls or chat sessions because the agent has access to all previous customer support interactions. The CRM can also help escalate the response if agents realize they need a manager or a more experienced representative to take over during a call. If an agent is seeking help, the system will automatically find the appropriate person and transfer the call.

Help Salespeople Manage Travel

For salespeople who need to travel to different customer sites during the day, a CRM system can make sure they take the most efficient route to arrive on time. This helps increase sales productivity while keeping customers happy. Some CRM solutions integrate sales reps’ calendars with mapping software, providing reps with a visual presentation of their day’s itinerary and step-by-step directions to reach their next appointment. Support for mobile devices means reps can use the software on the road.

Monitor Data Security

Customer information is some of the most valuable data that your organization holds. Compromise of that data can damage the company’s bottom line and reputation. When customer information is scattered across multiple spreadsheets and other documents, instead of being stored in a well-designed CRM system, it becomes more vulnerable to hacking and theft. Leading CRM systems typically include access controls and other security features that ensure only authorized employees can access the system and restrict access based on the user’s role. Companies can also monitor suspicious activity and set rules preventing access at specific times.

Align Sales and Marketing

A CRM can help companies forge alignment between sales and marketing teams, supporting the ultimate goal of increasing revenue. With better insights from sales into what clients are buying and why, marketers can adjust lead scoring criteria based on the likelihood that they’ll drive sales. Then they can refine those criteria as they analyze the sales that result. The CRM can also automate the process of passing leads from marketing to sales.

Increase Profitability

Ultimately, a CRM system supports profitability by increasing revenue and boosting productivity. Some of the ways a CRM contributes include:

• Automation in sales, marketing and customer service, which reduces overall costs by enabling each group to become more productive.
• Higher lead-to-sales conversion rates, due to better-targeted marketing and a better understanding of customer needs.
• More cross-selling, facilitated by improved knowledge of what customers have bought and which complementary products they may be interested in.
• More enduring customer relationships, fueled by better customer experiences throughout the entire lead-to-customer journey.

CRM Use Case Template

Building a library of use cases helps the company define all the ways that employees will use a CRM. This can be extremely useful when determining the business value of CRM, evaluating and implementing solutions, and developing training. A use case template can help you build a library quickly and in a consistent format.

Get the free use case template

This CRM use case template provides a basic structure to define each use case, laying out the business problem to be solved, the ideal solution, which processes will be affected and how employees will interact with the system.

Download this template (opens in new tab)

Choosing the Right CRM for Your Business

Because a CRM plays such an important role in the business, it’s important to take the time to select the right solution for your needs. An important step is to bring all stakeholders together to compile a detailed checklist of what you want to accomplish with the system. Key questions to consider include:

• What problems are you trying to solve? Prioritize the company’s goals, whether they are improving sales productivity, targeting better prospects or improving customer service.
• How much can you afford? You’ll need a realistic idea of both the true cost of the system and your budget.
• What technical support do you have? A cloud-based solution requires less IT expertise than an on-premises system.
• How big is your business? Think about whether the system will support your future growth plans as well as current needs.
• What’s unique about your business? Look for products with the specific features you need and vendors that have customers in your industry.
• How are you going to access the CRM? If employees need to access the system from home or on the road, a cloud-based system with mobile support may be the best fit.
• Do you need the system to integrate with other software? Some CRM solutions integrate well with business systems that handle financial, inventory and ecommerce applications.

NetSuite CRM is a cloud-based solution that supports sales force automation, customer service and marketing automation, with additional functions such as partner relationship management. As part of an ERP suite , NetSuite CRM integrates closely with financial, inventory and ecommerce applications to help companies manage the entire customer life cycle. NetSuite CRM provides visibility into all customer interactions, supporting improved sales performance and customer satisfaction.

Video: Rural Utility Service Centralizes Communication in NetSuite CRM

A comprehensive CRM can be applied to an extraordinarily wide range of use cases to improve sales, marketing and customer service. The benefits include increased productivity, a better understanding of customer needs and, ultimately, more sales and higher profitability.

#1 CRM In The Cloud

CRM Use Cases FAQs

What are CRM use cases?

A use case describes how users interact with a CRM system for a specific purpose. The focus is on the applications, not system design or structure. A complete set of use cases specifies how a company will use a CRM. Collectively, these use cases define all the behavior required of a CRM.

What are examples of a CRM?

Comprehensive CRM systems combine sales force automation, marketing automation and customer service. Some are integrated with other applications; others focus primarily on specific subsets of these capabilities. For example, some products are primarily sales force automation tools, while others are largely designed for customer support.

How is a CRM used?

A CRM provides a central place to store information about prospects and customers, tools to analyze the data in the system, and applications to support sales, marketing and customer support. CRMs are used to automate routine tasks, personalize customer contact, identify business trends and otherwise improve business operations and results.

What is a CRM, explained with example?

A CRM helps manage all of a company’s interactions with customers and prospects. For example, the CRM can track customer purchases and browsing history, and then mine that data to personalize marketing. It may send customers product recommendations based on their purchasing or browsing histories. CRM solutions that are integrated with ecommerce and inventory systems also support unified purchasing and support processes.

CRM vs ERP: What’s the Difference?

Businesses looking to automate core business processes typically look at two main software solutions, enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM). ERP helps companies run…

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“I’d rather be a pirate than join the navy.”

To this day, Apple co-founder and former CEO Steve Jobs’ famous words define the company’s attitude and ambitions.

And, though Apple is most well-known for its innovative founder and ethos for doing things differently, the real secret to the tech giant’s success is something all successful brands do well. We’re talking, of course, about Apple's CRM (customer relationship management) strategy – how Apple keeps its billion-strong customer base happy, hungry, and coming back for more.

And it must be doing something right. Because despite eschewing traditional forms of customer retention – Jobs was famously opposed to market research, and Apple still doesn’t run a formal loyalty scheme – the company has built one of the most enduring, exciting, and enigmatic brands of all time .

Let’s take a look at Apple’s CRM case study, and explore how your business can learn from the best.

The Apple story

1976: Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak begin testing the first Apple computers in the basement of Jobs’ childhood home in Los Altos, California.

1980: Apple becomes a publicly traded company.

1983: Apple launches the Lisa, though it sells poorly and is plagued by slowness and compatibility issues.

1985: Steve Jobs resigns.

1994: Apple releases its first powerPC-based desktops and notebooks.

1997: Steve Jobs returns to Apple.

1998: Apple releases the iMac. This is followed by iTunes and the iPod (2001) , the MacBook Pro (2006) , and the iPhone (2007) .

2011: Apple becomes the world’s most valuable publicly traded company, though this triumph is marred by Jobs' death in October.

2014: Apple launches both the Apple Watch and Apple Pay.

2020: Apple is worth $2 trillion.

2021: Apple partners with Product Red (RED) to combat HIV/AIDS and safeguard vulnerable communities from COVID-19.

2022: On the first trading day of 2022, Apple becomes the first US company ever to reach a market value of $3 trillion.

2023: The start of 2023 marks another milestone for Apple, as it reports that there are over 2 billion active Apple devices.

The years between 2020 and 2022 were good ones at the office for Apple, as it grew its revenue from $274.5 billion to $394.3 billion .

Apple’s CRM strategy: the secret to success

“You’ve gotta start with the customer experience, and work backwards to the technology.”

Steve Jobs , Apple co-founder and former CEO

You can boil Apple’s CRM strategy down to just two words: Apple ID . Let’s explain.

When you take your first Apple product home, you’re asked to create an Apple ID – a unique profile that syncs across all Apple devices you own. This ID allows Apple to remember your purchases with the Apple Store, and provide personalised recommendations for music and films. You can even share content and cloud storage with other members of your family, and monitor your kids’ purchases.

For Apple, it’s a self-renewing, seemingly limitless data set, allowing it to constantly tailor its services and re-engage customers with handpicked deals, discounts, and products. Not only is this targeted marketing done effectively, but it also engenders a sense of loyalty and familiarity with Apple’s brand and ethos .

Apple ID, used in conjunction with Apple’s rich ecosystem of products, is the core of Amazon’s CRM strategy – and, ergo, its wild and ongoing success. But that’s not the only trick this Silicon Valley behemoth has up its sleeve.

Let’s take a look at the top four ways Apple uses CRM – and how your business can follow suit.

▶ Read more: The Best CRM Systems for Small Buisnesses

The top 4 ways Apple uses CRM

No self-respecting article would be complete without a healthy peppering of Steve Jobs quotes, right? So here are four, each one demonstrating how Apple walks the talk when it comes to its lofty CRM goals and strategies.

“Get closer than ever to your customers. So close, in fact, that you tell them what they need well before they realise it themselves.”

It’s an ambitious aspiration, but one that Apple follows through on. Apple’s consistently high NPS (Net Promoter Score) ratings indicate that it’s remarkably good at retaining its customers. Loyalty rates research from Statista confirms that 92% of iPhone users in 2022 were unlikely to change brands from Apple.

Apple’s CRM usage is a huge factor in its great customer retention. For decades, Apple has used CRM to get to know, connect with, and nurture those connections with its customers. Sending a series of emails to customers who have visited Apple stores is one of its fundamental marketing methods, however, selling new products is not the purpose of these emails. Instead, they are sent to inquire how the staff at the store handled the customer while they were being serviced. This way, the impression of being well-cared-for by Apple is remembered, forming a bond between customer and company.

Also fuelling Apple’s commanding customer retention scores is its stellar technical support. Whenever you buy an Apple product, you have the option to schedule in a tailored, one-to-one session with a specialist – exploring your new device’s best features, and fine-tuning it to your tastes.

Apple’s commitment to understanding the individual is no accident . It’s a carefully plotted out CRM strategy, and it’s paying stunning dividends.

▶ Read more: The Best Cheap CRM Systems

“[The computer] took us three years to build. If we'd given customers what they said they wanted, we'd have built a computer they'd have been happy with a year after we spoke to them – not something they'd want now.”

It’s clear Apple’s understanding of its customers runs deep. Yet, paradoxically, Jobs was famously opposed to market research . Rather, Apple’s intimacy with its customers has traditionally stemmed from the company’s empathy with their pain points and needs.

In contrast to Jobs' guiding ideas, the company's current strategy is to build lasting relationships with its clients. Apple’s CRM is programmed to collect customer data once an Apple ID has been registered. When they’ve registered, Apple’s CRM strategy is to inform and teach its customers about the benefits of owning this great Apple product.

Another way for Apple to learn about its customers’ satisfaction is by sending a survey or an NPS Apple poll after making a purchase. These surveys would gather information about the customers’ level of satisfaction or if the product is highly recommendable. Apple employees would use this feedback to their advantage and work on improving its service.

It’s this, above all, that’s driven Apple’s desire to innovate – to expand and evolve its offerings to meet not only its customers’ current requirements, but those of their futures, too.

Because if it isn’t game-changing, Apple won’t do it . The iPhone, iPod, and iPad were all ahead of their time, while iTunes was once the only legal online catalogue of songs to feature music from all five major record labels.

With Apple TV now producing original content and Apple Pay redefining how we shop, Apple’s innovation is a hallmark of its desire to grow with the needs of its users.

Want more? Discover how CRM is redefining the success of other major brands with our CRM case studies .

“How does somebody know what they want if they haven’t seen it?”

It’s a good question, and one that continues to define how Apple operates its physical shops.  Apple’s retail departments and staff are built with the individual in mind – to ensure its customers have an experience, rather than simply make a purchase. Anyone who’s ever visited one of Apple’s stores will back this up, too – they’re places of wonder, where you can explore the latest technology at your own pace.

Apple’s use of CRM in-store is a testament to its long-term mentality. An immediate sale is good, but an ongoing relationship with a customer is more profitable . By foregoing conventional sales tactics, Apple’s shops create value by encouraging browsers to love and appreciate the benefits of having an iPhone, an iPad, or the latest Apple Watch.

And, by training its employees to understand (and not just sell to ) those that enter its stores, Apple cultivates a more engaged, loyal customer base that prioritises the person, rather than the product .

Using this CRM technique helps Apple personalise its relationship with its customers. Its software archives customer profiles, which allows the staff to provide a quality customer experience.

Not only that, but when a customer comes into the store, the experience doesn’t just stay there. Apple’s CRM is used so extensively in their retail structure that every encounter gets programmed into Apple’s system. Apple automatically sends out a survey to your email after your purchase, which enables the staff to improve brand awareness and value every feedback.

“Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.”

Apple is… a cool company. Whether you buy into its products or not, Apple’s pull is undeniable. Boasting one of the most iconic and instantly recognisable brands in the world, it draws huge queues at product launches, while thousands of user-generated videos online are dedicated to ‘unboxing’ Apple devices.

But Apple’s brand is more than just a byproduct of designing products that look, feel, and work well . Its ecosystem of products – each of which functions seamlessly with the rest – engenders loyalty with the brand, while rewarding the customer for choosing Apple.

Better still, Apple’s branding has succeeded where plenty of other big companies have failed – by appealing to millennials. Research shows that Apple is among the top ten brands that millennials ( and Generation X, too! ) feel feel an affinity with , and it’s not hard to see why.

With simple, stripped-back product designs, a commitment to sustainability, and a playful tone of voice, Apple (quite literally) speaks to whole generations.

Take Twitter, for example. Millennials often use this platform and Apple’s simple strategy of posting a tip of the day, which varies from images to short videos, is highly appreciated by its customers – one of Apple's most recent tweets, a tip about tidying up your desktop, garnered over 200 likes, more than 70,000 views, and a dozen replies after just a few minutes.

Importantly, the tips Apple shares are useful for everybody that uses Apple products, even if they aren’t even in need of any technical advice. Plus, when customers comment on Apple’s social posts, the company always responds. Engaging with users shows commitment to listening to what they have to say, which makes them feel valued and, therefore, boosts their loyalty.

Coincidence? Or the result of a clear CRM strategy, planned and executed to perfection? We’ll let you be the judge.

▶ Read more: How Much Does CRM Software Cost?

What's next?

To nobody’s surprise, Apple’s CRM strategy breaks the mould. Rejecting the ‘hard sell’ approach, Apple has kept the customer at the forefront for decades. Overlooking market research, loyalty schemes, and traditional forms of customer retention and marketing, Apple can sell its products on hype alone. So, how can Apple’s trailblazing CRM strategy inform your own business’ CRM targets?

Well, you need to know your customers. You have to be able to speak to them in their own language, avoiding jargon and using phrasing that will resonate with them. You need to look to the future, to monitor consumer trends, and design your products so they’ll still be relevant in the years to come.

In short, you’ll require a CRM strategy. And to execute that – and avoid the common CRM problems that come with the territory – you’ll need a CRM system like one of these:

var appWikiRequestUrl = “https://appwiki.nl”;

To learn more about what this software can do for you, check out our guide to the best CRM systems for small businesses.

Otherwise, you can get a tailored quote just for your business – start comparing CRM software quotes with us, today .

Visit our free quote-finding tool to provide us with some details about your business’ CRM requirements – specifically, your team’s size, and the specific functions you’ll need the software to perform. It takes about 30 seconds to do, and then we’ll match you with one or more carefully curated CRM providers , who’ll be in touch directly with tailored quotes. Simple!

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4 Amazing CRM Case Studies You Should Go Through in 2022

Are you a business owner? Do you think your company has adapted to the evolving digital landscape?

While you may have figured out most of it, there is one important thing you should know if you want to be successful. 

Simply having the best product or offering the best services will not guarantee profitability. It is very important to forge strong relationships with your customers and work on boosting retention and loyalty. 

If you are wondering how you can improve customer relationship management, here are a few amazing CRM case studies for you. 

As more and more companies turn their attention to enhancing customer loyalty and retention, customer relationship management tools have become very popular. 

Besides, even the arrival of the COVID–19 pandemic has accelerated the demand for tools of CRM since 2020. The CRM market is expected to reach a market size of $129.9 globally by the end of 2028 [1]. 

So how have the big brands cracked the code and why are they so good at CRM? How do they do it?

To answer these questions, we are going to bring you some case studies which will give you a fair idea. 

Without wasting much time, let’s dive straight in. 

SEE ALSO: 7 Marketing Automation Trends to Look Out for in 2022

Understanding how big companies do CRM: Case studies

1. apple crm.

Apple, the brand itself does not need any introduction. 

The company which was founded by Steve Jobs is a global phenomenon and continues to send ripples of excitement during product launches. 

Apple has rolled out revolutionary products including the iMac, iPhone, iPad, and Apple TV. While there are no apprehensions pertaining to the quality of these products, Apple leaves no stone unturned to ensure customer satisfaction. 

Let’s explore how Apple leverages Apple ID.

If you have used iTunes, you will know that you need an Apple ID. Besides, even if you use an Apple device, you will need an Apple ID to register it. 

Your Apple ID syncs with all your devices to keep track of your movie and music choices and offer customized recommendations based on that information. 

What problem is this solving? It provides users with a higher level of convenience.

Apple uses the data it has collected to understand what its customers are looking for enabling them to improve their targeted marketing strategies. 

This is a classic case of a well-done CRM. 

2. Uber CRM

Uber hit the market in 2009 and since then has been at the forefront of the ride-sharing revolution. 

Today, Uber is a household name in many parts of the world, but the big question is, can it continue its dominance in the future? Well, we will have to wait and find out. In the meanwhile, we can take a look at how Uber has acquired more than 95 million customers worldwide. 

It is no secret that Salesforce has powered Uber’s CRM strategy and helped the company reach new milestones. 

Salesforce, one of the leading CRM vendors in the world helps Uber collect data from users who are engaging with the brand on social media. This approach helps Uber address customer queries and complaints in a timely manner. 

Besides, Uber can also keep track of all interactions with customers via an intuitive dashboard. 

Let’s not forget Uber’s loyalty program which allows customers to collect Uber Rewards. 

Every user earns points when they ride or eat with Uber, which can be redeemed across Uber’s plethora of services. 

It is safe to say that it is a textbook example of a brand acquiring customers by incentivizing them. 

3. McDonald’s

Did you know that McDonald’s serves around 1 million customers only in the UK? The number is projected to be anywhere close to 65-70 million across the world. 

So what is the secret sauce behind ensuring that customers keep coming back for more?

McDonald’s CRM strategy is second to none and this is why this is an interesting CRM case study. 

McDonald’s has joined hands with Astute Solutions. This partnership enables the global fast-food company to gain deep insights into customer feedback and their satisfaction levels. 

The company can also evaluate a restaurant’s performance based on region and swiftly identify gaps in customer relationships. Besides, this allows McDonald’s to step in before even the smallest of issues turn into serious problems. 

Astute Solutions works with McDonald’s to offer real-time customer information, integrate information from its restaurant into an advanced CRM tool, and enhance the accuracy of its reporting to facilitate sound decision-making. 

4. British Airways

The aviation industry is highly competitive and very consumer-oriented. Even a single bad experience is enough for customers to never look back.

So how does British Airways manage to fly more than 145,000 passengers to over 200 destinations each day? Why do customers love Birtish Airways?

The answer is clear – it’s Executive Club. 

The British Airways Executive Club is an excellent example of one should do CRM loyalty schemes. 

The program is free of cost and does have any ongoing charges. It allows passengers to earn ‘Avios’ points when you buy holiday packages, car rental, hotels, and flights via British Airways or its affiliated partners. 

These ‘Avios’ points can be redeemed for discounts on accommodation or flight tickets. Users can also choose their seat and meal preferences, paving the way for a flawless booking experience. 

As customers continue to fly with British Airways, they will be able to advance through the different tiers of the Executive Club membership (from blue to Gold). 

British Airways keeps track of this information using a CRM system named Teradata. It allows the airline operator to stay on top of all customer bookings and how they are engaging with their offers and deals. 

Learn, adapt, implement 

What are the key takeaways from all of these CRM case studies? 

Customer is the king, and if you treat the king right, your business will flourish. 

Having said that, it is important to have a full-proof CRM strategy in place to ensure you strengthen your relationship with your customers. It is critical that you start creating strategies to pull in more leads, manage deals in the pipeline, and foster healthy customer relationships. 

You will have to figure out a way to improve customer engagement, track your engagement, and also identify a way to improve your brand’s value. 

These CRM cast studies have made one thing very clear modern CRM software is a key part of this puzzle. 

If you are looking for a CRM software to take your customer relationship management to the next level, you can check out the different tools on our website. 

Read our reviews, compare different CRM solutions, and find a solution just for you. 

SEE ALSO: 5 Bold Predictions for CRM Software in 2022

Feature Image Source: rawpixel.com

Image 1 Source: rawpixel.com

Image 2 Source: rawpixel.com

[1] O’Connor. E (2022) “ TOP 50 CRM STATISTICS AND TRENDS FOR 2022 ” EPC Group [online] Accessed [March 2022]

Karandeep V

Karandeep was born in Pune, Maharashtra, an upcoming metropolitan city in the Western region of India. While most members of his family are engineers, he had different ideas. He was more inclined toward exploring the non-technical aspects of a business, which is why he studied Bachelors of Business Administration at Symbiosis International University, Pune.  Having said that, his love for new and upcoming technologies remained intact, which is why he has written extensively about technology throughout his career. After a brief stint with a gaming company at the beginning of his career, he discovered that his love for writing was not temporary.  Being a tech geek, he always liked installing and playing around with new applications on his mobile devices and the home desktop. He was fascinated by how technology can simplify even the most mundane and complex tasks with just a few commands. He keeps a close eye on how businesses use different tools to streamline their operations to boost productivity and efficiency. At ToolsMetric, he writes product reviews that cover the main features and specifications of different enterprise applications. The sheer amount of innovation and hard work that goes into building these tech solutions is one of the reasons why Karandeep loves reviewing these tools. Besides product reviews, he also writes interesting news articles and blogs that track the latest developments in the tech industry.  When he is not writing, you can find him rooted to his seat playing video games, watching movies, or supporting his favorite football team. Since his childhood, he has always loved to travel and explore new places. Traveling is a major part of his life due to a myriad of reasons such as experiencing new cultures, food, and traditions. His other hobbies include playing football, cooking, and running.  You can find him on LinkedIn here .

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• Vicente Guerola-Navarro   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-0367-6319 1 ,
• Hermenegildo Gil-Gomez   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-7985-2454 1 ,
• Raul Oltra-Badenes   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-1522-8230 1 &
• Pedro Soto-Acosta   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-4308-9781 2  

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Entrepreneurship is one of the business forces with the greatest power to transform today's society, due to its ability to discover and take advantage of new opportunities to satisfy customer new and changing needs and expectations. Customer relationship management (CRM) has proved to be both a highly influential business management strategy and a powerful business management technology solution, with a particularly relevant impact in the area of entrepreneurship. CRM has helped drive growth and future expectations and has had excellent results in terms of return on investment wherever it has been implemented. An exhaustive review of previously published findings in a specific subject area can uncover new lines of research. This paper uses semi-systematic review to the study of the reality of the link between CRM and entrepreneurial marketing in business. This approach is used to comprehensively describe the state of the art of the impact that CRM can have in the modern business environment, through the empowerment of entrepreneurial marketing. In a structured manner, the present paper reviews the 86 most relevant studies of how CRM affects entrepreneurial marketing policy development through its alignment with relationship marketing and customer-centric business models. The growing use of CRM in companies is one of the pillars of technological and social change in entrepreneurship, being a clear example of how big data can benefit society. The study focuses on the period from 2015 to 2019.

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Introduction

In a globalized commercial world such as the current one, markets are dynamic and changing, and the customer lies at the beginning and end of the value chain. One of the greatest values that entrepreneurship provides in an environment like this is the ability of entrepreneurs to take advantage of opportunities and discover new ways to meet customer expectations, and thereby transform the world in general and the market in general particular, all due to the unstoppable process of digital transformation. One of the consequences of globalization is the greater ability of customers to access both information and the acquisition of products and services offered even beyond the borders of countries (Guerola-Navarro et al., 2019 ). This means that the needs, desires, and expectations of customers are changing and increasingly demanding, with which the market has become so dynamic that only companies that manage to adapt to said dynamism survive. And for this it is necessary to invest in innovation and development, and to have an entrepreneurial spirit that is open to discovering and taking advantage of new opportunities and ways of satisfying those needs, desires and expectations. Entrepreneurship thus becomes one of the engines of change and transformation of society, which justifies the growing research interest in this area (Hills et al., 2008 ).

The area of entrepreneurship is being the center of study for various researchers from different perspectives due to its important role as an engine of economic and social development, reaching the point of being able to affirm that the entrepreneur is the single most important player in a modern economy (Sánchez, 2011 ). It was not too long ago that the field of entrepreneurship was considered little more than an applied trade as opposed to an academic area of study and there was no research to be accomplished because it was thought that those who could not attend college would simply “practice” the concept of new business start-up (Hills et al., 2008 ). The role of entrepreneurship in society has changed drastically in the last quarter century, to the point that, in recent years, entrepreneurship has been viewed as the engine of economic and social development due to the power it has developed to provide a better quality of life to society. society through its impetus and its transformative potential. Entrepreneurs are those who work on transformative environments, discover or identify opportunities, or create and exploit them to add value to society. Entrepreneurship is nowadays regarded as the study of the processes of identifying, evaluating, developing and exploiting opportunities, as well as of the resources and conditioners that influence these processes, as part of one of the most powerful tools that business has for bringing better customer experiences. (Frederick et al., 2018 ).

Nowadays, the customer is also considered the engine of business success (Díez de Castro et al., 2002 ). In such a world, companies must have the right tools to collect the necessary management information so that they can meet the needs and expectations of customers and thereby mold their productive, logistic, and commercial efforts to match these needs and expectations (Gil-Gomez et al., 2021 ; Ochoa Laburu, 1996 ; Vicedo et al., 2020 ). This makes the development of entrepreneurial businesses especially difficult, which is why it is shown that all those tools and technological solutions that can have a high impact on customer management and entrepreneurial marketing are key, an area in which Customer Relationship Marketing (CRM) has proven to have a special impact.

In the current business environment, and especially evident in its entrepreneurial part, where the client appears as the key and determining figure for any decision making (de Guzmán Miranda, 2014 ), it is essential to evaluate the impact that any strategy and tool may have on the management of the client's knowledge available to the company (Alfaro Faus, 2004 ), in order to be able to adapt its commercial and marketing actions towards the most efficient and appropriate target. Marketing (understood as the management of commercial relationships with customers within the market), and more specifically entrepreneurial marketing (as a powerful association of marketing tools and the innovative and transforming power of entrepreneurship) is therefore one of the great forces that promote the economic development of society. Along these lines, CRM has emerged in recent decades as the most widely disseminated strategy and management tool in terms of a tool designed and focused on managing the powerful marketing strategies through the management of the relationships with customers, and consistently and efficiently managing information and actions aimed at the clients (Al-Omoush et al., 2021 ), which is especially important in the field of entrepreneurship. This study tries precisely to analyze the previous and relevant studies that unify these important aspects of business management: the management of customer relationships, and marketing as a strategy for reaching customers, specifically in the field of entrepreneurship. The ultimate objective is to identify the dimensions that other previous studies have highlighted as more relevant and with the greatest impact in these fields of business management, to draw conclusions from the results obtained, and to propose future lines of research consistent with the results obtained.

For most entrepreneurial marketers, marketing is a social, personal activity and not only an organizational function. Marketing to achieve growth is what many entrepreneurs are passionate about. Marketing from the perspective of an entrepreneur is not just one of the functions of the business that must be carried out such as accounting, finance, or HRM; but is often considered by entrepreneurs as the core function of the firm (Hills et al., 2008 ). Regarding marketing area impactful tools, Customer relationship management (CRM) is one of the leading business strategies and business management tools (Al-Omoush et al., 2021 ), and it has been shown to be crucial in developing sales, marketing, and production planning strategies. This key role of CRM is a consequence of the customer-related information that can be obtained from all CRM sources of value, in the sense of providing the overall efforts of companies with the appropriate sense of customer service and customer needs (García Moreno et al., 2001 ). CRM refers to both a customer relationship management philosophy and the technological solutions or methodologies required for its implementation because each tool and each level of implementation of CRM is a true reflection of the CRM philosophy or strategy itself (Chen et al., 2020 ). Value chain management, together with the resulting strategy for producing goods and providing services, thus becomes meaningful and effective when it is based on the knowledge of the vital business reality of customers (Guerola-Navarro et al., 2020c ; Ochoa Laburu & Arana Pérez, 1997 ). This feature is one of the most highly valued characteristics of CRM’s action points.

Menguzzato and Renau ( 1991 ) established the principles that should be followed by business decision makers of successful firms that seek to achieve high levels of business performance and endure over time as model companies and shining examples of business success. In this sense, the presence and relevance of entrepreneurial marketing as part of business success is crucial to the study of any business management methodology (Miquel Peris et al., 1994 ). Therefore, any tool such as CRM, which supports the collection of customer management information and its use in planning strategies, is essential in management (Hills et al., 2008 ).

Hills et al. ( 2008 ) points out that entrepreneurs are characterized by creating and exploiting turbulent markets, something that other economic actors tend not to do. Economic theory suggests that entrepreneurs are seen as creating imbalances by introducing innovations to drive markets or as firms that attempt to move economies away from equilibrium by exploiting previously unidentified opportunities. The use of knowledge management and innovation, empowered by the use of CRM technologocal solutions, to create entrepreneurial rent has important implications for marketing (Gil-Gomez et al., 2020 ). In this way, entrepreneurial marketing proves not to be the direct consequence of specific managerial decisions but more the outcome of entrepreneurial processes and culture (Hills et al., 2008 ). The aim of studying the reality of CRM through scientific research in the areas of business, sociology, and technology is to effectively demonstrate that CRM is one of the most powerful business tools for managing sales, entrepreneurial marketing, and services (Guerola-Navarro et al., 2021b ).

In this paper, and during the following sections, the impact of CRM on entrepreneurial marketing will be studied. First, a Literature Review section is presented in which what has been ascertained from previous studies on the relationship between CRM and marketing in general is referenced, particularizing on the entrepreneurial aspect of business marketing. In the following sections, the methodology followed in the study is explained, as well as the results obtained and the conclusions derived from this scientific study.

• Literature review

Marketing is one of the areas in which the expectation of impact is greatest through the use of CRM technological solutions and the culture of customer relationship management itself. Specifically, and within the general concept of marketing, entrepreneurial marketing is one of the areas with the greatest projection both at the business level and at the research level. This section initially analyzes the concept and relevance of entrepreneurial marketing, and then the concept and evolution of CRM solutions, to later proceed to establish the marketing approach to the CRM customer-centric management theory, all of it as previous stages for finally stating the state of the art on the impact of CRM on entrepreneurial marketing specifically.

• Entrepreneurial marketing

Marketing is the discipline concerned with studying the behavior of markets and the needs of consumers. Entrepreneurial marketing, as part of the global discipline of marketing, but with the special characteristics of entrepreneurial agents, analyzes companies’ commercial management in attracting, capturing, and retaining end customers by fulfilling their wishes and resolving their problems all with the aim of transforming society by discovering opportunities and paths not explored by other business agents (Hills et al., 2008 ; Bennett, 1995 ). Regarding entrepreneurship, entrepreneurs’ tactics for using the marketing strategies differ from the traditional business brand, where product development, pricing, promotion, and distribution are the key marketing mix pillars (Martin, 2009 ). Entrepreneurs prefer direct interchanges and building personal relationships, being the entrepreneurs' tactics clearly based on personal observation and contact information, rather than formal research and global marketing initiatives.

Kraus et al. ( 2010 ) establishes that, within the business field of discovering and taking advantage of new business opportunities that can transform society and improve the overall customer experience, entrepreneurial marketing can be understood as the combination of marketing with an entrepreneurial mindset, which leads to a definition of entrepreneurial marketing as the "organizational function of marketing by taking into account innovativeness, risk taking, pro-activeness and the pursuit of opportunities without regard for the resources currently controlled". Smart and Conant ( 1994 ) suggests that entrepreneurial firms have a different set of marketing competencies that typically includes a superior understanding of customer needs, market trends, and market positioning. Hills et al. ( 2008 ) indicate that entrepreneurs engage in marketing in ways that differ the classical marketing theory.

Jones and Rowley ( 2011 ) suggest that marketing in SMEs is intertwined with other activities and behaviors in small business and argue that to understand marketing in SMEs it is essential to understand its context, specifically in relation to customer engagement, the innovation. and business approaches to marketing. Given the relevance of the interaction between entrepreneurship and marketing, the concept of "entrepreneurial business" has gained significance in the research and business sphere. While some authors argue that entrepreneurial business is important to all organizations (large and small), there is a general recognition that the concept is particularly appropriate for the context of small businesses (Jones & Rowley, 2011 ).

Stokes ( 2000 ) establishes how marketing adapts to entrepreneurial contexts and proposes a conceptual model of the marketing processes undertaken by entrepreneurs. This study explores how entrepreneurial marketing differs from traditional marketing theory, concluding that entrepreneurs tend to be innovation-oriented, driven by new ideas and an intuitive feel for the market, rather than rigorous evaluation of business needs.

Customer relationship management (CRM)

The origins of CRM date back to the 1970s, when CRM emerged as a technological solution for companies to automate the management of the internal sales force (Buttle, 2004 ). Recent bibliometric studies assessing the evolution of the hubs of productivity and influence in terms of the eminent authors, countries, and institutions in the field of CRM have shown the exponential growth of interest in CRM since 2010 (Liu et al., 2020 ), being a definite complement for the recent extensive literature reviews performed about CRM impact on entrepreneurial marketing and innovation areas (Guerola-Navarro et al., 2021a ).

CRM is one of the most modern business management tools to establish effective channels and methods of customer-centric information management, in conjunction with Enterprise Resource Planning solutions (Vicedo et al., 2020 ; Oltra-Badenes et al., 2019 ). Its primary goal is to improve organizational performance to enable firms to achieve better business results (Guerola-Navarro et al., 2020a ). This modern approach differs considerably from earlier approaches such as the one described by Chen and Wu ( 2016 ), who proposed a basic definition of CRM as “a combination of people, processes and technology that seeks to understand a company’s customers.” This definition has become obsolete given the recent evolution of CRM tools toward a global vision of comprehensive management of information in relation to customer knowledge to achieve more effective interactions with clients. Modern studies of business management and the use of information technology consider the necessity of the comprehensive management of key information for business decision makers. Payne and Frow ( 2005 ) established a global conceptual framework for this modern approach to the comprehensive management of customer information and expectations, leading to successful decision making and the planning of coordinated and effective entrepreneurial marketing strategies to attract and retain the company’s most profitable customers. For this purpose, CRM is a fundamental tool (Ayyagari, 2021 ).

Recent studies corroborate the importance of CRM as a key tool in the digital transformation of society and the current globalized and dynamic market (Gil-Gomez et al., 2020 ). The role of CRM is stressed not only because of its potential to improve current management (or exploitation), but also because of its potential in developing innovation (or exploration) capacity. This potential makes CRM one of the most powerful management technology solutions in the field of modern business management (Adiwijaya et al., 2017 ).

Marketing approach to the CRM customer-centric management theory

Having established the importance of CRM as a business management technology solution with a major impact in the field of marketing, and especially on entrepreneurial marketing, it is important to identify the marketing approach that is most closely aligned with the CRM customer-centric management theory. This marketing approach is used in this study to ensure that the results are consistent and relevant for future studies. Of all current theories and trends in marketing, the definition of relationship marketing (or relational marketing) is of greatest interest because of its close match with CRM objectives. Specifically, relationship marketing is defined as the integrated effort to identify and maintain a customer network, with the aim of continually reinforcing it for the benefit of both parties, through individualized contacts and interactions that generate value over time (Harker, 1999 ).

This concept of relational marketing is especially important in the area of entrepreneurship, since maintaining a long-term relationship with loyal customers empirically shows that it favors the creation of a financial cushion and a culture of confidence in the future of the company, which they are the basis for every entrepreneurial agent to continue taking risks and facing new challenges. In short, a loyal customer base allows entrepreneurs to be what they are, agents who pour all their energy and capacity for innovation into transforming society through previously undiscovered or untapped opportunities. Loyal customers are defined as those who always buy a specific type of item in the same store, who always consume the same brands, and who always carry out their business operations through the same entities (de Guzmán Miranda, 2014 ). In terms of its basic principles, relationship marketing (Alfaro Faus, 2004 ):

is based on segmented or customized marketing,

tries to generate long-term benefits,

represents a commitment to the development of a mutually beneficial relationship continued over time,

is based on continuous improvement and the creation and contribution of value to the client,

orients and coordinates the entire company toward the client,

requires complex and continuous internal marketing,

directs the training, motivation, and evaluation of employees toward increasing customer satisfaction,

seeks customer satisfaction with each relationship through an emphasis on customer service.

In the entrepreneurial business environment, there is therefore a link between CRM technology solutions, relationship marketing based on customer centered focus and business success. To achieve the expected benefits of relationship marketing, CRM is a key tool for business management. In a globalized, dynamic, and changing market, like today’s, the principles of relationship marketing are critical to the success of any entrepreneurial marketing strategy adopted by any company hoping to succeed. CRM is one of the technologies that has aroused the most interest in the last decade. This interest is reflected by numerous bibliometric studies. Its market share has increased dramatically in recent years, especially with the development of cloud computing platforms. CRM is a technology that has only relatively recently attracted interest. Also, its scope of development is closely linked to relationship marketing. Therefore, it was considered both interesting and novel to conduct further research on this subject, hence the motivation for the present literature review.

State of the art on the impact of CRM on entrepreneurial marketing

Given the relative newness of CRM technology solutions as a focus of scientific research, there are few studies of the state of the art in terms of its impact on the current business reality. Following the theory of the duality and complementary nature of the qualitative and quantitative studies of the realities under investigation (Hernández Sampieri et al., 1996 ), the state of the art should first present quantitative analysis of the publications and citations in this area and should then offer in-depth analysis of the most relevant publications.

The first approach to the study of the state of the art is to examine the quantitative reality of the subject. This approach is reflected in CRM bibliometric studies such as the study by Tsai ( 2011 ) and the more recent study by Guerola-Navarro et al. ( 2020b ), who reviewed the most important and well-recognized databases in scientific research to graphically analyze the evolution of the number of publications and citations and determine the hubs of greatest productivity and influence. The origin (author, country, entity, etc.) of the research articles stored in these databases was considered in terms of productivity. The origin of articles whose publications had most citations were considered to be of greatest influence.

Regarding the second, this approach to the state of the art of CRM, scholars have conducted systematic reviews of the literature on CRM, identifying lines of investigation that have been proposed for future research. Ngai ( 2005 ) reviewed the academic literature on CRM from 1992 to 2002, providing a comprehensive bibliography and proposing a method of classifying the literature. Subsequently Ngai et al. ( 2009 ) built an academic database of literature for the period 2000 to 2006 and proposed a classification scheme to classify these articles. More recently, Soltani and Navimipour ( 2016 ) systematically reviewed the state-of-the-art literature on CRM mechanisms and offered recommendations for future research.

Considering previous research and the intention to establish a complete state of the art for CRM technology, there is a lack of studies that specifically address the entrepreneurial marketing side of CRM. The decisive influence of a good entrepreneurial marketing strategy on successful business activity has been verified. Similarly, CRM has also been cited as one of the most relevant technological solutions in obtaining the key management information for the development of such a marketing strategy. Therefore, a study that reflects the state of the art of CRM in the specific field of entrepreneurship marketing can prove valuable for subsequent research. This future research on the role of CRM in improving marketing strategies is expected to be vital to enhance company performance.

Therefore, through an extensive literature review, this paper complements the existing bibliometric studies of CRM by adopting a semi-systematic review to studying the business reality of CRM, focusing specifically on the entrepreneurial marketing side. This approach, together with the quantitative approach of bibliometric analysis of the productivity and influence of the scientific research community, establishes a complete state of the art that can be used to support future research on the impact of CRM as a tool and its marketing applications in the modern business environment.

This paper thus offers a comprehensive review of the literature on the potential of applying CRM technology solutions through their impact on companies’ management of entrepreneurial marketing strategies. All research articles published since the birth of CRM to the present day (end of 2019) are reviewed. This paper has the following structure. First, the research methodology is described. Then, the method to classify articles on CRM in entrepreneurial marketing is presented. Next, these articles on entrepreneurial marketing in CRM are reviewed and analyzed. Finally, conclusions are drawn in relation to future research on CRM and its impact on marketing management.

Research methodology

There are several types of literature review research. However, certain elements are common to all of these, namely analysis of the most important papers on a given topic of study, categorization of these studies under the proposed taxonomy or conceptual framework, and the establishment of the basis for the future research agenda. Snyder ( 2019 ) notes that a “literature review can broadly be described as a more or less systematic way of collecting and synthesizing previous research,” raising questions about the quality and trustworthiness of classical literature review studies and establishing guidelines for new methods. Systematic review papers may be of several types: structured reviews focusing on widely used methods, theories, and constructs (Canabal & White, 2008 ; Paul & Singh, 2017 ; Kahiya, 2018 ); framework-based studies (Paul & Benito, 2018 ); hybrid-narrative studies with a framework for setting the future research agenda (Kumar et al., 2019a ); theory-based reviews (Gilal et al., 2018 ); meta-analyses (Knoll & Matthes, 2017 ); bibliometric reviews (Randhawa et al., 2016 ); and reviews aiming at model or framework development (Paul, 2019 ; Paul & Mas, 2019 ). Torraco ( 2005 ) and Callahan ( 2010 ) argued that an integrative literature review should offer a research agenda, a classification of concepts, conceptual frameworks as the way of thinking resulting from the study, and the basis for developing future research. In line with the indications of Snyder ( 2019 ), the present study follows a semi-systematic review, with the following four phases: 1) design, 2) conduct, 3) analyze, and 4) structure and write the review. The elements followed in each phase of this study are detailed below.

Phase 1. Design the review

The purpose of this study is to categorize the most important papers on CRM and entrepreneurial marketing. The goal is to provide a map of studies and conclusions that can help establish a focused research agenda. The purpose of the study is to support the empirical testing of models of the impact of CRM and entrepreneurial marketing on firm performance. Previous bibliometric studies show that CRM is a business management technology that has been growing since 2000. This growth has been especially pronounced in the last decade, particularly in the last five years, with the development of cloud computing platforms. Therefore, the present review was deemed necessary. The potential audience for this study is growing as it is shown in the bibliometric studies confirming the growing interest and influence of papers on CRM (Guerola-Navarro et al., 2020b ). The same growing interest is shown in the literature around entrepreneurial marketing, as one of the most powerful forces to transform the society and the market itself. The search strategy is based on bibliometric studies carried out with the same research criteria. This study follows and complements these previous studies by describing the state of the art. Therefore, as explained in this section, the Web of Science Core Collection database for the period 2015 to 2019 was used.

Phase 2. Conduct the review

The present study provides a review of the literature on the interaction between CRM and entrepreneurial marketing. Therefore, the selection procedure was designed to identify articles based on all the keywords related to these two concepts that provide meaningful results. Certain adjustments were foreseen to eliminate articles that were not impactful or whose content was not intrinsically relevant to the study. The selected articles were carefully read to ensure the quality, representativeness, and applicability of the study in the scope described in the future research agenda.

Phase 3. Analyze

In order to obtain the needing information for carrying out this study, three sources have been explored: complementary bibliometric studies, previous literature reviews, and methodological studies of literature review processes.

Phase 4. Structure and write the review

The paper begins with the description of the scope and objective of the study, followed by the description of the methodological basis followed on it. The information regarding the impact of CRM and entrepreneurial marketing has been reviewed, considering Its importance, representativeness, and relevance for future research. The conclusions are presented with the aim to bring the most interesting points to other researchers and to open new researching lines in the future.

Following these propositions (Snyder, 2019 ), the starting point has been to determine which database to use to identify scientific research articles published in prestigious journals. The database chosen in this study was the Web of Science (WoS) Core Collection, which is owned by Thomson Reuters. The journal’s own page contained the citations from any journal (Mulet-Forteza et al., 2019 ), but we only wanted to take into account the citations from the most relevance journals in the research fields, and this was why we have used only this database. WoS core collection covers most of the known scientific disciplines, hosting more than 50,000,000 papers across more than 15,000 journals (Merigó & Yang, 2017 ). In the field of scientific research, it is generally assumed that WoS contains only high-quality journals characterized by timely publication and review of papers, scientific criteria for the peer review process, and broad dissemination through the Internet and the most widely used channels for the publication of scientific research (Martínez-López et al., 2020 ). Therefore, WoS was considered the most appropriate database for this study, both due to the specific interest of our study, as well as the prestige, completeness and relevance of this database in the scientific field.

In the WoS refine categories, there is no specific section for CRM and entrepreneurial marketing. Therefore, the search had to be refined by filtering the results depending on the primary focus of the journals and the papers included in these journals. The Web of Science Core Collection database was the core database used for this study, as it has been explained previously. The initial period used in the literature search for this study was 1900 to 2019, with the intention of covering all completed and closed years in terms of publications (at the time of the study, the year 2019 was not yet closed and it continued to receive publications). It was based on the search strings “customer relationship management”, (“Customer relationship management*”), “CRM” (“CRM*”), “entrepreneurial marketing” (“entrepreneurial marketing*”), “entrepreneurship” (“entrepreneurship*”) and “marketing” (“marketing*”). With these refine filters, it has been observed that the database obtained contained a sample of the entire spectrum and range of topics that were intended to be analyzed in this study, so it was not considered necessary to expand, reduce, or change these parameters for others (in fact, it has been found that introducing other parameters deviated the database from the sample that was intended to be used in the research). The search returned 1,034 results from the Web of Science Core Collection in these areas for this timeframe.

To consider the most relevant research papers for a comprehensive literature review, an important field in WoS is Document Type (Vallaster et al., 2019 ). The document types of interest in this study were article, review, and letter (Merigó et al., 2015 ; Vallaster et al., 2019 ). The original data set of 1034 was reduced to only articles, reviews, and letters, being the number of results of the search reduced to 646 articles.

The focus of this study is the relationship between CRM management technology solutions and the management of marketing strategies, all within the scope of business management. Therefore, filters were applied to select articles in the WoS categories of Business, Management, Operations Research Management Science, Computer Science Information Systems, Information Science Library Science, Computer Science Interdisciplinary Applications, and Economics. This process gave a total of 541 results.

Analysis of the timeframe of previous literature reviews shows that the most recent state of the art was created in 2016 by Soltani and Navimipour ( 2016 ). Therefore, to ensure the originality of the articles and choose the correct timeframe in this study, these results were filtered for the years 2015 to 2019. The reasons for selecting this timeframe are given below.

The period 2015 to 2019 covers the last five years for which data are available. Therefore, this period best reflects the most up-to-date approaches and trends in this area.

The bibliometric study by Guerola-Navarro et al. ( 2020b ) to examine the evolution and trends in scientific research on CRM shows that the recent rise in the number of publications on CRM (and, by extension, the interest in this topic) began in 2015.

After applying this filter in WoS, the search returned 197 articles, covering the type, content, and magnitude of research database that was looked for the research.

The full text of these articles was reviewed to eliminate those that were unrelated to the application of CRM marketing tools in the planning and development of business marketing strategies. All articles where the primary focus was not the inextricable relationship between CRM and marketing were eliminated, considering not only the existence of a marketing module within the CRM technological solution itself but also (and even more importantly) the impact of CRM strategy on the development of effective marketing strategies and policies.

Thus, the number of relevant articles was 86 following the elimination of those that were not considered relevant to this study or that were not considered important articles in relation to the application of marketing techniques to CRM. These 86 articles were classified according to the dimensions of CRM and its elements and according to the dimensions of marketing and its elements.

Other items were discarded for the following reasons (research studies that appeared as search results in the WoS Core Collection with the strings used in this study, but that for different reasons have been analyzed but are not part of the sample from which the results and conclusions were obtained of this study):

Some articles were found in WoS using the filters for this study. However, their content was not entirely relevant to the concepts represented by these filters. Examples of these articles are those by Hu et al. ( 2019 ), Naudé and Sutton-Brady ( 2019 ), Skarmeas et al. ( 2019 ), Mosavi and Afsar ( 2018 ), and Di Benedetto ( 2017 ).

Some articles were relevant to CRM but not to entrepreneurial marketing. Examples are those by Cricelli et al. ( 2020 ), Cruz and Vasconcelos ( 2015 ), Garrido-Moreno et al. ( 2015 ), and Mohammadhossein et al. ( 2015 ).

Some articles were relevant to entrepreneurial marketing but not to CRM. Examples are those by Coda and de Castro ( 2019 ), Levin et al. ( 2019 ), Mehrabi et al. ( 2019 ), and Alnawas and Hemsley-Brown ( 2019 ).

Some articles were mostly technical and focused more on the technological side of the CRM tool than on its impact on business management. Examples of these articles are those by Cu et al. ( 2019 ), Yang and Shieh ( 2019 ), Ullah et al. ( 2019 ), and Ivan and Popa ( 2015 ).

Some articles focused exclusively on applicability to a specific environment or situation and were not general enough to be extrapolated and to be considered representative of a general case. Examples are the articles by Sota et al. ( 2020 ), Junaid et al. ( 2019 ), Rahimi and Gunlu ( 2016 ), and Siems et al. ( 2015 ).

With the results of the literature review and with the bibliometric research, it is hoped that the most relevant areas of research interest and focus can be detected. The future research agenda (Paul & Rosado-Serrano, 2019 ) will be defined by these research trends. It will help reveal the most relevant and influential studies of the expected benefits of the implementation and use of CRM in the field of entrepreneurship. This study aims to achieve a model to measure the impact of the use of CRM and entrepreneurial marketing on firm performance.. For this purpose, it is crucial to have a study of the state of the art as a starting point. This study of the state of the art consists of a solid bibliometric study and a thorough literature review.

Following this description of the selection of these articles, the methodology that was used to classify them is now developed. The first step to classifying the articles that explore the links between CRM and entrepreneurial marketing (i.e., the articles whose content is relevant to the present study) and to building a comprehensive state of the art was to identify the dimensions and elements that characterize CRM and those that characterize entrepreneurial marketing.

CRM dimensions

When performing an extensive search for previous studies of literature reviews or the creation of a state of the art of CRM, different CRM dimensions and elements can be used to classify the articles. The literature review shows that CRM can be defined in terms of four dimensions with the following elements (Kracklauer et al., 2004 ; Ngai, 2005 ; Parvatiyar & Sheth, 2001 ; Swift, 2001 ):

Customer identification:

Target customer analysis

Customer segmentation

Customer attraction:

Direct marketing

Customer retention:

Loyalty programs

One-to-one marketing

Complaint management

Customer development:

Customer lifetime value

Upselling/cross-selling

Market basket analysis

Ngai ( 2005 ) analyzed the concept of CRM as a tool to identify the most valuable clients, attract them as trusted clients, retain them with loyalty policies, and develop a lasting partnership with them. For this process, four dimensions are used: customer identification, customer attraction, customer retention, and customer development. These dimensions are a true reflection of the potential of CRM technology solutions to reinforce the business value chain based on knowledge of the needs and expectations of clients and to achieve the goal of customer satisfaction. This goal is client focused, and the needs of clients offer the starting point in this business value chain (Li et al., 2006 , 2019 ; Lin et al., 2010 ).

Kracklauer et al. ( 2004 ) defined customer identification as any effort by the company to turn as many individuals as possible into customers as per the business aims of the company for a given time and under given circumstances. This phase has two elements or stages that are central to its success in customer acquisition.

Target customer analysis is where a company studies its capabilities and possibilities for development in the short and medium term, analyzes what its target market may look like based on its circumstances and surroundings, and identifies its target customer to direct its recruitment efforts (Hult & Ketchen, 2001 ).

Customer segmentation is where a company tries to identify and analyze its target customers, and after establishing its global potential market, the company segments or divides its target market according to the characteristics of the homogeneous segments that are of interest for its commercial activity (Huang & Lin, 2005 ).

Customer attraction is defined as any effort by the company to get customers interested in the goods and services it offers. Customer attraction is the next step after segmentation during the previous step of customer identification (He et al., 2004 ). This stage consists of one primary activity.

Direct marketing is the principal tool to overcome challenges and grasp opportunities associated with the need for customer attraction. Companies must address target audiences both directly and indirectly, always keeping in mind that reaching the right customers is the key to business success (Palmer & Koenig-Lewis, 2009 ).

Customer retention is the most difficult objective to achieve in the current globalized, changing, and dynamic market. Econometric studies show that it is considerably more efficient for companies to retain their best existing clients than to secure new clients whose long-term performance is unknown (Reinartz et al., 2004 ). Establishing the fundamental elements for customer retention is therefore crucial for business success.

Loyalty programs involve creating a global structured plan composed of synchronous actions in which all efforts are focused on retaining the best clients (Kracklauer et al., 2004 ), especially through customer service and support programs.

One-to-one marketing is important because in markets as competitive as today’s globalized environment, personalizing marketing efforts to suit the clients (or segment) that these efforts target is the only way to match marketing campaigns to customers and expected results (Miquel Peris et al., 1994 ).

Complaint management is important because in the current market, customer retention is not viable without an adequate customer service and support policy. This policy describes how to accept, process, and respond to all feedback and complaints from customers (Karimi et al., 2001 ).

Finally, customer development refers to all efforts to strengthen and develop commercial activity with long-term clients. This activity occurs through attempts to expand and strengthen profitable lines of business with existing loyal customers (Aggarval & Yu, 2002 ). Three key elements are considered at this stage.

Customer lifetime value analysis refers to the prediction of the total net income a company can expect from a customer (Drew et al., 2001 ).

Upselling and cross-selling are promotion activities that aim at augmenting the number of associated or closely related services that a customer uses within the company (Prinzie & Poel, 2006 ).

Market basket analysis means maximizing customer transaction intensity and value by discovering patterns in the purchase behavior of customers (Aggarval & Yu, 2002 ).

Each of these four dimensions of CRM has several elements, which are used in this study to classify the selected articles in the field of marketing in CRM.

Entrepreneurial marketing dimensions

Following the same research approach as for CRM, previous literature reviews or state-of-the-art analyses of marketing and entrepreneurial marketing, specifically relationship marketing, were reviewed. Interest in this form of marketing is due to its growing importance, its alignment with CRM technology solutions, and its efficiency, which has been shown in recent studies (as mentioned in the introduction).

Harker ( 1999 ) synthesized the definitions of relationship marketing. The following dimensions or conceptual categories and their corresponding elements were identified:

Creation/birth: attracting, establishing, getting

Development/develop: enhancing, strengthening

Maintenance/maintain: sustaining, stability, keeping

Interactive/interaction: exchanging, mutually, co-operating

Long term/temporary: lasting, permanent, retaining

Emotional content: commitment, trust, promises

Output: profitable, rewarding, efficiency

Despite being the most extensive and most specific of any research on this topic, the aforementioned study is also the oldest. Therefore, these categories were taken as a conceptual reference, but a more recent study was sought to identify the dimensions that are most pertinent to the current economic and business environment.

Samiee and Walters ( 2003 ) studied and classified the most important articles on relationship management in an international context. This approach is especially interesting because the current market is characterized by increasing globalization. Therefore, the international business approach is considered up to date and relevant to this study. Samiee and Walters ( 2003 ) concluded that the following constructs can be used to classify articles (in order of appearance in the studied articles):

Relationship quality

Reciprocity

Investment in the relationship

Information exchange

The third literature review considered on relationship marketing is the most recent one. Das ( 2009 ) presented an adaptation of the study by Samiee and Walters ( 2003 ) to a more up-to-date environment. This adaptation is concise and simple, reducing the categories under study to the following five constructs:

Cooperation

The list of constructs compiled by Das ( 2009 ) is the most recent list and is consistent and well aligned with that of Samiee and Walters ( 2003 ). Thus, the dimensions defined by Das ( 2009 ) are used in this study. These dimensions are the most well recognized in the recent scientific research on relationship marketing. They are also accepted as suitable for the study of international business. Therefore, the marketing dimensions used in the classification of the selected articles are trust, commitment, cooperation, closeness, and relationship quality.

Trust depicts the concept of relationship management as emotional and behavioral, focusing on concepts such as bonding, empathy, reciprocity, and trust (Sin et al., 2005 ). This concept is linked to the current trend of customer-centric marketing and thus to CRM as a tool to achieve this goal.

Adamson et al. ( 2003 ) focused on the joint impact of a strategy combining trust and commitment on retail customer management, where the relationship with the customer and the customer service and support strategy is fundamental to business success.

Also central to the success of the business marketing strategy is the cooperation between the different components of the value chain, starting with clients and their needs and expectations, passing through all internal departments of the company including the outsourced external services (logistics, supply, etc.), and ending again with the client and client satisfaction (Vazquez et al., 2005 ).

Closeness refers to the interest and familiarity with which the company deals with clients. The aim is to meet their needs and expectations while giving them the highest degree of satisfaction possible, thereby establishing a long-term partnership that is beneficial for both customer and company (Nielson, 1998 ).

The last dimension is relationship quality, which is the most general of all and involves characteristics of all the previous dimensions. It brings together all the efforts of the company (within its relationship marketing plan and strategy) to establish a relationship of trust, cooperation, customer service, and support that guarantees customer loyalty and a long-term partnership with customers (Bennett & Barkensjo, 2005 ; Storbacka et al., 1994 ; Ulaga & Eggert, 2006 ).

Classification process

Once the dimensions of CRM and entrepreneurial marketing had been established, the articles were classified according to these dimensions and their elements. The first step was to read each article carefully and evaluate whether it was related to CRM. If the article was considered to be related to CRM, then the dimensions of CRM that were relevant to the study were identified. The second step was similar to the first step, except this time for entrepreneurial marketing. In this case, the dimensions of entrepreneurial marketing that were applicable to the study were identified. Once the dimensions of CRM and entrepreneurial marketing had been identified for each selected article, the third step was to organize the results in a table to analyze the results and draw useful conclusions for future entrepreneurial marketing studies in CRM.

Once the selection process of the articles considered in this study had been carried out and the methodology and classification process had been defined, the 86 selected articles were classified according to the following factors:

the four dimensions and nine elements of CRM and the five dimensions of entrepreneurial marketing

the year of publication of each selected article

the journal where each article was published

the number of citations of each article according to WoS.

From these classifications, a clear and concise picture about the state of the art was expected to form. This picture can be used to focus and develop future studies in which the primary topic of study is CRM in entrepreneurial marketing in general or, more specifically, the impact of CRM on company performance through its strategic potential in entrepreneurial marketing.

Next, and as support for the discussion of results and presentation of conclusions of the study, the results are presented concisely and in a table format that allows an easy identification of the key arguments of discussion.

To analyze the results of the study, classification of the 86 selected articles was first necessary. The detailed distribution of these articles classified according to the proposed classification framework is shown in Table 1 .

In this table (Distribution of the selected articles according to the proposed classification framework) it has been identified which are the determining dimensions and elements (of CRM and entrepreneurial marketing) in each of the studies analyzed, in order to establish new classifications a posteriori that make it possible to identify the most relevant research focuses for future research, as well as to identify in which areas CRM and entrepreneurial marketing coincide decisively in terms of powerful business management tools. Following the four specified distribution criteria, this classification was analyzed to determine the most important selection criteria in this field.

Distribution of the selected articles by CRM dimension and entrepreneurial marketing dimension

From the results obtained in Table 1 , it has been analyzed and taken a further step in their interpretation based on the distribution of the selected articles by CRM dimension and entrepreneurial marketing dimension. The aim is to identify which are the dimensions of CRM and entrepreneurial marketing that have aroused and arouse more interest in recent years, so that conclusions and recommendations can be drawn on relevant aspects of both tools that help to improve business management strategies, and with it to improve organizational performance and business results.

The quantitative distribution of the selected articles by CRM dimension and entrepreneurial marketing dimension is shown in Table 2 . This table was created once the CRM dimensions, CRM elements, and entrepreneurial marketing dimensions that are crucial for business decision makers had been highlighted for each selected article shown in Table 1 .

The overall distribution in Table 2 shows that customer retention is the most common CRM dimension where marketing is used to support decision making. Table 2 shows 32 results out of a total of 86 selected articles, representing a percentage of 37.21% of the total. The next most common CRM dimension by number of results is customer development, with 23 results, representing 26.74% of the total. Next are the CRM dimensions of customer identification, with 17 results (19.77%), and customer attraction, with 14 results (16.28%). Summing the results of customer retention and those of customer development gives a total of 55 results, representing 63.95% of the total of 86 selected articles. Therefore, these are the most influential CRM dimensions.

The most commonly used CRM element for assisting business decision makers is loyalty programs (within the CRM retention dimension), with 23 results, representing 26.75% of the 86 selected articles. The CRM elements with the next highest numbers of results are customer lifetime value (within the CRM development dimension) and direct marketing (within the CRM attraction dimension), both with 14 results, each representing 16.28% of the 86 selected articles. Aggregating the results from these three most common CRM elements gives a total of 51 results, representing 59.31% of the total. The rest of the CRM elements in descending order are target customer analysis (10.47%), customer segmentation (9.30%), complaint management (5.83%), upselling/cross-selling (5.83%), one-to-one marketing (4.63%), and market basket analysis (4.63%).

Table 3 shows the importance of the entrepreneurial marketing dimensions according to their prominence in the decisions of business decision makers. The results were obtained by classifying the 86 selected articles. To avoid overlaps, the most relevant dimension is considered. These dimensions are shown in descending order.

Relationship management is the most commonly used entrepreneurial marketing dimension, with 38 results of the 86 selected articles, representing 44.19%. With less than half this number of results are commitment (17.44%) and trust (16.28%). Following these are cooperation (12.79%) and closeness (9.30%).

Distribution of the selected articles by year of publication

Table 4 shows the distribution of the selected articles by year of publication. In this table, the 86 selected articles are sorted according to the year in which they were published.

Clear growth can be observed since 2015, which, as previously stated, is the year in which scientific research interest in this subject began to rise (Guerola-Navarro et al., 2020b ).

The decline in publications in 2019, based on the recent trend and experience, is most likely to have occurred because some articles have been approved for publication but are still in the editing and production process. The calendar year 2019 had just ended at the time of this study, so there is still the possibility of more papers being published with the reference year of 2019.

Distribution of the selected articles by journal

The selected articles were also classified according to the journal where they were published. This analysis shows which journals are most focused on this topic. This distribution is presented in Table 5 .

The first noteworthy conclusion arising from the distribution of articles by journal is that this distribution has a broad spread, with the 86 selected articles published across 62 journals. Therefore, many journals can be used to search for information on this topic. The second striking conclusion is that no journal stands out over the others.

In the period under study, the Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing published the most articles (five), representing a percentage of 5.81% of the total of 86 selected articles. With four published articles each (4.65% of the total), the Journal of Strategic Marketing and the Middle East Journal of Management were the next most prolific journals. Two journals published three articles each (3.49% of the total): International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management and Journal of Interactive Marketing , and 10 Journals published two articles each (2.33% of the total). The rest of the journals published only one article each (47 journals with 1.16% of the total).

Distribution of the selected articles by number of citations

Table 6 was used to study the articles with the greatest influence in this field of scientific study. Table 6 shows the distribution of articles by number of citations of each publication in the WoS.

The most cited article has a much higher number of citations than any other article. It can therefore be considered the most influential of the selected articles. This article, by Fidel et al. ( 2015 ), had received 39 citations when this study was conducted, representing 11.27% of the total citations of all selected articles. In second place is the article by Breugelmans et al. ( 2015 ), with 31 citations (8.96% of the total). This article is followed by the article by So et al. ( 2016 ), with 29 citations (8.38% of the total), and then the article by Wang and Kim ( 2017 ), with 27 citations (7.80% of the total citations).

Discussion and conclusions

After reviewing the most recent literature on the impact of the use of customer relationship management strategy and systems in the field of entrepreneurial marketing, the general conclusion is that effectively a good efficient use of these tools appears in these studies as a strong link between business management and company results. The second important conclusion is that this is due to the fact that the use of CRM favors the adaptation of entrepreneurial marketing efforts to the most effective and relevant needs and focuses of action in the environment of the company's customers.

Looking at the results of the study, it has been identified which entrepreneurial marketing and CRM dimensions are the most relevant in previous studies. The main contribution of this study has been to identify these dimensions, as a result of the points of interest raised by previous studies, and therefore covering the gap in the literature as no previous study has been found that followed the parameters used in the present investigation. This contribution provides interesting ideas about what future lines of research can be undertaken by researchers interested in the impact of the use of CRM combined withentrepreneurial marketing in the search for a joint and powerful impact on the effective management of customer relationships within the current changing and dynamic world in which entrepreneurship finds its greatest asset to demonstrate its power to transform the market and society as a whole..

The most important conclusion for future research is that the field of scientific research on the use of CRM as a strategy and technological solution that accelerates and stimulates the entrepreneurial marketing, is developing and growing, as reflect by most of the recent bibliometric studies on the subject. In this study, after a process of careful selection, a detailed and exhaustive analysis of 86 scientific research articles was conducted, providing valuable information for business decision makers in this area. The timeframe for selection of these articles was 2015 to 2019. In 2015, scientific research interest in this year began to rise. Although the timeframe spanned the period up to the year 2019, some articles approved for publication in that year are still awaiting publication.

The second conclusion is that CRM retention and CRM development are the key CRM dimensions for business decision makers looking for tools to create successful entrepreneurial marketing strategies. Regarding the distribution of articles by CRM dimensions, customer retention is the most common CRM dimension where marketing is used to support decision making, with 32 articles focusing on this dimension (37.21% of the selected articles). Within customer retention, loyalty programs represent the CRM element addressed by most of these articles, with 23 articles (71.88% of the articles on customer retention). The second most influential CRM dimension was identified as customer development, with 23 articles (26.74% of the total). Customer lifetime value was the most highly valued CRM element within this dimension, with 14 articles (60.87% of the customer development articles). These two CRM dimensions (CRM retention and CRM development) are addressed by 55 (63.95%) of the 86 selected articles, so they may be considered the most influential CRM dimensions. This conclusion was expected and does not imply any contradiction with what CRM systems and strategies have been designed for, since (as seen in the articles reviewed) modern marketing theories indicate that the best business success policy is the retention of good existing customers. Although it was an expected conclusion, this study has shown that it is indeed true and demonstrable, and that the desired and expected benefits of the use of CRM confirm the initial hypotheses. On the other hand, and as can be seen in the following conclusion, it has been more specifically identified which CRM elements (directly related to these most relevant dimensions identified in this case) are the ones that have the greatest impact on good management of the business. business marketing.

The third conclusion of the study, in relation to the CRM elements with the greatest impact on decision making in entrepreneurial marketing, is that the most decisive CRM elements are loyalty programs, customer lifetime value, and direct marketing. The most commonly used CRM element for assisting business decision makers is loyalty programs, with 23 results (26.75% of the total), followed by customer lifetime value and direct marketing, each with 14 results (16.28% of the total). These three categories account for a total of 51 of the selected articles, representing 59.31% of the total. The third conclusion is fully consistent with the second conclusion because loyalty programs, customer lifetime value, and direct marketing are essential values in any retention and development program targeting a company’s most profitable customers. Once again, it is confirmed that the empirical results of the study are in line with those expected, which gives the researchers the necessary security to assume that a good use of CRM can lead to an improvement in the degree of organizational performance and with it the results of the company. Specifically, the use of loyalty programs is presented as the most effective tool for companies in the marketing area, with CRM being the most efficient support available to companies to design such loyalty programs.

Fourth, regarding the key entrepreneurial marketing dimensions for business decision makers, relationship management was identified as the most commonly used marketing dimension, referenced in 38 of the selected articles (44.19% of the total). Commitment, with 15 articles (17.44%), and trust, with 14 articles (16.28%), are less common. Again, these results are consistent with the previous conclusions because relationship marketing, commitment, and trust are the relationship marketing dimensions upon which the concept and working strategy of CRM are based. The findings obtained from the study, referring to the predominant dimensions in the field of marketing, and more specifically in the field of entrepreneurship, confirm that a good management of the information on customers (their needs, tastes, characteristics, priorities, etc.) is essential to business success, and this is achieved most efficiently through the use of CRM systems and strategies. Collecting and managing in a centralized and consistent way the history of interactions with clients, helps to design new and impactful marketing actions aimed at capturing, maintaining, and expanding the partnership with clients.

All these conclusions are aligned with the initial expectations for this scientific research. The review of the highlighted key entrepreneurial marketing dimensions for business decision makers, CRM dimensions and CRM elements shows that the greatest commitment of the joint between CRM and entrepreneurial marketing is to retain and develop relations with the most profitable existing customers. This strategic focus was observed to be much more prominent than the identification, acquisition, and attraction of new customers. Promoting and establishing a culture of customer loyalty and customer lifetime value is crucial to business success. Within this area, customer relationship management is the key marketing factor, along with the development of an environment of trust and cooperation with customers.

In addition to the first objective of identifying and ranking the primary focus in the area of CRM in entrepreneurial marketing, the second objective of this study was to offer suggestions for future research. The findings of this study regarding the quantitative evolution of the selected studies over time lead to recommendations for future studies to further research in this area. Based on the content and key indicators obtained in this study, the areas of customer retention and customer development are those of greatest interest and opportunity for future research. The elements that are most valued in this study and that may provide the fundamental pillars for future research are relationship management, supported by trust and commitment toward customers.

In line with the initial expectations of this study, the most influential papers, authors, and journals in relation to the study of CRM were detected. CRM is a high impact technological solution in entrepreneurial marketing and can have a strong influence on firm performance. In fact, given its powerful link with marketing in the area of entrepreneurship, and as previous studies on the growing influence of CRM among the most relevant Information Technologies within the field of business management show, the growing use of CRM in companies is one of the pillars of technological and social change in Business spirit, which is precisely one of the most obvious consequences of the use of marketing in the area of entrepreneurship and in its commitment to take advantage of unknown opportunities to offer new and better goods and services to society. The transformation power that CRM is exerting on the client's commercial management capacity is being a clear example of how big data can benefit society through a greater and more efficient adaptation of the offer of companies to the needs of customers, which clearly results in customer satisfaction and the overall good of society.

Based on the state of the art, which is jointly illustrated by the bibliometric studies and literature review, the following future research agenda is proposed. The recommendation is to evaluate the current (exploitation) and future (exploration) benefits that make CRM a key tool for achieving a sustainable impact on business performance, and this in coordination with the impact area of entrepreneurial marketing as an unstoppable force for development and transformation of society through its unlimited source of inspiration to find new ways and paths to take advantage of opportunities to satisfy customer needs. It will thus be possible to identify and evaluate the key factors for success from among the paths that lead from CRM and entrepreneurial marketing to firm performance. Once these key factors have been identified and evaluated, a measurement model should be proposed. This model should show the relevant constructs for the use of CRM and entrepreneurial marketing (directly linked to Innovation capabilities) to improve business management. The validity of the model and of the associated hypotheses can then be empirically tested. More specifically, and following the particular findings of the study, it is proposed to analyze which specific entrepreneurial marketing actions are empirically demonstrated as the most effective, aligned with the identified elements (loyalty programs) and the identified dimensions (customer retention), and supported by the dominant dimensions identified (relationship management).

The combination of this review of the literature on CRM as a business management solution in entrepreneurial marketing, together with the bibliometric study of CRM, provides a crucial foundation for subsequent studies of the impact of CRM on firm performance through the use of powerful entrepreneurial marketing strategies. This research enables identification of the most relevant previous studies. Previous conclusions can be used to formulate the most accurate research models. These models can be empirically tested in different sectors or areas of business activity. The main value of this study therefore lies in its review of previous results and conclusions to establish new research models for testing. In the literature review, a gap has been detected regarding the existence of generic models and global empirical studies on the impact of the use of specific CRM components on specific entrepreneurial marketing elements. Consequently, the empirical design and testing of models in concrete and real environments that provide valuable decision criteria to business decision makers is proposed as a line of research.

Finally, the main limitation of this study (but also its greatest virtue) is that it was performed using the Web of Science Core Collection database. This database is one of the most prestigious and complete databases of scientific research publications. Another limitation is that it reviewed high-impact publications for the period 2015 to 2019. This period corresponds to the last five years prior to conducting this study. It also coincides with years of strong growth in interest in research on this subject. Therefore, the study is restricted to the content contained in this database, leading to the possible exclusion of articles that are not recorded in the database. The study is also restricted to this period, even though publications on this topic have also appeared outside this period. Furthermore, the study suffers from a gap left by articles approved for publication in 2019 (appearing as articles published in 2019) but still pending publication at the time this study was conducted.

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Guerola-Navarro, V., Gil-Gomez, H., Oltra-Badenes, R. et al. Customer relationship management and its impact on entrepreneurial marketing: a literature review. Int Entrep Manag J (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11365-022-00800-x

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Accepted : 22 May 2022

Published : 13 June 2022

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s11365-022-00800-x

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Successful Customer Relationship Management: A Case Study

By Laura Petrolino

Onboarding.

Whether you are a product or a service business, that magic time after a customer has made a sale, yet before they either start using your product or working with you in an organized manner, often makes or breaks their entire experience.

No matter how great your product or amazing your service, if you muck up your onboarding, you’ll have a much larger moat to swim to achieve true customer satisfaction.

The old adage, “you only have on chance to make a great first impression” applies well here. While you *might* be able to mend the relationship later on, it will take a lot of work to rebuild that layer of trust.

Component of Successful Onboarding

Proactivity is the name of the game in onboarding. And that takes the shape of four basic components:

Set expectations

What can they expect from your work together (or your product)?

• How will things work?
• What’s the communication flow like?
• Where can they go for help?
• Where do they find out what to do?
• Who does what?

Most organizations cover these issues as part of the business development stage, so assume they don’t need to address them again in onboarding.

While that might be the case, there is a difference in the priorities and area of focus for a prospect vs. a customer.

Even if you covered all of this in prospecting, you need to do it again. And clearly.

Ease concerns or doubt

Anytime anyone starts something new, it’s scary.

They might have complete confidence in your product or service and be super excited about work with you, but where there is unknown, there is doubt.

Doubt is always an enemy to successful customer relationship management and customer satisfaction.

Provide a roadmap

What’s one of the best ways to ease doubt?

  A roadmap .

Help people understand where they are going, how they will get there, and how long it will take.

Do this with a clear, goal-focused roadmap everyone agrees to. 

Establish the tone of the relationship

There are a lot of different types of good customer relationships .

Part of successful customer relationship management is setting that right dynamic between you and your customer.

There are very formal relationships, more casual ones, fun and personal relationships, and so on.

It’s important to set the tone from the beginning of what type of relationship you expect.

Of course, the customer controls part of this, but you need a starting point to launch from and adjust based on their responses.

This is also really where you look at your brand personality and how that applies to your organizational relationships.

Customer Relationship Management: A Case Study

I’ll get more actionable about each of the four components outlined above in a subsequent post.

Today I want to present a simple case study.

One that shows how a company instituted a few processes to proactively address common onboarding hurdles.

I love this example because it shows successful customer relationship management doesn’t have to be tedious, expensive, or time-consuming.

It just needs to be consistent, targeted, proactive, and customer-focused.

After my recent move, my WiFi came in spotty in my new office.

After much lamenting (aka whining) to the all-knowing Gini Dietrich about it, she suggested I get an adapter.

Off I went to Amazon to find an adapter.

The Great Gods of Online Shopping suggested one from Net-Dyn .

It got great reviews, was a good price, and Mac compatible — I got it.

The next day I received an email from Net-Dyn

Inside they provided me clear instructions, proactively answered many of my questions and concerns, and added a dose of fun.

The brand voice is actually what makes this email.

It changes the customer experience and makes them fun, relatable, and approachable.

Plus it’s unexpected.

I mean, I bought an adapter.

It’s not necessarily a fun, sexy purchase.

But now I know my adapter is guaranteed, even on Mars, so that changes everything.

They supply really comprehensive directions and then end with this.

This email should probably be in a textbook about successful customer relationship management.

(And clearly points to why they are the top-rated adapter on Amazon.)

Customer Relationship Management Requires Consistency

Now let me make this VERY clear (before you all yell at me): One email isn’t a customer relationship management strategy.

Even when it’s a really well done email that talks about cookies.

But it’s a good example of an effective process to proactively address a new customer’s concerns and set the tone of the on-going relationship.  

It lowers possible start-up and implementation issues and lets me know right away that, should I have issues, they are very open to feedback and there to help.

It funnels my feedback to them, vs. possible rants to the jeering crowds of the internet (although those still will happen).

To continue this story, when I went to download the driver, I found they didn’t have one for my operating system.

I chatted with their Zen Desk operator who continued the experience the email had set.

He told me to return to Amazon and which one I needed to purchase instead.

My new adapter is on the way.

At this point, prior to product use, I’m a fan of the company.

My expectation is the product will be awesome, and so even if it just “works,” I’ll be a happy customer.

Customer relationship management starts at the very beginning of the relationship.

A process needs to be in place to make sure that beginning is a positive one.

Laura Petrolino

Laura Petrolino is chief marketing officer for Spin Sucks, an integrated marketing communications firm that provides strategic counsel and professional development for in-house and agency communications teams. She is a weekly contributor for their award-winning blog of the same name. Spin Sucks . Join the Spin Sucks    community.

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Customer Experience

Updated On: Apr 5, 2024

20 mins read

Defining Customer Support Management: Best Practices & Case Studies

Customer Support Management (CSM) is the art of transforming frustrated callers into loyal customers. Imagine a customer calling in, fuming about a malfunctioning product. Through effective CSM, your support agent not only troubleshoots the issue but also empathizes with the customer’s situation offers helpful solutions, and leaves them feeling valued.

This focus on creating positive customer experiences is the cornerstone of successful CSM, ultimately driving customer satisfaction , retention, and business growth.

But what exactly is CSM, and why is it essential? Join us on a journey to explore the core customer support management best practices and case studies in this blog.

Table of contents

• What is Customer Support Management? 
• Best Practices to Improve Customer Support Management 
• Case Studies of Delivering Outstanding Customer Support 

What is Customer Support Management? 

Customer support service management involves addressing customer concerns, resolving issues, offering advice, and fostering positive relationships. 

Effective customer support management goes beyond fixing issues, to creating long-lasting customer satisfaction and loyalty.  

Best Practices to Improve Customer Support Management 

Maintain transparent and clear communication with the customers .

Clear communication ensures that customers are kept in the loop throughout the support process.  

For example, agents can enhance transparency by honesty informing customers about hold times or by quickly transferring calls to the appropriate department for faster resolution. 

Knowledge management as a tool for the modern contact center

Get Handbook

Create a Guided Knowledge Base 

Knowledge base creation is an essential practice in customer support management. It involves the development of a comprehensive repository featuring frequently asked questions (FAQs) , tutorials, and troubleshooting guides .  

FAQs serve as a quick reference guide, providing concise answers to common customer queries. Tutorials in the knowledge base offer step-by-step instructions and visual aids, guiding customers through various processes and tasks.  

A guided knowledge base’s main objective is to enable customers to find solutions independently and reduce the workload of support teams. 

Empower Agents with Training 

Empowering agents through training is a cornerstone of successful customer support management. Comprehensive training programs are essential in furnishing support teams with the expertise, knowledge, and skills to effectively navigate and resolve diverse customer issues. 

Training agents leads to best practices in customer interactions, emphasizing empathy, active listening, and clear communication. Investing in ongoing education can empower support agents to handle various issues confidently and competently.

This not only elevates the quality of customer interactions but also enhances the overall efficiency of the support process. 

Empowered agents possess a deep understanding of the products and the art of customer engagement , which puts them in a better position to provide outstanding customer service and enhance customer happiness and loyalty. 

Prioritize Customer Security and Privacy 

Customer security and privacy are necessary pillars of customer support management.  

Customer security and privacy involve a steadfast commitment to handling customer data with the utmost care.  

Strict adherence to data protection regulations is non-negotiable. Adhering to legal regulations such as GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act), and other industry-specific regulations is essential for building and maintaining customer trust. 

Implement Customer Service Analytics 

Customer service analytics transforms raw data into strategic guidance, allowing businesses to proactively address customer needs, enhance operational efficiency, and continually refine their approach to deliver satisfactory customer support experiences.  

Implementing customer service analytics is a pivotal strategy that brings a data-driven dimension to customer support management.  

For example, finding trends in customer questions can help create relevant FAQs and direct product enhancements to deal with recurring issues. Response times and customer satisfaction ratings are performance metrics that provide quantifiable standards for improving and streamlining support procedures. 

Adopt an Omnichannel Customer Service Strategy

Omnichannel support in customer management represents a holistic and integrated approach to customer interactions, ensuring a seamless and unified experience across all channels.

For example, a customer who initiates a conversation on social media should experience a seamless transition if they later choose to continue the conversation via email or phone.

Maintaining continuity is the aim of omnichannel support , regardless of how a customer communicates—by email, phone, live chat, or social media. This implies that consumers get consistent information, individualized care, and a thorough grasp of their past and current interactions with the company regardless of their chosen channel.

By implementing omnichannel support in customer management, businesses enhance customer satisfaction, foster loyalty, and deliver a superior and unified customer experience across all touchpoints.

Case Studies of Delivering Outstanding Customer Support 

Jupiter: delivering outstanding cx by empowering agents with the latest knowledge.

Founded in 2019, Jupiter is a digital-born banking startup. It needed to establish solid human connections to gain customer trust in an industry accustomed to decades of relationship management and branch interactions.

However, when they started with their grand vision for customer support challenges like scattered SOPs, outdated and wrong information delivery, and longer agent learning curves obstructed the mission.

In Knowmax, they found a solution that could empower their frontline support teams with the latest knowledge, create a single source of truth for their SOPs, and reduce agent learning curves.

Fortune 500 Telecom operator: Transforming CX while Saving $60k in Support Costs  

The client is a Fortune 500 Telecom Group with Middle East Operations and is part of a large global telecom group with 22 country operations across continents.  

The client’s existing knowledge base limited the ability of customer service teams to deliver accurate and faster resolutions primarily due to –  

• Use of multiple knowledge base(s)  
• Static knowledge base failing to provide contextual knowledge to agents.  

However, the biggest challenge was migrating 6,000 articles and decision trees when they considered an alternative knowledge management software .  

The search for the right KM system came to an end with Knowmax!  

The Knowmax team undertook a comprehensive content audit and worked collaboratively with the client to migrate their existing KB to Knowmax. The result was:  

• 360 person-days effort of migration reduced to just 60 days   
• $60K support cost savings with Knowmax’s AI content migration engine that fast-tracked the migration process and launch of the new KM solution  
• Significant improvement in CSAT, NPS & FCR  

Uncover the full story here .  

Looking to supercharge your CX?

Pratik Salia

Pratik is a customer experience professional who has worked with startups & conglomerates across various industries & markets for 10 years. He shares latest trends in the areas of CX and Digital Transformation for Customer Service & Contact Center.

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