CRM Apps 2.0

I am sure that every reader is now aware of web 2.0, the new face of web. As a result of standardization of web2.0, CRM apps also came up with a new face that I would like to call as CRM Apps 2.0. Though it is not a generic term in industry but I would like to share this new face of CRM apps using this term. Before going into more details about CRM Apps 2.0, let’s start with defining CRM.

"CRM is the business strategy that aims to understand, anticipate, manage and personalize the needs of an organization's current and potential customers" -- PWC Consulting

As the definition says, CRM is the business strategy and to execute that strategy, the set of applications or software we use are termed as CRM Apps. CRM Apps contains various pieces of software that are integrated with each others, like:

• 1. Sales Management System
• 2. Lead Management System
• 3. Marketing Management System
• 4. Customer Support System
• 5. Project/Team Collaboration System

A successful CRM implementation will bring your customer service, sales and marketing people (and anyone else in your organization) close to each other and your customers. It helps them for making quick decisions, help marketing team to know the latest market trend and give the ability to mould their market strategy accordingly. It measures marketing effectiveness and helps in delivering personalized customer care.

Using CRM, individual customer preferences, improve customer relationships and maximize customer retention can be easily observed. CRM not only helps any organization to improve sales and customer satisfaction but also plays an important role in keeping eye on one’s performance that helps in good resource management as well as rewarding the people as per their performance.

So after discussing about what CRM mean and before we talk more about CRM 2.O, lets first throw lights on “What is web 2.0”?
The concept of "Web 2.0" began with a conference brainstorming session between O'Reilly and MediaLive International.

The term first became notable after the O'Reilly Media Web 2.0 conference in 2004. ^[1][2]Although the term suggests a new version of the World Wide Web, it does not refer to an update to any technical specifications, but rather to changes in the ways software developers and end-users utilize the Web. According to Tim O'Reilly:

O'Reilly Media formulated sense of web 2.0 by below comparison table

I am sure now you are clear with CRM and Web 2.0, now let’s look into CRM 2.0, CRM 2.0 is nothing but a merger of CRM and web 2.0 or using web 2.0 in CRM applications.

Nowadays CRM applications are vastly adopting features of web2.0 like:

• Tagging – One can tag to any information like tag to any contact, lead and company that helps finding data in one click.
• Blogging- In CRM 2.0, users have their own blog so it can be used for knowledge sharing, discussion within the organization and it also helps employees to come closer in any big organization by allowing them to remain in contact easily.
• RSS feed – Now you can see implementation of RSS feeds in CRM system, RSS feeds can be integrated with any RSS reader that helps in keeping everyone updated whether they are logged in the system or not.
• Rich GUI – We easily can see the difference between older CRM and CRM 2.0 user interfaces, now we can see more rich UI features like drag and drop , graphical reports , interactive statistical report with chart and graphs. Even it allows adjusting the layout as per user’s convenience.
• No refreshing – CRM apps 2.0 focuses on lesser reloading with maximum use of Flex and Ajax technology.
• Rich features – In CRM apps 2.0 we can see lots of rich features being implemented that allows faster communication like audio & video chat, digital phones, screen sharing , audio & video messaging and using real time whiteboards etc.
• ID card implementation – It is like a tool tip but with more information. It contains all basic and necessary information so it reduces clicks required.
• Mail client integration - Integrating outlook and Thunderbird – Now CRM apps and mail client both can talk with each other. One can merge mails, contacts, to do lists and calendar to their CRM system.
• Web services – By exposing web services from CRM 2.0 apps, it can communicate with other business networking site where you perform marketing activities. It helps apps to share data to each other so it saves time to enter/maintain same data at multiple places.

Above are some few features I observed during my recent study on CRM 2.0 apps and it struck me to correlate CRM 2.0 with Web 2.0 so, I thought to share it with everybody.

We have developed many CRM apps under my direction at Rightway Solution (I) Pvt. Ltd. for many offshore clients. Rightway is the team of 70+ professionals and Customized CRM Apps Development, CRM 2.0 Development, CRM Product Development, SaaS Based CRM Application Development, Modification and enhancement of exiting CRM systems comes under Rightway’s expertise. Rightway has 7+ year experience in IT industry and can cater all kind of CRM needs for any industry.

Hope this brief write-up will help readers to understand new face of CRM apps. Feel free to contact me for more information or discussion about CRM 2.0.

For more information, visit www.rightwaysolution.com, or write to info@rightwaysolution.com.

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