Key Strategies For Evolving CMOs Into Strategic Business Leaders

Two-thirds of chief marketing officers (CMOs) want more involvement in business strategy development and increased profit and loss responsibility, according to a joint study conducted by Forrester Research, Inc. and Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc. The survey indicated a disconnect between the career aspirations of marketing leaders and how they spend their time. When asked which competencies are the most important to their personal success, 82 percent of chief marketers identified strategic thinking as a top imperative. Other leadership-driven competencies such as people management/team development, relationship building with the senior executive team

One way CMOs can forge a business partnership with key stakeholders in the organization is by creating brands and offerings that are highly relevant to customers, therefore helping the company acquire new customers, drive stronger customer loyalty, improve retention, and enable bottom-line growth. However, according to the survey, one-quarter of CMOs are not involved in any way with customer service and support, distancing marketing from what customers are saying in the field. In addition, less than half of CMOs identified being the voice of the customer a top priority for their personal success, with even fewer identifying listening to/interacting with customers, and personal knowledge of customers as crucial to their jobs.

More information about Customer Relationship Management can be found at www.CRMindustry.com

One in Five U.K. Firms Has a Head of CRM

One in five (19%) top UK corporations have now demonstrated their commitment to customer relationship management by appointing a dedicated Head of CRM, a study by integrated marketing specialist GI Insight has found. This is a substantial increase on the proportion (14.5%) two years ago and represents a growth rate in dedicated CRM Directors of almost one third in the last two years.

The study also analyzed the number of Heads of CRM in total, including those that also have another main job, such as Marketing Director or Customer Services Director. The findings show that 48% of UK top 500 companies now employ a Head of CRM compared to 44% in 2005. These findings serve as a barometer of ‘CRM commitment’ and were compared to findings from 2005.

More detailed analysis of the study revealed a number of sectors that score particularly highly for appointing Heads of CRM. Three industries stand out from the crowd:

- Retail – of retail organizations appointing a Head of CRM, 52% of these are dedicated Heads of CRM. Because transactional data is so fundamental to customer relationship management in retail, the sector’s leading position for appointing dedicated Heads of CRM may well also reflect some of the ways in which retailers can use the data and analysis outputs that come out of their CRM programs.

- Media and entertainment – of media and entertainment organizations appointing a Head of CRM, 50% of these are dedicated Heads of CRM. This was entirely unexpected. Music labels, publishers, broadcasters, cinemas, and so on are, after all, mainstays of the above-the-line advertising industry. However, customer value is often much higher now than in the past. Newspapers are engaging their readers with a wide range of online and offline services, music publishers are also issuing games, technology, infotainment products and much more. And the culture of home entertainment has been vastly boosted by increasing levels of DVD viewing and television usage.

- Travel/leisure/hotel - of travel, leisure and hotel organizations appointing a Head of CRM, 46% are dedicated Heads of CRM. Businesses in this sector seem to be coming back into play as effective CRM players. This is a crucial return to form for the sector, seen in the 1980s as pioneers of loyalty and database marketing initiatives, but who slipped to the back of the pack in the 1990s and the early years of the new millennium.

Source: CustomerThink

More information about Customer Relationship Management can be found at http://www.crmindustry.com/

One in Four Interested in Mobile Marketing, But That is Likely to Grow

The third annual study by the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) provides insights into overall consumer mobile usage by demographic group, awareness and usage of mobile phone features and services, and interest in and concerns about specific applications. The study’s key findings include:

- Interest in mobile marketing remains as high as it was in the previous two surveys. One in four respondents in the 2007 survey expressed interest in mobile marketing. Although some respondents had difficulty readily associating benefits with mobile marketing, those who do say that they value the ability to receive highly relevant information, the coupons and rewards received and the convenience of accessing the desired applications quickly and easily.

- The number of consumers who have experienced mobile marketing continues to grow. One out of 20 respondents had participated in mobile marketing. The highest participation is among respondents age 25-44.

- Sweepstakes and voting campaigns are the most widely used types of mobile marketing. The second most common type is receiving alerts about products, services, accounts. Ten percent of respondents have used their mobile phones to receive and redeem coupons.

- Ethnic groups are key audiences for mobile marketing. For example, African Americans and English-dominant Hispanics indicate stronger interest in mobile marketing than Caucasians. These findings suggest that the mobile channel can be highly effective for reaching specific ethnic groups.

Teens and young adults use text messaging more than any other demographic. People ages 13-24 send and receive the most – more than 50 messages per week – while half of all survey respondents use text messaging at least once a week. This usage shows that most mobile users are at least familiar with text messaging, if not regular users, making it an effective tool for mobile marketing campaigns.

Also noteworthy is that 54 percent of 13-34 year olds use SMS for social networking, while 44 percent of 13-34 year olds said they use text messaging for flirting or dating, and 10 percent of 13-34 year olds said they have broken up with a boy or girl friend using text messaging.

More information about Customer Relationship Management can be found at www.CRMindustry.com

Online customer engagement becoming a priority

Marketers are paying more attention to online customer engagement than ever before, with 77% of companies saying that its importance has increased in the past 12 months, according to a survey by E-Consultancy and cScape.

The 'Online Customer Engagement Survey' report showed that the majority of companies (90%) believe that online customer engagement is either 'essential' or 'important' to them. The report also found that companies are using a wide range of methods to interact with customers, including web-based and desktop 'widgets' (small software applications) as well as participation in social networks and uploading to video-sharing web sites such as YouTube.

Many marketers are now realizing that they need to take an integrated approach that embraces all the channels used by their customers, as a "consistent online and offline customer experience" was seen as being 'essential' or 'very important' by 86%.

The survey found evidence that many companies have already been taking steps to deliver a more integrated customer experience. Since the first edition of the survey at the end of 2006 there has been a significant improvement in the number of organizations that are either 'very advanced' or 'quite advanced' at mapping customer experiences.

Nearly one in five companies (18%) said that they are already using web-based widgets, while a further 39% plan to use them in the future. A widget is essentially a third party software application that can be embedded in a web page, and holds particular attraction for marketers because it can help achieve off-site visibility and engagement.

Almost one third (32%) of the companies surveyed said they are planning to use social networks (such as Facebook), and a further 19% are already using them. Video-sharing web sites are being used by 21%, and a further 29% are planning to use them in the future.

The full report has been made available for download from cScape's web site.

Source: TheWiseMarketer

More information about Customer Relationship Management can be found at www.CRMindustry.com

Many Web Retailers Miss The Basics

Online retailers are failing to execute on many e-commerce basics, according to FutureNow's "2007 Retail Customer Experience Study." FutureNow sent mystery shoppers and analysts to over 300 retail Web sites.

Of those sites,

• 74% offered estimated delivery times
• 61% did not offer any information on the product page regarding in-stock availability
• (Only) 58% correctly answered an e-mail question within 24 hours
• 52% of retailers had physical stores; only 10% of all retailers offered in-store pickup of orders
• 43% offered free shipping
• 42% provided shipping costs early in the checkout process
• 35% had a checkout process with more than four steps
• 33% offered customer reviews

Source: Emarketer

More information on Customer Relationship Management can be found at www.CRMindustry.com

Employee Resistance To Using CRM Software is Biggest Hurdle for Companies

A recent survey conducted by Really Simple Systems, a provider of hosted CRM software, revealed that over 80% of respondents regarded employee resistance to using the software as the biggest hurdle they faced when implementing a new system.

The survey questioned 500 users of CRM encompassing SME business owners, directors and sales, marketing and IT managers on their views of the current state of the CRM market and the efficacy of products currently available. Surprisingly, of the users polled, 82.9% of respondents said that getting staff to use the software was the biggest challenge they faced.

Another key finding of the survey revealed that 71.9% of the respondents surveyed said that they would be prepared to trade functionality in their CRM systems for ease of use.

Other findings from the research revealed that:

- 42.9% of respondents use less than half of their existing CRM system's functionality
- 50.5% said that synchronizing data was a major issue
- 67.1% said that finding time to evaluate CRM systems was a major issue

More information can be found at www.CRMindustry.com

Online Consumer-Generated Reviews Have Significant Impact on Offline Purchase Behavior

A new study by comScore, Inc. and the Kelsey Group, of more than 2,000 U.S. Internet users in October 2007, revealed that consumers were willing to pay at least 20 percent more for services receiving an “Excellent,” or 5-star, rating than for the same service receiving a “Good,” or 4-star, rating.

The study examined the offline sales impact of online reviews for restaurants, hotels, travel, legal, medical, automotive and home services. Nearly one out of every four Internet users (24 percent) reported using online reviews prior to paying for a service delivered offline. Of those who consulted an online review, 41 percent of restaurant reviewers subsequently visited a restaurant, while 40 percent of hotel reviewers subsequently stayed at a hotel.

More than three-quarters of review users in nearly every category reported that the review had a significant influence on their purchase, with hotels ranking the highest (87 percent). Ninety-seven percent of those surveyed who said they made a purchase based on an online review said they found the review to have been accurate. Review users also noted that reviews generated by fellow consumers had a greater influence than those generated by professionals.

comScore asked the study participants how much they would be willing to pay for a particular service based on the quality of the service. The results showed that consumers were willing to pay between 20 percent and 99 percent more for an Excellent (5 star) rating than for a Good (4 star rating), depending on the product category.

More information can be found at www.CRMindustry.com