What is Customer Relationship Management (CRM)?

CRM is often misunderstood as simply a collection of marketing tools used to message promotional and brand-led campaigns. Traditionally, brands use “CRM” to group together retention channels like email, SMS and direct mail. While those channels are still an important part of your marketing mix, CRM encompasses much more than just sending messages. 

When used correctly, customer data can be leveraged to make informed decisions across the entire customer lifecycle, from marketing and sales to customer service. The true power of CRM lies in the ability to analyse customer data to drive long-term relationships and business growth.

Instead of just pushing messages, CRM allows businesses to better understand their customers, anticipate their needs, and deliver personalised experiences. Whether you're trying to improve customer service, create more effective product offerings, or optimise marketing efforts, CRM helps you make data-driven decisions that impact every touchpoint with the customer.

Brand vs. Commercial

Brand objectives focus on longer term brand-building messaging, for example, brand awareness campaigns. Commercial objectives are centred around generating sales and are more likely to be reactive responses to shifts in demand. While both are essential for business growth, finding a balance between these two goals can often be difficult.

Overemphasis on one can harm the other. If you only push sales messages, customers may disengage or feel overwhelmed by the constant bombardment. Alternatively, if you're only focused on brand-building efforts without driving conversions, you're missing out on valuable sales opportunities. The key is to strike a balance. CRM insights help inform a strategy that targets the right audience with the right message at the right time across multiple channels without damaging brand reputation.

The Issue with Broadcast Messaging and the Need for Smarter Automation

Historically, brands relied on broadcast email marketing to drive a quick spike in sales. This channel was highly effective for driving quick sales, so brands continue to lean on it, assuming they will achieve the desired results. However, it is important to adapt to the evolving customer expectations. Due to advancements in marketing automation, customers now demand a more personalised experience.

As automation becomes smarter, brands must implement more refined strategies. Instead of bombarding contacts with generic emails, brands should leverage their customer behaviour, preferences, and interaction data to learn more about their customers, ensuring they mainly send highly personalised messages across multiple channels.

Using Data to Inform Decisions Across the Business

CRM isn't just about marketing — it’s about using customer data to inform decisions across the entire business. From product development and customer service to marketing campaigns, CRM helps create a 360-degree view of the customer, enabling businesses to make smarter, data-driven decisions.

One common mistake is relying solely on surveys to understand customers. While surveys can provide valuable insights, they’re time-consuming and often complex. However, businesses already have a wealth of customer data from past purchases, website interactions, and customer support interactions. This data and zero-party data (information customers willingly provide) can be leveraged to improve segmentation and targeting for marketing campaigns, website personalisation and other customer touchpoints.

The Growing Importance of Retention

The cost of acquiring new customers is increasing, and brands are overly reliant on paid channels. As costs in these channels rise each year, so does total spending, which results in a drop in net numbers. Brands need to shift their focus to organic channels. 

Due to the rise in paid channel costs, retention has become even more important. It's often said that retaining an existing customer is far cheaper than acquiring a new one. CRM plays a significant role in helping brands understand their customers better, predict their behaviour, and stay ahead of their needs.

By analysing customer data, brands can identify patterns and trends to anticipate future behaviour. This proactive approach helps brands engage customers in a way that increases retention, builds loyalty, and ultimately drives more sales over time. CRM strategies focused on retention help customers feel valued, leading to more repeat purchases and a stronger long-term relationship.

Read more about rising CPSs here.

Overcoming CRM Challenges: The Internal Struggles

One of the most significant challenges brands face with CRM is the lack of internal resources or expertise. Many companies have siloed departments and data, making it difficult to get a comprehensive view of the customer journey. Without someone dedicated to managing CRM, brands can struggle to effectively use data to its full potential, often leaving valuable insights untapped.

The key to overcoming this challenge is to centralise CRM efforts within an organisation. This may involve hiring or designating someone internally to manage CRM, ensuring all departments are aligned, and breaking down data silos. A unified approach to CRM helps ensure a consistent, personalised customer experience and improves overall business outcomes.

Not Sure Where to Start? Let Us Help You with Our New CRM Offering

Brands frequently struggle to strike a balance between brand and commercial goals. This often results in an overemphasis on reactive messaging at the expense of building a foundation for long-term growth through customer retention and loyalty.

For brands unsure where to begin, we’re here to help. Our new CRM offering is designed to help businesses of all sizes leverage customer data to drive smarter decisions and deliver personalised experiences.