Integrated Customer Management

Principles of Integrated Customer Management - Price and quality of service have become negligible differentiators for companies in the manufacturing industry and the customer experience is emerging as the primary way manufacturers can stand apart from competitors. The goal of integrated customer management is to align people, processes and technology to enable service providers to deliver the customer experience they intend, rather than having the experience happen as an unplanned result.

Alignment All people, processes and systems must be aligned to meet both business goals and customers desires. For example, bundling products is a good example of an initiative that crosses lines of business and/or departments. Beyond this, customer service, accounting and other functions must also align support resources to shield customers from the complexity of all behind-the-scene operations that make these and all offers possible. Alignment allows customers to perceive and interact with their service providers as one company, not as disparate lines of business.

Agility In industries where the pace of change has greatly accelerated, service providers must be able to quickly and efficiently react to changing market conditions and customer demands. Entering new businesses or bringing new products to market quickly and cost-effectively is critical and is often a key differentiator between large organizations and their newer, more nimble niche players. Agile organizations can change direction when it makes sense for them to do so--or when their customers demand it--without being hampered by organizational stovepipes, or by inflexible business processes or IT infrastructure.

Customer-centricity In the past, ostensibly due to the original utility status of many communication service providers, the customer experience was not a primary concern. Providers sought only to make their products and services available, not necessarily easy to access or use. Therefore, the customer experience was primarily a by-product of internally focused processes designed to achieve the desired result (market or activate a service, generate a bill, enable customer service) efficiently and cost-effectively. Today, consumers have more authority and less patience with a slow, frustrating or otherwise unfulfilling customer experience. Whether they're interacting with a customer service representative, responding to an advertised offer, downloading content or paying their bill, customer demand that their experience be simple and, optimally, create value for them. Therefore, service providers must put the customer at the center of their business. Customer-centricity means making the business easier for customers to do business with. It also involves understanding customers' needs and desires and mapping processes and resources to meet them.

Complete customer visibility for today's manufacturers - The positive steps we take to help our customers are simply what they expect; the things that go wrong are what begin to fragment the relationship. Customer relationships, therefore, must be managed so that manufacturers can continuously meet or exceed expectations, anticipate and respond to change, and maximize the opportunities presented by each customer's needs.

Our solution provides the real-time information you need to grow your customer base, retain customers, and find additional business opportunities with current customers. With built-in manufacturing industry experience, our solutions enable you to manage customer contacts and relationship development-gathering each customer's complete history and extending it across the organization-so you can identify customer needs, automate ongoing orders, and generate focused marketing programs. And since they're accessible anytime, anywhere and fully integrated with other enterprise solutions, you're able to reduce costs and improve operating efficiency.

Option Matrix customer relationship management solutions for manufacturing help you:

• Gain complete customer visibility
• Find rapid access to critical information
• Improve lead generation and pipeline management
• Provide efficient customer service
• Get anytime, anywhere mobile access
• Reduce costs with complete integration