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Regardless of signs of the green shoots of recovery, it remains a tough economy out there. Consumers are credit crunched and cash strapped and this, inevitably, has an impact on their attitudes to the organisations they use and purchase from. Taking care of your customers has never been so important, because your customers have never had so much choice, or such high expectations.
Good customer relationship management is critical to delivering this care. Yes, it’s about technology, but these days a CIO needs to think about people, processes, marketing and cost models if his CRM strategy is really going to help the business.
We start our exploration of these topics with Andrew Small, who looks back over developments in customer contact centres over the past decade and delivers some predictions for what’s ahead. Today’s technology is far ahead of what will be needed or used in the next few years, and in this economy, nobody wants to take any risks. Thus the real focus for the early 2010s will be on assembling absolutely dependable technology at the right price, with maximum flexibility for both the company and the customer.
Next, Ruth Rowan explores what trends in CRM mean for customer loyalty. A CIO’s responsibility for the contact centre puts him in the customer interaction front line. The CIO needs to use the contact centre to reach today's picky customer. In short, contact centres are increasingly being recognised and used as a brand tool. Brand, price and service are factors in the contact centre environment like never before. The challenge for CIOs is optimising the customer service experience - making it personal and effective - while simultaneously controlling cost.
Finally, we return to Andrew, who discusses how the evolution of ideas like cloud and just-in-time computing have revolutionised cost models for CRM and customer contact centres. CIOs can free themselves from predictions and best guesses, instead building models that flex up and down for their needs. Costs vary accordingly.
Click below to watch these interviews.
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Top tips for CIOs: Andrew Small
- Andrew Small looks back over developments in customer contact centres over the past decade and delivers some predictions for what’s ahead.
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Top tips for CIOs: Ruth Rowan
- CRM critical to keeping brand loyalty through recession
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Top tips for CIOs: Andrew Small
- Andrew Small discusses how the evolution of ideas like cloud and just-in-time computing have revolutionised cost models for CRM and customer contact centres.
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Case studies
- Air China: Chinese airline chooses superior network solution
- Air Products Medical
- AmicusHorizon
- ASSIST-CARD: Travel care company streamlines customer service
- AstraZeneca: Outsourcing of operator services helps leading drugs company to improve customer service and reduce cost
- Aurora Fashions: Multichannel approach delivers business growth
- BT Digital Inclusion: Helping people Get IT Together
- BT Disaster Relief: Proactive policies for more effective emergency responses
- BT Fundraising Telethons: Helping to make a difference for those most in need
- BT South Tyneside: Successful outsourcing is about looking after people
- BT: Mobile workforce transformation
- ChildLine: A vital children’s lifeline approaches its 25th birthday
- Cork County Council: Convergence spearheads service transformation
- Coventry Building Society: Powering a financial services transformation
- DAS Espana: Specialists on tap with intelligent call handling
- Department for Work and Pensions: Changing the focus of incapacity benefits
- Department for Work and Pensions: Helping the country to work
- E.ON: Faster data generates better business
- Enterprise Rent-A-Car: Maintaining class-leading customer service
- Five: New media platform partnership
- Greater Manchester Police: Faster police call handing better protects public safety
- GSK Nutritional Healthcare: Making CRM miles better
- Integrated US Healthcare Organization
- Interflora: Resilient, scalable hosting and connectivity platform moves information faster to deliver flowers in hours
- Katha Information Technology and E-Commerce School: Investing in people for a better world
- Konecta Foundation: Virtual Data Centre helps key charity event
- Lincolnshire County Council: A platform for better public services at reduced cost
- London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games: BT Hosted IP Telephony gives voice to the Games
- London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games: Service delivery – the ultimate right first time challenge
- London 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games: Reaching for the peak
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- MOD Wi-fi: Service personnel morale soars with wi-fi internet
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- Musto: Sail of the century
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- NHS Blackpool Hospitals Foundation Trust: A clinical telephone service transformation
- NHS Heart of Birmingham Teaching PCT: Health trust gets better connected with IP telephony
- NHS N3 Infrastructure
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- NHS Sutton and Merton Community Services: RiO underpins ‘Virtual Community Hospital’
- NHS Wakefield District: Promising prognosis for BT telehealth trial
- NHS: Barts and The London NHS Trust
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- Norton Rose Group: Scalable cloud-based service for on-demand business
- Relate for Parents & Families: Delivering a self-service online counselling tool
- Repsol: Flexible connections enable new applications
- Sainsbury’s
- Scicom: Competitive edge with networked CRM
- Sky Deutschland: Giving customers a better view
- Softchoice
- Spark: Business opportunities promise brighter future
- SPD: Scalable pay-as-you-go cloud-based contact centre
- Standard Life
- Suffolk County Council: Transforming the adult social care experience in Suffolk
- Swale Heating
- TD Waterhouse: Investors get instant automatic access to share price information
- The City of Edinburgh Council: A smart city is a sustainable city
- The City of Edinburgh Council: successful partnerships are those that value people
- The Farrer Park Company
- TNT: Outsourced customer service excellence
- Transform Sandwell: CRM assures service quality for forward-looking council
- Wessex Water: Keeping critical measurement data flowing
- Western Power
- WHSmith: Leading UK newsagent’s use of store-based mobile technology helps deliver improved customer experience
- ZTE: Fast-growing global telecommunications manufacturer offers more focused customer service