...An important step in organizing CRM based sales management was to build up or gather this (central) memory so everybody could use it The memory started to be an issue.

From every part of the organization, different client addresses and different product history -- some clients bought product X with one sales unit and product Y at another office - were gathered.

The problem of distributed client data became visible when CRM started to be a topic. In order to manage relations, you first need to figure out the history of the client relations. Do we know this client, what has he or she bought, and most of all mining in the data -- what is the client behavior? Does this client belong to a certain group and can we benefit from knowing this? So, one of the challenges of CRM was thus to bring forward an overview of a client, gathering the different transactions made in different product systems.

Now that you have this central memory, you can analyze client behavior. What do they buy and when, what are cross-selling opportunities and most of all, are there groups of clients to establish? And how does the individual client within a group buys.

In investment management you have different profiles. Some private investor will trade on a monthly bases, others trade actively and again some other group will follow the advice of a guru. The trade frequency various over the different groups.

CRM is more than sales management about offering different approaches just because you have learned - from your client history - that different clients have different preferences. Where sales management is about having one product and searching for clients to buy it, CRM is about having client groups and behavior and adapt your offerings in a way that it best fits these needs

Having an available client history is one requirement. The rest is just digging into this collective memory and understand what profitable client groups are.

These new knowledge or requirements should be channeled to the sales agents in the front-office. If they are no longer to be sold product only, they should receive tips and leads. And with this a new client history will be made. Refreshing the (central) memory.

2006 Hans Bool

Hans Bool

Hans Bool has worked for many companies in many countries in different (mainly) management positions.

Recently he started Astor White. A company that offer a new approach in management advice and consulting.