Companies are changing the way they do business. Many businesses in the 1970s focused on financial management, in the 1980s on process redesign and in the 1990s on enterprise resource planning.
Today’s managers and strategists are turning to customer relationship management. Great companies always have been built around strong customer relationships. CRM lets today’s companies maximize the value of their customer relationships through systematic use of technology and analysis of customer information.
CRM is an umbrella term referring to a range of marketing, sales, service, organization and technology initiatives. The common thread is the application of knowledge to customer interactions. Building a CRM program requires investment of time, money and resources, and often brings associated changes in processes and priorities.
http://www.dmnews.com/pdffiles/crmbusiness.pdf
