Understanding the role of mobile for managing client relationships
The mobile revolution, rising smartphone usage and also significantly high speed Internet have successfully empowered the clients. In the present times, clients are actively making use of mobile phones for a wide variety of activities like online shopping, banking transactions, socializing, looking for news and details, etc.
This sort of usage patterns are affecting every stage of the buying cycle and also offering the marketers ample opportunities to involve with the clients. It is believed that emerging ‘mobile first’ strategies are considered as natural outcome as marketers are looking for innovative solutions across a wide variety of channels like SMSes, MMS, email, wassup, in app push notifications. With every opportunity comes wide number of challenges.
First and foremost, very few vendors provide a comprehensive solution, the market is full with providers that have service abilities limited to just one or two mobile platforms. Customers that involve with such vendors finally implement marketing initiative in ‘bits and pieces’. Many are of the opinion that a fragmented approach is responsible for causing operational anarchy and enhancing of CAPEX for the business.
An important differentiator of the mobile platform is that it helps carrying out two-way communications, as the clients offer the option of governing the communications flow.
Bagging unsolicited, not so important and untimely messages has the potential to close any involvement that a firm aims to conduct with its clients. Hence, the challenge is for making these communications personalized in its approach and also targeted. And, it is not just the client requirements that need attention but also their availability, location, their reaction to a particular form of stimulus are also part of the key factors which define the content that marketers will need to focus upon in their contact programs.
A cloud-based service delivery model, along with multichannel and unified platform created on top, and which also manages the client interactions by developing individual profiles, can be a great booster for the CRM requirements of a business.
It is also believed that the mobile-based CRM tool can be responsible for data collection via relationship management and also loyalty programs. While the collected data can be a great booster for any brands’ overall marketing and advertising initiatives, the key for attaining success with CRM lies in understanding how to make use of this details to find the bottlenecks and also enhance the client interactions.
Analyses of the CRM detail along with the behavioral profiles pushes in-depth segmentation apart from precise targeting. At the end, the right mobile CRM strategies will prove helpful for companies to bag a ‘single view of the client’.
Growing shift to mobile driven social media
With increasing number of clients accessing social media via their mobile phones, the opportunities are rising to make use of this channel for successfully engaging with clients. As per a recently released report by Nielsen, social media has become a relevant channel for client service. One in every three social media users claim that they are more inclined towards using social media instead of phone for reviewing the issues related to client servicing.
Therefore, social channels are not just media for indulging in networking and entertainment. They are also being utilized for opting for purchases, availing of utility services and successfully sharing feedback. The result is the requirement for offering social self-care options assumes relevance for the marketing professionals. It is believed that a low cost self-care model is also important not just because of its convenience and price, but as it offers the marketers the opportunity to enhance their firm’s CRM details with the client’s social profile.
It won’t be incorrect to say that a unified, integrated and also multi-channel platform is the need of the hour for businesses taking up mobile marketing strategies. This approach will considerably make use of the power of mobile for enhancing business productivity and growth via the method of unified client engagement.
Furthermore, personalized multi-channel campaigns have driven the need for standard marketing models with the help of engagement, lowering of churn and also bringing improvement in client satisfaction levels. A successful CRM strategy will prove beneficial for integrating mobile and social platforms both apart from measuring the CRM campaigns efficiency against the objectives, thus helping in setting up stage for future strategies.