The Three Biggest Management Problems Behind the Failure of CRM Initiatives

How companies implement and use CRM, including Microsoft Dynamics CRM, continues to be a critical challenge for improving profitability, productivity, and customer retention, as well as for lowering costs and gaining critical insights into customer/prospect behaviour and preferences. 

Some businesses, however, still struggle to get the return-on-investment that they anticipate with their new CRM systems, despite CRM success rates having markedly increased.  So what are the reasons behind these CRM failures, and how can you avoid the same problems?

Reason #1:  Having a Poor Definition, or Lacking a Definition, of Success

One would suppose that companies undertaking a major CRM project would be clear and decisive about what they want it to achieve, and what ROI they want to gain.  The problem with not having a definition of success means that there's no way to show that the initiative is giving the expected ROI, or even any at all.  So to avoid this serious pitfall, be sure to create a clear case for implementing a CRM system that is unique to your business, document your current CRM situation so you have a clear baseline for comparison, and most important, establish criteria for success, so you can observe whether or not the CRM implementation is achieving what you intended it to achieve.

Reason #2:  CRM is Viewed as an IT Project

A crucial thing to remember about a CRM implementation is that it is a business venture rather than strictly an IT project, and as such, requires as much guidance from the CEO of the company as the CIO.  The CEO's concerns about a CRM system include such things as driving sales, encouraging customer loyalty, ...