Customer relationship management

Customer relationship management (CRM) is the practice, generally using data analysis to examine massive volumes of information, by which a company or other organisation manages its connections with its customers.

Data is collected from a wide variety of sources by customer relationship management systems, including but not limited to a company's website, phone, email, live chat, marketing materials, and, more recently, social media. They help companies identify their client base and determine the best ways to meet their demands, which in turn increases customer loyalty and revenue. Customers of the past, present, and future may all be targeted using a CRM system. From the company's vantage point, this relationship encompasses the whole gamut of activities involving interaction with consumers, including sales and service, forecasting, and the study of consumer trends and behaviours. It is projected by Gartner that by 2020, the worldwide CRM industry would be worth $69 billion.

In the early 1970s, when businesses were still gauging customer satisfaction with yearly surveys or by directly polling front-line employees, the idea of customer relationship management was born. Sales automation back then required separate mainframe systems, but at least companies could organise their clientele into spreadsheets and databases. The Farley File is one of the most famous early examples of customer relationship management systems. James Farley, Franklin Roosevelt's campaign manager, created a file called the Farley File to keep track of all the political and personal information they gathered on the individuals they met or were scheduled to see. FDR used it to impress the individuals he met by "remembering" information about them, including their families, careers, and political affiliations. Database marketing, or using statistics to analyse and acquire client information, was first proposed in 1982 by Kate and Robert D. Kestenbaum. In 1986, Pat Sullivan and Mike Muhney launched the first commercial contact management service, an assessment system for customers named ACT! They built it on the concept of the computerised Rolodex.