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Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

​Strategic

Strategic CRM concentrates upon the development of a customer-centric business culture.[18]

The focus of a business on being customer-centric (in design and implementation of their CRM strategy) will translate into an improved CLV.[19]

Operational

The primary goal of CRM systems is integration and automation of sales, marketing, and customer support. Therefore, these systems typically have a dashboard that gives an overall view of the three functions on a single customer view, a single page for each customer that a company may have. The dashboard may provide client information, past sales, previous marketing efforts, and more, summarizing all of the relationships between the customer and the firm. Operational CRM is made up of 3 main components: sales force automation, marketing automation, and service automation.[20]

Sales force automation works with all stages in the sales cycle, from initially entering contact information to converting a prospective client into an actual client.[21] It implements sales promotion analysis, automates the tracking of a client's account history for repeated sales or future sales and coordinates sales, marketing, call centers, and retail outlets. It prevents duplicate efforts between a salesperson and a customer and also automatically tracks all contacts and follow-ups between both parties.[21][22]

Marketing automation focuses on easing the overall marketing process to make it more effective and efficient. CRM tools with marketing automation capabilities can automate repeated tasks, for example, sending out automated marketing emails at certain times to customers, or posting marketing information on social media. The goal with marketing automation is to turn a sales lead into a full customer. CRM systems today also work on customer engagement through social media.[23]

Service automation is the part of the CRM system that focuses on direct customer service technology. Through service automation, customers are supported through multiple channels such as phone, email, knowledge bases, ticketing portals, FAQs, and more.[20]

Analytical

The role of analytical CRM systems is to analyze customer data collected through multiple sources and present it so that business managers can make more informed decisions.[24] Analytical CRM systems use techniques such as data mining, correlation, and pattern recognition to analyze the customer data. These analytics help improve customer service by finding small problems which can be solved, perhaps by marketing to different parts of a consumer audience differently.[20] For example, through the analysis of a customer base's buying behavior, a company might see that this customer base has not been buying a lot of products recently. After scanning through this data, the company might think to market to this subset of consumers differently, to best communicate how this company's products might benefit this group specifically.[25]

Collaborative

The third primary aim of CRM systems is to incorporate external stakeholders such as suppliers, vendors, and distributors, and share customer information across groups/departments and organizations. For example, feedback can be collected from technical support calls, which could help provide direction for marketing products and services to that particular customer in the future.[26]

Customer data platform

Main article: Customer data platform

A customer data platform (CDP) is a computer system used by marketing departments that assembles data about individual people from various sources into one database, with which other software systems can interact.[27] As of February 2017 there were about twenty companies selling such systems and revenue for them was around US$300 million.[27]

​South East England is one of the nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL for statistical purposes. It consists of the counties of Buckinghamshire, East Sussex, Hampshire, the Isle of Wight, Kent, Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Surrey and West Sussex. Major towns and cities in the regions include Brighton and Hove, Milton Keynes, Southampton, Portsmouth, Slough, Reading and Oxford.

South East England is the third largest region of England, with an area of 19,096 km2 (7,373 sq mi), and is also the most populous with a total population of over eight and a half million (2011). The region contains seven legally chartered cities: Brighton and Hove, Canterbury, Chichester, Oxford, Portsmouth, Southampton and Winchester. The region's close proximity to London and connections to several national motorways have led to South East England becoming a prosperous economic hub with the largest economy of any region in the UK, after London. The region is home to Gatwick Airport, the UK's second-busiest airport, and Heathrow Airport (the UK's busiest airport) is located adjacent to the region's boundary with Greater London. The coastline along the English Channel provides numerous ferry crossings to mainland Europe.

The region is known for its countryside, which includes two national parks: the New Forest and the South Downs, as well as the North Downs, the Chiltern Hills and part of the Cotswolds. The River Thames flows through the region and its basin is known as the Thames Valley. It is also the location of a number of internationally known places of interest, such as HMS Victory in Portsmouth, Cliveden in Buckinghamshire, Thorpe Park and RHS Wisley in Surrey, Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire, Windsor Castle in Berkshire, Leeds Castle, the White Cliffs of Dover and Canterbury Cathedral in Kent, Brighton Palace Pier, and Hammerwood Park in East Sussex, and Wakehurst Place in West Sussex. The region has many universities; the University of Oxford is the oldest in the English-speaking world, and ranked among the best in the world.

South East England is host to various sporting events, including the annual Henley Royal Regatta, Royal Ascot and The Derby, and sporting venues include Wentworth Golf Club and Brands Hatch. Some of the events of the 2012 Summer Olympics were held in the south east, including the rowing at Eton Dorney and part of the cycling road race in the Surrey Hills.

In medieval times, South East England included much of the Kingdom of Wessex, which was the precursor to the modern state of England. Winchester was the capital of England after unification of the various states, including the kingdoms of Kent, Sussex and Mercia. Winchester stopped being the administrative capital of England some time in the 13th century as its influence waned while the City of London dominated commerce. The last monarch to be crowned at Winchester was Richard II in 1377, although the last monarch to be crowned by the Bishop of Winchester was Queen Mary I in 1553.

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