CRM can be classified further into

Operational crm
Analytical CRM
Collaborative CRM

What is Operational CRM?
Operational CRM supports the front desk executives of the customer service, sales and marketing functions.It is helpful in collecting informastion fromn the customers/clients and forwarding to the concerned team to who process the issue.

The advantages of using an operational CRM are
* Delivers personalized and efficient marketing, sales, and service through multi-channel collaboration
* Enables a 360-degree view of your customer while you are interacting with them
* Sales people and service engineers can access complete history of all customer interaction with your company, regardless of the touch point.
Some of the typical operational CRMs are

Sales force automation (SFA).
Customer Support/service applications.
Enterprise marketing automation (EMA).

A CRM will not improve the performance of an enterprise just by installing a software. To ensure that the CRM becomes successful in an organization the management has to show a lot of commitment and make investment consistently in it over a period of time. The management should formulate a clear business process, train and educate the employees on the significance of understanding the customer, ensure co-ordination among the sales, marketing and the customer service departments of the organization.

Choosing the appropriate software and the IT support for it is very critical for the success of the CRM; however the use of software alone does not guarantee the success of a CRM. It is the combination of the software, the process and the employees which contributes to the success.

Customer Relationship Management(CRM) is a practice in an organisation which helps to collect information about customers from various sources and using it for managing customer relationship better.It helps the organisation to understand the customers requirement when carried out succesfully.The use of softwares in CRM has made it really easier to analyse the data and derive critical information out of them.
According to wikipedia, “CRM includes the methodologies, strategies, software, and web-based capabilities that help an enterprise organize and manage customer relationships. It is the collection and distribution of all data to all areas of the business. The general purpose of CRM is to enable organizations to better manage their customers through the introduction of reliable systems, processes and procedures for interacting with those customers”.

As already told in the earlier posts Lotus Notes can be used used both for mails as well as for applications that would help the organisation function effectively.The applications can either be custom built or generic products available readily.Products such as HRMS and CRM are developed by several software companies.You have to be very careful in choosing the application products as they may or may not suit the specific requirements of your
organisation.Keeping this in mind the best alternative would be going for a custom built
application which will suit all your requirements.Choose the right partner who can provide you the perfect combination of cost-effectiveness and Quality.For more information on sme services refer small business services.

What are the applications that can be developed using Lotus Notes/Domino?

Lotus Notes suits most the applications which involve workflow,although it can support other kinds of applications as well.Some of the typical applications for which Lotus Notes is employed are

Sales Force Automation
Customer Relationship Management
Expense Tracking
Leave Application
HR Management System
Payroll Management
Performance Approval System
Purchase Approval System
Enquiry Tracking

Let us see what these applications are and how it can help your organisation in the coming posts.

Lets find how to create a link to the notes document in a MS word document. To add a link to the MS Word document,we have to first create a NDL file.

To create a NDL file, open your notes document to which you want to create a link, go to
EDIT, Copy as link and choose Document link.Open a notepad and paste the link,now save this notepad with any name you want with an extention .ndl(eg.: link1.ndl),now the NDL file is ready to use.

Now open the MS Word document, go to INSERT,then choose OBJECT and then choose the tab CREATE FROM FILE and locate the NDL file you have saved and click ok. The link will now be created in the MS Word document.

To open the link the Lotus Notes application must be kept open.

Lotus Notes has a feature where information in Microsoft Excel can be used in its documents, forms and views.To transfer the data from an Excel sheet to the Notes document,we can create an embedded object in the Notes document or form.

What is an embedded object?
Data available in one file(source) can be transfered to another file(Destination) by inserting them.This process is called Embedding.The data transfered is called the object or the Embedded Object.
Whenever there is a change in the object it is automatically updated in the Notes Document.Alternatively,the data from a Microsoft Excel work book can be imported into the Notes Document or Forms.When you import the data to Lotus Notes, the data alone is tranferred and there is no link maintained between the Excel workbook and Lotus Notes.So, even if there is any change in the source document, no change happens in the Notes document or form to whichthe data was tranferred.

Before The Call | Solution

If you have a sales team that is cold calling on customers and if you use Salesforce.com, Before The Call has an interesting solution that lets you find out complete details about the lead through multiple sources, before your sales person makes that call.

“Know the Prospect:
Draw from the best-known market intelligence partners to enrich your leads without leaving Salesforce.com. The Validator service search tens of millions of records to ensure you have the most accurate contact and company information available. This information is important to any sales process and Before the Call is able to use this information to access other sources that will provide you a full picture of the prospect. No longer will you have to exit CRM to search for this information, it is all in-process, in-context and retained within your CRM application. “

Interested in doing this from within your Lotus Notes based CRM? While no readymade solution exists, it is possible to build links with webservices. It is also possible to get data from the different lead sourcing companies like infoUSA and merge it with your Lotus Notes CRM data. At Maarga, we offer complete lifecycle solutions for software development on Lotus Notes/Domino technologies. We can also club it with BPO/KPO services like internet based market research to get you the leads you need into your CRM.