Building Customer Relationships Through Public Relations

Building Customer Relationships Through Public Relations

Author: Aspatore Books

Publisher:

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 132

ISBN-13:

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Building Customer Relationships through Public Relations is an authoritative, insiders perspective on the key strategies for creating a distinct reputation with the consumer in a crowded marketplace. Featuring presidents and CEOs representing some of the nations leading PR firms, this book provides a broad, yet comprehensive overview of the best practices for creating powerful brands in order to establish trust and credibility with customers, as well as to meet the demands of employees, investors, and vendors. Citing recent examples-both successful and unsuccessful-of connecting with consumers on a high level, the authors articulate the finer points of an industry focused on understanding your audience and delivering to meet their needs.


Book Synopsis Building Customer Relationships Through Public Relations by : Aspatore Books

Download or read book Building Customer Relationships Through Public Relations written by Aspatore Books and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Building Customer Relationships through Public Relations is an authoritative, insiders perspective on the key strategies for creating a distinct reputation with the consumer in a crowded marketplace. Featuring presidents and CEOs representing some of the nations leading PR firms, this book provides a broad, yet comprehensive overview of the best practices for creating powerful brands in order to establish trust and credibility with customers, as well as to meet the demands of employees, investors, and vendors. Citing recent examples-both successful and unsuccessful-of connecting with consumers on a high level, the authors articulate the finer points of an industry focused on understanding your audience and delivering to meet their needs.


Converted

Converted

Author: Neil Hoyne

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2022-02-22

Total Pages: 192

ISBN-13: 0593420667

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When the world’s biggest brands want to sharpen their digital marketing strategy, they call Neil Hoyne – Google’s Chief Measurement Strategist and Senior Fellow at the Wharton School. In his first book, he offers a simple, research-backed playbook that anyone can use to find their best customers and develop relationships that last. Under pressure for quick results and facing fierce marketplace competition, too many marketers are boxed into spaghetti-to-the-wall forms of digital marketing that limit the potential of their long hours, countless experiments, and warehouses of data. And in the end, they watch their competition sprint ahead. But what if you built a business around long-term relationships with customers, using data to understand who they are, what they need, and where to find more customers just like them? You can. And you’ll leave your competitors, with all of their data and their short-term thinking, to poke around in the scraps. In Converted, you will learn how to: • Understand the full value of each relationship • Engage in an ongoing conversation with your best customers • Ask the right questions so you can anticipate your customers’ needs • Find more great customers A real person is always on the other end of the transaction. Converted shows you how to win their hearts.


Book Synopsis Converted by : Neil Hoyne

Download or read book Converted written by Neil Hoyne and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2022-02-22 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When the world’s biggest brands want to sharpen their digital marketing strategy, they call Neil Hoyne – Google’s Chief Measurement Strategist and Senior Fellow at the Wharton School. In his first book, he offers a simple, research-backed playbook that anyone can use to find their best customers and develop relationships that last. Under pressure for quick results and facing fierce marketplace competition, too many marketers are boxed into spaghetti-to-the-wall forms of digital marketing that limit the potential of their long hours, countless experiments, and warehouses of data. And in the end, they watch their competition sprint ahead. But what if you built a business around long-term relationships with customers, using data to understand who they are, what they need, and where to find more customers just like them? You can. And you’ll leave your competitors, with all of their data and their short-term thinking, to poke around in the scraps. In Converted, you will learn how to: • Understand the full value of each relationship • Engage in an ongoing conversation with your best customers • Ask the right questions so you can anticipate your customers’ needs • Find more great customers A real person is always on the other end of the transaction. Converted shows you how to win their hearts.


Relationship Building in Public Relations

Relationship Building in Public Relations

Author: Petra Theunissen

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-09-22

Total Pages: 220

ISBN-13: 1317293495

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This book aims to provide an interdisciplinary approach to highlight the importance of relationships in public relations, delving not only into the organization-public relationships but also into interpersonal relationships within the industry in order to offer new, empirical insights into the impact and formation of such relationships. Theunissen and Sissons theorize that public relations cannot exist without interpersonal relationships and the ability to create and maintain such relationships. Taking a critical stance, the book will move beyond mere rhetoric and conjecture by providing solid evidence-based research results to inform their theories about the impact of relationships and dialogue on public relations thinking. Rather than following contemporary thinking, it aims to embrace current changes, look ahead and prepare a new generation for the challenges of 21st century public relations practice.


Book Synopsis Relationship Building in Public Relations by : Petra Theunissen

Download or read book Relationship Building in Public Relations written by Petra Theunissen and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-09-22 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book aims to provide an interdisciplinary approach to highlight the importance of relationships in public relations, delving not only into the organization-public relationships but also into interpersonal relationships within the industry in order to offer new, empirical insights into the impact and formation of such relationships. Theunissen and Sissons theorize that public relations cannot exist without interpersonal relationships and the ability to create and maintain such relationships. Taking a critical stance, the book will move beyond mere rhetoric and conjecture by providing solid evidence-based research results to inform their theories about the impact of relationships and dialogue on public relations thinking. Rather than following contemporary thinking, it aims to embrace current changes, look ahead and prepare a new generation for the challenges of 21st century public relations practice.


Building Customer-brand Relationships

Building Customer-brand Relationships

Author: Don E. Schultz

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2015-01-28

Total Pages: 424

ISBN-13: 1317475607

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Almost every advertising, promotion, or marketing communications textbook is based on an inside-out approach, focusing on what the marketer wants to communicate to customers and prospects. This text takes a different view - that the marketer and the customer build the ongoing brand value together. Rather than the marketer trying to 'sell', the role of the marketer is to help customer buy. To do that, a customer view is vital and customer insight is essential. Customer insights allow the marketer to understand which audiences are important for a product, what delivery forms are appropriate, and what type of content is beneficial. "Building Customer-Brand Relationships" is themed around the four key elements marketing communicators use in developing programs - audiences, brands, delivery, and content - but provides an innovative approach to marketing communications in the 'push-pull' marketplace that combines traditional outbound communications (advertising, sales promotion, direct marketing, and PR) with the inbound or 'pull' media of Internet, mobile communications, social networks, and more. Its 'customer-centric' media planning approach covers media decision before dealing with creative development, and emphasizes measurement and accountability. The text's concepts have been used successfully around the world, and can be adapted and adjusted to any type of product or service.


Book Synopsis Building Customer-brand Relationships by : Don E. Schultz

Download or read book Building Customer-brand Relationships written by Don E. Schultz and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-01-28 with total page 424 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Almost every advertising, promotion, or marketing communications textbook is based on an inside-out approach, focusing on what the marketer wants to communicate to customers and prospects. This text takes a different view - that the marketer and the customer build the ongoing brand value together. Rather than the marketer trying to 'sell', the role of the marketer is to help customer buy. To do that, a customer view is vital and customer insight is essential. Customer insights allow the marketer to understand which audiences are important for a product, what delivery forms are appropriate, and what type of content is beneficial. "Building Customer-Brand Relationships" is themed around the four key elements marketing communicators use in developing programs - audiences, brands, delivery, and content - but provides an innovative approach to marketing communications in the 'push-pull' marketplace that combines traditional outbound communications (advertising, sales promotion, direct marketing, and PR) with the inbound or 'pull' media of Internet, mobile communications, social networks, and more. Its 'customer-centric' media planning approach covers media decision before dealing with creative development, and emphasizes measurement and accountability. The text's concepts have been used successfully around the world, and can be adapted and adjusted to any type of product or service.


Managing Customer Experience and Relationships

Managing Customer Experience and Relationships

Author: Martha Rogers

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2022-04-19

Total Pages: 517

ISBN-13: 1119815347

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Every business on the planet is trying to maximize the value created by its customers Learn how to do it, step by step, in this newly revised Fourth Edition of Managing Customer Experience and Relationships: A Strategic Framework. Written by Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, Ph.D., recognized for decades as two of the world’s leading experts on customer experience issues, the book combines theory, case studies, and strategic analyses to guide a company on its own quest to position its customers at the very center of its business model, and to “treat different customers differently.” This latest edition adds new material including: How to manage the mass-customization principles that drive digital interactions How to understand and manage data-driven marketing analytics issues, without having to do the math How to implement and monitor customer success management, the new discipline that has arisen alongside software-as-a-service businesses How to deal with the increasing threat to privacy, autonomy, and competition posed by the big tech companies like Facebook, Amazon, and Google Teaching slide decks to accompany the book, author-written test banks for all chapters, a complete glossary for the field, and full indexing Ideal not just for students, but for managers, executives, and other business leaders, Managing Customer Experience and Relationships should prove an indispensable resource for marketing, sales, or customer service professionals in both the B2C and B2B world.


Book Synopsis Managing Customer Experience and Relationships by : Martha Rogers

Download or read book Managing Customer Experience and Relationships written by Martha Rogers and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2022-04-19 with total page 517 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Every business on the planet is trying to maximize the value created by its customers Learn how to do it, step by step, in this newly revised Fourth Edition of Managing Customer Experience and Relationships: A Strategic Framework. Written by Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, Ph.D., recognized for decades as two of the world’s leading experts on customer experience issues, the book combines theory, case studies, and strategic analyses to guide a company on its own quest to position its customers at the very center of its business model, and to “treat different customers differently.” This latest edition adds new material including: How to manage the mass-customization principles that drive digital interactions How to understand and manage data-driven marketing analytics issues, without having to do the math How to implement and monitor customer success management, the new discipline that has arisen alongside software-as-a-service businesses How to deal with the increasing threat to privacy, autonomy, and competition posed by the big tech companies like Facebook, Amazon, and Google Teaching slide decks to accompany the book, author-written test banks for all chapters, a complete glossary for the field, and full indexing Ideal not just for students, but for managers, executives, and other business leaders, Managing Customer Experience and Relationships should prove an indispensable resource for marketing, sales, or customer service professionals in both the B2C and B2B world.


Start Your Own Public Relations Business

Start Your Own Public Relations Business

Author: Entrepreneur Press

Publisher: Entrepreneur Press

Published: 2009-04-01

Total Pages: 192

ISBN-13: 161308093X

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The explosion of media opportunities and the rapidly changing communications landscape have served as key drivers for the public relations industry, creating huge opportunities for communications and PR specialists like you! Coaching you all the way, the experts at Entrepreneur show you how to parlay your PR experience into a successful new business. Our experts take you step by step from building the business foundation to managing day-to-day operations. Learn how to set up your firm, choose your market niche, prospect and sign clients, build media relationships, set fees, and more! Plus, gain priceless insight, tips, and techniques from practicing entrepreneurs and industry experts! Learn how to: • Set up your own PR firm • Choose your market niche • Win over, sign, and keep clients • Build strong, well-planned campaigns using the latest tools of the trade • Develop prosperous relationships and partnerships • Boost profits by expanding your business • And more Go from public relations pro to CEO! Start your own public relations firm today!


Book Synopsis Start Your Own Public Relations Business by : Entrepreneur Press

Download or read book Start Your Own Public Relations Business written by Entrepreneur Press and published by Entrepreneur Press. This book was released on 2009-04-01 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The explosion of media opportunities and the rapidly changing communications landscape have served as key drivers for the public relations industry, creating huge opportunities for communications and PR specialists like you! Coaching you all the way, the experts at Entrepreneur show you how to parlay your PR experience into a successful new business. Our experts take you step by step from building the business foundation to managing day-to-day operations. Learn how to set up your firm, choose your market niche, prospect and sign clients, build media relationships, set fees, and more! Plus, gain priceless insight, tips, and techniques from practicing entrepreneurs and industry experts! Learn how to: • Set up your own PR firm • Choose your market niche • Win over, sign, and keep clients • Build strong, well-planned campaigns using the latest tools of the trade • Develop prosperous relationships and partnerships • Boost profits by expanding your business • And more Go from public relations pro to CEO! Start your own public relations firm today!


Revenue Operations

Revenue Operations

Author: Stephen G. Diorio

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2022-04-19

Total Pages: 292

ISBN-13: 1119871123

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Crush siloes by connecting teams, data, and technologies with a new systems-based approach to growth. Growing a business in the 21st Century has become a capital intensive and data-driven team sport. In Revenue Operations: A New Way to Align Sales and Marketing, Monetize Data, and Ignite Growth, an accomplished team of practitioners, academics, and experts provide a proven system for aligning revenue teams and unlocking growth. The book shows everyone how to connect the dots across an increasingly complex technology ecosystem to simplify selling and accelerate revenue expansion. With Revenue Operations, you’ll understand what it takes to successfully transition to the new system of growth without killing your existing business. This practical and executable approach can be used by virtually any business - large or small, regardless of history or industry - that wants to generate more growth and value. By reading this book you will find: Real-world case studies and personal experiences from executives across an array of high technology, commercial, industrial, services, consumer, and cloud-based businesses. The six core elements of a system for managing your commercial operations, digital selling infrastructure, and customer data assets. Nine building-blocks that connect the dots across your sales and marketing technology ecosystem to generate more consistent growth and a better customer experience at lower costs. The skills and tools that next generation growth leaders will need to chart the roadmap for a successful career in any growth discipline for the next 25 years. An indispensable resource for anyone who wants to get more from their business – board members, CEOs, business unit leaders, strategists, thought leaders, analysts, operations professionals, partners, and front-line doers in sales, marketing, and service - Revenue Operations is based on over one thousand surveys of and interviews with business professionals conducted during 2020 and 2021. It also includes a comprehensive analysis of the sales and marketing technology landscape. As a perfectly balanced combination of academic insight and data-driven application, this book belongs on the bookshelves of anyone responsible for driving revenue and growth.


Book Synopsis Revenue Operations by : Stephen G. Diorio

Download or read book Revenue Operations written by Stephen G. Diorio and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2022-04-19 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Crush siloes by connecting teams, data, and technologies with a new systems-based approach to growth. Growing a business in the 21st Century has become a capital intensive and data-driven team sport. In Revenue Operations: A New Way to Align Sales and Marketing, Monetize Data, and Ignite Growth, an accomplished team of practitioners, academics, and experts provide a proven system for aligning revenue teams and unlocking growth. The book shows everyone how to connect the dots across an increasingly complex technology ecosystem to simplify selling and accelerate revenue expansion. With Revenue Operations, you’ll understand what it takes to successfully transition to the new system of growth without killing your existing business. This practical and executable approach can be used by virtually any business - large or small, regardless of history or industry - that wants to generate more growth and value. By reading this book you will find: Real-world case studies and personal experiences from executives across an array of high technology, commercial, industrial, services, consumer, and cloud-based businesses. The six core elements of a system for managing your commercial operations, digital selling infrastructure, and customer data assets. Nine building-blocks that connect the dots across your sales and marketing technology ecosystem to generate more consistent growth and a better customer experience at lower costs. The skills and tools that next generation growth leaders will need to chart the roadmap for a successful career in any growth discipline for the next 25 years. An indispensable resource for anyone who wants to get more from their business – board members, CEOs, business unit leaders, strategists, thought leaders, analysts, operations professionals, partners, and front-line doers in sales, marketing, and service - Revenue Operations is based on over one thousand surveys of and interviews with business professionals conducted during 2020 and 2021. It also includes a comprehensive analysis of the sales and marketing technology landscape. As a perfectly balanced combination of academic insight and data-driven application, this book belongs on the bookshelves of anyone responsible for driving revenue and growth.


Building Brands Directly

Building Brands Directly

Author: Stewart Pearson

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2016-07-27

Total Pages: 445

ISBN-13: 1349137715

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New competition, technology and economics have changed the behaviour of markets and the practice of marketing. Customers are more discerning, and demand more quality, service and choice. Established brands are under threat. New brands are tougher than ever to build. How to create business value by sustaining existing brands and building new brands is the priority of our major business leaders, the managers to whom they entrust their brands and the students who are the brand stewards of the future. In this book Stewart Pearson explains how to build your brands directly: by investing in the loyalty of your customers and explains the commercial realities behind today's marketing headlines.


Book Synopsis Building Brands Directly by : Stewart Pearson

Download or read book Building Brands Directly written by Stewart Pearson and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-07-27 with total page 445 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New competition, technology and economics have changed the behaviour of markets and the practice of marketing. Customers are more discerning, and demand more quality, service and choice. Established brands are under threat. New brands are tougher than ever to build. How to create business value by sustaining existing brands and building new brands is the priority of our major business leaders, the managers to whom they entrust their brands and the students who are the brand stewards of the future. In this book Stewart Pearson explains how to build your brands directly: by investing in the loyalty of your customers and explains the commercial realities behind today's marketing headlines.


Conversations in Communication, Volume 2

Conversations in Communication, Volume 2

Author: Jabaree Dunham-Carson

Publisher: FMS Full Media Services

Published: 2015-04-29

Total Pages: 108

ISBN-13: 9780996003346

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The purpose of this study is to discover if Customer Relationship Management programs can serve as a function of Public Relations in the development of stakeholder relationships. Conversations In Communication, Volume II: Customer Relationship Management (CRM) as a Function of Public Relations analyzes CRM communication by exploring the organization-public relationships between customers and their banking providers. Data is analyzed and explored and practical CRM software options are offered for readers to enhance their organizations.


Book Synopsis Conversations in Communication, Volume 2 by : Jabaree Dunham-Carson

Download or read book Conversations in Communication, Volume 2 written by Jabaree Dunham-Carson and published by FMS Full Media Services. This book was released on 2015-04-29 with total page 108 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The purpose of this study is to discover if Customer Relationship Management programs can serve as a function of Public Relations in the development of stakeholder relationships. Conversations In Communication, Volume II: Customer Relationship Management (CRM) as a Function of Public Relations analyzes CRM communication by exploring the organization-public relationships between customers and their banking providers. Data is analyzed and explored and practical CRM software options are offered for readers to enhance their organizations.


Accelerating Customer Relationships

Accelerating Customer Relationships

Author: Ronald S. Swift

Publisher: Prentice Hall Professional

Published: 2001

Total Pages: 524

ISBN-13: 9780130889843

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Preface Corporations that achieve high customer retention and high customer profitability aim for: The right product (or service), to the right customer, at the right price, at the right time, through the right channel, to satisfy the customer's need or desire. Information Technology—in the form of sophisticated databases fed by electronic commerce, point-of-sale devices, ATMs, and other customer touch points—is changing the roles of marketing and managing customers. Information and knowledge bases abound and are being leveraged to drive new profitability and manage changing relationships with customers. The creation of knowledge bases, sometimes called data warehouses or Info-Structures, provides profitable opportunities for business managers to define and analyze their customers' behavior to develop and better manage short- and long-term relationships. Relationship Technology will become the new norm for the use of information and customer knowledge bases to forge more meaningful relationships. This will be accomplished through advanced technology, processes centered on the customers and channels, as well as methodologies and software combined to affect the behaviors of organizations (internally) and their customers/channels (externally). We are quickly moving from Information Technology to Relationship Technology. The positive effect will be astounding and highly profitable for those that also foster CRM. At the turn of the century, merchants and bankers knew their customers; they lived in the same neighborhoods and understood the individual shopping and banking needs of each of their customers. They practiced the purest form of Customer Relationship Management (CRM). With mass merchandising and franchising, customer relationships became distant. As the new millennium begins, companies are beginning to leverage IT to return to the CRM principles of the neighborhood store and bank. The customer should be the primary focus for most organizations. Yet customer information in a form suitable for marketing or management purposes either is not available, or becomes available long after a market opportunity passes, therefore CRM opportunities are lost. Understanding customers today is accomplished by maintaining and acting on historical and very detailed data, obtained from numerous computing and point-of-contact devices. The data is merged, enriched, and transformed into meaningful information in a specialized database. In a world of powerful computers, personal software applications, and easy-to-use analytical end-user software tools, managers have the power to segment and directly address marketing opportunities through well managed processes and marketing strategies. This book is written for business executives and managers interested in gaining advantage by using advanced customer information and marketing process techniques. Managers charged with managing and enhancing relationships with their customers will find this book a profitable guide for many years. Many of today's managers are also charged with cutting the cost of sales to increase profitability. All managers need to identify and focus on those customers who are the most profitable, while, possibly, withdrawing from supporting customers who are unprofitable. The goal of this book is to help you: identify actions to categorize and address your customers much more effectively through the use of information and technology, define the benefits of knowing customers more intimately, and show how you can use information to increase turnover/revenues, satisfaction, and profitability. The level of detailed information that companies can build about a single customer now enables them to market through knowledge-based relationships. By defining processes and providing activities, this book will accelerate your CRM "learning curve," and provide an effective framework that will enable your organization to tap into the best practices and experiences of CRM-driven companies (in Chapter 14). In Chapter 6, you will have the opportunity to learn how to (in less than 100 days) start or advance, your customer database or data warehouse environment. This book also provides a wider managerial perspective on the implications of obtaining better information about the whole business. The customer-centric knowledge-based info-structure changes the way that companies do business, and it is likely to alter the structure of the organization, the way it is staffed, and, even, how its management and employees behave. Organizational changes affect the way the marketing department works and the way that it is perceived within the organization. Effective communications with prospects, customers, alliance partners, competitors, the media, and through individualized feedback mechanisms creates a whole new image for marketing and new opportunities for marketing successes. Chapter 14 provides examples of companies that have transformed their marketing principles into CRM practices and are engaging more and more customers in long-term satisfaction and higher per-customer profitability. In the title of this book and throughout its pages I have used the phrase "Relationship Technologies" to describe the increasingly sophisticated data warehousing and business intelligence technologies that are helping companies create lasting customer relationships, therefore improving business performance. I want to acknowledge that this phrase was created and protected by NCR Corporation and I use this trademark throughout this book with the company's permission. Special thanks and credit for developing the Relationship Technologies concept goes to Dr. Stephen Emmott of NCR's acclaimed Knowledge Lab in London. As time marches on, there is an ever-increasing velocity with which we communicate, interact, position, and involve our selves and our customers in relationships. To increase your Return on Investment (ROI), the right information and relationship technologies are critical for effective Customer Relationship Management. It is now possible to: know who your customers are and who your best customers are stimulate what they buy or know what they won't buy time when and how they buy learn customers' preferences and make them loyal customers define characteristics that make up a great/profitable customer model channels are best to address a customer's needs predict what they may or will buy in the future keep your best customers for many years This book features many companies using CRM, decision-support, marketing databases, and data-warehousing techniques to achieve a positive ROI, using customer-centric knowledge-bases. Success begins with understanding the scope and processes involved in true CRM and then initiating appropriate actions to create and move forward into the future. Walking the talk differentiates the perennial ongoing winners. Reinvestment in success generates growth and opportunity. Success is in our ability to learn from the past, adopt new ideas and actions in the present, and to challenge the future. Respectfully, Ronald S. Swift Dallas, Texas June 2000


Book Synopsis Accelerating Customer Relationships by : Ronald S. Swift

Download or read book Accelerating Customer Relationships written by Ronald S. Swift and published by Prentice Hall Professional. This book was released on 2001 with total page 524 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Preface Corporations that achieve high customer retention and high customer profitability aim for: The right product (or service), to the right customer, at the right price, at the right time, through the right channel, to satisfy the customer's need or desire. Information Technology—in the form of sophisticated databases fed by electronic commerce, point-of-sale devices, ATMs, and other customer touch points—is changing the roles of marketing and managing customers. Information and knowledge bases abound and are being leveraged to drive new profitability and manage changing relationships with customers. The creation of knowledge bases, sometimes called data warehouses or Info-Structures, provides profitable opportunities for business managers to define and analyze their customers' behavior to develop and better manage short- and long-term relationships. Relationship Technology will become the new norm for the use of information and customer knowledge bases to forge more meaningful relationships. This will be accomplished through advanced technology, processes centered on the customers and channels, as well as methodologies and software combined to affect the behaviors of organizations (internally) and their customers/channels (externally). We are quickly moving from Information Technology to Relationship Technology. The positive effect will be astounding and highly profitable for those that also foster CRM. At the turn of the century, merchants and bankers knew their customers; they lived in the same neighborhoods and understood the individual shopping and banking needs of each of their customers. They practiced the purest form of Customer Relationship Management (CRM). With mass merchandising and franchising, customer relationships became distant. As the new millennium begins, companies are beginning to leverage IT to return to the CRM principles of the neighborhood store and bank. The customer should be the primary focus for most organizations. Yet customer information in a form suitable for marketing or management purposes either is not available, or becomes available long after a market opportunity passes, therefore CRM opportunities are lost. Understanding customers today is accomplished by maintaining and acting on historical and very detailed data, obtained from numerous computing and point-of-contact devices. The data is merged, enriched, and transformed into meaningful information in a specialized database. In a world of powerful computers, personal software applications, and easy-to-use analytical end-user software tools, managers have the power to segment and directly address marketing opportunities through well managed processes and marketing strategies. This book is written for business executives and managers interested in gaining advantage by using advanced customer information and marketing process techniques. Managers charged with managing and enhancing relationships with their customers will find this book a profitable guide for many years. Many of today's managers are also charged with cutting the cost of sales to increase profitability. All managers need to identify and focus on those customers who are the most profitable, while, possibly, withdrawing from supporting customers who are unprofitable. The goal of this book is to help you: identify actions to categorize and address your customers much more effectively through the use of information and technology, define the benefits of knowing customers more intimately, and show how you can use information to increase turnover/revenues, satisfaction, and profitability. The level of detailed information that companies can build about a single customer now enables them to market through knowledge-based relationships. By defining processes and providing activities, this book will accelerate your CRM "learning curve," and provide an effective framework that will enable your organization to tap into the best practices and experiences of CRM-driven companies (in Chapter 14). In Chapter 6, you will have the opportunity to learn how to (in less than 100 days) start or advance, your customer database or data warehouse environment. This book also provides a wider managerial perspective on the implications of obtaining better information about the whole business. The customer-centric knowledge-based info-structure changes the way that companies do business, and it is likely to alter the structure of the organization, the way it is staffed, and, even, how its management and employees behave. Organizational changes affect the way the marketing department works and the way that it is perceived within the organization. Effective communications with prospects, customers, alliance partners, competitors, the media, and through individualized feedback mechanisms creates a whole new image for marketing and new opportunities for marketing successes. Chapter 14 provides examples of companies that have transformed their marketing principles into CRM practices and are engaging more and more customers in long-term satisfaction and higher per-customer profitability. In the title of this book and throughout its pages I have used the phrase "Relationship Technologies" to describe the increasingly sophisticated data warehousing and business intelligence technologies that are helping companies create lasting customer relationships, therefore improving business performance. I want to acknowledge that this phrase was created and protected by NCR Corporation and I use this trademark throughout this book with the company's permission. Special thanks and credit for developing the Relationship Technologies concept goes to Dr. Stephen Emmott of NCR's acclaimed Knowledge Lab in London. As time marches on, there is an ever-increasing velocity with which we communicate, interact, position, and involve our selves and our customers in relationships. To increase your Return on Investment (ROI), the right information and relationship technologies are critical for effective Customer Relationship Management. It is now possible to: know who your customers are and who your best customers are stimulate what they buy or know what they won't buy time when and how they buy learn customers' preferences and make them loyal customers define characteristics that make up a great/profitable customer model channels are best to address a customer's needs predict what they may or will buy in the future keep your best customers for many years This book features many companies using CRM, decision-support, marketing databases, and data-warehousing techniques to achieve a positive ROI, using customer-centric knowledge-bases. Success begins with understanding the scope and processes involved in true CRM and then initiating appropriate actions to create and move forward into the future. Walking the talk differentiates the perennial ongoing winners. Reinvestment in success generates growth and opportunity. Success is in our ability to learn from the past, adopt new ideas and actions in the present, and to challenge the future. Respectfully, Ronald S. Swift Dallas, Texas June 2000