A REPORT ON CRM STRATEGIES IN ITES INDUSTRY by Sanjay Gupta

A REPORT ON

CRM STRATEGIES IN ITES INDUSTRY

Information Technology Enabled Services (ITES) Definition: ITES, Information Technology Enabled Service, is defined as outsourcing of processes that can be enabled with information technology and covers diverse areas like finance, HR, administration, health care, telecommunication, manufacturing etc. Armed with technology and manpower, these services are provided from e-enabled locations. Objectives of ITES ITES was formerly known as IndoNet. The main objectives of ITES are: •

Enabling business strategy

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Achieving an organization's business goals

ITES Services ITES offers different services integrated in a single delivery mechanism to end users. Some of the services offered include: •

Medical Transcription

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Document Processing

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Data Entry and Processing

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Data Warehousing

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IT Help Desk Services

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Application Development

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Enterprise Resource Planning

Business process outsourcing Business process outsourcing (BPO) is a form of outsourcing that involves the contracting of the operations and responsibilities of a specific business functions (or processes) to a thirdparty service provider. Originally, this was associated with manufacturing firms, such as Coca Cola that outsourced large segments of its supply chain. [1]. In the contemporary context, it is primarily used to refer to the outsourcing of services. BPO is typically categorized into back office outsourcing - which includes internal business functions such as human resources or finance and accounting, and front office outsourcing which includes customer-related services such as contact center services. BPO that is contracted outside a company's country is called offshore outsourcing. BPO that is contracted to a company's neighboring (or nearby) country is called nearshore outsourcing. Given the proximity of BPO to the information technology industry, it is also categorized as an information technology enabled service or ITES. Knowledge process outsourcing(KPO) and legal process outsourcing (LPO) are some of the sub-segments of business process outsourcing industry.

Knowledge process outsourcing Knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) is a form of outsourcing, in which knowledge-related and information-related work is carried out by workers in a different company or by a subsidiary of the same organization, which may be in the same country or in an offshore location to save cost. Unlike the outsourcing of manufacturing, this typically involves high-value work carried out by highly skilled staff. KPO firms, in addition to providing expertise in the processes themselves, often make many low level business decisions—typically those that are easily undone if they conflict with higher-level business plans.

Types of KPO services KPO services include the following: •

Market research services

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Legal research services (also known as Legal Process Outsourcing)

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Patent research services

Challenges to providers In addition to the challenges faced by clients, KPO companies themselves have challenges: •

High staff turnover, especially where work is not challenging to the employee's skills

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High cost of training and tendency to lose the most experienced employees to the clients

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Ensuring the security and confidentiality of information, especially when privacy laws vary from one country to another

Market researching Leaders in the market research industry are slowly seeing the benefits offered by KPO and have begun outsourcing.Comprehensive IT solutions are offered by vendors who provide solutions covering the entire life cycle of a market research project. Smaller firms can also benefit from these solutions as they are cost effective and remain within the budget of smaller organizations. KPO is claimed to efficiently increase productivity and increase cost savings in the area of market research.Advocates claim that the trend is likely to prove increasingly popular in the global market research industry.

Literature Review (CRM Practices in ITES) The Indian Business Process Outsourcing Industry: An Evaluation of FirmLevel customer Relation Management - Arti Grover,

Delhi School of Economics,

University of Delhi

Introduction Companies in high wage nations are increasingly viewing offshoring of services as a strategic and essential element of their business strategy. Offshoring enhances the overall productivity of the sourcing firm by lowering its costs of production, providing access to high quality resources not available internally and releasing internal resources 1. The impact of offshoring on the productivity of the buyer has been widely researched 2, however, little investigation has gone into the factors that explain the productivity of the supplier in an outsourcing relationship. A major stumbling block in such an evaluation is the complete absence of any theory relating to the service provider firm. In this paper, we borrow relevant features of a firm, which resembles that of a typical service provider firm from different strands of literature. This helps us formulate an econometric model of a representative Business Process Outsourcing 3 (BPO) or Information technology enabled services (ITES) firm to quantitatively evaluate the factors that explains its performance in India. The specification of our econometric model is based on the available literature on the theory of a supplier and preliminary analysis of aggregate and firm level data. Our estimation of BPO firm performance indicates that in the year 2002-03, prior experience, number of locations, funding from venture capitalists and the number of clients positively affects a firm’s performance while investment on information security certification, which is a mandate from the client, does not benefit the supplier firm, at least in the short run. Further, we find that our empirical results are robust and invariant to the choice of estimation technique. Predictions of the model for the BPO Industry In the Indian BPO space, Venture Capitalist funds such as Oak Hill, General Atlantic Partners, Westbridge Capital, Warburg Pincus, among others have been very active and have invested more than US$ 300 million from 2001 to 2003. In the first stage of BPO development in India, when competition was low, firms backed by VC did not perform well. Examples include firms like Tracmail, Epicenter Technologies and Infowavz which have now touched the stage of insolvency while Transworks and FirstRing have already closed down. As is true of the externally financed

intermediate good suppliers in the Aghion et al model, the initial development of the Indian BPO industry faced lower incentives for technology adoption for firms funded by VC. This is obvious from their poor performance. However, in the past decade, competition in the Indian BPO industry.

Significance of CRM Customer retention through better customer services is very significant for any business enterprise. The slowdown in global economy and tough competition among the enterprises made the companies to focus at cost containment and growth in profitability. Managing the good relationship with the customers is the only key to success and for the survival of the business. The concept customer relationship management helps companies to not only to retain the existing customers, but also widen the customer base. The cost of retaining a customer is one-fifth in the cost of acquiring a new customer. CRM helps in tracking marketing opportunities better and focus on those customers who not only increase the sales/volume but also in terms of profitability. CRM is defined as tracking customer behavior in order to develop marketing and maintaining customer relationship to a brand often by a development of software system provides one-on one contact between the marketing business and their customer. CRM is a business strategy, which includes the people, processes, and technology associated with a marketing and service. It provides information for every corporate activity from marketing to fulfillment. CRM embodies six key disciplines: Sales force Automation; Marketing Automation; Help Desk, and call center. The CRM technology promise to retain customers and boost the top line continues to resonate with companies recovering from a tough economy. Apart from customer relationship management, CRM also referred as customer relationship marketing and continuous retention marketing. CRM's largest vendors such as siebel, people soft, Oracle, and SAP will continues to grow and expand their reach into newer application segments, such as marketing automation, partnerrelationship management and even employee-relationship management. ICICI Bank, HDFC Standard Life, UTI and ABN-Amro are now looking at business process management to increase returns on investment, improve customer relationship management and employee productivity. The worldwide CRM services market reached $22 billion in 2002-03, a 10.6 percent increase from the prior year according to Gartner group. The group forecasts this market to hit $25.3 billion in 2003-04, and $47 billion by 2006. The CRM market in India has witnessed a healthy growth and expects the CRM software market to grow at a CAGR of 40% to reach Rs 188 crores in 2006. Predictions of the model for the BPO Industry

In the Indian BPO space, Venture Capitalist funds such as Oak Hill, General Atlantic Partners, Westbridge Capital, Warburg Pincus, among others have been very active and have invested more than US$ 300 million from 2001 to 2003. In the first stage of BPO development in India, when competition was low, firms backed by VC did not perform well. Examples include firms like Tracmail, Epicenter Technologies and Infowavz which have now touched the stage of insolvency while Transworks and FirstRing have already closed down. As is true of the externally financed intermediate good suppliers in the Aghion et al model, the initial development of the Indian BPO industry faced lower incentives for technology adoption for firms funded by VC. This is obvious from their poor performance. However, in the past decade, competition in the Indian BPO industryhas grown tremendously and therefore by the Aghion et al model we would expect higher pace of technology adoption and performance for VC backed BPO firms 8. We will test this in the empirical section of the paper. In the Aghion et al model, it is easy to see that a high fixed (and variable) cost of operation 9 decreases the pace of technology adoption and hence firm performance. This is primarily the reason to expect low performance in firms with high proportion of voice based process. On the cost side, firms with a high proportion of voice processes have high fixed costs of operation (like dialer running and maintenance, bandwidth costs) as well as high employee wages 10 and related expenses, while on the revenue side, voice processes are among the ones with lowest billing rates. Voice processes typically require low entry-level skill which induces higher competition and thus drives down prices11. For instance, Wipro BPO, Spectramind blames its poor performance in the past to a high proportion of voice processes and there had been a clear mandate to reduce this proportion from 84% in 2005 to 60% in a span of 18 months for improving its margins. Aghion et al model also implies that high (variable) labor cost, lowers the pace of technology adoption and hence firm performance. This is intuitive because increasing labor cost lowers not only the expected profit from adopting a new technology, but it also increases the cost of adopting the technology. In the Indian BPO industry, high employee attrition 12 rates averaging about 40%, (In 2002, the attrition rate in Wipro BPO was 120%) are additional costs, over and above the wage inflation of 15-20% per annum. Attrition 13,14 is a big drain on the revenues of BPO firms. It costs a company $1000 to train an agent. GENPACT, the largest Indian third party vendor, spends about

$10 million and over 1.5 million man hours per annum on training and it takes at least three months for a new employee to reach an optimum productivity level. To combat high attrition, GENPACT maintains a buffer of 15% employees on bench which further increases labor costs and lowers firm performance15. High bonuses, salary hike, incentives, door-to-door transportation services and offsite team events are some of the strategies to fight attrition which have additionally

pushed up the average labor cost of the industry and pulled down the margins. It is worth noticing that voice-based processes, which are characterized by high levels of stress and odd working hours 16, are again at a disadvantage due to high attrition rate. Attrition in voice based processes averages between 50-55% as against an average of 30-35% for non-voice work. As cost of labor rises in India, voice-based BPO firms may be unsustainable in future if higher rates of attrition persist. To combat the problem arising from high labor and operational costs, firms try to maximize “shift utilization” (that is, 3 eight hour shifts) from their fixed investment of $ 10,000-$ 15,000 per seat in office space. However, reality is far from ideal. Shift utilization of Indian call centers is about 1.5-2 shifts principally because 80% of the call center business in India comes from the US, which implies that most of these seats are vacant for 16 hours. To increase seat utilization, BPO firms actively look for clients across the US, that is, from the east coast to the west coast, as well as in UK and Australia. To increase seat utilization, call centers handle their voice-based services during business hours and use non-business hours to answer queries through e-mail. This may also enable a healthy balance of voice and non-voice processes and thereby help evade the problems typical of a voice based process.

Indian Offshore Suppliers: The Market Leaders Understanding the Market Leads to Better Vendor Relationship. by Stephanie Moore and William Martorelli with Adam Brown

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Large suppliers continue to dominate the market for Indian software and services exports. This is due to the preference of North American customers for large, seemingly stable partners. Indeed, these Indian industry leaders remain ideal vendor partners for large customers seeking significant scale in their offshore operations. The leading Indian suppliers will continue to pace the market, but cracks are beginning to appear. Obliged to continue their rapid growth by seeking the largest opportunities, their customer responsiveness and recruitment/retention policies are being tested. Smaller Indian suppliers are emerging as viable alternatives. While customers struggle to differentiate the leading Indian suppliers, which all seem to have the same breadth of capabilities, important differences exist. One of the most significant differences is the relationship management philosophy by which they engage with their customers. Large suppliers continue to dominate the market for Indian software and services exports. This is due to the preference of North American customers for large, seemingly stable

partners. Indeed, these Indian industry leaders remain ideal vendor partners for large customers seeking significant scale in their offshore operations. The leading Indian suppliers will continue to pace the market, but cracks are beginning to appear. Obliged to continue their rapid growth by seeking the largest opportunities, their customer responsiveness and recruitment/retention policies are being tested. Smaller Indian suppliers are emerging as viable alternatives. While customers struggle to differentiate the leading Indian suppliers, which all seem to have the same breadth of capabilities, important differences exist. One of the most significant differences is the relationship management philosophy by which they engage with their customers.

Rapid Growth Challenges Vendors And Adds Risk To Client Engagements To make matters worse, Indian vendors need to increase headcount rapidly to accommodate new business. Infosys, for example, grew from about 15,000 employees last year to about 25,000 employees this year. Today, Wipro brings in about 200 recruits every Monday. In addition to finding the qualified resources to hire — a Herculean task in itself — the vendors have to assimilate and train this new staff quickly. Each recruit has to learn the vendor’s culture and processes required to deliver quality results. Even if we assume that every vendor can train and assimilate staff quickly, most clients are going to find themselves with a preponderance of unseasoned junior staff on projects. Client Relationship Management Emerges As the Key Differentiator All of the leading Indian suppliers possess mature infrastructure, robust development processes, and typically very broad capabilities. In fact, these capabilities are so broad that it can be difficult for many customers to tell the leading vendors apart. Because significant differences exist, customers should evaluate these capabilities carefully. One of the most important areas of differentiation lies in the vendor’s engagement and relationship management philosophy and overall relationship management skills. Some Indian suppliers are easier to work with than others. By providing the kind of engagement style that customers are used to from domestic suppliers, these suppliers provide transparency

in relationship management. The level of relationship transparency required by any customer will vary depending on the offshore outsourcing maturity of that customer. Early adopters with significant experience in managing offshore suppliers, for example, will not need these skills as much as beginners. Moreover, these competencies will not be as important in a relationship based on staff augmentation as they are with project based engagements, where a close, flexible, and transparent relationship with suppliers is essential. One of the principal reasons Cognizant has been included in the leader category is its mature relationship management skills.

New CRM Solution Specifically for Companies on IBM System Platforms Tue Aug 4, 2009

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Infor today announced the availability of Infor CRM, a new solution that provides enhanced customer relationship management (CRM) capabilities to customers with Infor enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions on IBM System platforms. The new solution can help Infor's more than 14,000 System customers create growth and loyalty through heightened customer dialogue, increased revenue, reduced costs, and enhanced customer service. CRM linked with Infor's ERP products, provides Infor customers a single, integrated view of customer-related information such as credit limits, financial transactions, orders, quotes, shipments, and more. End users can access the solution via their Internet browser, ensuring data availability anywhere, anytime. The solution further simplifies use by providing CRM data to users through a single access point. CRM has robust capabilities for campaign management, opportunity management, sales process management, and quotation and order management.

CRM helps customers leverage their ERP data with new capabilities that will help them increase sales revenue, reduce sales costs, expand data visibility, enhance forecast accuracy, and improve customer service," said Kevin Piotrowski, director of System solution marketing, Infor. "Providing innovation and support to our large installed base of System i customers is an important priority and commitment for Infor and a major factor behind our

recent establishment of a business unit dedicated to our worldwide base of customers who use IBM System i." CRM i Edition enables companies to manage campaigns using CRM and ERP data to easily target subsets of their customers with offers tailored to specific wants and needs. Using e-mail, call lists for telesales and the mail merge function, the solution enables companies to better define and execute campaigns. Additionally, the solution provides the ability to manage marketing events, such as invitations, response tracking and post-event surveys, and also measure a campaign's success. With the solution's sales process management functionality, companies can use multiple sales practices as part of an overall CRM program. User-defined sales processes include additional sales to an existing customer, service without a contract, maintenance renewal, sales to a prospect, sales through a partner or reseller, and major account sales. In each instance, a record is created for every opportunity, enabling usersto review status using various parameters such as deal value, predicted close date and others. Additional functionality in Infor CRM i Edition enables users to manage quotations and orders by taking advantage of the abundant information contained in the company's existing ERP system. This data includes pricing, discounting, promotions, sourcing, and more. Using this data, the solution simplifies the prospect-to-customer and quote-to-order conversion processes, enabling users to increase the number of inquiries that become orders. This conversion rate is also boosted by the solution's opportunity management capabilities,

which

helps

improve

rates

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shorten

IT enabled Services (ITeS) INDIA

sales

cycles.

Sector structure India is referred to as the back office of the world owing mainly to the Information Technology-enabled Services (ITeS) sector. According to the National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM), the apex body for software services in India, the revenue of the information technology sector has grown from 1.2 per cent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in 1997-98 to an estimated 5.8 per cent in 2008-09. Indian IT-BPO grew by 12 per cent in 2008-09 to reach US$ 71.7 billion in aggregate revenue. Software and services exports (includes exports of IT services, BPO, Engineering Services and R&D and Software products) reached US$ 47 billion, contributing nearly 66 per cent to the overall IT-BPO revenue aggregate. ITeS, which started with basic data entry tasks over a decade ago, is witnessing an expansion in its scope of services to include increasingly complex processes involving rule-based decision making and even research services requiring informed individual judgment. It now offers services such as knowledge process outsourcing (KPO), legal process outsourcing (LPO), games process outsourcing (GPO) and design outsourcing among others. India continues to capture a large share of new offshore centers being established in Asia. According to a new report by the Everest Research Institute, a leading research agency on the IT, ITES and BPO sector, more delivery centers have been set-up in tier-I and tier-II locations during the second quarter of 2009 as compared to the first quarter. Moreover, according to AT Kearney, India continues to be the most preferred destination for companies looking to offshore their IT and back-office functions. It also retains its lowcost advantage and is among the most financially attractive locations when viewed in combination with the business environment it offers and the availability of skilled people. India has retained its numero uno position even as some other well-established outsourcing hubs dropped in their attractiveness to be replaced by new emerging destinations in AT Kearney’s latest ranking of the top outsourcing destinations across the globe. The top three countries in the 2009 Global Services Location Index (GSLI) remain the same — India, China and Malaysia.

Moving up the value-chain India with its natural competitive advantage is likely to play a huge role in various segments of the ITeS industry. •

The Indian animation industry is rapidly growing as a major outsourcing hub with a growth rate of 30 per cent.

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The Indian KPO sector is estimated to become a US$ 10 billion industry by 2012, from the current size of US$ 4 billion.

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India is fast becoming a hot destination for outsourced e-publishing work. As per a Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) report, the industry is growing at an annual rate of 35 per cent and India's outsourcing opportunities in the value-added and core services will help make the publishing BPO industry worth US$ 1.46 billion by 2010.

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As per a CRISIL study, engineering services outsourcing (ESO) is poised to be the next big opportunity in the Indian outsourcing services industry. The ESO sector is likely to grow at a compounded rate of 26 per cent and post revenues aggregating around US$ 7.5 billion by 2012.

Deals The cross-border merger and acquisition (M&A) involving Indian IT and IT-enabled companies increased by nearly 12 per cent between January 1 and December 15, 2008 to US$ 3.22 billion (in 98 deals) compared with US$ 2.88 billion (in 159 deals) in 2007. The average deal size in 2008 increased to US$ 32.86 million (as compared to US$ 18.15 million), according to Grant Thornton India. Some recent deals include: •

Essar Group's business process outsourcing and technology arm, Aegis Ltd, has acquired CCN Group PTY Ltd, a South Africa-based BPO firm, for around US$30 million.

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Nasdaq-listed EXL Service has acquired the operations of European logistics provider Schneider Logistics in the Czech Republic. Analysts peg the transaction value at about US$3 million to US$5 million.

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Infosys BPO, the BPO arm of Infosys Technologies, has secured a five-year contract with T-Mobile UK. Infosys BPO has been engaged by T-Mobile UK to support several core processes for their finance directorate which cover customer finance, commercial finance and accounting (F&A), and procurement operations.

Growth A study by NASSCOM and Everest India on the Indian BPO sector states that India is at the forefront of the rapidly evolving BPO market, having established itself as a "destination of choice." According to the study, the Indian BPO sector, at its current momentum, can reach around US$ 30 billion in export revenues by 2012. Furthermore, the domestic BPO market (in verticals such as, banking, retail, insurance, media, telecom and government) provides an additional US$ 15-US$ 20 billion opportunity for the sector. According to the study, the Indian BPO sector has been growing at more than 35 per cent over the past three years. Moreover, according to a latest Ernst & Young report, the domestic BPO market is expected to reach US$6 billion by 2012, with a maximum addressable opportunity of US$16-19 billion. The study notes that domestic service providers would move to tier II and III cities to tap additional resources at low cost to serve domestic clients. The net margin in the domestic BPO market is predicted to increase gradually from around 9 per cent in 2008 to 11-12 per cent in 2012. Exports According to NASSCOM, if India maintains its current share of the global offshore IT-ITeS market, the IT-ITeS exports from India will exceed US$ 330 billion by 2019-20 (nearly 14 per cent of the projected worldwide spend). Currently the exports stand at US$ 47.3 billion. The ITeS sector is working towards reducing its dependence on the US market and is exploring new and emerging markets such as those in Australia and the Middle East. Government Initiative

Realising its potential, after IT Parks and IT special economic zone (SEZs), the government has cleared a proposal for creating much larger Information Technology Investment Regions (ITIRs) to give a fillip to the country's growing IT and ITeS sector. Road Ahead According to a new Gartner report, the share of Indian BPO vendors will be 10 per cent of the total global market by 2010 from the current 5 per cent. Moreover, the domestic market is developing, providing a huge opportunity to the BPO sector. Infosys Technologies sees over US$ 1 billion worth of outsourcing contracts coming from the Indian market over next few years, as the country’s government and state-owned organisations seek to become more efficient by outsourcing their IT needs.

BPO About Wipro Wipro has 2300 + person years of experience of delivering CRM solutions in the past eight years. Wipro’s vast experience comes from our years of experience implementing different suites like Siebel, Amdocs Clarify, Peoplesoft CRM, SFDC and SAP CRM. Wipro provides unmatched business value to customers through a combination of process excellence, quality frameworks and a mature Global Delivery Model which in turn helps in reducing the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO). Consider the following •

SFDC Implementation across SFA, Customer Support, Marketing Automation and PRM

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SFDC Application Integration & Consolidation- using Middleware and SAP XI

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SFDC Administration and Support (Functional & Technical)

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Propriety methodologies for rapid implementation and roll outs

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Deep industry specific vertical knowledge

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CSAT of 4.5 ( on a scale of 1 to 5 )

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On time. On Budget .Always

Delivering strategic solutions that match the high stakes

Wipro BPO Solutions is a leading provider of Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) focusing on the complex, voice and non-voice based segment of customer-care services. The integrated solution approach provides enhanced value to the customers through process standardization, process simplification and process optimization. Services are provided from delivery centers in the North America, Central and Eastern Europe, India, China and Latin America. Our services include, Customer Service Technical Help Desk Finance and Accounts Outsourcing Human Resource Outsourcing Procurement Outsourcing Specialized Services BASE)))™

Wipro BPO is about delivering long-term benefits & measurable value to our customers through: Business process re-engineering Integrating technology with BPO Knowledge services Wipro BPO is uniquely positioned to service customer requirements by leveraging its tenets of quality and innovation, the best people talent, self sustaining process framework and domain

knowledge. We offer customized service offerings; translating into the most flexible and cost effective services of the highest quality for our customers. In 2002, Wipro took a quantum jump in the BPO services by acquiring the then Spectramind. Wipro BPO Solutions, complements the services offered by Wipro Technologies, making it one of the largest BPO service players. With over 19,000 people, operating out of 9 different locations (India and Eastern Europe), Wipro BPO has been a critical partner to all its customers in achieving their business goals. Wipro BPO services customers in various industries including Banking & Capital Markets, Insurance, Travel & Hospitality, Hi-Tech Manufacturing, Telecom & Healthcare sectors. Wipro BPO also has deep expertise in delivering process specific solutions in areas like Finance & Accounting, Procurement, HR Services, Loyalty Services and Knowledge Services.

Wipro BPO Loyalty Services In the current global business environment, a company’s survival and success depends on how effectively it manages customers across the entire lifecycle. It is essential that businesses have a single view of the customer across the customer lifecycle, enabling them to uncover retention drivers and customize marketing and operational enhancement efforts. Wipro’s Loyalty Services provides an integrated approach to revenue enhancement, productivity improvement and enhanced customer loyalty. We follow a three-step program to manage your customers across the life cycle: •

Understanding drivers of loyalty and defection

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Developing a loyalty strategy with a framework for measurement and rewards

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Systematically delivering what your customers value

ENTERPRISE APPLICATIONS SERVICES (EAS) Globalization and Technology innovation have presented new set of challenges to the organizations like increased competition, shrinking margins and customer’s increasing expectations .In the face of such challenges, it is imperative for an organization to have a customer centric business strategy .A CRM software facilitates improved customer relations and thus has evolved as a competitive edge for organizations. The challenge now has zeroed

down to selecting right CRM product with maximum ROI and flexibility. The mantra is to “Do more for less. “ Today some of the risks faced by clients while implementing traditional CRM Solutions are: •

Long development life cycles and complex customizations taking longer time-tocustomer which further takes a toll on the IT investments

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Under utilization of investment on huge CRM licenses and Client/Server infrastructure

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Millions of dollars being spent on maintenance and upgrades

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Low user adoption and consequent failure of the CRM strategy

To help minimize the above risks, Wipro’s CRM practice brings you Software as a service (SaaS) in collaboration with Salesforce.com(SFDC), the market leader in On-Demand CRM Solutions

SFDC CRM Salesforce.com is the worldwide leader in on-demand customer relationship management (CRM) services. SFDC’s strong credentials in Sales Force Automation, Customer Service, Marketing Automation and Partner Channel Management helps customers of any size derive quick time to value, usability and lower upfront cost. Wipro’s Service Offerings Wipro’s Global CRM Practice helps customers define & execute their CRM Strategy which comes from the impeccable record of delivering CRM implementations in multiple business processes across different industry verticals.

Consulting As radical changes that occur in the business environment, evolution invariably becomes a necessity as customers world-wide expect and seek innovation for both products and services. Successful CRM acts as a differentiator in business, especially when product and price fail to achieve this competitive advantage. Also the product and price advantages being replicable, they fail to give you the necessary edge in your industry. Hence CRM is emerging as a critical strategy as customer relationships are coming to the forefront of the competitivebattleground. At Wipro, we offer a range of CRM consulting services to help you enhance the life-time value of your customers and increase customer satisfaction. Some of the broad based offerings are as listed below : CRM strategy definition As the right CRM strategy will help you revolutionize your business practices, our domain experts help you define an optimal CRM strategy, formulate a plan for efficient execution, and establish milestones for your CRM implementation.

Business process analysis and definition

For rapid deployment of the CRM solution across the organization, we combine our traditional process improvement techniques with technology to carry out business process analysis and definition. This enables keen understanding of the uniqueness of your business processes, thereby ensuring that the CRM solution implemented, meets your strategic business objectives. Solution prototyping To help our customers increase the familiarity with their CRM environment, we design a solution prototype. This helps our customers test the effectiveness of the CRM implementation in their organization. Gap analysis Any deficiencies (gaps) in your existing CRM products and processes should be addressed to completely leverage your CRM solution. We identify the business processes, which are not supported by the standard application and suggest potential solutions for these gaps, revitalizing your CRM system

Implementation Increasing customer loyalty, sales, profitability and gaining a competitive advantage are the key drivers to an organization’s success. An investment in this respect is an investment into your future, the one that will repay you with improved business processes and higher returns. A CRM initiative which fails to fall in line with the organization’s stated objectives to success, will not work as a differentiating business strategy. Wipro ensures that your CRM project delivers rich short-term results and also realizes the full strategic advantages of the implementation in the long run. We combine the best in processes, people, infrastructure, alliances and our global delivery model to ensure that CRM works best for your business. Our CRM offerings span across

various business functions like customer care, marketing, sales force automation, customer service, order management and partner relationship management Our project management ensures that, each critical success factor is successfully incorporated during implementation, so that a complete end-to-end solution is delivered. Our expertise in enterprise applications deployment enables seamless integration with existing legacy or other application systems. Our analytics reporting services help in defining the right metrics for your marketing campaigns and customer behavior analysis. A successful CRM is possible only through the integration of the four key components process, technology, data and people. Therefore, the ultimate success of a CRM project lies in the hands of the user. To make your CRM program completely successful, we train future users to handle the transition into a CRM driven enterprise

Upgrades Organizations on a fast-track need to keep their processes geared up to achieve accelerated growth. This coupled with an ever-changing customer perception of value is a key driver for growth in any business. Customer perception of value is an amalgamation of what the customer receives, how much of it is sold, delivered and supported and the cost- the total cost of ownership. Every successful organization thus aims to minimize the total cost of ownership for its customers. A customer-centric strategy will ensure that, your organization is aligned with your augmenting business objectives. In such a situation, your leap into the next level of technology has to ensure minimal interference with your on-going processes. Wipro’s migration assistance in Siebel CRM Version upgrade: Upgrade from one version of Siebel to a higher version, in a specific business environment

Re-implementation: Sometimes due to high customization in the existing framework, a simple version upgrade might not be practical. In order to, evade this situation and also, leverage new functionalities of a higher version, Wipro offers re-implementation services for a successful upgrade. We conduct an impact analysis to conceptualize the impact of a new version upgrade and setup the necessary infrastructure for the build. We assure seamless data migration when a new functionality is implemented, so that operational functions are undisturbed. We employ a proprietary upgrade & re-implementation methodology for better predictability & governance. Our clients have benefited from an accelerated upgrade model which ensures rapid upgrade processes and 100% on-time deliveries.

Center of Excellence CRM process improvements and competency building to stay with cutting edge technology has always been the agenda with Wipro. We develop industry specific point solutions and participate in various forums. The Center of Excellence (COE) complements the engagement to focus on entire CRM application life cycle management than just implementation. CoE has a well structured portal with: •

Completely threaded knowledge repository from requirements to deployment

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Sand box environment so that end users feel confident of the application

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Seamless induction of new IT staff managing application

CoE also has standards based CRM pre-configured solutions to navigate green-field CRM implementations and provides application roadmap definition along with methodologies which have specific templates and checklists to ensure consistency and quality of deliverables .We also do customer specific feasibility assessments or proof of concepts to provide solutions for complex requirements

Overview Companies in virtually every industry face an almost insolvable problem: how to reduce operating costs and maintain profitability in the face of soaring customer expectations. According to IBM research, 79% of business leaders have only a generalized or superficial/absent understanding of their customers. As a result, they could interpret that business leaders continue to act on an operational basis or “what can be made faster or more efficient,” versus what the customer may value most. In an atmosphere of extreme price sensitivity, customers are demanding more service, more convenience and more personalized communications. Businesses must maximize every interaction with their customers to make positive impressions and drive loyalty and preference. At IBM Global Business Services, it regards CRM as a journey, not a destination. It involves shifting the focus from products and channels to customer. It means streamlining and integrating the sales, marketing and customer service. Done right, the results can be extremely powerful: •

Lower contact center costs

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Increased customer satisfaction and sales conversion rates

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Improved sales performance across all channels (direct, indirect and partner)

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Reduced field service operations costs

Business challenge What business challenges are today clients facing that might be addressed by these offerings? One or two paragraphs - Consider pain points. •

How can organization deliver competitively superior customer experiences within a realistic, achievable operational model in a cost effective manner?

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How can formalize and deploy the advocacy building, higher-order emotive attributes, such as dignity or empathy, as promised by brand?

Automotive

customer

relationship

management

(CRM)

analytics solutions

Automotive CRM analytics solutions from IBM employ technology for greater customer insight. Target market for higher sales and return on marketing expenditures. Use customer intelligence to personalise messaging and offers across marketing channels. Help predict trends, optimise customer relationships and uncover new sales opportunities. The advantage Extensive industry experience Our automotive CRM analytics solutions include: •

Extensive experience in successful CRM analytics implementations.

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Leadership in collaborative tools.

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Convenience of complete solutions including hardware, CRM applications from leading software vendors and installation.

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One point of accountability to give you the results you need.

We can leverage our experience from our CRM implementations. •

We have automotive industry experience from engagements with Volvo Truck, JCI, Renault, Peugeot, DCX and Jeep.

•

We offer a long CRM consulting track record with customers across the automotive industry.

The benefits Gain the power of information CRM analytics solutions from IBM can help thecompany capitalise on customer intelligence to gain substantial strategic advantages.

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Improve understanding of customers' needs.

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Identify and target customers with higher profit potential.

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Gain decision support from accurate, up-to-date customer intelligence.

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Personalise offerings to individual customers for greater returns.

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Derive insights into customer purchasing patterns to identify inhibitors to success, recognise new or up and coming trends and possibly uncover hidden niches.

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Give customers a more positive contact experience to improve customer satisfaction and loyalty.

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Improve your overall reputation in the marketplace with targeted, relevant marketing and excellent customer service from sales to repair and service warranties.

The ROI Happier customers, more revenue Automotive CRM analytics solutions from IBM can help to achieve the return on investment by providing accurate customer data that enables to: •

Identify and target customers with higher profit potential.

•

Increase the effectiveness of marketing programs by delivering targeted, personalised messages to help increase revenue.

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Reduce cost of tracking leads through automation.

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Increase orders with relevant messaging that enhances customer satisfaction.

CRM Practice Integrate sales, marketing and customer service functions and improve sales performance across all channels IBM’s Customer Relationship Management (CRM) practice helps to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of marketing, sales and customer service, while also helps to improve customer loyalty, satisfaction and profitability. They do this by understanding the evolving dynamics of customer relationships, products and the sales and service channels then synchronise the processes, competencies and systems that enables to: •

Help clients understand the "voice of the customer" and interpret what it means.

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Link information and processes across the enterprise, to create effective interaction and product affinity.

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Reengineer and integrate sales, service and customer contact capabilities.

 CRM Strategy – to help clients achieve consensus around their CRM strategy and identify the capabilities required to meet business goals. They do this by creating a view of the end state from a customer and company perspective and a benefitsdriven blueprint of the future platform. The work spans areas of CRM value proposition, CRM blueprint and roadmap, and CRM transformation program.  Marketing and Sales Transformation - to focus on strategies and solutions to improve sales and marketing performance by driving effectiveness and efficiency through all stages of the sales and marketing process. Thework spans areas of marketing operations, marketing programs, and sales operations.  Service Transformation – to help improve customer and employee satisfaction, and dramatically drive down the “cost to serve,” often resulting in improved revenue. Looking across the entire field service lifecycle, they help to set competitive metrics, simplify/standardise processes and leverage technology aggressively but prudently. The work spans areas of service transformation strategy, service transformation diagnostic, and service transformation implementation.

 Contact Center Optimisation – to help clients improve efficiency and effectiveness of contact centre operations by designing consistent approaches to dealing with customers across all channels (phone, web, IDTV/kiosk, mobile access, etc). The work spans areas of contact centre strategy, contact centre consolidation strategy, contact centre diagnostic, self service assessment, and telephony integration assessment.  Business Intelligence – to help focus the use of customer insight to achieve business intelligence, better campaign capabilities and deeper relationships between the customer and provider. Some of the key BI applications and practices include threat/fraud

detection,

risk/compliance,

operational

intelligence,

business

performance management (BPM), and workforce productivity.  IT Services for CRM - to provide business and technology services for CRM that will improve the ability to serve customers. The key services offerings that align to CRM include Siebel CRM OnDemand, Portals, content and e-Commerce Services, Network Convergence Services, Infrastructure services readiness engagements, and Customer experience, branding and usability design services.

CRM solutions Branch convergence from IBM and Avaya The inability to reach the right expert at the right time. Inefficient use of customer representatives. Inconsistent customer experiences. See how IBM and Avaya can help eliminate these frustrations through the creation of an enhanced branch communications network.

Customer relationship management from IBM and SAP Sustaining customer relationships and identifying new markets is integral to the success. How can they control costs and inspire customer loyalty? IBM and SAP can provide the applications, best practices and industry expertise need to provide personalized service, access to information and integration across channels.

Customer service solutions from IBM and KANA Increase the quality of the customer experience, turn service centers into profit centers, and ensure processes are compliant with regulations. IBM and KANA can help to organization deliver the experience customers want over multiple channels while effectively balancing cost, compliance, and revenue objectives to benefit their business.

Electronics sales and service from IBM and SAP The electronics business must acquire and retain customers in a competitive market. But loyalty is in short supply. IBM and SAP help to compete with customer-focused strategies, processes and tools designed to help increase loyalty, revenue and profit.

IBM and Oracle's Siebel solutions The IBM and Oracle alliance unites the recognized market leader in CRM with the largest Oracle integrator and implementer worldwide. Together, we offer companies new opportunities to do CRM right.

CRM done right from IBM The goal - Improve success by doing CRM right According to a recent study by IBM's Institute for Business Value and The Economist, 85 percent of companies do not feel they are fully optimizing their CRM initiatives. How can it improve CRM operations? Can it mitigate the risk that's inherent in new programs? What's the best way to secure organizational commitment to these critical initiatives? IBM CRM done right can guide to transformation.

The advantage - Adopt a pragmatic approach to CRM initiatives IBM has developed a pragmatic approach to planning and deploying CRM initiatives—the IBM CRM done right framework. In applying the framework, it can help to establish agreement within organization on how CRM can create value for business and clients. It

helps to shape a vision for the capabilities that will deliver the value proposition. And finally, create and execute an implementation roadmap that defines projects to build new and improved CRM environment. IBM CRM done right can guide its decision making, optimize practices and alleviate the risk of transforming CRM capabilities into a strategic differentiator for organization.

The benefits - Realize the true benefits of CRM CRM programs must impact the bottom line and deliver a return on time, effort and investment. Successful CRM can transform the company, helping to grow more profitable by serving customers more intelligently. Our CRM Strategy services are designed to improve the success of initiatives. Potential benefits include: •

Management buy-in and sponsorship of the CRM vision and business objectives.

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Alignment of the vision with shareholder and customer value.

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Alignment of the strategy with operations (marketing, sales and service) by linking the value proposition with customer-facing processes or channels.

IBM

has

worked

with

companies

across

many

industries—financial

services,

telecommunications, pharmaceuticals, manufacturing and more—to build innovative CRM strategies and to implement solid, successful initiatives. The strong relationships with leading CRM application providers such as Siebel, PeopleSoft and SAP, enable to offer a complete solution that delivers measurable benefits. The customer experience planning and implementing own CRM transformation at IBM—the largest Siebel implementation in the world—contributes greatly to the expertise and can apply to the solutions build for clients. They are integrating all the parts of the business that touch clients and have already seen a 30 percent improvement in client satisfaction ratings.

The goal - Conquer the challenges of CRM transformation Addressing CRM as a core operation can present many challenges. Compelling company to change. Achieving consensus around CRM strategy. Aligning teams to work toward one common goal. Sustaining commitment and support. IBM CRM done right is designed to help conquer these challenges by creating directed value cases and aligning priorities with the appropriate resources and work efforts.

The advantage - Leverage CRM strategy capabilities IBM has the capabilities to help and build an effective and successful CRM strategy. •

IBM Global Business Services has CRM engagements with 74% of the Fortune Global 100 and 45% of the Fortune Global 500.

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They have the largest global CRM practice with more than 5,500 experienced CRM practitioners who work with leading companies across a broad set of industries, providing integrated, on demand solutions that transform how clients interact with customers at every point of contact.

•

IBM has business relationships with several industry-leading CRM application providers, including Siebel, PeopleSoft and SAP, which help to build a complete solution for CRM operational transformation.

The benefits - Improve the success of CRM efforts From justifying business decisions to building and maintaining support for CRM programs. They can help to develop: •

Value case—fundamental analysis of the cost, feasibility, risks, benefits and economic return of a CRM initiative with which customers gain: o

Organization agreement on initiatives, goals and financial expectations.

Clear economic justification for CRM solutions.

Documented proof of commitment.

o •

Confidence that business decisions are made on sound analysis.

Value propositions—definition of specific measurable objectives that create the most value for all stakeholders, including customers, employees, partners and the company as a whole.

•

Operational blueprint—future end-state vision for the new CRM operations that includes:

•

Plan for deployment of new resources.

Strategy for building new technologies and infrastructures.

Design of new processes.

Comprehensive strategy for managing change.

Implementation roadmap—development of a planned sequence of short CRM programs that work together to reach the main goal, with each step contributing incremental results along the way.

•

Sponsorship, governance and change management—process to build support for the CRM transformation that helps ensure the entire organization stays committed throughout the deployment with: o

Sponsorship and agreement from all stakeholders.

Development of an empowered governance structure.

Plan for change management.

The approach - Learn from our CRM experiences IBM worked with a U.S. retail bank to: •

Identify and prioritize CRM strategic business objectives that support the bank's business and financial goals.

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Identify capabilities required to realize the CRM strategy.

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Align processes, organization, application and data in an operating model that delivers the required capabilities.

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Develop a financially justifiable roadmap for implementing the redefined operating model.

As a result, key internal stakeholders were aligned to common objectives and the transformation roadmap. The expected five-year benefit case was forecast in excess of US$125 million.

The financial advantage - Achieve the ROI promised by CRM IBM CRM done right can deliver great value by improving the success of CRM efforts. •

Help secure investments in CRM initiatives—and enhance shareholder value—by improving the likelihood that programs will be successful with comprehensive planning.

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Boost revenue potential by focusing on a series of smaller programs that can contribute value and ROI on their own while building toward the long-term vision.

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Garner support and commitment to programs to help ensure investments are not wasted on initiatives that will be abandoned in the near future

Introduction Winning in the market share through the world-class customer service is an important method adopted by many companies. Customer relationship management [CRM] is one of the customer care

services and which provides the opportunity for the companies to maintain customers intact and also attract new market for their products. Significance of CRM in GENPACT Customer retention through better customer services is very significant for any business enterprise. The slowdown in global economy and tough competition among the enterprises made the companies to focus at cost containment and growth in profitability. Managing the good relationship with the customers is the only key to success and for the survival of the business. The concept customer relationship management helps companies to not only to retain the existing customers, but also widen the customer base. The cost of retaining a customer is one-fifth in the cost of acquiring a new customer. CRM helps in tracking marketing opportunities better and focus on those customers who not only increase the sales/volume but also in terms of profitability. CRM is defined as tracking customer behavior in order to develop marketing and maintaining customer relationship to a brand often by a development of software system provides one-on one contact between the marketing business and their customer. CRM is a business strategy, which includes the people, processes, and technology associated with a marketing and service. It provides information for every corporate activity from marketing to fulfillment. CRM embodies six key disciplines: Sales force Automation; Marketing Automation; Help Desk, and call center. The CRM technology promise to retain customers and boost the top line continues to resonate with companies recovering from a tough economy. Apart from customer relationship management, CRM also referred as customer relationship marketing and continuous retention marketing. CRM's largest vendors such as siebel, people soft, Oracle, and SAP will continues to grow and expand their reach into newer application segments, such as marketing automation, partner-relationship management and even employee-relationship management. ICICI Bank, HDFC Standard Life, UTI and ABN-Amro are now looking at business process management to increase returns on investment, improve customer relationship management and employee productivity. The worldwide CRM services market reached $22 billion in 2002-03, a 10.6 percent increase from the prior year according to Gartner group. The group forecasts this market to hit $25.3 billion in 2003-04, and $47 billion by 2006. The CRM market in India has witnessed a healthy growth and expects the CRM software market to grow at a CAGR of 40% to reach Rs 188 crores in 2006.

IBM's 2004 Global CRM Survey According to 2004 Global CRM Study from IBM Business Consulting services, 85% of companies in America, Europe and Asia large and small, across every industry are not feeling fully successful with CRM. Fewer than 15% of global companies believe they are fully succeeding with their CRM initiatives, and another 20%to 30%are having only some success. The survey was conducted in late 2003 and early 2004 on 373 senior-level or above management decision makers or influencers at a mix of small, medium and large enterprises, to understand how companies attain CRM success and achieve significant return on investment. More than half of respondents' companies had annual revenues exceeding US$50 million; 30% of respondents reported annual revenues of US$ 1 billion to more than US$50 billion. Despite the dismal results, CRM continues to hold great promise for most companies. Over 50% of the 373 companies surveyed believe CRM is relevant to increasing performance from a shareholder value perspective.75% consider CRM important in delivering revenue growth through improved customer experiences, retaining and growing existing customer bases, increasing customer acquisition rates and influencing the development of new product and services. A successful CRM strategy should be at a heart of business model which focuses on a virtue of flexibility, real time responsiveness, and a laser focus on the customer. Significant findings Around 75% of companies manage CRM at the division level such as marketing, sales, IT or Customer service. Only 25%of companies run CRM from corporate, where a senior level team typically spans multiple divisions and business units. Survey revealed that corporate units achieve a CRM success from 25% to 50%. Senior management in over 35% of companies impede CRM success by portraying CRM as useful, but not critical. Over 75%of companies do not realize returns on CRM initiatives because they do not fully use CRM once it is implemented. Only 21% of responding companies view alignment as very important to CRM success. Approaches to CRM success The global research survey found that the two approaches most consistently cited as requirements for CRM success were 'change management' such as training employees to use CRM processes, tools and policies; and 'process change' such as involving employees in the process of designing and

changing CRM activities. The right action taken drive commitment to CRM throughout the company that in turn translates into sustained value. The key faults which can cause CRM projects to fail or prevent delivery of expected return –on – investment include too much dependence on technology systems as a panacea or organizations down-play the importance of senior management buy-in which in turn leads to lukewarm adoption by employees. The IBM study reveals the great promise of CRM in driving customer value and increasing organizational performance when it is done correctly. In the end, making CRM effective comes down to culture and creating broad acceptance and adoption. Successful CRM can transform a company, helping it to grow more profitably by serving its customers more intelligently. At its best, CRM does more than just automate a call center or improve a sales report; it can transform a company – culturally, structurally and strategically. P-factors in implementation For implementing CRM, the company has to start with three P-factors namely people, processes, and planning. The P factors affect sales, productivity, service, and profitability. The well management of the organization and right mix of these factors will lead the company to grow and prosper. People factor A positive interaction among employees, customers, and vendors will create a successful enterprise. Contact with the customers and vendors will create a successful enterprise. Contact with the customers and vendors are essential in order to understand their likes and dislikes of a company's product and the way for further improvement of company's business. The next people factor is employees. If there are complaints from employees about the customers, vendors, other departments as well as complaints about employees from the side of customers and vendors, the gaps have to be bridged before starting a CRM initiative. The importance of people's change favorable towards the work and interaction with each other is a valuable contributor for the successful implementation with each other is a valuable contributor for the successful implementation of the CRM concept. Establishing a consistent process of reviewing and resolving the issues will create a good image on the company's management. The perception of employees, customers, and vendors on the company also reflect on a positive mood. Process factor

The CRM success is also influenced by the process factor. Before introducing a new technology, the company management needs to review their business and workflow processes. In reviewing the workflow, it is essential to look at the natural flow of orders, product and information. It is also important to note at the source of order namely internet, the mail or the call center and continues through the shipment of product. This will facilitate to notice any bottlenecks, employee conflicts and inter departmental issues. Once these are mitigated, the next step is to document the procedures, policies and processes.

Planning Factor Planning is a particular kind of decision-making that addresses the specific future that managers desire for their organizations. A well-developed plan will give the managers to stretch boundaries and achieve organization goals. The primary features of a good plan are:

* Specific particulars: each goal and the step must be indicated. For example increase customer retention by 20% * Responsibility: the responsibility should be assigned to a team or person for completion. *

Deadlines:

Specific

Flexibility:

Modifications

Integration:

the

area

deadlines

and

are

affected

contingencies

essential by

CRM

for must

need

the be

plan

integrated

mentioned.

when

necessary.

the

plan.

* Metrics: Benchmarks are essential in order to measure the success or failure. Addressing the P factors will reflect on small gains initially and latter there will be tremendous growth in profitability. There will be a rise in sales, decline in cost, satisfactory customers and motivating employees. How do GENPACT succeed at CRM? Across the world, there are some companies who are successful at customer relationships and some are not. Numerous reasons are attributed for this. George day, marketing professor at Wharton Business School provided the answer after surveying 342 companies. He classified the companies that pursue a CRM strategy in to three groups.

The first and the most successful are companies that have market driven approaches. This approach makes CRM a core element of a strategy that aims to deliver superior customer value through complete solutions, superior service and a willingness to cater to individual requirements. Technological support will then come in to speed up business processes which will save the customer's time and effort.The second rungs are companies whose CRM initiatives are related to inner-directed. These companies want to get a better picture of their internal processes, with the intent of organizing data to cut service costs and help improve marketing targets. However, these companies assign operational tasks to the IT department, which does not have much to do with the operational strategy.

Finally, there are companies that use a defensive approach to crm, by way of using loyalty programs and reward. This is essentially a reactive strategy and, at best, maintains status quo in the market. Limitations of CRM The business objectives in front of the CRM path are appearing more like distant mirages when companies see the potholes/ traffic jams and road- raged drivers that lie in between. The software and systems cost hundreds of thousand of dollars to buy and customize and it takes months, if not years to install, integrate and debug. The process requires endless meetings with IT staff, which are in short supply, command huge wages, and may not have all the skills to do it right. Further, the business enterprises may not have the screening and training modules, or have the time to develop and deploy them to sift out agents for contacts. CRM is essentially about value. But this is not achieved simply by putting more people on the phones. The businesses have to offer a broad, integrated range of services: live agents and technology, backed by market analytics and deployed to each to their advantage. CRM implementation is a challenge. Most managers are reluctant to measure parameters to monitor progress before and after a CRM exercise. This is because it could show how well or badly the manager has implemented the CRM programme. CRM has become a senior management issue because it consumes staggering amounts of money and, notwithstanding the success stories, has mostly proved a disappointment. Companies around the world spend has mostly proved a disappointment. Companies around the world spend $3.5

billion a year on CRM software and that is only a fraction of total expense. Implementation, training, and integration outlays can be three to five times higher. Further, it takes three years to complete the implementation. Outsourcing the CRM To overcome the limitations of CRM approach practiced by companies themselves, the company's worldwide contact the outsourcing bureau or service provider to find the solution. This will facilitate faster

and

less

bumpy

alternative

CRM

route

reach

the

business

destination.

The outsourcing provider or bureau provides a CRM platform that offer an integrated blend of live agent and automated IVR, web and e-mail services, connected with contact management and if needed, integration with the business enterprise existing database. Many service providers have entered the CRM game that companies have almost too many choices. There are data base providers and call centers. There are communications specialists. Most advertising agencies have their own direct marketing arms. Further there are technolog6y vendors. With all these, getting started on CRM should not be a problem. Outsourcing the CRM can reduce customer retention costs, with out compromising the responsiveness, accuracy, availability, and quality of customer service. In addition, businesses should strive to increase both their efficiency and quality and drive greater profits to their bottom lines. By outsourcing CRM and intelligence, companies will have powerful analytics with fewer payrolls overhead. Meanwhile suppliers are delivering greater personnel accountability and ability to access software, technology and skill sets otherwise4 not available to a single company. Suppliers promise greater revenue reduced marketing costs and shortened cycle time. Many companies have decided to outsource all or part of their CRM technology, applications and /or business processes to achievable improved processes, business improvement, more effective customer

service,

increased

competitive

advantage

and

demonstrated

ROI.

According to a survey reported in tele Professional magazine, "Companies who fully outsource CRM had the most favorable results. This is reflected in a greater 10-year average return to investors, a higher average 10 Year annual growth rate and a larger average percentage change in annual earnings per share". Off shoring CRM Locations

A large number of companies around the world have set up thousands of off shoring call centers to provide integrated customer service solutions. Australia has about 4000 call centers employing 225000 people with US$7 billion revenue. Similarly India has nearly 1000 companies employing over 100,000 people with revenues of US$1 billion. Philippines and Ireland has 70 and 500 companies employing over 12000 and 40000 people respectively. Elements of CRM outsourcing IN GENPACT CRM outsourcing includes the following elements: Customer support: this comprises value based phone support, e-mail response, live chat and cobrowsing and instant messaging. Telemarketing and telesales: this covers outbound calling for lead generation, campaign management and outbound calling for cross-sell and up-sell to existing customers. Employee IT Desk: this comprises level1 and 2 multi-channel support for internal applications; system problem resolutions related to desktop; notebooks; shrink wrapped products; connectivity; office productivity tools support including browsers and mail; new service requests; IT operational issues; and remote diagnostics. Thames water is a good example for CRM outsourcing in the Utility industry. Thames water has signed a business process outsourcing deal with Xansa to offshore to India it's metered billing expenses and Customer correspondence operations. The BPO service will handle over 700,000 transactions a year and in one month it has already handled predicted volumes and cleared a backlog of an extra 17 percent of transactions. Limitations Even though the outsourcing to CRM provides valuable benefits to a business organization, but it still faces some problems. The business enterprises are losing much of their control of customers and services to another party. Another problem is technology implementation, database integration and agent selection and training issues with the service provider. These issues are more complex. Conclusion For selecting the right outsource provider, the business enterprises should take enough time, due diligence and clearly established and communicated goals and objectives. A successful relationship will be one that lowers the business costs, increase the company's revenue and retains profitable relationship a win-win situation for the company's business and its most valuable assets, and business customers.