RE:markable is the weekly email about emails. Dropping the latest email marketing news, updates, insights, free resources, upcoming masterclasses, webinars, and of course, a little inbox mischief.
If your CRM strategy is treating CRM as a tool or a tactic, something is going wrong.
CRM is a cross-functional strategy. What it isn’t is email marketing, because email marketing is just one channel of many that supports your overall relationship with the customer.
It’s time to retire the mindset that CRM = email because it’s simply not true.
The often-heard phrase of “We have a CRM, but it’s not working” is indicative of this very issue because if you’re using a CRM as intended, you’re touching every customer relationship point successfully and aligning data, teams, systems, and communications.
But where do you start when it comes to redefining your CRM strategy and mindset, and how can you fix it?
Let’s dive in!
For many businesses, especially those in the growth phase, customer data is often siloed on multiple, isolated channels.
What ends up happening is that CRM can quickly become an ‘email CRM’ situation because things aren’t being approached in overall alignment (the full, zoomed-out picture!).
More often than not, when the term “CRM” is used, it’s actually referring to email blasts, reaching every recipient as quickly as possible for marketing purposes.
This is already a very isolated view of CRM because email blasts are generally the marketing function of emails, so we’re not even including transactional, sales, customer support, and service emails (which are all part of the wider customer experience).
Email is just one channel in a much larger CRM ecosystem, meaning that email marketing is a CRM channel, not a CRM strategy.
To find out more about how (and why) CRM is a core business function, you can read our blog on Why CRM Should Be a Core Business Function!
The TL;DR, though, is that when your CRM works properly, the customer will always feel known rather than spammed or harassed.
The short version? Email gets misused through over-sending, siloed approaches, and ignoring the full picture.
The long version?
Putting email marketing at the centre of your CRM means that you’re inevitably overlooking the importance of lifecycle marketing and the full customer journey (which also means you’re missing out on creating connected, personalised customer experiences!).
So, how can you fix it?
Wherever your customer is in their journey, you want to engage them and meet their needs — that’s what lifecycle marketing is all about.
From the initial awareness to purchase, onboarding, retention, and advocacy, you want to adapt to where they are to engage them as effectively as possible across all touchpoints.
For example, during the awareness phase, you’ll be focusing on building interest and introducing your brand through marketing campaigns. The retention phase requires personalisation to follow up at the right time and keep customer satisfaction high.
Each engagement with a customer should be based on their specific journey to engage them at every stage, which is why lifecycle marketing and customer journeys go hand-in-hand to fix your approach to email within the realm of CRM.
Email without the bigger CRM picture = disjointed, siloed, disengaged customer experiences.
Email within CRM as a central hub, utilising external communications as a multi-channel ecosystem = consistent messaging and experiences, personalised touch, and relevant and coordinated outreach.
Well, you don’t do CRM by sending a newsletter, so you can’t simply view CRM as email!
When you start to treat CRM as a cross-functional growth engine, you’re putting out consistent, engaging, personalised messaging that resonates at exactly the right time for the customer.
By building the strategy around the customer experience, their needs are central to the processes that are all unified under the CRM, making it easier for departments to work towards business goals effectively and efficiently.
Use email the right way - as part of a broader, aligned ecosystem - and the results will speak for themselves.
If you’re looking for predictable, sustainable business growth, then your CRM is the foundation to build towards that goal.
Transitioning to treating CRM as an embedded business function might seem like an uphill struggle, but it can contribute significantly to growth across your business!
If you’re struggling to assess your current CRM strategy, we’d love to help – get in touch, and we can get you on the road to driving sustainable, scalable growth!
RE:markable is the weekly email about emails. Dropping the latest email marketing news, updates, insights, free resources, upcoming masterclasses, webinars, and of course, a little inbox mischief.