What Does the “s” Mean in sCRM?
[widget id="ad_unit-3"]ad_unit-3[/widget]Did you notice anything? I used a lowercase “s” because it’s time for the hype to be over (I didn’t come up with it – but saw it on Twitter). It’s time to start putting the social extensions to traditional CRM into place. There’s really no reason to keep talking about the social customer anymore either. Why? Because we all know that our friends, family, vendors, prospects and customers do more than email. So, what are we going to do about it?
I’ve got an idea!
Instead of creating completely ridiculous new interfaces that completely ignore the continuing realities of complete businesses – and not just the individual sales or marketing or service faces – why doesn’t someone create something that takes into consideration the jobs we still have to do – and give it to us where we’re already doing it? Why can’t more traditional interfaces be enhanced to incorporate engagement channels that we are all using beyond email, phone and the face to face stuff?
Watching some of the stuff that’s been developed is frustrating because they tend to trample all over the outside-in approach to solving problems. They take a little piece of technology and try to build the world around it. Wouldn’t it be so much nicer if the jobs we do were simply enhanced? Even if we’re not completely outside-in, can’t we slowly draw people and businesses down that path by extending their reach to places they could never reach before?
I’m ready to throw away my Twitter client
The problem with these things is that I don’t really have time to spend on them. The hacks and workarounds for monitoring what’s important to me has a problem. There is no simple way to monitor the people I want to, when I should be monitoring them and where I should be monitoring them – or engaging them. I can’t be in multiple places at once – MY JOB HASN’T CHANGED!
- No, I don’t want to create a stack for each person.
- Yes, I do want it to be in context.
- No, I don’t want to use yet another service that purports to weight the importance of my contacts – outside the context for my complete relationship with them.
- Yes, I do want to engage them in the social world but I need to see everything else in our relationship – and it would be nice to know what they’re talking about without me as well (without yet another service!)
I’m looking for the solution that extends the big CRM with a little bit of “s” and not the other way around. You can’t run a business on social, so why do so many entrepreneurs continue to make the same mistakes over and over. Here’s the answer – they forgot about the jobs we’re already doing to support our business strategies (whatever they are, good or bad). It’s time to get with the program. What are the existing CRM vendors doing that really gets it? Is there anything coming down pike that’s new, yet respects the jobs we already do?
I’m sure there is. 
I’m waiting eagerly – waiting for that someone who has figured out what that little “s” stands for.
Mike Boysen
Mike Boysen, founder of Effective CRM, is a strategic consultant in the CRM arena. He brings practical insight to businesses to help them understand customer-centered business strategy: outside-in process design, frameworks for understanding customer needs, understanding the jobs of your customers, market growth through innovation, behavior driven relationship marketing programs and designing systems to support these initiatives. The technology part is simple, so why are you spending so much money on that? Can't answer that? This is not the CRM your friends have been talking about...