The impression that CRM projects can be low-success is no myth, and there is evidence that solutions can go wrong. In many enterprises, CRM is a four-letter word.
What number always comes to the table when discussing CRM woes? 70% of CRM projects fail. So said the Butler Group in 2002. (Strangely, Butler never published this number though it is attributed to them.) Sure, the number is frightening, but what does it really mean?
THE FAILURE MYTH
There is no “no-risk” project as central as a CRM. The more stakeholders and business processes involved, the more risk is introduced.
The “high risk” myth is that CRM is inherently risky, and that the price of failure is total loss. While there are stories of super-pricy CRM projects that end without anything resembling a functioning system (i.e. the Siebel Effect), most statistics of failure—like the Butler Group’s—are actually measuring outcomes less catastrophic and more controllable.
The scary 70% failure rate or Forrester Research’s more recent 47% in 2009 are aggregating several perspectives of “failure” from the actual users of a CRM.
AVOIDING FAILURE
Here are the most common perspectives of failure and what to learn from them:
- “It doesn’t do what I want.”
Different users can see the same system as a great success or as a waste of time. Engaging as many stakeholders as possible, addressing the most critical needs first, and relentlessly communicating that CRM solutions grow and change over time helps users to be both engaged and expectant. - “The data is a mess.”
Data is the riskiest part of a CRM solution, but projects often overly focus on the capabilities of a system and neglect the unrewarding work of cleaning up customer data. If you think your data is troublesome in your financial system where only A/R has to deal with it, wait until you put it in the hands of all your sales and support staff without cleanup. Utter chaos. - “I don’t know what happened to it.”
The most spectacular CRM failure stories all involve incredibly ambitious requirements with intentions to wholly replace multiple existing systems and fulfill the wishes of all stakeholders right out of the gates. Managing scope is critical to not ending up on the wrong side of the CRM failure statistics. - “It’s too hard to use.”
CRM technology has come a long way. The best-of-class CRM platforms can do virtually anything you need them to do. However, if decision makers are focused on the technology and platform over the user-experience, the most capable solutions can see low user adoption. Answering, “What’s in it for me?” is crucial for success amongst sales and support staff. The best CRM projects view the solution as empowerment of their customer-facing workers not enforcement from the executive level down.
Learning from past mistakes helps to avoid them. The technology and implementation of CRM has adapted and grown enough to make these types of failures fully avoidable. Educate yourself and your project team, work with experienced partners, and you’ll be on the path to a CRM that truly works as you imagined it.
Highland is committed to avoiding the high-failure risks of CRM. Our CRM projects for manufacturers and distributors focus on successful implementation and user adoption with an extremely high success rate.
Highland exclusively uses SugarCRM for the CRM component of our solutions. SugarCRM is a third generation CRM solution without the inherent limitations of first generation technology (e.g. SAP, PeopleSoft) or second generation technology (e.g. Microsoft Dynamics, Salesforce.com). SugarCRM offers a friendly user-experience, modern web APIs for integration, and maximum flexibility for customization.