The Near Term Future State of CRM

AMR Research released a report ('The Customer Management Market Sizing Report, 2007-2012') speaking to the near term future state of the CRM marketspace. The following lists four primary concepts I came away with upon my review of the documentation surrounding this report:

1) CONTINUED SHIFT TO SAAS PLATFORM

The analysts predict that within the next four years SaaS "will continue to dramatically outpace the perpetual license software market by double digit margins". The AMR Research survey data supports "a universal preference" for the subscription software model in customer management, regardless of company size.

2) CRM VIABILITY IN A TOUGH ECONOMY

While the AMR analysts concede that funding for customer-enhancing systems can be tight in a down economy, smart organizations will continue to invest in CRM systems because of the wealth of insights such systems can provide.

"An almost universal trend around customer-centricity and customer experience management will fuel continued customer management investments regardless of economic conditions," write the AMR analysts. Those organizations that "streamlined operational and supply chain efficiencies through the last economic downturn, leaving the customer experience as the most important potential competitive weapon," will drive even more investment in CRM systems.

3) SOFTWARE IS NOT THE SOLUTION

A disturbing trend that the AMR analysts note is that "CRM failure rates remain high". "Although vendors are improving user interfaces and technologies to combat this problem, it only puts a bandage on the situation."

*Personal note, this is an important item to dwell on. Software alone is not the solution. A combination of ensuring the application addresses the business issue(s) at hand coupled with training and continuous improvement will enable higher adoption and in the end an implementation success.

4) THE PLAYERS

The analysts contend that Microsoft and Salesforce.com will continue to push into larger enterprises and "see success competing directly with SAP and Oracle."