Business Publications
Close to the Customer - by Colin Coulson-Thomas
 | Because there is nothing so important as delighting the customer... Customer management ought to be at the top of the agenda for every company planning a bright future in the twenty-first century. Yet managers at the sharp-end are faced by a daunting list of urgent challenges. How to find and retain high-value customers. How to improve customer satisfaction levels. How to handle complaints and compliments. How to keep profitable customers loyal. How to build effective customer relationships. How to differentiate between "good" and "bad" customers. The list goes on and on... So just how can you keep your company at the leading edge of customer management when so much is happening so fast? Previously, you would have to scan dozens of newspapers and magazines to keep up-to-date with scores of developments in techniques and technologies. Now there is Close to the Customer. Close to the Customer is a new series of management briefings that helps you access leading-edge thinking about customer management issues. The mission of the series is to show how today's company can harness new management ideas and technologies to build closer links with customers, increase market-share and enhance profitability. Each Close to the Customer briefing targets a specific hot topic. It presents the results of exclusive research by a team of global specialists in a concise easy-to-read briefing format. Each briefing is aimed at the needs of busy managers who need to keep abreast of new thinking in key marketing and customer management issues. Critically, Close to the Customer is strong on actionable information. In each briefing, you find a clear overview of the most up-to-date management thinking in a given area. You discover new management techniques and methodologies. And you tap into hard practical experience that will help you shape your own customer strategies with more confidence. Issue by issue, Close to the Customer builds into an unrivalled portfolio of ideas and information about customer management. The briefings will save you hours of time researching key customer issues. Indeed, they contain information simply not available anywhere else. Close to the Customer is a cost-effective way to build knowledge and expertise in the most critical issue facing every business. Keeping customers satisfied.
If you don't get close to your customers... somebody else will: Practical advice... real-life case studies... best practice guidelines... world-class solutions: all in the 28 Close to the Customer briefings.
Select a portfolio of briefings to address your customer
management issues, priorities and opportunities. Brief comments on the 28 briefings: Customer value management The goal of customer value management is to help a company deliver optimal value to customers. This briefing describes a top-level process for customer value management and demonstrates its benefits through real-life examples. The briefing underlines the close relationship between customer value management and relationship marketing. Key feature: six case studies on understanding customer needs. 20 pages. Effective data mining Data mining is a key technology for identifying new customers. But it is shrouded in complex technical and operational issues. This briefing cuts through the hype to explain the most important data mining issues in non-technical terms. It recommends how to use data mining, where to start and shows the typical costs and benefits. Key feature: 21 management recommendations. 28 pages. Targeting high-value customers Whether among the world's airlines or Britain's recently privatised rail companies, the key marketing battle is for high-value travellers. This briefing explores the key strategic and tactical issues involved in targeting high-value travellers and running loyalty schemes. It recommends a winning management approach and suggests how and where to start. (Read this briefing in conjunction with Managing frequent traveller schemes.) Key feature: relationship management outsourcing options for airlines template. 20 pages. Managing frequent traveller schemes Setting up a frequent traveller scheme seems an ideal way to develop loyalty among high-value travellers. But such schemes are fraught with pitfalls. This briefing draws on the detailed experience of schemes such as Air Miles and Cathay Pacific to show how they can be managed most effectively. (Read this briefing in conjunction with Targeting high-value customers.) Key feature: policy options for airlines during a customer lifecycle. 24 pages. Managing complaints and compliments Handling complaints -- and compliments -- effectively is critical to retaining satisfied customers. This briefing looks at some of the key concepts involved in dealing with unsolicited communications. It provides an overview and systems approach for managing contacts and explores organisational issues. Key feature: a pick-up-and-use six stage contact management process. 24 pages. Retail insurance customer management Customer service is increasingly a key differentiator for retail insurance companies. This briefing looks at recent customer management developments in the insurance industry. It shows how successful companies focus on key elements of customer value. The briefing looks at likely future developments in the near and long term. Key feature: managing eight stages in the customer lifecycle. 28 pages. Retail banking customer management The banking business is undergoing a major change in terms of the ways it develops contacts with customers. This briefing shows how customer management depends on a good combination of strategy, culture, systems and implementation processes. It explores likely developments in the near and long term. Key feature: map of market change in the banking industry. 24 pages. Relationship marketing strategy Relationship marketing is vital to the successful integration of all marketing functions. This briefing identifies the main elements of successful relationship marketing and shows how they are related to customer value management. It shows where to start in developing a relationship marketing strategy and spotlights key implementation issues. Key feature: detailed relationship marketing planning template. 32 pages. Managing retail customers The advent of new technologies is rapidly changing the way successful retailers are managing their customer base. This briefing explains recent developments in retailing customer management. It looks at ideas, such as loyalty cards, and analyses successes and failures so far. The briefing identifies some critical success factors in retail customer management. Key feature: two checklists -- for issuing and managing loyalty cards. 20 pages. Building customer relationships: best practice When it comes to building good customer relationships, the winning post is constantly moving further away. This briefing provides a practical guide to developing and implementing those marketing strategies that provide the foundation for good customer relationships. It shows the role of customer value management in achieving best practice. Key feature: two questionnaires for evaluating customer management. 28 pages. Managing customer service in utilities Many utilities are still climbing a steep learning curve in managing their customer relationships. This briefing identifies the key issues in utility customer management, sales, marketing and service. It recommends some practical ways forward. Key feature: the functions utility IT systems need to support. 28 pages. Relationship marketing: the technology From the Internet to data mining, from electronic commerce to cable television, relationship marketing is awash with new technologies. This briefing identifies the main trends in using IT to improve customer management. It shows how to make that vital connection between IT and customer management strategies. It suggests some ways to measure the cost-benefit of new technologies. Key feature: 10 critical lessons from implementing technology. 24 pages. Customer loyalty: best practice Every company wants to build a base of loyal -- and profitable -- customers. This briefing defines customer loyalty, analyses common customer loyalty programmes and shows their strengths and weaknesses. It provides a clear outline for designing and managing customer loyalty programmes. Key feature: an action plan for managing loyal customers. 24 pages. Marketing beyond 2000: a new strategy The ability of customers to access information from the Internet may turn some of the rules of marketing on their heads. Now customers may seek out their own suppliers and dictate how the relationship develops. This briefing explores some of the strategic issues behind "transparent marketing". (Read this briefing in conjunction with Transparent marketing: the implementation.) Key feature: nine questions and nine critical recommendations for transparent marketing. 24 pages. Managing automotive customers Why are average car buyers infuriated with how dealers treat them? Why are automotive suppliers frustrated with what they achieve with their customer databases? How important are brand and model versus customer management? This briefing shows how automotive companies are trying to improve their customer management and what they are achieving? Key feature: how to chart the change in customer behaviour. 24 pages. Direct mail: best practice Why does so much direct mail not deliver long-term business benefits? Because it is not coordinated with other relationship marketing activities. This briefing explores some of the best practice ways to make the most from direct mail. Key feature: how to use direct mail effectively at different customer relationship stages. 24 pages. Transparent marketing: the implementation Just what does a company need to do to catch the tide of the new "transparent marketing"? Most marketing departments will need to develop new skills and processes. This briefing looks at the key implementation issues for companies wanting to win new customers in the next millennium. (Read this briefing in conjunction with Marketing beyond 2000: a new strategy.) Key feature: a 9 step approach to using technology to improve customer management. 24 pages. Building customer-focused data Most companies hold more information about their customers than they realise. But it is poorly coordinated and never gets used to build the relationship -- and win new business. This briefing looks at how the most effective companies build a relationship management data strategy and make it work. Key feature: 13 ways to define the difference between "good" and "bad" customers. 24 pages. Best practice customer management Companies who believe the only way to learn more about their customers is to open up direct marketing channels should think again. Many suppliers could learn more if they developed effective partnerships with those intermediaries that already sell their products. This briefing explores the issues and shows how to develop working partnerships in key distribution channels. Key feature: making partnerships work in intermediaries. 24 pages. Managing good and bad customers As competition in most markets intensifies, winners will be those companies who build a portfolio of "good" customers while avoiding as many as possible of the "bad". "Good" customers not only provide more profitable business, they're easier to build effective relationships with. This briefing provides a wealth of practical advice on recruiting "good" customers. 24 pages. Managing customers with e-business Everybody's talking about e-business but which companies are doing it effectively? A company needs to address as many marketing and logistical as well as technical issues if it wants to generate profitable revenue from e-business. This briefing provides a down-to-earth practical guide for companies that have not yet reaped their share of profitable e-business. 24 pages. Models of customer management There are plenty of new ways to manage customers -- but successful companies will develop a portfolio of customer management techniques. Effective market segmentation and relationship building are two key issues. This briefing explores the old and new models of customer management that will be needed in the new millennium. 24 pages. Customer management on the move - using the mobile phone as a new way to manage customers The mobile phone is emerging as a key new tool of customer management. It is the first truly mass market embodiment of pervasive computing -- with household penetration sky-rocketing leaving the PC way behind. New mobile technologies suggest the mobile phone will take over simpler information transfer roles from PCs. The mobile phone could become the key communication medium for the customer on the move. So how should marketing and service management use this new tool for competitive advantage? This briefing answers the critical questions. Key feature: How to future proof customer management checklist. 24 pages. Multiple intermediation - how business partners can work together to manage customers better Progress with information technology makes it possible for several companies to be involved in the management of individual customers –- or transactions. This briefing examines the world of complex intermediation. It shows how far companies have to go in creating value for customers or themselves by using the information generated by and about customers as the latter pass through the formers' hands. It also suggests how to build effective partnerships between intermediaries and suppliers to improve customer management. Key feature: how to decide where you can add more value and get most margin without taking the responsibility and costs of the whole value chain. 24 pages. The intelligent e-business - how a virtual company finds and uses information to satisfy real customers Most successful companies succeed with customer management not just because of how they use information, but also because of strong clear strategies, professionally developed policies and effectively managed implementation programmes. At the core of these lies proper use of data. In future, when most large companies are likely to have substantial e-business -- and some move entirely towards it -- what will distinguish the intelligent e-business from the dumb e-business? What information will it be using -- and how? This briefing suggests some answers to these questions. Key feature: how to decide which information will give you greatest competitive advantage in an all-e world. 24 pages. The intelligent supply chain - the practical issues of supplying and servicing customers over the web Developing an effective e-business means handling a whole range of supply chain issues. This briefing focuses on the data, processes and systems that companies need so that the various supplier-customer relationships in an electronic supply chain work effectively. It investigates the extent to which removing different parties -- vertical integration and/or disintermediation -- increases net value to suppliers or customers, when it does not, and the costs and benefits to final customers. (Read this briefing in conjunction with The intelligent e-business.) Key feature: how to decide your new place in the virtual supply chain and the systems support you need to make it work. 24 pages. Time-lapse customer management - how to manage infrequent customers so they don't forget but return for more When a customer buys a "consumer durable" product, contact with the manufacturer is often rare. Most contact is managed by an intermediary. It's infrequent -- taking place in bursts around the initial purchase or around regular or emergency service. Or never if the customer uses an "unauthorised" service agent. So is it worth the manufacturer trying to maintain a relationship with the customer -- rather than focusing on providing a reliable product? This briefing uses surveys of practices in several industries, including the automobile industry, to provide answers to this critical question. Key feature: how to decide which consumer durable customers can be cost-effectively managed and what you need to do to achieve this. 24 pages. People in customer management - Creating the culture and processes that help staff serve customers better Successful long-term customer management is often driven by managers who change how their companies think and act -- and who mould the behaviour of customer-facing staff that deliver on the company's promises. And the most successful managers create a culture and processes that are independent of current job holders and their personalities -- a way of working embedded deeply in their companies' approach to business. This briefing uses research into the people aspects of customer management to show how some companies are on the right road, but others are wedded to old approaches where real customer care is only skin deep. Key feature: how to identify the people and process implications of new ways of doing business with customers and how to ensure that these implications are properly handled. 24 pages. Select a portfolio of briefings to address your customer management issues, priorities and opportunities. |
