CRM

Customer relationship management (CRM) is a broad term that covers concepts used by companies to manage their relationships with customers, including the capture, storage and analysis of customer information.

There are three aspects of CRM which can each be implemented in isolation from each other:

Operational CRM
Operational CRM provides support to "front office" business processes, including sales, marketing and service. Each interaction with a customer is generally added to a customer's contact history, and staff can retrieve information on customers from the database as necessary.

One of the main benefits of this contact history is that customers can interact with different people or different contact “channels” in a company over time without having to repeat the history of their interaction each time.

Consequently, many call centers use some kind of CRM software to support their call centre agents.

Collaborative CRM
Collaborative CRM covers the direct interaction with customers, for a variety of different purposes, including feedback and issue-reporting. Interaction can be through a variety of channels, such as web pages, email, automated phone (Automated Voice Response AVR) or SMS.

The objectives of Collaborative CRM can be broad, including cost reduction and service improvements.

Analytical CRM
Analytical CRM analyses customer data for a variety of purposes

The technology requirements of a CRM strategy can be complex and far reaching. The basic building blocks include

• A database to store customer information. This can be a CRM specific database or an Enterprise Data warehouse.
• Operational CRM requires customer agent support software.
• Collaborative CRM requires customer interaction systems, eg an interactive website, automated phone systems etc.
• Analytical CRM requires statistical analysis software as well as software that manages any specific marketing campaigns.

A typical CRM system is subdivided into three basic sub modules:

• Marketing
• Sales
• Service

ASP

Active Server Pages (ASP) is Microsoft's server-side script engine for dynamically-generated web pages. It is marketed as an add-on to Internet Information Services (IIS). Programming ASP websites is made easier by various built-in objects.
Most ASP pages are written in VBScript, but any other Active Scripting engine can be selected instead.

The Long Tail

Anderson argued that products that are in low demand or have low sales volume can collectively make up a market share that rivals or exceeds the relatively few current bestsellers and blockbusters, if the store or distribution channel is large enough.

They found a large proportion of Amazon.com's book sales come from obscure books that are not available in brick-and-mortar stores. They then quantified the potential value of the long tail to consumers. In an article published in 2003 these authors showed that, while most of the discussion about the value of the internet to consumers has revolved around lower prices, consumer benefit (a.k.a. consumer surplus) from access to increased product variety in online book stores is ten times larger than their benefit from access to lower prices online. Thus, the primary value of the internet to consumers comes from releasing new sources of value by providing access to products in the long tail.

Marketing

In a nutshell it consists of the social and managerial processes by which products (goods or services) and value are exchanged in order to fulfill the needs and wants of individuals or groups.

A market-focused, or customer-focused, organization first determines what its potential customers desire, and then builds the product or service.

Two major factors of marketing are the recruitment of new customers (acquisition) and the retention and expansion of relationships with existing customers (base management).

Strategic Marketing attempts to determine how an organization competes against its competition in a market place. In particular, it aims at generating a competitive advantage relative to its competition.

Operational Marketing executes marketing functions to attract and keep customers and to maximize the value derived from them, as well as to satisfy the customer with prompt services and meeting the customer expectations. Operational Marketing includes the determination of the marketing mix.

The four Ps are(Marketing mix):
Product: The product aspects of marketing deal with the specifications of the actual good or service, and how it relates to the end-user's needs and wants. The scope of a product generally includes supporting elements such as warranties, guarantees, and support.

Pricing: This refers to the process of setting a price for a product, including discounts. The price need not be monetary - it can simply be what is exchanged for the product or service, e.g. time, or attention.

Promotion: This includes advertising, sales promotion, publicity, and personal selling, and refers to the various methods of promoting the product, brand, or company.

Placement or distribution refers to how the product gets to the customer; for example, point of sale placement or retailing. This fourth P has also sometimes been called Place, referring to the channel by which a product or service is sold (e.g. online vs. retail), which geographic region or industry, to which segment (young adults, families, business people), etc.

The marketing department's goal is to bring people to the sales team using promotional techniques such as advertising, sales promotion, publicity, and public relations.