Customer Relationship Management [System] (CRM)

Definition

A CRM is a technology tool or platform used to track customer information and help marketers guide customer journeys. CRMs collect information on campaign interactions and results for all your users to support campaign reporting and planning. There are a wide variety of services out there and none are built quite the same, so in searching for a CRM, companies should focus on key functionalities needed.

CRMs have recently become integrated with automated marketing messaging systems, meaning marketers can act on their CRM data to send new messages and campaigns. Properly set up and monitored, a robust CRM can aggregate performance stats for groups of users to inform marketing strategies with regard to timing, design, history, trends, devices, channels, and other preferences. The data collected in a CRM can inform highly personalized campaigns.

Usage

CRMs have been around for a while but began primarily as a sales tool or for data managers. Marketer-friendly, automated systems with multichannel functionality are relatively new so some people may think you're referring to a clunkier system from the past. The term is gaining understanding but still one of those acronyms that can lose people. If you say the full “customer relationship management system,” it's often understood by most.