CRM Software

A recent Gartner (News - Alert) study found that large businesses are greatly increasing their use of social media for customer service management software related processes and brand management, with 30 percent planning to implement it over the next 24 months, the study reported.

Enterprises are loving the benefits they are continuing to see via use of the social customer relationship management (CRM) software, with four in 10 leading businesses expected to adopt this technology within five years, as part of their ongoing efforts to improve customer service, according to Gartner.

"There is strong corporate awareness, including at corporate executive levels, of social networks and their potential impact on corporate brand management and customer service perception. We expect the high-profile nature of social networks and social CRM for customer service to rapidly advance adoption from early adopter to mainstream deployments, despite the volatile and rapid evolution of social networks in general," said Drew Kraus, research VP at Gartner, in a statement.

He added, "As awareness and use of social networks increases, customer service executives and planners are feeling increasing pressure from corporate executives to articulate a strategy for how this new communication channel will be harnessed so that they don't get left behind."

Social media-aware businesses are recognizing that employees who interact with customers via social media sites such as Facebook (News - Alert) and Twitter can also provide customer service functions, in certain circumstances even faster than those working in traditional customer service capacities, such as phone banks or email response centers, Gartner said.

The idea of implementing social media into their marketing and customer support plans is not just limited to just small businesses; a January report by SugarCRM (News - Alert) provided evidence that 72 percent of the small and midsize businesses that were surveyed have plans to link data from social networks into their CRM software this year.

Users want — and expect — businesses to respond to their questions and complaints via social media, a May 2010 report by consulting firm Accenture said.

"Companies are investing in customer service," said Joe Hughes (News - Alert), senior executive with Accenture's customer service and support business, told InformationWeek when the report was released, "but at the same time customer expectations are rising — in many cases faster than the investments. Some of the investment has been to reduce costs, which favorably impacted the way clients perceive customer service, but the path to more profitable, longer lasting customer relationships centers on improving the customer experience."