abusive customers acquiring new customers aggressive customers angry customers attract customers attract new customers attracting customers bad customers big customers brand new customers only british customers broadband customers business customers challenges managing customers communicating with customers customers customers and colleagues customers complain customers complaints customers contact customers expectations customers experience customers needs customers numbers customers online customers perception customers requirements customers satisfaction customers service customers services dealing with angry customers dealing with customers dealing with difficult customers different types of customers difficult customers dissatisfied customers domestic customers end customers existing customers external customers find customers get customers getting customers gifts for customers greeting customers handling customers handling difficult customers happy customers hate customers how to attract customers how to deal with customers how to deal with difficult customers how to find customers how to get customers how to retain customers how to win customers individual customers industrial customers interaction with customers internal and external customers internal customers international customers irate customers keep customers keeping customers losing customers loyal customers management customers managing customers meeting customers mystery customers needs of customers new customers only our customers profiling customers protect customers reach customers retaining customers rude customers satisfied customers serving customers stupid customers suppliers and customers suppliers customers targeted customers thanking customers the customers treating customers fairly types of customers understand customers understanding customers unhappy customers upset customers what customers want what do customers want why customers leave www customers What Is a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) System? Even if you think you know the answer, the question has changed. IT'S IMPOSSIBLE TO state precisely what customer relationship management (CRM) means to everyone. The term has been applied to almost every element of business that even remotely interacts with a customer. In its infancy, CRM systems were a series of mainframe or server-based applications specific to sales, marketing and support business functions. The applications were lightweight by today's standards and did little more than capture and file critical data. But as cultural boundaries within organizations weakened, individual fiefdoms of information gave way to sophisticated applications that could span business functions. By doing so, these applications created the vision of a single view of the customer. For the first time, organizations could track and analyze shifting customer needs, link marketing campaigns to sales results, and monitor sales activities for improved forecasting accuracy and manufacturing demand. CRM's Evolution CRM has evolved since its earliest incarnation, originally driven by an inside-out focus, through three phases of evolution: technology, integration and process. Recently have we seen a major leap forward to a fourth phase: customer-driven CRM — an outside-in approach that has intriguing financial promise