Literature Review

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Literature ReviewSupervisor: Ronald Bartels

Group: Niharika Neervani (Leader) 100042073 Mobile: 0470419413

Gelareh HosseinPour Niri 100100052

Batish Sama 100048262

Long Trieu 100010287

Kush Luthra 6627412

Suresh Kumari 4985559

ICT80003 – professional project – LITERATURE REVIEW

CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT (CRM)

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Executive SummaryThis paper aims to provide a comprehensive insights into the Customer Relationship

Management (CRM) knowledge area, where most organisations attempt to understand and

implement in order to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of their customer service. First

of all, the report presents a brief background to CRM as well as the dominant CRM vendors and

the respective solutions offered (e.g. Microsoft provides both on-premise and cloud-based CRM

solution). After that, some of the value-adding attributes of CRM will be introduced in terms of

technology, business and organisation. Subsequently, the literature review goes through some

of the most popular CRM systems in the market such as SAP, Oracle and Microsoft; then

addresses the challenges of implementing a CRM solution, which are classified under three

main categories, namely:

Human-related challenge

Technology-related challenge

Business-related challenge

Microsoft Dynamics CRM will be the main focus of the discussion throughout the rest of the

literature review since it is the primary software solution the project team of this research

component has been working on during the last ten weeks. Particularly, this paper introduces

Medica, a successful case of Microsoft Dynamics CRM implementation, which was reported to

significantly improve its customer’s experience, boost productivity and increase profitability.

Medica has been struggling with the ever-increasing growth of the business until the

management decided to adopt a new system to tackle to problem. Finally, the security aspect

of Microsoft Dynamics CRM is discussed in a thorough manner. This is also a worrisome concern

to all organisations that plan on adopting CRM systems (e.g. Microsoft, SAP and Oracle) to

support their businesses.

Table of ContentsExecutive Summary....................................................................................................................... 2



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Table of Contents...........................................................................................................................3

Introduction...................................................................................................................................4

Background to CRM...................................................................................................................4

A literature review of CRM............................................................................................................6

How CRMs add value to the business........................................................................................6

Some dominant CRM vendors in the market.............................................................................7

What are the challenges of implementing a CRM system?......................................................10

A successful case of Microsoft Dynamics CRM implementation..............................................12

Security of customer data in CRM systems..............................................................................13

Conclusion................................................................................................................................... 15

References................................................................................................................................... 16

IntroductionVarious studies have been exploring the customer relationship management (CRM) concepts in

terms of strategies, practices and solutions available in the market. However, there is a need for



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a systematic review of the literature in order to understand how a good CRM system in place

can help organisations improve customer retention, boost sales and increase productivity. By

reviewing a diverse range of articles and papers, this report has come up with an insightful

analysis into how CRM systems can add value to the business as well as the challenges of

implementing them in organisations. More importantly, the literature review also addresses

various types of CRM system in the market in order to offer a clear understanding of the

situation where each type best fits.

Background to CRMIn an increasingly competitive market, organisations are striving to increase profitability, reduce

cost and retain customers. Customer retainment is a contemporary issue that every

organisation is concerned about since customers tend to be increasingly rigorous in making

purchase. Customer relationship management (CRM) emerges as set of practices, strategies

and technologies that organisation adopt to manage customer interaction through the life cycle

so as to improve the relationship with customers, increase customer retention and improve

sales. The collection of customers’ data across all channels (e.g. website, phone, email and

social network) of an organisation is done via CRM systems, which in turn use the collected data

to support customer-facing staff in their daily tasks (Rouse 2014). Typically, a CRM solution

provides three main features:

Data consolidation: customer data from various sources is stored in a centralised

database, which is available to all business users.

Customer interaction record: customers’ call, email, feedback or inquiries are archived

the system and can be accessed by relevant business users

Automation of business processes: such as qualify a lead; transform an opportunity

into an account.

Four biggest vendors that are currently dominating the market are SAP, Microsoft, Oracle and

Salesforce. They are offering CRM solutions to all kinds of organisations from big corporate to

SMEs. The following table summarise three main types of CRM solution offered by most

vendors:



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Solution type Description

On-premise solution

On-premise CRM give the responsibility of managing the software, maintaining the database and ensuring the security to the company itself. Particularly, organisations have to purchase the license upfront and the CRM software will locate at the server of the organisation. This type of solution is suitable for huge corporations with complex CRM needs since it has to be configured specifically to suit the business requirements and to work with the legacy systems.

Cloud-based solution

Some SMEs seek cloud-based CRM (i.e. CRM on-demand) as a cheaper alternative to the fixed solution. This type of software is hosted on an external server whereby employees can access at any time via a web browser. This type of CRM is suitable for small enterprises that have relatively simple need for CRM software as well as cannot afford a great deal for license since they can purchase the software through monthly subscription. However, the biggest concern about this type of CRM is the loss of control over data, which is the most precious resource of an organisation since data is stored externally.

Open source solution

The source code of this type of CRM is made available to public, thus any organisation with some expertise in IT can configure it to suit their specific needs at little or no cost. SugarCRM is one of the most popular open source solutions.



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A literature review of CRMHow CRMs add value to the businessOrganisations face various issues in their daily operations such as high customer churn,

inefficient processes and unreliable reporting. Therefore, the implementation of CRM is

essential to help them overcome those issues, add value to the business through more satisfied

customers and gain competitive advantage over their rivals (Nisula 2008). Particularly, a CRM

system in place will offer organisation the following advantages:

From the technical perspective

It offers organisations with scalability options in terms of adding CRM functions and

processes according to the future growth of the organisation. As business needs change,

CRM solutions like Microsoft Dynamics have the ability to grow with your business.

It facilitates effective time management by prompting users to follow up on activities

alongside with automating alerts when important events occur, or if actions are missed.

Resources can be allocated or prioritised in CRM as per the business needs.

It features process automation that allows companies to cut down expense on wages as

resources are used in the most efficient manner. Furthermore, CRM is capable of

eliminating duplication of effort by integrate with finance and other back-office

application seamlessly, so that teams can focus on the core activities that add value to

the business.

Most of the CRM providers in the market go mobile by offering a mobile version of the

CRM system whereby employee can connect and work remotely and be even more

productive at any time or anywhere

From the business perspective

It enables organisation to make decision more effectively thanks to the real-time

reporting capability across all business areas.



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Better-quality lead generation can be done using marketing functions that leverage the

customer segmentation feature to send campaigns and personalised messages to the

targeted clients.

Financial or cash flow of the company can be managed using pipeline reports, which are

the foundation for reliable sales and production forecasts.

CRM allows for faster response to customers’ needs thanks to the integration of data

across the organisation, which grants access all employees involve in the process. The

faster and more effective the response is; the more satisfied customers will be.

From the organisational perspective

CRM brings about a positive organisational environment where employees are eager to

share information, cooperate effectively as well as gain better understanding of other

departments in the organisation.

Employees are better rewarded and motivated thanks to the performance tracking

capability that enables organisation to keep track of the best-performed staff member

(i.e. through KPIs)

(Nineteen business benefits of CRM 2016)

Some dominant CRM vendors in the marketOracle CRM On Demand

Oracle’s CRM solution offers organisations with extensive capabilities of driving sales,

marketing, service effectiveness and loyalty. It also delivers cross-channel experience to

customer, in combination with Oracle’s Commerce solutions. Essentially, organisations of all

sizes and types can use Oracle CRM On Demand to:

Get smarter

Get more productive

Get the best value

According to Oracle (2016), its CRM solution provides organisations with an extensive set of

tools that optimises the entire sales process as well as increases productivity and sale results.



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Besides, it also delivers crucial information to those who involve in the process including travel

salesforce, in-house sales, partners and management. Oracle CRM On Demand is embedded

with real-time reporting along with effective historical analytics that provides management with

actionable insights to the current business in order to make better solutions. Sales and

prospects information can be quickly accessed through Outlook, web browser or on mobile

device.

Moreover, the marketing feature of Oracle CRM On Demand offers organisations a complete

set of capabilities to automate the marketing process, which includes designing inbound and

outbound campaigns, lead management and nurturing, and measuring marketing return on

invest. More importantly, Oracle CRM On Demand marketing can be fully integrated with CRM,

which presents various utility such as built-in email and web marketing, easy-to-use

automation, and built-in analytics.

(Oracle CRM on demand 2016)

SAP CRM

SAP CRM delivers personalised and seamless customer experiences through SAP Hybris

solutions powered by SAP HANA. In-memory and big data technologies are used to drive digital

transformation as well as to smoothly integrate sales, marketing, commerce, and customer

service.

Particularly, SAP Hybris Cloud For Sales gives organisations easy access to real-time analytics,

social selling tools and customer information at any time. Using SAP Hybris Cloud For Sales,

organisations can take advantage of the cutting-edge capabilities such as Account Management

Intelligence, Mobility, Opportunity Management and Insights, Real-Time Analytics, Predictive

Analytics for Next Generation Customer Engagement, Email and Notes Integration, Sales

Performance Management, Cloud-based Platform in order excel in the market and gain

competitive advantage over their rivals.

On the other hand, SAP Hybris Marketing enable organisations to deliver individualised one-to-

one marketing to mass audience. It helps to obtain not only customer history, but also the



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current tendency as well as motivation. With advanced analytics, organisations can discover

customer’s hidden trends and opportunities so as to remarket and target specific audiences in

their campaigns thanks to the understanding their online behaviour. With the aid of SAP Hybris

Marketing, organisations can monitor the performance of all marketing activities in order to

optimally plan resources and drive customer advocacy.

(Explore the SAP portfolio 2016)

Microsoft Dynamics CRM

Microsoft Dynamics CRM is a versatile and integrated customer relationship management

solution that offers a full set of capabilities in conjunction with integration Office 365, Power BI,

Yammer, Skype, Lync, and many other social conferencing systems that employees, business

partners, and customers already used.

In particular, the Sales functions provides a comprehensive and intuitive solution that allows

salespeople to be more productive and deliver excellent customer experience. Thanks to the

essential insights and guidance, salespeople can work more efficiently by collaborating with

colleagues or build a trusted relationship with customers through personalised engagements.

Some of the sales functions offered by Microsoft Dynamics CRM include opportunity

management, social selling, planning and management, content collaboration, mobiles sales

and sales intelligence.

On the other hand, the Marketing function is an integrated solution for marketing operation,

planning and execution across all channels—email, SMS, digital, social, and traditional. It

enables organisations to plan, execute and measure campaigns from start to finish in order to

bring organisation’s marketing vision to life. Organisations can engage with customers more

intimately across channels, build sales pipeline, and demonstrate the impact of marketing

investments made in real time. Marketing resource management, multichannel campaigns, lead

management and scoring, sales and marketing collaboration, social marketing, and marketing

intelligence are among the core capabilities of marketing.



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Among all of the above CRM solutions, this paper’s main focus will be on Microsoft Dynamics

CRM because the main project of this research component is the configuration of a CRM

system.

This paper will mainly focus on Microsoft Dynamics CRM because it is a relatively affordable

solution for all types of business, especially SMEs. However, being less expensive than its

counterparts does not necessarily mean it is not powerful. In fact, Microsoft Dynamics CRM is

better than rest thanks to the seamless integration with other Microsoft applications, which

have already been used by most organisations.

(Microsoft Dynamics 2016)

What are the challenges of implementing a CRM system?There are numerous challenges face organisation during the implementation of the CRM

system. This paper has identified a number of pitfalls and classified them under three main

categories, namely:

Human-related challenges

Lack of support from senior management can potentially fail the project, as they do not

enforce the adoption of the new system company-wide. This is because the

management does not have a clear vision of the benefits offered by the CRM system

once put into operation.

Lack of an adequate change management plan can have adverse impact on the

implementation of the CRM system, or may cause the project to fail in the worst case.

The new system is likely to be resisted by the employees as it is probably viewed as

“something that benefits management only”. Furthermore, employees tend to have the

feeling that they could be replaced by the new system, thus they may resist it or try to

undermine the implementation process. Finally, the migration to another environment

entails the change in employees’ routine task, which may cause inconveniences and

uncomfortable mindset.



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Lack of expertise from CRM vendor. The CRM vendor might lack experience in delivering

such a tremendous solution or they might not be able to anticipate the challenges of

implementing the CRM system in a complex environment.

Technology-related challenge

Some CRM products are structured and do not allow for customisation to fit specific

business needs. Particularly, some of the solutions do not support multiple deployments

such as private cloud and on-cloud. Moreover, some solutions are not able to scale up

to the growth of the business as well as to keep pace with the technology advance.

Integration is among one of the most troublesome issues, which can cause segregation

of systems, duplication of effort and multiple version of the truths. Most of the CRM

solutions does not integrate well with the legacy systems of the organisation; as such

would cost hundreds of thousand dollars merely to rectify the integration problem.

Data migration is a great challenge for CRM adoption as data is stored in fragmented

legacy systems and data silos. The migration of data to the new system would cost a

great deal in terms of money and time.

Business-related challenge

Business processes may be disrupted or redesigned during the implementation, which

may have detrimental effect on the business. CRM is considered a technology rather

than a business transformation tool thus business expects to customise and configure

the CRM towards their business processes rather than vice versa. However, the former

is not always the case since not many CRM solutions can cope with the specific needs of

every industry.

(Fifteen practical challenges in CRM implementation 2015)

A successful case of Microsoft Dynamics CRM implementationBefore organisation can leverage Microsoft Dynamics CRM to enhance customer interaction, a

successful implementation must take place. Ruston (2012) stated that all enterprise system



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projects must follow an appropriate approach to implementation, and Microsoft Dynamics is

not an exception. This approach consists six steps, namely:

1. Diagnostic

2. Analysis

3. Design

4. Development

5. Deployment

6. Operations

Apart from implementation approach, there are many other factors that can influence the

implementation of Microsoft Dynamics CRM. According to Immix (2015), the following factors

can dictate the success or failure of a CRM project.

A clear project scope

A good change management plan

Dedicated support from high-level management

Strong cooperation among employees

Adequate training

A good test plan

The case of Medica

Medica is a health service provider that provides health insurance for more than 1.5 million

customers. The firm has been growing rapidly and facing a significant growth in customer

volume in a short period of time lately. Medica management understands that getting customer

is difficult and retaining customer is even harder. The company has been facing several issues

with losing critical customer data and duplication of effort because the current Java-based CRM

application cannot not cope with the growth of the business as well as the change in

technology (e.g. mobile support).

To solve the problem, the management decided to adopt Microsoft Dynamics CRM for their

sales and marketing processes and the results were significantly impressive.



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Medica employees begin to communicate and collaborate in a more effective manner as

CRM offers employees access to useful data for making decisions and measuring their

own success.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM is compatible with various other applications such as Outlook

and Skype for Business. As such, it boosts the productivity of employees significantly as

they can perform their daily tasks in one single application.

Medica was able to adopt CRM system in a short period of time without too much effort

spent on coding and testing thanks to the built-in entities and easy-to-customise

processes.

Customer service were substantially increased follow the implementation of the CRM

system as customers are more satisfied with the response time of the service when they

make a claim or submit an inquiry.

(CRM case study of Medica 2016)

Security of customer data in CRM systemsOrganisations are taking security and privacy issues more serious recently due to the

proliferation of mobile and cloud technology. The advent of those cutting-edge technologies on

the one hand has changed the way organisations do business, but also posed imminent threats

on the customer data on the other hand. Particularly, CRM mobile solution allows employee to

work remotely from office, which means they can meet customer, present proposal and update

information dynamically using their mobile phone. Additionally, the on-cloud version of CRM

offers organisation quick configuration time, centralised off-premise storage and competitive

price. However, there are several inherent risks to data security when using mobile CRM

(hacking, hijacking) or online CRM (no control over data, data loss over transmission); which

organisations need to consider when adopting a CRM solution (Boguhn 2011).

Microsoft Dynamics CRM uses the same security model for both Microsoft Dynamic 2016 and

Microsoft Dynamics Online to protect data integrity and privacy. The main objective of this

model is to provide organisations with role based, field level and record level security.

Microsoft ensures the security of its CRM product is regularly enhanced, vigilantly maintained



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and routinely verified through constant testing. Customers’ data is stored in an environment,

which is physically secured by controlling accessibility through multiple security checks. These

security checks are applied at different multiple levels at certified Microsoft Data Centres,

which are responsible for hosting the online CRM solution. Those centres are located around

the world and typically implement the following industry standard features:

Encrypted transmission: connections to the data centres are established using Secure

Socket Layer (SSL) or Transport Layer Security (TLS, which ensure a highly secured

connection between the server and the premise.

User security: User access is restricted by roles and responsibilities so that users only

receive the right privileges to access absolutely right information needed to fulfil their

tasks. A two-factor authentication for access to CRM data helps prevent unauthorised

access to the system via misused device (i.e. smart phone).

Data isolation: Microsoft provides each client with separate database to ensure isolation

from other customer data. Furthermore, clients’ databases in data centres are isolated

from each other based on security boundaries, which is enforced logically through

middle tier administration.

Natural disaster control: Includes seismically braced racks as well as fire extinguishing

and prevention systems.

(How secure is cloud CRM data? 2013).

ConclusionThe sum up, this literature review has addressed various perspectives of customer relationship

management including the dominant vendors, the challenges of implementation as well as the

security concerns of CRM. SAP, Oracle and Microsoft are the predominant CRM vendors in the

market that offer various CRM solutions to suit specific business needs and capabilities. Depend

on the particular situation of the business, organisations can choose from on-premise, cloud-

based or open source CRM solutions. However, they need to be aware of the common pitfalls in



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implementing a CRM solution such as change management, data migration and security issues,

which could exert serious impact on the business. Finally, a case of successful implementation

of CRM was introduced along with the critical success factors, which play a crucial role in

adopting CRM.

ReferencesBoguhn, B 2011, CRM Security Concerns, Compare Business Products, viewed 30 September

2016, <http://www.comparebusinessproducts.com/crm/crm-security-concerns>.

Explore the SAP portfolio 2016, SAP, viewed 30 September 2016,

<http://go.sap.com/australia/solution.html>.

Fifteen practical challenges in CRM implementation 2015, Simple CRM, viewed 30 September

2016, <http://www.simplecrm.com.sg/blog/15-practical-challenges-in-crm-implementation>.



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How secure is cloud CRM data? 2013, CRM Switch, viewed 30 September 2016,

<https://www.crmswitch.com/crm-security/crm-data-security>.

Immix, R 2015,’ Success factors for ERP Implementation (Microsoft Dynamics AX)’, immix,

viewed 16th Sep 2016, <http://immix.co.za/success-factors-erp-implementation-microsoft-

dynamics-ax/>.

King, S & Burgess, T 2008,’ Understanding success and failure in customer relationship

management’, ScienceDirect, viewed 16th Sep 2016,

<http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezproxy.lib.swin.edu.au/science/article/pii/

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<https://www.microsoft.com/en-au/dynamics/default.aspx>.

Nineteen business benefits of CRM 2016, Preact CRM, viewed 30 September 2016,

<http://www.preact.co.uk/why-crm/how-businesses-benefit-from-crm>.

Nisula, A 2008, Final thesis report - Adding value to the customer through customer relationship

management, Tampereen University of Applied Sciences, Tampere.

Parr, A & Shanks, G & Darke, P 1999, ‘Identification of Necessary Factors for Successful

Implementation of ERP Systems’, researchgate, viewed 16th Sep 2016,

<https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220985012_Identification_of_Necessary_Factors_f

or_Successful_Implementation_of_ERP_Systems>.

CRM case study of Medica 2016, Power Objects, viewed 16th Sep 2016,

<http://www.powerobjects.com/case-studies/medica/>.

Rouse, M 2014, Customer relationship management (CRM), TechTarget, viewed 30 September

2016, <http://searchcrm.techtarget.com/definition/CRM>.

Ruston, P 2012, ‘AX Success: Managing a Successful Microsoft Dynamics AX Implementation’,

Ruston Group, viewed 16th Sep 2016, <https://www.rustongroup.com/2016/06/successful-

dynamics-implementation/>.



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Oracle CRM on demand 2016, Oracle, viewed 30 September 2016,

<http://www.oracle.com/us/products/applications/crmondemand/index.html>.



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