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2008 was a big year for Web 2.0 tools, social CRM applications and analytics technology, as companies increasingly focused on the "voice of the customer" and on becoming more customer-centric. Browse our collection of the hottest CRM definitions and buzzwords of 2008 and get an overview of the past year's biggest CRM trends.
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Table of Contents The top 10 CRM terms and buzzwords of 2008
1. Social CRM/CRM 2.0
2. Collaboration
3. Web self-service
4. Chief customer officer
5. "Voice of the customer" programs
6. Speech analytics
7. Text analytics
8. Workforce optimization
9. Customer experience
10. Real-time contact center
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The top 10 CRM terms and buzzwords of 2008
Social CRM/CRM 2.0 refers to CRM tools and applications that make use of Web 2.0 technologies and social networking tools to help companies develop closer customer relationships over the Internet. Social CRM grew in popularity in 2008 as many CRM vendors began building Web 2.0 functionality into new, social CRM offerings.
Listen to a podcast on the CRM and Web 2.0 phenomenon.
Collaboration is a feature often found in CRM products with Web 2.0 functionality that enables a group of individuals to work together to share ideas or accomplish a specific task. In 2008, many CRM vendors began making "social CRM" enhancements to their products, adding collaboration functionality.
Read about Oracle's addition of collaborative features to Oracle CRM On Demand.
Web self-service is a version of electronic support, or e-support, that allows customers and employees to access information and perform tasks over the Internet, without the help of a customer service representative. Many companies looking to cut costs and improve the customer experience adopted Web self-service technologies to serve their customers and employees in 2008.
The role of a chief customer officer can include communicating with employees, conducting customer research and overseeing the customer experience. As many companies renewed their focus on the customer experience and took steps to become more customer-centric, many appointed chief customer officers in 2008.
Get an expert's take on the chief customer officer job.
"Voice of the customer" programs also called customer experience intelligence or customer feedback management programs, are initiatives sometimes put in place by companies looking to make improvements and decisions based on the opinions and experiences of their customers. "Voice of the customer" programs became popular in 2008, due in part to the maturation of text analytics technology.
Find out how one company prepared its call center for a "voice of the customer" program.
Speech analytics is a call center technology that mines customer calls for data, providing insight into customer behaviors. Speech analytics is still an emerging technology in the call center, but it saw a lot of growth in 2008 as companies took advantage of its ability to reduce costs, increase revenue and improve customer service.
Get the top speech analytics software headlines.
Text analytics technology is used to obtain and analyze text-based customer information, providing the company with insight into customer feedback. According to industry experts, the text analytics market is still small, but it has been growing rapidly in 2008, thanks to some companies adopting the technology in order to gain a competitive edge.
See how one hotel chain is using text analytics technology to analyze thousands of customer surveys.
Workforce optimization (WFO) is a call center technology that combines recording, quality management (QM) and various other call center technologies to optimize call center performance. In 2008, experts saw the WFO market continue to grow, despite the economic recession. The increased need of companies to become more customer-centric has played a large role in fueling that growth.
Visit the workforce optimization guide.
The customer experienceis a term used to describe the interaction between a customer and an organization. It can include call center agent interactions, purchases, customer service requests and more. In 2008 there was a renewed focus on the customer experience -- many companies took steps to better understand and improve customer satisfaction.
A real-time contact center is a term used to describe call centers that deliver the right information to the right call center agent at the right time. In 2008, many call centers made investments in technology that provides real-time information to call center agents, allowing them to serve the customer more completely, thereby improving the customer experience.
Find out if it's possible to measure the customer experience in real time.
Buzzword definitions provided by WhatIs.com
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