ABOUT THE VENDOR
ClientLogic is an international provider of integrated customer management solutions, including
customer care, eCommerce, marketing and fulfillment services. A subsidiary of Canadian diversified
company Onex Corporation, ClientLogic is headquartered in Nashville, TN and operates in 55
facilities throughout North America, Europe, and Australia. ClientLogic offers its clients an
international suite of services, including integrated customer acquisition, list management and
brokerage, multi-channel customer service, sales and technical support (phone, fax, e-mail, chat,
self-help, and mail); e-commerce, and fulfillment services.
ABOUT THE CLIENT
Founded in 2000 by Dennis Publishing, DDM Press creates and markets branded books aimed at the
demographics of Dennis Publishing magazine brands. In addition to bookstore sales, DDM Press
markets its book products direct-to-consumer through direct mailings, magazine ads, Internet
promotions and telemarketing campaigns. DDM Press is currently developing book products for all
five of Dennis' U.S. magazine properties as well as developing new formats and markets.
ABOUT THE TECHNOLOGY
ClientLogic offers a full suite of services for businesses that recognize the value of managing all
aspects of the customer experience:
Customer Care -- ClientLogic provides customer service, sales, and technical support to our
clients' customers
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on a 24x7x365 basis through e-mail, online chat, fax, phone, self-help, and
mail.Fulfillment Services -- ClientLogic offers fulfillment services: order and payment processing, warehousing, inventory management, e-commerce, catalog, continuity services, returns processing activities, and order pick, pack and ship.
Marketing Services -- ClientLogic's Marketing Services include continuity programs, loyalty programs, e-commerce services, inbound and outbound telesales, database development, campaign management, customer analysis, e-mail communications, list management, and list brokerage.
DDM Press was looking for a vendor to take care of all aspects of CRM, from order processing to fulfillment.
SearchCRM spoke with Steven Kotok, publisher of DDM Press, about the project.
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SearchCRM: Did you already have CRM implemented before ClientLogic?
Kotok: Before, we were with a smaller fulfillment house. Things weren't working out with them -- the customer experience was bad because the products weren't getting out at the right time, the orders weren't getting processed well, and none of our communications were what we wanted them to be.
SearchCRM: What were you looking for in a CRM vendor?
Kotok: We were looking for someone who could handle everything from soup to nuts so we could present one face to the customer. We didn't want to have to coordinate three or four different vendors and try to get them to all present the same message to our customers. We were also looking for someone with a lot of experience in the field. ClientLogic was the only one who had both those pieces of the puzzle.
SearchCRM: Was there any implementation on your end?
Kotok: What we do use we either download via FTP or it's Web-based. So we didn't have to buy any servers or hardware or install any software.
SearchCRM: What does ClientLogic do for you?
Kotok: ClientLogic handles everything for us, from order processing through getting the product to the customer, and also customer service.
We've expanded our marketing sources so we may hit a customer with direct mail, though an ad in one of our magazines, through telemarketing, through a promotion in an outgoing package like an invoice insert, or via the Web. The customer will order the book by returning something to ClientLogic through the mail, through the Web, by phone -- any one of a variety of ways.
Each one of those orders is keyed so we know when the customer ordered and how they ordered. From there, within about a half a week, that order is processed and the product is shipped out to them with some other promotions inside based on who that customer is. The customer gets the book a few days later, and a lot of the contact from there is customers calling with questions about the product or the billing process.
SearchCRM: What have been the benefits of this CRM system?
Kotok: A certain number of customers will return the product and a certain number just won't pay. Switching to ClientLogic, the returns went down and the number of people who pay us went way up. We assume it's because customers were getting the product faster. Since a lot of these are impulse purchases, time is the enemy; the more time you have between when you decide you must have the book and when the book comes, the more your enthusiasm cools. If you can get them the book that much faster, they're likely to still be in the mood to receive it.
SearchCRM: Have you seen ROI yet?
Kotok: It wasn't much of an investment to go into ClientLogic because we already had a vendor and then we moved to ClientLogic. There were some minor setup fees, but we weren't investing a large upfront sum. But for the same number of products shipped out, we're getting more money back by people paying instead of returning the product.
SearchCRM: Do you have any advice for companies that are thinking of starting a similar project?
Kotok: Definitely don't wait. There's always another reason to put it off, another reason it's going to be inconvenient to do it--but the benefits are immense. Every order the customer makes, you're going to get some benefit if you can make an across-the-board improvement to your operations like you can by switching vendors.
SearchCRM: If you could do it all over again, what would you do differently?
Kotok: Once we made the switch, we'd do a lot of things sooner. We wanted to wait until we'd been with ClientLogic a while before we started experimenting with promoting through different media, for example. I probably would have just done that all from the get-go. We could have done a lot of things sooner.
Linda Formichelli's writing appeared this year in Woman's Day, Wired, Writer's Digest, Family Circle, Psychology Today. Contact her at linda-eric@lserv.com, or check out her Web site http://www.twowriters.net
This was first published in September 2001
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