what are the advantage and disadvantage of CRM and E-CRM?

Customer relationship management is finally coming of age. Like e-business before it, CRM was the subject of considerable hype before businesses took a step back and thought about the benefits and challenges that CRM would bring to the organisation and its effect on the bottom line.
However the concept is now finding widespread acceptance. Industry dynamics, changes to channels to market and new technologies mean that CRM is especially relevant to leasing.
A major driver of the adoption of CRM techniques is customer loyalty. Loyal customers are more profitable but the costs of customer acquisition are high, so customers may not become profitable for a number of years and happy customers perceive value in the relationship too, so will be less price sensitive.
These points should chime with lessors. Unless they are part of a large banking group on which they can depend for customer leads, the cost of acquiring new lessees is a major expense for most industry players and maximising the value from a customer is vital. Turning the relationship from transactional to value add price is essential in an industry where e-business techniques are threatening to make rate the only differentiator.
One way or another, loyalty is about adding "switching costs" where the service you give is sufficient to create a cost in moving elsewhere. To achieve this you need to understand the customer.
Industry dynamics driven by globalisation and e-business mean that adoption of CRM may be a prerequisite for survival. There is every chance the new CRM will be internet based.
The industry is moving to a multi-channel architecture with infinite potential for delivery channels to be fine-tuned. Lessors will use some or all of these channels simultaneously requiring a consistent view of the relationship across all channels. Having made a payment through a call centre, the customer will expect the balance to have changed when they go online and implies a single source of customer information.
More fundamentally, channels will be self-service. Customers will manage their own contact with the lessor and it will be up to the lessor to ensure the same level of service is available on electronic channels as on traditional channels. E-CRM is the ultimate incarnation of the self-service approach using CRM techniques to customise the experience for each customer.
CRM will have an enormous impact on the leasing industry. The trend towards multiple channels to market requires a CRM approach to tie delivery channels together. E-CRM extends this to support self-service channels customised to the needs of individual market segments and customers.
CRM also provides benefits to lessors who are often in the dark as to which customers are most profitable and which will default. CRM systems allow lessors to retain and segment customers for different products and service levels. In an increasingly commoditised industry, this is one way out of rate-based competition.
Self-service through electronic channels may yet prove to be the greatest catalyst for the implementation of a customer centric organisation. However, the benefits of CRM deserve to be considered independently of such initiatives. In a tight marketplace, real business benefits can be delivered through CRM. Do not believe the hype. But believe that CRM can give you that much needed competitive advantage