Customer Relationship Management

A case Study of Customer Relationship Management

Walmart is a multinational retail giant operating across the globe. Walmart is operating in more than 11000 retail outlets working with 69 associate partners in more than 27 countries. Walmart is having e commerce websites in about 10 countries making it as the world leader in the field of Retailing. Walmart employees’ more than 2.2 million people across the globe.

Review of CRM in Walmart

Walmart has been a pioneer in the field of Loyalty programs which the company has introduced worldwide. Walmart has introduced loyalty programs in which it offers loyalty cards to the customers and the customers can use these cards to get good discounts on any of the purchases they make, since Walmart is in tie ups with a number of big brands so the customers can get high quality of products at a low price. With a very successful and a vast network Walmart tracks the activities and the purchasing pattern of more than 80 million customers across the globe. This tracking further helps Walmart to analyze and develop marketing strategies as per the demand of the customers. CM of Walmart has helped it in developing a framework which helps it to have a sustainable competitive advantage.

The Walmart way

Walmart has been rated as one of the world’s best retail service provider, with such a wide network and global coverage Walmart is indeed the most reputed name in the domain of retail selling. Walmart has emerged out to be a global leader as a result of its tie ups with the business giants of various nations, which has helped it to penetrate deep inside the formulation of customer specific services, which has lead to high level of satisfaction among the clients.

Walmart has been focusing on customers and this is the reason that the company has established its brand across the globe in terms of quality and service.

Proposed improvements to the role of staff in promoting good CRM

Staff indeed plays a very vital role as far as the implementation of promotion of Good CRM is considered. Since Walmart has about 2.2 million employees associated across the globe in various processes, so it becomes very important for the employees to get involved in the CRM activities so that the quality could be implemented in all the processes. The employees should update their regular work related to the stocks and should report regarding the future demand so that steps could be take to make the things available which are of high demand in nature. Apart from this the frontline executives should also take the charge of collecting the information regarding the changing demand of the customers so that more focus could be laid on the customer oriented marketing concept.

Since millions of customers visit the retail outlet daily and they have varied needs and demands, so the employees will have to look into providing variety of products to the customers, so that they can be exposed to choices and make a decision depending upon their preference criteria.

Plan for the implementation of improvements

Improvements is what is the overall aim of all the CRM practices within the organization, Wallmart should look in to the implementation of the following, for the improvement purpose-

·             Since at peak times the mall witnesses a huge crowd, it becomes highly important for the managers to effectively manage the crowd, so that the customers could enjoy the shopping experience without any frustration.

·             The Front executives and the managers in charge should take in mind the long waiting que at the billing counter, so that the customers should not have to wait for long durations.

·             Since today’s market is a customer oriented market and it is of utmost important for the business unit to implement the CRM practices in a manner so that it is meant for serving the customers with the utmost priority.

Conclusion

CRM practices are meant to attain the maximum of the customer’s attention, Loyalty programs are based on a simple concept that a loyal customer is far more beneficial than a non loyal customer as far as business profitability is considered, hence it should be the first priority of a business to maximize the count of the Loyal customers, so that the company could ensure maximum returns with increasing count of the satisfied customers, Because in today’s competitive era “Customer is the King” and the earlier this thing is understood the better it would be for the overall profitability of the business.