Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software for the public sector will help manage vendors, suppliers and customers. CRM software has many sub-functions, broken up into modules, for the more elaborate versions. The goal of the application or suite of applications is to create a seamless environment to control how you present your organization to your clients. Your customers will appreciate an organization that makes their experience with you easy, quick and effective.

During your CRM software comparisons, consider the needs of the following aspects of your organization's customer interactions, all of which will have a direct or indirect impact on your customer relationships.

1. Performance managers and marketing analysts provide solid benchmarks, which allow your organization to measure progress towards goals.

2. Customer advocates and experience designers work to make the experience your customers have with your company as positive as possible.

3. Internal collaborative functional operations support your customer facing operations through IT, planning and manufacturing.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Buy the right campaign management CRM for public sector enterprises

With marketing-oriented CRM sales software, public sector organizations can coordinate the activities of those engaged in getting your organization's message to the public. The software, therefore, must be able to integrate contact and demographic information. The best marketing-oriented CRM software will help your sales teams create a campaign that presents clients (past, present and potential) with purchasing opportunities.

I recommend: Chordiant Software, Inc. sells Decision Management Solution (CDM) software. CDM is scalable (it can grow with your organization) and helps create sophisticated customer experience strategies. Marketing Pilot Software, LLC sells MarketingPilot Enterprise Software, which provides not only the expected functions to coordinate your marketing strategy, but also includes project and expense management tools.

Streamline your sales team with sales force automation (SFA) CRM public sector software

Your selection of public sector CRM solutions should include SFA. A sales force that pesters customers with sales pitches for unwanted products is likely to turn off those customers even when they are ready to buy. Moreover, inefficient calls waste the valuable and limited resource of your salespeople's time.

I recommend: Customer Management Software available from Salesforce.com, inc. includes a Sales Force Automation application. Your sales staff can use it offline or online and it provides access to real-time customer data. The Pivotal CRM Marketing Suite serves to ensure the consistency of your message and accelerate campaign planning.

Coordinate customer service and support with collaborative CRM software for the public sector

The best organizations provide multi-channel support options to their clients. Such options often include live online chat, email, form-based requests and phone calls. It is critical to coordinate the activities of a customer who may use more than one channel to communicate with your organization. Frequently, an issue may begin with a phone call, move to a chat and culminate in an email exchange. Information gathered through any channel should be available through all others. For managing public sector customers, CRM collaborative software is crucial.

I recommend: RightNow Technologies, Inc. sells RightNow Service, which provides your customers and agents with the required information regardless of the channel through which your organization acquired the data. Customer Tracker from Automation Centre is a good solution, if your organization uses Lotus Notes and Domino applications.

Tips & Tactics

Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• •  When you shop for a public sector CRM vendor, try to find one that has experience in the public sector. This often requires dealing with organizations whose budgets fluctuate and whose payments may be uneven.