What is CRM? And what types of CRM are there? An overview of what Customer Relationship Management actually is about and what it offers you. The post What is CRM and what types of CRM are there? appeared first on Archie CRM.... Read more »

Account Based Marketing (ABM) is a relatively new B2B marketing and sales technique that supports the buyer journey in a targeted way. The post Account Based Marketing: a new interpretation of the AIDA appeared first on Archie CRM.... Read more »

Collecting customer data and Account Based Marketing go hand in hand. In 4 steps it becomes clear how the process works. The post Collecting customer data in 4 steps appeared first on Archie CRM.... Read more »

CRM is not only suitable for large companies but also for small businesses, CRM for SME, as it is about relationship management and customer focus. The post CRM for SME appeared first on Archie CRM.... Read more »

ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) is a useful system, but it's not CRM. Companies do need a CRM system along side. The post ERP is not CRM appeared first on Archie CRM.... Read more »

Internal communication is part of customer intimacy. With the use of CRM, you create structure and give employees autonomy. The post Shape customer intimacy appeared first on Archie CRM.... Read more »

Online sales and account management need not be an obstacle for organizations. In fact, with a good CRM system, it's powerful. The post Collaborate online in sales appeared first on Archie CRM.... Read more »

Working from home does not have to be a problem to increase customer loyalty. This is possible with the right CRM software. The post Remote customer loyalty: three tips appeared first on Archie CRM.... Read more »

The right mindset in a CRM implementation is one of the success factors for the success of implementation. The importance of transparency must be clear The post CRM: a matter of having the right mindset appeared first on Archie CRM.... Read more »

First in a number of videos I will be doing around the benefits of CRM technology. Thought I would go back to CRM’s routes and talk about the benefits of contact management. ShareThis... Read more »

Much has been written and said over the years about CRM project failures and their causes, but a lot of it has been by marketing folks and journalists rather than those on the front line. So in this video I wanted to set out what failure really looks like and... Read more »

I was conscious that in last week’s ‘layperson’s guide to a CRM project’ video, where I broke a project down into the different stages, that I didn’t really cover off associated timelines. Something I’ve addressed in the following video, in the context of a mid-sized CRM implementation: ShareThis... Read more »

In this video I wanted to set out the principle stages of a CRM project. It’s aimed at people new to managing a CRM project, and tries to identify some of the things to look out for as you progress. ShareThis... Read more »

People are often surprised how long a CRM project can take. In this video I go through ten ways to speed up the delivery of a system. ShareThis... Read more »

As promised in last week’s post, which outlined the costs involved in running a CRM project, this video sets out ways to reduce them. ShareThis... Read more »

In this video I walk through the different types of costs that are involved in a CRM project. These include software and implementation costs, project team time, the impact of go-live on users, system support, and the ongoing development and management of the system. ShareThis... Read more »

‘CRM Consultant’ is a confusing term, largely because it’s used by a lot of different people that might be involved in a CRM project. In this video Richard Boardman walks you through the different types. ShareThis... Read more »

Just created a video about our CRM Value Maximisation services, which are designed to help organisations generate more value from their existing CRM systems: ShareThis... Read more »

  As a lot of people have noticed, chart customizations in the Unified Interface in Model-Driven Power Apps, or Dynamics 365 does not behave the way they used to in the classic interface. This is because the Unified Interface only supports a subset of the chart customization options that were... Read more »

A great dashboard in Dynamics 365, or Model-Driven App will not only show you the relevant data and insights, it will also make it easy to get to the relevant records so you can take action. Drill-downs and clicking on records to navigate to them has been the standard user... Read more »

As Power BI is used increasingly within Dynamics 365 or Model-Driven apps, attention to detail in the user experience is increasingly important. Users should be able to seamlessly navigate between the two technologies, and the visual cues should match between them for a coherent user experience. Visual cues for example,... Read more »

Last year I wrote a lengthy blog post comparing the three main methods of getting Dynamics 365, or Common Data Service data into Power BI for analysis. Now, at the most recent Microsoft Business Applications Summit, a new method was announced that I was finally able to try out. The... Read more »

Some years ago, I wrote a blog post about how to create a chart that compared monthly sales, to the same month in the previous year. The approach required quite a bit of XML editing and the chart was limited to only comparing this and last year. No data from... Read more »

There are a few different ways to get your Dynamics 365 data into Power BI. Now that the Common Data Service connector has come out of preview and is generally available, I figured it would be a good time to have a look at the different methods and how they... Read more »

It has been a little while since the last update, but Mohamed Rasheed and I just added some bug fixes and improvements to the Power Query (M) Builder for the XrmToolBox. If you are new to the Power Query (M) Builder and how it can accelerate Power BI report development... Read more »

I realize this is my fourth blog on this particular topic, and I am sure it won’t be the last. The occasion: Microsoft has released a new built-in, easier way of embedding Power BI reports on Dynamics 365 and filter them according to record context. The approach is not as... Read more »

Power BI recently started supported embedding Power BI visuals securely out-of-the-box. That means we can now show Power BI reports inside Dynamics 365, without having to deal with authentication. And with minimal use of code, we can filter the visual to the record that it is being displayed on. Like... Read more »

"The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits them and sells itself." Most Dynamics 365 users don't lose deals over […] The post Why Dynamics 365 Users Need CRM Email Marketing Integration! appeared first on CRM Software Blog | Dynamics... Read more »

Learn what project management tools implementation involves, how Dynamics 365 Project Operations connects sales, resourcing, delivery, and finance, and why it beats disconnected tools. Introduction Most project-based businesses don't fail […] The post Project Management Tools Implementation: A Complete Guide to Dynamics 365 Project Operations appeared first on CRM Software... Read more »

Why Do Most CRM Implementations Fail? CRM implementations don’t typically fail because of the technology. Usually, failure results from a lack of adoption and effective change management processes. At the […] The post Why CRM Implementations Fail Due to Poor Adoption appeared first on CRM Software Blog | Dynamics 365.... Read more »

CRM fragmentation rarely shows up first as a failed system. More often, someone exports the pipeline to Excel before a forecast call, copies a service update into Teams, or rebuilds […] The post CRM Fragmentation: The Hidden Operational Cost in Microsoft 365 Environments appeared first on CRM Software Blog |... Read more »

Customer Experience is No Longer Reactive For most organizations, customer churn doesn't actually begin with a cancellation notice. It starts much earlier, often as a series of small, disconnected signals […] The post How Copilot and Dynamics 365 Help Organizations Anticipate Churn Before It Happens appeared first on CRM Software... Read more »

Right now, at this exact moment, your sales team is trying to close deals on incomplete customer information. They don't know it. But deals are being lost because of it. […] The post Merge Duplicate Records in Dynamics 365 Without Guesswork appeared first on CRM Software Blog | Dynamics 365.... Read more »

If your day-to-day involves Microsoft Dynamics 365, Business Central, CRM, or Power Platform, here's something worth your attention. We're giving away one All-Access Pass to Community Summit 2026, worth $2,399, to one lucky reader. […] The post We're Giving Away a Free All-Access Pass to Community Summit 2026  appeared first on CRM Software Blog |... Read more »

For years, many organizations have delayed moving from Dynamics CRM or Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement On-Premises to the cloud. The system still works. Users know it. The integrations seem stable. So […] The post Last Call for On-Prem CRM: Why the EWS Retirement Matters More Than You Think appeared first on... Read more »

AI can improve product development by helping teams identify issues earlier, evaluate products from new perspectives, prototype ideas faster, and explore more possibilities before committing development resources. At ForgeXRM, we […] The post How Can AI Improve Software Product Development on the Microsoft Platform? appeared first on CRM Software Blog... Read more »

Why Dynamics 365 teams need a control layer — and most don't have one. There's a conversation that happens in almost every Dynamics 365 environment I've walked into over the […] The post The Gap No One Talks About: Why Dynamics 365 Teams Need a Control Layer appeared first on... Read more »

Is Dynamics 365 Working Hard Enough for Your Business? Nearly 20,000 verified organizations worldwide rely on it to manage customers, streamline operations, and improve decision-making. According to 2026 dataset, adoption […] The post Microsoft Dynamics 365 Across Industries: Why CRM Optimization Matters More Than Ever appeared first on CRM Software... Read more »

Your Dynamics 365 CRM is full of valuable business data, but is it helping you predict what comes next or simply recording what has already happened? While many organizations are […] The post Generative AI vs. Predictive AI: What's Next for Dynamics 365 CRM? appeared first on CRM Software Blog... Read more »

Sales teams do not need another artificial intelligence feature list. They need to know where Microsoft Dynamics 365 AI sales agents actually reduce friction inside real selling work. Most sales […] The post Microsoft Dynamics 365 AI Sales Agents: Where They Create Operational Value appeared first on CRM Software Blog... Read more »

Why Customer Service Is Becoming a Data Problem, Not Just a People Problem CRM Contact Centers: Getting Answers with Microsoft Dynamics 365 Every customer interaction starts the same way: "Can […] The post Why Customer Service Is Becoming a Data Problem, Not Just a People Problem appeared first on CRM... Read more »

Customer experience prioritization is your greatest (missed) opportunity for growth.... Read more »

Customers' prosperity fuels everyone's prosperity. So, how well do managers in every function understand customers' goals?... Read more »

Bad CX metrics practices are like out-of-date GPS or a broken compass: you think you’re on the right track, only to find you’re going in circles or way off target.... Read more »

AI relies on data quality: you assume AI outputs are truth, but if your data is junk, then AI recommendations are likewise junk.... Read more »

Do “customer experience metrics” enrich your understanding of: the customer? their experience? value to them? For companies you buy from, how well do their “CX metrics” tell them about you, your experience, and your value from them? Let’s take an inventory of popular “CX metrics”: Marketing Metric Definition About Whom... Read more »

Maximizing growth means starting with alignment in your corporate strategy and customer experience strategy. Otherwise, you’re robbing investors of growth. Highly aligned companies see:1 58% faster revenue growth + 72% higher profit + 2.2X customer retention + 3.2X customer satisfaction + 8.7X effective leadership + 16.8X engaged employees Highly aligned... Read more »

High-potential customers are your starting point for customer experience management. — What are their aims? — How aligned are you? If you don’t know the aims of your high-potential customers, what does that say about your aim? High-Potential Customers High-potential customers might not be the biggest firms. — Who’s spending... Read more »

Revenue risks are anything out-of-sync with customers. $3.8 trillion (USD) revenue globally is risked by bad customer experiences annually. — This is $119 billion higher than last year.1 Issues in bad customer experience:1 — Service delivery issues 46% — Communication problems 45% — Employee interactions 39% — Price 37% —... Read more »

Bad CX practices deceive managers and rob investors: A) Insults repel customers: the opposite of your goals. B) Falsehoods derail customer-centric growth. C) GIGO (garbage-in, garbage-out) metrics stunt your potential. D) Misdirected actions squander opportunities. This is the first of a 4-part series covering (A) insults, (B) falsehoods, (C) GIGO,... Read more »

The definition of customer experience typically centers erroneously on the word “interactions”. 1) B2C Example: Celebrating my nephew’s winning soccer season with brunch at a busy restaurant, my brother got a pager from the reception desk, and we enjoyed the pretty landscape in the parking lot while waiting for our... Read more »

In revenue operations, demand generation, customer success, and business development, how often are cost decisions central to your work? Not beyond your own budget, right? Ironically, company-wide cost decisions shape all growth strategies. Gaps Rob Growth Potential The recipe for success is simple: Say what customers get and give exactly... Read more »

Customer experience dashboards and compensation shape your culture. — Revenue emphasis = mercenary culture. — Narrow scope = myopic culture. — Score-based = self-centric culture. — Root cause focus = value culture. When Vodafone mistake-proofed root causes of customer experience gaps, value ebbed and flowed accordingly! Gray trend = their... Read more »

CX Day is a highlight of the year, celebrating customers, CX professionals, and CX outcomes. It’s always the first Tuesday of October. This year’s theme is: Why this theme? According to the Customer Experience Professionals Association (cxpa.org/get-involved/cxday): To explore and highlight credible proof of business impact. Real-world return on investment:... Read more »

Your CX ROI metrics roadmap is a cause-and-effect sequence that multiplies growth. All customer experience metrics used today are lagging indicators of growth. You’re measuring what already happened with customers. Therefore, it’s lagging. Leading indicators are what you are doing that causes the lagging indicator. A leading indicator shows what... Read more »

Corey Livingston explains how to diagnose a GTM rebuild, earn sales trust, prioritize growth motions, and measure progress before pipeline appears.... Read more »

Episode summary: Scott Gillum, founder and CEO of Carbon Design and author of The Hidden Buyer Journey, joins Brian Carroll on The B2B Roundtable: What Dashboards Miss to talk about what really drives complex B2B buying decisions.... Read more »

Lindsay Cournoyer explains why B2B marketers need to stop optimizing only for what can be tracked, and why brand, memory, and trust still matter when buyers are not ready to talk.... Read more »

Deanna Ransom explains why more reps, tools, and activity aren’t fixing pipeline, and why B2B growth now depends on precision, retention, and truly knowing your customer.... Read more »

The man who helped build marketing automation explains why the MQL model most B2B teams still run on was designed for the wrong 5% — and what to do about the other 95%.... Read more »

Your dashboard says the GTM machine is running. And yet deals slip. Here is what dashboards almost never show you -- and the diagnostic work that actually finds where revenue breaks.... Read more »

A PE-backed company had $13M in pipeline against an $8.5M target. Over 150% coverage. They still missed the number. The problem was not volume. It was what happened after pipeline was created.... Read more »

A collections agency endorsed by Mother Teresa changed how I approach B2B marketing. When we stopped converting and started helping, we got 303% more sales opportunities.... Read more »

A billion-dollar building products company had 20,000 leads flowing into 10+ follow-up paths with no visibility. The funnel was not broken. The system underneath was never built. Here is what they fixed.... Read more »

Image courtesy of PixabayCX Journey Inc.'s site is growing up! I'm so excited to have a new site going live this week! I'm sharing this note as a blog post as it will be my last post on what is currently www.cx-journey.com. A couple of things to note:This site will... Read more »

Image courtesy of PixabayToday I'm pleased to share another guest post by Paul Laughlin. This post originally appeared on Paul's site on March 9, 2019.This is the second in two-part series from Paul about agile working. Find the first post in the series here.In my first post on how to... Read more »

Image courtesy of PixabayToday I'm pleased to share a guest post by Paul Laughlin. This post originally appeared on Paul's site on February 21, 2019.The term Agile working is being used within more and more businesses. Although loosely defined, it generally refers to a more flexible and pacey way of... Read more »

Image courtesy of PixabayI originally wrote today's post for Forbes. It appeared on the Forbes site on November 14, 2018. I've made some slight modifications since then, as it turned into a two-part series. This is the second in that series; the first part can be found here.In this follow-up... Read more »

In today's post, I reveal the secret sauce for journey mapping success. Are you ready?There's a lot of bad press out there about journey mapping. And there's a lot of bad journey mapping (or what people think is journey mapping). A few months ago, I shared my six-step journey mapping... Read more »

If you're a speaker, thinking about becoming a speaker,  an event organizer, or considering hosting an event in the near future, you'll definitely want to read this. And even if you're none of the above, please continue reading. And feel free to share this whitepaper with anyone you believe will... Read more »

Image courtesy of PixabayI originally wrote today's post for Forbes. It appeared on the Forbes site on October 18, 2018. I've made some slight modifications since then, as it turned into a two-part series.The good news is that you've embarked on a customer experience transformation journey. The bad news is... Read more »

This is a modified version of a post I originally wrote for CallidusCloud. It appeared on their blog on June 14, 2018.If you want to move beyond cosmetic changes and lip service to real changes in both the employee experience and the customer experience, the first thing you have to... Read more »

Image courtesy of PixabayDo you know the difference between means and outcomes? Between the journey and the destination?I know. I know. Those are silly questions to ask.Of course everyone knows the difference between means and outcomes. Of course everyone knows the difference between the means to an end and the... Read more »

Image courtesy of PixabayHow do leaders drive (lasting) change?Last week, I enjoyed spending a few days in Vegas, speaking and networking at Fiserv's annual client Forum. The keynote on the second day of the event was Troy Aikman, who was interviewed by Fiserv's CEO Jeff Yabuki about sports, of course,... Read more »

Image courtesy of PixabayI originally wrote today's post for CallidusCloud. It appeared on their blog on July 12, 2018. When companies focus on people, their people - employees first, then customers - the numbers will come.This is a tough concept for a lot of executives to grasp. They know the... Read more »

I hate to tell you this, but you're just not.*I've been doing a bit of speaking lately, either about journey mapping or with journey mapping as a piece of the talk, and I've learned a lot - or, rather, confirmed a lot. Namely, you might think you're journey mapping; you... Read more »

Image courtesy of PixabayI originally wrote today's post for CallidusCloud. It appeared on their blog on April 13, 2018.How do you prioritize your CX improvement initiatives?You've listened to customers. You've mapped their journeys. And you've identified a lot of improvement areas that would make the experience light years better for... Read more »

Image courtesy of PixabayThis is the second of a two-part series on common VoC program mistakes.In case you missed the first post in this series, you can find it here.Note that I haven't prioritized or categorized these mistakes, but take a close look at each one to ensure you're not... Read more »

Every AI CRM vendor selling into 2026 has an AI agent story by now. The differentiator is no longer whether agents exist, but who is allowed to build the next one, how long that takes, and what happens to the bill once it works. For decades, CRM has promised growth... Read more »

Every so often a vendor conversation earns the word “useful,” and this one flirts with it. On CRMKonvo #309, Pega‘s Matt Healy walked into a room of skeptics and, refreshingly, did not try to sell AI as pixie dust. He sold governance. Let me explain why that is the interesting... Read more »

The Ghost of Cluetrain In 1999, the Cluetrain Manifesto famously declared that “markets are conversations.” It was an inspiring, romantic notion that promised to democratize commerce, wresting power from faceless corporate monoliths and handing it back to a sovereign consumer. Fast forward to today, and that conversation has been thoroughly... Read more »

For years, the enterprise software complex has sold us on a beautiful fairytale: the single source of truth. We were told that if we just poured enough capital into our CRM systems, and if we just badgered our front-line sales representatives enough to log every transactional interaction, absolute operational clarity... Read more »

TheStreet ran a piece this week arguing that, of Microsoft’s two Copilot announcements, the shift to usage-based pricing matters more to investors than the DeepSeek flirtation. That read is correct. It is also the tell. Here is what Microsoft actually did. Copilot Cowork, the agent that reaches across Microsoft 365... Read more »

The news At its PegaWorld conference in Las Vegas on June 8, 2026, Pegasystems announced Pega Infinity 26, which it says will be available in Q3 2026. The principal change is commercial: Pega is moving away from per-token pricing for its AI agents toward a flat charge per completed “case,”... Read more »

Microsoft Build 2026 produced two announcements that, read together, describe something more interesting than the usual conference launch cadence: a plausible scenario in which enterprise AI stack decisions made in the next 12 months could become significantly harder to reverse. The operative word is “could”. Several pieces of the announced... Read more »

Every single week, I sit through pitches from enterprise software vendors boasting about the next iteration of their ” AI-powered sales pipeline optimization platforms”. They promise to auto-magically turn cold leads into closed contracts while minimizing human intervention. That sounds great on a slide deck designed to pump the stock... Read more »

The contemporary B2B sales landscape is currently drowning in its own engineering achievements. For the past decade, the holy grail of outbound sales development was scale: how many touches could an automated sequence tool squeeze out of a Sales Development Representative (SDR) per day? The answer was always “more”. With... Read more »

The Satechi ChargeView 240W desktop charger ticks all the right boxes for this charging geek.... Read more »

The inconsistent service, shady upcharges, and uptick in better-valued competitors made the choice easy.... Read more »

Samsung's latest smartwatch introduces new metrics, a longer-lasting battery, and hints at the future of wearables.... Read more »

The Marshall Stanmore IV is a more expensive home speaker, but there's so much to like that $430 sounds like a good value.... Read more »

A SIM swapping attack could compromise your phone, your personal accounts, and even your identity. Here's how to thwart them.... Read more »

With its unique size, the Galaxy Z Fold 8 is a refreshing take on foldable phones, and I'm all for it.... Read more »

Microsoft's latest progress report details much-needed Windows 11 improvements in reliability, performance, stability, and usability. But here's what else I see.... Read more »

The Pixel 11 may cost more, but Google's software advantage may make it worth it for you.... Read more »

The updates were unexpected. Apple must have considered this flaw serious enough to warrant an immediate fix.... Read more »

OnePlus has officially ended business across North America and Europe. I explain what happens next and the best alternatives to consider.... Read more »

Certifications and years of experience can only take you so far in cyber now. Automation means new skills are coming to the fore.... Read more »

No AC? Me neither. Here's how to keep yourself and your home cool during a heatwave.... Read more »

Wi‑Fi 7 is rapidly moving out of the lab and into American living rooms, with data from Ookla showing US usage is growing fast.... Read more »

From portable monitors to wireless mice and earbuds, these accessories can help you be more productive this year.... Read more »