THE CHALLENGE
Environment Canterbury’s vision embodies ‘a living landscape’ rich in natural resources for all to share and enjoy. Yet the pathway to the sustainable management of the land, coastline and other resources involves considerable consultation, public dialogue and interaction with local bodies, organisations, community groups and individuals. Handling this huge information task to date was a number of disparate business systems, unable to bring consistency and commonality across Environment Canterbury’s customer contact databases, document management systems and financial systems. The challenge was to introduce a CRM process that would give a 360 degree view of customers across any business unit that the customer has a relationship with.
As Microsoft certified partners, Intergen had the right resources.
“We knew they were the most up to play with CRM.”
Martin Foley, Customer Services Manager, Environment Canterbury.
A Natural Step to a CRM Environment
Environment Canterbury selected Intergen on the back of a successful project on revitalizing their website. Wayne Stiven was looking for CRM expertise but he also describes the people side of the equation as being a key factor.
“We saw CRM has the ideal platform to integrate all of our databases and bring all contacts into one manageable point. That was the first initiative, but beyond that my vision is for Environment Canterbury (ECan) to extend the entire business value focus of CRM, by using it to drive our customer relationship services.”
“We saw a high level of technical expertise, at a cost that was realistic. Industry rates can be exorbitant but here we felt we were getting exceptionally high quality development at a reasonable price. There was a relationship link here, and a feeling you could talk without the clock ticking."
CRM at Work
CRM represents a considerable change across a large organisation, but its ease of use will prove valuable within Environment Canterbury. Complex data can now be represented in a fashion that ‘makes sense’ and is accessible for a wide range of users. Every bit of information captured about a customer will eventually be totally visible, regardless of where the contact has been made, whether it be by phone, email, or documentation. Consistency and follow-up are two key benefits, with any action within CRM being part of a custom defined workflow process. Customer service reps now have access to a knowledge base of frequently asked questions and common procedures. The CRM design also supports delayed updates when a business system is not available.
THE BUSINESS DIFFERENCE
As development and piloting completes, Environment Canterbury is set to bring its new central business system online. Martin Foley sees a lot of scope for customer relationship management in the future, seeing the 360 degree view of customers as the key to a consistent customer centric focus across Environment Canterbury. He adds, “We are getting a lot of business value beyond what we asked for. Intergen has built in more than just the standard CRM features.”