CRM and ERP Life Cycle
The Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software in the company that integrates the business technology, strategy, and processes to accomplish the goals for companies that want to operate in a customer-driven environment (Motiwalla, 2012). “Customer relationship management (CRM) systems enable a firm to provide specific services to each individual customer (Lawton, 2000). For example an organization may design a Web page that shows the pricing based on the user’s location and preference. The CRM is design to support the customer’s requirement and meet their business needs to improve customer experience and increase revenue within their organization. The Enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems integrate data across and be comprehensive in supporting all the major functions of the organization (Motiwalla, 2012). The CRM system focuses on the customer relationship within the organization. The ERP system focuses on integrating the organization’s data in real time to all across the organization to the internal and external users.
The customer relationship management system life cycle involves focus on people, procedures, company philosophy, and culture, rather than just information technology (Motiwalla, 2012). The first step in the life cycle is to outline the corporate CRM goals and practical process changes that have to occur before focusing on possible technology solutions (Motiwalla, 2012). Next the key people need to be identified who can explain all of the core processes of the organization. Functional requirements are needed from these key people that documents all of the essential processing and functionalities required of the system. Success or failure of the implementation is directly related to a thorough functional requirements document (Motiwalla, 2012). Next the architecture is determine by the functional