MARKETING AND BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT
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The client relationship management (CRM) sector has been
undergoing rapid growth and major change recently. Respected
research organization Gartner reports that the sector has been
growing at a rate of over 13 percent, making it one of the fastest
growing types of business soware. This year, the market for CRM is
expected to reach $36 billion.
Since some of the leading law firm CRM systems have been
around for more than 20 years, it might be easy to jump to the
conclusion that the law firm CRM space has not been experiencing
this recent growth and innovation. Nothing could be further from
the truth. Recently, a variety of new CRM systems have entered the
market, and many new features have been developed to enhance
exitsting system value and adoption. In addition, some providers are
finally offering firms new options for hosting their systems and data
in the cloud. With so much change taking place, now is an excellent
time to explore where all this change could be heading.
Challenges of the Past
Many of the recent innovations in CRM technology for law firms
have been developed to help deal with common CRM frustrations.
For almost as long as there have been CRM systems, these systems
have been notorious for their challenges. In fact, Gartner estimated
up to 70 percent of CRM implementations fail to meet expectations.
What they don't mention, however, is that one of the most common
reasons for this is that expectations are frequently wrong. (But that's
an article for another day.)
One of the most common challenges has always been aorney
adoption. In the past, CRM systems had to deal with a "chicken and
by Chris Fritsch of CLIENTSFirst Consulting
Get Smart: The Future of CRM,
and the CRM of the Future
Get Smart: The Future of CRM, and the CRM of the Future
