CRM Notes

Question 1

What is the quality standard

Definition - Quality standards are defined as documents that provide

1. Requirements
2. Specifications
3. Guidelines
4. Characteristics

that can be used consistently to ensure that materials, products, processes, and
services are fit for their purpose.

Every organisations have different parties with different requirements, such as

- Employees: requires safety to work

- Customers: require certain quality and/or quantity by a deadline.
- Regulatory agencies: laws and regulations
- Vendors, shareholders, etc.

(All these parties can also be known as the organisation’s stakeholders)

Standards provide organizations with the shared vision, understanding, procedures, and
vocabulary needed to meet the expectations of their stakeholders.

Because standards present precise descriptions and terminology, they offer an

objective and authoritative basis for organizations and consumers around the world to
communicate and conduct business.

ISO 9001:2015

- Objective: Ensures that what is being offered to customers satisfies their needs
with a set of requirements.

- Have been improving over the years to maintain the high level of structure and
make sure it is in line with the other management systems.

- Allow organisations to continue managing their quality and look for areas that
need to be improved in terms of management system
How it assists organisations to define “quality”

Quality standard is a standardised quality that’s being defined.

It defines what quality should be standardised so that if everyone follows and meets the
requirements, there is a consistent quality. An example is that defective products would
be reduced, the amount of mistakes and errors would also decrease as you know what
you are trying to achieve.

However, it is only the MINIMUM standard and is not necessarily the best quality.

So in conclusion, it helps you define “quality” by telling you what is standardised quality,
what should be consistent quality and what should be the minimum standard. Therefore,
it is not necessarily the best quality.

Standard quality certification ≠ good quality.

An example is Ngee Ann Polytechnic students. The requirement to graduate and to get
a diploma in Ngee Ann Polytechnic is that students have to pass their modules. This
shows that even though they manage to get a certificate for graduating, it does not
always mean that they did a great job in their studies. They may have barely passed the
minimum requirement to get a diploma.

Companies; Once the companies implement and achieve the requirements of ISO
9001, there would be an improvement in efficiency, productivity and customer
satisfaction. The requirements of ISO 9001 are that it needs to demonstrate its ability to
consistently provide products and services that meet customer and applicable statutory
and regulatory requirements and aims to enhance customer satisfaction through the
effective application of the system, including processes for improvement of the system
and the assurance of conformity to customer and applicable statutory and regulatory
requirements.
With the approved quality standards, companies can set clear objectives and
standardise the process. The benefits of being accredited by approved quality standard
is that it is able to

• Identify risks and opportunities

• Prevent problems from reoccurring

• Greater employee morale

• Factual approach to decision making

• Better supplier relationships

• Improved record keeping

• Improved customer satisfaction

• Improve the control over the business process

• Continuous improvement

Most importantly:

• International recognition – recognised in approximately 188 countries, ISO 9001

can help you to access international trade

• Increased revenue – win more contracts and tenders, whilst streamlining your
processes and identifying opportunities for cost savings. Helps to boost
marketing and sales effort.

• Increased efficiency – Implement processes and procedures which are based on

a quality focus
Consumers; Once a company or organisation is accredited by the approved quality
standards, it allows consumers to build trust in them. They are more willing to buy the
products in a company as they believe that their items have quality since they have
been accredited by the approved quality standards. In general, what the consumer
wants is:

• The best goods and service

• For the best values

• Available to most people

With the approved quality standards, consumers are able to use the products with trust
and deeper belief in the quality. It allows consumers to not have any concerns or
worries. With the ISO standards, it provides consumers with:

• Improved quality of service

• Reduced need for returns

• Assurance of service

• Improved experience
The importance for companies to participate in the committees tasked to set
standardized guidelines in the quality standards

Representation

- Strengthen the company and its ability to compete with other competitors

Networking

- Benefits the company in the form of business opportunities, joint ventures, and
development

Ability to Influence the Outcome

- Help to shape the content of new standards that will affect their business, while
they are being prepared

Head Start

- Gain a competitive edge through learning about trends and best practices
How profiling and segmentation help Capitol Land decide whether it would be
worthwhile to sign on the spa as a tenant.

Profiling and market segmentation - Creating the ideal customer

- Profiling is the first step, which is to gather customer profiles based on

information. It is basically a description of your customer

- Segmentation is to categorize your customer profiles into different sub groups.

Each of these groups shares a unique characteristic based on the information
gathered in profiling

Types of profiling & segmentation:

- Demographic
- Psychographic
- Behavioral
- Geographical

Demographic

• Demographics profiling refers to a customer’s characteristics

• Demographic groups customers based on their: age, marital status, gender,

ethnicity, income, education level and employment status

• Customers who live around the local area usually have similar demographics

Psychographic

• Psychographic profiling refers to a customer’s traits such as personality and

lifestyle. It deals with the interests & opinions of customers

• Psychographic segmentation groups customers according to their lifestyle and

interests
Behavioural

• Behavioural profiling refers to a customer’s buying patterns. It analyzes the traits

that affect a customer’s decision to buy something, like their needs, sensitivity to
prices, brand loyalty and expectations

• Behavioural segmentation is to group customers according to these traits

Geographical

• Geographical profiling is to gather information on where customers live. It is

based on their geographical location. Companies can use this profiling to target
customers who live within a certain distance from them.

• For example, a small, local cafe may only want to target people from the
neighbourhood who live within a 7m radius.

• Geographical segmentation will group customers according to where they live

and come from

Benefits of Customer Profiling & Segmentation

When a business profiles and segments their customer base, they are learning more
about their customers & dividing them into segments for target/niche marketing.

They can use the customer profile & segmentation to answer important questions such
as ‘Are they interested in buying my products? Who am I targeting?’ By answering
these questions, a company can:

- Save costs on marketing

- Employ effective marketing strategies which have the potential to generate the
most profit by targeting the group of customers which are most likely to purchase
the product.
- Predict the profitability of new startups/outlets
The differences between target (niche marketing) vs mass marketing

Target Niche Market

- Targeted or niche marketing represents a segment of the main market that is

consolidated by a common interest or demographic

Pros:

1. Understand the needs and demands of the subgroups better.

2. Ability to position business as go-to for specific niche market

3. Ease of capturing attention of subgroups

Cons:

1. Can be invaded by larger companies

2. Small scale limits chances of high profits

3. Can be vulnerable to changes in demand

Mediums of Niche Marketing

• Partnerships with other small niche business

• Pamphlets

• Coupons

• Word of mouth

• Targeted events

• User generated content

Mass Marketing

- An undifferentiated marketing strategy that is directed to attract a large portion of

consumers that can be of potential interest to products and services offered as
high as possible. Basically, it is producing one for all products.

Pros:

1. More potential customers to reach out to as it ignore different market

segmentations

2. Save marketing costs by using the one size fits all approach.

3. Can put up a strong brand image.

Cons:

1. Result in loss of revenue of marketing plans are not in place

2. May be successful in certain areas.

3. Expensive capital to start up with.

Mediums of Mass Marketing

• Social media

• television/ radio

• Newspapers

• Magazines

• Email
Which is more effective

- Effectiveness varies based on the products and services that are offered by the
sellers.

Apart from targeting specific subgroups, niche marketing is effective when you are just
at the first stage of the product life cycle, the introduction, where sellers would want to
grow their products or services to build trust, forge relations as well as to get their brand
known in the market. This will give sellers time to develop trust properly and fully, also
to obtain a greater ability to tempt their potential buyers to take risk especially for
smaller businesses and those who are new to the market.

As for mass marketing, it may be effective when targeting large potential buyers
needing common needs of your products or services but it's more effective when
business owners have established the maturity stage of the product life cycle such that
it allows businesses to be flexible such as able to reduce price while maintaining profits
which is known to be a motivating factor.

Migration from Mass Marketing to Targeted Marketing

Consumers are unique and have their own needs and desires which allows the
business owners to have access to vast amounts of data as compared to the past. Data
obtained could be directly from consumers or hinted by their behaviours from previous
buying’s.

With this businesses can alter their products or services and personalise it for their
potential and present customers and perhaps attain more loyal customers. Hence, why
niche marketing is on the trend.