What is Customer Engagement and Why is it Important?
Customer engagement is a series of connected interactions that, when frequent and positive, can lead to purchases and repeat business. Leading customer-centric organizations know how to begin and maintain conversations, ask questions, listen and respond to comments, and use that data to build better products and services. When done well, it can lead to not only meaningful interactions with customers, but also long-term, loyal relationships.
Your best customers not only buy from you but they also evangelize for you. That is the holy grail of customer engagement and while important in any era, it has even greater value in today’s world of social media where positive and negative news is magnified. Building deep, sustainable customer relationships has never been more important than it is right now. In fact, it has become the top priority for companies who understand that to compete in this multi-channel, digitally connected world it’s no longer just about products and pricing.
How to Connect the Customer Engagement Dots with Dynamics 365
When Microsoft recently launched Dynamics 365, it marked the end of the Dynamics CRM brand. Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement is the new name for the CRM component. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tools are still critically important and a key ingredient for successful customer engagement. However, the goal was to create a new product name for the rapidly expanding cloud business applications platform that now reaches far beyond CRM. Although confusing at times, the good news is that it is a more accurate description since it covers both the CRM and ERP worlds, including both AX and NAV.
AccuWeather: A Microsoft Customer Engagement Leader
Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement has taken Dynamics CRM to a whole new level of flexibility, integration, automation, and insight. Instead of buying static software you have to maintain, you have the freedom to architect an end-to-end solution on a unified cloud platform with the core functionality and intelligent applications you need.
AccuWeather is a great example of a company that is challenged to constantly keep up to date, literally as the weather changes. As the leading global provider of weather information, AccuWeather receives 17 billion requests daily. To stay on top, they have to deliver critical, lifesaving weather information that is both reliable and real-time. AccuWeather migrated its application programming interfaces (APIs) to Microsoft Azure, and Microsoft Dynamics 365 is also an integral part of the company’s technology platform. Moving to the cloud helped the company scale out globally and provided a better foundation for more business opportunities. Besides scaling better, the APIs expanded possibilities by integrating new data sources and functionality, including radar feeds, imagery, and device sensors. For more information, read the full Microsoft AccuWeather case study.
What kind of customer engagement implementation is right for my organization?
Integrating disparate systems to achieve end-to-end customer engagement is not easy but it does offer a big revenue payoff. When done well, it allows you to:
- React to changing marketing conditions
- Fill gaps between the front-end user interface and the back office
- Gain a complete and single source of financial and operational insight
Getting Started
At Western Computer, we help people choose the right tools and implementations to achieve optimal customer engagement. Our offerings include implementations and upgrades, training, custom development and integration, cloud solutions, and on-going support. We understand that customer service, engagement, and experience are today’s strategic advantages.
One of the advantages of using the Microsoft platform is that it can be customized to meet your specific needs and integrated with a large number of business applications. Depending on your resources and goals, we adjust to your company’s unique needs to do as much or as little as needed. With over 160 professionals dedicated to Microsoft Dynamics and 500+ successful implementations under our belt, we have crafted a nimble and flexible methodology for a wide variety of customers. Let Western Computer help you put customers first and deliver a seamless experience—through every single part of their journey with you. Contact us with any questions or to schedule a demo.