CDP vs CRM

Customer data is a critical asset for any business, regardless of its size or industry. The ability to collect, manage, and use customer data effectively is essential for creating meaningful relationships with customers and delivering personalized experiences.
In this context, it is helpful and beneficial to discuss two of the most well-known systems CDP vs CRM. Both these terms Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Customer Data Platform (CDP) are frequently used interchangeably. While both are designed to help businesses manage customer data, they serve different purposes and work together in unique ways.

In this article, we will explain the differences between CRM and CDP, how they work together, and why it is essential to leverage both CRM and CDP processes and platforms to drive business growth.

UNDERSTANDING CRM | BENEFITS OF CRM | CRM USE CASES | UNDERSTANDING CDP | BENEFITS OF A CDP | CDP USE CASES | DIFFERENCES BETWEEN CDP AND CRM | HOW CRM AND CDP CAN WORK TOGETHER

 

UNDERSTANDING CRM

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is the process of managing interactions with customers and potential customers throughout the customer journey. A CRM system is a technology solution that enables businesses to store customer data, track interactions, and analyze customer behavior to deliver enhanced customer experience and value.

CRM systems typically store information like customer contact details, purchase history, support requests, and other interactions with the brand. This data is used by sales, marketing, and customer service teams to provide better service, personalize communications, increase value-add to customers, and ultimately drive revenue growth.

BENEFITS OF CRM

The Primary Goal of a CRM system is to improve customer relationships, but it also has several other benefits, as given below.

Organizing Customer Data in One Central Location

Organizing customer data in one central location is an important task for businesses of all sizes. Doing so can help improve customer relationships, increase sales, and streamline business operations.
Here are some steps that are typically implemented by businesses to effectively organize customer data in one central location:

Identify the data you need to collect: Determine what information is relevant and necessary to collect for each customer. This may include basic information such as name, email address, and phone number, as well as additional information such as purchase history, preferences, and demographics.

Choose a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool: A CRM tool is designed to help businesses manage customer relationships and store customer data. There are many CRM tools available, so choose one that is user-friendly and can handle the amount of data you need to store.

Develop a Data Entry and Management process: Create a process for entering customer data into the CRM tool and ensure that all employees are trained on how to use it properly. This may include guidelines on how to format data, how often to update it, and how to handle sensitive information.

Integrate data from other sources: If you have customer data stored in other places, such as spreadsheets or email accounts, consider integrating this data into your CRM tool to create a complete customer profile.

Use data to improve customer relationships: Once all customer data is in one central location, use it to personalize communications and marketing efforts, identify customer needs and preferences, and provide better customer service.

By following these steps, businesses are able to effectively organize customer data in one central location and use it to improve customer relationships and business operations.

Automating Repetitive Tasks

Automating repetitive tasks using a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system can be very beneficial for businesses, as it can save time and improve efficiency. Here are some ways that a CRM system can be used to automate repetitive tasks:

Lead Management: A CRM system can be used to automate lead management tasks such as lead capturing, lead scoring, and lead assignment. This can save time and ensure that leads are being properly tracked and followed up on.

Sales Process Automation: A CRM system can be used to automate the sales process by creating automated workflows that move prospects through the sales funnel. This can include tasks such as sending out automated emails, scheduling follow-up calls, and creating automated quotes and proposals.

Customer Service Automation: A CRM system can be used to automate customer service tasks such as ticket management, email communication, and social media monitoring. This can improve response times and ensure that customer inquiries are being properly tracked and addressed.

Marketing Automation: A CRM system can be used to automate marketing tasks such as email campaigns, social media posts, and targeted advertising. This can save time and improve the effectiveness of marketing efforts.

Reporting and Analytics: A CRM system can be used to automate reporting and analytics tasks, such as generating sales reports, tracking customer behavior, and analyzing campaign performance. This can provide valuable insights and help businesses make data-driven decisions.

Automating repetitive tasks using a CRM system can save time, improve efficiency, and allow businesses to focus on more important tasks.

Streamlining Customer Communication

CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems can be used to streamline customer communication in a number of ways. Here are some ways that businesses can use CRM systems to improve customer communication:

Centralized communication: A CRM system can be used to centralize communication with customers across multiple channels, such as email, phone, social media, and chat. This can help ensure that all communication is properly tracked and documented.

Personalization: Businesses can use CRM systems to personalize communication with customers based on their preferences, behavior, and past interactions with the business. This can help improve the customer experience and build stronger relationships.

Automated communication: Automating routine communication tasks, such as sending out welcome emails, appointment reminders, and follow-up emails can be easily implemented using a CRM system. This can save time and ensure that customers receive timely communication.

Multi-channel communication: A CRM system can be used to enable communication with customers across multiple channels, such as email, phone, social media, and chat. This can help businesses reach customers where they are most comfortable and increase response rates.

Collaborative communication: Collaboration between different departments and teams within the business, such as sales, marketing, and customer service can be made more effective and seamless. This can help ensure that all customer communication is consistent and aligned with the business's goals and values.

Streamlining customer communication can help businesses improve the customer experience, increase efficiency, and build stronger relationships with their customers.

Improving Team Collaboration

CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems can be used to improve team collaboration in a number of ways. Here are some ways that businesses can use CRM systems to improve team collaboration:

Shared database: A CRM system can provide a shared database that allows all team members to access and update customer information. This can help ensure that everyone has access to the most up-to-date information and can avoid duplicating efforts.

Task management: Assign tasks to team members and track their progress using CRM tools. This can help ensure that tasks are completed on time and that everyone is working towards the same goals.

Collaboration tools: Many CRM systems offer collaboration tools such as shared calendars, chat functionality, and file sharing. This can help team members communicate and collaborate more effectively, even if they are not in the same location.

Workflow automation: Automate workflows and streamline processes using CRM tools, reducing the risk of errors and improving efficiency. This can help team members focus on more important tasks and avoid getting bogged down by repetitive administrative tasks.

Analytics and Reporting: Comprehensive analytics and reporting tools from CRM systems allow team members to track performance and identify areas for improvement. This can help the team make data-driven decisions and continuously improve their processes and performance.

Effective team collaboration can help businesses improve efficiency, reduce errors, and achieve better results.

Providing Insights Into Customer Behavior

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems can be an effective tool for gaining insights into customer behavior. By using data collected from customer interactions and transactions, a CRM system can provide valuable information and insights about customer preferences, purchasing behavior, and trends.

Here are some ways a CRM system can provide insights into customer behavior:

Customer segmentation: CRM systems can be used to identify different groups of customers based on their behavior patterns. This allows businesses to tailor their marketing and communication efforts to each group's unique needs and preferences.

Purchase history: By tracking customer transactions, a CRM system can provide insights into which products or services are most popular and when customers are most likely to buy. This information can help businesses plan promotions and adjust inventory levels accordingly.

Customer engagement: Businesses can use CRM systems to track customer interactions across multiple channels, including social media, email, and phone. By analyzing this data, businesses can gain insights into which channels are most effective for engaging customers and which types of content resonate with them.

Lead tracking: CRM systems can help businesses track potential customers throughout the sales cycle, from initial contact to final purchase. This allows businesses to identify where potential customers are dropping out of the sales funnel and make adjustments to improve conversion rates.

Predictive analytics: By using machine learning algorithms, CRM systems can analyze customer data to make predictions about future behavior. This can help businesses anticipate customer needs and preferences, identify opportunities for upselling or cross-selling, and minimize the risk of customer churn.

Overall, a CRM system can be a powerful tool for gaining insights into customer behavior. By leveraging the data collected from customer interactions and transactions, businesses can better understand their customers' needs and preferences, and make informed decisions to improve their products, services, and marketing strategies. 

CRM USE CASES

CRM systems are commonly used in industries like retail, financial services, and healthcare, where customer interactions are frequent and often complex.

 

UNDERSTANDING CDP

A Customer Data Platform (CDP) is a technology solution that enables businesses to collect, unify, and activate customer data from multiple sources and channels.

Thus a CDP is all-encompassing and over-arching platform designed to create a unified customer profile that includes both known and anonymous data, providing a holistic view of each customer's behavior, preferences, and engagement across a wide variety of channels such as Social Media, Email, Search Engines, Websites, Marketplaces, CTV, Advertising networks, Media networks.

CDP systems typically collect data from a wide variety of sources, including:

• Website interactions
• Search engine and browser engagement
• Mobile app usage
• Social media activity
• Email communications
• Point-of-sale systems
• Customer service interactions

Once the data is collected, the CDP processes and unifies it into a single customer profile that can be used to deliver personalized experiences across channels. CDPs also enable businesses to activate customer data by sending it to other systems, such as marketing automation platforms, customer service systems, ad networks, and CTV networks.

BENEFITS OF A CDP

The Primary Goal of a CDP is to create a single source of truth for customer data and enable businesses to deliver more personalized experiences.

Like CRM systems, CDP also has the following benefits.

• Organizing Customer Data Into One Central Location
• Providing Insights Into Customer Behavior

In addition, a CDP also has several other key benefits, as given below.

BIRDS EYE BLUE - BIG DATA CDP (CUSTOMER DATA PLATFORM)

Improving Data Accuracy and Completeness

A Customer Data Platform (CDP) is a powerful tool that can help businesses improve the accuracy and completeness of their customer data. Here are some ways a CDP can achieve this:

Data consolidation: A CDP can consolidate customer data from multiple sources, including CRM systems, marketing automation platforms, and social media channels. This ensures that all customer data is stored in one central location, which reduces the risk of data duplication and inconsistencies.

Data cleansing: A CDP can be used to identify and eliminate duplicate or incomplete data, which improves the accuracy and completeness of the customer database. This can be done using automated data cleansing tools that identify inconsistencies, such as incorrect email addresses or missing contact information.

Data enrichment: Customer data can be enriched in a CDP by adding additional information from third-party sources, such as demographic data, psychographic data, firmographics, deterministic and behavioral data. This provides businesses with a more complete picture of their customers and allows for more targeted marketing and personalization.

Real-time data updates: Customer data can be updated in real-time in a CDP, ensuring that businesses have access to the most up-to-date information about their customers. This is particularly useful for businesses that rely on real-time data for marketing campaigns or customer service interactions.

Data governance: Businesses can implement better data governance using a CDP, ensuring that data is stored securely and complies with data privacy regulations. This is especially important for businesses that collect sensitive customer information, such as financial data or healthcare information.

A Customer Data Platform (CDP) can be a valuable tool for improving the accuracy and completeness of customer data. By consolidating, cleansing, enriching, and updating customer data, businesses can gain a more complete understanding of their customers, which can lead to more effective marketing campaigns, improved and enhanced customer experiences, and increased revenue.

Enabling Real-Time Data Processing and Activation

Customer Data Platforms (CDP) can enable real-time data processing and activation, which can be extremely valuable for businesses that rely on timely insights to make informed decisions. Given below are some ways a CDP can achieve these results:

Real-time data ingestion: A CDP can ingest data from various sources in real-time, allowing businesses to quickly process and analyze the data as it comes in. This is particularly useful for businesses that rely on real-time data, such as e-commerce companies that need to process customer transactions in real-time.

Real-time segmentation: A CDP can segment customers in real-time based on their behavior or preferences, allowing businesses to deliver targeted marketing messages or personalized experiences. This can be especially valuable for businesses that want to respond quickly to changing customer behavior or market conditions.

Real-time data activation: A CDP can activate data in real-time, allowing businesses to take immediate action based on customer behavior or preferences. For example, a CDP can trigger personalized email campaigns based on a customer's recent purchase or send a push notification to a customer's mobile device when they are near a physical store location.

Real-time analytics: A CDP can provide real-time analytics that allow businesses to quickly analyze customer behavior and trends. This can be useful for businesses that need to make quick decisions based on changing market conditions or customer needs.

Real-time integrations for customer interactions: A CDP can integrate with other real-time systems, such as customer service platforms or chatbots, allowing businesses to provide real-time support to customers. This can help improve customer satisfaction and loyalty.

As seen above, a CDP can be a valuable tool for enabling real-time data processing and activation. By ingesting, segmenting, activating, analyzing, and integrating data in real-time, businesses can gain a more complete understanding of their existing and potential customers. 

This can lead to more effective customer outreach via a wide range of options including display marketing campaigns, social media advertising, email marketing, search engine advertising, CTV advertising, and more, with significantly better customer engagement, improved and enhanced customer experiences, and increase in business growth and revenues.

Supporting Regulatory Compliance

One important benefit is that a Customer Data Platform (CDP) can support regulatory compliance by ensuring that businesses collect, store, and use customer data in a way that complies with relevant regulations and laws.

Data governance: Businesses can leverage a CDP for better data governance, ensuring that data is stored securely and complies with data privacy regulations. A CDP can implement access controls, data encryption, and audit trails to track data usage and ensure compliance with regulations like GDPR, CCPA, and HIPAA.

Consent management: A CDP can help businesses manage customer consent, ensuring that they have obtained valid consent before collecting, storing, or using customer data. A CDP can also allow customers to withdraw their consent at any time and provide businesses with a way to track and manage consent across multiple channels and systems.

Data deletion: Given the key role of a CDP as a single, unified data platform for customer data, CDPs can also help businesses comply with regulations that require the deletion of customer data after a certain period or when requested by the customer. A CDP can automate the deletion of data based on retention policies and provide businesses with a way to track and manage data deletion requests.

Data accuracy: Businesses can ensure the accuracy of customer data using a CDP, which provides tools for data cleansing, deduplication, and enrichment. This can help businesses comply with regulations that require accurate and up-to-date customer data, such as GDPR's right to rectification.

Reporting: A CDP can provide businesses with reports that document compliance with regulations and laws related to customer data. This can help businesses demonstrate their compliance with regulations and respond to requests for information from regulators or customers.

Overall, a CDP can be a valuable tool for supporting regulatory compliance by providing businesses with better data governance, consent management, data deletion, data accuracy, and reporting capabilities. By complying with relevant regulations and laws, businesses can protect their customers' privacy, maintain their reputation, and avoid costly fines and penalties.

Providing Insights Into Customer Behavior

A CDP can provide valuable insights into customer behavior, which can help businesses make informed decisions and improve customer experiences. Businesses can access various groups of customer data including the following.

Customer profiles: A CDP can create a single, unified view of each customer, combining data from various sources such as transactional data, demographic data, and behavioral data. This can help businesses understand each customer's preferences, behavior, and engagement with their brand.

Customer segmentation: A CDP can segment customers based on various attributes and behaviors, such as purchase history, website visits, and email engagement. This can help businesses create targeted marketing campaigns, personalize customer experiences, and improve customer retention.

Customer journey mapping: A CDP can map the customer journey, identifying key touchpoints and interactions across various channels and devices. This can help businesses understand the customer experience and identify opportunities for improvement.

Predictive analytics: A CDP can use predictive analytics to forecast customer behavior and identify trends or patterns. This can help businesses anticipate customer needs, optimize marketing campaigns, and improve customer satisfaction.

Real-time analytics: A CDP can provide real-time analytics that allow businesses to quickly analyze customer behavior and trends. This can be useful for businesses that need to make quick decisions based on changing market conditions or customer needs.

As given above, a CDP can help businesses make data-driven decisions and improve customer experiences. By creating unified customer profiles, segmenting customers, mapping the customer journey, using predictive analytics, and providing real-time analytics, a CDP can help businesses understand their customers better and deliver more personalized, relevant experiences.

CDP USE CASES

CDPs are commonly used in industries like retail, travel and hospitality, and media and entertainment, where customer interactions are increasingly digital and spread across multiple touchpoints and channels. CDPs can also be deployed in various B2B-centric industries and verticals ranging from broad to highly specific use cases.

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN CDP AND CRM

While both CRM and CDP are designed to help businesses manage customer data, they have several key differences. CDPs and CRMs both aim to improve customer relationships, however they differ in their functionality and approach. CDPs are designed to aggregate and unify customer data from multiple sources, while CRMs are focused on managing customer interactions and data throughout the customer lifecycle.

Data Sources

Data collection from different data sources is one of the most important differences between CRM and CDP systems. CRM systems typically collect data from known customers, while CDP systems collect data from both known customers and unknown, sources of potential and future customers. Besides, CDP systems can collect data from a wide range of data sources and customer interactions and engagement, as well as known and identified interests and behaviors of current and future potential customers. CRM data is often limited to transactional and contact data, while CDP data includes a much broader range of interactions and behaviors.

As also described above, CDP systems collect data from a wide variety of sources and channels to help businesses provide more value to customers, and can include both online customer engagement and transactional data as well all as offline sources such as in-store purchase receipts, customer surveys, and in-store visits. 

Data Processing

CRM systems are designed to store and analyze data, while CDP systems are designed to collect, unify, and activate data. CDP systems perform more complex processing, such as identity resolution, deduplication, and segmentation, all of which facilitates in focused targeting and activations. 

Use Cases and Implementation

CRM systems are primarily used for sales, marketing, and customer service, while CDP systems are used for personalization, customer engagement, and cross-channel orchestration and activation. 

Although CDPs and CRMs have different use cases, they both play an important role in managing customer data and relationships. CDPs focus on creating a comprehensive customer profile and delivering personalized experiences, while CRMs focus on managing the sales process and providing customer service.

Customer View

CDPs create a unified view of each customer by integrating data from various sources, while CRMs provide a view of customer data within the system.

CDP focuses on collecting and unifying customer data from various sources and channels into a centralized location. This data can come from a variety of sources, including website interactions, social media, email marketing campaigns, and offline transactions. The purpose of a CDP is to create a complete, 360-degree view of the customer, which can then be used for reporting and analytics.

CRM, on the other hand, is primarily focused on managing customer interactions and relationships. It typically includes features such as lead management, opportunity tracking, and customer support management. While CRM systems do collect some customer data, their primary purpose is not to create a comprehensive customer profile. Instead, they focus on managing the customer relationship and improving customer satisfaction.

Real-Time Data

CDPs provide real-time data, while CRMs may have a delay in data updates.

Personalization

CDPs enable personalized marketing and targeting based on customer behavior, interests and preferences, while CRMs focus on managing customer interactions and data throughout the customer lifecycle.

Sales Automation

CRMs automate sales tasks, such as lead generation and pipeline management, while CDPs do not typically offer sales automation features.

Customer Service Management

CRMs provide tools for managing customer service interactions, such as case management and support tickets, while CDPs do not typically offer customer service management features.

Reporting and Analytics

CRMs provide reporting and analytics tools for tracking customer interactions and analyzing data. CDPs tend to be more focused on customer behavior and insights. They enable businesses to track customer journeys across multiple touchpoints and gain a deeper understanding of customer preferences and behavior.

While both CDP and CRM systems are important for managing customer data, they have different focuses when it comes to reporting and analytics. CDPs are more focused on customer behavior and insights, while CRM systems are more focused on operational metrics related to customer relationships and interactions.

HOW CRM AND CDP CAN WORK TOGETHER

While CRM and CDP serve different purposes, they are both critical for businesses looking to create personalized experiences for their customers. By integrating CRM and CDP systems, businesses can leverage the strengths of each platform to achieve significantly better results.

Here are some examples at a very high-level of how CRM and CDP systems can work together to create a broader impact on customer management and adding value to customers.

Personalized Marketing Campaigns

By combining CRM data with CDP data, businesses can create more personalized marketing campaigns that take into account a customer's entire journey with the brand. For example, a retailer might use CRM data to identify customers who have purchased a specific product in the past and use CDP data to send them personalized product recommendations based on their browsing history.

Improved Customer Service

By integrating CRM and CDP data, businesses can provide more context to customer service teams when interacting with customers. For example, a customer service representative might be able to see a customer's browsing history and recent purchases, enabling them to provide more tailored support.

Real-time Personalization

By integrating CDP data with CRM systems, businesses can deliver real-time personalization across channels. For example, a travel company might use CDP data to personalize the content on their website, while using CRM data to deliver personalized email offers to customers who have previously booked a trip with them.

Better Segmentation

By combining CDP and CRM data, businesses can create more granular customer segments. For example, a retailer might use CDP data to identify customers who have recently browsed their website, and then use CRM data to segment those customers based on their purchase history and demographics.

Improved Reporting

By integrating CDP and CRM systems, businesses can get a more comprehensive view of their customer data, enabling them to make better-informed decisions. For example, retailers might use CRM data to identify their best customers, and then use CDP data to analyze their behavior, interests and preferences across different channels, thus creating a win-win for both sides, retailers and customers alike.

Overall, the integration of CRM and CDP systems enables businesses to create a more complete picture of their customers, enabling them to deliver more personalized experiences, improve customer engagement, add more value to customers and visitors, and ultimately drive revenue growth.

CDP vs CRM - SUMMARY

In today's digital age, customer data is one of the most valuable assets for businesses. Customer management systems are constantly evolving and one of the more recent frequent topics is CDP vs CRM, what are the differences and specific use cases of both. 

By leveraging both CRM and CDP systems, businesses can collect, manage, and use customer data more effectively, enabling them to deliver more personalized experiences and ultimately drive business growth.

While CRM and CDP systems serve different purposes, they are both critical for businesses looking to create meaningful relationships with their customers. By integrating these platforms, businesses can leverage the strengths of each system, enabling them to create a more comprehensive view of their customers and deliver more personalized experiences across channels.

 

Author:
Reshma Rodricks
Founder and CEO, Birds Eye Blue, Inc.