The Integration of Supply Chain Management and Customer Relationship Management

Abstract

It’s not only the focus on CRM that allows companies to outperform their competition. Companies so far rarely integrate supply chain management and customer relationship management. By integrating these business processes companies are able to break through and achieve a number of improvements in their financial and performance metrics that would have been unachievable using only stand alone CRM and SCM techniques. JDA Chief Technology Officer Scott Hines coined the term ISCRM; Integrated Supply Chain and Customer Relationship Management. Later in this part of this book, a local US case study of JDA and a global study conducted by Deloitte Consulting show how the integration of demand-generating and supply-chain operations through information technologies help companies to create an outstanding value proposition. Superior performance in sales, market share, customer service etc. can be achieved by creating digital loyalty networks. To build this network, companies must develop not only a customer strategy, but also a partner and supply chain strategy to support customer loyalty. There is great potential in the development of ECR via focusing on the consumer to meet his or her needs. There is also significant potential in the integration of the supply and demand sides with the help of respective IT capabilities and well-developed digital platforms.