1. Explain the three step process of customer care with any corporate example.

Ans- The three step process of customer care are as follows: y y y Listening Responding Improving LISTENING Organizations should have sufficiently equipped channels of communication to listen to the customers. Complaint Handling Mechanism is a passive and reactive approach. This should be converted into a pro-active system, where organizations can find out innovative ways to get feedback from the customers and respond on its own. The method and procedures of listening to the customer should be accessible, easy, simple and widely communicated to the customers. RESPONDING First of all any call from the customer must be acknowledged. Customer expects a quick and appropriate response to his call. The complaint or service request should be handled appropriately. IMPROVING Organizations need to learn from previous experiences of complaints and grievances, so that recurrences of problems to the customers are minimal. The customer care mechanism should provide inputs to product improvement, new product development, improvement in service delivery system, training of manpower, campaign planning, brand building exercises etc. EXAMPLES are as follows:

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1. Trader Joe's Braves a Winter Storm for an Elderly Customer An 89-year old Pennsylvanian was snowed in around the holidays, and his daughter was concerned he wasn't going to have enough food to last the inclement weather. The daughter called multiple stores trying to find someone who would deliver, and finally learned that Trader Joe's doesn't normally deliver, but it would in this special instance. It took the order, and also suggested other items that might fit the elderly man's special low-sodium diet. After the daughter ordered around $50 worth of food to be delivered, the Trader Joe's employee told her that she didn't need to pay for it, and to have a Merry Christmas. The food was delivered within 30 minutes of the phone call, and the holidays were saved for one elderly man and his family.

2. Free Tickets From the Jet Blue People Officer If you fly Jet Blue, you might just run into the mystical People Officer. One such passenger reports of the People Officer standing up mid-flight and announced that he had free tickets to give away to anywhere that the airline company flew. The man played trivia games, and handed out tickets to anyone who knew the answers. In all, around a dozen free tickets were handed out during the mid-flight games. The Jet Blue employee then went on to ask if anyone had any suggestions or concerns with Jet Blue, and answered questions about upcoming possible promotions. Think he made any life-long Jet Blue customers from that one plane ride? 3. United Airlines Saves Your Seat, Books a Flight New York Times best-selling author Steven Levitt wrote an article about how United Airlines turned him into a customer for life in a couple ways. Steven was running late, and unlike other airlines, they actually saved his seat until the last second. On another occasion, United Airlines called him and informed him that his flight was delayed by a few hours, and they saw that he was in the airport. The call went like this: I see that youre at the airport and your flight is delayed a few hours. A seat opened up on an earlier flight, so I grabbed it for you in case you wanted it. It leaves in 40 minutes, so youll have to hurry. These two events, Levitt explains, turned him into a life-long customer of United Airlines. 4. Starbucks Wants You to Have an Experience "Nothing Short of Fantastic" Disgruntled Starbucks customer Jason called in to the company's corporate offices after a mixup with a New Jersey branch's barista. Instead of simply giving him a refund, the customer service representative told Jason that they needed to "make him whole, and give him an experience nothing short of fantastic." They promptly filled his rewards card with $50 of store credit.

Q2 Explain the different phases of the customer life cycle and discuss various marketing initiatives needed at each phase. Ans The different phases of customer life cycle :

Q3.Do you agree that retention of customers in the current competitive scenario is a challenge for the organization?

Ans- Customer Retention is the activity that a selling organization undertakes in order to reduce customer defections. Successful customer retention starts with the first contact an organisation has with a customer and continues throughout the entire lifetime of a relationship. A companys ability to attract and retain new customers, is not only related to its product or services, but strongly related to the way it services its existing customers and the reputation it creates within and across the marketplace.Customer retention is more than giving the customer what they expect, its about exceeding their expectations so that they become loyal advocates for your brand. Creating customer loyalty puts customer value rather than maximizing profits and shareholder value at the center of business strategy. The key differentiator in a competitive environment is more often than not the delivery of a consistently high standard of customer service.
Good customer retention is vital to any organization because a slight reduction (5%) in the customer defection rate has a disproportionately positive effect on profitability (depending on the cost of acquisition, ranging between 25 and 80%!). Companies with high retention also grow faster. However, customers can only be retained if they are loyal and motivated to resist competition. When customers are merely satisfied with the service they receive they may still "walk". Your customer retention management relies on the combination of the following:

y y y

High satisfaction with product performance and customer service. High intention to continue to do business with you. High willingness to recommend you to others.

(High means the top-box score [typically of a five-point scale] in quantitative measurements) There are two components of customer retention. Both need to be pursued.

y y

Customer satisfaction. Systematic and proactive customer relationship management.

In the current scenario, a major challenge for an organization is to retain its valuable and talented employees. The management can control the problem of employees quitting the organization within no time to a great extent but cant put a complete full stop to it. There are several challenges to it. Let us understand the challenges to employee retention:


Monetary dissatisfaction is one of the major reasons for an employee to look for a change. Every organization has a salary budget for every employee which can be raised to some extent but not beyond a certain limit. Retention becomes a problem when an employee quotes an exceptionally high figure beyond the budget of the organization and is just not willing to compromise. The organization needs to take care of the interests of the other employees as well and cant afford to make them angry. The salaries of the individuals working at the same level should be more or less similar to avoid major disputes amongst employees. A high potential employee is always the center of attention at every workplace but one should not take any undue advantage. One should understand the limitation of the management and quote something which matches the budget of the

organization. An individual should not be adamant on a particular figure, otherwise it becomes difficult for the organization to retain him. Remember there is a room for negotiation everywhere. In the current scenario, where there is no dearth of opportunities, stopping people to look for a change is a big challenge. Every organization tries its level best to hire employees from the competitors and thus provide lucrative opportunities to attract them. Employees become greedy for money and position and thus look forward to changing the present job and join the competitors. No amount of counseling helps in such cases and retaining employees becomes a nightmare. Individuals speak all kind of lies during interviews to get a job. They might not be proficient in branding but would simply say a yes to impress the recruiter and grab the job. It is only later do people realize that there has been a mismatch and thus look for a change. Problems arise whenever a right person is into a wrong profile. An individual loses interest in work whenever he does something out of compulsion. The human resource department should be very careful while recruiting new employees. It is really important to get the reference check done for better reliability and avoid confusions later. Some individuals have a tendency to get bored in a short span of time. They might find a job really interesting in the beginning but soon find it monotonous and look for a change. The management finds it difficult to convince the employees in such cases. Individuals must also understand that every organization has some or the other problem and adjustment is required everywhere, so why not in the present organization? It becomes really difficult for the HR Department to find out what exactly is going on in the minds of the individual. An individual should voice his opinions clearly to make things easier for the management. Unrealistic expectations from the job also lead to employees looking for a change. There is actually no solution to unrealistic expectations. An individual must be mature enough to understand that one cant get all the comforts at the workplace just like his home. Individuals from different backgrounds come together in an organization and minor misunderstandings might arise but one should not make an issue out of it. An individual must not look for a change due to small issues. One needs time to make his presence feel at the organization and must try his level best to stick to it for a good amount of time and ignore petty issues.
Q4. Consider that you are the project in charge for CRM implementation in a large organization with a countrywide presence. Workout the plan for creating awareness about the project. Ans-

Q5.What is sales force automation? Briefly discuss any five facilities provided by sales force automation in managing customer relationship. Ans-