{"id":147026,"date":"2021-02-08T07:00:15","date_gmt":"2021-02-08T15:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oroinc.com\/b2b-ecommerce\/blog\/how-crm-systems-improve-listening-to-your-customers\/"},"modified":"2025-10-31T04:57:13","modified_gmt":"2025-10-31T11:57:13","slug":"how-crm-systems-improve-listening-to-your-customers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oroinc.com\/b2b-ecommerce\/blog\/how-crm-systems-improve-listening-to-your-customers\/","title":{"rendered":"How CRM Systems Enhance a Customer Listening Strategy"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the B2B customer journey<\/a><\/u><\/span> is becoming more complicated and prospects and customers are searching for information related to your products and service across numerous channels, mapping your buyer journey, understanding your customer data, and predicting your prospect’s next steps brings a huge challenge to marketing and sales leaders.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s digitally-savvy b2b buyers are using vendors’ websites, internet search, social media, and other channels to research products and services to become more informed than ever. Buyers consume an average of 13 pieces of content that range from videos, blog posts, emails, reviews, and research papers according to FocusVision.<\/a><\/u><\/span><\/p>\n

\"content-sources\"<\/p>\n

And as the B2B buyer journey is becoming more complicated with more information available online and an increasing number of decision-makers, it takes longer to make a purchase decision with a duration of 2-6 weeks.<\/p>\n

Thus, the amount of touchpoints customer makes with your brand is increasing.<\/p>\n

\"content-journey\"<\/p>\n

[Source<\/a><\/u>]<\/p>\n

So, with an increasing amount of free information on the internet, B2B buyers are becoming in charge of the customer experience they receive and expect companies to proactively address their current and future needs.<\/p>\n

And to do that, businesses must reimagine the way how they are doing business and start adopting modern CRM technologies<\/a><\/u><\/span> for a single source of truth for their customers to improve customer listening and make an informed decision.<\/p>\n

So, let\u2019s discover what challenges businesses are facing and how we can use a CRM system to improve our customer data and orchestrating effective <\/span>B2B customer journeys<\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span> by customer listening strategy.<\/span><\/p>\n

What is Customer Listening?<\/h2>\n

Customer listening is actively collecting and analyzing data of your prospects and customers to gain deeper insights about the customer experience to determine current and future needs and to drive personalized business processes and experiences across marketing, sales, and customer service to improve customer experience.<\/span><\/p>\n

Customer listening is intended to collect these data traces that prospects leave scattered across the internet and put them together to get a deep understanding of your b2b buyer journey.<\/span><\/p>\n

And because customers should be at the heart of your business and according to a recent <\/span>SuperOffice study<\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span>, <\/span>customer experience has become a top priority for businesses in 2021.<\/p>\n

As the trend of customer listening is increasing in importance, <\/span>44% of businesses are planning to\u00a0increase IT budgets\u00a0in<\/u><\/span> 2021<\/span><\/u><\/span><\/a> to better manage customer data from multiple channels and to find tools that can help customer information from being siloed within different departments.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"2021<\/p>\n

Businesses Face Complex Marketing & Sales Challenges<\/h2>\n

Businesses face complex marketing and sales challenges\u00a0such as disconnected data, tools, and processes which can cause both teams to poorly manage leads.<\/span><\/p>\n

The way the marketing team generates high-quality leads has fundamentally changed since modern customers are more digitally savvy with free access to almost unlimited information.<\/span><\/p>\n

Businesses that do not innovate and adapt to the needs of their customer will eventually suffer huge losses or die. And we do not need to go far away as there are plenty of examples like <\/span>Dell Hell<\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span> or Blockbusters.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"2018<\/p>\n

[<\/span>Source]<\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span><\/p>\n

Listening to your customers is extremely important as reported by <\/span>Review 42<\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span>, <\/span>every year, US businesses lose\u00a0$1.7 trillion\u00a0because of bad customer service as 461% of consumers have stopped\u00a0doing business with a company after\u00a0a poor experience according to Microsoft<\/a><\/u><\/span>.<\/p>\n

\"2018<\/p>\n

[<\/span>Source]<\/span><\/a><\/u><\/span><\/p>\n

Therefore marketing and sales teams have to reimagine the way how they operate and improve customer experience, poor lead management, sellers ignoring leads generated by marketing<\/a>,<\/u><\/span> and no insights to improve results and\/or inform the customer journey.<\/p>\n

Sales and Marketing Use Different Tools to Track User Interaction<\/h3>\n

One of the biggest challenges companies are facing with marketing and sales teams while trying to improve customer listening is that they sometimes use different tools to track user interaction.<\/p>\n

Prospects are expecting businesses to provide a seamless and consistent customer experience during any touchpoint on any channel.<\/p>\n

\"Customer<\/p>\n

[Source<\/a><\/u><\/span>]<\/p>\n

But because marketing and sales teams are using different tools to track user interaction it brings challenges:<\/p>\n