ERPs and CRMs were the main focus of our class last week. ERP stands for Enterprise Resource Planning. ERPs are integrated systems that manage business processes. ERPs allow businesses to have one system that stores all of their data instead of multiple systems that store their data separately. It helps to consolidate data and make business processes move with more efficiency.
CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management. CRMs allow businesses to store data about their consumers, making it easier to improve customer relationships. The people who use CRMs are those who work in sales and marketing, HR, accounting, and strategy. The people who need insight on consumers are the people who need CRMs.
Both ERPs and CRMs store data in order to increase profits. In addition to similarities, ERPs and CRMs have some distinct differences. ERPs have an internal focus whereas CRMs have an external focus. ERPs help business processes move faster by having all data in one system. CRMs are used in order to improve external relationships that businesses have with their consumers.
Hi Grace, both ERP software and customer relationship management allow companies to better understand how to improve their business. ERP focuses primarily on internal functions (i.e: supply chain functions, accounting, procurement, etc.), and CRM focuses on the company’s customers.
I agree that ERPs are more internally focused with the company and CRMs are more externally focused with the customers.