Although the term CRM has come to stay, in most CRM  projects the term is effectively a misnomer. In a relationship, one would expect both parties to play an active role. In the large number of projects I have been involved in since 1994, companies have wanted to know about  customer related activities of their employees, about opportunities and incidents and turnover, but have not been genuinely interested in a full scale relationship. The acronym CIS (Customer Information System) would describe most applications more accurately.

New technologies, Web 2.0 and Social Networks should cause changes, but this does not seem to be happening,  companies using Twitter, XING, Facebook or LinkedIn are typically only broadcasting their sales pitches. An effective customer portal, integrated with social networking sites could be of considerable benefit – both B2B and B2C customers are surprisingly helpful when it comes to giving feedback, supplying references or suggesting product improvements – if they have open communication channels, bidirectional communication channels!