Factors influencing the adoption and implementation of customer relationship management strategies by small and medium enterprises in KwaZulu Natal

Abstract

Small to medium enterprises (SMEs) play an important role in the development of economiesboth in the developed and developing countries. SMEs face many obstacles in their path to survival and much has been discussed in terms of helping the small enterprises to survive and grow to fulfill their economic potential and derive the benefits that come with it. As such, many solutions have been proffered to ameliorate the demise of SMEs in their early stages of establishment. This paper wishes to harness customer relationship management (CRM) to help SMEs to survive and thrive in the harsh economic environment. CRM creates a competitive advantage that can be viewed as a panacea to SME failure. It is therefore the aim of this study examined the factors that influence the adoption of CRM by SMEs in Kwa-Zulu Natal (KZN).The goal is to move away from the misconception that CRM is a technology but gravitate towards treating CRM as a holistic strategy that should diffuse within the whole organisation. Organisational, environmental, technological and information culture factors should all be integrated and help the firm to make a well-informed decision when it comes to adopting CRM strategies. The scope of this paper is further motivated by the fact that there is a paucity of studies that investigate the adoption of CRM by SMEs in KZN CRM adoption and implementation are not without their problems, but the promises are too good to ignore; and, indeed, the future prosperity of SMEs may lie in CRM adoption and implementation.