What is SCM and CRM? Briefly Explain them

SCM :

              Supply Chain Management (SCM) is the management of the flow of goods and services. It includes the movement and storage of raw materials, work-in-process inventory and finished goods from point of consumption.

A supply chain, as opposed to supply chain management, is a set of organizations directly linked by one or more upstream and downstream flows of products, services, finances or information from a source to a customer.

Supply chain management flows can be divided in three main flows.

(1) The Product Flow

(2) The Information Flow

(3) The Finances Flow

                                               The product flow includes the movement of goods from a supplier to a customer as well as any customer returns or service needs.The information flow involves transmitting orders and  updating the status of delivery.The financial flow consists of credit terms, payment schedules and consignment and title ownership arrangements.

There are two main types of SCM software : 

Planning applications and execution applications.Some SCM applications are based on open data models.

CRM : 

              Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is an approach to managing a company's interaction with current and future customers.CRM is a term that refers to practices, strategies and technologies that companies use to manage and analyze customer interactions and data throughout

 the customer lifecycle, with the goal of improving business relationships with customers, assisting customer retention and driving sales growth

Common feature of CRM software includes :

 

(1) Marketing Automation : 

                                              CRM tools with marketing automation capabilities can automate repetitive tasks to enhance marketing efforts to customers at different points in the lifecycle.

(2) Sales force automation :

                                                 Also known as sales force management, sales force automation means to prevent duplicate efforts between a salesperson and a customer.

(3) Contact center automation :

                                                    Designed to reduce tedius aspects of a contact centre agents job contact center automation might include pre-recorded audio that assists in customer problem solving.

(4) Geolocation Technology or Location Based Services :

                                                                                                 Some CRM systems include technology that can create geographic marketing campaigns based on customer physical locations, sometime integrating with GPS apps.