CRM in Russia: development History

History of formation of the market

In 1999 in Moscow there took place the forum devoted to CRM within which experts made the forecast that in the next two-three years the Russian market waits for a boom of CRM not only among banking organizations, but also the companies of other industries, including the average size.

However, this forecast did not come true, and from 2000 to 2005 of the Customer Relationship Management System were implemented into the period mainly in the largest companies of customer-oriented spheres, such as banks and telecom where fight for client loyalty not just marketing activity, but severe need of survival in highly competitive market.

In the 2000th years active expansion of the western CRM brands for the Russian market which find a favorable field for activity here begins. Domestic platforms in 2001-2002 only were in a creation stage so foreign vendors got the very first large customers and delicious shares of local "pie". The example is SalesLogix, in the West the player mainly of the sector of medium and small business, in Russia begins to be implemented in the largest companies and becomes de facto the standard in corporate banking.

It is impossible to tell that domestic developments in the field of CRM were not at all. For example, the company "Expert Systems" is engaged in software development for maintaining clients since 1997 (the program Quick Sales and Sales Expert), but at the beginning of the 2000th these programs could not compete with large western CRM platforms on methodology and functionality.

The Sage brand in Russia remained is not known prior to the beginning of the 2000th years though to that to the moment Sage was the largest vendor owning popular accounting solutions (AccPac, Line500) and the solutions CRM-SalesLogix and Sage CRM. SalesLogix appeared before all in our market: the first implementations - 1999, in 2001 appeared the first partners.

It was simpler than Microsoft in respect of popularity of a brand in the market when the corporation seriously undertook the market of business applications, having added to ERP-to the products Axapta and Navision a product with the "original"name Microsoft CRM. The strategy of the company on consolidation of these solutions further under the Dynamics brand, integration of solutions with office products was repaid fully.

After entry into the Russian market of key western CRM of vendors in 2001 begins the pool of their partners - the system integrators specializing in implementations of CRM systems which on this moment are the largest players in the market of control automation of customer relations forms: this year, for example, a game includes Sputnik Labs (now - Technoserv Consulting), AT Consulting (AT Consulting) (AT Consulting), FB Consult.

The first domestic developments of CRM in large quantities began to be implemented in 2002, initially such solutions applied for the market of SMB of the companies. Approximately in the same time domestic vendors of software of accounting and ERP (1C, Galaktika, Parus and others) included CRM modules in the packets.

The first version of the Terrasoft CRM system was developed by Alexander Popov in 2001 — 2002. In 2002 Alexander Popov together with Katerina Kostereva founded Terrasoft company. In addition to development of software products is engaged in IT consulting and implements complex projects on implementation of CRM strategy and automation of the enterprises.

In 2004 Siebel comes to Russia, success of a system was rather prompt that was promoted by successful marketing strategy and careful selection of partners.

In the first half of 2006 of representative office of Oracle and Siebel completely integrated. By this moment it was already announced start of several large-scale projects on the Oracle CRM platform: clients of Oracle on DBMS - and to ERP solutions – grateful base for sale of CRM. Siebel acquisition far advanced Oracle in CRM market. SAP in Russia also initially battled against persistence for the largest players, and succeeded in it, proposing the separate CRM solution.

By data J’son&Partners, in 2005 the Russian market of CRM was still quite fragmentary: 14% belonged to 1C, 11% - SAP CRM, 9% - Oracle/Siebel, 7% - IBM, 6% - SalesLogix, 4% - Microsoft CRM and another 49% were the share of smaller players. However, from the provided data it is visible that in local market the western brands generally continued to hold the leading positions.

2007 — In Baltika brewery the CRM solution based on "the Monolith is started : CRM", become one of the largest in Russia on number of users.

Further in 2005-2010 market development of CRM in Russia went the way deepenings of examination of system integrators and increase in demand for the systems of this class from customers. Domestic platforms strengthened the positions, the field for more serious competition between the western and domestic players, especially in the sector of medium-sized enterprises opened. By the time of crisis of 2008 the Russian market of CRM approached in rather mature type.

The 2010th: whether reached the market of a maturity?

In spite of the fact that the Russian market of CRM systems develops for nearly 15 years, not all industries fully automated customer relations. Most the companies in Russia use functionality of CRM systems only partially for certain business processes. Therefore vendors and system integrators agree in opinion that the market of CRM in Russia did not reach a complete maturity yet, and for work in this area there is still a considerable space.

Alexey Kudinov, the director of CRM solutions of 1C-Rarus company, considers that the Russian market of CRM systems is at a stage of active growth. According to him, penetration of CRM systems in the largest cities can be estimated at 18-20%, and in regions of Russia from 5% to 10%. At the market actively there are about 50 suppliers of CRM systems.

"It should be noted that there is a large number of offers of the systems of the class Contact Management under the guise of CRM systems that often disorients clients. The price offer can differ up to ten times for a workplace", - the expert explained.

As it was already told above, not all industries began to use the CRM system so long ago as the market of automation by customer relations in Russia was created. For example, retail networks began to see and receive return from CRM systems rather recently: with the advent of new means of communications; with increase in opportunities of IT systems for processing of the big arrays of information which are available for retail networks; with growth of the competition for the client and his attention, the CEO of Manzana GroupOleg Palenov notes.

"Manzana Group, generally specializes in CRM systems for retail networks and we clearly trace this trend of application of CRM in retail. If earlier the few heads of retail chain stores thought of increase in efficiency of work with the customer base using the CRM system or did not understand how a system can help, then in recent years the situation changes directly in the eyes", - he told TAdviser.

Olga Rubtsova, the deputy CEO Technoserv Consulting, notes that the subject CRM is "hot" not only in retail, but also and banking sector, and for the last 5-7 years. De facto the lion share of the companies in Russia have no CRM which would allow to service fully clients, she considers.

"For example, in banks the boom of CRM began in the 2000th years for support of work with the corporate block. Up to the end this way of automation was done only by large banks. Then there was stunning growth in retail, and banks gave up efforts into this sphere. But more or less fully in the retail block the most essential is automated – issuance of credits. But it is not a CRM system, but rather credit front", - Olga Rubtsova explains.

"Noise" around CRM does not mean rapid development of these systems in practice. Industry giants have correctly constructed CRM systems – large banks, telecom operators. Other organizations approach implementation of CRM if not for the first time today, then again, Olga Rubtsova added. Also add to Tops Consulting companies that now the increasing interest in CRM solutions is shown by the companies of small and medium business.

Experts of NORBIT note that if to compare the Russian market of CRM systems to the person, then "to us now 25 years. We are idealists, and we have not enough experience, but we are ready to changes". NORBIT considers that the relation of clients to implementation of CRM is transformed: now they approach projects more consciously.

The same trend is noted also in Asoft: "The customer began to understand a class of CRM systems and need of their use during the work with the large volume of information", - the commercial director of the company Alexey Fitiskin said

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At the same time the Russian developments in the field of CRM become more and more competitive in relation to the western products. Especially it concerns industry solutions.

"The set of the products provided on the Russian CRM the market do not concede in quality to foreign players. In this sense we created rather mature market with strong competition. But, certainly, the market still in a stage of active growth, with all problems accompanying this growth", -Igor Sugnach, the CEO of FreshOffice explained.

Alexey Makeev, the partner of AT Consulting company (AT Consulting) (AT Consulting), the director of practice of Siebel CRM, also told TAdviser that in the market there is a large number of successful examples of the implemented CRM solutions, most the companies leaders in the industries already have extensive experience of application of CRM solutions and set an example to the competitors. At the market there is rather large number of solutions as the industrial, suitable for large-scale projects and assuming deep customization for accounting of specifics CRM processes of the company, and basic CRM processes, more local, suitable for automation, and not assuming deep setup.

Thus, deepening of industry expertize, further improvement and development of functionality of domestic solutions, growth of number of implementations in "not the traditional" industries, but medium and small business remains the main vectors of development of the Russian market of CRM for the next years.