Customer Relationship Management

Driving CRM Valuein HealthcareDeploying intuitive CRM options can produce greaterRO! and enhanced patient and caregiver experience.

By Rebecca Wet temann

F or those that know customer relationship manage-ment (CRM]but not necessarily healthcareCRM seems like the perfect solution to many ofthe healthcare industry's key problems. Needto improve efficiency and manage patient records? Trackpatients' progress electronically. Need to improve patientcare? Use metrics and analytics to evaluate those recordsand identify areas for improvement. Need to maximizequality of care while minimizing cost? Adopt CRM to trackand manage patient satisfaction.

Unfortunately, the challenges many other CRM adoptershave struggled with in the past that thwarted success andslowed the delivery of CRM value are arguably even morepresent in healthcare:

User adoption: If you think salespeople are difficult to trainand motivate to use new software, try doctors.

Multiple data sets in multiple systems: Particularly withmerger and acquisition activity in healthcare organiza-tions, and departmentalized data warehousing efforts, fewhealthcare organizations have a single integrated view ofall their data.

Customer data confidentiality concerns: Many other sectorsview this as a customer confidence issue, but in healthcare,customer data security and confidentiality is not only im-portant, it's criticaland regulated.

IT budget challenges: As healthcare organizations havelooked to cut costs and improve efficiencies, investing inbroad IT initiatives has not been a common practice.

Many CRM vendors have targeted healthcare as a keyopportunity area. However, given these challenges, it'snot surprising that most CRM vendors have won morecustomers in pharmaceuticals, health testing, and otherrelated fields than at hospitals and other healthcare fa-cilities. Despite this, healthcare organizations that have

explored investments in improving customer relationshipmanagement have delivered ROI while visibly improvingpatient care, both by learning from others' mistakes in keyCRM success areas and by looking beyond the old-schooldefinition of CRM technology. What follows are a numberof key strategies for success.

Look Beyond the CRM LabelMany CRM vendors provide customized solutions for

the healthcare vertical market ^^^m^^m^^^^^^^mand many implementation part- For more informationners provide vertical-specific on Nucleus Researoh,expertise in making CRM ap- www.rsleads.com/709ht-206plications work in healthcare. Despite this, it's importantto remember that a number of technologies and not justthose with the CRM moniker can deliver value as part ofa broader strategy to support CRM in healthcare. We'veanalyzed a number of cases where content managementfrom various vendors enabled connpanies to improve patientmanagement and patient care by providing better accessto information for both staff and patients.

Another key technology area supporting CRM improve-ments in healthcare is data analysis. Business intelligenceor predictive analytics tools that fall more on data analysisthan "pure" CRM may present better short-term ROI op-portunities than a broad investment in case management.For example, some CRM tools are designed to provideall employees with dashboards and reporting to moni-tor patient care metrics while others provide predictiveanalytics, used to predict outcomes for better proactivemanagement.

Think Before You Move DataNo matter whether it is CRM, content management

or analytics, taking a close look at all three can help youleverage data to improve patient management. But it's alsoa good idea to look before you leap. We've found mosthealthcare organizations have, at best, fragmented data

4 8 September 2007 HEALTH MAMAGEMEIUT TECHNOLOGY www, heo Ith mgTtech. com

Customer Relationship Management

stores, multiple record-keeping systems and inconsistentdata entry processes. Before you start paving over cowpaths, you should take a closer look at what you have.

As an example, a medical testing company that weevaluated recently had deployed a CRM solution. Duringthe deployment, the testing company had imported infor-mation from its legacy billing system directly into the ap-plication. It found that incomplete data and lack ofa clearunderstanding of the data structure required additionalchanges to make the deployment successful.

Don't Ignore On-demand OptionsOn-demand CRM has been a disruptive and positive

force in the market. It is no longer just a strategy for tbemidmarket or departmental CRM need, nor is it out ofthe hands of IT. By building a developer community andan on-demand development language, on-demand can sup-port more complex requirements than it could just monthsago. It can also be an opportunity for internal developers tobuild customized CRM solutions and then outsource theongoing support. Continued innovation and growth of newmarketing, sales and service applications in the on-demandmarketplace will force the on-premise players to continueto innovate as well.

Some have been concerned about security and integrityof data when deploying on-demand CRM for healthcare.However, reviewing the data security measures tbat on-demand vendors employ to ensure tbe security of indi-vidual customers' data may reveal that it's more robustthan your internal measures.We should all be watching tosee if Google's recent acquisition of Postini, a messagingsecurity service, drives its expertise in security and com-pliance even further. Adopting on-demand can also helpyou to accelerate CRM deployment. Ifyou wish, you canthen migrate some applications or user accounts back onpremise to reduce the burden on IT and capital risk whiledelivering significant benefit.

Involve Users From Day OneThe most successful CRM deployments utilize end-user

input in the decision, design, and development process forgreater buy-in and usability. For example, a number of em-ployees of one hospital organization resisted having to findthe information themselves because they were accustomedto requesting information from an internal team. In orderto counter this resistance and maximize adoption, the de-ployment team regularly held focus groups with employeesto belp them understand that tbe deployment would actu-ally enable them to complete tbeir jobs. By sharing theirpreferences and requirements with the deployment teamduring these meetings, users became more invested in theprocess, which reduced their resistance.

Web-sawy end users and greater usability are beginningto replace training as tbe key to CRM adoption. Casual

CRM users in particular will benefit from making CRMintuitive and linking it to the natural users' desktop. Forexample, companies that provide Microsoft Office Out-look desktop integration, can ease adoption and increaseuser productivity. Additionally, more and more vendorswill deliver vertically-customized solutions that alreadyreflect some business processes and best practices. Lookingto these solutions can help reduce deployment time andeliminate the risk of being the first to test usability.

Phase Adoption and TrainingStarting with an initial pilot that allows you to identify

and articulate benefits can help build momentum for yourproject. Additionally, phasing adoption and training canhelp you leverage initial experience to ease adoption witheach new department or area of functionality you add toyour CRM technology strategy.

An example would be a hospital tbat first deployed asystem to manage emergency room records and is nowexpanding the system to support broader patient recordmanagement across the hospital. This has given ER doc-tors tbe advantage of "getting their feet wet" and see thebenefits ofthe system while avoiding the initial capital andpolitical cost of pulling doctors away from patients to putthem tbrough extensive IT training.

ConclusionCRM can deliver ROI to healthcare, and if you're

considering a CRM project today, you can take advantageof the previous experience of both healthcare and non-healthcare organizations to accelerate benefits and reducerisk. Since healthcare is a key target market opportunity formany CRM vendors you can leverage your position to youradvantage. Both your vendor and implementation partnersshould compete to win your business by showing both theirexperience in meeting similar needs and their willingnessto make an investment in ensuring your success.

Finally, to ensure success you'll want to make sure thatyou have a clear business case that is based on solving thekey business problem you plan to solve; the benefits youexpect to achieve, as well as bow and when they will hap-pen; and, milestones for the project to ensure you'll achievetbe projected ROI. This will help you to articulate andvalidate tbe project with management, focus on the greatestareas of benefit when you deploy, and manage any potentialscope-creep with a clear roadmap for CRM success.

Rebecca Wettemann is vice presi-dent of research at Nucleus Research.She can be contacted at rwettemann@nucleusresearch. com.

HMT

5 0 September 2007 HEALTH MANAGEMENT TECHNOLOGY www.healthmgttech.com