Customer Relationship Management in Splash and Shukran Card

This report discusses the implementation of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) in Splash and Shukran Card. It highlights the key issues of CRM and its relevance in the fashion retail industry. The report also includes a literature review on CRM and its impact on businesses. The subject is not mentioned, and there is no course code or college/university mentioned.

Running Head: CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
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GOOGLE
Customer relationship management

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Contents
Introduction...........................................................................................................................................2
Rationale for the topic...........................................................................................................................2
CRM (Customer Relationship Management) in Splash and SHUKRAN CARD...................................2
Key Issues of CRM (customer relationship management).....................................................................4
LITERATURE
REVIEW………………………………………………………………………………………………4
Research Methodology..........................................................................................................................5
Framework to collect Quantitative data.................................................................................................6
Source of Secondary data......................................................................................................................6
Use of the Secondary data.................................................................................................................6
SWOT analysis of Splash......................................................................................................................7
Research areas related to CRM..............................................................................................................8
Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................8
References.............................................................................................................................................9

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Introduction
The report brings about the discussion on the topic “Customer relationship management’ in
context to the company Splash and the reward point as “ShukranCard”. Customer
relationship management (CRM) refers to an approach to manage the interaction with the
current and other potential customers. The report will discuss about the CRM approach in the
organisation “Splash” headquartered in United Arab Emirates (U.A.E). The company is a part
of the landmark group, founded in the year 1993 deals in clothing, i.e. fashion apparels for
both men and women (McCormick et al., 2014). The company has been dealing successfully
in the retail fashion business and able to attract large number of customers around the world.
Thus, report in the later part will list the key issues in the topic, CRM and describe the use of
research methodology especially agile and waterfall.
Rationale for the topic
Customer Relationship management (CRM) is an integrated approach that manages the
interaction and relationship of an organisation with the customers for their successful growth
in the long-run. It is beneficial to both the customers and the company, and this is the reason
or rational behind choosing CRM as the topic for conducting research. It helps customers to
know the real growth and success of the business and their effectiveness in managing their
relations with their customers (Jacobs, Chase and Lummus, 2014). Thus, conducting research
in context to CRM is effective to acquire knowledge about the relevance and importance of
the topic. CRM is beneficial for research rather SCM, as studying or carrying out research in
SCM (supply chain management) will describe about the company’s relations with the
vendors, whereas CRM focuses on the customers. The customer relationship management
personnel’s in the companies are responsible to respond and resolve to their customer’s
queries quickly. Thus, these are some of the listed reasons due to which CRM was selected as
the topic, rather than SCM for research in this report.
CRM (Customer Relationship Management) in Splash and SHUKRAN CARD
Splash is a part of the Landmark group UAE operates as one of the biggest retail
conglomerates based in Dubai, UAE. The company has been emerged and grown to over 150
stores and 50 brand stores across 14 different countries. The company has been recognised as
the trend setter in the region, and offers an extensive prime collection of clothing for men,

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women, and the teens. In addition, the company has been identified as one of the best place to
work for in the UAE.
CRM in splash has been well operated, and monitored as the retail business has been
effective in storing customer and prospect data, and tracks customer interactions effectively.
As discussing about the approach of CRM, it is referred to a CRM tool, which helped Splash
in managing contact, sales management activities, workflow processes, productivity, and
other such processes. Thus, CRM software or the tool helps the fashion retail business to
manage and improve their interactions with their customers, and access to the customer data
and business information (Castaldo and Grosso, 2016).
The companies like Splash as one of the biggest apparel retailers are involved in extensive
advertising of their products to enhance the interest and interaction with their customers.
Advertisements helps the company to increase customer loyalty towards their products and
other offerings, as the clothing retailers always aim at retaining their current as well as future
customers in the long-term. The aspects of customer orientation, relationship marketing, and
database marketing form the crux of the CRM in Splash (Kaul, 2017).
SHUKRAN CARD is used as one of the CRM tool in the fashion retail, Splash as a reward
point in their organisation. It is an exciting reward programme used by the fashion retail,
Splash as a way to thank their customers and it can be used at any outlet to earn or redeem
any reward points against the expenditure. Shukran is the landmark group’s award-winning
loyalty programme, especially found in the Middle East, which has been designed to offer
better rewarding shopping experience at Splash (Costa et al., 2017).
Members or customers earn valuable Shukrans on the purchase made by them and they utilize
the card on the instant savings on every product offered by the company, such as accessories,
footwear, clothing, furnishings, electronics, restaurants, and others. Thus, analysing the tool
of CRM established in the fashion retail it has been observed that customer’s provided
positive response or feedback and stated that Shukran provides real rewards for the money
invested in the products (Kerbache, Amann and Burquel, 2017)
Thus, the above description has stated that the company is able to establish and nurture sound
relationships with their customers in the market, which indicated about effective Customer
relationship management practices in the company leading to higher success.

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Key Issues of CRM (customer relationship management)
The approach of CRM has been widely applied in the businesses to increase customer
loyalty, and enhance their relationship with the various customers. However, recent
researches have revealed some of the aspects or the issues in the implementation of CRM
tools or software by the business organisations. These are four major issues such as
neglecting attitude of employees in using CRM methods or tools. Most of the employees
recognise updating of the system, as a waste of their time. Thus, it is the responsibility of the
businesses to recognise the problem and identify the reasons of the negative response towards
using the system.
Lack of integration capabilities: This has been one of the major issues, as the benefits of
CRM or the tools will only be received when it has been integrated with the existing IT
system like ecommerce, marketing automation, ERP and several others. The lack of support
from the staff of vendors of the existing system which needs to be integrated into the system,
will lead to the burden and wastage of time of the staff in the organisation. In context to the
fashion retailer Splash, there are number of challenges that the company face in terms of
implementing CRM, such as growing consumerism, creating a unique experience for the
consumers and the process of inventory management.
Splash being one of the biggest fashion retailer in the middle east it has been found that due
to the indecisive nature of the industry’s business it faces issues in better implementation of
CRM. Growing consumerism as the consumers have variety of options to fulfil their
demands, as they have access to many channels apart from the retail stores like e-commerce
platform and mobile commerce. The issue of demand variety for the products which attracted
by the social media is another problem for the brand owners of Splash to offer new
collections in the short period (Costa et al., 2017).
Players or brand owners inn Splash faces problems in the aim to create unique experience for
their customers and gain customer’s attention. Brands obtain higher brand loyalty from their
customers as they engage in creating positive feedback from the customers.
Managing inventory is another CRM challenge for the company, as it has been known that
fashion retailers roll out their new collections on the basis of seasons. For an example, if the
summer’s is not that hot, then the apparels brands will reduce their prices to dispose unsold
stock in the market. Thus, excellence in the stock visibility, operations planning, and the

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inventory intelligence is the primary challenge faced by Splash within the region. Thus,
above mentioned are the issues faced in the company in context to CRM, affecting their
relationship with the customers within region (Tuite, 2018).
LITERATURE REVIEW
Customer Relationship Management (CRM), as defined by Linoff and Berry (2011),
is the approach that refers to the practices, principles and technologies that a business
organization follows at the time of interacting with the clients to manage and analyze their
wants and needs. In other words, CRM is adopted in various companies to enhance the
overall experience of the customers. More particularly, with the increased rate of growth of
technologies, customers feel more concerned about privacy and safety of their information.
Hence, Khodakarami and Chan (2014) mentioned that to ensure proper storage of their data
and provide protection against identity theft, the companies use this tool in a huge array of
procedures in different fields. Continuing in the same vein, Wang and Feng (2012) asserted
that it is significant for any organization to reduce forecast customer needs in an effective
way. Since CRM contains every bit details of customers, it becomes very easy to track their
performance and determine whether they are profitable for the business or not. The CRM
system is implemented through segmenting and storing the collected data, which assists in
analyzing customer behavior (Ernst et al., 2011). Then the system provides solutions as per
the trends understood from the analysis done to offer positive experience to the customers.
Additionally, CRM systems also improve coordination and collaboration among employees.
In fact, as argued by Sultan (2010), most of these systems are cloud-based; the
performance of the employees can be accessed easily and almost from all location. Also, a
CRM platform assist in providing quality customer service by making the organized data
visible, resulting in better development of the understanding of customers. Nevertheless, the
CRM systems can also be applied to businesses by integrating with e-commerce platform too

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and have greater visibility regarding the delivery of products (Kumar and Reinartz, 2018).
This business-facing tool, if utilized properly, can make an expansion in the business by
generating more leads on the basis of database. The leads can then be assigned and converted
into sales by providing high quality service to the customers. As a result of higher sales
conversion rates, CRM also boosts revenue. In other words, with greater accessibility to
details, the sales employees have better ability by allowing in managing customer profiles
and keeping detailed notes on meetings (Baird and Parasnis, 2011). Moreover, intricating
data using CRM platforms also assists in turning customers to long-term patrons. This is
because the CRM software allow to have good records of meetings with the customers,
thereby maintaining strong personal rapport with each of them. CRM also increase revenue
by expanding customer base. For instance, many companies set up automated emails to
obtain information regarding referrals from the existing customers. Tracking the prospects of
the company also help in recognizing the pattern of sources and make better use in future
marketing.
Customer Relationship Management in Splash
To understand more about the customer relationship management, Splash, the largest
retail clothing store in the Middle East can be considered. Being established in 1993, this
store has grown to almost more than 200 stores across 14 nations around the world (Splash,
2016). This business offers latest styles for people including men, women and teens and for
different age groups. Along with more than 4000 employees, the company passionately helps
customers to set trends. Though usually, clothing retailers struggle to attract new potential
customers, yet with the help CRM software Splash has managed to increase foot falls and
achieved higher sales. Along with better customer analysis, this software has helped to
enhance customer satisfaction and improve revenues (Splash, 2016). Kim and Ko (2010)
further argued that to bear this competitive world, the higher authorities of this retail clothing

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store decided to implement this tool to integrate inventory management, sales, customer
communication and other marketing units. This tool helps in acquiring, evaluating and
differentiating customer data, in turn, helping retailers to generate customer centric insights,
and hence optimize productivity. Nevertheless, as Wang, Cavusoglu and Deng (2016)
proposed to apprehend the implementation and working of CRM software, it becomes
important to understand the touch points between retailers and customers of any company. In
case of Splash, the interactive channel acts like a touch point while providing positive
experience to any customer.
On the other side, Muther (2012) argued that besides conventional channels such as
print advertisements, television, direct mails, product can also be considered as the most
significant touch point. These touch points influence, attract and impact on customer’s
purchase decision. It has also been observed by Levy, Weitz and Grewal (2012) that CRM
software in this retail clothing store has integrated with other marketing tools and assisted in
managing the customer touch points so as to make effective use of mediums of
communication in the form of internet, e-marketing and social networking. Over time this has
again helped in grabbing attention of more and more number of customers. Also, the CRM
systems have provided a multi-channel approach considering the increasing influence of
changing demands of customers and fashion trends. Most importantly, CRM include various
details of customers and store it to obtain information regarding their behavior, buying
influences, backgrounds and feedbacks as well (Moore, Doherty and Doyle, 2010). After
assembling the data, this tool then helps to analyze and interpret the findings from which it
becomes easy to find out the interested customers and the amount they are willing to pay.
Moreover, Keller (2010) further stated that the factors impacting the decision making process
of the customers can also be identified from the interpretation. The collected customer
feedbacks not only motivate to focus on the drawbacks of any product but also indicate

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specific information regarding the loyal customer groups (Johnston and Johnston, 2012).
Thus, interpreting data with the help of CRM software in Splash has helped the apparel
retailers to improve existing knowledge of customer base. Accordingly, a better plan can be
devised to increase the sales of the products of this business, thereby increasing revenue
sources.
Usage of Shukran Card
To reach out more number of customers, Splash also use Shukran Card, which is an
exciting award-winning program designed to offer rewards and extensive collection of
popular clothing for different age groups. Shukrans basically make up a virtual currency that
people can earn and spend while shopping at either any Landmark Group brand or other
partner brands, be it online or in-store (Shukran, 2010). The cardholders get to know about
the special events, offers and updates first as compared to other customers. Moreover, they
also get special and personalized deals from this company. Furthermore, these members get
early access to new launches, in-store events and sale previews, in turn, gaining more
benefits. Splash offers membership to only those members who spend at least AED 1500 on
purchasing within one year period (Shukran, 2018).
As a cardholder, the customer can enjoy exclusive benefits as discussed above and
can even earn 10 percent cash back too. In fact, the cardholders can also become the shopper
of the month by purchasing more and more products. As a Shukran member, not only people
can earn points during promotions and sales but also learn about exclusive offers. More so,
they also receive invites to events at participating outlets, and through managing the points
balance, the members can update their preferences through online account. Nevertheless, as
identified by Montjoye, Radaelli and Singh (2015), this card has certain limitations too. For
instance, customers often have to give out personal information, resulting in privacy concerns

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regarding security of customer data. At the same time, people also receive numerous contacts
depending on policies and practices of Splash. As a result, to mitigate these risk issues, the
company needs to develop payment security strategy, such as in the form microchip
technology and enhance data security standard.
Research Methodology
Research methodology refers to the method which has been used to conduct research in a
specific area or subject. It is considered as the systematic and logical way to solve any
problem, and consists of the theoretical analysis of the body of methods and principles in
relation to the branch of knowledge. Research methodology serves the purpose of collecting
information and data which has to be used to strategize business decisions. Researchers in
their study use methods qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods, with some more
specific methods such as surveys, interviews, case-studies, and self-reporting (Taylor,
Bogdan, and DeVault, 2015).
In context to the company in the report, Splash there are two basic and most popular research
methodologies which are used in conducting the research in a particular field. With the
fashion retail business, these two methodologies are found to be used to provide
information. ;thesemethods are called as Agile and Waterfall. Waterfall methods is called as
more traditional approach, and agile is the specific type of rapid application development,
and newer than waterfall. It is a linear approach towards software development (Naidu and
Babu, 2016).
Waterfall method of research in Splash it has been found, that developers and customers in
the company agrees on what will be delivered in the development lifecycle. It leads to
effective planning and designing which is easy to understand for both the users and the
customers. Waterfall approach of research allows easy measurability of the data or
information gathered from different sources.
Agile research methodology is an iterative and the approach which is based on the team to
development (Serrador and Pinto, 2015). The main advantages of using agile methodology
are that the customer has frequent opportunity to review the work and recommend any
changes if required. The development in the agile approach tends to more user-focused and

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they gain sense of ownership by working with the team directly (Mahadevan, Kettinger and
Meservy, 2015).
Framework to collect Quantitative data
The framework which has been in this report to collect information about the company
Splash and the aspect of CRM (customer Relationship management) has been studied or
collected through experiments, surveys and the other such methods. The company has been
earning huge profits also due to the reason that it runs or operates in multiple countries,
which defines about the large number of brands. Thus, several surveys have been conducted
in the fashion retail Splash who aims to fulfil the desires and expectations of the men,
women, and teens in the fashion industry. Being a part of the landmark group, the data has
been collected in an optimum manner, as they focus on a number of values such as listen,
empower, adapting and delivering best and valuable products or services to the customers
(Khodakarami and Chan, 2014).
Source of Secondary data
Secondary data refers to the information or the data which has been collected by someone
who is other than the user. Thus, it is the market research which has been already conducted
by someone else. Market research is a term which is used to describe to the process of
gathering or collecting information about any topic or company (Burns, Bush and Sinha,
2014).
The data has been obtained in this report including the sources such as the annual reports,
trade associations, universities, and others. In addition to these, the secondary data in this
research is to be collected using the internal sources, which has been already collected by the
company and states about further use in the future projects or business activities. These
included balance sheets, statement of profit and loss, inventory records, and sales figures
(Johnston, 2017).
Use of the Secondary data
Secondary data which has been collected using quantitative methods is beneficial as it
provides data in an effective manner and helps in recognising the future growth and scope of
the fashion retail. The fashion sector or industry in the UAE has already expanded in around
9 countries, with the members in millions. Thus, the secondary data which has been collected

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acts as the baseline for the primary research to collect the data which will be useful in further
analysis and reaching to conclusions about the company.
SWOT analysis of Splash
Strengths Weakness
 One of the strength in the fashion
industry is the growing income levels of
the people working in the firm. The
growth in the level of income of the
people leads to an increase in the
disposable income.
 Splash has been working great and has
been considered Middle East’s largest
fashion retailer since a long time.
 The company has award-winning
collection within the region, and caters to
the demands of different age-groups
including men, women and teens (Wu
and Tso, 2018).
 One of the weakness found in the fashion
retail businesses‘Splash’ is the
development or production of a kind of
product which does not appeal to the
population of the community, leading to
stagnation of capital.
 In splash, there are huge losses when
there is a decreased demand for the
apparels in any season, as it creates a
burden on the producers to dispose the
unsold production.
Opportunities Threats
 Number of stakeholders in the fashion
retail is increasing who are willing to
make investments in the businesses like
Splash. Thus, it can be an opportunity for
the company to increase their profits in
the future.
 Splash can work more upon involving the
use of advanced technology and
investment in information technology
will be beneficial to increase sales, and
leading to higher profits in the long-run
(Jenkins and Williamson, 2015).
 One of the threat for the fashion retail
businesses like Splash faces some
downturn in global economy in the case
of specific products or accessories such
as footwear, and sunglasses; which
decreases the purchasing of these
products. This leads to reduction in the
income of the company.
 Trade barriers, shift in the trends and
preferences of consumers, and the
government legislations acts as major
threats to the fashion retail business in
theregions (Palvia et al., 2015).

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Research areas related to CRM
Some of the research topics related to the customer relationship management (CRM), which
includes customer focus, customer acquisition, customer care, sales management, CRM
comparison, CRM consulting, CRM groupware, data quality and others (Erdem and Jiang,
2016).
Conclusion
To conclude the above discussion it has been analysed that customer relationship
management is an important concept in the field of marketing in any organisation. It is the
aspects through which a company is able to increase reach and enhance brand loyalty through
targeted content or promotional methods. In context to the company chosen in this report
called ‘splash’ which has been dealing as a fashion retailer in the middle east and several
other countries. The report discussed in detail about the CRM and the tools used by the
company to enhance their relationship in the market.

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