Infor touts CRM Epiphany Data Advisor updates

Business application firm Infor has unveiled a customer relationship management (CRM) tool that it claims can help enterprises ensure that records are up to date and accurate.

CRM Epiphany Data Advisor (PDF) automatically analyses information stored across multiple datasets, and recommends which need updating or improving according to business priorities.

The module then offers the best possible means by which this data could be collected by suggesting the optimum communication channel, according to Infor.

The tool also collates data into a single, central backbone on the Epiphany CRM system to remove data duplication and improve retrieval and back-up.

Mark Mortensen, a principal analyst with Analysys Mason, suggested that CRM systems are increasingly important in helping enterprises manage and use data effectively.

"The amount of data that firms are storing now is amazing, but customers are contacting them in all sorts of ways - online, in store, over the phone - and they want the process to be seamless across these channels," he said.

"CRM systems are vital to help firms manage this information and help sales agents by generating information or product offers for a particular customer by matching their data with similar customers'."

Mortensen added that CRM vendors are becoming increasingly successful in emerging markets as industries such as telecommunications become more mature and start to demand such capabilities.

"In China there is a much more developed customer care market than we believed as there are more customers than ever using services from operators that have data in systems that needs managing," he said.