CRM Implementation Benefits Realisation Plan
This is a practical guide to building a benefits realisation plan for a crm implementation project — how the project’s benefits will be measured and actually realised, adapted to the realities of deploying a customer relationship management system to improve sales and service.
What a Benefits Realisation Plan is
A benefits realisation plan is how the project’s benefits will be measured and actually realised. For the full concept and how it works in general, see Benefits Realization. On a crm implementation project it plays the same role, tuned to this kind of work.
Why it matters for a CRM Implementation project
CRM Implementation projects live or die on deploying a customer relationship management system to improve sales and service. A well-built benefits realisation plan gives the team a shared, explicit reference for exactly that — reducing ambiguity, aligning stakeholders, and making problems visible early enough to act. Skipping it, or doing it generically, is how crm implementation projects drift into avoidable delay and cost.
What to include
- Target benefits
- Metrics / KPIs
- Baseline values
- Owner
- Realisation timeline
CRM Implementation-specific considerations
Tailor the benefits realisation plan to the risks that most often derail crm implementation projects:
- Poor data quality on migration
- Low user adoption
- Integration with existing tools
Example
On a real crm implementation project, the benefits realisation plan would be shaped by deploying a customer relationship management system to improve sales and service. In particular, it should explicitly account for the project’s biggest risks — poor data quality on migration, low user adoption, integration with existing tools — rather than treating them as afterthoughts.