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In the struggle to achieve higher profitability many companies have sacrificed resources, time and process, losing touch with their most precious stakeholder--the customer. The sophistication of today's customers, their elusive tastes and needs, and heightened market competition combine to intensify the threat of losing customers. Forward-looking companies now recognise that sustainable and profitable growth depends, first and foremost, on effective customer relationship management--the practice of identifying, attracting and retaining your most valuable customers. Managing customer relationships, written in co-operation with Andersen Consulting, is based on the collective insight of more than 200 senior executives at companies in North America, Europe and Asia. Information was gathered from a quantitative survey of 200 leading companies followed by more than 100 personal interviews with top executives. This report will help you learn: How companies organise business processes that most directly affect customers How companies manage and deepen customer relationships How companies are using technology to identify, attract and retain customers Why companies that best understand the relative value of different customers and incorporate that knowledge into strategies will be more profitable How companies are devising highly personalised and customised strategies to maximise the revenue returns on relationships with their most valuable customers How companies are moving from functional to process-based structures to become more flexible and innovative, spreading the responsibility for customer tasks among employees at all levels and in all parts of their organisation Insights from the leaders in customer management: Hewlett-Packard: Targeting customers and building relationships using a segmentation model that assesses customer value based on the match between what the customer needs and what the company offers Oticon