CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT

Background of the company

Headquartered in the United States of America, Wells Fargo is the fourth-largest bank, involved in providing financial services. The bank has been serving the needs and requirements of its potential clients for a long time back. The organization has kept its goals clear and has achieved it through sheer efforts and efficiency.

In fact, the organization has focused on initiating programs that have helped in creating environmental awareness. Their approach toward accelerating transition into a low carbon economy has contributed much to reducing the negative impact on climate and the environment. One of the most important aspects that have been noticed is that they promote diversity and provide equal access to opportunities for employees. The net income of Wells Fargo gained in the year 2018 was US$867.41billion. The number of employees working in this organization counted to 258,700. Thus, it can be said that their market growth has been prominent in recent years. 

Cost of problem

Despite the growth of the organization, the organization has faced various scandals that lead to a conflict with their customers. The CRM tool used by Wells Fargo was way below standard and the fraudulent activity that happened recently was a live proof validating the same. In the recent case, 2 million unauthorized and fraud accounts were opened in this bank without having genuine and real owners to verify the same. This scandal resulted in huge turmoil both for the company and its customers. The employees also had to be a prey of this situation where 5300 of them lost their job. Had they used a better CRM process they could easily prevent this financial disaster. There are many tools that comply with industry standards and maintain the security of customer and transactional information.

Sales force provides CRM tools that set high alerts and the customer gets notifications every time there is an activity happening. The feature helps them to not continue any activity without the permission and authentication of the customer. They also provide tools that help in cross-checking the addresses provided in KYC forms and that mentioned during card issuance so that it assures that the rightful customer is getting the card. These help in preventing such malpractices.

In this context, mention must be made of the issue that shareholders faced for which many of them opted out of Wells Fargo.

Figure 1: Total Shareholder Return

(Source: [3])

The above picture shows the downfall of the shareholder return on the basis of 10 years, 5 years and 3 years.

Summary of CRM tool

As mentioned earlier that the company has faced a major financial loss in their business after the cross-selling business, this has been the reason for which the company thought of bringing about changes in their CRM system so that they can rebuild the trust and loyalty of their customers and clients. With this in mind, the organizations collaborated with Salesforce services. Salesforce Sales Cloud was the CRM tool that has helped the organization to bridge the gaps with their clients.

Through this system, Wells Fargo not only established proper customer engagement but also improved its sales opportunities. It was a mobile application through the help of which the organization rebuilt its trust with its potential client and customers and removed the scars of the scandals. It should be added here that the CRM tool implanted within the Sales Cloud is actually a customer contact database. One of the most important aspects of the system that needs to be added here is that the system integrated social media signals for the organizations and transformed into a proper presentation for the sales team thereby helping in increasing their productivity and profitability. Thus, it can be clear without the help of CRM tools, it would not have been possible for Wells Fargo to undergo such drastic change at a time.     

Success Metrics for using the CRM tool

The cross-selling scandal by the organization created a lot of noise in the banking industry of the United States. Had they used the CRM tool before the scandal happened and remained abstained from doing such misdeeds would have helped them to grow little more instead of losing their clients and their trust s well. However, it should be added here that with the establishment of Salesforce Sales Cloud software or tool, the company gained much profitability and their lost customers at the same time. 

Figure 2: Revenue collected by Wells Fargo from 2009 to 2018

(Source: [4])

From the above figure, it is clearly noticeable that the net or total revenue of the company has increased to a great extent. In the year of scandal, it has been noticed that the company has faced a major downfall in their sales market. In the year 2014, their sales generated 84.3bn; however, in the year 2016, they successfully uplifted their revenue by 88.27bn. In fact, consistency has been maintained in the year 2018 as well[5].

The benefits that the company generated from implementing the CRM tool involve:

Benefits	Impacts
Increased transparency	This helped the organization to maintain transparency with its client and enhanced the client and customer relationship. This further influenced the revenue and profitability of the company that increased by 2%
Implementation of cross-reference check	The implementation of a cross-reference check, it enhanced client satisfaction level and user experience
Increased employee satisfaction	Due to the scandal, a lot of employees lost their jobs and some quitted. The establishment of the CRM tool helped in increasing customer retention and staff satisfaction as well

Table 1: Benefits and impact of Wells Fargo’s CRM tool

(Source: [6])

Figure 3: Assets collected by Wells Fargo from 2009 to 2018

(Source: [7])

From the above graph, it can be clearly analyzed that Wells Fargo has received major drawbacks in the year 2014 after the scandal and they made profits with the incorporation of CRM tool, Salesforce Sales Cloud tool. Its assets also received a major boost in the year 2016 (1.93), 2017 (1.95), and 2018 (1.9) whereas it was 1.69 in the year 2014[8]. Thus, it is clear that the CRM tool has been a boon to the organization. 

Conclusions and Recommendations

Conclusion:

From the above analysis, it can be concluded that it is high time that Wells Fargo needs to bring about changes in their CRM tool in order to maintain its efficiency and functionalities as well as operations. In fact, it should be added here that the organization needs to focus on other marketing tactics using CRM tools through which they can gain large mass and retain its customers and clients. In order to maintain their position, the organizations will have to focus on improving the CRM tool as, much possible.

Recommendations:

Recommendations	Possible impacts on Wells Fargo
It is necessary for the organization to determine the right customers required to increase their profitability and maintain its market position in the United States	Positive
Providing better customer service in order to increase productivity as well as profitability	Positive
Providing training to the employees on the ways by which they can handle their customers	Positive
Keeping the CRM tool updated	Positive
Improving customer retention through its CRM tool	Positive

Table 2: Recommendations with possible impacts on Wells Fargo

(Source: [9])

References

Atchison, S. 2020. The Wells Fargo debacle: How CRM runs amok. Available at:   https://www.campaignlive.com/article/wells-fargo-debacle-crm-runs-amok/1410958 [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Statista.com, 2019. Total assets of Wells Fargo from 2009 to 2018 (in trillion U.S. dollars). Available at:  https://www.statista.com/statistics/295473/wells-fargo-assets/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Statista.com, 2019. Total revenue of Wells Fargo from 2009 to 2018 (in billion U.S. dollars). Available at:  https://www.statista.com/statistics/295387/wells-fargo-annual-revenue/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Tayan, B., 2019. The Wells Fargo Cross-Selling Scandal. Available at:  https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2019/02/06/the-wells-fargo-cross-selling-scandal-2/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Wellsfargo.com, 2019. Wells Fargo. [About]. Available at: https://www.wellsfargo.com/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Wellsfargo.com, 2020. Corporate Responsibility. Available at:   https://www.wellsfargo.com/about/corporate-responsibility/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

yescrm.org, 2020. 27 Awesome Ways CRM Can Accelerate Your Business Growth. Available at:   https://www.yescrm.org/27-awesome-ways-crm-can-accelerate-business-growth/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Wellsfargo.com, 2020. Corporate Responsibility. Available at:   https://www.wellsfargo.com/about/corporate-responsibility/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Wellsfargo.com, 2019. Wells Fargo. [About]. Available at: https://www.wellsfargo.com/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Tayan, B., 2019. The Wells Fargo Cross-Selling Scandal. Available at:  https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2019/02/06/the-wells-fargo-cross-selling-scandal-2/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Statista.com, 2019. Total revenue of Wells Fargo from 2009 to 2018 (in billion U.S. dollars). Available at:  https://www.statista.com/statistics/295387/wells-fargo-annual-revenue/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Statista.com, 2019. Total revenue of Wells Fargo from 2009 to 2018 (in billion U.S. dollars). Available at:  https://www.statista.com/statistics/295387/wells-fargo-annual-revenue/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Atchison, S. 2020. The Wells Fargo debacle: How CRM runs amok. Available at:   https://www.campaignlive.com/article/wells-fargo-debacle-crm-runs-amok/1410958 [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Statista.com, 2019. Total assets of Wells Fargo from 2009 to 2018 (in trillion U.S. dollars). Available at:  https://www.statista.com/statistics/295473/wells-fargo-assets/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

Statista.com, 2019. Total assets of Wells Fargo from 2009 to 2018 (in trillion U.S. dollars). Available at:  https://www.statista.com/statistics/295473/wells-fargo-assets/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]

yescrm.org, 2020. 27 Awesome Ways CRM Can Accelerate Your Business Growth. Available at:   https://www.yescrm.org/27-awesome-ways-crm-can-accelerate-business-growth/ [Accessed on 13th February 2020]