Having been through BPT Partner's CRM certification program, a huge topic of discussion revolved around, "How do we take the concept the CRM is a way of thinking about customers and deploy it in a corporate setting?"

As a CRM consultant and someone who has seen the inside of dozens of CRM programs, I am amazed at the number of executive sponsors and project managers who look at CRM as another IT effort. To them, CRM serves as the repository for customer interactions. That isn't a bad start actually -- if you get that much right, you are on the path to improved customer interactions.

But if you stop short of the next step -- using the CRM trasactional data to get intimate with customers -- you risk undermining most projects. Why? Software is for trasnactions and analysis. CRM is about using the data to know your clients.

Perhaps the best way to get companies to think differently about CRM is just realizing that there is a phase that comes after the software is installed and that it is the really important one. Most forget the work begins on the day you switch the software on!

What's the right time in a project to think beyond the software? Are there any indicators that work consistently?