Only one in four companies are enabling omnichannel customer engagement, whereby they have a unified, "single view" of the customer and are delivering a consistent, contextual, and relevant experience across all their channels, a recent study commissioned by SAP Hybris, a business unit of SAP SE (NYSE: SAP), shows. Sixty-one percent of business leaders are convinced their existing IT systems supporting customer relationship management (CRM) and the sales environment are holding back their company's commercial vision. And just 17 percent of businesses are ready to support a mobile-first engagement with customers.

"Today's generation of customers are always connected and well informed, but businesses are lagging behind in terms of both understanding and engaging their customers across all their channels in ways that are both relevant and consistent, said Brian Walker, chief strategy officer, SAP Hybris. This fundamental shift is precisely the reason why we're going beyond CRM. We are innovating to help our clients digitally transform their customer experience, enabling customers to engage, transact and get service in the most convenient ways, while at the same time simplifying their technology landscape."

CeBIT Attendees to See Innovation Beyond CRM

Following on SAP's announcement of its vision and strategy for a simplified front office, the company continues to address the need to move past traditional CRM applications through its range of customer engagement and commerce solutions. SAP Hybris innovations will be showcased at CeBIT 2016, being held March 14 to 18 in Hannover, Germany. In the spotlight will be updates to the SAP Hybris Customer Experience solution, which uses customer profile data to personalize experiences across digital channels with content targeted to the individual. Demos of the SAP Hybris Marketing solution will take place at SAP's CeBIT stand, showcasing how organizations can gain real-time insights into the context of each customer and then use these insights to deliver highly individualized customer experiences across channels. A free trial of SAP Hybris Marketing is available here.

DNA Oy to Treat Business Customers to a Consumer Experience

CeBIT attendees will also be able to preview features of an upcoming release of the SAP Hybris Commerce solution, the next generation of its commerce suite. This suite is helping companies like DNA Oy, one of the largest cable and telecommunications operators in Finland, achieve success. DNA has seen a 65 percent increase year-over-year in business-to-consumer (B2C) online sales following its adoption of SAP Hybris Commerce, Edge edition, B2C option. Building on the increased engagement DNA is seeing with its consumers, the company has begun implementing SAP Hybris Commerce, Edge edition, B2B option, to bring a leading consumer-grade experience to its business customers.
At DNA, we want to serve our B2B customers with same consistent omnichannel experiences they receive as consumers, said Esamatti Vuolle, customer experience and commerce architect at DNA. Essentially, we want our customers to enjoy rich functionalities and fine-grained personalization, while maximizing loyalty. SAP Hybris solutions have been a major enabler of our customer experience, for which our customers give us high marks.

SAP to Engage Customers with "Beyond CRM" Tour

SAP will kick off its European "Beyond CRM" tour at CeBIT. Scheduled to make stops in Frankfurt, Paris, Zurich and 10 other European locations, the tour will bring a truck packed with the latest SAP Hybris customer engagement and commerce innovations to its audience. Visitors to the truck will experience digital transformation firsthand, as they see how marketing, sales, commerce, customer service and billing technology come together in a simple way to create great experiences. For tour dates, locations and photos follow @saphybris.
SAP Hybris is a new brand name launched in January 2016 and is used here to mean the offerings, employees, and business of acquired company hybris AG, which continues to be our legal entity until integration with SAP is complete.