Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems are key to strong customer relationships and a company's long-term success. Such software allows businesses to engage, understand, and boost their customer base. The stats speak for themselves: the CRM market reached $65 billion and tends to grow even further at a 13.9% rate till 2030. Like any other product, CRMs are constantly transforming. To keep up with the changes and succeed, businesses should follow customer relationship management trends. In this article, I will share essential CRM trends for 2024 and afterwards discuss the upcoming ones for 2025.
AI
You can either use a CRM with built-in AI (most systems now have it) or integrate such a solution into an existing system. «Thinkable» AI will help analyze data, predict sales, automate repeatable processes, generate recommendations, and much more. At Curie Tech, we leveraged LIama to develop a CRM for a German Pharmaceutical Company to transform voice-to-text in real time, analyze data, and enable automation to fill out the CRM.
The integration of AI, ML & IoT into CRM systems is driving improvements in predictive analytics as well as customer insights. AI automates communication and data-driven models, as well as reduces manual tasks, especially with chatbots and automated lead delivery. AI-powered CRM analyzes customer data to predict trends and recommend actions. Considering IoT integration, it helps CRM systems detect issues early enough to provide customer behavior insights.
Cloud-based Solutions
Cloud CRMs are trending because of accessibility and scalability. There’s no need to get everyone in the office: employees can reach CRM data from literally any place. In cae attack or unexpected data leak occurs, cloud-based solutions will help rapidly back up all the important data and prevent information loss. The Cloud CRM market was valued at $91 billion in 2023 and is expected to reach $262 billion by 2032. Cloud CRMs also integrate with other tools, enabling seamless data sharing across departments and improving customer service and personalization. The trend is growing as more companies adopt digital transformation, benefiting from real-time access to data and enhanced security features.
Multichannel Approach
To get more leads, businesses should communicate with clients using multiple channels. Advertisers use 2.7 channels on average to promote their products online. For example, you can send emails for announcements, use chatbots as Q&A, make an app with push notifications, and create mailings in messengers. Don’t forget about social media accounts on Instagram, TikTok, or other networks to promote your products or services, engage an audience, and increase customer loyalty. With communicative CRM, you can get the support and coordination of communication channels and processes between you and your customers.
Note: according to a McKinsey survey, Gen Z customers are 30 to 40 percent more likely to call than millennials. Furthermore, premium-segment customers of all ages also prefer the phone, and social media is still the least preferred channel among all generations.
UGC Content
User-generated content is content users create about a brand (videos, reviews, photos, etc.). The study shows that 50% of consumers trust reviews as much as personal recommendations from friends and family. Cooperate with influencers, order native ads, and reach your target audience. Speaking about CRMs, you can use the created content there to incorporate it into emails: make up a story to show your product/service in real-life situations. UGC also provides valuable insights into customer preferences, allowing companies to personalize their CRM strategies. By integrating UGC into CRM systems, businesses can track customer interactions and use this data to improve customer experience and loyalty.
Voice Assistants
As Siri and Alexa help us with our daily routine tasks, voice assistants in CRMs assist in rapid data search within the CRM. Such a built-in technology enhances productivity, saves time, and helps to avoid typos or other mistakes. Voice technology can help businesses assess customer conversations by analyzing tone, emotions, and language. This enables CRM systems to improve customer satisfaction via early detection of potential issues. This trend includes recording meetings, creating transcripts, and identifying key topics of conversation. Chatbots are evolving from text to voice, using NLP to better respond to customer inquiries. AI-powered self-service chatbots speed up responses by predicting needs and accessing customer data.
CRM in 2025
CRM trends 2024 still represent the latest growth opportunities in the CRM landscape. They highlight the importance of evolving your CRM strategies as technology changes. The unifying theme is the deeper integration of AI for hyper-personalization, voice and conversational interfaces, and enhanced customer service. What about 2025?
Hyper-personalization. Top goal in customer care for 2025, as McKinsey states. Companies that consolidate all customer information, such as attributes, behaviors, and past interactions across various channels, will engage customers more effectively. Using CRM data and analytics, contact center agents can identify ways to enhance the customer experience, resolve issues before they arise by addressing personalized needs, and determine the moments to initiate live interactions.
Omnichannel communication. Businesses in 2025 should provide smooth experiences for key customer journeys: gather, track, and visualize every customer interaction in one central data hub. With this comprehensive view of the customer journey, supported by specialized CRM tools, companies will be able to respond quickly with personalized actions based on a customer’s history, preferences, and behavior. Both agents and customers will switch effortlessly between channels without losing context, leading to more personalized and cohesive service.
Focus on conversation. CRMs might evolve from an internally focused sales-driven tool to an externally focused conversation-driven platform. In other words, such a change will help businesses maintain dialogues with customers across multiple channels. The key insight here is building customer relationships centered around the main people’s priorities and objectives.
Emotion recognition. Businesses should provide personalized and quick responses to meet clients’ needs and provide proper assistance, and CRMs can help with that. With emotion recognition technology in CRM, entrepreneurs will be able to identify customers' emotions in real-time and build stronger relationships. As of 2024, we already have Deepface and FaceID technologies, and some eye-tracking models and emotion recognition systems are successfully used in hospitals. Hence, CRMs with such technology are no longer something vast and unreal.
CRM systems are essential for businesses looking to strengthen their relationships with customers. They collect and organize vital customer data, such as purchase history, communication preferences, and interaction records, in one place. As of 2024, the main CRM trends are AI implementation, cloud-based solutions, UGC content, voice assistants, and a multichannel approach. In the next year, among the tendencies listed above, hyper-personalization, omnichannel communication, focus on conversation, and emotion recognition will be trending. Keep up with the changes and stay tuned for CRM trends!