Strategic Customer Relationship Management Training Course

Duration 5 days 10 modules · 33 contact hours
Level Advanced Certificate on completion
Who attends Sales Directors, Key Account Managers and others
Fee from USD 1,100 KSh 95,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 7 Nov 2026 Course code SD-S-029

Before you join: Participants should have at least three years of experience in sales, account management, marketing, customer service, commercial operations or CRM delivery.

Dates & prices

Two start dates a month in every city, and live online on weekdays or weekends. Fees are per participant; classroom fees include tuition, materials, lunch and refreshments, and the certificate.

Suggest a date or city

Showing the next six months. Later dates, other cities and private deliveries for your team are available on request.

Course overview

Customer relationship management fails when customer data, sales activity, service delivery and marketing communications operate as separate systems. Relationship value is then hard to measure, account teams lack a shared view of priorities, and customers receive inconsistent treatment across channels. For organisations with long sales cycles, recurring revenue, regulated customer records or strategic accounts, CRM must become a managed commercial discipline rather than a software database.

This course develops the ability to design, direct and improve a CRM strategy linked to customer value, retention, growth and service performance. Participants analyse customer portfolios using segmentation, RFM analysis, customer lifetime value and profitability measures. They build account plans, map customer journeys, establish lifecycle communications, manage churn and service recovery, and create CRM scorecards for leadership review. The course also addresses data governance, consent, technology requirements, adoption and decision rights needed to sustain CRM change.

Teaching combines focused instructor briefings with case analysis, account-planning work, CRM data scenarios, customer-journey mapping, service-recovery simulations and facilitated peer review. Participants apply the methods to a realistic business-to-business, financial services, public service or membership-based case, then develop an implementation plan for their own setting. They leave with a practical CRM strategy pack containing diagnostic tools, account-planning structures, performance measures and a 90-day improvement plan.

The course is intended for experienced sales, marketing, customer service and commercial leaders who influence customer strategy, key-account performance or CRM programme delivery. It is particularly relevant where retaining valuable customers, improving cross-functional coordination and proving the financial contribution of relationship investments are management priorities.

What you will be able to do

  • Diagnose CRM performance using customer equity, lifecycle value, churn and profitability measures
  • Segment customer portfolios using needs-based criteria, RFM scoring and strategic attractiveness assessments
  • Design customer journeys using moments of truth, service blueprinting and closed-loop feedback
  • Develop strategic account plans using stakeholder maps, white-space analysis and mutual action plans
  • Build retention and service-recovery processes using churn signals, complaint taxonomy and cohort analysis
  • Create lifecycle communication rules using consent, channel preferences and next-best-action logic
  • Construct CRM scorecards linking customer metrics to revenue, retention, service cost and margin
  • Produce a 90-day CRM improvement plan with governance, milestones, owners and benefit measures

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Build credible CRM business cases using retention, margin and customer lifetime value
  • Lead cross-functional customer improvement discussions with shared commercial measures
  • Prepare strategic account plans for complex buying centres and renewal risks
  • Identify CRM data and process failures before they damage customer relationships
  • Present a structured CRM improvement plan to senior commercial stakeholders

For your organisation

  • Improved retention focus for valuable customers with identifiable churn risks
  • More consistent account management across sales, service and marketing teams
  • Clearer investment decisions through customer profitability and lifetime-value analysis
  • Higher CRM data quality through defined ownership, rules and governance
  • Better management visibility through CRM scorecards tied to commercial outcomes

Course modules

10 modules over 5 days

Participants can define a CRM strategy that connects relationship activity to commercial value.

  • CRM business case linking retention, cross-sell, service cost and margin
  • Relationship economics: customer equity, lifetime value, churn and share of wallet
  • Map stakeholder expectations across buyers, users, influencers, gatekeepers and service teams
  • Distinguish transactional selling, account management, customer success and relationship marketing
  • Define CRM operating model decisions: data, process, people, technology, governance
  • Align CRM objectives with corporate strategy, sales strategy and service promises

Participants can prioritise customer segments using evidence of value, needs and strategic fit.

  • Build needs-based segments using firmographic, behavioural, value and attitudinal variables
  • Apply RFM scoring to recency, frequency and monetary-value purchase patterns
  • Calculate customer lifetime value using margin, retention, acquisition cost and discount rate
  • Prioritise segments through attractiveness, competitive position, accessibility and strategic fit
  • Create personas from validated evidence rather than assumed demographic stereotypes
  • Select differentiated value propositions for priority segments and buying situations

Participants can establish CRM data requirements, quality controls and accountable governance arrangements.

  • Audit CRM data fields against sales, service, marketing and finance decisions
  • Establish account hierarchies, contact roles, buying centres and consent records
  • Define data-quality rules for completeness, accuracy, timeliness, uniqueness and validity
  • Design lead-to-account matching rules for reliable pipeline reporting and attribution
  • Use GDPR lawful-basis, purpose-limitation and retention principles in customer records
  • Set data stewardship responsibilities, escalation paths and CRM adoption measures

Participants can improve customer journeys by identifying friction, ownership gaps and priority interventions.

  • Map end-to-end customer journeys from trigger through renewal or recovery
  • Identify moments of truth, friction points, handoffs and unmet needs
  • Link journey stages to channels, owners, service levels and measures
  • Apply service blueprinting to frontstage interactions, backstage work and supporting systems
  • Design closed-loop feedback processes using NPS, complaints and win-loss evidence
  • Prioritise journey improvements using impact, effort, risk and customer value

Participants can manage strategic accounts through structured stakeholder, value and action planning.

  • Diagnose buying-centre dynamics with stakeholder maps, influence levels and relationship strength
  • Develop account plans covering objectives, white-space opportunities, risks and actions
  • Use SPIN questioning to uncover needs, implications and value requirements
  • Structure mutual action plans around milestones, responsibilities, dependencies and decision dates
  • Conduct value reviews using realised outcomes, adoption data and unresolved issues
  • Protect trust through expectation setting, transparent communication and disciplined follow-through

Participants can design retention and recovery responses based on customer risk signals and economics.

  • Model churn risk from engagement, usage, complaints, payment and relationship signals
  • Define retention triggers, save offers, escalation thresholds and ownership rules
  • Apply service recovery steps: acknowledge, investigate, resolve, compensate and confirm
  • Measure retention using cohort analysis, renewal rate, churn rate and revenue retention
  • Design complaint taxonomy distinguishing product, process, people and policy causes
  • Build win-back approaches based on departure reasons, changed needs and economics

Participants can plan coordinated lifecycle communications that support adoption, renewal and customer growth.

  • Plan lifecycle communications for onboarding, adoption, renewal, advocacy and reactivation
  • Set contact policies balancing relevance, frequency, channel preference and consent
  • Design next-best-action rules using propensity, value, context and business constraints
  • Coordinate sales, marketing and service touches through shared journey triggers
  • Test messaging with control groups, response rates, conversion and incremental revenue
  • Govern campaign approvals, suppression lists, brand standards and regulatory requirements

Participants can measure CRM contribution through customer, commercial and operational performance indicators.

  • Construct CRM scorecards linking leading indicators to revenue, retention and profitability
  • Separate activity measures from outcome measures and diagnostic measures
  • Build cohort, funnel and account dashboards for management review
  • Calculate customer profitability after service costs, discounts, returns and credit losses
  • Forecast portfolio revenue using pipeline quality, renewal probability and expansion assumptions
  • Run quarterly business reviews with evidence, decisions, owners and due dates

Participants can specify CRM requirements and manage adoption, controls and user accountability.

  • Specify CRM requirements through user stories, process maps and data definitions
  • Evaluate CRM platforms against workflow, integration, reporting, security and usability criteria
  • Configure opportunity stages, mandatory fields, validation rules and approval paths
  • Plan adoption using stakeholder analysis, role-based learning and manager reinforcement
  • Monitor usage through login, record quality, process compliance and conversion metrics
  • Control access with role permissions, segregation of duties and audit trails

Participants can prepare a governed CRM improvement plan with measurable priorities and ownership.

  • Establish CRM governance forums, decision rights, policies and escalation routes
  • Draft a 90-day CRM improvement plan with milestones and accountable owners
  • Sequence initiatives using customer impact, value, feasibility, dependencies and risk
  • Set benefit hypotheses, baselines, targets and measurement ownership before implementation
  • Review ethical risks in profiling, automated decisions, incentives and vulnerable customers
  • Communicate CRM priorities through executive narratives, scorecards and operating routines

Exercises and examples are adapted to each cohort's sectors and roles.

What you take back to work

  1. CRM strategic diagnostic template
  2. Customer segmentation and value-prioritisation model
  3. Strategic account plan template
  4. Customer journey and service blueprint
  5. CRM performance scorecard
  6. 90-day CRM improvement plan

Who should attend

  • Sales Directors — need to improve account growth, retention and sales-team coordination
  • Key Account Managers — need structured methods for managing complex customer relationships
  • Customer Experience Managers — need to connect journey improvement with commercial results
  • Marketing Managers — need to design lifecycle communications from customer insight and consent
  • CRM Programme Managers — need governance, adoption and performance measures for CRM change
  • Customer Service Leaders — need to reduce churn through recovery processes and service insight

Skills and tools covered

Customer value analysisStrategic account planningJourney designRetention managementCRM data governanceCRM performance measurement

Tools and standards

RFM analysis, Customer Lifetime Value, Net Promoter Score, GDPR

How the course runs

Training methodology

The instructor uses short briefings to introduce CRM models, followed by realistic cases from business-to-business sales, financial services, membership organisations and service operations. Participants analyse customer portfolios, interpret CRM data, map journeys, prepare account plans and respond to retention and service-recovery scenarios. Group work tests trade-offs between customer value, commercial priorities, consent and service capacity. Facilitated review links each method to participants' own accounts or customer programmes. The course closes with individual application planning and peer challenge.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have at least three years of experience in sales, account management, marketing, customer service, commercial operations or CRM delivery. They should understand their organisation's customer types, sales process and basic performance measures such as revenue, conversion, retention or service levels. Familiarity with a CRM system is useful, but system-administration expertise is not required. The course does not require coding, advanced statistics, database design or prior use of specialist analytics software. Participants gain most value when they can bring a current customer relationship challenge or account portfolio context.

A typical training day

08:30 – 10:30First session
10:30 – 10:45Refreshment break
10:45 – 12:30Second session
12:30 – 13:30Lunch and networking
13:30 – 15:00Third session
15:00 – 15:15Refreshment break
15:15 – 16:30Workshop and daily review

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in East Africa Time, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

  • Instruction by a practitioner facilitator
  • Full course workbook and materials
  • Exercise files, templates and case studies
  • Refreshments and lunch on classroom deliveries
  • Certificate of completion
  • Post-course application plan

Frequently asked questions

Participants should have practical experience in a customer-facing, commercial or CRM-related role. They do not need technical CRM configuration skills, coding ability or advanced analytics knowledge.

Bring details of a current customer relationship issue, account portfolio, retention concern or CRM initiative where possible. Commercial figures or customer data are useful but should be anonymised where confidentiality requires it.

It suits experienced sales, account management, marketing, customer experience, customer service and CRM professionals. It is designed for people who influence customer strategy or need to improve customer value and retention.

Sales courses usually focus on opportunity conversion, negotiation and individual selling performance. This course addresses the wider system for managing customer value, including data, journeys, retention, service recovery, governance and reporting.

Participants can use the templates to assess CRM maturity, prioritise customer segments, improve account plans and establish scorecards. The 90-day plan provides a starting structure for discussions with managers and cross-functional teams.

Each training day runs from 08:30 to 16:30 and provides about 6.5 contact hours. The five days progress from CRM strategy and customer insight through account management, retention, performance measurement, governance and implementation planning.

Questions about this course?

Ask about dates, fees, group bookings or running it for your team. Our training team replies by email.

Ask on WhatsApp info@skillsetdevelopment.com

Related courses in Sales