Customer satisfaction is an integral part of company growth and success. Customer relationship management (CRM) systems offer businesses a way to keep current customers satisfied, as well as a way of finding new customers. Social Media can play a huge role in both these endeavors.

Many companies incorporate Microsoft CRM in order to manage and organize all the contact it has with both existing and prospective customers.

By combining social technology and Microsoft CRM a powerful tool arises..T he benefits of combining Microsoft CRM and Social Media are countless. Companies can use social media for providing better customer service to their already large customer base. By storing this information in Microsoft CRM, service and product quality can be improved.

Marketeer can use social media to reach more people and spread the word of their products and services. In the end, the main goals of both CRM and Social Media are providing better customer service and attracting new customer.

If you want to combine social media and Microsoft CRM, there are 2 principles:

1. Interface. Data from social media will not be stored in the Microsoft CRM database. Microsoft CRM will only show the social media information.
2. Integration. Using the Social Media platform API, data from the Social Media will be extracted and stored in Microsoft CRM.

Table below states some possibilities of bot principles. 

	Interface	Integration
Data in CRM Database	No	Yes
Reporting on Social Media data	No	Yes
Workflows social media (status) updates	No	Yes
Complexity	Simple	Complex
Contact can update (own) contact information	No	Yes
3rd degree relations available	No	Yes

 Of course a hybrid solution is also a possibility.

Below is an example of an LinkedIn Interface in Microsoft CRM. With the code

function LinkedInLoader(crmFormField) {

 var ll = this;

    ll.scriptSource = 'http://www.linkedin.com/companyInsider?script&useBorder=yes'

    ll.field = crmFormField;

    ll.container = crmFormField.parentNode;

    ll.nameToSearch = crmFormField.DataValue;

    ll.spanId = ll.field.id + '_linkedin';

 if (ll.container != null) {

 var span = document.createElement('span');

        span.id = ll.field.id + '_linkedin';

 var td1 = document.createElement('td');

        td1.innerHTML = ll.container.innerHTML;

 var td2 = document.createElement('td');

        td2.appendChild(span);

        td2.style.width = '15px';

 var tr = document.createElement('tr');

        tr.appendChild(td1);

        tr.appendChild(td2);

 var table = document.createElement('table');

        table.width = '100%';

        table.style.tableLayout = 'fixed';

        table.cellSpacing = 0;

        table.cellPading = 0;

        table.appendChild(tr);

        ll.container.innerHTML = table.outerHTML;

    }

    ll.ApplyCorrections = function() {

 var div = document.getElementById('company-insider-info-window');

 if (div != null) div.style.height = '275px';

 else window.setTimeout(ll.ApplyCorrections, 500);

    }

    ll.Enable = function() {

 new LinkedIn.CompanyInsiderPopup(ll.spanId, ll.nameToSearch);

 new LinkedIn.CompanyInsiderStylesheet();

 var span = document.getElementById(ll.spanId);

 if (span != null) span.attachEvent('onclick', ll.ApplyCorrections);

    }

    ll.OnScriptReadyState = function() {

 if ((event.srcElement.readyState == 'complete') ||

     (event.srcElement.readyState == 'loaded')) {

            ll.Enable();

        }

    }

    ll.Load = function() {        

 var script = document.createElement('script');

        script.type = 'text/javascript';

        script.src = ll.scriptSource;

        script.onreadystatechange = ll.OnScriptReadyState;

        document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(script);

    }

}

if (crmForm.FormType != 1) {

 // Set the field that contains the company name

 var linkedInLoader = new LinkedInLoader(crmForm.all.name);

    linkedInLoader.Load();

}