CRM Requirements Template
Create your own customized checklist by using this as a starting point, deleting what
you don’t need and adjusting the weights of each item to match your
situation.
All terms used in this checklist are fully explained in Just Enough CRM.
1 Vendor Requirements
1.1 Financial stability
1.2 Referenceable customer base
1.3 Geographical presence: sales and post-sales support
1.4 Business model. ASP/licensed?
1.5 Technical vision
1.6 Business vision
1.7 Customer focus
2 Technical Requirements
2.1 Technical platform
2.1.1 Compatible hardware
2.1.2. Compatible OS
2.1.3 Compatible database
2.1.4 Compatible web server
2.1.5 Thin or thick client
2.2. Scalability
2.2.1 User load and distribution
2.2.2 3-tier architecture
2.3 Availability
2.3.1 High-availability features
2.3.2 Backup and recovery requirements
2.4 Integration
2.4.1 Required integrations
2.4.2 Standard API
2.4.3 Fully exposed data model
2.5 Development environment
2.5.1 Customization depth required/power of customization tool
2.5.2 Standard script/programming language
2.5.3 Support for migrating customizations to production
3 Functional Requirements
3.1 Cross-functional requirements
3.1.1 Phone integration
3.1.1.1 Screen pops
3.1.1.2 Entitlement checking
3.1.1.3 Outbound dialing
3.1.1.4 Support of specific phone switch
3.1.2 Email support
3.1.2.1 Email integration
Link to corporate email system
Tag outbound emails
Bulk outbound emails
Automatic load of incoming email
Automatic processing of incoming emails
Firewall compatibility requirements
3.1.2.2 Email processing
Automatic acknowledgements on emails
Routing of incoming emails
Canned response templates
Automatic response suggestions
Automatic responses
3.1.2.3 Email utilities
Spell checking
Supported formats
Email templates
Attachments (inbound/outbound)
3.1.3 Customer Portal
3.1.3.1 Knowledge base
KB access from portal
Search capabilities from portal
3.1.3.2 Authentication and security
Authentication required?
Link to existing scheme?
Signup control (self/manual)
Authentication scheme
Flexible permission scheme e.g. for partners
3.1.3.3 Personalization
Required?
Types of personalization
3.1.3.4 E-commerce
Online shopping
Online order taking
Integrations required
3.1.3.5 Order tracking
Online order tracking
Integrations required
Online order modification
3.1.3.6 Service/support case entry
3.1.3.7 Online case management
Online viewing of existing cases
Management of confidential information
Adding comments
Closing cases
Reopening cases
3.1.3.8 Customer forums.
Required?
Monitoring requirements
User moderators?
3.1.4 Wireless support
3.1.4.1 Supported devices and protocols
3.1.4.2 Wireless messaging
Outbound alerts
Inbound messages
3.1.4.3 Wireless real-time access
Required?
Essential subset for function
Customization required
3.1.4.4 Data synchronization
Downloads to device
Upload changes?
3.1.5 Chat support
3.1.5.1 Integrated chat support or link?
3.1.5.2 Chat environment
Response templates
Control of window size
Restrict chat access to certain pages
Chat works on all types of pages
Firewall compatibility and requirements
Records of chat communications
3.1.5.3 Advanced features
Push pages to customers
Browser control
3.1.6 VoIP
3.1.6.1 Inbound/outbound?
3.1.6.2 Compatibility with standards
3.1.7 Multichannel support
3.1.7.1 Consistent experience
3.1.7.2 Universal queuing and logic.
3.1.8 Customer Database
3.1.8.1 Comprehensive records
Consumers/corporate customers?
Multiple corporate contacts
Special customer relationships e.g. reseller/end-user
3.1.8.2 Custom fields
Fields required
Restrictions on creation, deletion
Ease of creation/changes
3.1.8.3 Link between databases
Customer master
Synchronization requirements
Data cleansing.
3.1.8.4 Customer history
Records needed
Synchronization requirements
3.1.9 Employee database
3.1.9.1 Records needed
3.1.9.2 Concept of organizational hierarchy
3.1.9.3 Synchronization requirements
3.1.9.4 Permissions
3.1.10 Knowledge management
3.1.10.1 Document creation.
Required in tool?
Easy process
Migrate CRM objects to documents?
Spell checking
Document templates
Custom document attributes
Document formats
New documents available on the spot
3.1.10.2 Heterogeneous knowledge bases.
Migrating documents to the kb
Searching on external documents
Supported formats
Attachments support
3.1.10.3 Knowledge creation workflow
Custom document statuses
Permission-based reviews
Support for review queues
Review alerts
Adding review steps
3.1.10.4 Document maintenance
Expiration date
Document categories – how many levels?
3.1.10.5 History trail
3.1.10.6 Self-learning features
Popularity rankings
User ratings
Report failed searches
Flagging errors
3.1.10.7 Search capabilities
FAQ
Tree-based search
Full text search
Searching on document attributes
Natural language queries
Case-based reasoning
Refining existing searches
3.1.10.8 Leveraged searches
Automatic suggestions
Linking documents with other objects
3.1.10.9 Permissions and authorizations
Group profiles
Combine group profiles
Individual profiles
Permissions on documents or categories?
Permissions for internal/external users
3.1.10.10 Subscriptions and alerts
Send alerts to uses
Alerts to subgroups of users
Users subscriptions to documents
Users subscriptions to categories
3.1.11 Metrics
3.1.11.1 Data availability
Required fields
Reporting against custom fields
3.1.11.2 Customizable templates
Key reports
Graph templates
Time-based report templates
3.1.11.3 Report creation tools
Easy to use tools
Integration to external report writers
3.1.11.4 Report distribution system
Self-service subscriptions
Output formats
Dump to spreadsheets
Link to data warehousing system
Impact of reporting on system
3.1.12 Internationalization
3.1.12.1 Language support
For data entry
Sort order
3.1.12.2 Foreign currency support
3.1.12.3 Interface localization
3.1.12.4 Time zones
3.2 Marketing Automation Requirements
3.2.1 Campaign design
3.2.1.1 Easy to use for a business user?
3.2.1.2 Support promotion codes
3.2.1.3 Dynamic campaigns
3.2.2 Customer targeting
3.2.2.1 Query universe
3.2.2.2 Permission-based marketing
3.2.2.3 Automatic opt-in/opt-out
3.2.3 Campaign delivery
3.2.3.1 Recurring campaigns
3.2.3.2 Multi-step campaigns
3.2.3.3 Event-triggered campaigns
3.2.3.4 Email and phone-based campaigns
3.2.4 Campaign analysis.
3.2.5 Lead distribution
3.3 Sales-Tracking
3.3.1 Opportunity management
3.3.1.1 End-to-end tracking
3.3.1.2 Track products
3.3.1.3 Track milestones
3.3.1.4 Track competitors
3.3.1.5 Deal routing
3.3.2 Contact management
3.3.2.1 Track all interactions
3.3.2.2 Schedule appointments
3.3.2.3 Manage to-do items
3.3.2.4 Supports sales methodology
3.3.2.5 Collaboration
3.3.2.6 Presentation creation
3.3.2.7 Proposal generation
3.3.2.8 Proposal template
3.3.2.9 Expense reports
3.3.2 Marketing encyclopedia
3.3.4 Quoting
3.3.4.1 Quote creation
3.3.4.2 Approval workflow
3.3.4.3 Pricing tool
3.3.4.4 Configurator
3.3.5 Account management
3.3.6. Forecasting tools
3.3.7 Disconnected usage
3.3.7.1 Synchronization
3.3.7.2 Ability to download/upload selected data
3.3.7.3 Functionality in disconnected mode
3.4 Support-Tracking Requirements
3.4.1 Flexible case attributes
3.4.1.1 Custom values
3.4.1.2 Custom fields
3.4.2 Case creation and entitlement
3.4.2.1 Easy/quick case creation
3.4.2.2 Case packs
3.4.2.3 Annual contracts
3.4.2.4 Support multiple entitlement strategies
3.4.3 Routing, rules, and alerts
3.4.3.1 Single-criteria routing
3.4.3.2 Multi-criteria routing
3.4.3.3 Automatic (forced) assignments
3.4.3.4 Alert on screen / e-mail / pager
3.4.3.5 Escalations
3.4.3.6 Easy-to-use rule engine
3.4.4 Workflow support
3.4.4.1 Special case statuses
3.4.4.2 Full workflow support
3.4.4.3 Powerful and flexible workflow engine
3.4.4.4 Business users can modify workflow
3.4.5 Defect and enhancement tracking
3.4.5.1 Functionality in the tool
3.4.5.2 Integration with other systems
3.4.6 History trail
3.4.7 Collaboration and escalation
3.4.7.1 Automatic and user-controlled escalations
3.4.7.2 Asking for collaborators
3.4.7.3 Record collaboration
3.4.7.4 Make collaboration visible to customers
3.4.8 Field service
3.4.8.1 Disconnected usage
3.4.8.2 Wireless usage
3.4.9 Customer satisfaction surveys
3.4.9.1 Transaction-based
3.4.9.2 Sampling mechanism
3.4.9.3 Opt-out
4 Implementation and Maintenance Requirements
4.1 Time
4.1.1 Maximum allowable
4.1.2 Phased implementation
4.2 Implementation assistance
4.2.1 Vendor
4.2.2 Third-parties
4.2.3 Certified partners
4.2.4 Waiting period
4.2.5 Training for administrators
4.2.6 Training for programmers
4.2.7 Training for end-users
4.3 Maintenance policies
4.3.1 Length of support for old releases
4.3.2 Certifications on new O/S
4.3.3 Certifications on new DB versions
4.3.4 Warranty period
4.4 Support programs
4.4.1 Support hours
4.4.2 SLA
4.4.3 Availability of patches
4.4.4 Technical knowledge base
4.4.5 Ceilings on fee increases
4.5 Long-term tool maintenance
4.5.1 Tasks that can be handled by business users
4.5.2 Friendly user interfaces
4.5.3 Customization tools
4.5.4 Easy upgrades
5 Budget
5.1 Initial costs
5.1.1 License
5.1.2 Hardware
5.1.3 Add-on products
5.2 Implementation costs
5.2.1. Integrator
5.2.2 Internal resources
5.2.3 Training
5.3 Maintenance costs
5.3.1 Support fees for associated hardware or software
5.3.2 Internal costs
5.3.3 Costs for add-on purchases