Consider the last email or digital ad you received from a favorite retailer. It may have included an offer to save 20 percent on your next online purchase, or an invitation to shop in store during an exclusive sale. You don't think too much about this brand’s customer relationship management (CRM) or marketing capabilities, because you don’t have to.

Why? Because the most sophisticated brands employ tools that can tailor an email or a social media post to their buyer’s sweet spot. Powered by data and analytics, these CRM tools do the heavy lifting for marketers to engage their customers in more personalized, authentic ways.

CRM Watchlist 2016

Often recognized as a forerunner in CRM software, SAS Customer Intelligence has added a new accolade to its trophy case as a winner on the 2016 CRM Watchlist. The annual list – curated by leading CRM industry analyst, Paul Greenberg – includes the dominant companies to watch in the CRM market. As Greenberg notes in his announcement blog post on ZDNet, the competition was especially stiff this year, with 131 vendors vying for the winners spot. With each submission, Greenberg reads and scores the company (which is weighted), which is then followed up with extensive research analyzing the vendor in the markets it addresses.

One important distinction of the Watchlist is the winner's impact within the CRM space. Greenberg cites that “the impact has to be obvious, both in the prior year and in the anticipated next two or three years.” And “that there is no doubt at all that your company is making a major impression on a market and actually changing or strengthening that market by its presence.”

The impact is not only from the strength of our SAS customer intelligence offerings,  but as a whole company. Greenberg states, “To have an impact, the company has to be pretty much a complete company who has been doing this long enough to have established a rhythm that leads to impact. The company has to be well rounded -- it has financial stability, solid management, excellent products and services, culture, and a strong partner ecosystem to help sustain its efforts.”

The SAS customer intelligence team is honored to earn a spot on the winners list for 2016, demonstrating SAS's commitment to helping brands deliver customer experiences that matter.