3 reasons why your CRM system should not be at the center of pharma processes

Hannover, March 25, 2025

In many pharmaceutical companies, the CRM system is at the center of commercial and medical processes because it consolidates customer information and is used almost daily by commercial and medical teams. The CRM system helps users comply with processes and the important compliance requirements in the pharmaceutical environment.

Very often, CRM systems in these areas also have data sovereignty, at least for customer-related data. However, there are also good reasons to remove the CRM system from the center, at least from a data perspective.

 Here are three of the most important reasons:

1. Strong dependence on the CRM system

In many life sciences companies, the CRM system determines the processes in the teams that use it intensively through its technical capabilities. However, these systems do not always represent the ideal process for the respective team or business unit.
Many consuming systems are also dependent on data from the CRM system, as data from the CRM system is often extracted for analysis systems or for use in marketing and other departments.
But what happens to the data and defined processes if the CRM system is changed or even has to be changed?
Firstly, there is the effort involved in migrating from one CRM system to another. Data must be transferred from one system to another and transformed into the new data format. Processes must also be transferred to the new system and probably adapted to the new technical conditions.
Secondly, there is also additional effort to adapt all connected systems that use data from the CRM system for their processes or provide data for the CRM system to the data structures of the new CRM system.

There are many dependencies around the CRM ecosystem that ultimately affect data storage and the use of data. More independent is a central data repository.

2. Limitations in the integration of additional data

CRM systems often offer some standardized interfaces to load additional data from external data sources into the CRM system and make it available.

However, the possibilities are usually strictly limited and standardized. Not all data that can be meaningfully and profitably linked with the data in the CRM system can be loaded and used. This reduces the possibilities of combining this data in any way to gain new insights or to use the data for AI in the future.

3. Reduced flexibility in the selection of a new CRM system

Sometimes there is a need to switch to a different CRM system. We generally recommend choosing the CRM system that best supports the company and business processes.

However, if the previous CRM system has the role of the central data repository, this decision often has to be adjusted so that the CRM system offers the best bidirectional interfaces to connect all external systems that deliver and consume data. This reduces flexibility in choosing the new CRM system and thus also in supporting the ideal and familiar processes.

More benefits of a centralized data storage

In light of these three reasons, a central data repository outside of operational systems combined with a well-thought-out data strategy is the better solution.

This central data repository shifts data sovereignty from the operational CRM system to itself, which drastically increases flexibility in data usage, reduces migration efforts, and also provides a certain level of fail-safety.

This is also demonstrated by the following application examples:

• Through the data strategy, data from the CRM system is regularly synchronized with the central data repository and prepared in such a way that it enables the generation of new insights alone or in combination with other data. Incidentally, the central data repository also enables easy provision of data for AI use in the company.
• Furthermore, this central data strategy facilitates the exchange of the CRM system by having the data from the old CRM system already in the central data repository, making it easier to transfer to the new CRM system. Systems that consume data from the CRM system can be completely taken out of focus as they already receive the data from the central data repository. This frees up time and resources for the migration of business processes.
• And of course, such a central data strategy also offers the possibility to use exactly the CRM system that best supports the processes of the business unit for each area. The data from the individual CRM systems is consolidated through the data strategy and the data repository and distributed to the respective other systems. Despite the fragmentation of systems, this provides a 360° view of customers.

The CRM system focuses on mapping and supporting customer-related business processes. However, it is no longer suitable as a central data repository in the current era because the requirements for data storage and preparation have changed, linking data from different data sources, and using AI. Therefore, it is advisable to centralize data storage and set up an appropriate data strategy. This approach allows operational systems like a CRM system to focus again on supporting operational processes optimally.

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