ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT QUARTERLY
FINALIST
GREATER DANDENONG CITY COUNCIL / URBAN ENTERPRISE“ Monitor CRMs”
The City of Greater Dandenong engaged Urban Enterprise to enter into a partnership to develop a cloud based Customer Relationship Management( CRM) system to specifically meet the needs of economic development practitioners in maintaining an online business database, engaging with businesses and reporting on engagements undertaken.
economy and there is remarkable seasonal volatility to it, there are problems with applying traditional methods to calculating local expenditure, floorspace demand and employment. Usual approaches rely on simple per capita assumptions, or require extensive, regular and costly surveys. Even so there are problems such as human error, reporting bias and no insight into seasonal variation.
Since its launch in April 2017, Monitor CRMS is now being used by three Local Governments, with many others interested in exploring the application of the software.
Monitor CRMS is the first CRM to be designed specifically to meet the needs of local economic development practitioners. Key features of the system include:
• Monitor CRMS allows the user to easily manage their business and contact directory in one place through a user-friendly interface, drawing on the Australian Business Register. Directory changes are automatically saved allowing the user to keep track of all changes.
• Monitor CRMS provides a comprehensive set of tools for engaging, tracking and recording interactions with businesses and contacts. This tool will allow Councils to engage with businesses and contacts directly and record quick engagements or notes next to a specific contact.
• Monitor CRMS can easily report in line with EDA’ s Vic SPN proposed performance measures and reporting framework as well as reporting on a host of other engagements and industry measures.
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT INITIATIVES – RURAL & REMOTE
WINNER
GEOGRAFIA“ Small Town, Big Data”
Known for the white sands of Cable Beach, the Shire of Broome sought to update its Local Commercial Strategy to guide and inform medium to long-term land use planning and development. As tourism makes up a significant share of its
A collaboration between the Shire, Geografia and planning firm SITE used bank transaction data as a new and innovative input to forecasting economic activity and floorspace demand. In doing so, contributing to the growing toolset of evidence-based economic development practitioners everywhere.
This work showcases how‘ big data’ can be used even by smaller councils in relatively standard local
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