CRM keeps track of customers, potential customers, and leads. It is up to the company to decide what is tracked but common things are sales call history, sales, type of company, personal information about contacts in the company.

The personal info can be notes about what they have told you. This is where relationships come in. If you remember a birthday, names of kids, types of pets, names of pets, football team they like then you have some small talk before business talk.

Hi John it is Ralph from X Corp, is this a good time to talk?

Good, I wanted to tell you about this new widget we have but before I do I have to know, how did you get Fluffy out of the tree?