CRM The Must-Have Business Tool
Why Every Business Needs A Good CRM
A CRM software is a must-have tool for virtually every company. In this article, you will find out why every business venture needs a good CRM.
If you’re running a fledgling business, and haven’t leveraged CRM, there is a great chance that your sales are stagnating. Moreover, it’s highly possible that you are also struggling to retain customers. As you are not using any CRM system, it’s impossible to understand their customer needs, and satisfy those needs better than your competitors.
Typically, businesses use different methods to gain a competitive advantage. Some entrepreneurs upgrade products and services, or even lower prices. Is that enough? The answer is a big NO. You’ll always find that whatever businesses area you improve, things will remain the same as long as you neglect responsiveness, and retaining customers. That’s why it’s crucial to implement a good CRM system in place. A CRM simplifies the process of collecting, organizing, and managing customer information.
According to Salesforce, entrepreneurs who were wise enough to adopt a user-friendly CRM to gain competitive advantage are likely to reap the following benefits:
● 29% of sales increase annually,
● 34% of sales productivity,
● and 42% sales forecast accuracy.
So, in order for you to blend technology and strategy successfully, you always need a good CRM.
What is a good CRM?
A good CRM (customer relationship management) can be defined as a tool businesses can use to manage interactions with existing and potential customers. Over and above that, a CRM allows companies to manage customer relationships, plan marketing campaigns, store customer data on the cloud, and more.
A good CRM plays a huge role in acquiring and retaining customers. It doesn’t matter if your business is B2B or B2C, a startup or well-established. Its growth essentially depends on four touchpoints: Lead generation, sales activities, onboarding, quality customer support.
There are four types of CRMs that you need to know about:
Sales and Marketing Automation
Sales and Marketing CRM allows you to keep track of the sales process, record leads, compile sales forecasts, record, and do a variety of other things. Examples of Sales and Marketing CRMs include Salesforce, Hubspot, and Zoho, and SharpSpring.
One of the challenges faced by marketing managers today is sending the right message to the right potential customer. Luckily, CRM software allows you to organize and customize each message by sifting through contacts and target only certain prospects.
Operational CRM
The Operational CRM is more multipurpose than the sales and marketing CRM. You can use it to support the sales, marketing, and customer service functions simultaneously. Examples of operational CRM brands include Insightly, Salesforce, Tesco, and many others.
Analytical CRM
If you want to gain insight into your customer trends, predict behavior, and get a better understanding of their needs. This is the CRM that you need. When you have a tool like this it becomes relatively easy to upsell and cross.
Collaborative CRM
As the word tells you, collaborative CRM helps departments to collaborate. A marketer, for instance, can use this CRM to record leads, then escalate them to the sales team. The sales team will then use the CRM to collaborate with the onboarding team when a new customer needs to be onboarded.
It’s essential that you should compare features, prices, and terms before signing up with any vendor. CRMs differ greatly as far as Annual Costs and Get Started Costs are concerned. For example, Sharpspring can charge you $10200 in annual costs, whereas Hubspot charges $38400.
Some key benefits of using a good CRM include:
A good CRM helps generate qualified leads
Marketo has found that entrepreneurs that use CRM systems to nurture leads have a 50% chance of generating Marketing Qualified Leads. A good CRM allows them to drive prospects through customer journeys easily.
Over and above that, store data that will help identify patterns in customer behavior. Business owners can do lead scoring, and keep tabs with prospects who are likely to buy from you.
A good CRM allows you to improve customer’s experiences
A study conducted by Walker found that great customer experience is the number one determinant in enticing customers and retaining them. A good CRM will help you improve the customer experience so that you can exceed their expectations.
If you have CRM you’ll be able to do the following:
● You’ll get a broader knowledge of your customers’ needs, tastes, pain points, etc.
● Compile a detailed profile for each prospects,
● Improve customer services to keep your customers happy.
A good CRM allows you to segment your customers
In previous years, segmentation was one of the most costly exercises. Nowadays any business can use a CRM to segment customers without breaking the bank. You can segment customers by using location, behavior patterns, products, psychographic information, and demographic information such as age and academic background.
When your sales team contacts prospects they can easily impress them by using demographic information saved on the CRM system. For example, by mentioning a company that they work for, their profession, and, highlighting some of their pain points.
Next up, use a CRM to streamline a sales process. Here’s an example of a sales process: A tech company that offers a different purchase order solution has the following sales process: free trial, demo by one of their sales’ team, a proposal, negotiation, closing, and onboarding.
A good CRM allows departments to collaborate
A good CRM helps departments within a company to collaborate easily. Managers and subordinates across different departments can share information, bounce off ideas, assign tasks, collaborate in drafting powerful emails, and more.
Furthermore, you can use CRM to collaborate with valued customers. The support team will use CRM to track customer needs, then escalate enquiries to the technical team.
Your operations department can also use CRM to design an interaction management system that will facilitate interaction between management, the staff and customers. In the system valuable information such as prefered method of communication, prefered time, and days can be stored.
A CRM helps to optimize marketing efforts
One of the efficient ways of optimizing marketing efforts is by using a good CRM. Marketers can use it to analyze customer behavior, create messages that will drive their journey through a sales funnel.
Implementing a Good CRM
Follow the easy steps to implement an efficient CRM system in your business:
Define your pain points and CRM needs
Before investing your resources in the wrong CRM system, know what your CRM needs are. Ask yourself these questions:
● Which departments stand to benefit from using the CRM software?
● How many people will be using the CRM system?
● How much does the CRM software cost per user, and what’s your budget like?
Define your business goals
Your business goals should be clearly defined before you introduce a CRM. Ask yourself the following questions:
● What’s the customer retention rate that you’re aiming for?
● What would be your Monthly Sales Growth?
● What would be your Average Profit Margin?
Get your manager’s buy-in first
Once your business goals are well-defined, the next step will be to broach the subject to your managers. Allow them to ask you as many questions as possible, and in situations, you don’t have an answer, provide it at a later stage. Winning your manager’s buy-in will mean you won’t have the challenge of introducing a new CRM system to the rest of your team.
Have an implementation plan in place
Never make the mistake of rolling out a CRM system without having an implementation plan. The plan should reveal the following:
● Who will be responsible for implementing the CRM,
● The date when the CRM will be rolled out,
● The allocated implementation budget,
● The evaluation process that will be used.
Test it before signing up for an annual plan
Lastly, it is advisable that you test the CRM software for a couple of days before signing up for an annual package. Use the following questions to evaluate the efficiency of each CRM system.
● Is the CRM software user-friendly?
● Is it affordable?
● Can this CRM help you achieve your future growth?
● Is the CRM secure for you to store customer data?
While using a CRM has many benefits, you can’t yield the best result unless you hire a CRM specialist. To learn which CRM is right for you, reach out to Big Hit Creative today. We can help you set up, install and optimize your new Client Relationship Management process.
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