After choosing and rolling out a CRM system, many businesses will leave it at that. But are they really making the most of their system? The answer for most businesses is “probably not.” The CRM system should be the main tool for your sales and marketing departments. It needs to be kept up to date, just not with the data it holds, but also how it is set up. Then you can make the maximum use of the data it holds.
If we’ve learned anything the past few years, it’s this: sales and marketing no longer exist in silos; they can’t afford to. According to Forbes, businesses who fully utilize their CRM systems increase sales by 29 percent. In a rough economy, it’s those little touches that a CRM system can bring to the table that allows companies to better serve their customers, but if CRM isn’t integrated with the back end financial data, companies aren’t getting a full view of their customers.
Contacts Journal is a simple CRM software solution that works across the iPad and iPhone. Each time a client meeting occurs, the program can take down meeting notes, display records of past conversations and set dates for future meetings.
Intelestream CRM is a CRM software solution with a wide number of features to guide users throughout the sales cycle. At the start, the program can run full marketing campaigns and target messages by segments. As users enter leads into the product database, they can track all interactions, send out quotes and ultimately close deals.
If you’ve written off email marketing as being ineffective, you may want to think again. Email is one way you can stay in touch with your real estate database and remain “top of mind,” quickly and easily. It’s much more cost effective than many other marketing channels, such as direct mail and print advertising, and much of it can be automated.
Leveraging functionalities that are beyond a system’s scope is like trying to put a square peg in a round hole. Although the peg will never fit, many companies attempt to push their systems far beyond their originally intended scope in an effort to wring out every last bit of potential savings. Contrary to the integration craze, sometimes two solutions are better than one. Joe Alphonse states his case for separating contract management from CRM.
No doubt, managing a business in this age of globalization and global competition isn’t a cakewalk. Moreover, continuous increases in expenditures have encouraged companies to opt into investing in managed services, including CRM outsourcing.
Act! is a CRM and email marketing software solution that helps users organize all lead details in a centralized location. At the start, users can easily pull up details for all open opportunities and leads. The program can then maintain sales reps’ calendars, meetings and upcoming tasks.
Swiftpage Saleslogix is a CRM software solution that provides a complete view over all interactions a company has had with customers. The program can help users collaborate together in the areas of closing sales and providing customer support. Meanwhile, the system observes all open sales data, can generate forecasts and shows sales pipelines at a variety of geographic levels. The product also suggests ways users can convert a lead, and users can easily import marketing data into the CRM database.
Banckle CRM is a web-based CRM software solution that helps users organize all their customer data. Upon logging into the program, users can see all sales-related developments and events on a real-time dashboard. From there, users can manage tasks, pull up customer data and interaction histories, communicate with customers and update records.