Anyone in business long enough can tell you the importance of a good CRM system. The main issue of a good CRM is cost.
First: What is CRM?
Client Relations Management. It handles phone calls, emails, chats, social media interaction, marketing, sales, customer complaints, client records, client information and anything related to your client in business. As your business grows you'll find that data does as well. Managing, organizing, retrieval, and accuracy of this data is crucial to any business. It's a make or break situation. Grow too fast and your systems will drag you down and bog down your employees with endless searching.
Let me ask you. How long would it take for you to accurately report how many leads you have and where they are in the sales process? If your answer isn't in minutes you need to update your system. How about what are the interests of your top clients? You may think this isn't important until you realize you just ran a $50,000 TV ad that no one even cared about and had no increase in sales.
The largest companies such as Google, Amazon, Facebook and YouTube on the planet are all about client data. The more data you have the stronger your company becomes. You see if you know what your top client's interests are you can target ads directly at others that are interested in the same topics. This will not only bring you clients but more top clients.
A good CRM system will help you stay organized. Business owner's around the world are constantly unsure if everything is taken care of. We live in a reality of uncertainty. This causes major stress and can really hurt your business and put a strain on your family. Let's think about it this way. How would it feel to be able to look at a dashboard at the end of the day seeing that everything is handled? Might that give you the ability go home and really be present with your children and spouse?
Let's talk solutions.
Free CRMs: Yes, Free!!! Everyone loves free. The issue is these are not custom to your business and are clanky and slow. It doesn't sound like much when your phone employee has to wait 10 seconds to load a client's information, but over time this free system is going to cost you big.
Pre Packaged CRM: Lots of amazing features. Works out of the box. The issue is it wasn't built for your business. You'll have to create workarounds and on top of that, you'll have to train every new employee on these workarounds.
Spreadsheets: Oh, these are my favourites. Now imagine a spreadsheet with 3000 clients. How long does it take to get any information out of those? Let's build a report LOL.
Custom Built CRM: Want to talk about pricey. This is a great solution if you have all the money and time in the world. Not only will it cost you an arm and a leg it will take years to implement.
Salesforce: Many hear the word Salesforce and cringe at the price. It is an expensive solution and also can be costly because an in-house Salesforce admin is usually needed. But, consider this, billions have been spent on development. The user interface is second to none. They are actually using an AI names Einstein on the back end now. Einstien will literally rate your leads for you. Analyze the interest of your top clients in seconds. The time you'll save will make it well worth every penny. If employed correctly Salesforce can actually save you money by freeing up your workforce to concentrate on what they are good at. Now don't just jump in and go purchase Salesforce. Explore your options. One great solution that I have recently become acquainted with is an outsourced Salesforce Department and Development company named Vye Consulting . Now imagine not only putting the best CRM system to work for you, but having an expert team to build and maintain that system.
I'll tell you if you are planning on growing, want to make your customers happy, need to automate redundant processes, want accurate real-time reporting, and simply want to go home knowing that your business is handled. Salesforce combined with Vye Consulting is your best option. This is how you compete with the giants Amazon, Ebay, T-Mobile, US Bank, Farmers Insurance and much more. After all, these giants of industry are already using Salesforce.