We have been implementing CRM solutions since 1997 and we have seen so many scenarios of why you would need to invest in a CRM solution. So, if you don’t have a CRM solution here are the reasons why you need one!
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is key for any business whether you are B2B or B2C. Looking after clients and ensuring you “know” them is pivotal and that’s how Customer Relationship Management systems were borne, to help businesses to provide the right messages for the right customers at the right times.
If you are working with clients daily and you have several touchpoints with them, then you need a CRM. If you have a sales process, an operational process and marketing activity then the likelihood is a CRM solution is required.
Do I really need CRM?
Here are my top 10 reasons why you need a CRM solution:
- Leads are being generated and lost or forgotten
This one is a huge loss of time and money. Lead generation takes time and energy and losing a lead because it isn’t logged, or someone forgets to follow them up is not great business practice. Make sure the leads are opted into marketing and they have requested to receive information from you.
- Prospects’ nurture is ineffective
If you have a list of prospects but you are not managing them well, then a CRM solution will take away all that pain. Ensuring you know what they are interested in and who they are will ensure that you can follow them up and keep close to them at every stage of their consideration of using your services or buying products from you.
- Do you know your clients?
Over the years we have seen so many scenarios, but do you really know your clients? Do you know just one primary contact, or do you have several contacts and relationships? Are they happy? Are they still working with you and using your services? Have they stopped interacting with you? How many clients do you have? When was the last time you spoke with your clients and contacts in one business? if you can’t answer these questions then you need a CRM solution and it’s possible you are missing valuable relationship opportunities. A CRM solution can help you to notice any client that may be feeling unloved, or that has stopped buying from you when they always did. Good CRM solutions will notify the right people in your organisation to take action, thank a client, speak with them…
- You are working on Spreadsheets
If you are working on spreadsheets moving the data across as a client moves through the sales funnel. Stop. This is fraught with error and manual intervention. I can guarantee you will duplicate clients and the data impact of this, and the customer experience will be poor.
- You spend a day a month (or more) creating reports
If you spend a day or more a month creating the same reports a CRM system will give you that day back and more! What’s not to like about that? Using dashboards and other reporting you can see the data daily, weekly, monthly… This will save time and enable you to make decisions using the right up to date data. Data you can trust.
- “They say they sent the quote”
If you have people in your organisation that say they sent the quote, they sent the email, they sent the follow up then they did, right? I am not suggesting for one moment that CRM solutions should be a big brother (that’s what gave them a bad name in the 80’s) no, not at all. What I am saying is that should your business need that information to show the client you didn’t forget them, or that the agent who was working with them has left or is away, the business is armed with information and can ensure they can continue to help that client which provides the opportunity to offer excellent customer satisfaction. To have the data at your finger-tips is crucial.
- Several sources of data
Do you have one single source of data? Having data across several owners in various spreadsheets, documents, cloud storage or several solutions is not easy to manage. Ensuring the data is cleansed and not duplicated in that scenario can be difficult. CRM solutions have come a long way and today can be the interface to so many data structures. Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Sales and Customer Service, for example expands using integrated solutions from Microsoft to expedite and get closer to clients as well as offering one single doorway into the data. Monolithic CRM solutions that claim to do everything don’t work!
- Connected Data
Number 7 brings me nicely onto connected data. You can integrate and marry up your CRM solution with your ERP solution, reporting, chat solutions, websites and more. And getting this right offers the opportunity for your business to pivot and grow. Getting the right system to do the right job in a connected way will provide you with connected data that starts to provide a full view of your business removing silos and blinkers. It also will help to have just one digital tool. According to Microsoft, In 2020, 37% of employees said there were too many digital tools to use at work. By designing a CRM solution properly, you can ensure that the digital tools are speaking with each other and you can reduce the number that are used or are deemed to be used. What I mean by this is your users could be using one system, not CRM, via the CRM doorway and therefore expanding the data experience in one system! Seriously this works.
- You do the same thing again and again…
Groundhog day at work is not a good thing! If you are doing the same task again and again there is a chance it can be automated. If you are sending the same communication and remembering to do so for different clients at different times it can be put into a workflow. The beauty of a CRM solution that has been implemented correctly is that the client receiving the communication still feels the communication is personal to them. And that’s essential to get closer to your clients.
- Your customer service is coming up short
According to Thinkjar, it is 6 to 7 times more expensive to attract a new customer than it is to retain an existing one. And according to Marketing Metrics, the probability of selling to an existing customer is up to 14 times higher than the probability of selling to a new customer. Therefore, looking after clients is key and an opportunity to do that is to make sure that your customer service is tip top. This can be on your account management tasks but also on your support tasks should you offer that service. Having everything in one system really makes sense and offers you the opportunity to ensure that the communications are joined up and you truly understand your clients. If spending more time managing customer complaints is the situation, then a CRM solution will certainly provide answers and solve that pain. Good CRM solutions, that are suitable to scale with your business, can route calls to agents, aid scheduling and manage SLAs so you never miss a promise to your client.
But how do you know if investing in a CRM solution is a worthwhile investment?
It is if you implement it properly. Not only will it resolve the problems outlined above and provide demonstrable change and growth, but it will revolutionise your business providing real-time insights and saving you time, which in turn will allow you to focus on what you do best; your business.
Take a look at our testimonials, we do CRM and we do it well!
Find out more:
See our guide to implementing CRM solutions
The value of a CRM implementation can only be measured when you have the right expertise to deliver the solution to your precise needs. Ensuring that your processes and your business communications are working in unison in CRM is what we do best. Contact us for more information.
Blog written by Catherine Carlyle who has been working implementing CRM solutions since 2009.