What Is A CRM, And Why Do I Need It?
When people talk about CRM, they are referring to a CRM system or tool that helps with contact management, sales management, productivity, and the like.
You need it because nothing about business is simple anymore. And you have multiple people dealing with multiple projects, businesses and processes, and you can’t afford to have (projects, promises, rewards programs, new business programs, goals, profit margins, and/or customer relationships) fall between the cracks.
When you use CRM technology, the system is specifically set up to help you stay on top of – and coordinate — how you do what you do. That’s why we say that the ultimate goal of a CRM is to improve profitability by maintaining better relationships. That’s really it, in a nutshell.
Who needs a CRM?
Just about any business that utilizes sales, customer service, business development, recruiting, marketing, or any other line of business. The more irons you have in the fire, the more you need a way to manage the irons to keep that fire burning brighter.
So, specifically your CRM might let you store customer and prospect contact information, identify sales opportunities, record service issues, and manage marketing campaigns, all in one central location (generally, the cloud). Your CRM can also make all information about every customer interaction available to anyone at your company who might need it.
So, looking at a CRM that way, with immediate visibility and quick access to data, you can see how collaborative the system can be. The more collaborative it is, the more informational it is, the more likely CRM can be used to increase productivity. That’s the beauty of the thing.
Getting on the CRM bandwagon
CRM is gaining a lot of momentum. And yes, your organization will want to use this resource, especially if you plan to share information, grow revenue, and add clients and staff in the future.
CRM is great to help target sales, business objectives, and get and share up-to-date, reliable information on your progress. It can also help translate streams of data coming in from multiple platforms like sales, customer service, marketing, and social media monitoring.
At FocalPoint, for instance, we provide business-appropriate CRM solutions to help our customers imbed their marketing into their business. Some clients use our CRM to better understand the pipeline of sales or prospects coming in, or to help forecast marketing data for the next quarter. It can also provide clear visibility of every opportunity or lead, to the actual sale.
FocalPoint can customize CRM to just about any type of business, managing inquiry across channels without losing track, and providing sales, service, and marketing a single view of every customer.
Bottom line?
Business is getting more and more complicated. Marketing is multi-channel and often fragmented. The world is increasingly data-driven, and your clients expect accurate information follow-up quickly. If not, they go somewhere else.
Our CRM systems can help automate administrative tasks, like data entry and lead, or service case routing, so you can free up time for what’s most important to your administration.
So, a CRM crafted around your business saves you time and money.
Let’s talk about what our cloud-based, custom CRM can do to help streamline your business.
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