CRM is customer relationship management. “Customer is the king of any business, and CRM is the tool that builds and enhances the customer relationships.”
The management guru Peter Drucker said “the purpose of the business is to create and keep customers.” CRM took its shape in the early 1990s. The first functions offered by the CRM software were contact management, sales force automation and database marketing.
CRM provides deep insights that optimizes the business in an impeccable way. It streamlines the business operations and enhances the marketing, sales and customer support functions that maximizes the productivity and profitability of a business.
Functions of CRM Software
CRM plays a vital role in building the business in any given scenario. There are certain functions a CRM software should have. These functionalities make CRM a wholesome software that your business needs.
1.Lead management
Managing the leads is important for any business, as it is the first step in the sales cycle. CRM software is a magical tool that captures the leads from multiple sources such as phone calls, social media platforms, emails, web forms and chats.
The business can ensure that they do not lose any leads during the process. One can focus on the lead generation, lead scoring and qualifying the leads in an effective way. The business can also decide on the marketing efforts to track the progress of the leads along the sales cycle.
2.Contact management
Contact management helps record the information of the customers such as name, address, their email id, phone number, social media account details. All the data is put in a searchable database which allows for easy access and data retrieval. The contact database helps save time and effort for the sales team. They don’t have to remember or search for each and every detail in the system.
3.Email
Email is considered the most important channel for any B2B communication. With CRM, the business can send bulk mails, track the email conversations, plan for drip email campaigns and send automated emails to clients on their birthdays and anniversaries.
Also read: A Comprehensive List of 9 Best CRM Companies in the USA!
Today the CRM software can be integrated with Gmail or Outlook, which is considered essential for the buyers.
4.Reporting and analytics
Reporting and analytics is very much needed for the basic business functions such as sales, marketing and customer support. CRM offers advanced reporting and analytics capabilities that help track the metrics such as profitability, customer acquisition and effectiveness of the campaigns. One can have a high level view on how the business is performing based on the different metrics. The features also helps you create reports that might be helpful in making collaborative decisions across different teams.
5.Marketing
Marketing is considered the backbone for any business. The marketing process involves deciding on the target market, generating leads, qualifying & nurturing those leads, launching the marketing campaigns and finally tracking the campaign performance. The marketing function covers important concepts such as content marketing, marketing automation and marketing management. With CRM marketing automation, the marketers can deliberately reduce the costs and improvise their marketing efforts.
6.Workflow automation
CRM enhances the workflow of the business by automating the processes using rules, if else triggers. One can automate the repetitive workload and thus can save a lot of time and effort. Workflow automation ensures that right actions are being completed at every stage of the sales cycle.
7.Pipeline management
The businesses can use the sales pipeline to visualize the entire sales cycle , which includes viewing how the prospects are moving down the funnel, overview of sales rep achievement on the quotas, and the overall sales team performance. If the company has multiple products, they can create multiple sales pipelines to compare the volume of sales for different products. With the sales pipeline, one can know which deals are performing well and which ones are not.
8.Document management
Document management is one important function that helps to create files and documents which one can access, edit and share across multiple teams from the CRM system directly. One can focus on the security of the documents by providing access and editing rights.
9.Activity management
A business usually has to manage a lot of routine activities and functions such as notifications, task management, reminders, notes and some other alerts. Keeping control over the activities is important as the businesses cannot afford to skip the activities at any cost. One needs to make sure that the tasks are completed on time without any hassles.
10.Forecasting
Estimating the future sales or revenue by analyzing the past and present data trends is known as forecasting. CRM system improves the forecasting model by letting the sales team analyze and test different scenarios that help in accurate prediction. One can also chart out different strategies that would support the future sales cycle based on the forecasting model.
- Improve customer relationships
With CRM customer service automation, the businesses can improve and enhance customer relationships in an effective way. The CRM keeps track of the tickets, the escalation history, customer queries, the cases and the solutions associated with the problems. This indeed enhances the customer service across the organization.
12.Options for customization
Each company is different and has unique requirements when it comes to a CRM system. Easily customizable CRM platform will be a suited solution for any business today. The businesses look for a flexible CRM solution with highly customizable options that caters to their needs. They might look for the solution to sync with their OS, or the layouts as per their preferences, the kind of data they want to manage and so on.
“Looking for a CRM solution with all the desired functionalities for your business? Apptivo is the solution that fits just right for any business!! Apptivo is a cloud suite of integrated business solutions that offers multiple functionalities and capabilities that streamlines the workflow and enhances the productivity of your business in an unimaginable manner.
Bottom line
The ultimate job of a CRM solution is to build the business towards a next level with minimal human effort and time. With an investment in a CRM solution,the businesses will be able to perform their workflow with greater efficiency and speed. CRM is one useful tool for all the businesses irrespective of their size and type and definitely an effective platform that one can use to scale their needs and requirements.
