Overview

CRM (Customers-Relations-Management) sounds like a big term, but in reality, it is an essential and beneficial component for businesses of all sizes, that manage a customer database in some form. Businesses that leverage CRM systems to manage their customer relations and sales process have an edge over those that haven’t adopted a system in their sales process.

What is a CRM?

CRM is a system that you can implement in your business to streamline sales and marketing functions, to help your sales and marketing resources perform their tasks efficiently.

If you are a start up company, you may not feel a pressing need to have a system in place. When your business starts to boom, you will be spending a lot of time tracking your sales process, if you don’t have a system in place. 75% of the sales managers say that CRM helps drive and increase sales, as well as improve customer retention by 27%. You can not afford to take these numbers lightly.

Consider these 4 benefits a CRM offers to streamline your Sales & Marketing process:

1. Better Lead Intelligence for Both Marketing and Sales
2. Better Sales and Marketing (Smarketing) Alignment
3. Help Sales Prioritize its Pipeline
4. Closed-Loop Reporting Lets Marketers Improve Campaigns

If you are shopping around for a CRM, look for these 9 must-have features:

1. Contact Management
2. Deal Stages
3. Daily Dashboard
4. Task Management
5. Content Repository
6. Automated Data Capture
7. Reporting
8. Mobile
9. Integration with Marketing Automation

There are several systems in the market that you may want to look into. You can signup for trial versions of these for free before you decide on the one that fits your business sales and marketing needs. Here are some to start with:

• SharpSpring
• HubSpot
• Zoho
• SugarCRM
• Insightly
• Microsoft Dynamic365

If you need more information on implementing a CRM in your business, DOWNLOAD THE FREE eBOOK TODAY.

About the Author

Kalpana Murthy, President/CEO at WSI Plano, DBA Kriti Web Solutions, LLC. is a Digital Strategist, Consultant, Speaker/Trainer, & Software Engineer who is passionate about bringing affordable technology solutions to businesses to build online presence. Kalpana Murthy is a certified partner with Google, HubSpot, Sharp Spring, SEMRush and other digital solution providers.