Addressing Pressing Needs

Contact management is sometimes the most pressing need that drives people to seek out customer relationship management software, but as many sales and marketing managers have discovered, there are other built-in functions that complement the contact management tools in CRM.

Evaluating the health of the sales pipeline often comes down to separating optimistic (or "wishful" depending on your mood) thinking from the reality of actually closing the sale. This evaluation can be difficult for someone who's not physically present during the sales process. CRM systems can give sales managers complete access to all the pertinent information on the lead and on what the sales person has done with them already. If handled right, spotting a problem and coaching a sales person will actually increase morale, and close rates.

Performance Indicators

When it comes to sales compensation and keeping the eagles flying, there's nothing like "one version of the truth" for sales managers and sales people to work from. Key performance indicators are built in to the more advanced CRM systems so that sales performance isn't judged solely on the bottom line. Bottom line is vital of course, but it doesn't always tell the whole story.

When the sales cycles are too long it's hard to review performance based purely on sales for that period. In a team-selling environment as well, the person who visits the client to evaluate their needs and writes the proposal can't be held to the same benchmark as the person responsible for closing the deal.

Performance indicators can also help make it obvious to sales people what they need to work on, and where in the selling process they need to pay extra attention.

An inevitable part of the world of sales is churn-the best way to make smooth transitions for new employees is to give them all the information they need in a standardized way. Not only does this get new employees ramped up, it makes sure that unresolved issues don't get dropped, and that the customer doesn't have to start their relationship from scratch. If they do, chances are much better they'll stick with the sales person, not the company.

Sales and More

Sales-making more of them to new and existing clients, more efficiently-is central to CRM, but Customer Relationship Management technology can help a number of different departments operate better.

The marketing department, in conjunction with the executives in charge of corporate strategy, can figure out how to best use precious marketing dollars to reach new customers. The snapshot of the customer that CRM provides can also give insight into how customers perceive the company, and if the brand's value proposition is being heard in the noisy market place.

Customer service employees, at contact centers or out in the field, can have the most up-to-date information on a customer's needs. A CRM system will not only have the case history of a customer, but will often have embedded procedures for diagnosing a problem and information about the customer's product to help an agent quickly resolve the issue.

Three Ways to Plug in to CRM

How a company wants to access CRM is completely up to them. There are a number of online CRM vendors who offer feature-rich, hassle-free products for a monthly subscription fee. When shopping around, keep in mind that "online," "hosted," and "on demand" are used interchangeably, and all mean the same thing. Some vendors offer wide-ranging packages that are useful for general business needs. A few CRM companies offer industry-specific hosted CRM, best for companies that have complicated, industry-specific business processes.

A business can host the CRM package on their own computers if they want. Online systems are extremely secure, but sometimes companies prefer, for legal or public relations reasons, to skip online systems. There are more upfront costs with an in-house CRM package, but if a company is confident in their vendor it can be cheaper in the long run to buy a system outright.

Hybrid CRM is a new development in the world of Customer Relationship Management. A company can test out a vendor's CRM system online, with very little commitment and risk. If they like what they see, they can move some, or all of their CRM components in-house. Companies who go this route find that it's more convenient to leave some functions online so that their field agents can access them from any computer, and leave other functions, related to accounting, billing, or marketing, in-house.