A lot of companies nowadays face different troubles that could be effectively avoided with smart use of appropriate software. With the technological development of CRM software and tools, issues like broken communication, scattered data or lack of reliable customer feedback may become a thing of the past.

Getting the right software to support your business can make a difference in some crucial details and help it grow. Properly used CRM could become central to your online operations and your business in general.

What is CRM?

So what is a CRM system anyway? Firstly, CRM collects, integrates and helps you interpret a ton of valuable customer data. This includes their browsing and purchase history on your website, social media activity, communication of customers and prospects with your company, all kinds of feedback and much more. It can also help you with the organization of your team, by tracking their performance and communication and by helping automate the workflow.

Most importantly, CRM pays off. If you prefer the language of numbers, ROI of CRM software amounts to $8.71 per every invested dollar. Let’s see why.

Workflow automation

High-quality CRM software normally offers immense help when it comes to organizing, automating and speeding up work processes. For instance, for each contact or lead, it can tell you exactly where they are in the sales funnel and even automatically create future tasks based on this information.

CRM can also help to automate your marketing efforts. It can automatically execute huge email or social campaigns. All you need to do is provide content, set triggers that are supposed to provoke the action and determine the initial parameters for segmenting the audience. This can save an enormous amount of time, as well as the money you would’ve otherwise spent on manual workforce. And also keeps you away from the dangers of human error.

Data consolidation and integration

Another huge advantage offered by CRM systems is gathering scattered data collected across multiple channels. A reliable CRM software is not only able to collect this huge amount of info, but will also process it and enable you to make an actual sense of it. Some of them can be integrated not just to your website and social networks, but virtually any application you wish, thanks to the use of API.

These integrated data also include any communication you’ve had with your customers. Having all this info about your customers and prospects will help you do a better job at segmenting them and personalizing their experience. All this further enables you to build more sustainable relationships with your customers.

Moreover, CRM ensures easy access to data from wherever you need it, whenever you need it. As much as 74 percent of CRM users claim that they have improved access to customer data thanks to the software. And having the right data about your customers and your target groups is absolutely crucial for any serious sales or marketing effort nowadays.

Real-time insights

One great thing about CRM is not only that you have access to all the necessary data, but you also have it in real-time. As soon as the user makes a purchase or sends you a message or signs up, you’ll be informed about their progress in the customer journey. This enables you to approach them or take any other appropriate action immediately. You can even set the system to take this action automatically.

It’s also extremely important that you can measure the success of your sales or marketing efforts in real-time. If things are going bad, it’s crucial that you have feedback that can help you identify the exact problem. Any business that’s expecting growth needs to be able to adapt and modify their strategies in real-time, as soon as any kind of trouble occurs.

It helps you manage your team

Last but definitely not least, you can use your CRM to track the performance of every member of your team, also in real-time. You can find all the closed deals, (un)successful campaigns, communication, lead nurture efforts, customer support issues and much more – all in one place.

This way CRM provides you with some objective criteria for rating your employees’ efforts and achievements. You can even get daily, weekly or monthly condensed reports highlighting the most important findings. Having this sort of insights can help you pick the best people and build a more efficient team. You’re not just saving a lot of money this way, you’re also largely affecting the satisfaction of your customers.

Final thoughts

All in all, a decent CRM system can help you speed your team up and improve efficiency in several areas of your business. With automated workflow and easy access to all important data, your sales team will have an easier job selling stuff, and your marketing team will be able to create and execute narrowly-targeted campaigns. It will also help your customer support teamwork faster and smoother. So if you’re still not using CRM software to manage your business, it seems like an idea definitely worth considering.