About CRM

Your customers are the life blood of your business. No matter the size of your operation, you need customers to keep the doors open, the lights on and your business growing.

Keeping track of all of these customers and their individual information as well as maintaining relationships with them can be testing. That is unless you incorporate a CRM system into the day-to-day running of your business.

What is a CRM System?

A CRM or Customer Relationship Management, in Lehman's terms is a system which stores information about your customers.

How much data you want this to cover and how intricate you want your CRM system to be however is entirely up to you.

It may be something as simple as someone's name and contact number.

Equally, it could include purchase history, marketing preferences and a record of interaction. A CRM collects data from interactions such as; email, telephone, live chat and social media and has the ability to store files, documents and additional resources.

A CRM also has the capability to integrate third party systems such as email and project management software, making it an extremely effective tool for your business to utilise.

Although the storing of information using a CRM may not seem the like the most exciting of endeavours, the way you harness this information can be. Any data stored with a CRM can be used to curate strategy around; sales, marketing and customer service with ease and professionalism.

How Does A CRM Work?

Generally, a CRM systems will be cloud based so the internet will be used to store any data instead of relying on any hardware which can often be expensive to install and maintain.

This also means that all data regarding your customers stored through your CRM will be hosted on your CRM providers servers instead of in your own premises.

When it comes to both security and convenience, then a CRM is hugely beneficial.

One of these benefits is that is seamlessly facilitates remote working.

Whether your staff are working from home or travel is part of their role, they will always be able to access vital information.

Being cloud based, any data within your CRM system will update in real time.

This allows for up-to-date and effective communication and information sharing amongst your staff no matter where they are in the world.

How Can CRM Benefit Me?

There are a vast number of ways in which a CRM can benefit your business, below we've listed just a few of the key ways in which a CRM can improve your output today.

How Can CRM Benefit Me?

Almost like a cheat sheet, a CRM gives your team a competitive edge when it comes to understanding your customer base.

With in-depth customer information at their fingertips, personalisation of customer communication and interaction becomes a simple task.

Any and all interaction that you have with customers can be saved on your CRM system giving your team the most current and in-depth information available.

Improved Customer Retention

Customer retention features such as appointment reminders and follow up email notifications can be included as features with a CRM system.

A CRM also prompts you to reach out to existing customers who haven't been contacted for a while and could be feeling neglected by your business.

Always remember that customer retention is always much more profitable than acquiring new customers.

In fact it is believed that 80% of your future profits will come from 20% of your existing customers.

Understanding Customer Needs

If you track the buying habits of your customers using a CRM then you will have a clearer understanding of their needs.

With this information, cross/upselling becomes a much easier task than without it.

This can allow for a clearer understanding of how to anticipate customer needs allowing productivity with your sales team.

More Effective Communication

Keeping your customers happy is key for the success of any business. We've already discussed how much they can contribute to your finances. Communicating effectively is one of the best ways that you can gauge a customer's happiness with your business and what needs to be addressed to improve/maintain this relationship. A CRM saves both you and your customers time with a series of customisable, ready-to-use templates for:

• Email
• Letters
• Documents
• Proposals
• Invitations
• Newsletters
• & More

Who Can Use CRM?

There are 3 main teams that can improve their performance by using a CRM.

These teams are:

• Sales
• Marketing
• Customer Service

CRM For Sales

A CRM is designed primarily with sales in mind, providing customer information that is everything your sales team needs to succeed.

Priority lead scoring and a dynamic pipeline with drag-and-drop features allows for a streamlined approach to sales.

CRM For Marketing

If you use email marketing, then the templates mentioned can make this process a much easier task for you marketing team.

These can be sent in bulk to both all or a specific demographic of your choice.

Collecting data the monitor effectiveness of your marketing strategy is also a bonus of a CRM.

Who opened your correspondence? Did they click, if they did where? Detailed insights such as these are all features of CRM that can benefit your businesses marketing team.

CRM For Customer Services

As mentioned multiple times already, keeping your customers happy is key priority for any business.

A CRM can help your customer service teams track metrics such as customer loyalty or agent performances amongst others.

Here you can dig down in to the heart of what makes your business tick.

Like sales, a CRM prioritises the most pressing issues first, allowing for the right people to be contacted at the right time.

All information about a client is easily accessible via a CRM system allowing your agent to be prepared before they can even pick up a phone.

Appropriate For All Business Sizes

No matter what the size of your business, a CRM can aid with your day-to-day operations.

Here's a quick guide to help you find what you're looking for.

CRM For Small Businesses

If your business is on the smaller side then you won't be requiring an all singing all dancing system and as such, will be best off getting one of the more basic CRM systems.

The required level of customer support needed, ease of use and a suitable storage limit are all essential to even the most basic CRM system.

CRM For Medium-Large Businesses

With increased staff and demands, comes a need for a more sophisticated system.

Consumer support that isn't 24/7 could cause major headaches if you deal with international clients or operate out of standard business hours.

There will also be an increased need for your business to access more intricate analytics for optimum performance.

Sales forecasting, email tracking and business intelligence are just some of the features that you can access through CRM that are perfect for these sized businesses.

Naturally, the larger the business, the larger the client base. This means that you will also be looking for a CRM system with a much larger storage allocation.

CRM For Medium-Large Businesses

With increased staff and demands, comes a need for a more sophisticated system.

Consumer support that isn't 24/7 could cause major headaches if you deal with international clients or operate out of standard business hours.

There will also be an increased need for your business to access more intricate analytics for optimum performance.

Sales forecasting, email tracking and business intelligence are just some of the features that you can access through CRM that are perfect for these sized businesses.

Naturally, the larger the business, the larger the client base. This means that you will also be looking for a CRM system with a much larger storage allocation.

CRM For The Giants Of Business

A CRM isn't just for independent businesses, even the worlds biggest and best multi-national corporations out there use a CRM as part of their day to day lives.

Amazon and Google are just two of the heavyweights out there who have built themselves a reputation of providing personalized approaches to their customers.

All with a CRM at the heart of their journey to becoming the best.

How Much Does A CRM System Cost?

Typically, a CRM system is paid for on a per month, per use basis.

Cost will generally range from £10 - £240 and will depend on a range of factors.

Features: CRM providers will generally offer a series of "tiers" of pricing which will come with a variety of features. Naturally the more features and the more advanced the system is, the higher the cost will be.

Capacity: The larger your business, the larger capacity CRM system will be required.

Product: A CRM for sales and service teams will generally be more affordable as they are more common. Marketing packages, due to them being more niche and technical will be more costly.

Marketing deals tend to be at a fixed monthly rate as opposed to a per user basis.

Great for larger teams. Less so for smaller ones.

Additionally, there are free-to-use CRM systems available.

Be warned however that like most things in life, you get what you pay for when it comes to a CRM system and we wholeheartedly advise that you avoid these if you are wanting the optimum CRM experience.

How Can I Get A CRM System?

Hopefully that's cleared up some questions that you may have regarding how a CRM system can help your business.

Now the last one you most likely have, is "how can I get a CRM system"? Well, the process couldn't be simpler; all you have to do is click the "Get Quote" button to start comparing prices.

This is an absolutely free service and there's no obligation to commit, so click the button, follow the prompts and get comparing now.