5 signs that it's time to automate your customer data
Do you know who your best customers are?
Better yet, do you know if customers are slip-sliding away or returning to buy anew? Are they costing you more in time and services than they actually spend?
It's tough to stay on top of such data. Salespeople tend to keep contacts and leads in their heads, if you can even persuade them to share. Accounting is often overloaded or outsourced. Customer service typically works overtime. Maybe you're feeling growing pains.
If so, it's likely time to consider customer relationship management (CRM) software. Such programs automatically track and manage customer information. That gives you the ability to move information where and when you need it, whether to analyze, slice and dice or market. The latest Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 also fully integrates with all Microsoft Office applications, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook, offering seamless advantages.
"Small businesses can use CRM to record the details of every client contact," says business coach Michelle Neujahr, based in Yarmouth, Maine. "Templates within a CRM software program allow you to tailor letters, create newsletters and send e-mails. Staying in touch is as easy as a few clicks."
In fact, after some earlier releases proved more trouble for smaller companies than they were worth, CRM programs have been re-engineered to be more intuitive and small-business friendly. The up side of installing CRM definitely is on the rise.
Telltale signs that CRM might come in handy
If any of these scenarios hits a nerve, it makes sense to check out potential benefits of the latest CRM programs for your company.
1. The cleaning crew swept up the Post-It that had all your contacts and notes for a deal you're putting together."As soon as a business starts to collaborate around customers, in terms of sales, services or marketing, it’s time to consider a CRM system," says Brad Wilson, general manager for Microsoft Dynamics CRM.Instead of isolated bits of data on each staffer's hard drive, in paper files in drawers or scribbled on a blizzard of sticky notes around the office, a CRM application centralizes information and serves it up for multiple users. Everyone — or only the few you select — gains access to shared data and analysis. Each user can then add notes, figures or comments about all meetings, sales or marketing efforts at every customer touch point, even from remote or mobile locations. Imagine how much that eases follow-up calls, deal-closing and next-step actions or decisions.
2. You're reinventing the wheel every time you launch a marketing campaign.Once your business is up-and-running, you need to be consistent about operational processes, financial and staff management and marketing efforts. Typically, that's when CRM becomes cost-effective. Business and technology consultant Anne Stanton, based in Norwich, Vt., describes one 10-employee retail client who sells lots of electronics products."Every time they launched a marketing campaign about an upgrade or a new product that might interest some customers, they had to go into the accounting system and figure out who they sold the product to and who might be interested," she says. "Then they had to type the contact information into an Excel spreadsheet to start the marketing effort. Three months later, they had to do it all over again. They were wasting days every time they launched a marketing campaign."CRM, of course, puts such information at your fingertips. Once the company installed CRM, they could create lists of customers and generate postcards to mail the same day.
3. You're spending endless time and energy on meetings designed to bring everyone up to speed.With everyone in the loop via real-time collective access, CRM programs frequently cut the time and resources spent on communications or handoffs for collaborative projects. Sales, support or accounting staff can note actions, solve problems or add services within the CRM forms or fields. Just remember that the program is only as timely and valuable as the data entered into it. "CRM only works if users are accountable and everyone buys into it," says Jeff Karpel, owner of Karpel Computer Systems, an IT consultancy in St. Louis.
4. You don't know whether customer e-mail requires immediate response or back-burner priority.With instant access to customer information, you know as soon as an e-mail lands whether you're hearing from a valued customer or from a deadbeat that's been ignoring the bill for months."Microsoft CRM 3.0 has seamless integration with Outlook and MS Accounting," says consultant Stanton. "That makes training and adoption by users much easier." You can move from CRM screens to Outlook and back again, without feeling as if you've switched programs.
5. You're squandering opportunities for new business development.Many companies now rely on some sort of sales contact application to manage customer relationships. These programs tend to be flat lists that handle scheduling and contact data. They're certainly useful for customer prospecting and sales contacts. But they are not particularly efficient in leveraging the customer relationship."They can't manage a customer to the individual level," says Jeni Kaiser, spokeswoman for Atlas Travel International, a travel and meeting planner based in Milford, Mass. To fuel growth, Atlas installed a CRM system that uses a Web-based interface, customized by its chief technology officer, Rock Blanco. The program allows every employee access to information that can service every one of their customers."Atlas attributes part of its 64% growth over the past year to its superior CRM tool," says Kaiser.If you are attracted to CRM's benefits, be careful not to do too much too fast. Most programs offer dozens of features and options that you can activate or not, depending on your company's needs and pace."You can always make the system more complicated later," says Microsoft's Wilson. "The problem won't be that the system can't handle it. What might happen is that people won't have a clear understanding of what they want to do. Wait 30 days or so and get some feedback so you can evolve over time."