The last couple of years for small businesses have been difficult. We have all had to readjust how we live and work — many times on the fly. For companies focused on growing and sustaining their customer bases, Customer Relationship Management (CRM) solutions have become critical tools.
How CRM Software Helps Small Business
Let’s start with your customer. When it comes to customer successes — and failures — you probably have a lot of data to track. This gives you the power to pinpoint your successful strategies and systems. But first, you need a good way to organize, share, and understand that data.
CRM platforms help businesses of all sizes connect data from sales representatives, track leads, and solve challenges. A successful platform simplifies the business process to help customer relationship management. It also enables you to analyze your data and create reports to improve the decision-making process. You should be able to automate processes to make them more accessible, track employee performance, and monitor the market for the latest trends.
A successful CRM platform can improve your customer’s experience as well as your staff’s performance. By creating a 360 view of your customer base, your team will be prepared for every meeting and know how to handle stumbling blocks.
A good CRM platform will also provide you with an app store to access hundreds of applications for everything from invoicing to social media to customer service tools. This removes more manual processes between teams through automated data flows. It also makes it easier to scale. Growing with your small business is critical, as you don’t want to have to recreate your data under a new platform when you exceed your goals.
CRM Must-Haves for Small Businesses
Starting a small business is not an undertaking for the faint of heart. Often, founders spend much of their time perfecting their product or service and use whatever tools and services are available.
For sales teams, this translates to utilizing spreadsheets or external email solutions. For these businesses, a CRM platform helps centralize and automate tasks, like finding potential customers through lead generation tools. You can even go as far as automating business processes tied to sales, marketing, and customer service.
What small businesses should look for in a CRM and lead management platform:
- Keep your sales activities organized and prepared for your next call or meeting
- Drive demand with lead scoring, personalized campaigns, and automated lead nurturing flows
- Empower customer service to resolve issues faster with built-in chatbots
- Access data when you need it on any device — no more syncing or exporting data between systems
- Collaborate better with your teammates on a centralized platform
- Clear and concise reporting for your entire business at your fingertips
Small Business CRM Software Considerations
Built-In Training
Nothing’s worse than launching a new tool you have such high hopes for just to face painfully low adoption rates among your team. Most of the time, this indicates an easily fixed problem — users just need training. You don’t want to spend days on training, but you also want to ensure that your team can utilize the necessary components for your small business to run and grow.
Find consultants that can help your small business decide the best workflow, build your custom implementation, and then teach you how to leverage it. Connect with someone who understands that this software is an asset that will grow with your business. Pick the technology that can automatically update with new iterations and enhances its products while keeping your data and customizations in place.
App Integrations
Whether you use popular file-sharing services like Dropbox or email marketing applications like MailChimp, you’ll want your new technology to work with you. Instead of having to sign up for proprietary software in addition to your new CRM integration software, make sure that you are using programs that integrate with your existing technology.
Click Seamlessly with Your Digital Transformation Goals
Maybe CRM software isn’t the only component of your digital transformation success story. Make sure you’re selecting software that works as part of a whole. Find technology that will join your data goals and automate your sales activities.
Often you’ll need synchronization with already existing technology, which is no problem for a knowledgeable consultant. Whether you’re just starting your company’s digital transformation or adding to existing services, a cloud-based system makes integrations easier.
Brand Customization
You’ll want your interface to look unique. While it might seem cosmetic on the surface, customizing your system for your brand is a boon for both staff and client morale.
Templates should have a look and feel of your personal brand. You’ll want to customize colors, templates, and background images. You know how your staff operates and what they’ll interface with best, so customization is key to a well-oiled CRM system for your small business.
Choose a CRM Platform to Suit Your Needs
Our consultants at Soliant recommend Salesforce for small businesses ready to grow. Our projects start with one question: how can Salesforce best support your business and address its challenges?
From there, Soliant consultants collaborate with your team to learn more about your business needs so we can form a partnership to deliver strategic Salesforce solutions.
We are a trusted Salesforce partner specialized in development practices. We can help you launch an application tailored to your unique needs the first time around, on time, and on budget.
