9 Tips to Build a Solid CRM Workflow to Accelerate Sales

Often, salespeople are extremely focused on generating leads and not on following up with them. But, honestly speaking sales is a tricky process. It comes with a series of twists and turns and out of nowhere, you are most likely to face challenges at every level. Henceforth, a workflow comes into consideration, to streamline the process. 

But, how to create a workflow when everything is scattered? We all know that sales hardly follow any rules and most of the time salespeople have to take a momentary decision.  However, having a plan always helps. When you work with CRM software, having a workflow and keeping up with it becomes easier than ever. Following up with leads becomes more seamless than ever before with a CRM tool. Maybe your new person is completely unaware of  the CRM system or new to B2B sales in general—but it could also be that they have no idea how to use their CRM data for lead generation. The bottom line is this: your team needs a solid workflow if they’re going to hit their goals. 

Here are 9 tips for creating an effective CRM workflow that will help boost your company’s sales numbers:

1. Decode the stages of the customer journey

The customer journey is the path a customer takes through your business. It’s not unilateral, rather a more complex journey involving multiple stages:

• Awareness – This stage involves understanding that you exist and what it is you do for them. You’ll want to make sure they know about all of the services or products you offer—even if they don’t need any of them yet!
• Consideration – At this stage, customers are still evaluating whether or not they need something from you and are trying to decide which solution would work best for their needs and budget. Their goal should be clear by now: decide if this company is right for me!
• Purchase/Signup – Once they’re convinced that your brand is exactly what they are looking for, that’s the time customers make a purchase. Right from then, they become your paying customers. This could include anything from buying an ebook through Amazon Kindle directly through email marketing campaigns such as MailChimp; however there may also be other options available depending on what type of business model being run by said organization (ecommerce vs B2B).

2. Use trigger-based automation to drive sales

In order to get the most out of your CRM and sales process, nothing but automation triggers come to your help. Trigger-based automation is not a completely new concept. Rather, it is more of a process that used to exist even in the era of word-of-mouth marketing. Limited-time offers or something like this are triggers to push your audience to make a decision in your favor as soon as possible. It’s like telling them to do it now or the offer won’t last. `Triggers are automated actions that occur when certain events happen in the system. For example, if someone signs up for a trial account, send them an email telling them how their first month will be paid for by you!

Triggers can be set up on both individual contact records and groups of contacts (such as all customers who purchased over $250). Once you have set up a trigger, it will automatically fire whenever any one of those conditions occurs. 

You can also set up multiple triggers in ConvergeHub so that they can be sent at different times.  People in your organization will get notified separately depending on who they are and what type of content was created by which action—this allows everyone involved with data entry tasks like updating existing information within CRM systems without having anyone manually enter anything into each individual record manually every time someone does something new within their system; this leads directly into why automation is so important here: fewer errors means better accuracy when making decisions based off previous experiences which means higher productivity levels overall!”

3. Start with a full view of the CRM data

The first step of CRM workflow is to get a full view of your CRM data. You can do this by importing all of your contacts, leads and opportunities into one single spreadsheet. This will help you see everything that’s in there so you know what needs attention and how much effort it’s going to take to get things done. Keep in mind that data is at the heart of everything. So, if you do not have a complete view of it, it’s will be difficult to create a robust workflow.

Once you’ve got all of this data in one place (and ideally with some extra columns added), then it’s time for planning! Remember that, every planning that is powered by data is a surefire success plan. 

4. Use automation to take action on leads quickly

You can use automation to take action on leads quickly. Here are some ways you can use automation to send out emails and text messages:

• Schedule phone calls
• Schedule meetings
• Send social media posts (if you don’t have a CRM)

5. Make sure the marketing campaigns and sales process are aligned

If your marketing campaigns and sales process are differently aligned, the revenue goals will never be reached. Whatever strategies you are making, it is important to make sure that there’s a seamless customer experience across all channels. 

6. Build a lead scoring model that works for your company and its customers

Lead scoring is an important segment of the sales workflow. A lead scoring model that works when you have a defined set of problem. The next step is setting goals for yourself—and not just any goals! You should choose ambitious yet realistic ones that will take at least three months (or six months) of consistent practice before they can be achieved on a daily basis. For example, maybe getting more than 20% more traffic per month through social media posts would be an achievable goal if done consistently over time; while getting rid of all negative comments left by customers on product reviews would certainly require some work but could still happen given enough effort put into it.

7. Incorporate new technologies into B2B SEO, social media and mobile communications 

Social media is a great way to promote your business, drive traffic to your website and engage with customers.

• Going social can be a great way to attract B2B audience
• Brand awareness campaigns using social platform helps business reach out to the new age customers who mainly rely on social channels for brand reviews

8. Set up regular performance reviews or check-ins with clients after they buy

You can’t expect to increase sales if you’re not nurturing customer relationships. Regular performance reviews or check-ins with clients after they purchase, help ensure they’re staying happy with the product or service. It includes two different components.  

• Customer satisfaction: You don’t know what works for the customers and what does not. Those trying to reach out to customers need to make sure that how they treat their customers can make or break their brand. The most important factor in getting new customers is making them feel welcome and wanted by providing a high-quality experience from the beginning. This will help build trust between your company and its customers, which will ultimately lead to higher conversion rates down the road.
• Customer feedback: Try to get as much customer feedback as possible because that will tell you the true picture of your brand in the market. When you ask for feedback from your customers it validates that you are doing something for your customers. Once you get to know this, you also get valuable insight into the status of your business and how it is impacting your customers. Based on that you can also decide whether you need to make any improvements in the future. Also make provision for survey and feedback in the questionnaire, so that they can point out specific areas of improvement.

9. Share upcoming events, offers and service alerts

Let them know what is coming down the pipeline by sharing upcoming events, offerings, and services so they’ll be interested in buying in the future. By sharing occasional information about upcoming events, offers, and services, it will be easier to cross-sell and upsell. You should also include details on how clients can access these materials in their inboxes or on their mobile devices. This will help them understand why they should engage with your business right now before something else comes along as a choice. 

The Final Takeaway

A well-planned sales process can help you sell more and keep customers happy. The best way to create a solid workflow is by understanding the stages of the customer journey. No mater how tricky sales is, if you understand the customer mindset you are in a winning position. Use automation to take action on leads quickly and integrate your sales processes with social media, mobile communications and SEO campaigns so you’re always staying ahead of your competition.