Tag: QuickBooks CRM

Why Small Businesses Need Cloud Based Business Growth Technology And Tools

In the modern times, you just cannot debate the necessity of easy to use CRM tools for both small, medium-sized, and enterprise-level businesses. This is because Customer Relationship Management software platforms have outgrown to be a robust platform for sustaining optimal customer relationships. Therefore, most businesses have invested in world-class business growth technology platforms to enhance and maintain the efficiency of their CRM systems. In recent times, one of the major emerging trends in easy to use CRM solutions is the use of cloud based CRM software platforms. While there are a lot of debates going around as to whether an organization that has already used on-premise CRM software, should use cloud based CRM platforms, here are some of the key reasons as to why cloud based CRM is so very popular among small and medium-sized business owners across the globe.

In the modern times, you just cannot debate the necessity of easy to use CRM tools for both small, medium-sized, and enterprise-level businesses. This is because Customer Relationship Management software platforms have outgrown to be a robust platform for sustaining optimal customer relationships.
Therefore, most businesses have invested in world-class business growth technology platforms to enhance and maintain the efficiency of their CRM systems.

In 2008, only 12% of businesses used cloud-based CRM. This figure has now increased to 87% - SuperOffice (2018) Click To Tweet

In recent times, one of the major emerging trends in easy to use CRM solutions is the use of cloud based CRM software platforms.
While there are a lot of debates going around as to whether an organization that has already used on-premise CRM software, should use cloud based CRM platforms, here are some of the key reasons as to why cloud based CRM is so very popular among small and medium-sized business owners across the globe.

  1. Easy accessibility

Accessibility is the key to successful customer relationship management. This is because in the modern time sales reps need to access the CRM software wherever and whenever they want. Hence, a platform that allows sales reps to log-in and works from anywhere as long as there is an internet connection, proves to be helpful in critical situations where salespersons must have to make last minute calls to a customer. Hence, cloud based CRM software platforms allow your sales teams to close deals from remote areas and also generate new leads on the go.

  1. Scalability

Cloud based CRM software systems are also extremely flexible while considering the scalability factor of the tool. This is because when you buy CRM that are hosted in the cloud it allow companies to adjust their scope of operation, by either scaling up or down depending on the growth or fall in their businesses. While using a cloud based CRM software organizations can call up the CRM vendor, who can make the adjustments instantly to accommodate any growth or downfall in the data input capacity for the company.

  1. Flexible integrations

Another pertinent reason for small and medium businesses to buy CRM software tools that are cloud based is its ability to accommodate flexible integrations.

For most businesses using cloud based CRM to store their vital customer related information and initiatives, can integrate financial and accounting software, like QuickBooks CRM software, or emails and many other similar business growth technology and tools, that helps in establishing a seamless flow of data in both the applications needed for the growth of the organization.

  1. Allow Collaborations

Cloud based CRM software systems allow its multiple users to work inside one integrated platform without any type of interferences. For example, it permits each member of your sales, marketing, support, and accounts teams to have their own login, whereby it allows the possibility to log on multiple accounts at the same time. This feature of an easy to use cloud based system also offers enhanced security, since it prevents someone unauthorized from stealing any data from the CRM database .

  1. Centralization of information

Gathering information on the prospects, leads, and customers is often an uphill task for both small and medium-sized businesses, which can even be frustrating and time-consuming at times. With a cloud based CRM system, it is easily possible to collect all the customer information from one central location and also, share the information with different members in an organization.

  1. Increase productivity

Since with a cloud based CRM solution your team can work without being tied to an office desk, hence once you buy CRM that are cloud based it helps to increase the rate of productivity in your workplace. Additionally, cloud based CRM software not only allows your teams to track their customers and prospects from anywhere, but it also helps in collecting real-time data and initiating meaningful conversations that increase customer engagements to increase productivity across the board.

  1. Enhanced security

More so, after the implementation of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) norms, system security has become one of the most critical factors of any business. As cyber-attacks can always happen on the local systems used by on-premise CRM systems, the level of security offered once you buy CRM platforms that are cloud based are cheaper and more efficient, which reduces some major investments needed for implementing onsite security of the network running in the office.

  1. Hassle-free and quick deployment

In this age of advanced digitalization, it takes only a few minutes to lose a customer. As time is the essence of customer relationship in modern times therefore, sales reps need a business growth technology solution that can allow them to interact with their customers from anywhere, before they change their minds. Cloud based CRM software allows faster execution and deployment of commands regardless of the user’s location, which reduces unnecessary pressure on the IT teams.
In other words, cloud based easy to use CRM systems allows businesses to reduce their time-lag considerable while increasing their rate of quality services which boosts sales and customer experience.

  1. Data backup

Data backup is just another most critical function that usually consumes a lot of resources for most businesses. Given that a CRM database collects and stores a lot of confidential and important information about their leads, prospects, and customers, cloud based CRM allows companies to back up their data and retrieve it easily in case of any unforeseen breach of data, or system breakdowns.

  1. Easy installation

Last but not the least, most easy to use cloud based CRM software solutions can be installed in a matter of hours, which helps in not impeding the day-to-day workflow of small and medium-sized businesses, whereas on-premise CRM software needs few weeks and at times even months for proper adoption and deployment.

Conclusion

Given these following advantages, small businesses should not ignore the impact of a cloud based business growth technology like a cloud based CRM systems, be it Salesforce or any other Salesforce Alternative CRM mostly used by startups and small businesses since it is time that companies must overcome the use of outdated legacy customer relationship management technologies and explore effective and financially viable ways to improve their customer relationships.

sign up

Easy to Use CRM Trends To Follow For The Success Of Small Businesses in 2019

Keeping in line with the development of technological advancements is most important for businesses both big and small. Likewise, it is also extremely vital to update your marketing and customer interactions as per the latest easy to use CRM trends for users of this software, especially in small businesses. Because remaining aware of the constantly evolving business growth technology and tools, helps SMBs to drive present customers to do recurring purchases and also attract new customers, which further increases their ROI.

Keeping in line with the development of technological advancements is most important for businesses both big and small.
Likewise, it is also extremely vital to update your marketing and customer interactions as per the latest easy to use CRM trends for users of this software, especially in small businesses.

Because remaining aware of the constantly evolving business growth technology and tools, helps SMBs to drive present customers to do recurring purchases and also attract new customers, which further increases their ROI.

About 79% of leads do not convert without CRM - ThomsonData (2019) Click To Tweet

On a comprehensive and wide-ranging note, users of best CRM for small business, while they watch these latest trends, it helps the small and medium firms to expand their customer connect and increase sales for consistent revenue growth.

Considering the same, here are some of the important and best small business CRM trends of 2019, which can add more viability to your sales and marketing skills:

  1. Increasing Requirement for Adoption of Mobile App

In recent years, both small and mid-sized firms across the globe have started deploying easy to use CRM as their new-age marketing tools.

However, in 2019, due to the rising sale of mobile and handheld devices, it has been noted that CRM integration with mobile apps will also escalate for assisting the customer care representatives.

Mobile CRM will also help the sales reps to receive notifications, capture relevant notes and contact or call the customer from their mobile devices, using an online mobile CRM app, for consistent sales growth.

Therefore, mobile CRM, which was earlier just an option for owners of the best CRM for small businesses, is fast becoming a very important part of managing customer relationships successfully.

  1. Improved Predictive Analysis

All best CRM software for small businesses helps their users to find out the number of interested customers, their preferred mode of communication and the preferred time of communication for their customer base.

However, going by the easy to use CRM trends of 2019, the latest improvement in the predictive analysis will not offer greater insights pertaining to ideal engagement approach for small businesses, but it will also aid in digging out their customer transaction history and other customer details for executing ideal customer sales.

  1. Improved Integration

In the past, small business owners who are fully aware of what is CRM technology also faced several obstacles while integrating CRM solution with all the main elements of their businesses.

Considering this fact, in the present times, CRM integration leading to better connectivity is going to expand radically as SMBs will be able to include new products and services into their CRM software.
For example, the use of QuickBooks CRM software that even helps in integrating accounts with CRM platforms.

These integrations will include powerful solutions for workflows, social media, customer sales, and product tracking, which will no doubt offer a holistic solution for a 360-degree customer view during communication by the users of CRM software.

  1. Importance of Social Media Networking

Finally, it is natural that your customer support team will have their own timing and a specific day off. Nevertheless, customers nowadays always expect faster responses online. Hence, customers when they fail to communicate with their preferred brands through conventional communication channels, they tend to follow their brands on social media to get the latest news and developments about new product launches in the company.

Therefore the best CRM for small businesses in 2019, will be trying to upgrade their technology to become pioneers in social CRM (SCRM) functionalities, whereby they can promote their business via social media channels, which will allow their users to find 24/7 accessibility with their customers.

Conclusion

Therefore to conclude in 2019 and beyond an easy to use and effective CRM solution can not only provide your startup or small business with an opportunity to unify and streamline disparate areas in business but it will also proactively contribute to anticipate and understand the needs of the customers which will improve your businesses’ bottom line.

sign up

How To Make The Best Use Of Customer Data Using Easy To Use CRM For Business Growth

In order to be successful in business nowadays, you have to go beyond selling your offerings and have to nurture and build your relationship with your customers. The good news is that thanks to technology like easy to use CRM, there are plenty of opportunities today to understand your customer and their requirements, and remain engaged with them regularly. Customers in the present times interact with businesses more than ever before via email, phone, online purchases or social media platforms. Moreover, brands often encourage their consumers to offer opinions and share purchase preferences, provide feedback, at every interactions in their journey.

In order to be successful in business nowadays, you have to go beyond selling your offerings and have to nurture and build your relationship with your customers.
The good news is that thanks to technology like easy to use CRM , there are plenty of opportunities today to understand your customer and their requirements, and remain engaged with them regularly.

93% of executives expect that using more customer data in their campaigns will create a noticeable shift in their ability to meet disruptive and competitive challenges. - Forbes Click To Tweet

Customers in the present times interact with businesses more than ever before via email, phone, online purchases or social media platforms.
Moreover, brands often encourage their consumers to offer opinions and share purchase preferences, provide feedback, at every interactions in their journey.

However, when customers think that those revelations are going unnoticed, they shift to more engaging brands in the blink of an eye.

Hence failing to listen to the customers has never been more injurious to the success of businesses than what it is now.

Nevertheless, the same technological advancements that permits so much of customer interaction also helps smart organizations to manage and act upon the data resulting out of these communications.

Scalable and modern cloud-based storage options like CRM database, computing technologies, intuitive API integrations, and others have created unprecedented opportunities for businesses nowadays to know their customers, decrease the time needed to act upon this knowledge and thereafter finally create more profitable and stronger customer relationships.

Now, the key for doing this is to deploy the right technology and understand how to use it and so you need to understand how data can help to build stronger relationships.

Therefore, here are three smart ways for data collection and its use that can help your business create meaningful and profitable relationships over time.

  1. Provide a more complete understanding of customers

Many large organizations have already figured out means to leverage data to build better relationships with customers of their offerings.
Nevertheless, SMBs have been hampered by a paucity of resources to appropriately collect and manage customer-facing information even a few years back in the past.

Now as the tools to generate customer data proliferated with the growth of Salesforce Alternative CRM software solutions for small and mid-sized businesses, many SMBs began collecting data only to become overwhelmed with how they can manage and apply that information for their businesses.

However, by centralizing marketing and sales activities in a well-integrated CRM database, you can even easily merge artificial intelligence through CRM integrations and recognize opportunities and intersections for sale, operation and customer support reps once you are using all-in-one CRM software for your business growth.

This centralization of information not only allows enhanced personalized and accurate up-selling of products and services but it even aids in better and faster resolution of customer-facing issues that helps in building long-term relationships and trust between businesses and their customers.

  1. Eliminate bottlenecks to better customer sales and service

No customers like to reply to the same question(s) times and over again. Conversely, no organization likes to deploy different resources to serve its customers because their internal business process discourages or prevents effective internal communications.

This is exactly where an integrated customer data in a CRM database solves both of these above-stated issues by aiding to eliminate or reduce internal barriers between siloed business responsibilities.

For example, an easy to use CRM software that enables all team members to securely input data make sure that at every step customers are treated with non-redundant and relevant interactions.

With the help of a small business CRM software, SMBs can not only note customer details which includes email communications, key conversations, customer preferences, project requirements and more, so that every internal touch-points gains a comprehensive and holistic view of the customer, but it also helps to make the employees know their place in the process.

Hence consolidating information about the customers in a CRM database helps in streamlining delivery of services which results in maintaining appropriate follow-ups when required which makes the customers feel that they have a cohesive team working on their behalf.

  1. Encourage long-lasting relationships

Like any relationship, communication is the key for all businesses. However maintaining an ongoing understanding of your customer’s requirements (and truly relate them with your business) is what helps in nurturing and maintaining long-lasting and meaningful relationships.

Now, customizing features in easy to use CRM software enables businesses to build these more productive (and more profitable) relationships with their customers.

This is because by using easy to use CRM you can easily collect and use key data, such as customer interests, and also payment and financial information if you are using a QuickBooks CRM and other relevant information, with available technologies like CRM and email integrations, mobile CRM apps, web forms, as these tools ensures that all data in the CRM database are accurately tracked and reported throughout the pipelines.

Hence information in your CRM database not only aids in delivering custom offering(s) to your consumers but also makes them feel like they have a partner they can count on, which results in loyalty, referrals, and most importantly rapid business growth .

sign up

5 Ways to Step up Loyalty with CLM CRM Software

If you are using a CLM (Customer Lifetime Management) CRM software you must be knowing that any great loyalty program not only makes sure that your customers feel appreciated, but it also boosts revenue generation in the long haul. However, even if you just announce a customer loyalty program for your brand, the program will undoubtedly generate great attention, although the values from such loyalty programs are most often hard to extract and analyze for business growth. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary for businesses to focus on robust loyalty programs using CLM CRM software solutions that will create a lasting impression on the consumers of your offerings.

If you are using a CLM (Customer Lifetime Management) CRM software you must be knowing that any great loyalty program not only makes sure that your customers feel appreciated, but it also boosts revenue generation in the long haul.

However, even if you just announce a customer loyalty program for your brand, the program will undoubtedly generate great attention, although the values from such loyalty programs are most often hard to extract and analyze for business growth.

Therefore, it is absolutely necessary for businesses to focus on robust loyalty programs using CLM CRM software solutions that will create a lasting impression on the consumers of your offerings.

Companies that earn $1 billion annually can expect to earn, on average, an additional $700 million within 3 years of investing in customer experience - Temkin Group Click To Tweet

CLM CRM solutions can not only be used for boosting the success of these loyalty programs but it also helps in increasing customer satisfaction, which can be done by doing the following as explained below:

  1. Identify program goals

Primarily even before you launch a loyalty program you must understand the purpose of launching your program, which can include reasons such as:

  • Entice customers
  • Retain customers
  • Find enhanced wallet share
  • Boost profits
  • Find insights into customer behavior

Although most of these stated goals are related to each other, nevertheless, it is always advised that you must provide your attention to specific goals.

  1. Track customer spending habits

Use an easy to use CRM solution that offers comprehensive tools for accumulating your customer’s data, such as integrating your CLM CRM tool with accounting software, like QuickBooks CRM that offer  QuickBooks CRM integration free. Using integrations like these helps in analyzing the purchase behaviors of your customers and thereafter offer customized discounts and customer schemes according to their spending habits for upselling your offerings.

Hence integrating third party business applications with CLM CRM software present a great way to update brands to assemble customer data from several sources that help in making your loyalty programs a success.

  1. Never shortchange points

Businesses employ several approaches to reward their loyal customers and thereby enhance the company-consumer relationship.
Therefore, always remember to honor your commitments while running a loyalty program.

Avoid putting complex rules and regulations as doing so will for sure scare away your customers and even worse make them feel that the program is all but just another ‘bait’.

Additionally, avoid creating tricky situations where points are awarded to the customers in the loyalty programs but are distributed in such a manner that most customers can never accumulate enough reward points to redeem anything meaningful.

Therefore, remember; if you shortchange customers your loyalty programs are sure to fail.

  1. Profile vendor information

Just like businesses use CLM CRM software to gain insights on the spending habits of the consumers and find out ways they can make use of that information to boosts service delivery which aids in building better relationships between them and their customers, you can do the same for vendors associated with your loyalty program using your CRM solution.

This is because doing this activity will aid you in rightly matching vendors with your customer’s expectations that in turn will help improve the performance of your loyalty programs in the long haul.

  1. Log and analyze interaction history

The interaction history that can be found in the CRM database can offer vital clues about both the customers and the vendors to determine the parameters around the program.

For example, analyzing and tracking interactions will help you to set the right number of loyalty points to be earned for a specific amount of cash spent by the customers for buying your offerings.

Moreover, without a log to monitor the activities of your customers, you will always risk of excluding most of your customers if the information is not properly gathered, or land up in a scenario where your brand many give out too many loyalty points that can eventually eat into the profits of your company when customers redeem them.

Conclusion

Hence, CLM CRM solution not only helps to establish an effective loyalty program, but it also aids in impacting both the customers and the partnering vendors in the program that aids in the growth of your business positively.

sign up

Key Reasons Why You Need A Cloud Based CRM For Your Small Business

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is the most popular buzzword in today’s competitive business landscape, as most of us know that easy to use cloud based CRM can bring significant benefits to your business. It really does not matter if your organization employees 10 or more than a 1000 people. Since when it comes to choosing a CRM solution, the first thing that we should look at is that this tool should be able to help you right here, right now; should be capable of handling all your unique business needs without any major customization, help you to establish closer connections with your leads, prospects and customers; can be accessed day and night in and out of your office, should not be complicated to use, must be affordable for startups and small businesses and lastly make your business sell more and grow faster in your marketplace.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is the most popular buzzword in today’s competitive business landscape, as most of us know that easy to use cloud based CRM can bring significant benefits to your business.

It really does not matter if your organization employees 10 or more than a 1000 people.

Cloud-based services will continue to grow in 2019, predicting a 23% growth compared to what it was 5 years ago- International Data Corporation Click To Tweet

Since when it comes to choosing a CRM solution, the first thing that we should look at is that this tool should be able to help you right here, right now; should be capable of handling all your unique business needs without any major customization, help you to establish closer connections with your leads, prospects and customers; can be accessed day and night in and out of your office, should not be complicated to use, must be affordable for startups and small businesses and lastly make your business sell more and grow faster in your marketplace.

So let us steer you in this article through these unchartered CRM waters, help you to find the best small business CRM software for your SMB, and make you appreciate and understand the advantages of using a cloud based CRM software over traditional on-premise CRM solutions that are still available but rarely sold in the CRM space.

What is cloud based CRM?

Cloud based CRM or SaaS CRM software solutions, defines an easy to use CRM solution that is hosted in the Cloud.

Cloud based CRM software platforms like Salesforce and many other Salesforce Alternative CRM solutions can be accessed through the internet, making it convenient for all users to access the same info at any time through desktop, mobile or tablets, irrespective of their geo-locations across the globe.

Why lifting your business up to the Cloud?

IT Cloud services, in general, have seen stellar and unprecedented growth in the recent times. According to an IDC (International Data Corporation), report spending on cloud-based services will continue to grow in 2019, predicting a 23 percent growth compared to what it was 5 years ago.

Therefore here are some of the key reasons why easy to use cloud based CRM software is a tool that all businesses (especially small business and startups) should sincerely consider to harness rapid business growth.

Trouble-free installation

There is a deep-rooted fear even today that CRM solutions come with complex installation processes. Nevertheless, in 2019, this is completely erroneous and untrue.

Unlike traditional on-premise CRM solutions, modern cloud based easy to use CRM software solutions are extremely easy to learn and can be up and running in no time.
Simple as it is, all you need to install a cloud based CRM software is just an access to the internet.

Seamless access

Accessibility round-the-clock is by far the biggest advantage of using a cloud based CRM software.

For example, imagine you need to make a game-changing and urgent sales call while on the go, or quickly find a contact’s phone no. or email, or amend a sales proposal when you are out of your office. Well, in all these varied circumstances, cloud based CRM software is the only solution that can let you access your best CRM for small business from anywhere using a desktop, laptop, tablet, or even a cheap smartphone. Again all you need to access your easy to use CRM software remotely is an internet.

Therefore, as your employees can access and remain connected with the centralized CRM database using a cloud based CRM even outside working hours (if need be), cloud based CRM software platforms are particularly handy for any modern businesses.

Ease of use

Using a CRM cannot get easier than using a cloud based CRM software platform.
All you need to do, to use a SaaS CRM solution; you need to buy a software package at a fixed monthly pricing and thereafter log-in with the access code provided by your CRM vendor while making sure that you have reasonably fast internet connectivity at all times.

Cloud based CRM software solutions are maintained by the vendors of the CRM and it is also accompanied by a wide range of self-service online system maintenance tools.

Affordability

Another major benefit of using cloud based CRM software over on-premise traditional CRM systems is that this business-enhancement software will certainly never break your bank or rip your budget.

This is because no business especially if it is an SMB or a startup organization likes to allocate a big sum of their budget for a one-off purchase, but prefer to use a business solution which can be availed by smaller regular installments.

Now, all cloud based CRM software platforms operates on the pay-as-you-go subscription business model, which, needs minimal upfront investments. Moreover, there are no hidden costs associated with the tool, such as buying additional hardware or license fees.

For example, if you are using ConvergeHub, the best small business CRM software, which is an award-winning cloud based CRM platform, the subscription can be as low as $11 per user/ month (billed quarterly) or $9 per user/month (billed annually).

Uncompromised security

An extremely serious concern for all businesses using cloud based information storage system is undoubtedly security.

Truthfully, the security of the CRM database is one of the most prevailing reasons as to why companies were wary of installing a cloud based solution for their businesses.

Nevertheless, in recent times, CRM vendors that offer online SaaS solutions know that very well and therefore take security issues most seriously.

Not surprisingly, in 2019, the information security levels in cloud based CRM software solutions are much higher than on-premise CRM tools.

This is because, cloud based CRM vendors offer advanced and automated data backup strategies that have an impeccable data recovery plan, two-step verification, and also strong password protection (more after the introduction of GDRP on May 25th, 2018) to counteract any data breach in their systems.

Reliability

No business wants to deploy a system that you use every day to crash at a moment’s notice, bringing potential financial meltdown for your business.

The good news is that with cloud based CRM software such a situation almost never occurs as its server has multiple replicas in the cloud. Therefore, if one server fails it is immediately replaced by another and so SaaS CRM software systems continue to remain operational 99.99% of the time and are hence reliable enough even for the fussiest of organizations in the business world.

Flexible potential

When adopting their chosen best small business CRM software, most SMBs like to start with only the features that can help with them with their unique needs.

However, with time as your company expands, you may come to a decision that you need, for example, new features, integrations and more for your business growth.

In this case, if you are using a cloud based CRM, you can immediately update the CRM to satisfy your novel business needs.

For example, you might like to integrate QuickBooks accounting software that you have been using since long for your business with your CRM, and so by easily integrating the two software use QuickBooks CRM you can make your idea come true which offers QuickBooks CRM integration free.

Hence, cloud based CRM offers bigger and better integrations and is capable of developing more innovative and robust CRM software solutions that can be provided to you straight away.

Enhanced compatibility

Silo products and solutions have little chance of success in today’s IT world.

Therefore, the exchange of information between already available technologies is considered paramount nowadays.

Hence, much like QuickBooks CRM, several other integrations and compatibility with other products and services is the key to ensure the longevity and effective utilization of your cloud based CRM software platform.

Cloud based CRM can easily integrate with software and applications, such as email clients, MS products, predictive dialers, business automation, and documentation software solutions and more, which make SaaS CRM software the appropriate choice for modern startups and small businesses.

Takeaway

Hence, when you are adopting a cloud based CRM solution, after reading this article make sure that your vendor provides a flexible SaaS solution that is able to sustain your business growth .

Now if you want to know further and learn more as to how cloud based CRM can impact your business, request a personalized demo by clicking the link below.

sign up

Best Practices Of Contact Management With Easy To Use CRM Software

It is often said that it takes a decade to build a reputation but just one minute to ruin it. Any good business strategy not only signifies more closure but it also means repeat business and happy customers. Now, how can you beget happy customers? The answer is easy- by understanding their requirements and delivering their needs. However, to do this you elementarily require more information about your customers and secondly an easy to use CRM or Contact Management software that helps you to build a stronger informational customer profile.

It is often said that it takes a decade to build a reputation but just one minute to ruin it.
Any good business strategy not only signifies more closure but it also means repeat business and happy customers.
Now, how can you beget happy customers?
The answer is easy- by understanding their requirements and delivering their needs.
However, to do this you elementarily require more information about your customers and secondly an easy to use CRM or Contact Management software that helps you to build a stronger informational customer profile.

Easy to use CRM is critical for your sales teams.

Patronage by loyal customers yields 65 percent of a typical business’ volume - American Management Association (2018) Click To Tweet

This is because Contact Management software aids them to dig out customer information gathered in the CRM database to find out your customer’s needs, wants and preferences.

Even though for startup organizations and small businesses purchasing a best small business CRM software could stretch their budgets a little, nevertheless, an easy to use CRM software offers certain most essential benefits that can empower your sales, marketing, and support teams.

As a part of your best small business CRM software, a Contact Management solution also features:

  • Centralized storage for contact information
  • Sales tracking
  • Easy to search through your CRM database
  • Email integration
  • Scheduling
  • Lead nurturing
  • Conversion management
  • Document management

Although the requirement for customer data is acknowledged by all in businesses, most organizations especially startups and SMBs fail to create a contact management plan that is integrated with the required touch points needed for converting prospects and nurturing existing customers.

Here are a few contact management best practices for your business using best small business CRM software:

1. Tracking interactions

When an easy to use CRM platform has an integrated Contact Management software it helps in creating a single page for viewing all the interactions between your prospects and your company, which aids sales, marketing and customer support teams in your organization to find quick access to the required information when and where they need it from the centralized CRM database.

Using the best small business CRM software all interactions of phone calls, meetings, emails, and social integrations are logged and stored with the contact information.

Therefore, once you have a CRM in place, a single click can provide you all the information of your leads, prospects, and customers and prepare your teams to make the calls with all relevant information at their fingertips.

Moreover, if you are using a QuickBooks CRM like ConvergeHub, which offers QuickBooks CRM integration free, you can keep on using QuickBooks for accounting, and at the same time see invoice and payment information, customer details, products, directly in your best small business CRM, which you can then use for business process automation, reminders, customer service, and follow-ups.

Hence, by bringing your different teams together Contact Management software when integrated with a CRM helps you to cross-sell and forecast which products or services of your brand can be of interest to your customers.

2. Better understanding of your customer

It is a known fact that customer service is far less expensive than acquiring new customers. According to a recent survey, it has been found that 9 out of 10 consumers in the U.S said that they are ready to pay more for enjoying a superior customer experience.

Hence, it does not really matter how awesome is your offerings, since the only thing that is of interest to the customer is how well they are being treated.

Now, equipped with an easy to use CRM software you can access everything that is needed to understand your prospects and customers, right from the history of their purchases, to their interactions in your website, their social media presences and more.

Therefore, with such homogeneous information at their fingertips, your sales and support reps can pitch their calls with more efficiency for each of your customers.

3. Up-selling and cross-selling opportunities

It is easy to access and share data when you have all the required information stored centrally in the CRM database .

Therefore, accessing customer history after implementing CRM software for your organization, according to a report published by NelsonHall, most businesses takes a great stride in up-selling and cross-selling activities.

For example, if one of your customer’s purchase histories shows that the customer has purchased several ankle-length jeans, by using automated email campaigning feature of the CRM, you can easily email the customer on sneakers or best-suited belts to match those jeans.

4. Increased profits

Can you imagine collecting a colossal number of business cards and storing them without an easy to use CRM?
We guess not.

Now even if you are capable of storing your customer and prospect’s data in silo software solutions it makes no sense of that data that is only visible to you, since it can reduce your sales and profits, as in this case your sales teams will be spending more time for finding information than leveraging it.

Additionally, manual data entry is a time-consuming and tedious process. Content management software is a platform that helps to organize data as specified and aid employees to devote their work hours to more important tasks than the administrative ones.

Now, because of the above stated reason as your business grows more efficiently by minimizing unnecessary middle work, your sales and support reps can retain more customers by offering them superior customer service, make up-sells and cross-sells by understanding the customer’s needs and find new customers through word of mouth advertising and networking and hence accomplish more in the same workday.

5. Targeted marketing

With the best small business CRM and Contact Management software in place, you can access several marketing templates and create timed and automated drip marketing campaigns.

Using easy to use CRM solutions you can not only group your potential customers by priority and interests but also create groups that fit best with your marketing plans.

Conclusion

Therefore, in a gist, every aspect of easy to use CRM software is cut-out to perform a particular task efficiently so that it can help your organization manage marketing, sales, and support better for your company and also your customers.

sign up

How To Better Align CRM Strategy With Easy To Use CRM Software

IT industry experts and innumerable business gurus often talk about the importance of aligning technology in accordance with the most strategic goals of your business. Now, this also true with easy to use CRM, or Customer Relationship Management software, whereby for a CRM implementation to achieve success, the software must be closely aligned with your businesses’ CRM strategy for finding growth. Therefore, to align your CRM strategy with the CRM software, you primarily need to understand exactly what your organization is hoping to achieve from your CRM?

IT industry experts and innumerable business gurus often talk about the importance of aligning technology in accordance with the most strategic goals of your business.

Now, this also true with easy to use CRM , or Customer Relationship Management software, whereby for a CRM implementation to achieve success, the software must be closely aligned with your businesses’ CRM strategy for finding growth.

91% of companies with more than 11 employees now use CRM software - Buyer Zone Click To Tweet

Therefore, to align your CRM strategy with the CRM software, you primarily need to understand exactly what your organization is hoping to achieve from your CRM?

This is because, while strategies can be unique and different for every company, the following easy to use CRM system’s capabilities can be adapted and reviewed and thereafter applied for all organizations aiming to implement their CRM solution in the pursuit of enhancing customer relationship for their business.

Ease of implementation and use

Although “ease of use” in CRM software is a subjective opinion, nevertheless several organizations want to adopt a CRM system that is relatively easy to deploy and use.

This is because, if the CRM solution is not so, it may exceed the budget on start-up cost, detract their projected ROI from the CRM, or even worse the users of the CRM may not embrace the software willingly.

For example from a usage point of view, does your CRM system requires excessive keystrokes, screens, mouse click, and page refresh to perform common tasks and processes?

Or how easy it is for your employees to access the screen in the CRM’s dashboard they find most useful for their day-to-day activities and tasks?

These factors need to we evaluated and thereafter modified, as the easy to use feature is most needed and an important attribute especially for small businesses, that mostly have fewer training programs, limited support channels, and also inadequate IT resource.

Scalability

How scalable is your best small business CRM software?

Businesses, especially small organizations will undoubtedly change, and so they need to plan in advance for their future growth.

Because of this, your CRM application must be capable of accommodating the change and growth in business, which may include supporting an increase in the users of the software, or a boost in transactions without failing on its performance.

Therefore, an easy to use CRM that is not scalable will ultimately provide diminishing returns for your business growth .

Cloud based CRM software platforms offer near limitless scalability, since if you purchase a SaaS CRM you can easily scale-up or scale-down your user counts as per your business needs.

Business Process Automation           

One of the major advantages of using your best small business CRM software is that it can very easily automate most of your business processes, which eventually leads to increased productivity for your employees.

Therefore, one of the key features that you need to evaluate while adopting your easy to use CRM software is the level of sales process automation or SFA (Sales Force Automation) capabilities it provides.

This is especially true with small businesses that are looking for trimming their labor costs or are bootstrapped with limited resources.

Most easy to use CRM like ConvergeHub offers workflow designers in the software, which permits businesses to set up triggers for events and automate business processes with the help of the CRM system.

Software Customization

There is possibly no CRM in the marketplace that is capable of accommodating all of any organization’s business needs.
Therefore, the ability of easy to use CRM application’s to be tailored and customized can make a great difference in business to software fit and ROI.

Moreover, the level of customization that is possible with your CRM application also makes a big difference in the success and failure of the CRM implementation process.

Best small business CRM software like ConvergeHub enable their customers to configure, customize and upgrade their easy to use CRM software solutions to their requirements or changing business goals.

Hence, before adopting a CRM look into the level of flexibility the software offers which is a differentiation most small businesses need today to compete effectively in their respective marketplace.

Read More: Powerful Marketing Strategies To Grow Your Business Faster

Reduced support and maintenance

Deployment of easy to use CRM software in an enterprise can lead to very large support requirements and IT maintenance services.

This is the exact reason as to why, a growing number of organizations are opting for cloud based CRM systems, rather than traditional on-premise licensed software products.

Cloud based applications do not require internal maintenance and support issues because SaaS CRM vendors handle many frequent problems with the software on behalf of their customers in a shared service setup.

System integration

Another key consideration that you must watch out while adopting your easy to use CRM, is the level your CRM system integrates with other applications like ERP or an Accounting software that will help in contributing to your CRM strategy for your business.

There are several CRM applications in the market that provides their software platforms with the capability of enabling simple integrations and data exchange with third-party applications.

For example, small business CRM like ConvergeHub, which is also known as the most popular QuickBooks CRM provides QuickBooks CRM integration free and so allow the seamless transfer of data between the CRM and the accounting app, which helps in generating more revenue.

Versatility

Before adopting a CRM, you need to find how much functionality your company is looking out of your easy to use CRM?

Many CRM systems deliver SFA (Sales Force Automation), marketing automation, sales order processing, PRM (Partner Relationship Management), customer support as part of their basic offerings.

Additionally, you even need to understand what kind of analytical capabilities and business intelligence, such as online analytics processing, data warehousing or predictive reporting that you require for your business.

This is because, once you get these questions answered, during the CRM selection process, by understanding your business needs can prove invaluable during implementation and for aligning your CRM strategy with the software.

Remote access and mobility

Nowadays as most of the workers are mobile, they prefer the CRM application’s ability to be accessed from various locations and types of devices on the go.

Now, cloud based CRM applications allow the users to access their easy to use CRM even via a Web browser, regardless of their location and thus do not make them remain tied to any particular desktop.

Information Security

Confidentiality and strong information security are most essentially required, especially for applications and systems that house sensitive information like customer data, sales forecasts, and others.

For example, security considerations for a CRM include encryption, access control, and also an array of layered security protocols.

Therefore, before purchasing your CRM apply extra due intelligence to the CRM service provider’s security infrastructure as physical and logical security should always be on your highest priority while using this technology for your company.

Takeaway

While the CRM software’s capabilities and features should not be used for laying down your CRM strategy, nevertheless, understanding what to look for and what is available in the CRM can help to identify opportunities and craft a workable strategy that can be easily implemented within the constructs of the software.

sign up

Tip On How To Engage Customers Like A Pro Using CLM CRM Software

Customer engagement, which is an incredibly necessary variable that foretells the success of your business, is often overlooked by several brands all across the globe. However what is customer engagement? To explain it simply, customer engagement as the words suggest is an act of engaging customers with your brand using personal outreach, social media, and a laundry list of many other techniques, using CLM CRM software.

Customer engagement, which is an incredibly necessary variable that foretells the success of your business, is often overlooked by several brands all across the globe.

However what is customer engagement?

To explain it simply, customer engagement as the words suggest is an act of engaging customers with your brand using personal outreach, social media, and a laundry list of many other techniques, using CLM CRM software.

CMOs (Chief Marketing Officers) value awareness more than ROI and market share- Gartner Click To Tweet

It is needless to say that customers that are engaged to your brand will stick around longer, as they are more loyal and therefore provide your business with a reliable stream of revenue.

This is because customer engagement is a factor that directly impacts the satisfaction levels of your customers, and the benefits that were noted above stems from their satisfaction.

Customer engagement is, therefore, a part of the overall Customer Experience (CX), since the more better you can deliver CX using a CLM CRM software, it will lead to more satisfied customers.

Customer experience is so important a factor for business growth in the modern times since, in a Walker report, it has been forecasted that CX will outpace product price and quality by 2020 as the main differentiators for brands in the marketplace.

Hence, how can you increase customer engagement for your brand and reap the benefits that will help in your business growth?

Here are some of the best customer engagement best practices and tips that will empower and inspire you to take your customer engagement efforts to new heights.

Use The Right Software

First and foremost, in order to engage your customers effectively, your most essentially need an automation tool that will help you to streamline processes leading to less wastage of time on routine administrative works and help generate more focus on your customers.

One of the most popular tools that businesses use today for increasing their focus on the customers is easy to use CRM software solution, preferably a CLM CRM software, that not only helps you to store customer data but also aids in providing personalized experiences to your customers which increases engagements.

Actually, these days many organizations are opting for all-in-one CLM CRM software platforms like ConvergeHub because easy to use CRM solutions provides sales enablement, marketing automation, and customer support all in the same platform.

Moreover, with CRM software’s like ConvergeHub which is also one of the most popular QuickBooks CRM that offers QuickBooks CRM integration free, you can unlock the important customer data that is locked inside your accounting software QuickBooks and use it from the CRM to drive sales and customer engagement.

Ask For Frequent Customer Feedbacks

Ask your customers what you can do to improve your offerings that can better facilitate the benefits of using your products or services.

One of the most popular methods for doing this is to send a follow-up survey after the resolution of customer support calls.

You can also send an annual survey to all your customers, to uncover their pain-points that you may not be aware of, and then implement changes in your offerings or business processes based on their feedback and suggestions.

Now, when customers see that your organization is making the necessary improvements that your customers asked for, they will look forward to engaging more with your organization and become more loyal to your band.

Reply To Comments On Social Media

Today, social media is possibly the best place where you can engage your customers. As ‘Millennial(s)’ are overtaking the ‘Baby-Boomers’ as the largest consumer demography, we are going to view an increasing use of social media platforms.

Therefore, when someone is taking the effort and time to comment on your posts, it is necessary that you must respond as quickly as possible in an encouraging and polite manner.

Thank and compliment your customers, rather to say, stroke their egos and you will surely find that they will come back and get engaged with your brand since if you ignore them, they will be gone.

Using social media listening tools in CLM CRM software platforms to get alerted the very moment someone comments or mentions of your brand on the social media posts will help you to engage the right audience at the right time, and get a dialogue started.

Personalize All Your Customer Interactions

With so much of personal data stored in your CRM database , of your customers, you can easily personalize every interaction that you have with them.

Since doing this will not only make your customers feel that you know them, but it will also encourage your customers to get engaged with your organization.

Use your personalization efforts in marketing, sales and customer support workflows.

Always remember used knowledgeably and with discretion, you can use the personal information of your customers in the CLM CRM software , to speak to them like an old friend, and not like an organization that just needs their money.

Create A Client Advisory Board

If you are not aware of how to develop a CAB (Client Advisory Board), create a group of perhaps 15 to 20 representatives from your high-value customers.

Ask for their participation, by inviting your selected customers in meetings, whereby they can express their concerns about your offerings and also suggest product or service enhancements that they feel you need to make your offerings more effective, or easy to use.

It is also suggested that you can summarize these meetings with your Client Advisory Board and inform your customers what your company is planning to do with their advice.

This is because; sending periodic emails to your customers, summarizing the meeting with your CAB will show that you truly care about their opinions and needs.

Conclusion

Following these tips will not only raise your customer engagements to new levels but doing this will also very soon make your customer become your brand advocates, which will lead to increased revenue and sustainable business growth.

sign up

Most Important Integrations That Every MCA CRM Must Have For Business Growth

If you are an owner of a Merchant Cash Advance business, chances are that you have sat in on a few meetings with your employees to help your teams understand the best approaches to manage their leads, contacts, customers, and opportunities. Now, what begun with a Rolodex machine, a date book, and a telephone has now evolved in MCA businesses to the use of sophisticated online lead management software applications- better known as MCA CRM platforms, like ConvergeHub, which is customized for Cash Advance businesses. If you are not aware of what is CRM, you might wonder what is exactly the purpose of Merchant Cash Advance CRM software, how it can help your business to attract and retain more customers, or how you can integrate your easy to use CRM with your MCA website for rapid and consistent business growth.

If you are an owner of a Merchant Cash Advance business, chances are that you have sat in on a few meetings with your employees to help your teams understand the best approaches to manage their leads, contacts, customers, and opportunities.
Now, what begun with a Rolodex machine, a date book, and a telephone has now evolved in MCA businesses to the use of sophisticated online lead management software applications- better known as MCA CRM platforms, like ConvergeHub, which is customized for Cash Advance businesses.

Integrating QuickBooks and CRM helps your business deliver a better customer experience. Click To Tweet

If you are not aware of what is CRM , you might wonder what is exactly the purpose of Merchant Cash Advance CRM software , how it can help your business to attract and retain more customers, or how you can integrate your easy to use CRM with your MCA website for rapid and consistent business growth.

So, here are the answers to your question.

What is Customer Relationship Management software?

The main task of any CRM software be it customized for Cash Advance or any other business, is that it is an application that helps your sales, marketing, support, and even accounts manage your leads, prospects, customers, leading to business growth and more sales.
It is a software that helps to keep track of your leads and customers, their relationship with your organization, keep a record of whom they work for, what they are doing, what they are thinking about buying, or keep a tab on how often they contact you, among an incredible number of other options that CRM also aids in business.

The major benefit of using Merchant Cash Advance software in your MCA business is to find the ability to streamline your sales process, increase interactions with your Cash Advance customers and prospects and finally nurture those relationships in a way you see it fit for your business growth.

Therefore, regardless of whatever easy to use CRM software that you use, for Cash Advance, Retail, Reality, Legal, or any other business, majority of CRM software platforms, gathers the same type of information and have identical types of goals, such as:

  • Perk up customer communication and customer retention plans
  • Enhance company profitability by ushering business growth
  • Increase focus in your business
  • Increase prospect and customer tracking abilities

What are CRM integrations?

The best and the most popular easy to use CRM software especially Salesforce Alternative CRM software solutions are the ones with the highest user adoption rates. This is because, the more your sales, marketing, support, and accounts are willing to input data, the better will be the CRM platform’s ability to enable your employees to engage more customers and perform better over time. Hence inputting more data in the MCA CRM leads to increased business growth.

As with most easy to use CRM software platforms there is no one-size-fits-all solution, as vendors of CRM software as a whole strive to meld different functions to accommodate the needs of individual employees, to personalize their workflow, and create a uniform system that better tracks performance, ensure consistency in customer engagement, and improve productivity for business growth.

Now, CRM platforms can achieve this above-stated feat, with official and third-party integrations.
While official integrations are native collaborations between the MCA CRM and external software solutions, third-party integrations need the use of APIs or web services such as Zapier.

Here are some of the most used integrations that your MCA CRM platforms must have for increasing your alternative lending business’s growth.

  1. QuickBooks (Online)

For organizations, especially the ones that cater to financial services, QuickBooks accounting software is one of the most popular third-party software used along with their CRM platforms.
MCA CRM software platforms like ConvergeHub, offers QuickBooks CRM integration free, and is widely accepted as one of the best QuickBooks CRM software for any alternative lending business who are looking forward to using the data from their QuickBooks accounting software to build a closer relationship with their customers and generate more sales.

Once you integrate QuickBooks and your MCA CRM together, there can be a free exchange of information and data between these two software applications, whereby you can continue to use QuickBooks for accounting purposes, and at the same time see all the customer’s details, products and services for sale, along with invoice and payment information directly in your CRM.
You can then use this data from QuickBooks CRM for reminders, follow-ups, customer service, and business process automation.

  1. DocuSign

A plethora of signing on documents is most essentially required in alternative lending businesses. Therefore, most Merchant Cash Advance software users prefer integrating their MCA CRM with DocuSign that can help them to manage every aspect of each contact from preparing and sending documents for signing to managing them in their CRM platforms.

Using DocuSign with CRM for your business growth helps in remaining rest assured that everything stays legal, secure, and visible with a complete audit trail, apart from saving money and time and enhance your customer’s experience with your organization, delighting your customers along the way.

  1. Ring Central

MCA CRM is a storehouse of information about communications between your teams and your leads, prospects, and customers. Therefore, most companies in alternative lending business integrate Ring Central, which is an external software that help users to dial and log calls through RingCentral inside the CRM in a smarter way to enhance productivity and enrich customer interactions. This integration between the MCA CRM and RingCentral is perfect for small businesses who want to have a reliable voice service inside their CRM and efficiently manage customer phone calls.

  1. Google Drive

Google Drive integration for Merchant Cash Advance CRM software allows the users of the MCA CRM to share, sync, manage and access files associated with records through Google Drive right from within the easy to use CRM account. All attachments from your respective CRM records gets stored and synced into your associated Google Drive account with the help of this most important integration, used by many in alternative lending businesses.

  1. Google Calendar

Integrating Google Calendar with your MCA CRM software helps to bring all of your events, tasks, and meetings from your Google Calendar to your Merchant Cash Advance software, allowing you to stay updated by referring to what you have planned so that you never miss out any opportunities.

Once you use this integration for your alternative lending business and edit the calendar of your choice in real time, you can make a decision if you want those alterations to be reflected in either the Google Calendar, or MCA CRM software’s calendar, or both.

  1. Lead Generator Tool

If you are using ConvergeHub, the best MCA CRM for small businesses, you can also download and integrate its Free Lead Generator Tool.

Using this integration allows you to visit any lead’s social media page and capture all information instantly with no manual typing and hereafter save qualified leads from social media, other websites and even Gmail with one click of the mouse for even more sales power and business growth.

This integration (which is most often liked by all ConvergeHub MCA CRM users) helps to capture qualified leads into the sales funnel in a flash and use the power of CRM to convert them into paying customers – all for FREE.

Conclusion

Hence, the only limit to the ways you can use ConvergeHub MCA CRM is your imagination. ConvergeHub CRM seamlessly integrates with more than 30 third-party integrations, helping you to integrate your billing, call management, e-signature solution, and others, for a complete customer data, smarter selling, leading to rapid business growth .

sign up

Unbeatable KPIs And Sales Metrics For Modern Sales Teams

In the present day’s highly competitive business landscape, small businesses and startups find it increasingly difficult to compete without the ability to find data-driven decisions, and therefore, sales metrics and analysis provided by modern technology like best small business CRM software solutions make it easy. In 2019 it has been observed that most small businesses are moving to an all-in-one easy to use CRM solution like ConvergeHub and others because they provide marketing, sales, support and also accounting modules all on the same platform.

In the present day’s highly competitive business landscape, small businesses and startups find it increasingly difficult to compete without the ability to find data-driven decisions, and therefore, sales metrics and analysis provided by modern technology like best small business CRM software solutions make it easy.

In 2019 it has been observed that most small businesses are moving to an all-in-one easy to use CRM solution like ConvergeHub and others because they provide marketing, sales, support and also accounting modules all on the same platform.

Effective sales organizations are 81% more likely to be practicing consistent usage of a CRM or other system of record- Aberdeen Group Click To Tweet

Which means that all data and information from every department within the organization can now be stored in one central CRM database that in turn help increase the accuracy and volume of the data and metrics at your disposal, allowing businesses to make enhanced data-driven decisions.

Key sales metrics to measure and analyze

A converged all-in-one CRM software like ConvergeHub (which is also the most popular QuickBooks CRM solution in the US markets) help track loads of sales metrics, which we will cover now that modern sales teams should leverage and embrace to drive more sales resulting in growth of their businesses.

  • Month-over-month total sales

Keeping track of overall sales by reps, every month, is not a new concept, as sales teams have been doing it since ages and it is still one of the most important sales metrics even today.

Best small business CRM software like ConvergeHub provides robust CRM reporting that allows you to easily keep a tab on how each of your sales reps are performing with regards to sales, against their monthly benchmarks.

Using CRM data once you find that your rep’s total monthly sales volumes are plummeting, you can easily identify the reason behind the drop, and use the information in the CRM database to help improve your sales rep’s performance and get them back on course.

  • Sales funnel flow

Another true and tried sales metrics that are critical to the success of modern sales teams is sales funnel flow that helps managers to view which sales-reps are moving leads through the sales funnel at an expected velocity and those who are falling back.

The great thing is that as data collection and analysis takes place automatically in most best small business CRM software solutions like ConvergeHub, you can easily check your CRM’s dashboard and simply check how many leads each rep have in their funnel.

This kind of granular details allows sales managers to find bottlenecks at any particular stage of the funnel and if needed makes changes to fix the issue and allow leads to flow smoothly through the funnel once again.

  • Conversion rates

Sales reps receive MQL or Marketing Qualified Leads from the marketers, for those leads that have shown a propensity to buy and are therefore ready for sales outreach.

However, once the marketing teams pass an MQL to the sales, they can get converted into a customer or even fail to do so.

Hence, by measuring your businesses’ conversion rate by taking the number of leads that you have converted to customers and dividing it by the total number of Marketing Qualified Leads you have received from the marketers you can easily find if your conversion rate is low or at-par with your businesses’ expected growth.

Low conversion rate could signify that your marketing teams are qualifying the leads too early, or your sales reps are not effective at closing deals, which can be analyzed easily by the sales reporting features provided by most easy to use CRM software platforms like ConvergeHub.

  • Outreach activities completed

Every sales rep engage in prospecting outreach, which consists of sending cold emails, making cold calls, etc.

Logically speaking, the more prospects your sales teams meet, the more likely they are likely to convert them to customers.

This is the reason why it is important to track the number of cold prospect emails, and the number of cold calls, done by the reps and set an outreach benchmark and measure each rep’s outreach against that to identify those reps that require support to improve their efforts.

Using best small business CRM like ConvergeHub, your reps can use inbuilt sales email templates to expedite their email sending process, or use auto-dialer and pre-recorded voice mail drop features to make more calls in less time.

  • Opportunities lost

Finally, the last but another most important KPI that needs to be considered is to track the number of opportunities that got lost, as well as the ratio of opportunities created to the opportunities lost for each of your sales reps in your sales team.

Since, if you find that your reps are creating lots of new opportunities but are also losing most of them, you need to look into it and understand the reason behind that.

In most best small business CRM software platforms like ConvergeHub, you can easily customize the CRM’s dashboard that can help sales managers and reps check in daily and find the right insight they require at a glance.

As a pro tip, you can use the call recording feature found in most easy to use CRM software platforms to record each sales calls made by individual sales reps so that your managers can listen to them and spot the weak points in the rep’s approach and instruct them to improve upon those areas.

Conclusion

Although most of these sales metrics and KPIs may not be new, nevertheless these are all tried and true parameters to be analyzed that can help modern sales teams to thrive and help grow their business by using information collected in the CRM database to make strategic and informed decisions for increasing productivity and bring faster revenue growth.

Therefore, by constantly measuring sales metrics and KPIs, you will see more deals won with data in front to validate those winning decisions, without making unrealistic expectations by overlooking the information stored in your easy to use CRM database.

sign up

New Trends to Boost Your Best Small Business CRM in 2019

With the arrival of 2019, different kinds of easy to use CRM software (even Salesforce Alternative CRM software solutions) are predicted to go through substantial overhauls and renovations- in terms of better intelligence, enhanced automation, new integrations and much more. Hence, the transformation in the cloud based CRM industry for small businesses is as good as its ability to gear up with the latest trends in the software industry, which consequentially makes us look at a number of new features that will surely revolutionize the way we use easy to use best small business CRM today.

Best small business CRM software solutions in modern times are all about better supporting and serving the customers during their journey.
Modern CRM for small businesses software platforms empower startups and small business establishments to form an emotional bonding with their prospects and customers by looking out for their best interests as a consumer of their offerings. Additionally easy to use CRM software solutions also ensures the customer-facing employees of an organization to find the right information and data from their best small business CRM software about their customers at the right time, so that they can better focus on nurturing relationships.

The Service Desk Institute has found that more than 80 percent of IT departments are using self-service as a way to meet this need. Click To Tweet

Just like any other advancements in technology with every passing year, easy to use CRM software is also undergoing futuristic transformations, bringing new innovations and simplifications to this three-lettered workplace, within an entire organization.
Therefore, be it marketing, sales, accounts, operations, or even event management and collaborations, modern best small business CRM like ConvergeHub can only get better and smarter.

With the arrival of 2019, different kinds of easy to use CRM software (even Salesforce Alternative CRM software solutions) are predicted to go through substantial overhauls and renovations- in terms of better intelligence, enhanced automation, new integrations and much more.

Hence, the transformation in the cloud based CRM industry for small businesses is as good as its ability to gear up with the latest trends in the software industry, which consequentially makes us look at a number of new features that will surely revolutionize the way we use easy to use best small business CRM today.

  1. Automatic Workflows and Intuitive User-Interface Reconfiguration

Using AI (Artificial Intelligence), modern best small business CRM software platforms will be able to adjust workflows more effectively and perform with lesser turn-around time.

This will be done by using technologies like AI and machine learning- two of the most advanced technologies that can simulate human behaviors using a non-human entity.

By learning and understanding the usage patterns and trends of the users, easy to use CRM software for small businesses and startup organizations will automatically take over mundane repetitive tasks and even adapt the user interfaces to individual usage based on their usage patterns.

Manash Chaudhuri (CTO of ConvergeHub- The #1 Easiest Converged CRM for SMB) remarks:

“At ConvergeHub, we are in the process of incorporating AI and Machine Learning into the future of our sales and marketing tools. Using AI in the sales and marketing processes creates a more tailored and user-specific experience for the buyers and can help small business organizations get found by more prospective customers, convert more new leads and thereby sell their products and services to more customers.”

  1. CRM at the Center of an Omni-channel Approach

Nowadays, more than six touch points are needed before any typical sale, which happens across several channels.
According to us as small business CRM vendor and consultants, we have realized that simply initiating touch points across multiple channels is not enough- rather the consistency of customer experience is what that really counts as much as the breadth of engagement.

Therefore, the fewer touch points that you use the better will be your sales process as a small business organization.
Hence, in 2019 easy to use CRM platforms will proactively look towards ramping up their integration algorithms and API with the objective of attaining leaner and tighter integrations with external services and tools.

In the modern times, easy to use cloud based CRM software systems are therefore evolving to serve as the never center for this omnichannel approach, unifying mobile marketing, landing pages, social campaigns, customer support ticketing, sales calls, accounting processes and other channels into a coherent whole.

In the recent times in 2018, ConvergeHub has integrated QuickBooks online, with its CRM systems, and is now one of the most popular QuickBooks CRM in the small business CRM marketplace, offering QuickBooks CRM integration free.

  1. Self-Service via easy to use CRM platforms

One particular channel that will witness a stellar growth and deeper integration with CRM for small and medium businesses- is self service.

While Gartner predicts that by 2020:

“A customer will manage 85% of the relationship with an enterprise without interacting with a human, so make sure to give your customers the direction and tools they need to accomplish tasks themselves.“

In another whitepaper published by ZenDesk states:

“50% of customers think it’s important to solve product or service issues themselves and 70% expect a company’s website to include a self-service application.“

In 2019 it is predicted that more than half of the modern consumers are likely to abandon an online purchase if they cannot get an answer to their questions quickly.

According to Forrester Research:

“The Service Desk Institute has found that more than 80 percent of IT departments are using self-service as a way to meet this need.”

Therefore, the link between easy to use CRM and self-service is a natural one as CRM application when integrated with ChatBots is capable of customizing self-service interactions and render a customer care feedback loop that sales, marketing, and support teams can also tap into in real-time as and when it is needed.

Hence, small and medium business CRM software vendors like ConvergeHub have also taken into notice the need for customer-service integration and self-service in particular, which is on a rise.

  1. From CRM to Social CRM

The transition to easy to use social CRM is imminent. Engaging customers by creating virtual communities is a more pertinent way that will be the new trend in social media marketing.
Therefore, it is predicted that in 2019 and beyond these communities and social media as a whole will take a greater shape as an important element within all best small business CRM software platforms.

Since being social will not only help businesses interact more closely with their consumers, but it will also provide hitherto unseen insights into customer’s buying patterns and their behaviors, which in turn will enhance to the lead nurturing capability of the easy to use CRM for small business in a big way.

  1. Enhanced Mobility

Customers of easy to use CRM for small businesses are no longer bound to their PCs and are constantly accessing data on the go. Therefore, customer support resources and front line sales and marketing employees will be increasingly empowered by mobile devices for support.

In 2019 we should also see NLP (Natural Language Processing) making its way into best small business CRM software platforms as a precursor to adding functionalities such as recording minutes of the meetings, updating records, and several other voice-based interactions that can revolutionize the way we interact with cloud based CRM software technology today.

Finally- On-premises CRM has become the exception

Adoption of cloud based CRM for startups and small and medium businesses used to be a tough sell.
However, that is no longer the case.

According to our research, we found that 80 percent of all new CRM purchases are in the cloud.

This is because not only finding sufficient talents and vendor support to maintain these on-premise legacy systems will become more difficult to find over time but the increasing need to access the CRM software from multiple locations and devices has also led to the rise of using cloud based CRM solutions in small businesses.

Therefore, if privacy protection was an obstacle to cloud based CRM adoption in the past, after the enforcement of the GDPR rules, this year may be the time to look again for cloud based CRM in the market for better and deeper interactions with your leads, prospects, and customers.

Do you want 2019 to be the year where you achieve massive revenue growth?

Then start planning NOW.

Create your revenue growth strategy for 2019.

If you would like to get some ideas or brainstorm on how ConvergeHub can provide the right technology to achieve your company’s marketing and sales goals, and retain your existing customers by enhancing customer’s experience with your brand, you can reserve a confidential consultation with one of our experts.

On this 30-45 minute call we will:

  • Take a deep-dive into your business process
  • Pinpoint areas with most growth potential
  • Discuss how to implement an effective marketing automation system that lets you focus on the most important tasks

Click here to check out how you can achieve your sales growth plans in 2019!

sign up

2018: The Year in Review

When the year-end arrives, all of us find the incessant urge to recall the various things that happened, going down the memory lane and refresh the timeline to view the goals that were fulfilled with the passing year. We live in the age of the customer, where consumers (not business executives) decide on how customer-centric companies are. Since in 2018, among many other things, we understood that good customer experience can help to control cost, and so business executives in both small and large B2B organizations are presently more interested in their potential to fuel sustainable top-line growth

When the year-end arrives, all of us find the incessant urge to recall the various things that happened, going down the memory lane and refresh the timeline to view the goals that were fulfilled with the passing year.

We live in the age of the customer, where consumers (not business executives) decide on how customer-centric companies are.
Since in 2018, among many other things, we understood that good customer experience can help to control cost, and so business executives in both small and large B2B organizations are presently more interested in their potential to fuel sustainable top-line growth.

Nurtured leads make 47% larger purchases than non-nurtured leads.- The Annuitas Group Click To Tweet

Easy to use CRM software platforms like ConvergeHub is the foundation building block of an organization’s customer experience strategy to win, serve, and retain their customers, enabling organizations to integrate many new technologies and business strategies, which are constantly being rejuvenated by new trends.

Nowadays, consumers across all industries want to connect easily with companies to interact, make a purchase, or get services from organizations.

In a recent survey done by Forrester, it was found that:

More than 72% of consumers say that they value their time and consider it to be the most important thing that an organization can do to provide them with good service.

Therefore 2018 showed organizations that they must offer customers means to easily engage with them to foster an ongoing relationship based on omnichannel dialogue that can enhance loyalty and strengthen retention.

Here are a few notable trends that we saw in the B2B industry using CRM software in 2018:

CRMs Have Split Out By Vertical

In the past CRM has been largely kept as its own category of software, more like a separate companion to whatever other business systems, you are already using for your industry.
Implying, when you purchase an easy to use CRM platform, it does not necessarily mean that the software will have all the compatibility and functionalities for what you do every day.

However, over the last few years and more so in 2018, CRM companies have realized that there is a critical need for highly specialized CRM software platforms. Therefore, 2018 has been a year which showed the mushrooming growth of vertically specialized CRM solutions, which are specific to such B2B industries like Real Estate, Merchant Cash Advance business, E-commerce, Field Services, Legal and others.

It has been predicted by renowned CRM vendors and stalwarts that it is extremely likely that within the next 5-10 years CRM platforms will no longer come as a standalone solution, but will be a part of industry-specific requirements.

Personalized Workflow Automation Through AI Technology Platforms

Another most important and prominent advances that this year has shown, is that Artificial Intelligence will power up our CRM platforms to learn from our sales, marketing, and support rep’s interactions by analyzing data, helping AI to find answers to our questions, predict our requirements, or take care of forgotten and tedious tasks so that we can focus on more important issues.

2018 has been the take-offyear which illustrated how AI-powered CRM systems can access untapped and unseen activity patterns to uncover insights on leads or an existing customer, predict trends, and make critical decisions which will significantly reduce cold calls and save hours of work.

For example, in 2018 we have seen how B2B organizations will continue using AI-powered analytics to prescribe the right action for customer-facing employees and use prescriptive advice to identify high-quality leads, send relevant sales collaterals to the buyers, or use optimal discounting to maximize revenue per contract to enhance business growth.

This year has shown us how AI-powered rules can help pinpoint the right prospect, recommend issue resolutions, use machine learning and predictive analysis to uproot guesswork out of critical marketing decisions, help create appealing and innovative campaigns, and route leads to appropriate resources in the organization.

Businesses Are Supporting Digital Customer Journeys Evermore

The present year has seen a sporadic growth in personalized product recommendations, automated product configuration, price negotiations, and order taking. Even for post-purchase support, we have seen more B2B companies offering customer facilities for online issue submission, tracking and scheduling for service technicians, apart from exploring the value of offering automated conversational interactions with chat-bots and virtual agents.

Hence, small business CRM software platforms like ConvergeHub has taken a step ahead in 2018 for providing the right customer experience for the right customer at the right time in his or her customer journey.

Tighter Integration With External Tools

Another noteworthy trend that we have visualized this year is the improvement of tighter integrations of CRM software with external tools and services to improve the usage of small business CRM software systems.

CRM developers in 2018 are keen on understanding the need for industry-standard interfaces to connect multiple B2B solutions and services, integrating new technologies across sales, marketing, business accounts, and customer support.

For example, successful collaborations with accounting application like QuickBooks CRM that allow intelligent synchronization across platforms using REST-based APIs are the key to winning collaborations by permitting systems to effortlessly communicate with one another privately and securely for enhanced user productivity of the CRM software.

In the days to come, the future of CRM technology will definitely see the need for the growth of integrating mobile and web-based solutions with a CRM for using information from different but tightly related sources to generate meaningful relationship intelligence.

Social And Mobile CRM Are Flying High

This year has witnessed a surge in social CRM technology as CRM vendors have realized that the key to keeping your customers engaged lies in harnessing the power of social media channels for marketing and customer support.

This surge in the growth in social CRM technology and increasing emphasis on customer sentiment analysis and social influence in B2B organizations are factors that not going to determine where your business is today, but where you want to be a year from now, once the pace of sales and customer acquisition has gained its speed.

Moreover, in this time of change, CRM companies in 2018 have also recognized the need for enhanced mobile CRM technology as they have recognized most of their B2B customers want to be able to take their CRM system with them everywhere, as this year we can see creation of CRM brands that are solely available via app, focusing on mobile-first.

Big Data Is Getting Into The Legal Weeds

In the present times, B2B companies are now having an insane amount of information about their customers, data that could (in theory) be used to really invade someone’s personal life.

Therefore, governments across the world have started paying attention and growing interest in protecting their citizens from businesses’ interests in their personal lives.

The European Union, in particular, is interested in setting up laws surrounding adoption of Big Data in CRM technology, and so this year CRM users and vendors have started learning how they should be storing and collecting personal data of their customers, now that General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has come into effect to support the collection and management of personal data in a secure way.

Finally- CRM Adoption Will Rise

Looking for technology to help the CRM industry to overcome the adoption challenge (that has long been one of its greatest obstacles), 2018 has seen the rise of ‘Gamification’, by which several CRM vendors are making it more enjoyable for the B2B users to easily adopt this excellent and unparallel business tool.

By stimulating competition and participation while using the CRM software among employees, this year B2B organizations are driving engagement across the board, by applying easy to use gaming procedures to non-gaming business applications, which is the latest elements to motivate and inspire employees, praise their accomplishments, improve their performance and eventually maximize returns for business growth.

sign up

Do you have any other ideas of new trends that we saw in the B2B industry using CRM software in 2018? Share it with us in the comments section below!