How To Boost Lead Conversion Using Sales Management CRM Tools

Does your organization have a solid process in place to get your leads qualified so that your sales teams find time to focus on the most sales-ready prospects in their sales management CRM software? Do you have any idea about how your sales reps are qualifying and thereafter converting those leads into customers? Lead conversion skills are the heart of revenue growth and expansion in any organization. Therefore, here are a few best practices that can help you increase your lead conversion ratio and grow your business to new heights in 2021.

Does your organization have a solid process in place to get your leads qualified so that your sales teams find time to focus on the most sales-ready prospects in their sales management CRM software?

Do you have any idea about how your sales reps are qualifying and thereafter converting those leads into customers?

92% of consumers trust recommendations from brand advocates. - Nielsen Click To Tweet

Lead conversion skills are the heart of revenue growth and expansion in any organization.

Therefore, here are a few best practices that can help you increase your lead conversion ratio and grow your business to new heights in 2021.

Integrate Your Sales Management CRM With A Marketing Automation Platform

A majority of sales reps today use easy to use CRM software solutions to move leads and prospective opportunities through the sales pipeline and close deals.

If you know what is CRM software, you must be aware that CRM is a robust application that stores a plethora of information about all your leads, and customers in the CRM database, which includes details like demographic and behavioral data.

Therefore, when you use automation in CRM, which is also known as Sales Force Automation (SFA) in tandem with your sales management CRM, you can without any hassles leverage that contact details to customize and target the messages that you need to send to your prospects.

Nowadays even most Salesforce Alternative CRM tools, let you personalize your lead nurturing process and send messages based on your prospects’ past buying behaviors, interests, and more.

Since doing this allows you to send more personalized outreach. Which in turn helps in better engaging prospects that enhance the likelihood of conversion.

Publish Awesome And Informative Blogs

We all acknowledge that the stage for converting leads comes at the very end of the sales cycle. However, to persuade the leads to get to that point, whereby they become interested enough to procure your offerings- you primarily need to build up trust.

Leads and prospective customers cherish to see you as a subject matter expert and an authority in your arena and feel that you can be trusted to support them and ensure their growth and satisfaction using your offering(s).

According to Forbes, blogging is a great way of building that trust:

The fact is that in the world of today you cannot become an authority simply by declaring yourself as one. Customers are more suspicious, and they want to see you prove it. By producing quality information that’s true and reliable in every blog, you are making sure that you can become that authority.

Prospects and leads are more likely to engage with brands and organizations once you can establish yourself as an indisputable authority in their minds, leading to more lead conversion rates.

Set Up Killer Landing Pages With Optimized CTA Buttons

As the leads move through your sales pipeline, you need ways to capture more of their information by increasing their engagement with your brand.

One of the most effective ways to do this is to create simple, yet attractive landing pages that will encourage your leads to take the desired action, like request a demo, register for a webinar, etc.

Make it painfully clear to your leads, and visitors viewing your landing page, which action you want them to take, how they can take it, and most importantly what will they receive in exchange.

If you are not sure how to create awesome landing pages, it is best to check out some examples from your competitor’s websites.

Run Lead Nurturing And Lead Generation Campaigns

It is a common fact, that to convert leads, you must primarily generate leads. There are several ways you can generate new leads, from email drip campaigning to social media programs.

Now, once you have generated new leads, you need to nurture them through the sales pipeline that must consist of a series of ‘touch-points’ to move them towards a sale.

Lead nurturing aids in identifying sales-ready leads using lead scoring, since each action your leads take can be scored to move the leads closer to conversion.

Set Up Lead Scoring To Qualify Leads

Lead scoring techniques help your marketing teams to identify the most sales-ready leads in your CRM database.

While scoring leads, you can use a point system that indicates the value a lead represents, by awarding points to leads for actions they take, like clicking or opening emails, visiting your website, downloading eBooks, participating in post-sales surveys, etc.

You can also award points to your leads for demographic data such as the place they reside, their job titles, the industry they work, etc.

As these scores accumulate over time, you set a score threshold, at which a lead may be considered as an MQL (Marketing Qualified Lead), which once they cross can be passed over to the sales teams for immediate follow-ups.

Remember, while you are setting up your lead scoring system, always include your sales teams in the process, since they can better decide along with your marketing teams, which action warrants which score, and at which a new lead can be considered as an MQL.

Moreover, it is also highly advisable that you must check your lead scoring practice at least once every quarter, for finding whether the leads are being qualified too soon or too late in the process. Since, if your marketing teams are passing a lot of MQLs to your sales teams, but very few of them are getting converted, odds are that your marketing executives are qualifying the leads too soon, and hence you must increase your MQL threshold to fine-tune your lead scoring process.

Simply put lead scoring boosts the lead quality in your business CRM, which helps in achieving a better conversion rate for your organization.

Enable Sales To Quickly Follow Up On Qualified Leads

According to a survey done by InsideSales, it states that:

Your odds of reaching a new sales lead drop over 10 times if you wait longer than the first hour of shown interest, and the odds of [sales] qualifying that lead decrease six times after the first 60 minutes.

Therefore you need to enable your sales teams for immediate to follow up, using a sales cadence once a lead is qualified, since the longer you wait to reach out to a qualified lead, the lesser the chances of conversion will be along with the passage of time.

Using a sales management CRM for creating reminders and automating tasks it is easy to send alerts to sales reps the moment a new lead becomes qualified, to ensure that your sales teams do not let MQLs fall through the crack.

Share On Social Media And Use Social Monitoring To Find Brand Advocates

It is easy to engage your know leads with multichannel campaigns and email marketing.

However, what can you do about those leads whose contact data you do not have in your CRM database?

Therefore, when you create blogs and other types of content around your brand, share them on social media, so that people may share it, which in turn will extend the reach of your brand and drive in more new leads to click through to your blog or website.

Since, once people do that, you will understand that the engagement has begun, as these will be leads that are genuinely interested in your offerings, and are so easier to qualify and convert into customers.

Remember to always include some type of offer in association with your content that you are sharing to capture the contacts of these new leads.

While sharing your content on social media platforms, if you find people speaking positively about your brand, reach out, start a dialogue, and show your appreciation. You may even ask them if they want to feature in an interview or a case study of your brand.

In other words, treat these people with care and respect in any possible ways, because they are potential brand advocates for your business, who can be super helpful in promoting your brand and also help to increase conversion rates.

Here are two statistics that illustrate the role that brand advocates can play for growing your business.

  • 92% of consumers trust recommendations from brand advocates. (Nielsen)
  • Only 18% of consumers trust recommendations from industry influencers. (Forrester Research)

Key Takeaway

Lead conversion is the bread and butter of your business since it is a process that allows your business to grow, by bringing dollars into the coffers in your organization.

Nevertheless, as you can see, lead conversion does not happen on its own, as it requires serious planning and execution of various tactics to increase the lead conversion rate.

Therefore, always measure your lead conversion ratio, by keeping a scorecard that can help you track this metric so that you can easily identify what is working and what is not, and let you fix the nonperforming issues and focus more energy on conversion tactics that are producing results.

The math is simple. When you increase engagement levels, you boost conversion rates, and revenue climbs for stellar business growth.

sign up

Key Features Of Sales And Marketing CRM Tools – That Can Save Your Startup Today

Startups all across the globe are glorified as the ultramodern way of taking control of your life, is circumventing nine to five jobs, and throwing them into the bin. Nevertheless, according to a report published by Small Business Trends, it states that approximately 40 percent of startups are profitable, while 30 percent of them are at break-even points and the rest 30 percent losing money. Therefore if you are having any second thoughts on your big idea, read through this article as we unravel the real problems and issues that can stall your super ideas and how adopting the best sales and marketing CRM tools can change that for you and make your company find business growth.

Startups all across the globe are glorified as the ultramodern way of taking control of your life, is circumventing nine to five jobs, and throwing them into the bin.

Nevertheless, according to a report published by Small Business Trends, it states that approximately 40 percent of startups are profitable, while 30 percent of them are at break-even points and the rest 30 percent losing money.

Therefore if you are having any second thoughts on your big idea, read through this article as we unravel the real problems and issues that can stall your super ideas and how adopting the best sales and marketing CRM tools can change that for you and make your company find business growth.

Paying attention to your customers is important since 14% of startups fail due to not regarding customers’ needs. - Fundera Click To Tweet

What is CRM?

CRM is both a technology and an awesome strategy that integrates into itself several dimensions of customer relations, which helps to convey real value to the customers and retain the same for businesses. With CRM related IT solutions, world-class customer relations can be easily attained and utilized to create brands in the marketplace.

In other words, best business CRM is a tool that helps one understand their target customers, their needs, and how brands can sustain that customer relationship to propel your startup on the basis of that relationship.

Now there are three types of easy to use CRM software that is available in the marketplace:

1. Strategic CRM

This is a CRM software that is based on delivering value to the customers, better than the rest of the competitions, and integrates the same in product development and structure of the business.

2. Operational CRM

This CRM software focuses on the automation of sales, production, and service as per the requirement of the consumers.

3. Analytical CRM

This CRM software focuses on gathering, storing, distributing, and thereafter integrating and analyzing consumer-facing data to cater value to both customers and businesses.

There are several models of sales and marketing CRM tools available in the marketplace. Nevertheless, in this article, we shall discuss the IDIC model which aids businesses to ascertain the customers who are of high value and loyalty towards the brands.

Identification: Find out who is the customers and understand them well.

Differentiation: Identity which customer has the greatest potentiality and thereby have more future prospects.

Interaction: Makes sure that businesses can perceive the customer’s desires, and understand the customer’s possible relationship with other brands.

Customization: Personalize offers and means of communication to make sure that the customer’s desires can be fulfilled.

So now that you are aware of what is CRM let us move on to the five most important reasons as to why you must buy your best sales and marketing CRM tools for your startup organization and stick to this cutting-edge business growth technology and tool.

5 KEY PROBLEMS AND THEIR SOLUTIONS (FOR STARTUPS)

1. CASH CRUNCH

According to a report published by Small Business Trends, it states that more than 29 percent of startups fail because of cash crunch and more than 18 percent for cost and pricing issues.

Therefore it is important for any startup business to keep their pricing compatible and yet generate enough profits to keep the krypton of cash crunch at a bay.

This is over here small business CRM software comes into play as it can help customers to understand the customer’s choices and buying patterns to integrate the same in product development and provide pricing that predicts good business growth.

2. POOR RELATIONS WITH THE CUSTOMERS

Relations with its customers is the spine of any business, especially startups as they are more consumer-based models of business and this is why more startups are in need of incorporating CRM strategies for their growing businesses.

According to reports among all startups that fail more than 17 percent are those that failed to develop and deliver a user-friendly product or service and another 17 percent failed because of inappropriate business models that underlined their offerings.

Therefore, this data even illustrates the growing importance to adopt the best all in one CRM in developing a consumer-based model for business that can help in building user-friendly offerings.

3. NEED FOR THE RIGHT TEAM

The idea of delivering a customer-friendly offering, for any startup is a challenging task, which needs the right team to pull that off.
As per statistics and data that we referred to before about 23 percent of startups fail due to their team’s inefficiency in catering a customer-friendly offering to the consumers in the marketplace.

Therefore as a startup entrepreneur, you need extensive staffing and training programs that can aid you in employing the right team to focus on providing value to the needs of your customers.

This is over here CRM for small business once again comes into play as it can help you to identify the right persons for your job and even train the same marketing, sales, and support strategies to reach customers and sustain them over a long period of time.

4. NEED FOR RESEARCH

Just as there is no way that we can write an article without any proper research, similarly the same applies to any startup, as comprehensive market research is most important and a must for the growth of any startup business across the globe.

According to research, it has been found that 42 percent of failed startup ventures were not successful since they did start their business after performing any market research about their proposed offerings.
Additionally, 13 percent of startup businesses failed and are so ill-fated because they launched their business at a bad time, statistics which show the extent to which startup organizations ignore real-time market trends while starting their businesses.

Therefore, as one of the most recognized vendors of software solutions in the Salesforce Alternative CRM marketplace, we can assure that it is the business growth technology that is capable of storing, integrating, and analyzing consumer data which aid startups to find and focus on the right market at the right time to launch the right product or service in the marketplace.

5. MARKETING WOES

As per statistics and data that we referred even before 14 percent of startups fail due to poor or ineffectual marketing and another 14 percent for ignoring their customers.

But why do startups fail at marketing or while conducting their after-sales service?

Even though there can be multiple factors that can make it happen but one of the most important of all these factors is not knowing well your customers.

CRM for SMB and startups helps growing businesses to understand their customers thoroughly so that they can cater to their customer’s needs.

This is exactly where Analytical CRM comes into play which aids in gathering consumer-related data and with Operational CRM that can ensure faster services to their customers and Strategic CRM that can help in marketing their offerings strategically to target relevant consumers based on their behavioral and purchase patterns which can be easily collected, stored and thereafter analyzed once it is hived inside the CRM database.

Conclusion

Therefore now that you know why your startup needs to adopt the best sales and marketing CRM tools and implement CRM strategies for your business growth, and the right type of CRM to go for to overcome each of these hurdles at the beginning of your entrepreneurial journey, it remains without any doubt that small business CRM software is that much-needed firepower which your startup needs as the next big weapon for victories ahead in this competitive global marketplace.

sign up

Why B2B Sales Prospecting Methods Are So Tough To Realize – And How to Make It Easier For SMBs

To begin with, let us admit that B2B sales prospecting methods are not easy to accomplish. Rather B2B sales prospecting can be really tough to find the attention of the B2B (Business to Business) buyers in a marketing model that has altered a lot in the recent years, whereby increasing competition in the marketplace makes is more and more stand out from the crowd. Now prospecting for hot new products and services on the market is not a difficult thing. This is because direct and targeted approaches can create enough demand and thereby keep the sales funnel from getting depleted when a new offering fills a gap in the market. But what happens when the low-hanging fruit has been picked up by the knowledgeable buyers? What happens when the competition has caught on and caught up?

To begin with, let us admit that B2B sales prospecting methods are not easy to accomplish. Rather B2B sales prospecting can be really tough to find the attention of the B2B (Business to Business) buyers in a marketing model that has altered a lot in the recent years, whereby increasing competition in the marketplace makes is more and more stand out from the crowd.

80% of sales require 5 follow-up calls after the meeting. Click To Tweet

Now prospecting for hot new products and services on the market is not a difficult thing. This is because direct and targeted approaches can create enough demand and thereby keep the sales funnel from getting depleted when a new offering fills a gap in the market.

But what happens when the low-hanging fruit has been picked up by the knowledgeable buyers?
What happens when the competition has caught on and caught up?

In this case when the executive suite will be still calling for action and revenue that is when fresh B2B prospecting methods and skills are needed as we as one of the popular vendors of easy to use CRM will discuss below.

Actually at the heart of the dilemma faced by the B2 prospectors lies the inability to create selling opportunities when their buyers (inconveniently) are not actually looking to buy. Therefore traditional prospecting methods and sales pitches may no longer be effective with B2B prospecting nowadays, and this is clearly a big problem with so many sales, marketing, and business development professionals having being bought up with old school business growth ideas on a diet of little else that hardly works in B2B marketplace today.

Who Are These New Breed of B2B Buyer

In present times the rules have changed for the B2B marketers since the typical new breed of B2B buyers has evolved in several ways.

Multiple Buyers

In modern times the individual buyers have largely given way to a “team approach” whereby multiple players are most often involved in purchasing decisions made by organizations, sometimes which spreads across different business functions, where people entrusted for buying often have very little experience of the procurement process.

An interesting report published by HBR (Harvard Business Review) in 2015, illustrated that the average number of buyers involved in a considered buying process is 5.4, however, what is more, alarming was the drop off in conversion rate as more people are added to that buying process.

Hence sellers that are keen on developing their B2B prospecting methods need to primarily ascertain who has the authority to make the buying decision in an organization, and thereafter if it is found that the person cannot make a unilateral decision, the next goal should be to help the decision-maker to get others on board and thereafter provide additional tailored information covering each buyer’s specific area of responsibility.

For example, an end-user of any B2B product or service will definitely have different information requirements and concerns vs. a financial authority working in the same company.

Informed Buyers

Nowadays with the rise in the internet which has led to a sporadic abundance of research information available online has given birth to the rise of “self-educated” buyers and so potential prospects are no longer sitting back waiting for a solution to be presented to them, as the buyers are proactively seeking information themselves nowadays and as a consequence are likely to be less receptive to traditional unsolicited approaches.

Buyers seek value not price

In a research done by SiriusDecisions, it suggests that the cost factor involved in a sale is no longer a main deciding-factor for the B2B buyers in making their purchase decisions, whereby in the present times the “unique business value” of a solution or that an organization can provide to its buyer has become the factor of primary importance.

Nevertheless, even in this era of progressively more complex solutions, it appears that old habits are hard to die, and so too many teams in sales are now still considering price and also features when in reality the focus needs to be on conversions about the distinct value that the seller can offer to set them apart from the completion in the marketplace.

SOLUTIONGoing Beyond B2B Cold Calling

While this might require some time and long term training along with a cultural shift but what about here and now.  So what can organizations involved in selling can do to go beyond the realms of cold calling to reach out to their prospects and get things moving in the short-term?

So as one of the most acclaimed vendors of CRM for small and medium businesses and startups here we have provided a few suggestions for growing enterprises to get them started.

  • Deploy Effective Business Growth Tools

Every structure needs a firm foundation to stand on its own, this is the reason people who know what is CRM is greatly in favor of this business growth tool.

CRM helps to record and organize every interaction with the leads, prospects, and customers and make it available for analysis to every department in an organization –which results in ushering more effective communication, better organizational culture, and less waste of resources.

Using easy to use CRM solutions while the number of leads generated will be less than if it was done in a haphazard and unstructured manner, but the quality of the leads generated will be much higher which will better the conversion rate in the sales pipeline.

  • Have A Focus

The time and effort dedicated to prospecting in the B2B segment should be just on where it is going to be effective and not spread too thin.
This can be done by concentration on the best market segment (based on profitability) and personas as identified by the business CRM tool whereby the approach can be refined to appeal to a specific buying audience in the marketplace.

  • Go Social

Social media can be another robust digital tool in finding outreach and build relationships online. According to research, LinkedIn is the best haunting place for the B2B community, followed by Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and all other good platforms like Quora which are good places to connect and demonstrate expertise.

  • Shoot Email campaigns

Email still remains one of the most preferred modes of communication despite all that plethora of social platforms that we use. And that includes B2B buyers who are also considered as prime targets for a well-targeted email campaign that addresses their pain-points and provides solutions to those issues.

Creating separate email campaigns for the sales and marketing teams can help in prospecting B2B buyers where the sales campaigns are targeted towards the decision-makers and the marketing campaigns are covering all titles in the company involved in the buying decision of the purchasing process.

  • Do Networking

Joining networking groups online can be a source of new B2B contacts in real life as well as online, which can help to create relationships that can culminate in fresh businesses. Businesses can also consider putting their own networking events to raise their industry profiles.

Takeaway- Achieving The B2B Prospecting Challenge Today

B2B sales prospecting methods can be challenging and often discouraging in the face of the consumer’s demands. However, by undertaking long-term and short-term actions sales and marketing teams in the B2B industries can breathe new life into their prospecting methodology, and so we hope these thoughts will put coal and fire into your prospecting engine if it has stopped.

sign up

The Market Segmentation Process And Its Role On A CRM Tool

Once you are creating a market segmentation process let us tell you that segmenting the market works wonders if you are capable of targeting the right customers. In fact, so much so that if you can send specifically targeted email campaigns, you can easily see more than 100 percent higher click through rates comp to non-segmented email campaigns, and so you essentially double your chances using the market segmentation process in your easy to use CRM software. Now it is not only advantageous for your business to tailor your campaigns, but in the present time customers also prefer personalized communications from brands and businesses.

Once you are creating a market segmentation process let us tell you that segmenting the market works wonders if you are capable of targeting the right customers.

Because CRM software greatly improves data accessibility, sales reps at companies using a CRM can shorten their sales cycles by 8-14% - Nucleus Research Click To Tweet

In fact, so much so that if you can send specifically targeted email campaigns, you can easily see more than 100 percent higher click through rates comp to non-segmented email campaigns, and so you essentially double your chances using the market segmentation process in your easy to use CRM software.

Now it is not only advantageous for your business to tailor your campaigns, but in the present time customers also prefer personalized communications from brands and businesses.

If you know what is CRM tool, you must also be aware that it is a software platform that houses a plethora of useful information with respect to your customer’s preferences, demographics, and the purchasing habits of your consumers that can be used to fragment your marketplace.

Hence any business CRM irrespective of whether it is an enterprise-level software or a Salesforce Alternative CRM most CRM offers segmentation and features like campaign management for targeting the best demography for business growth.

In other words, a market segment is a number of consumers that are grouped together by the marketers, which can be segmented using a cutting-edge business growth technology solution like a CRM tool, according to several criteria which can include the consumer’s needs, their purchasing habits, age, lifestyle, preference, interests and more.

Therefore as one of the most cherished vendors of cutting-edge CRM for small and medium business and startups here are the roles of market segmentation on CRM:

Redefining Market Segments

The marketing segments must be big enough to meet the financial needs of the company and the offering(s). Segments may be chosen based on demographics, the generation of the consumer, or geological location. For sales CRM, the segment must also be reachable by promotional means.
In most cases, business marketers have already selected and grouped the products market segments before the implementation of the CRM. Hence, part of the market segmentation process is a secondary form of market segmentation, with existing customers further segmented so that post-purchase promotions may be personalized accordingly.

Targeting Market Segments

Using the market segmentation process, marketers study the typical characteristics of the segment members to determine potential product features and to figure out how to reach the segment members. Different segments may be more prone to specific media types, such as emails, e-magazines, web pages, even television or radio. Marketers target market segment members by tailoring products and commercials to suit the needs and tastes of the segment members and then displaying the advertisements on the market segment’s preferred media channels for finding better outcomes.

Managing CRM Database

Easy to use CRM goes farther than initial segmentation and target marketing because the marketer has more information on the segment’s characteristics.
This extra knowledge comes from a consumer database full of information on customer preferences and purchasing habits. This information is collected as part of a company’s consumer transactions and sales activities. Some companies administer customer surveys and store the results in their databases. Other companies nowadays have membership cards that record every customer purchase.

Promote to Market Segments

CRM marketers take the information in the databases and create promotions designed to meet specific customer wants and needs. This further segmentation helps retain customers, and customer retention is vital to business profitability. Typical CRM promotions include customer loyalty programs, personalized action between customer service personnel and the customer, and the ability to customize the product to suit the exact needs of the customer.

Conclusion

Hence in a nutshell market segmentation process not only provides you with useful insights into customer behavior and attitudes by tracking interactions, collecting sales data, and analyzing trends among specific segments. You can send powerful marketing material to smaller groups who share similar traits, resulting in increased Customer Lifetime Value (CLV), stronger sales and higher engagement rates.

sign up

Four Vital Tips For Evaluating And Raising The Bar For Customer Support In Businesses

World-class customer service will surely get you loyal and happy customers and amplify your revenues. Just ask any satisfied customers why they liked your services and one thing they will all probably say is “Because your support team solves problems quickly”. Hence as one of the most popular vendors of business CRM tools, we find quick turnaround time when it comes to dealing with customer issues is of utmost importance to your customer service reputation in the marketplace. However, it is needless to assume that you always need money to deliver prompt customer services. This is because, you can even run a lean customer service machine, on a shoestring budget, if you are aware of what is CRM technology that can even be the envy of any Fortune 500 company.

World-class customer service will surely get you loyal and happy customers and amplify your revenues.
Just ask any satisfied customers why they liked your services and one thing they will all probably say is “Because your support team solves problems quickly”.
Hence as one of the most popular vendors of business CRM tools, we find quick turnaround time when it comes to dealing with customer issues is of utmost importance to your customer service reputation in the marketplace.

28% of millennials think CRM applications are “extremely critical” to their success, compared to 18% of Generation X and 9% of Baby Boomers. Click To Tweet

However, it is needless to assume that you always need money to deliver prompt customer services.

This is because, you can even run a lean customer service machine, on a shoestring budget, if you are aware of what is CRM technology that can even be the envy of any Fortune 500 company.

In fact, according to Gartner Research, it has been found that if you are having a small business, odds are in your company’s favor that your establishment can deliver a higher level of customer satisfaction by customer tracking with the help of a business growth technology like a business CRM software.

Nevertheless, being small as an organization, you have the advantage of being nimble and approachable by your customers. In general, small businesses are not staggered by inter-departmental politics, and red tapes that big organizations face in their business establishments.

Hence, here are a few strategies that can help you to quickly deal with your customer issues. Most of these tools fall with the low to no cost category, but they definitely need investment in time and training if you want to enjoy the full benefit of these tips for decreasing the time needed for resolving your brand’s customer issues.

1. Use social media monitoring tools

Social listening on social media platforms may be one of the most helpful ways to track customers and solve their problems.
Encourage your customers to reach you out on social media platforms like

Facebook and Twitter and advise your customer care representatives to respond to them rapidly.

Now business CRM software, especially those that are integrated with social sharing features, better known as SCRM can help you listen in to the conversations of your followers on social media and thereby take necessary actions rapidly.

2. Take Advantage of Google Alerts

Although it is not a shiny and new application like social platforms, Google Alerts is also efficient if you need to keep an eye on what customers are saying online about your products or services.

Create a series of alerts with suitable keywords and set it up so that you can get necessary alerts by either RSS or email feeds. And the best part is as a Google product, it is free.

3. Use CRM software

You do not need to be on the list of Fortune 500 business establishments to buy CRM solution for keeping your customers happy.

In the present times and with the growth of cloud-based SaaS technology, depending on the scale and size of your small business, you can purchase Salesforce Alternative CRM software solutions that are price-performance leaders and are best suited for startups and small businesses.

However, if you want to spend more but stay with big names, vendors like Microsoft Dynamics and Salesforce have also scaled-down versions of their lead management software for small and medium businesses but might prove extremely heavy in your pocket.

4. Use feedback apps for brick and mortar businesses
Although there are several options for receiving online customer feedback, never neglect spot feedback from customers when they visit your brick and mortar store.

One of the fast deploying technology in many niches is QR (Quick Response) codes. Small businesses can team up with vendors of QR code apps that insert quick response codes on products in the store.

By scanning, the code customers are redirected to a mobile-optimized form while they are still shopping in your store and leave suitable feedback that can be examined in real-time and so complaints found can be resolved rapidly.

Conclusion

Hence, to fetch up, it is necessary that all small businesses must focus on customer satisfaction by adopting a business CRM in this ever increasingly competitive marketplace, with the help of these vital tips that are sure to bring more happy customers and increase your ROI.sign up

Primary Reasons For Buying CRM To Boost Sales and Revenue

CRM or Customer Relationship Management is time-tested software, which is not just the application of technology but is also a strategy to learn more about your customer’s needs and behavior in order the build a stronger relationship. However, as it is true that getting an easy to use CRM for your SMB too early is a wrong thing, similarly you can inflict a negative impact on your business if you buy CRM and its implementation gets too long. Even CRM guru Paul Greenberg the writer of the bestselling book “CRM at the Speed of Light” admits that it can be an accepted fact, like many others, your business may not be ready for CRM, for if that is the case, you will be wasting your money and efforts if you adopt easy to use CRM for your business growth.

CRM or Customer Relationship Management is time-tested software, which is not just the application of technology but is also a strategy to learn more about your customer’s needs and behavior in order the build a stronger relationship.
However, as it is true that getting an easy to use CRM for your SMB too early is a wrong thing, similarly you can inflict a negative impact on your business if you buy CRM and its implementation gets too long.

Using CRM software can increase sales conversion rates by up to 300% - Cloudswave Click To Tweet

Even CRM guru Paul Greenberg the writer of the bestselling book “CRM at the Speed of Light” admits that it can be an accepted fact, like many others, your business may not be ready for CRM, for if that is the case, you will be wasting your money and efforts if you adopt easy to use CRM for your business growth.

So, is your business ready for this business growth technology and tools?

To find an answer to this critical question, here are 3 indicators that can guide you to understand whether you should buy an easy to use CRM for your business right now or your company needs to grow further till you adopt this business growth technology for earning even better revenue.

1. Are You Losing New Sales?

Selling would have been a lot easier if none of the companies would have lost in their selling process. However, if you are losing sales because your lead and customer information got misplaced, or you failed to follow-up because your CRM database is disorganized, or your sales team is spending more time updating and managing their Excel spreadsheets than selling, then it is high time you should move towards implementing an easy to use CRM for your company.

At the most basic level CRM is a tool where you can store all leads and customer information in the CRM database that allows the user to collect, store and use the data for alerts and future sales and customer service activities.

CRM also allows rapid access to all collateral materials as and when they are needed, understand where sales may be going wrong, and find an immediate solution to the problem.

So the answer to what is CRM can be summarized that CRM software is a technology that helps in performing actions that are hard to do with a pure manual, spreadsheet-based approach.

2. Are You Loosing Existing Customers?

Apart from gaining new customers, CRM is even more valuable when it comes to retaining existing customers. Hence, if you are losing existing customers because of failure to follow-up, it is the time that you must introduce ‘Sales Force Automation’ or SFA with the help of easy to use CRM, into sales and customer service operations in your company.

3. Is Your Customer Data Too Large?

The longer you retain your customers, the more you know them. However, it is impossible to carry all the details of your customers, such as their payment terms, buying patterns, things they respond to, and even their personal information and others, in your head.

Therefore, when your organization needs to remember the large volume of data about your leads, prospects, and existing customers, it is the time that you need a CRM database to keep your entire information safe in one central repository.

Endnote

Although implementing CRM can be challenging, but if you are losing sales for any of these above scenarios, it is the time you must understand what is CRM, and adopt this most popular business growth technology for optimizing your organization’s sales and customer support efficiently.

sign up

4 Ways To Prepare For Ad Hoc Easy To Use CRM Training In Disturbed Times

The of late rapid outbreak of COVID-19 across the globe implies that the human race is now faced with living in an uncertain, undeniable, scary and distracted time. Now, while the far-fetching impact of this new challenge on both society and economy is still unknown and so sales and business do not have to immediately succumb to the pressure. As a matter of fact, with the right easy to use CRM software and business growth technology solutions many businesses do not have to close down or reduce their outputs at all. Rather CRM is a cutting-edge tool that can empower businesses to support their teams with remote working facilities which implies businesses can conduct their operations as close to usual as possible even during this COVID-19 Pandemic times.

The of late rapid outbreak of COVID-19 across the globe implies that the human race is now faced with living in an uncertain, undeniable, scary and distracted time.
Now, while the far-fetching impact of this new challenge on both society and economy is still unknown and so sales and business do not have to immediately succumb to the pressure.
As a matter of fact, with the right easy to use CRM software and business growth technology solutions many businesses do not have to close down or reduce their outputs at all.

Rather CRM is a cutting-edge tool that can empower businesses to support their teams with remote working facilities which implies businesses can conduct their operations as close to usual as possible even during this COVID-19 Pandemic times.

From customer service and email marketing to personalization, companies now expect to be able to connect platforms and technologies with customer data, in order to provide a more personalized experience. - SuperOffice Click To Tweet

Nevertheless, this technology does not take into account what personal trials your team members and employees might be going through, and therefore training any team in this time will be a challenging task. This is because it really makes sense with a constant cascade of news practically spelling out economic meltdown, not to mention the concerns people are having over one’s own health and the well-being of their loved ones.

Even though all said and done, time is the only element that will gradually diffuse the latter concerns, sales-oriented businesses can help to ensure that their sales teams about stability in their jobs by allowing remote working, which is not only true for enterprises but even effective for small organizations and startups by implementing an effective easy to use CRM training.

So where should brands, companies and businesses start for training their teams?

As one of the most popular vendors of award-winning Salesforce Alternative CRM software solutions to help your team get acclimatized with a new remote easy to use CRM or sales tools, the ideal place to begin is by uniting your teams and getting them onboard and enthusiastic about the innovative changes in these trying times.

1. Rallying Your Team

The golden key to success in any business is having a passionate team of employees that is enthusiastic about the work they are doing, and the key to achieving this is usually through excited leaders who are able to inspire.
Now, while finding this source of inspiration at these present times, with frightening distractions by the over flooding Coronavirus news, can be a problem, nonetheless, it is possible through honest and open discussions with your teams.

Hence, for this those that are conducting training of the easy to use CRM should consider asking questions around the best possible ways to communicate with their teams.

Some of these questions might include:
• What are your biggest issues of concern right now?
• How can your role in your organization address these concerns and issues?
• How can you best communicate with your team members right now?
• What are the aspects of processes and tools that you are struggling to understand today?

These above-stated questions will enable managers and leaders to perceive the scope of distraction and the amount of work thereby necessary for training, even before finding engaging and creative ways to communicate with their teams, based on which those conducting the CRM software’s training will be able to communicate the benefits of the chosen easy to use CRM tool more efficiently.

Doing this will not only get their teams excited about using the software but also understand the benefits of using an easy to use CRM, since if it is not done rightly teams may not opt to use the new software or even make use of it begrudgingly which can result in decreasing the adoption rate of the tool.

2. Make Easy To Use CRM Training Profoundly Appealing

While it is of utmost necessity to recognize the present stressful impact current global and regional events about Coronavirus Pandemic are having on your employees, nevertheless it does not mean that training should not be conducted.

Rather, it implies that the training of the CRM software needs to be as strategic as possible.

Therefore conduct the training by taking a step back and viewing the scopes of what you are asking your team to be familiar with.

For this some of these questions you can ask yourself might include:
• Are you try to train your team on multiple platforms and tools at once?
• Are you trying to totally change the way your team is working and overwhelming them with unnecessary and boring materials?
• Is there any way you can simplify and make their training easy?

Finding the answers to these questions are important since if remote working has not been a part of a company’s culture until now, it can be considered that the team is likely passing through a period of adjustment or facing a learning curve trying to grasp a whole new way of working.

Now as such CRM training materials will add to their burden if they are not engaging. Therefore, those conducting the training need to simplify all training materials so that they are concise, quick and reliable.

For this one of the most successful ways to train teams is to make them understand the core basics of what is CRM and provide them with post-training guides that they can learn later on at their convenience.

3. Plan For Remote CRM Implementation

Relating to the aforesaid point, those conducting the training of the software need to also make sure that the easy to use solution can be impeccably implemented offsite.

Hence, leaders need to think not only the complexity found in the CRM solution itself but even the capability of their teams to accept certain aspects of the CRM training by themselves, more so during these Pandemic times.

This right now, when the world is observing social-distancing norms can be done by using a plethora of different technologies like video conferencing which can educate in depth several aspects of the software by those conducting the training exercise, before your teams end the call and try doing certain additional exercises on their own.

Therefore, if you are the one buying the software, you must make sure that the onboarding process within the software is also simple to follow, which in return will help in considerably reducing the cost, as implementation and training of even an easy to use CRM often use up valuable time that can be easily saved by choosing the right solution once you buy CRM during these trying times.

4. Consider Existing Platforms and Their Integration Capabilities

When buying a CRM software solution, it extremely necessary that you must look at its integrational capabilities with all your existing business platforms.

For this some of the questions you can ask yourself might include:
• Will your selected CRM platform integrates seamlessly with any platform?
• Will the CRM solution present any serious issues in migrating data from your existing infrastructure or other often-uses business growth platforms?
• Is your company looking for introducing any other additional solutions in the future that you need to integrate with a CRM?

Now, looking into these factors are important since integration capabilities will undeniably add to your team’s and businesses’ capabilities in the future, since if the CRM database cannot be imported or exported between diverse platforms, it will surely spell disaster and a lot of additional work for not only the IT personnel employed in your company but even for people who manage these solutions and also your team that needs this information to do their job efficiently.

Takeaway

Hence while humanity at large is currently faced with a lot of societal and economic uncertainties, it does not mean that sales-oriented businesses need to give up as through engaging and effective communications, streamlined and simplified training processes, inspirational leadership, and lastly with the help of an easy to use CRM, sales teams can make a transition to remote working and continue on with business as usual.

sign up

Why In Modern Times Using Legacy CRM Solutions Can Erode Your Business Growth

In modern times businesses have shifted drastically and have become digital nowadays in the ways organizations market their brands. Hence in recent years, there has been an explosion of several digital marketing technologies for increasing brand awareness and revenue. Therefore, if you are aware of what is CRM within the context of this business growth technology marketing and sales efforts have been increasingly acquiring a singleness of purpose accompanied by new trends in marketing their offerings. While in the past marketing and sales once had limited interactions between these two departments, these two functional identities have nowadays become much more technologically synergistic and unified, while working towards a common goal. Therefore, today marketers working with organizations using legacy CRM software instead of cloud-based easy to use CRM software<are often frustrated about how manual their processes are, which can be at times even downright exasperating when simple tasks and request have unattainable solutions.

In modern times businesses have shifted drastically and have become digital nowadays in the ways organizations market their brands. Hence in recent years, there has been an explosion of several digital marketing technologies for increasing brand awareness and revenue.
Therefore, if you are aware of what is CRM, within the context of this business growth technology marketing and sales efforts have been increasingly acquiring a singleness of purpose accompanied by new trends in marketing their offerings.

64.2% of businesses view CRM tools as impactful on their bottom line - Finance Online Click To Tweet

While in the past marketing and sales once had limited interactions between these two departments, these two functional identities have nowadays become much more technologically synergistic and unified, while working towards a common goal.

Therefore, today marketers working with organizations using legacy CRM software instead of cloud-based easy to use CRM software are often frustrated about how manual their processes are, which can be at times even downright exasperating when simple tasks and request have unattainable solutions.

Here are some of the key factors that cause marketers within these companies to often suffer in silence since there is nothing that can be done to alleviate the pain points faced by these employees within their current business environment, whereby the management fails to understand that there are many Salesforce Alternative CRM software platforms in the marketplace, which are economic and efficient for automating tasks and help marketers generate more leads and revenue.

1. Leads, Prospects, and Customers Are All Mixed Together

In most legacy CRM and old contact management systems there was no opportunity to import unqualified leads inside a bucket that can separate these leads from customers and prospects in the funnel, which eventually cluttered the CRM database and marketing teams were often blamed for dumping worthless contacts into the CRM software’s database over several years, which not only compromised the performance of the software but even resulted in a loss of substantial work hours spend and revenue.

2. There Is No Way for Generating Web-Form HTML

In most legacy CRM software platforms unlike cloud-based easy to use CRM software solutions, after website form submissions they are distributed as simple emails in legacy CRM software environments, whereby these lead information needs to be manually fed into the CRM system. Which often than not never gets entered or procrastinated until these leads get misplaced or fall through the crack.
However, with modern best small business CRM software platforms like many Salesforce Alternative CRM software solutions Web-Form HTML helps to directly submit leads into the easy to use CRM software, seamlessly.

3. Requires Lead Assignment Rules to be Coded

In many legacy CRM software, you will mostly find that there are no admin-friendly means to set up lead assignment rules. Whereby, you need developers to code the rules that will help to determine how leads are to be assigned to specific sales reps in an organization, based on criteria like company size, location, vertical markets, and others.

4. Non-Existent or Basic Campaign Management functionalities

Monitoring and managing marketing campaigns are one of the most offered features in most contemporary easy to use CRM software platforms.
Nevertheless, traditional contact management systems and CRM tools are either devoid or have none of these campaign management features which have the important functionalities that are highly sought after by modern marketers nowadays.

5. Limited or No Integration

Most traditional CRM tools are devoid of integrations with email service providers, third-party databases, marketing automation systems, or online accounting applications which are found with most modern CRM software tools.

Per say, nowadays many best CRM for small business offers integrations with a plethora of third-party applications, which also include financial accounting software, as there are several CRM solutions today which are popularly known as QuickBooks CRM software that offers seamless integration of these business growth tools.

Additionally, marketers need the ability to segment leads, prospect, and customers based on their past behaviors for lead scoring, send targeted email marketing messages, trigger lead nurturing campaigns, develop landing pages, enrich lead records from third-party databases, or collect information about new visitors on their web page.

Although all these functionalities can be easily done by integrating third-party apps with easy to use CRM software and several other Salesforce Alternative CRM software built for SMBs, integrating these third-party applications with outdated legacy CRM systems can be exorbitantly costly and also difficult in most traditional on-premise CRM apps.

6. ROI Metrics Cannot Be Extracted Easily

Marketing, Sales, Support, and Accounts are the four key departments that are most associated with the influence of easy to use CRM systems.
Therefore metrics and KPIs pertaining to user adoption, business performance and customer perception of your brand not only helps to manage your existing customers, but it even aids in streamlining support operations and sell more to your customers efficiently.

Now even though there are some legacy CRM tools that can collect many of this information, nevertheless they lack appropriate reporting tools to make it easy for the user of the software to get the right type of reports that are needed for analyzing their business growth.

Conclusion

Hence, as sales, marketing, and support efforts are becoming increasingly intertwined, it is becoming more important to provide these teams with easy to use CRM software technology, that supports a close coupling of activities, as we find with all-in-one CRM software solutions, which alleviates most of the pains that users do experience using an outdated and on-premise legacy CRM system and tools.

sign up

What All Can Make Customers Opt For Your Brand Even In This Pandemic World

For reaching your business growth goals you must have made New Year’s resolution once again in 2020, just two months back, but fear to lose them because of this COVID-19 Pandemic, Never mind! Why? This is because researches say that resolutions do not work. Nevertheless, paradoxically, if you do not make them, chances are there you may be more likely to achieve and maintain your goals.

For reaching your business growth goals you must have made New Year’s resolution once again in 2020, just two months back, but fear to lose them because of this COVID-19 Pandemic.

Never mind!
Why?
This is because researches say that resolutions do not work.

People don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it. - Simon Sinek Click To Tweet

Nevertheless, paradoxically, if you do not make them, chances are there you may be more likely to achieve and maintain your goals.

According to Statistic Brain Research Institute based in California, USA:

“41% of Americans make New Year’s resolutions in the first place. But here’s the thing — only 9.2% of us are successful in achieving them.”

Therefore, before pressing on the ‘reset’ button for scaling up your business growth, understand the simple truth quoted by Simon Sinek, the author of the book Start and Why:
“People don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it.”
A quote that you make you think differently now, behind why a consumer of your offerings chooses to do business with an organization.

Although there are plenty of reasons to consider, however as the award-winning vendor of one of the best small business CRM software solution, here we are putting together a very short list of some of these ‘Whys’:

1. Price

Let us clear this factor out of the way first. There are several individuals who chose pricing as a primary factor before deciding on their purchases. However, those companies that get customers just because of the low price will lose customers when someone else has a cheaper price.
Therefore, the loyalty of these customers to the company is because of price, not the brand itself.

2. Convenience

Who does not want a frictionless and easy buying experience? Moreover, customers are often willing to pay higher prices if their customer experience is convenient.
Therefore if you know what is CRM, use an easy to use CRM software like ConvergeHub to enhance your customer experience and skyrocket your revenue this year.

3. Customer Service

When your employees are friendly, quick to respond, and knowledgeable, your customers will the way you treat them.
They will understand that like they are there to take care of your brand, you are also taking care of them by doing business with them and providing them service as per their unique needs.

4. The Culture

Every organization has its own culture, whether by default or by design. The culture is the personality of your brand and your company. It is the sum of your organization’s beliefs, expectations, ethics, values, mission, and goals for business growth.
According to an article published in Forbes, it states that a great corporate culture that engages employees is a drug for improving customer experience since customers want to remain affiliated with organizations when their values are congruent with their brands.

5. A Cause

You should believe in what your customers believe in. At a level this ties into your organization’s values and culture. However, this is also about giving back and your company’s community involvement in events which can be your organization’s participation in a charity event or any other cause that is important to you, everything from saving Rhinos to alleviating world hunger.

6. Trust

Trust your customers and do what they say, every time. This is because if your consumers do not trust your brand, they would probably not be doing business with your company anyway.

7. Reputation

Your consumers may have heard good things about your organization. Maybe it is just from their colleagues at work or friends, or maybe there are plenty of good reviews about your brand on the internet. Whatever be it, your company’s reputation plays a big part in securing the decision of your customers.

8. Consistency

Consistency is most often tied with the reputation and trust of your customers for your organization. Outside of lying, if there is something that erodes the trust of your consumers quicker than anything, is your businesses lack consistency.
Therefore, if you want your customers to use the word ‘always’ to describe their customer experience with your brand, like ‘They are always knowledgeable, helpful and friendly..’ remain consistent with your good behavior the customers.

9. The Way

The way you do your business is one of the many reasons why customers chose to come back. This is all about your business policies, processes, the hours you remain open, your location and more. Although these are mostly tangible reasons, nevertheless, these factors count to get a customer in your door.

Finally- The Why

Let us end this article where we started with Simon Sinek’s quote:
“People don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it.”
Although all these reasons (and more) may contribute to the decision as to why a customer may choose your brand over others this year, figuring out a customer’s ‘Why’ and scaling it to meet their reasons can help you bring customers back again and again after this 2020’s Pandemic and for many more years to come for business growth.

Using a small business CRM software that provides a 360-degree view of your customers stored in its CRM database, is an ideal tool for measuring your customer journey and thereby increase CLV (Customer Lifetime Value) as it is often quoted that:

“Acquiring new customers costs 5 to 10 times more than selling to a current customer, and current customers spend 67% more on average than those who are new to your business.”

sign up

Tips Guaranteeing Success For Startups And Small Businesses In 2020

Let us say that you have found a great and novel idea for building a small business or a startup organization that you are absolutely confident to succeed, or maybe are you already running an SMB and is stressed to find out how you can make it grow.

Now whatever be the fact, in either of these scenarios both startups and SMBs face a lot of challenges in their up-hill climb for business growth.
We say this since it has been recorded in several statistical observations that 9 out of every 10 or more simply speaking 90% of all startup ventures fail in their growth path.

Therefore, even though you must be wondering by now that if this is the hardcore reality faced by startups, how can you find your way for survival in this cut-throat marketplace, where most businesses die in their infancy.
Nevertheless, although running a new startup can seem to be an uphill task if you stay up-to-date on the latest industry trends like adopting an easy to use CRM and embrace these top growth hacking tips, we are sure that your businesses’ chances for survival in this competitive marketplace will be much higher than if you do not.

77% of customers would recommend a brand to a friend after having a single positive experience - Temkin Group (2019). Click To Tweet

Therefore, in this article, let us uncover some of the most used tips for business growth in 2020 so that you can use them, and hence, most likely outperform your competitions:

TIPS FOR BUSINESS GROWTH TO SECURE YOUR SURVIVAL

1. Automate As Much As Possible

Now one of the most critical steps that an owner of an SMB can ensure to its organization for maintaining optimal productivity is to buy a business management software that will help to automate time taking manual processes within the company.

To be candid and truthful, you can consider the above-stated fact as one of the most pertinent growth-hacking best practices that we can recommend for your small and medium business this year.

Hence after you have evaluated the needs for your business try to research and decide on the type of software that would aid in promoting and growing your business on an immediate basis.

While there are a plethora of business hacking software solutions in the marketplace nevertheless these two, in particular, are must-have for all businesses irrespective of its size or the industry they are in.

CRM (Customer Relationship Management)

If you know what is CRM, be it Salesforce the most popular enterprise-level CRM software in the CRM space or any other Salesforce Alternative CRM platform, CRM is a software solution that not only helps in automating loads of manual tasks, but it also aids in permitting all your teams (marketing, sales, accounts, production, and support) to work with the same data stored in the CRM database, providing all its users the ability to find a 360-degree view of each leads, prospects, partners and customer contacts in the database, and more.

Now you can adopt a cloud-based all-in-one CRM for SMB, which includes automation for marketing, sales, and support, all in the same platform.
Additionally, apart from automation, you can integrate loads of apps (using built-in plugins) like email, telephony, document management software, accounting software (like QuickBooks CRM) and many more with your CRM software so that you can complete nearly all your tasks using the same tool.
In the present times, startups and small businesses are increasingly vying for this option in most easy to use CRM for small businesses since it not only saves time, but it also increases collaborations within and outside the company and reduces the investments involved in purchasing separate siloed technologies.

MA (Marketing Automation)

Now that you have finalized on an easy to use CRM you must also find a CRM solution that has an integrated MA solution, which will help in nullifying the need for purchasing a stand-alone or a silo MA system for your company.

Since, if you do not do this, then you need to spend in a disconnected marketing automation solution to drive and automate your marketing and support efforts of your company.

MA solutions not only streamline your business processes but also increases brand awareness by automating tasks and make it easier for businesses to attract leads.

With built-in features like landing page builders, preconfigured email marketing templates, lead generation web-to-lead forms, metrics, analysis and more, marketing automation when it is installed in easy to use CRM or used just as a siloed software is even a critical tool for hacking on to your competitor’s marketing growth.

2. Train Employees On The Software You Use

When you invest in technology to streamline operations and automate your works, it is obvious that you must fully train your staff on how they can efficiently and successfully leverage that solution.

Hence, invest in software solutions that provide high-quality free onboarding and training during installation and implementation of the software platforms, which will help your employees to use the system with ease and make them ready to leverage the technology to its fullest extent seamlessly.

3. Prioritize on customer experience and satisfaction

According to studies conducted by multinational research agencies, it has been found that in the present time Customer Experience (CX) is overtaking product and pricing as the key factor influencing the consumer’s decision-making process.

This, in other words, means that consumers are prepared to spend more for any brand or organization if they find that the customer experience delivered by that company is of ‘world-class’.

Well, it is natural that great CX (customer experience) of any brand also increases customer satisfaction of the consumers of its offerings.
Therefore, as satisfied customers stay longer and spend more on any brand, it is necessary that as an SMB you must increase your level of customer satisfaction for the consumers of your offerings as it is 5-10 times more costly to get hold of new customers than to keep a hold on to your existing ones.

4. Dive Head First Into Social Media

It is a well-accepted fact of the modern times that Millennial(s) are steadily becoming the members of the largest demography across the world, those who are practically addicted to social media which they use for harvesting information from every place across the globe.

Hence becoming active on social media websites and platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and others are one of the other most vital tips for the prosperity of any startup or small business.

Therefore below are a few most important tips to make your business succeed with its social media presence:
– Join social media groups to share important insights and grow your reputation
– Share your inbound marketing contents in the social media channels
– Ask questions in your businesses’ social media posts to encourage engagements
– Incorporate CTA (Call to Action) in your social media posts
– Use social listening tools
– Run contests on social media platforms, and…more.

5. Measure Your Results Constantly

Measuring your efforts is one the most significant growth hacking tips, especially in times when your business is in its early stages or you have just launched your business.

Now, with all the best small business CRM software, you have excessive access to metrics and CRM reporting that can help you in your decision-making processes.

Metrics found in easy to use CRM solutions not only aids in monitoring your small businesses’ sales pipeline, but also measure the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns, gain forward-looking revenue estimates, and a lot more.

Now, we say this since all SMBs need to take up and ensure data-driven decisions to uphold and sustain its growth.

Hence, the analytics and metrics offered by your best small business CRM software solutions provide the numbers and insights you require to make informed decisions for your business growth.

Conclusion

Hence to be a part of the 10% of startups and small business that succeeds, following the business growth tips laid out above, will not only make you prepare your business for success in 2020 (than those that do not), but it will also set your brand apart from your competition and prepare your company to confront the initial storm that most small and medium organizations face for sustaining rapid and consistent business growth.

sign up

Some Of The Easy to Use CRM Trends For Business Growth In 2020

To toe, the line with the stellar advancements of technological developments is one of the most important errands in modern times for businesses both big and small. Similarly, it is even most important to update your sales, marketing and customer interactions as per the ongoing easy to use CRM trends for users of business growth technology, especially in small and medium organizations across the world. We say this because keeping a note of the growing technologies, helps small and medium businesses to not only drive their existing customers to make repeat purchases but it even helps in attracting new customers, which further aids in boosting their ROI and revenue. On a comprehensive note, users of the best small business CRM, once they watch and follow these latest trends, it assists these small firms to expand the connections with their customers and boost sales as an inevitable outcome of this activity.

To toe, the line with the stellar advancements of technological developments is one of the most important errands in modern times for businesses both big and small.
Similarly, it is even most important to update your sales, marketing and customer interactions as per the ongoing easy to use CRM trends for users of business growth technology, especially in small and medium organizations across the world.

84% of respondents ranked the importance of experience at the same level as products or services- SFDC (2019) Click To Tweet

We say this because keeping a note of the growing technologies, helps small and medium businesses to not only drive their existing customers to make repeat purchases but it even helps in attracting new customers, which further aids in boosting their ROI and revenue.

On a comprehensive note, users of the best small business CRM , once they watch and follow these latest trends, it assists these small firms to expand the connections with their customers and boost sales as an inevitable outcome of this activity.

Therefore taking into account the same, here are some of the key CRM trends of 2020, which can add more viability to your sales, marketing, and customer support and relationship building skills this year:

  1. Increasing Requirement for Adoption of Mobile App

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

Nevertheless, this year, in 2020, due to the stellar rising sale of mobile and handheld devices, it has been noted that CRM integration with different mobile apps will also escalate for helping the customer service 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 online mobile easy to use CRM app.

Therefore, mobile CRM, which was earlier just an option for owners of large enterprise-level organizations, is fast becoming a very important part of managing customer relationships successfully even in SMBs.

  1. Improved Predictive Analysis

All the best easy to use CRM software vendors for small business, help their users to find out the number of interested customers, the preferred mode of communication and the preferred time of communication of their customers.

However, going by the CRM trends of 2020, the latest improvement in the predictive analysis will offer greater insights pertaining to the ideal engagement approach to small businesses, by uncovering the history of their customer transaction and along with with it other customer details for executing sales to their ideal customers.

  1. Improved Integration

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

Considering this fact, this year, CRM integration, and connectivity are going to expand radically as SMBs will be able to include new products and services into their CRM software.

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 view during communication with the customers.

  1. Importance of Social Media Networking

Finally, it cannot be denied that the members of your customer support team will have their own work hours and specific day-offs. 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 channels to get the latest news and developments about new product launches in the company.

Hence all easy to use CRM for small business in 2020, are trying to improvement upon their technology to become pioneers in social CRM (SCRM) functionalities, whereby they can promote your business via social media channels, which will allow their users to find 24/7 accessibility to their customers, which goes true with CRM solutions like Salesforce or even any other Salesforce Alternative CRM tools that are mostly preferred by medium and small businesses.

sign up

Tips to Turn Your Easy To Use CRM Into a Money Making Machine

It is needless to say that if you know what is CRM and is using a robust and enterprise-level CRM like Salesforce or other Salesforce Alternative CRM which are mostly used by SMB organizations, a business growth technology like an easy to use CRM is always a smart investment. Hence everyone wants a positive return out of it, whereby businesses invest their money in easy to use CRM expecting a positive effect on their business (maybe even to increase their money by multiple folds). Nevertheless, several people forget that even before expecting your CRM to become a game-changer and money-making machine for your company, there are a few things that you need to take care of to make this business growth technology perform at its best.

It is needless to say that if you know what is CRM and is using a robust and enterprise-level CRM like Salesforce or other Salesforce Alternative CRM which are mostly used by SMB organizations, a business growth technology like an easy to use CRM is always a smart investment.

Every dollar spent on CRM implementation returns as much as $8.71 in sales revenue - Nucleus Research (2014) Click To Tweet

Hence everyone wants a positive return out of it, whereby businesses invest their money in easy to use CRM expecting a positive effect on their business (maybe even to increase their money by multiple folds).

Nevertheless, several people forget that even before expecting your CRM to become a game-changer and money-making machine for your company, there are a few things that you need to take care of to make this business growth technology perform at its best.

Therefore here are few tips on how you can make the most of this cutting-edge technology and turn your easy to use CRM into a money-making machine which predicts phenomenal revenue growth:

Information is Gold

Irrespective of which CRM you use be it Salesforce or any Salesforce Alternative CRM platform, how complicated or easy you think it is, there is no denying the fact, that CRM software presents to you a database which you might as well consider to have its value in gold.
In other words, a CRM consists of the information related to hundreds and thousands of leads and customers and is nothing less than a Black Friday jackpot that aids in the systematical arrangement of that data in one place.

Hence if you make the right use of this data stored in the CRM database, there is so much more you can do and achieve with this software tool.

Now if you will look a little deep and put on your thinking cap, you will realize that once you adopt an easy to use CRM software for your business it is far more easier to go after the customers with unique demands, and proactively remain in touch with your prospective leads at their proffered time or even keep all your sales, marketing, and support teams remain up-to-date with the latest things happening in your company.

The trick over here is to make someone from your teams responsible for managing all the data, someone who should be the one who should be trained even to take up necessary steps if any data issue or compliance is found in the software.

Still, You Are Using Spreadsheets?

Contrary to popular beliefs by many, everything that can be performed on a spreadsheet can be also accomplished in a CRM, and for that matter a lot better than a spreadsheet too.

Hence, if you are still living in the past and is using the age-old way of managing all your customer data using spreadsheets, just imagine how much time you are killing that you could have utilized in better ways for boosting your sales revenue and business growth.

Therefore, set your database once, and then enjoy everything that an easy to use CRM can do for you which even includes finding automated insightful reports on your sales, marketing and support teams, and the best way to start this is with your sales pipeline reports.

Hence, throw away that spreadsheet of yours into the trash and list all your leads and contacts in the CRM, you can count on us as one of the leading vendors of the best small and medium business CRM software , that you will not miss the spreadsheet for even a second once you start using this cutting-edge business growth tool.

Do More With Integration

Once you are convinced that easy to use CRM software platforms are your key for streamlining your sales pipeline, it is unfair on your part to expect a basic CRM to perform tasks like generating invoices, sending mass emails, automate your marketing efforts or make calls to your prospective leads.

However, the good thing is that there is a workaround.

Now if you are using a cloud-based CRM software, most of the third-party application providers nowadays provide APIs to integrate other business applications to your CRM.

In fact, to make things easier most of the CRM vendors provide these integrations by themselves.

Hence pick all the third-party apps like Gmail, Outlook, QuickBooks Online for accounting, PieSync, MailChimp, Zapier and more and look for their APIs for integration.

This is because once you integrate the easy to use CRM with these third-party tools there is no limit to what you can achieve with your CRM.

Now your easy to use CRM may not be your one-stop solution from the very first day you start using the software, but then again we all must remember that Rome was not even built in a day.

Embrace Automation

Like our saying or not, most people in this present world of digitalization is becoming more and lazier every passing day.

We expect our factories to run by themselves, our care to drive on their own. Rather say why leave a CRM behind when we expect robotics to do it for us, everything that is doable?

Now, most of the major CRM provides now offers marketing automation at an advanced level. Therefore modern CRM software solutions irrespective of whether it is Salesforce or any other Salesforce Alternative CRM platforms take some burden off your shoulders by automating processes and workflows using Sales Force Automation (SFA) integrated into the software.

Takeaway

Hence to conclude even though there is no guaranteed path to success while using an easy to use CRM software, nevertheless the above points do help a lot in making your CRM a successful investment and enjoy using the software for rapid business growth.

sign up