David Young
Marketing automation and CRM are two different systems with the same underlying purpose. They’re both designed to increase sales by improving your ability to communicate with customers and potential customers. With this shared purpose in mind, it may surprise some people to find that these systems have historically been entirely separate.
With so many big name vendors dominating the news, it would be understandable to wonder, “is there any room left for new CRM startups?”
With industry giants like Salesforce, Microsoft, Oracle, and others in the game, how would a new company even get off the ground?
If anyone still had any doubts about the potential of the wearable market, the introduction of the Apple Watch should serve to remove them. By some estimates, the wearable market is currently growing at ten times the rate of the mobile market. And this should come as no surprise–people have been longing for advanced wearable tech for a long time.
Many people recognize CRM as an essential tool for salespeople. However, CRM is increasingly being integrated across all departments within an enterprise. One of the key focuses of this increased integration is on marketing departments. Nearly every generation of CRM development now introduces expanded options for using CRM to improve and inform marketing efforts.
Customers are seeking an increasing level of control over their relationships with product and service providers. When they choose to interact with a business, they frequently do so with a preconceived notion of how the relationship will be structured.
There was a time when social networks were viewed as idle diversions. They provided a place to chat with friends, reconnect with old classmates, and post pictures. Now, businesses have realized that there is a wealth of productivity to be leveraged using the social networking model.
On Thursday, August 14th 2014, Swiftpage announced that the entirety of its Saleslogix CRM assets would be sold to Infor, a US-based enterprise software vendor. Saleslogix CRM will be renamed “Infor CRM”, and will continue to be developed under its new ownership. Infor has announced that they will retain 100 Swiftpage employees dedicated to Saleslogix development.
Often, CRM is discussed in the context of direct marketing, e-commerce, and B2B sales. In these situations, salespeople are generally at a desk or working from a mobile device with CRM data readily accessible. It’s natural to wonder how CRM can work for a retailer, when salespeople are working a sales floor and point of sale (POS) register.
To be of any use to your business, CRM data must have two key qualities: accuracy and accessibility. Without both of these qualities, whatever data you’ve collected (or think you’ve collected) won’t be as useful as you would like it to be. If you’re unable to access the data, you can’t use it. If you can’t trust the data, you shouldn’t use it.
Making sure your CRM data is accurate and accessible requires some planning on your part.
Customer self service (CSS) can be an important companion to a CRM system. CSS allows customers to perform many standard tasks, such as setting up accounts and paying bills, without the help of a CSR. This offers added convenience to customers, as they don’t have to wait for a CSR to help them, while also reducing customer service costs for the business.
There are a lot of reasons why your business may be considering switching to a new CRM system. No matter how good a particular CRM vendor is, their product will never be a perfect fit for every business. Making sure that your company has the best tools for servicing your clients may require a change in your CRM vendor.
Ok, so you’ve managed a successful CRM implementation, things are running smoothly, and you’re collecting a lot of new data. Thanks to a comprehensive CRM user training program, your employees understand that using CRM is to their advantage, it isn’t optional, and that any data not entered into the system “doesn’t really exist”.
So, all you have to do is sit back, and wait for the system to do its thing, right?
It’s not uncommon for CRM buyers to feel a sense of surprise when they discover the true nature of their relationship with a CRM vendor.
After a long period of courtship, followed by a quick marriage (the sale), they’re often surprised to find that the CRM vendor is no longer a major part of the relationship.
Enterprise marketing automation software is becoming increasingly popular and for many has become a crucial component of their enterprise toolkit. With its ability to create, manage, and evaluate content delivery, a comprehensive marketing automation solution is becoming as crucial a business tool as CRM.
While CRM software is increasingly becoming a tool used by a wider variety of people in a business, it’s still most closely associated with being a tool for sales professionals. It provides good salespeople with the information and functionality they need to become great salespeople.
If there are problems with your sales methods, no software can make you an overnight success
Open-source is a software development philosophy in which source code is made freely and openly available to the general public. Any interested party can download the code, modify it to their heart’s content, use it how they see fit and, if they wish, distribute their modified version for others to use.
For two decades, QuickBooks has been the dominant accounting software for small and mid-size businesses. Since it requires no formal accounting training to use, and offers numerous industry specific versions, its popularity is no surprise. Within the small business accounting market, QuickBooks captures nearly ninety percent.
On the surface, Facebook & CRM are aimed at opposite groups: people connecting with friends vs. salespeople managing opportunities. However, CRM is built on the premise that the more data you have about your customers, the better your relationship management will be.
And when it comes to collecting data about people, Facebook is in a league of its own.
Having CRM, using CRM, and being happy with CRM are all very different, yet related, topics. One of the hardest aspects of a CRM system to quantify is user happiness–how do you measure satisfaction? You could rely solely on internet reviews, but there’s a lot of marketing spin out there. Those reviews may not give you an accurate picture of what “Bob in sales” really thinks of the system.
When it comes to convenience and flexibility, especially for a mobile sales force, it’s hard to beat web applications. And when it comes to web applications, it’s difficult to ignore Google App’s growing presence in the enterprise application space.
Google’s suite of web-based products allows for an unprecedented level of coordination and collaboration on a wide variety of projects, and is a natural fit for cloud-based CRM solutions.
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