Why A CRM Could Be Even More Essential Than Phones For Your Business
Engaging with customers has become increasingly challenging for many small businesses, especially since the pandemic has created a physical and relational distance between sales teams and customers. Tracking customer interactions, monitoring deal statuses, and managing the revenue pipeline have all become more complex. In this environment, a cloud-based customer relationship management (CRM) system tailored for small businesses is as essential to a salesperson as their smartphone.
Several research sources confirm this trend. According to a study by Grand View Research, the CRM market size was valued at USD 43.7 billion in 2020 and is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 10.6% from 2021 to 2028. Fortunately, many businesses, including small ones, are on board with this trend. The same report indicated that approximately 91% of organizations, even those with as few as 10 employees, utilize a CRM system.
Beyond Sales: The Versatile Benefits of CRMs
What’s even more revealing about the increasing importance of CRMs for small businesses is a report by SoftClouds, the CRM Cloud Survey Report. It found that about 82% of respondents are using CRMs for more than just sales management. These companies reported that their CRMs are also instrumental in reporting and process automation, extending beyond the traditional functions of contact management and pipeline tracking.
Another report, the Not Another State of Marketing Report 2021 from HubSpot, highlights that over 40% of respondents have started using their CRMs to manage marketing campaigns. This includes targeting account-based marketing (ABM) and social media efforts, showcasing the expanding role of CRMs beyond traditional sales and customer management functions.
The shift towards social media marketing is particularly significant given that Grand View’s study revealed over 67% of customers are interacting with brands through social media platforms. This includes major networks like Facebook, Snapchat, Twitter, and even the often-overlooked Reddit.
Integrating your CRM with other business systems is one of the most effective ways to achieve a quick return on investment (ROI). Beyond social media marketing and business analytics, many companies leverage CRM customer data to support their help desk technicians and build strong, personal connections with front-line retail operations by integrating with the store’s point of sale (POS) system.
CRMs: Tools for Efficiency, Not Surveillance
It’s true that many CRM implementations face significant challenges, with failure rates reaching as high as 90% depending on the organization and its industry, according to the Harvard Business Review. The primary reason for these failures is often that organizations view CRM systems merely as surveillance tools rather than valuable sales instruments.
A common issue with CRM implementations is when management deploys the system and then expects salespeople to use it solely for reporting purposes. In this scenario, the CRM becomes a tool for monitoring individual performance rather than supporting the sales teams. While it may benefit managers by tracking who is doing what, it fails to assist salespeople in closing more deals, turning it into a burdensome chore rather than an effective tool.
Maximizing the benefits of your CRM involves more than simply setting up user accounts. It requires careful planning and significant upfront effort, which is especially crucial for small businesses. For smaller companies, each customer interaction holds greater value, so it’s essential to extract as much benefit as possible from these interactions. This approach helps ensure that your CRM contributes to building long-lasting relationships rather than just facilitating a series of quick sales.
Begin by compiling all existing customer data you have—such as names from marketing lists, details from help desk support calls, and any information collected by your sales team. Collect and organize this data, then create CRM profiles for each customer. While not every profile needs to contain identical information, ensure that each one includes all relevant details you have for that particular customer.
CRMs designed for small businesses, such as Bigin by Zoho or Salesforce Essentials, typically make data entry straightforward and accessible. However, if your CRM is complex and requires additional assistance, investing in that support can be worthwhile. Since you’ve already made an investment in the CRM, spending a bit more to ensure you fully utilize it can prevent your initial expenditure from going to waste.
A CRM shouldn’t be introduced to salespeople as an empty vessel they need to populate. Instead, it should be pre-loaded with all the information your organization has about current and past customers. This enables salespeople to immediately leverage that data to close deals and generate new opportunities. Effective management of opportunities and your revenue pipeline will follow once salespeople begin inputting actionable data into the CRM. To encourage this, ensure the software provides tangible benefits from the start.
Integrating Your CRM into Daily Operations
After rolling out your CRM, establish a detailed, step-by-step process for everyone who might benefit from the system, not just the sales team. For instance, while your salespeople use the CRM to track sales processes and record deal data, your product development team can analyze it to identify which products or versions are performing best and understand the reasons behind their success.
Imagine how much more effective your help desk technicians would be if, when an upset customer called, their softphone instantly displayed the customer’s CRM record. This record would include insights such as the salesperson’s perception of the customer’s satisfaction, their purchase history over the years, and potential interests in other products or upgrades. By using the CRM as an opportunity engine rather than just a deal recorder, this information could seamlessly flow between sales, support, marketing, and product development, enhancing overall efficiency and customer satisfaction.
The key to success with a CRM is communication. Even if senior management or the IT department configures the CRM and populates it with detailed data, a high risk of failure remains if these changes are not effectively communicated to the rest of the company.
Engage with everyone who could benefit from a comprehensive, evolving customer database—because that’s essentially what a CRM is. Understand how they would use it based on their actual daily routines, not just how you or IT envision it being used. This will require extensive discussions and a degree of mutual trust. You’ll get a clear picture of how processes are managed. Then, align this information with what your CRM can offer and the data you have to determine how best to support their needs.
A CRM should be viewed as a versatile Swiss Army knife for gathering and disseminating information. When used effectively, it can be incredibly valuable. However, if it ends up being just another administrative burden for employees to manage, you’re essentially wasting resources.
