Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems are generally deployed to manage a company’s interactions with potential or existing customers, with the aim to help that business to improve customer satisfaction and enhance customer experience (CX).
And being constantly engaged with the customer and understanding what makes them tick is crucial to any organization, as customers essentially determine the success of the business. CRM platforms have been very effective in achieving this for many companies.
The CRM provides a comprehensive snapshot of a company’s interaction with its clients, which include previous interactions, pending transactions, and the current status of orders or accounts. Furthermore, companies could also compile customer data from various interactions via company’s website, telephone and online chats, and even surveys, and review & consolidate them in a single platform. Think of a CRM as a virtual Rolodex, complete with comprehensive notes taken during every interaction or conversation.
Using a CRM could help companies tremendously in not only maintaining good customer relationships but enhance them to foster brand loyalty. For example, call centers use CRMs to resolve customer issues quickly and efficiently, which leaves a positive impression on the customer. Then, those satisfied customers would more likely promote the brand to others, like friends, family and work colleagues.
Companies that invest in a proper CRM system will immediately see the benefits in several other ways as well. With the integration of AI (artificial intelligence) and interfacing into other internal platforms such as ERP, HR systems or finance packages, CRM can help automate tasks, minimize errors and streamline workflows while eliminating time-consuming processes and duplication of efforts. Repetitive tasks, such as personalized e-mails, lead generation, and social media postings – once automated – could greatly improve the productivity of marketing department. Those mentioned backend automations will speed up things like order processing and tracking, and inventory management. Modern CRM solutions have extensive capabilities, and usually are the central core of any automated system.
But more than anything, listening to customers’ needs is perhaps the most significant aspect that a CRM solution helps with. Customers in the digital age are very vocal and not shy about sharing their opinion, be that on social media, review websites or public surveys. With CRMs, companies can capture this data too, and feedback directly to customers to further optimize relationships – or even send personalized special offers, according to expressed sentiment.
CRM helps curate customer data in a dashboard view, typically, with extensive capabilities to drill down into information. An individual’s records could contain products bought, returned or recommended publicly. Then, individual conversations could be seen, and even an AI-powered transcript of all phone calls that also pulls out and color-codes customer sentiment.
Companies are becoming more dependent on CRM solutions to ensure smooth operations and cost efficiency while striving to deliver better, more individualized customer services. According to a Gartner forecast, CRM will continue to be among the most rapidly-growing business software application markets with an estimated 13.5 percent CAGR from 2017 through 2022.
And as take-up rates increase, the number of solutions available is also growing. Tech HQ has picked our top three CRM software vendors that businesses should consider to up their CX game.
Based in Ghent, Belgium, this SaaS solution technology company understands that fantastic customer service does not only wins customers, but keeps them. Its CRM tools are designed for small and medium businesses that are desperate to spend less time on admin and step up to focus more on existing customers, and developing leads.
The collaborative, cloud-based CRM means that every customer interaction holds real weight: there’s little risk of wrong information making the team look disorganized, and with absolutely up-to-date information at hand, every member of staff can be right on the money, every time.
Brands will be able to build a better relationship with customers as the tools (note the plural: Teamleader CRM is extendable and modular) allow them to resume conversations with their clients exactly where they left off, making things like hunting through email trails a thing of the past. Moreover, since it doesn’t matter who left the conversation and who picked it up again; seamless communication between a company and its clientele becomes a reality – regardless of colleagues’ vacations or sick days.
Teamleader’s CRM integration capabilities are extensive, so it’s easy to incorporate third-party apps and tools’ data (such as Gmail, Office365, MailChimp, PayPal, LinkedIn and WordPress), and the core module is extensible itself, with three additional feature sets ready when you are – Project Management, Invoicing, and Support Ticketing modules available.
Teamleader’s CRM comes equipped with fully optimized mobile features that let sales teams manage customer information, schedule appointments, track and make phone calls, and convert sales more efficiently, from anywhere, on their cells or tablets.
Learn more about the Teamleader CRM here on TechHQ.
Maximizer offers a simple and adaptable CRM solution that provides centralized lead management features capable of instantly accessing the entire history of correspondence with customers and potential clients. The solution is accessible from anywhere with access to the internet, via Windows desktops and mobile devices.
Maximizer CRM tool comes loaded with core modules, including sales, marketing, and customer service tools: since every organization is different, the CRM can be customized further to fit needs accordingly. Further, the solution provides companies with insights regarding the business itself, and workforce performance, which comes in handy when making strategic decisions.
The solution has flexible deployment options: on their cloud, or the Maximizer’s cloud, or on-premise. To ensure data safety, businesses could divide data from application, storing their data in-house (for example) giving more control and a better, more hands-on security stance.
When companies experience growth in their client base, maintaining a high level of customer satisfaction understandably becomes more challenging, and Maximizer’s sales automation features – integrated with forecasting, reporting, and email – is designed to address the (rather good to have) problem of how to scale quickly.
Pipedrive is another popular CRM that has been establishing itself as a popular choice for small and growing businesses. The solution’s key feature is its dashboard overview that organizes business leads, which encourages companies to focus and prioritize quality leads over white noise.
The solution also scores relatively highly on the ease-of-deployment scale, and some users have found its functions the most user-friendly overall. With Pipedrive, managing the sales pipeline is no longer a daunting task, and as sales teams will be the first to admit, wrestling with technology is not a priority on the sales floor.
Extremely flexible, Pipedrive also lets business to tweak workflows to fit, and much like Teamleader’s CRM, it seamlessly integrates other popular productivity apps such as Dropbox, Zapier, RightSignature, Zoho, and more.
Pipedrive offers multiple configurations and layouts, and simplifies the collection of contact information using customizable web forms that could be embedded on websites or used in email campaigns, for example.
With fully-optimized mobile features, Pipedrive’s solutions allow access from anywhere in the world using any browser, and all data is backed up in real-time to a separate server, ensuring nothing is lost in transmission.
*Some of the companies featured are commercial partners of TechHQ
