If you’ve invested in customer management software, but you’re not seeing results, there could be a valid reason. In order to get the most out of your software, there are a few simple things you can do to maximise its potential.
What is customer management software?
Customer management software is also commonly known as a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system. CRMs allow you to establish work flows, automate processes, keep all your customer information in one place and even gather valuable data. When used properly, you’ll improve efficiency, increase sales potential and ensure better customer service and support.
Setting up workflows
You can generate workflows for almost everything in a CRM. Essentially, it’s a series of actions that take place based on certain other actions occurring. For example, a customer places an order, so a confirmation email is triggered. If they haven’t ordered again within 6 months, a special deal is emailed to them, or a task is created for your sales staff to get in touch.
That’s just one example, but your options are only limited by your imagination. These workflows, once established, just run in the background, but you can even trigger notifications for human input at certain points if that works better for you.
Automating sales emails
Sales automation is easy when you have a CRM. However, so is driving across the country if you have a car. Just like a car needs fuel to work for you, a CRM needs some input to deliver true benefits. Setting up your automated sales emails takes some time. But once it’s done, you’ll start really reaping the rewards.
Once you’ve set up your customer emails, you instantly improve your customer service. Whether it’s marketing emails to generate more business or post-sale confirmation emails, automation is the key to improving efficiency.
Keep customer information up to date
One of the biggest benefits of a CRM is having all customer information in one place. You can see previous orders, interaction history, and even organise your customers into different groups based on various metrics. The only problem is, if you don’t keep information updated, it becomes useless. You can even group your customers by importance, ensuring they always get the very best service.
However, if you don’t maintain their profiles correctly, the system doesn’t give you the same level of efficiency.
Integrate your customer management software
There is one final thing you simply must do if you want to get value from your customer management software. Integrate it with your other systems. Without doing this, you’ll never realise the full benefits and business improvement you can gain from a CRM. Link it to your enterprise resource planning (ERP) software, and even your website to facilitate an easier flow of information.
Don’t forget those social media profiles too. When trying to build a great brand, your CRM and social media accounts work hand-in-hand. Link your CRM to calendars and email clients too, because automation is great unless it creates more double-work for your teams!
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