Do businesses need a CRM system?

Smaller companies face a huge challenge. In fact, all companies, regardless of size, are constantly faced with the challenges of finding new and better leads, updating their products and services in market terms to grow new sales without messing with margins, while also retaining their existing customers and keeping them happy.

Many small business owners think CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems are for large companies, or that the time isn't right. A CRM system is one of the most important tools that a business can invest in and implement, and without it it's difficult to move up a gear. 33% of all new companies fail within three years, and only one in two survive the first five years.

How do you know if you need a CRM system? The quality of data held by companies varies in regard to customer and contact information. Many businesses sorely need a "central archive", which gathers all customer data in one place and better equips your company to build more, higher-quality relationships.

Here is a selection of the challenges that may arise:

• One of your best sales representatives leaves the company and all the contact information was in this person's head.
• Silo working – while your customer service team is trying to help an unhappy customer, your sales representative, unaware of this, is trying to sell something new.
• One of your potential customers has decided to do business with someone else – and you realize that you did not respond to the inquiry they sent, because the process was unstructured.

There are many situations like this, and obviously many others. You may need to integrate your CRM with other systems to meet all customer needs. Do you have a sense that your business could benefit from a CRM system?

Let's look at the benefits of having CRM in place:

1. All your customer interactions and information (in the form of quotes/orders, contact inquiries, documents, meetings, and so on) are stored in a single place and available to everyone in the organization.
2. All sales work can be tracked based on your sales process/pipeline, ensuring that it is followed up.
3. You can always coordinate specific marketing campaigns and follow up activities together with the sales team instead of having to send round an Excel list that quickly turns into 14 versions of one file.
4. You can generate accurate information about forecasts versus budgets at short notice. 
5. Identify customers that have not bought from you in a while, or who bought product A but not product B. 
6. Employees have access to customer information even when out of the office. 
7. You have an overview of lost business – both the cause and who took the business at different times. 
8. You know how many support tasks each customer had and why they arose.

As a small business, it can be difficult to figure out where to start. 
If you are curious about how webCRM can help your business and need a few tips to help you get started:

Book a demo with us today for a time that suits you!