What is a Sales CRM software?

A Sales CRM software is a technology that helps businesses build, maintain, and scale their relationships with their current and future customers. At its core, a Sales CRM holds all your customer data in one place and acts as an indispensable source of information for your entire organization. A Sales CRM brings greater visibility into an organization's processes, starting from the point when a lead discovers your product or service to the moment that you close them as a deal. It plays a vital role in offering a unified experience to your customers by facilitating personalized conversations at every stage.

Why do I need a Sales CRM software?

Every business, whether big or small needs to manage customer information and offer support when their customers need it.The success of your business lies in winning repeat customers, and this is where a Sales CRM systems comes into the picture. Sales CRMs play a huge role in helping your brand become more customer-centric and have a direct impact on your organization's growth and revenue, while drastically cutting down time spent on repetitive data entry and management.

Who uses a Sales CRM?

Sales CRM systems unlike what the name suggests, can be used by sales marketing, customer support, and service teams in an organization. A good Sales CRM tool usually integrates well with external systems that the other teams in your organization may use making it dispensable to everyone in your organization. For example, by deploying a Sales CRM the visibility of important data such as revenue, orders, and purchase information can be shared by both the sales and finance teams in your organization. This avoids manual data entry across different platforms, and allows you to have contextual customer information available whenever they interact with you.

Why shouldn't I use spreadsheets to manage my customer relationships?

Spreadsheets are not designed to do Sales CRM work. When your business is going digital, you don't want your sales and support teams to be moving backwards in their tech. While spreadsheets can certainly help you with basic information organization, the expectations of customers and the complexity of a growing business make spreadsheets less productive for everyday work. By exclusively using spreadsheets, your organization, you risk missing out on all the important tools that a sales rep or customer service agent needs to create a delightful customer experience. Features like sales automation or integrations for email and telephony. have become the norm in business, and for good reason. Spreadsheets simply cannot match these requirements.

How do I evaluate a Sales CRM?

Making an investment into a Sales CRM can be a make or break for your sales. Hence it is crucial for businesses to have a Sales CRM evaluation method (or CRM metrics) in place. The prime concern of a Sales CRM system is to improve relationships with customers and generate higher revenue. Therefore, it is necessary to identify if a prospective Sales CRM is intended to track the efficiency of your sales and marketing teams, or to build a stronger relationship with your customers. while being able to adapt to the specific requirements your organization might have. Getting answers to questions like these will help determine your approach when acquiring a new Sales CRM.

How do I choose a Sales CRM?

Here are some key points that you should consider when choosing a Sales CRM system:

Mapping your key requirements

Once you've decided to adapt to a Sales CRM, the first step is to undertake a deep analysis of your current requirements and what exactly you need from the Sales CRM software. If you are unsure about evaluating the product yourself, talk to a product expert, tell them your needs, and let them suggest the best possible solution for your business.

No hidden costs

The true hallmark of any good business software is that it shouldn't force you to pay extra with hidden charges and costly add-ons. Make sure that the vendor's complete pricing information is published online and that you are fully aware of what you are going to be paying upfront.

Ease of use

A Sales CRM software is only as good as the people using it. This is where many Sales CRM investments can go wrong. If your Sales CRM isn't easy to understand out of the box, your team members may examine alternate ways to store data leading you to not getting full worth of the money you've invested.

Flexibility

No two businesses are the same, and neither are their requirements. Make sure the CRM that you choose is fully customizable and integrates with the other applications that you use everyday.

Read online reviews

Online reviews are a great resource for learning about a product from the current experiences of a product's users. Product reviews can help you in understanding everything about a Sales CRM solution, from the best to the worst. You should also check if the vendor is active on social media and if they are responsive to customer questions.

Secure and compliant

This should go without saying—choose a vendor that puts security and privacy at the heart of their business. Your Sales CRM should be fully compliant with all the latest security standards and regulations, such as GDPR so that you know that your data is in good hands.

What are the key features of a Sales CRM system?

Here are some of the key features that should be a necessity for any Sales CRM system you choose:

Sales force automation

A Sales CRM software should help you streamline your critical sales functions, such as managing your leads, deals, activities, and forecasts. It should assist you to perform tasks much faster and more accurately with easy-to-create workflows.

Process management

Your Sales CRM should capture every step of your business process—from identifying a prospective buyer to closing a deal. You should be able to automate your offline processes, map them into your Sales CRM system, and execute complex business functions with ease.

Performance management

Every sale counts. Give your reps the necessary tools that will help them outperform themselves every single time. You should be able to get a better understanding of your territory-wise sales performance, future revenue projections, and lead predictions–all within your Sales CRM.

Analytics

The ability to generate insights from sales data, spot trends, and track key metrics allows you to make data-driven decisions. These capabilities are key for any good Sales CRM software.

Omnichannel communication

Business communications are no more isolated to a single channel. Your customers and prospects should be able to contact you using any channel that they prefer. A good Sales CRM enables your business to receive, manage, and respond to messages from phone, email, social media, and online chat, all in one centralized place.

Team collaboration

Every member of your team should be able to have a unified communication platform to help them stay connected and work together, wherever they are. A good Sales CRM will help your sales force to share notes and collaborate internally without having to use multiple apps.

Predictive sales and intelligence

AI is no longer just a buzzword, but an essential component of any Sales CRM that you purchase. Having an AI assistant in your Sales CRM can help sales reps by providing contextual information, identifying anomalies, and providing proactive suggestions that can positively impact their closing rates.

Customization

Every business is unique. Make sure that the Sales CRM you end up choosing is fully and easily customizable, integrates with other applications that you use everyday, and reflects your business processes.

What are the different types of CRM software?

Based on type

• Email marketing CRM
• Helpdesk CRM
• Lead Management
• Sales Management
• Social Media CRM

Based on Industry

• CRM for real estate
• CRM for pharmaceutical and medical device businesses
• CRM for retail businesses
• CRM for financial services

Based on size

• Small business CRM
• Enterprise CRM software

Which is the best CRM software?

We might be a little biased here, but the fact remains that Zoho CRM is used to great success by more than 250,000 businesses of all sizes and types around the world. With more than two decades of delivering world-class software technology to the global business community, Zoho has been the winner of major awards in the CRM tech space and is consistently rated highly by both critics and users. We think Zoho CRM can be the perfect solution for your business, regardless of size and industry. Sign up for a free trial and start your CRM journey today with the world's favorite CRM solution.