Six reasons why you should have a customer relationship management tool

Before we dive in, Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is a management tool that allows your business to work more efficiently with current and potential clients, all while working toward the same goal: improving business relationships. When your day consists of managing a wide variety of customers and clients, a CRM software can be an instrumental part of maintaining a profitable, growing, and thriving business.

Here are six reasons why your company should invest in CRM:

1. It encourages teamwork

Your company is made up of different departments who work together to problem-solve; however, when you're all working as individuals, important client details can slip through the cracks. A CRM system will provide you access to a shared library of information. A database that has been gathered collectively from your teams, enabling everyone to find account details to sales history all in one place.

2. It allows faster, easier communication 

When you use a CRM, your team will be able to reduce response time while providing higher quality feedback for your customers. For example, finance-specific questions can be sent directly to the accounting department for more detailed responses; whereas, an inquiry regarding conference dates can go to the marketing team etc.

Once you begin implementing these CRM system practices, your customers will take notice. With faster, more consistent and better communication, your customers' satisfaction levels will vastly be improved and maintained.

3. It promotes efficiency and organisation

It will help maintain optimal efficiency throughout your workday. With a CRM, all your customers' information is stored in one place: such as their contact information, the last project they were part of, and with whom they're working and have worked. This makes asking and answering questions on both sides much easier and encourages productivity.

4. It grants you and your team peace of mind

If a team member is out of office or away from their desk, but an urgent task needs to be completed, it will not be a problem. Since all the information is within the CRM system, other co-workers will be able to step in and help out when the task owner is unavailable and the client are in need of assistance.

5. It acts as a great reference tool

With the ability to store and retain any details entered on the record, CRM software will make it easy to refer back to past information, conversations, and projects; acquire lessons-learned, or help your team recall specific details about a certain client. It also removes the reliance on memory.

6. Real-time and event-triggered offers

Another advantage of using a CRM platform is because it can help manage promotion and price lists specific to customers. For example, you can program many CRM systems to only show a special offer to a specific customer after a purchase of a particular product or set price breaks depending on order quantities. Sales-people will then be able to produce quotes and sales order quickly without having to add special pricing or promotion manually.

For more information about how a CRM platform can help your manufacturing or distribution company streamline your sales and account management activities contact us today.