How well are you interacting with your customers? How are you engaging with prospects? Are you using your customer relationship management (CRM) software to its fullest capacity? The chances are that you could be better interacting with your clientele base and your prospects.
The importance of CRM software in creating a powerful customer-relations strategy is becoming clear to marketers in practically every industry. According to the Aberdeen Group, sales organizations deemed to be effective, are 81 percent more likely to use CRM on a consistent basis.
There are a number of ways that you can make your CRM software perform more efficiently. Let’s take a look at how your competition is using CRM to interact with their target audiences and drive sales.
How CRM Works
Customer relationship management platforms are software platforms that are used to create a rapport between a business and its past customers and potential future customers through the use of digital interactions. CRM platforms manage and collect data regarding client interactions, stores data relating to customers and their purchases, and automates a variety of processes designed to direct customer’s actions using marketing and sales funnels.
In the past, a company would service a client and merely hoped they would return to patronize their company on a regular basis. With the use of CRM, businesses can establish a relationship and use methods to entice customers to come back to patronize.
Lead Management
CRM platforms track and categorize a company’s leads, allowing the automated or manual addition of new leads to the system. This gives marketing teams the ability to both track and analyzed data pertaining to their customer leads.
The value of collecting information about customers cannot be overstated. It is crucial to have a keen understanding of the individual and collective interests and tendencies of a company’s client base.
Marketing Automation
The most effective CRM applications incorporate automated marketing functions. These marketing functions automate marketing tasks that are considered tedious and become monotonous. Some of the duties that are automated by the CRM are sending marketing emails and publishing posts for social media based on a set schedule.
Sales Automation
CRM platforms track customer data and interactions, and some platforms can automate various aspects of the sales cycle required to follow leads and attract and obtain new patrons by converting prospects into paying customers.
Workflow Automation
There are activities that are critical to the process of marketing and sales generation that are necessary for businesses to perform daily. CRM platforms can streamline business processes that are considered mundane. Workflow automation frees up your workforce to spend their time focusing on higher-level tasks and creative endeavors for the business.
Analytics
The best CRM platforms include built-in tools that allow businesses to analyze data to gain insight into what motivates customers and how to increase customer satisfaction. The marketing team at your company will analyze the sales data in their efforts to design a high-converting targeted campaign based on the results. The platform will also track and monitor campaigns to help teams evaluate their effectiveness.
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence is a technology that is used to perform tasks that typically require a thinking human to complete. This technology is being used in a growing number of ways to make businesses perform at greater levels of efficiency.
There are even some CRM applications that include artificial intelligence features that are implemented to recognize patterns that result in successful sales, which can lead to the development of more effective sales campaigns in the future.
Personalized Customer Experiences
One of the most potent ways to use CRM is to create personalized marketing campaigns specific to each customer. Campaigns are able to be distributed across numerous marketing channels, which will potentially lead to increased sales, conversions, and the expansion of your business’s brand awareness.
Using account-based marketing, creating an experience that is obviously catered to the individual customer, CRM platforms capitalize on the power of personalized marketing. Customers like to feel special and know that there is someone that is considering their needs specifically. Nothing speaks to personalization, like having a customized campaign that is designed for a particular client.
Conclusion
Don’t leave your marketing to chance by failing to use your CRM platform to create a consistent and engaging line of communication with your entire client base and prospective patrons. There is no substitute for personalized contact and customized special offers direct from your company to your target audience.
Use all of the tools at your disposal to create better customer engagement and drive more sales.