Salesforce is a cloud based CRM tool designed to streamline pre- and post-sales and support efforts through tracking, analyzing and sharing information across your organization. Since launching in 1999, Salesforce has grown into a CRM powerhouse – constantly adding new and exciting features to help improve their user experience. Is it time for a CRM tool that works for you? Are ready to invest in Salesforce?
Here are 6 signs that prove you’re ready to invest in Salesforce.
Disclaimer: We should start by saying that as Salesforce Consultants, we feel having even one or two of these issues would warrant you taking a closer look at whether or not you should invest in Salesforce for your customer relationship management (CRM) needs.
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Your contact and lead lists are out of control.
Leads and contact lists are never going to be perfect. Our Marketing team works diligently to keep our database information current and accurate, and Salesforce helps dramatically. For starters, when an email sent through Salesforce isn’t delivered, Salesforce alerts on their record and through the campaign used to send the message. This ensures you see the notification. If a prospect or client opts out of receiving emails, Salesforce automatically marks them in the system. A simple report filter can be used to exclude them going forward.
In addition, Salesforce also allows you to set up rules and restrictions for entering data. For example, if someone tries to enter an e-mail address that is already in your database, Salesforce will post a warning message prompting the person to investigate further. Fields in Salesforce may also be restricted so that information can only be entered a certain way, like two-digit for state abbreviations or phone numbers with parentheses around the area code. As users enter data, it is automatically formatted according to your pre-set rules.
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Your customer service score is low.
The saying goes, “The customer is always right.” While that may not technically be true, good customer service is critical for every organization. If you are receiving complaints on the level of customer service you provide your clients, then it’s time to evaluate, and your CRM solution may be to blame. Without quick, easy access to client information, your team will struggle to meet support needs.
Unfortunately, unhappy customers don’t stay. You need to equip your services and support teams with a robust CRM tool that can help them close and resolve issues in a timely manner. Salesforce Service Cloud helps your team close cases quickly by giving them access to a wealth of customer information, case notes and background data. This makes your customer care experience more personal and more positive.
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You’re using more than one system to communicate with your prospects, and they aren’t talking to each other.
We find that many companies are marketing on social media, using e-mail to communicate with prospects, tracking activity in CRM applications, and using another tool for customer communications. Worse yet, none of these systems are communicating with each other. Information gets lost in a sea of messages, posts, and IMs causing confusion and breaking down effective account management.
Deciding to invest in Salesforce can allow you to combine all of these methods of communication into one simple software solution. By integrating with Outlook, your sales teams can directly attach prospecting emails to an account or lead in Salesforce along with other activities associated with that prospect.
Using marketing automation add-ons like Pardot or iContact with Salesforce, you can integrate social media tracking, website traffic, webinar attendance, and more. All of the activities show up on the individual’s record in Salesforce giving your sales team and marketing team insight into prospect activity.
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The metrics on your sales team could be improved.
Do you have customized dashboards set up for each of your sales reps that provide you with high-level and detailed overview of their recent performance levels? Does that dashboard change in real-time so you always have the most up-to-date information?
Salesforce provides Managers with visual, user-friendly dashboards that can include all of the important success metrics. Some examples include; viewing how many calls were made in a given week, the number of appointments that were set, and if sales wins hit your quota.
Salesforce allows you to set up these individualized dashboards by using populated fields on the account or individual records. Dashboards are updated in real time as activity is entered into the system. By having quick insight into these metrics, Sales Managers are able to better assist their teams to help make them be more successful. Not to mention the amount of time saved by checking each individual record within your CRM database for updates.
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The ROI on your marketing campaigns consists of guesswork.
Your marketing team spends hours developing a campaign to increase brand awareness, hopefully resulting in shorter sale cycles for your sales team. They draft emails, write and design sales flyers centered around the campaign and put together a targeted list of prospects. Once the email is sent, now what?
Using Salesforce with marketing automation tools such as Pardot or iContact, you will be able to track how many messages aren’t delivered, how many are opened, and see exactly who clicks on any links in your message. Having these numbers not only allows you to judge the success of your marketing campaigns based on specific goals, but it also allows your marketing team to make quick changes based on user engagement. If people aren’t opening emails, try tweaking your subject lines. If they’re opening messages but not clicking links, try changing some wording inside the e-mails. Marketing automation tools in Salesforce make these changes quick and painless. Salesforce provides insight into the user experience and ultimately, gives your team the tools they need to be successful.
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Half of the company doesn’t use your current CRM to its fullest potential.
Customer Relationship Management tools are designed to do just that, help you manage relationships. But many times, employees see them as just an electronic rolodex. Information is entered only to be relegated to a virtual shelf collecting dust bytes.
Salesforce is highly user-friendly and provides its users with a vast knowledge base filled with how-tos and FAQs if you get stuck. In addition to the various online articles, the support team at Salesforce is fast and friendly. They answer your questions in a timely manner allowing you to resume working promptly.
Why invest in Salesforce over other CRM tools on the market? Because it’s the best. It has the highest number of users, a user-friendly interface, quick support response times, and top-to-bottom functionality your entire company can benefit from. Don’t just take our word for it. G2Crowd and other CRM comparative sites will tell you the same – click here. Call us today at 614-212-1111 to learn how you can take your company to the next level and invest in Salesforce or fill out the form below for more information.
