Top 5 tips for small business going to use CRM

With so many CRM products and solutions available in the market, how can you choose the right one for your organization? 

Here are the 5 tips that you should take in consideration:

1. Total Market view

The world is full of review sites. From global consultancies like Gartner to crowdsourced sites like G2, everyone has an opinion on CRM software. Some CRM authors spend a small fortune on “helping” reviewers to review their software. Even crowdsourced sites are sometimes “spoofed” by over-ambitions marketing teams.

2. What is your Ideal customer?

Size, as they say, isn’t everything. If the review sites help you work out a software author’s target customer by size, more research will tell you about their ideal customer by market. The vendor’s website should tell you about any specific verticals where they feel they are strong. As the UK economy is skewed towards the financial services sector, don’t be too surprised that most CRM vendors list that as one of their verticals. A better understanding may be found by looking at who works with the CRM vendor. If you are a Fund Placement Agent, do reference data sources work with the CRM products you are considering? Does the CRM product you are looking at have links to other software used in your industry?

3. Training and Education background

Selecting the right product is only one part of the story. How will you train the users to use the new CRM system? Most CRM products now have vibrant YouTube channels. Searching YouTube has replaced first line support for many products. Will that work for your team, or do you need some more personalised training? Do you and your team like web-based training or would you prefer a more human approach? Only when you have considered your options can you start selecting or eliminating CRM products that deliver the kind of training you will need.

4. How gets the product sold?

It’s fair to say that most CRM products are no longer bought, but rented. CRM leads the race to the cloud. As a result, you can be paying rental fees for many years. If that is not for you then look at suppliers that still sell software. Perhaps more importantly, do you deal directly with the software author, or do they sell through a network of Value Added Resellers? If you think that a direct deal with the software author is a good thing, you may end up having to buy from a smaller company. As a result you risk the supplier going out of business. You also miss out on all the products, services and expertise that turn a reseller into a Value Added reseller.

5. Where is your data located?

Last, but not least, where is your data? It’s highly likely that your data will be hosted in a cloud somewhere. There are numerous articles and videos elsewhere on our website that delve into the considerations for hosting data. When you are trying to choose a CRM product, it’s important that you consider the data security and access implications of your choice. Does your agreement allow you to get backup copies of your data? Can you extract your data from the CRM product should you need to change? How long are backups retained for? How often can you request a restore of a backup?