by Destiny De Guzman
How important are your customers to you?
All marketers nowadays may agree that customers are the most valuable asset to the company. They can say this in many ways, like how location is important—so they can get to customers, or how they should have a great management team—to help employees satisfy their customers. Ultimately, all efforts are focused on satisfying the customers.
Now, what does CRM have to do with this?
Customer relationship management refers to the practices, strategies, and technologies that companies use to manage and analyze customer interactions and relationships. Taking advantage of this could lead to plenty of advantages for the company. We have boiled down all of these advantages in 4 short phrases:
- Builds relationships with customers
- Reveals opportunities
- Cost effective
- Improved reputation
- Building Relationships with Customers
Having customer relationship management keeps track of all the interactions between the company and its customers throughout the entire customer buying cycle. This can help see what is important to the customer, how they buy, what their buying process is, and more. It gives the company a more in-depth analysis on the ins and outs of their customers. Keeping track of these interactions help the company have the upper hand the next time a customer comes around, since they will know what they want and how they can give it. This builds a long-term relationship between the two entities, instead of simply being a relationship in their emails.
- Reveals Opportunities
CRM also reveals which prospects have not been targeted or “sold to” yet. A “no” may mean “not today.” Having a CRM database not only helps keep track of the target market, but can also reveal potential customers that are not currently being targeted. This can lead to a ton of opportunities for the company—such as expansion, product development, or market development.
- Cost Effective
Although building and maintaining relationships with customers may seem time-consuming and costly—it is nothing but the opposite. With the right CRM applications, it can offer a very strong return on investment. By building relationships with customers, and ensuring that their needs are met, a company can go through a more targeted approach with their customers. They can start to figure out which customer is more profitable versus those who are not, and can save their resources instead.
- Improved reputation
Engaging with customers online can also lead to several negative encounters with current customers who have had a bad experience. Having CRM can help ensure that there are people who can protect the brand and remain a respectable company in the field. Learning how to properly acknowledge customers with negative experiences by identifying their behavior and previous interactions can help solve problems—this can also show that the company can properly (and professionally) handle unsatisfactory situations.
In conclusion, CRM puts the customers at the heart of the business, which has proven to be the way to best increase sales and profits. Maintaining a good relationship with your customers ensures that they will come back over and over again—especially if they trust your brand. Hopefully these four reasons can prove that CRM is not an option, and is in fact a must-have for your business.
Image from LinkedIn.com