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com

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CRM 101: What is CRM?

This is a simple definition of CRM.

Customer relationship management (CRM) (https://www.salesforce.com/crm/)is a technology for

managing all your company’s relationships and interactions with customers and potential customers.

The goal is simple: Improve business relationships. A CRM system helps companies stay connected to

customers, streamline processes, and improve profitability.

When people talk about CRM, they are usually referring to a CRM system, a tool that helps with

contact management, sales management, productivity, and more.

A CRM solution helps you focus on your organization’s relationships with individual people — including

customers, service users, colleagues, or suppliers — throughout your lifecycle with them, including

finding new customers, winning their business, and providing support and additional services

throughout the relationship.

Who is CRM for?

A CRM system gives everyone — from sales, customer service, business development, recruiting,

marketing, or any other line of business — a better way to manage the external interactions and

relationships that drive success. A CRM tool lets you store customer and prospect contact
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1/17/2020 What is CRM? - Salesforce.com

information, identify sales opportunities, record service issues, and manage marketing campaigns, all
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in one central location — and make information about every customer interaction available to anyone

at your company who might need it.

With visibility and easy access to data, it's easier to collaborate and increase productivity. Everyone in

your company can see how customers have been communicated with, what they’ve bought, when

they last purchased, what they paid, and so much more. CRM can help companies of all sizes drive

business growth (https://www.salesforce.com/customer-success-stories/), and it can be especially

beneficial to a small business, where teams often need to find ways to do more with less.

Here’s why CRM matters to your business.

Gartner predicts that by 2021 (https://www.forbes.com/sites/bobevans1/2017/05/23/in-marc-

benioffs-race-to-20-billion-these-4-engines-are-driving-salesforces-growth-cloud-wars/), CRM will be

the single largest revenue area of spending in enterprise software. If your business is going to last, you

know that you need a strategy for the future. You have targets for sales, business objectives, and

profitability. But getting up-to-date, reliable information on your progress can be tricky. How do you

translate the many streams of data coming in from sales, customer service, marketing, and social

media monitoring into useful business information?

A CRM system can give you a clear overview of your customers. You can see everything in one place —

a simple, customizable dashboard that can tell you a customer’s previous history with you, the status

of their orders, any outstanding customer service issues, and more.

You can even choose to include information from their public social media activity — their likes and

dislikes, what they are saying and sharing about you or your competitors. Marketers can use a CRM

solution to better understand the pipeline of sales or prospects coming in, making forecasting simpler

and more accurate. You’ll have clear visibility of every opportunity or lead, showing you a clear path

from inquiries to sales. Some of the biggest gains in productivity can come from moving beyond CRM

as a sales and marketing tool, and embedding it in your business – from HR to customer services and

supply-chain management.

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Though CRM systems have traditionally been used as sales and marketing tools, customer service
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teams are seeing great benefits in using them. Today’s customer might raise an issue in one channel —

say, Twitter — and then switch to email or telephone to resolve it in private. A CRM platform lets you

manage the inquiry across channels without losing track, and gives sales, service, and marketing a

single view of the customer.

Running a business without CRM can cost you real money.

More administration means less time for everything else. An active sales team can generate a flood of

data. Reps are out on the road talking to customers, meeting prospects, and finding out valuable

information – but all too often this information gets stored in handwritten notes, laptops, or inside

the heads of your salespeople.

Don’t make tracking and managing customer information harder than it needs to be. CRM
ensures your data is in one place and can easily be updated by anyone, anytime.

LEARNC AMORE
LL US (tel:1-800-667-6389)
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Details can get lost, meetings are not followed up on promptly, and prioritizing customers can be a

matter of guesswork rather than a rigorous exercise based on fact. And it can all be compounded if a

key salesperson moves on. But it's not just sales that suffers without CRM.

Your customers may be contacting you on a range of different platforms including phone, email, or

social media — asking questions, following up on orders, or contacting you about an issue. Without a

common platform for customer interactions, communications can be missed or lost in the flood of

information — leading to a slow or unsatisfactory response.

Even if you do successfully collect all this data, you’re faced with the challenge of making sense of it. It

can be difficult to extract intelligence. Reports can be hard to create and they can waste valuable

selling time. Managers can lose sight of what their teams are up to, which means that they can’t offer

the right support at the right time – while a lack of oversight can also result in a lack of accountability

from the team.

What does a CRM system do?

A customer relationship management (CRM) solution helps you find new customers, win their

business, and keep them happy by organizing customer and prospect information in a way that helps

you build stronger relationships with them and grow your business faster. CRM systems start by

collecting a customer's website, email, telephone, social media data, and more, across multiple

sources and channels. It may also automatically pull in other information, such as recent news about

the company's activity, and it can store personal details, such as a client's personal preferences on

communications. The CRM tool organizes this information to give you a complete record of

individuals and companies overall, so you can better understand your relationship over time.

A CRM platform can also connect to other business apps

(https://www.salesforce.com/products/platform/services/how-you-integrate/) that help you to

develop customer relationships. CRM solutions today are more open and can integrate with your

favorite business tools, such as document signing, accounting and billing, and surveys, so that

informationCflows
A L L U Sboth
( t e l : ways
1 - 8 0 0 to
- 6 6give
7 - 6 3you
8 9 ) a true 360-degree view of your customer.

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And a new generation of CRM goes one step further: Built-in intelligence automates administrative

tasks, like data entry and lead or service case routing, so you can free up time for more valuable

activities. Automatically generated insights help you understand your customers better, even

predicting how they will feel and act so that you can prepare the right outreach.

Here’s how a CRM system can help your business today.

1. MAKE IMPROVEMENTS TO YOU R BOT TOM L INE.

Introducing a CRM platform has been shown to produce real results – including direct improvements

to the bottom line. CRM applications have a proven track record of increasing:

LEAD CONVERSION BY UP TO (/SOLUTIONS/SMALL-BUSINES S-

S OLUTIONS /WIN-CUSTOMERS/?D=70130000000ICRQ)

+30 %

SALES BY UP TO (/S OLUTIONS /S MALL-BUSINES S -S OLU TIONS/WIN-

CUSTOMERS /?D=70130000000 ICRQ)

+30 %

SALES PRODUCTIVIT Y BY UP TO (/S OLUTIONS/S MALL-BUSINES S-

S OLUTIONS /WIN-CUSTOMERS/?D=70130000000ICRQ)

+35 %

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CUSTOMER SATISFACTION BY U P TO (/SOLUTIONS/S MALL-BUSINES S-

S OLUTIONS /WIN-CUSTOMERS/?D=70130000000ICRQ)
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+35 %

FASTER DECISION-MAKING BY U P TO (/S OLUTIONS/S MALL-BUSINES S-

S OLUTIONS /WIN-CUSTOMERS/?D=70130000000ICRQ)

+38 %

REVENUE BY UP TO (/S OLUTIONS /S MALL-BUSINES S -S OLU TIONS/W IN-

CUSTOMERS /?D=70130000000 ICRQ)

+25 %

Average Percentage Improvements Reported by Salesforce Customers

Source: Salesforce Relationship Survey conducted 2014–2016 among 10,500+ customers randomly selected. Response sizes
per question vary.

2. IDENTIFY AND CATEGORIZE L EA DS.

A CRM system can help you identify and add new leads easily and quickly, and categorize them

accurately. By focusing on the right leads, sales can prioritize the opportunities that will close deals,

and marketing can identify leads that need more nurturing and prime them to become quality leads.

With complete, accurate, centrally held information about clients and prospects, sales and marketing

can focus their attention and energy on the right clients.

3. INCREASE REFERRALS FROM EXISTING CU STOM ERS.

By understanding your customers better, cross-selling and upselling opportunities become clear —

giving you the chance to win new business from existing customers.
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With better visibility, you’ll also be able to keep your customers happy with better service. Happy
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customers are likely to become repeat customers, and repeat customers spend more — up to 33%

more according to some studies.

4. OFFER BET TER CUSTOMER S U PPORT.

Today's customers expect fast, personalized support, at any time of day or night. A CRM system can

help you provide the high-quality service that customers are looking for. Your agents can quickly see

what products customers have ordered, and they can get a record of every interaction so they can give

customers the answers they need, fast.

5. IMPROVE PRODUCTS AND SERVICES.

A good CRM system will gather information from a huge variety of sources across your business and

beyond. This gives you unprecedented insights into how your customers feel and what they are saying

about your organization — so you can improve what you offer, spot problems early, and identify gaps.

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1/17/2020 What is CRM? - Salesforce.com

Want to sell more, faster? Skip ahead.

Check out our interactive video and see how CRM with Salesforce can
L E T 'help you win
S C H AT

customers — as well as find them and keep them happy.

TAKE THE INTERACTIVE TOUR

(HTTPS://WWW.SALESFORCE.COM/FORM/DEMO/SMALL-BUSINESS/INTERACTIVE-
DEMO.JSP?D=7010M000000NVD9)

Here’s what cloud-based CRM offers your business.

CRM and the cloud computing revolution have changed everything. Perhaps the most significant

recent development in CRM systems has been the move into the cloud

(http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/the-enterprise-cloud/comparing-cloud-to-on-premise-crm-

choosing-a-solution/) from on-premises CRM software. Freed from the need to install software on

hundreds or thousands of desktop computers and mobile devices, organizations worldwide are

discovering the benefits of moving data, software, and services into a secure online environment.

WORK FROM ANYW HERE.

Cloud-based CRM systems such as Salesforce (Learn more: What is Salesforce?

(https://www.salesforce.com/what-is-salesforce/)) mean every user has the same information, all the

time. Your sales teams out on the road can check data, update it instantly after a meeting, or work

from anywhere. The same information is available to anyone who needs it, from the sales team to the

customer service representatives.

REDUCE COSTS.

CRM can be quick and easy to implement. A cloud-based system doesn’t need special installation,

and there’s no hardware to set up, keeping IT costs low and removing the headache of version control

and update schedules.

Generally, cloud-based CRM systems are priced on the number of users who access the system and

the kinds of features you need. This can be very cost-effective in terms of capital outlay, and is also
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extremely flexible — enabling you to scale up and add more people as your business grows. Salesforce

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1/17/2020 What is CRM? - Salesforce.com

is flexible in terms of functionality, too — you’re not paying for any features that are not useful to you.
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A CLOUD-BASED CRM PL ATFORM OFFERS YOU :

Faster deployment

Automatic software updates

Cost-effectiveness and scalability

The ability to work from anywhere, on any device

Increased collaboration

FREE TRIAL

What is Salesforce CRM? Try it free and see how it can help you grow your business.

START MY FREE TRIAL

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1/17/2020 What is CRM? - Salesforce.com

Getting Started with CRM

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OVERVIEW

What is CRM?

CHAPTER 1

6 ways CRM helps grow your business. (/crm/how-crm-improves-business/?

d=7010M000000Nv7D)

CHAPTER 2

Does my business need a CRM system? (/crm/why-crm-matters-to-business/?

d=7010M000000Nv7I)

CHAPTER 3

What should I look for in a CRM solution? (/crm/what-crm-tools-to-use/?

d=7010M000000Nv7N)

CHAPTER 4

Why Salesforce is the #1 CRM for growing businesses. (/crm/is-salesforce-a-crm/?

d=7010M000000Nv7S)

CHAPTER 5

How to craft a CRM strategy. (/crm/building-crm-strategies/?d=7010M000000Nv7X)

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1/17/2020 What is CRM? - Salesforce.com

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