Choosing The Right CRM With The Help Of A CRM Consultant
November 8, 2022
Managing your customer database can get really tricky without a good CRM. Irrespective of the scale, every business handles several customer records that need systematic processing and management. CRM helps you record, store, and analyze your customer relationships.
Modern CRM solutions help you track your customer interactions to personalize your service. A lot of them also streamline your sales, marketing, and customer service processes. Implementing a robust CRM helps you understand your customers better and assist them throughout their buying journeys.
However, living in the age of digitization has led to the emergence of several CRM solutions to choose from. A simple Google search will show you several different CRM options you can implement. This makes it important to pick the best from the lot.
While serving the same purpose, all CRM solutions have different specialties. Every CRM follows a unique approach and provides a unique UI to its users. Depending on your business needs and the customers your business caters to, it is important to choose the right CRM.
When it comes to making this decision, it becomes necessary to seek professional help. Most businesses seek assistance from CRM consultants to choose the right CRM. These CRM experts guide you every step of the way in choosing the CRM that is in sync with your business objectives.
Who Is A CRM Consultant?
A CRM consultant is an expert who helps businesses implement and use CRM solutions. They possess both business-related and technical expertise to provide personalized assistance to their clients. CRM consultants understand the nitty-gritty details of various solutions and help their clients make the right choice.
Working with a CRM consultant helps you resolve doubts, answer queries, and optimize the CRM you implement. CRM consultants provide tailor-made recommendations to their clients, from the product you purchase to the tools you should add. They perform need analysis, understand your business goals, and help you implement the right CRM solution in the best way possible.
Why Should You Work With A CRM Consultant?
Having an expert by your side is always advisable as you make important business decisions. A CRM consultant acts as a bouncing board, helping you resolve all your CRM-related issues.
Here are some important reasons why you should work with a CRM consultant:
Domain Expertise
Entrepreneurs and managers rarely possess complete domain expertise regarding CRM implementation. While it is possible to choose and set up a CRM solution by yourself, it is not the best way of implementing any digital solution.
CRM consultants possess the domain expertise required to choose the right CRM and implement it the right way. With years of professional experience, they bring with them unmatched skills and knowledge to give you the right sense of direction.
Saving Unnecessary Expenses
Without a CRM consultant, you may end up spending more than what is required while implementing CRM. Businesses often choose a platform that seems lucrative without diving deeper into its features. You may also purchase add-ons that aren’t needed and integrations you can do without.
A CRM consultant helps you avoid unnecessary expenses and keep a check on your budget. Depending on the allocated budget, they ensure that you implement the best CRM with the best features. Instead of spending more for little value, they help you spend to get maximum value for your expenses.
A Focused Approach
Businesses often implement CRM tools and features they never use. This adds to their managerial and financial burden. A CRM consultant follows a focused approach while helping you make the right decisions. They let you choose only the tools and features that are important for your business. They keep you from steering away from your goals and keep you focused throughout your implementation project.
Optimizing The CRM
If you want to leverage your business processes, merely implementing a CRM is not enough. It is important to optimize the solution to make the most of it. Before and after your CRM is launched, your CRM consultant helps you test, audit, and constantly monitor the platform. By optimizing your CRM, you can use it to attain all your objectives and build healthy customer relations.
Training Your Employees
Whether you are implementing CRM for the first time or switching to a new solution, your employees may require initial training. CRM consultants help you with user adoption and provide extensive training to your employees. They ease your employees into using the CRM to ensure sustainability.
Choosing The Right CRM With Your CRM Consultant
Once you have a skilled CRM consultant on board, they will help you choose a CRM that best suits your needs and preferences.
Here are some noteworthy ways in which you can work with your consultant to choose the right CRM:
Identifying Your Business Goals
As discussed earlier, each CRM solution has its own set of specializations. You should be well-versed in your business goals to choose the right CRM. With your CRM consultant’s help, clearly define the goals you want to achieve from CRM implementation. Analyze the direction you want to drive your business towards and identify what you’d need to do so.
Here are some important business goals a CRM solution helps you fulfill:
- Acquiring quality leads
- Increasing conversion rates
- Tracking customer base
- Tracking and winning opportunities
- Increasing ROI
- Improving customer relations
- Providing better customer service
- Creating omnichannel marketing campaigns
Deciding The Deployment Type
The deployment type is another important factor you should consider while choosing the right CRM. In most cases, businesses need to choose between cloud-based and on-premise CRM. Your CRM consultant will analyze your business goals and suggest the best way to deploy your CRM.
In the digital age, businesses often prefer implementing cloud-based CRM as it is a more flexible solution. Instead of setting up a CRM on-premise, cloud-based solutions help you manage your customer records without geographical restrictions.
Understanding The Features You Need
Different CRM solutions provide different features to their users. HubSpot is ideal for creating inbound marketing campaigns. Salesforce gives you robust tools for sales enablement. With your CRM consultant’s help, you need to identify the features you are looking for while choosing the right CRM.
You can also choose a suitable CRM based on the department that would use the solution, such as sales, marketing, customer service, finance, etc. Once you have a list of features you are looking for, selecting the right CRM becomes easier.
Checking Third-party Integrations
Not all CRM solutions integrate with all third-party applications and services. Third-party integrations help expand your CRM’s functionality and prevent employees from switching between different platforms.
Your CRM consultant will help you choose a solution that integrates with your existing applications and services. They will also consider the third-party apps you want to integrate with while looking for the right CRM. Moreover, they would help you choose a CRM platform that facilitates easy and smooth third-party integrations.
The Final Word
Working with a CRM consultant makes choosing the right CRM easier. Their expertise and knowledge help you make the right decisions and understand what is best for your business. Never rush through the process of selecting an ideal CRM consultant, and conduct thorough research for the same. Working with a consultant in sync with your business needs helps you optimize your CRM solution and get closer to your goals.
Featured Resources
Check Our Latest Resources
Proven ROI has been recognized as one of the Most Innovative Companies to Watch 2024 by CIO Bulletin—a testament to the company’s forward-thinking approach to CRM investments and strategic partnerships. By working closely with leading CRM platforms like HubSpot, Proven ROI is revolutionizing how businesses manage customer relationships, scale their operations, and drive growth.
Discover OpenAI’s latest breakthrough, GPT o1, a cutting-edge large language model transforming AI capabilities. Explore its features, applications, and impact on various industries.
In today’s fast-paced business world, companies are placing increasingly high demands on marketing executives. But are these expectations realistic, or are businesses asking for too much? Let’s examine this question through a job posting for a Vice President of Digital Marketing/Demand Generation at Self Publishing in Austin, Texas. This role sheds light on what many companies are looking for in their marketing leaders and whether these expectations align with reality.
Contact us today
Take Your Digital To The Next Level With Proven ROI
©2024 PROVEN ROI®| All Rights Reserved.