Essential CRM functions

In your search for customer relationship management software, it's important to carry out an analysis of the software package's functionalities, so as to opt for the tool that will intervene in every phase of the sales cycle, and integrate functionalities that will cover three distinct areas: sales force, marketing and customer support.

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What are the main criteria for choosing the right CRM software?

The essential functionalities of a CRM are as follows:

• Contact management includes customers, prospects and partners. This feature enables you to add contacts and organize them better online, so you can easily access your contacts, sort data or import or export them to an excel file. Contact management also facilitates e-mail campaigns.
• Sales stage: this feature gives you a global view of the sales processes currently underway, and enables you to schedule them according to the way your company operates. This function facilitates sales activity through a number of stages: firstly, CRM software helps you to gather information about your target, and then to prepare prospecting in order to facilitate contact with the prospect and the proposal of products and services. The next stage would be to follow up sales by calling the prospect back and making appointments, with the aim of successfully negotiating and concluding with a contractual commitment. The sales module also manages duplicates and the catalog of products, services and prices for greater sales efficiency.
• The Daily Dashboard gives you all the key figures for your business, to help you make the right choices and decisions. In concrete terms, it's a summary of your statistics by sales agent, sales, projects, customers, prospects, etc.
• Document Management is designed to save sales reps time by providing them with document templates for commercial purposes: proposals, standard e-mails, contracts, surveys, contact forms, etc. This function also enables all files to be centralized in a single location, with the option of sharing them.
• Reporting: CRM software integrates a powerful reporting function that generates refined summaries of customer relations: marketing, expectations, sales, etc. The aim is to ensure that the customer's needs are met. The aim is to ensure that objectives are achieved or not.
• Marketing & analysis : this module is one of the most important when choosing a CRM system, enabling you to study the behavior of potential customers and prospects. The aim is to get to know them better, so as to send them personalized promotional offers. This feature manages mailing, e-mailing, faxing, SMS, competitive intelligence and statistical analysis.
• Miscellaneous services: this module differs from one publisher to another, and manages commissions allocated to sales reps, author rights, the multilingual and multicurrency nature of CRM software, as well as parameter personalization.

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CRM software is essential if you are to implement a sales strategy that will enable you to gain a good understanding of your customers, and thus acquire and retain their loyalty. To this end, you need to select the software that best adapts to your customers' expectations, in terms of anticipating their needs and providing them with the best possible personalized offer. It's important to take the above-mentioned functionalities into account when choosing your CRM software. It's the ideal tool for building customer loyalty at the lowest possible cost, and for increasing sales in the long term.