CRM Software - Know your business requirements before you buy. It will save you money, time, and effort!

We have seen this all-too-common scenario:
A Senior Level Manager decides it is time to streamline the sales department, shorten the sales cycle for products, and turn your company into a customer focused organization. Another goal was to create a central repository for all data regarding marketing efforts, sales leads, customer service, and historical information about every interaction with customers.

CRM software selection has to fit your business strategy.

CRM software selection has to fit your business strategy.

Theoretically, to make your company grow and make it much easier for everyone to share information and work together. They have made the decision with the belief that we if can share information, then everyone can contribute to the sales process by inserting information in the centralized system.

To accomplish this, he connects with the IT department to research, purchase, and implement sales force automation or contact relationship management software. He was even smart enough to send all of his sales managers and account executives to training on the new CRM software. (Most don't bother with this step)

But unfortunately, the Customer Relationship Management Software fails miserably. It does not have the desired results that management or the IT department thought it would. It is hard for them to understand that after spending a lot of time, effort and money; things have not really changed much.

They found that, for the most part, people either don’t use the CRM Software, or if they do, they only use it in a very limited way.

How could this happen? Where is the expected ROI?

There are several reasons for the results experienced. Most all of them are not the result of the technology or the CRM software. They are the result of not knowing, understanding, or considering the company culture, work flow process(es), or the technology selected supported the requirements.

Most important of these are the first two; with consideration of how these might be enhanced and impacted by the third. The common mis-belief is that CRM technology will solve all issues and when is does not, then the CRM software has failed.

The reality is:
Every sales person had different habits and processes that didn’t match up with the software feature or functions.
There was no culture of information sharing. No one saw the value in taking the extra time to add pertinent information into the system. Management didn’t take these “soft” hurdles seriously enough.

Instead they should have:

spent time with users,
understood why things were done in certain ways,
determine if things needed to change,
share how changes would benefit the company

Instead, managers blindly hoped that the new software would fix their problems for them. What they ended up with is a glorified Rolodex of contacts with some other functions that a small set of users actually use or benefit from. This happens all too often.

CRM – or Business Management Software -

can improve efficiency and help expand the scope of various business processes.
Unfortunately, what it cannot do is fix a process or practice that is fundamentally broken.

Before you consider spending big bucks on a CRM system, Sales Force Automation (SFA), Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) or other small business software packages designed to boost productivity and automate business processes; ensure you understand the root causes of the slowdowns or inefficiencies of YOUR company.
Customer Relationship cycles

Ask yourself:

What the culture of the company is?
What processes are used and WHY?
What areas need to change? and
What those changes are?

Understanding the fundamentals of your business processes – and even your culture - can allow you to address their flaws and inadequacies before you commit to buying expensive crm software to improve them.

This will pave the way for the new software to save you time and money by automating and streamlining processes which are already optimized. Then, research and implement the small business software that most closely matches the culture, processes, and methodologies of YOUR company.

In fact, as a general rule, software companies research and adopt industry best practices and build them into their product. The closer your company is following these practices, the less work you have to do in aligning your processes with those the crm software requires.

More importantly, the less time and money you have to spend making expensive modifications to the crm software.

To ensure business practices are optimized before purchasing any business automation software, follow this straightforward method for fixing troublesome processes:

Document all the steps involved in the process(es) that will be affected by the new software. Be extremely thorough.
Identify the steps in the process causing slowdowns or waste. (time and money)
Determine what form such slowdowns or waste take (i.e. things like delays, redundancies, and asset mis-allocations).
Work to remove the slowdowns through elimination of redundancies, asset reallocation, personnel training etc.

By examining and fixing your business processes, before you shell out hard earned cash for crm software, you significantly increase the likelihood of a successful crm implementation.

You also ensure that problems that can’t simply be fixed with new software are not overlooked.
If you would like help in creating, evaluating, or improving your business processes, contact BestFit Solutions for assistance.

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