Improving Marketing Results with CRM
Customer relationship marketing increases brand loyalty while creating better leads and more sales. Organizing your marketing strategy with personalized messages improves marketing results and customer retention. In the past, marketing campaigns and other activities are often planned from guesswork. As a result, marketing budgets are wasted on poorly conceived and executed marketing initiatives.
In today’s evolving market, efficient marketing spending is crucial for business growth. Marketing efforts must target the needs of potential clients. Otherwise, you are wasting money by giving the wrong message to the wrong prospect.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) applications are often associated with automating sales processes. They also have tangible benefits to the marketing area of your business. CRMs provide the marketing team with visible and significant results. Having this information addresses the pains felt by your marketing organization.
Pain: Getting quality lead results from marketing campaigns.
Determining if marketing programs are successful is a significant pain for marketing executives. Results from advertising, direct mail, trade shows, and other mediums can be difficult to track. Marketing planning is oftentimes based on guesswork instead of hard facts.
CRM Can Help!
A Customer Relationship Marketing CRM can offer a comprehensive lead-tracking system. Executives have real-time access to information about leads and where they came from. C2CRM, for example, gives the marketing team instant views of leads in the sales pipeline. Track where a lead came from, the lead status, and the rep assigned to the lead.
Real-time Information shows the number of leads that turned into REAL opportunities. Actual sales numbers link to the marketing promotion, showing value for each campaign. ROI calculations assist management in deciding which programs they should renew or discontinue.
Drip Campaigns provides lead statistics for prospects moving to more targeted messaging campaigns. C2CRM can end the guesswork oftentimes associated with marketing planning.
Pain: Tracking Lead Follow-up
Marketing professionals don’t want leads sitting idle with little or no follow-up. This can result from unorganized, overworked, or inefficient sales teams.
CRM Can Help!
CRM tools track the status of any lead and allow salespeople to follow up on leads more efficiently. C2CRM shows the status of any grouping of leads.
Organize groups by campaign or event (such as a trade show) and reflect the current status of each lead. View details like the percentage of leads in the sales process and unqualified leads.
A CRM application also provides information about the status of a lead to the sales team member. This data is much more than good note-taking. C2CRM offers lead scoring and temperature gauging to rank which ones to focus on first.
CRMs provide stages within the sales cycle that sales professionals use to tag a lea. Once tagged with a certain stage of the sales process, it becomes easy to prioritize leads.
Classifying leads gives the salesperson a common point of reference for each lead. Leads are easier for reps to track and communicate their status to others. A CRM system empowers each sales rep to focus on their leads and shorten the sales cycle.
CRM reporting tools identify and analyze the lead status and ensure a timely follow-up. Leads are not ignored; they build strong relationships with the prospect.
Pain: Brand Loyalty & Recognition
How often does a prospect need to see your product information before buying? The more communication with the prospect, the more mindshare resulting in brand recognition.
The pain in marketing relates to how often a prospect receives your information. These marketing efforts can be expensive and time-consuming.
CRM Can Help!
C2CRM’s workflows communicate regularly to leads, prospects, and existing customers. By using workflows, you automate the processes in the system. Potential clients receive product information, or sales can upsell to loyal customers.
For example, if you have someone interested in a product, you will tag their record with that product name. Your CRM reminds the rep to contact them and receive regular communications. Targeted workflow processes include product-related articles, brochures, references, and other focused collateral.
C2CRM handles the follow-up process via email to help keep your products top of mind with the prospect. Your sales reps are notified when they need to call the prospects and move the sales process to the next step.
Your CRM saves details on your sales team members’ conversations with each prospect. Tracking any possible hurdles that may be overcome to close each deal. The more you get your message in front of a prospect, the more likely they will buy your product. Automating your processes increases the likelihood of closing more deals and customer retention.
Pain: Reporting
Creating detailed reports on the status of leads can be daunting through campaigns or any other marketing medium.
CRM Can Help!
A robust CRM system offers true analytics. Customer information is maintained in the database and allows specific information to be extracted. You can create reports showing details of any interest.
For example, in C2CRM, you can create real-time reports showing how many leads are received from a specific trade show. And of those leads, which resulted in opportunities or sales.
More importantly, you can compare statistics from the same trade show attended the previous year to see which was more successful. Analytics gives you the power to slice and dice your database as needed. You can compare, examine and dissect different bits of information to help you make informed marketing decisions. Dashboard widgets can also be created to display real-time analytics graphically.
Summary
The challenges of a competitive and dynamic marketplace make marketing a crucial component of a successful organization. Businesses implementing CRM strategies have tools to streamline the marketing process and build it into a well-tuned machine. Companies spend marketing funds in a targeted and effective manner.
There is a difference between the perceptions of efficient marketing and the reality of the results. CRM solutions create accurate reports with real-time data, which shows little doubt about where the marketing dollars are working. As a result, your business saves money by spending it with the most impact and NOT spending it on wasted efforts.
Many CRM software platforms do not have an integrated marketing automation component. This is an unfortunate oversight because marketing is the lifeblood of every business. Improving marketing effectiveness can give your business a definitive strategic advantage that can go directly to the bottom line.
Customer Relationship Marketing strategies create long-term relationships and improve the customer experience. C2CRM helps build customer satisfaction and customer loyalty. To learn more or see a demo of our marketing features, email sales@clearc2.com.