What are CRMs?

This is one of the questions that are frequently asked at Google every month, a product of the strength that these software solutions are taking in today's business world.

We do not want to focus this article on the business problems faced by an SME. We also want to talk about the solution, which is simpler than it seems: implement a CRM software.

But what exactly is a CRM?

CRM is a type of software specialized in the management of a company's business relations (Customer Relationship Management, for its acronym in English).

There are many brands today, several of them free and with quite powerful properties that will help your SME to be more efficient and profitable.

With a CRM you can:

• Have all your business information in one place.
• Segment your contacts according to their location, pain point, areas of interest, state of the sales cycle they are in.
• Understand how your contacts interact with your content and website.
• Control the day to day of your commercial management.
• Automate tasks and increase efficiency.
• Generate reports.

Why should SMEs implement a CRM?

Undoubtedly, one of the main challenges of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) today is profitability. Remember the statistics that say the pandemic has left about 2.7 million Latino businesses, mostly SMEs, on the brink.

And the profitability of SMEs is not only important for their owners. SMEs are essential to the economic fabric of the planet, especially in developing countries. According to World Bank statistics, SMEs account for 90% of businesses and 50% of employment worldwide.

Three benefits of using a CRM in your SME

Having said all the above about the importance of SMEs, it is time to focus on what really matters: those small (or large) details that we must correct if we want more profitability in our companies.

• Organization of your company's databases

Imagine this scenario: you return to a business meeting after several months in confinement due to COVID. You find a contact you didn't see months ago and with whom you had explored business.

— Hey, we're ready to pick up the conversations and invest in your product or service. Email me tomorrow to coordinate a new meeting—your prospect tells you.

"Of course, tomorrow as soon as I get to the office," you reply full of hope.

The next day, already in your office, you get ready to send the email, you look for your data in several Excel tables that you have and you can not find it. To finish adjusting, you can not find it in your email, because your contact does not have an email with his name and surname, but with the role. You remember, but nothing comes. Total catastrophe!

If it has not happened to you, and to prevent it from happening, nothing better than implementing a CRM. As stated by Salesforce, one of the giants of this market, with a CRM software you will be able to organize all the information to obtain a complete record of individuals and companies, all to have a better understanding about the relationship established with both over time.

• Make your sellers more efficient

Let's continue with the stories. You hire a new salesperson and are ready to assign them some accounts:

- Thank you for assigning me these accounts. What state are they in the sales cycle and when was the last time we contacted them?" asks the new employee.

"Ajem, hmmm, because I don't remember well," you say, watching a grimace of frustration and fear drawn on his face...

If you do not have the information well organized, the new seller could contact potential customers with inaccurate, or repetitive information, generating friction in the business process and reducing the chances of closing.

And how can a CRM help here? In many cases, poor commercial performance is the product of disorganization. In this case, a CRM allows you to automate small tasks and manage the workflow, while streamlining the sales process.

It also allows you to execute advanced tasks such as reporting, which will allow you to identify what is working in your business management and what is not, to take the necessary corrective measures.

• Generate more sales

There is one truth that I believe we cannot refute: times have changed and computer technology has come to change almost every sphere of our lives. And sales are NO STRANGERs to this trend.

Thanks to globalization, information technology and fiercer competition, relying on old sales methods not only leaves you at a disadvantage against the competition, but can put your company's long-term growth and sustainability at risk.

Today we simply don't have as much bandwidth to manually satisfy and one by one the questions of hundreds or thousands of prospects who may be interested in a company. Again, leave this in the hands of the CRM.

HubSpot, one of the most popular CRM software today, cites some international statistics of how the use of these solutions has improved the business management of companies, allowing them to grow.

HubSpot says that, in some sustained surveys among groups of companies, there was a 41% increase for each sales representative, in addition to a 300% increase in sales closings. He also shared the data that a company's ROI (Return on Investment) could increase up to 245% when these solutions are applied correctly.

Conclusion

We hope with this article we have been able to give a good initial approximation to what CRM is and what they are for.

In general, these solutions are quite robust, and at the beginning you may need an ally to help you understand all the functionalities, who is dedicated to learning them and then teaching them to your sales team.