Nigel Wilkinson
Managing Director of Daneswood. Nigel has been in sales and marketing since the 1980's and run digital marketing agencies since 2000.
Back in December, when we planned our blog schedule for the year (yes, we really do that, it’s not all seat of the pants stuff here you know), we decided that this month would be focused on Contact Relationship Management software (CRMs) and how you can use a CRM to improve your digital marketing.
Little did I know then how relevant this would be, as in the Spring, we decided to change the CRM system we have used for the past few years (HubSpot) and move over to Keap – you may know it under its previous brand of Infusionsoft.
This means that I am writing this in a break from trawling over data, planning integrations and automations and getting things generally set up as best I can for the Go-Live date, which hopefully will have successfully passed two weeks before you read this blog!
So, with this topic front and centre in my thinking, let’s dive into the world of CRMs. Let’s start with what a CRM is and why you need one!
A Customer Relationship Management system allows your business to store and manage all customer-related data in one place. This includes contact details, purchase history, interactions, preferences, and more. Depending on your business, you can select a CRM for eCommerce or Business-to-Business (B2B) to track the different types of prospects, customers, and transactions. There are hundreds of options out there.
For your sales team, whether it’s just you or a team of 20+, CRM systems offer features to track leads, manage opportunities, and monitor sales pipelines. By automating repetitive tasks, such as data entry, lead assignment, and follow-ups, CRM systems streamline sales processes, increase efficiency, and enable sales teams to focus on building relationships and closing deals.
An example of this might be that a prospect fills out an enquiry form on your website. Rather than waiting until you check your email & have time to call them, they instantly get a thank you email, giving them targeted information, possibly with a link to your sales team’s diary to book an initial call. This is then followed by further emails over the coming days with information, fact sheets, offers, reminders to book a meeting etc. All without you raising a finger! (except for the setup of course)
For your marketing, they help you segment customers, analyse data, and run targeted campaigns, resulting in better lead generation and conversion rates. Your CRM can capture a wealth of customer data that can be analysed to gain valuable insights. You can identify trends, analyse customer behaviour, measure campaign effectiveness, and make data-driven decisions. These insights help optimise sales and marketing strategies, improve customer targeting, and identify opportunities for growth.
Digital marketing these days is very data driven. Who clicked, who viewed, where did they find you, what message did they respond to, how did they contact you, where did they drop out if they didn’t contact you, what are your ideal customers, what do they look like, where do they come from, and a thousand other data points that you can’t remember but your CRM can!
Overall, a CRM system is important because it helps businesses manage customer relationships effectively, deliver superior customer experiences, optimise sales and marketing efforts, and drive long-term growth and success.
Next time, we will look into how you select the right CRM for you, what you need to think of when planning – or switching – and a few pointers to make using your CRM a success.