A quick yet comprehensive guide to choosing the right CRM for your enterprise.

Small businesses thrive on their ability to quickly shift and adapt to changing market trends. On the other hand, big businesses milk the benefits of economies of scale. However, one thing that benefits all kinds of businesses is operational efficiency. It reduces the time and effort spent on complex, repetitive processes.

So many businesses are acquiring custom CRM development services to offload and automate those tedious tasks. Custom Customer Relationship Management or CRM software has become a must-have for businesses, regardless of size.

But how should one decide whether a certain CRM is right for their business? Well, there are many factors involved for sure. But do not worry. You can easily zero in on the right CRM software by reviewing the criteria list we have provided below.

This list gives you an idea of what to look for in a CRM. It also explains in detail what each choice would mean for your business. Hopefully, by the end of this article, you will know what kind of CRM software development project you want for your business. But before we start, let’s first get an idea about enterprise CRM.

What Is Enterprise CRM?

As a business grows, the overall scope of operations expands. But most importantly, the nature of those operations and activities becomes increasingly complex as a business grows to become an expert in the industry. Tackling this complexity is hard for businesses, especially when many of those routine operations are handled by employees who do not have the means to make the task more efficient and effective. As a result, managing day-to-day tasks becomes time-consuming and effort exhaustive for businesses.

That is where an enterprise CRM becomes so useful for a business. CRM provides a common system where an enterprise’s varied operations can be managed simultaneously. For instance, a business has multiple sales departments. Then it would be best if all of them could access the business’s central client database. That is exactly what a CRM does.

It automates the information and data exchange process, making it faster and easier for different departments to access and share relevant information. It speeds up task completion while encouraging team coordination and collaboration to achieve business objectives.

Criteria to Evaluate the Right CRM Software

The CRM Must Align with Your Business Goals

CRM is essentially a problem-solving tool. To decide how effective a particular CRM is, you should clearly know the problem you want to solve. Once you have clarity regarding the goals you are trying to achieve, it will give you a roadmap of what to look for in a CRM. Below are some of the common business objectives. Prepare a list that includes or excludes certain operations based on your specific requirements.

Keeping track of activities and interactions with leads.
Keeping track of existing clientele.
Keeping track of prospects and closing rates.
Enabling communication and coordination between different departments.
Managing relationships with clients, leads, and prospects.
Creating personalized reports that document progress.
Developing strategies and plans for business operations.
Boosting profitability by optimizing performance and productivity.

Make Sure It Is the Type of CRM You Need

CRM gets generally classified into three types:

Operational: Operational CRM usually keeps track of interactions between the organization and its leads, prospects, and customers. The software primarily automates marketing, sales, and service operations.

Analytical: Analytical CRM accumulates and analyzes data acquired from a business’s sales, marketing, and customer service departments. Analyzing this data, CRM generates insights that are then utilized to guide business policies and strategies moving forward. This type of CRM broadly comprises features such as online analytical processing (OLAP), data warehousing, and data mining.
Collaborative: These types of CRM generally manage interactions between team members. They facilitate easy communication and collaboration between teams in different departments to optimize workforce performance. Moreover, such CRM raises the overall profitability of the business by improving customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Depending upon the kind of operations you want assistance in, you should choose a suitable CRM that serves those particular needs. If you cannot identify exactly which of the abovementioned three areas you need help with, you can use some input from your team members. They will tell you the tools and features that would help them do their job to the best of their abilities.

Carefully Choose between On-Premise and Cloud-Based

On-premise CRM refers to the kinds of CRM hosted on an organization’s internal servers. In the case of on-premise hosting, the business usually needs an in-house IT team that can do all the work like acquiring the license for the CRM, installing it on the company’s server, and taking care of all the maintenance operations such as conducting security check-ups, back-ups, and upgrades.

Cloud-based CRM, or SaaS-based CRM, is hosted using a different approach. Instead of on-site management, cloud-based CRM is hosted on third-party servers. Businesses pay vendors monthly subscription fees to host and manage CRM on their servers. You only need an internet connection to access your cloud-based CRM remotely.

According to a report published by Gartner, cloud-based CRM made up a whopping 80% of all CRM software sold during the year 2020. It indicates that more and more businesses are leaning towards a CRM that is hosted on the cloud. However, you can pick one that makes the most sense for your business.

Make Sure the CRM Has Only the Required Features and Functionalities

Every business is different. It has its own unique workflows, processes, audiences, and long-term goals. Considering how much two businesses can divulge on all of these, it does not make sense to adopt a “One Size Fits All” CRM. Even if you have an idea about the kind of CRM you want from the above criteria, it still is not prudent to get all features and functionalities of a particular type of CRM. After all, your business might not need certain features.

Now you might think, “Isn’t it better to have additional features? What if we don’t have a use for it now, it may come in handy later on.” That is true to a certain extent. Certain features might become useful for you in the future. However, you should ensure you are not sacrificing current efficiency in the hopes of future benefits.

Often, features that are not required become a hindrance that impacts the overall effectiveness and efficiency of the tool. Not to mention, you would be paying for something that you are not even using. Not a good deal, right? If you want a CRM that addresses your business needs in the most efficient and cost-effective way possible, then custom CRM development services are the right option.

Make Sure the CRM Has Integrability

A CRM’s biggest superpower is its ability to integrate with your existing enterprise systems and applications to streamline department operations. The integrability of a CRM makes this very easy. It becomes a lot easier and faster for a business to use a CRM if it can not only integrate with existing enterprise systems such as an ERP or HR software, accounting software, existing web platform of the company, or e-commerce solutions. In addition to that, CRM should also be able to pull off third-party integrations such as:

Office 365
Google G-Suite

Make Sure the CRM Has Scalability

Scalability is the ability of a tool to rapidly adapt to an organization’s needs and specifications. The sign of a scalable CRM is that it can quickly adjust as per your requirements, regardless of whether you have 10 or 100 members in your team. It also does not matter whether you need the basic features or the entire package.

Hence, the key is to collaborate with a trusted name in the industry that can deliver reliable CRM software development. Working with a trustworthy development company will help you get a scalable solution without draining your pockets. To make sure you get a CRM with ample scalability, do the following:

Carefully read the contract before you agree on a long-term agreement that would neither provide you with the necessary changes and modifications nor allow you to walk away from the deal.

Find a CRM that can rapidly adjust to your company and industry changes. A CRM that can expand and adapt to your needs is a valuable tool that can be crucial to the expansion of your company.

Make Sure the Pricing Fits Your Budget

You should take every alternative into account. Don’t just skip an option because you thought it was too costly. What may seem pricey regarding the upfront cost may be the cheaper option over the long haul. That said, you should have a budget before searching for CRM software. Even if you have no idea how much custom CRM development cost is supposed to be, it is always better to estimate how much you can afford to spend on it.

To ensure you get the best deal at the lowest price, look for more affordable payment plans for features you would be using. Usually, annual subscriptions are cheaper than monthly ones. Also, if there are any limited offers available, make sure to take advantage of those.

Lastly, avoid the following hidden costs:

Double-check whether the features you want to exist in the pricing tier you are subscribing to.
Do some forward-thinking math and calculate how much the plan would cost if you included more team members. It is important to do this because, in the future, your business may likely expand, and you would need a solution that can serve you and would still be affordable.
Check with your vendor and get details about data caps. Carefully review the details to find out whether there are limits on storage or other such features. Don’t buy a CRM offering very limited data storage. You might have to shell out a lot of money later to acquire capacity.
Third-party integrations, customer support, and data migrations are common services where you must be vigilant about hidden costs. These are usually considered premium services, so vendors charge more for them.

See If the CRM Ensures Data Security

Many consider data as the equivalent of oil in the modern economy. Whether that’s true or not, data is certainly critical for a business. You entrust the vendor with your most valuable asset

by handing over your organizational data to a CRM.

Hence, the CRM you choose must adhere to the most stringent data safety protocols so that cyber criminals and hackers cannot breach, steal, damage, or otherwise harm the data in any way, shape, or form. Rather than working with a service provider that is not upfront about the security systems they use, you should better find a different one.

Test the CRM via Live Demo Session

Request a live trial of the CRM. Set an appointment for a demo session with the business representative of the vendor. See how the CRM works and get your questions answered before deciding on one.

You can also make the CRM available to your team members and get their feedback. If your team is satisfied with the features and user interface, you can go ahead and buy the CRM.

Conclusion

There are four broad stages that anyone goes through while making a choice.

They first realize that they need something.
Then they try to find out more about what they need to make an informed decision.
Once they have enough information, they evaluate the pros and cons of each choice.
And lastly, after contemplating the cost-benefit analysis of each choice, they arrive at a decision.

In this article, we have covered all of these four stages. Hopefully, you will find this guide helpful in making an informed decision.

Remember, the purpose of a CRM is to help you compete in a ruthless marketplace. You should be able to do more with less. If you still have doubts about what’s right for your business, you should connect with vendors that provide reliable CRM development services. They will clear your doubts and confusion, guiding you toward the right decision.