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WHY YOUR COMPANY NEEDS AN OMNI-CHANNEL MARKETING STRATEGY

How many internet-enabled devices can you recollect right now within 20 seconds. I’m sure that at any time of the day, this number would vary from one to five devices.

As technology evolves, the multi-device capability gets embedded in our day to day life. For instance, 6 years ago, you wouldn’t ever imagine taking shopping decisions from your smartphone.

The era of customer service has also taken a U-turn in the given circumstances. Today, it has become imperative to invest in an omni-channel customer service and experience.

Now, let’s first define the meaning of omni-channel customer service?

Omni-channel customer service is a kind of multi-channel approach, which enables seamless customer experience across multiple platforms.

In fact, there is a range of different ways to interact with a brand today, be it email, social media, smartphone app, live chat, or talking to a call center agent on the phone. Customers like to choose how they want to connect with the organizations, and their choices have expanded from talking over phones to quick live chats.

Understanding the customer’s perspective

Let’s think from a customer’s perspective.

Say, you ordered a pizza on your laptop. Afterwards, you get real-time updates (e.g. the order has been placed, the pizza is on the way) through text on your smartphone, and finally, you call the delivery person to direct him to your home.

Do you have any idea how many channels you may have used to order a pizza?

Now, it’s become pretty obvious that using more than one channel to get a complete customer experience is necessary. When you consider the consistently increasing customer expectations, an omni-channel strategy is always a better option for your business.

According to various studies –

• Companies with the strong omni-channel customer engagement strategies retain an average of 89% of their customer, as compared to 33% for companies with weak omni-channel strategies. [Source: Aberdeen Group Inc.]

• 87% of customers think brands need to put more effort into providing a consistent customer experience. [Source: Kampyle]

• By 2020 the demand for an omni-channel customer experience will be amplified by the need for near perfect execution. [Source: PricewaterhouseCoopers]

Nowadays, the customer expects everything to be available at his or her convenience in a reliable manner. Yes, reliability is also important to them. 64% of customers expect to receive real-time assistance regardless of the customer service channel they choose [Source: Zendesk].

So, from all these facts and statistics, we can easily figure out two major customer expectations – multiplicity of communication channels and reliability of information. Both of these demands could be accomplished only with a perfectly executed omni-channel strategy.

Does multi channel integration support personalization?

Personalization is the latest trend, exercising marketing and customer service leaders. Most of the recent personalization debates focus on optimizing the online customer experience and omni-channel customer experience is one of them.

Application program interface (API) allows you to integrate multiple channels with your service CRM software; so that your customers can reach you through whatever way they want.

For an example – some people, especially young students, would always like to use social media as the mode of communication; contrariwise, some would prefer only mails or phone calls.

Your CRM system enables you to access social channels, like Facebook and Twitter, directly from the CRM application itself. Besides, you can integrate Gmail, Outlook and other systems with your customer service software. It leverages your prompt response to customer inquiries and feedback. So, without using any other application, you can still connect with your customers through their own preferred channels.

How to seal the gaps in Omnichannel support?

Now, it’s important to understand the difference between a multi-channel and an omni-channel customer experience. If you’ve got a compact social strategy, a high converting website, and a seamless mobile experience, you are delivering multi-channel customer experience. Yet, if they aren’t working together in perfect synchronization, you won’t be able to deliver an omni-channel experience.

Omni-channel isn’t only about availability in several channels—it also means having a reliable brand image,irrespective of the modes of interaction.

Basically, what you need is to create a suitable platform, where you can store all the information collected from different channels. You can simply showcase your data on the CRM dashboard, from where you can get constructive insights on customers’ experience.

Having a cohesive workstation for your business is preferable for omni-channel services, as it simplifies and organizes the workflow. With all the information available on your CRM dashboard, you can deliver a better experience to your customers.

Conclusion

Your internal team should be on the same page to work for an omni-channel strategy. While aiming to deliver a seamless experience to the customers, each of the department needs to be working towards the same direction. Therefore, communication will become more free-flowing and internal barriers will break down.

Are you looking for CRM software that can help to execute omni-channel marketing strategies?

Visit Kapture CRM to know more about us. You can ask for a CRM demo or try our 30 days free CRM trial to have an understanding about Kapture features and advantages. Call us at +91 7899887755 or send your inquiry at sales@kapturecrm.com.

 

Reference: http://www.kapturecrm.com/blog/

WHY YOUR COMPANY NEEDS AN OMNI-CHANNEL MARKETING STRATEGY

How many internet-enabled devices can you recollect right now within 20 seconds. I’m sure that at any time of the day, this number would vary from one to five devices.

As technology evolves, the multi-device capability gets embedded in our day to day life. For instance, 6 years ago, you wouldn’t ever imagine taking shopping decisions from your smartphone.

The era of customer service has also taken a U-turn in the given circumstances. Today, it has become imperative to invest in an omni-channel customer service and experience.

Now, let’s first define the meaning of omni-channel customer service?

Omni-channel customer service is a kind of multi-channel approach, which enables seamless customer experience across multiple platforms.

In fact, there is a range of different ways to interact with a brand today, be it email, social media, smartphone app, live chat, or talking to a call center agent on the phone. Customers like to choose how they want to connect with the organizations, and their choices have expanded from talking over phones to quick live chats.

Understanding the customer’s perspective

Let’s think from a customer’s perspective.

Say, you ordered a pizza on your laptop. Afterwards, you get real-time updates (e.g. the order has been placed, the pizza is on the way) through text on your smartphone, and finally, you call the delivery person to direct him to your home.

Do you have any idea how many channels you may have used to order a pizza?

Now, it’s become pretty obvious that using more than one channel to get a complete customer experience is necessary. When you consider the consistently increasing customer expectations, an omni-channel strategy is always a better option for your business.

According to various studies –

• Companies with the strong omni-channel customer engagement strategies retain an average of 89% of their customer, as compared to 33% for companies with weak omni-channel strategies. [Source: Aberdeen Group Inc.]

• 87% of customers think brands need to put more effort into providing a consistent customer experience. [Source: Kampyle]

• By 2020 the demand for an omni-channel customer experience will be amplified by the need for near perfect execution. [Source: PricewaterhouseCoopers]

Nowadays, the customer expects everything to be available at his or her convenience in a reliable manner. Yes, reliability is also important to them. 64% of customers expect to receive real-time assistance regardless of the customer service channel they choose [Source: Zendesk].

So, from all these facts and statistics, we can easily figure out two major customer expectations – multiplicity of communication channels and reliability of information. Both of these demands could be accomplished only with a perfectly executed omni-channel strategy.

Does multi channel integration support personalization?

Personalization is the latest trend, exercising marketing and customer service leaders. Most of the recent personalization debates focus on optimizing the online customer experience and omni-channel customer experience is one of them.

Application program interface (API) allows you to integrate multiple channels with your service CRM software; so that your customers can reach you through whatever way they want.

For an example – some people, especially young students, would always like to use social media as the mode of communication; contrariwise, some would prefer only mails or phone calls.

Your CRM system enables you to access social channels, like Facebook and Twitter, directly from the CRM application itself. Besides, you can integrate Gmail, Outlook and other systems with your customer service software. It leverages your prompt response to customer inquiries and feedback. So, without using any other application, you can still connect with your customers through their own preferred channels.

How to seal the gaps in Omnichannel support?

Now, it’s important to understand the difference between a multi-channel and an omni-channel customer experience. If you’ve got a compact social strategy, a high converting website, and a seamless mobile experience, you are delivering multi-channel customer experience. Yet, if they aren’t working together in perfect synchronization, you won’t be able to deliver an omni-channel experience.

Omni-channel isn’t only about availability in several channels—it also means having a reliable brand image,irrespective of the modes of interaction.

Basically, what you need is to create a suitable platform, where you can store all the information collected from different channels. You can simply showcase your data on the CRM dashboard, from where you can get constructive insights on customers’ experience.

Having a cohesive workstation for your business is preferable for omni-channel services, as it simplifies and organizes the workflow. With all the information available on your CRM dashboard, you can deliver a better experience to your customers.

Conclusion

Your internal team should be on the same page to work for an omni-channel strategy. While aiming to deliver a seamless experience to the customers, each of the department needs to be working towards the same direction. Therefore, communication will become more free-flowing and internal barriers will break down.

Are you looking for CRM software that can help to execute omni-channel marketing strategies?

Visit Kapture CRM to know more about us. You can ask for a CRM demo or try our 30 days free CRM trial to have an understanding about Kapture features and advantages. Call us at +91 7899887755 or send your inquiry at sales@kapturecrm.com.

manage multiple marketing channelsOmni channel marketing ideasOmni channel marketing meaning

WHY YOUR COLLEGE/UNIVERSITY NEEDS AN EDUCATION CRM SOFTWARE

The field of education has frequently come under the impression that it hasn’t changed in the last 400 years. In the sametime period, even the flimisiest human activity has undergone unrecoganizable changes. But as critical as it, the educational system has the same desk-table protocols that have been established centuries ago…

Very well, the situation is now rapidly changing and evolving!

Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) are now experiencing drastic changes. Students are now more demanding than ever.They demand complete authorities and teachers on request. As a result, educational institutes are turning to advanced technologies, so that they can cater to this increasing demand in an efficient way.

Exactly so, HEIs are now developing a “student-as-customer” standpoint to provide the best educational experiences. Hence, they are now moving forward to adopt Customer Relationship Management softwares for their organizations.

An educational CRM system helps institutions to have an all-inclusive perspective on students´ needs, collecting customer knowledge from the student interaction phases (admission, registration, fee payment, and course conclusion).

 Facts that explain present educational system

Today’s educational trends are amplified with a number of factors:

– Increasing Tutions and consequently increased expectations

– A multi billion demand for schooling and higher education

– Growing usage of online education and educational technology

– New business models of education emerging from Asia

Nowadays, students are getting accustomed with online information, reviews and enquiries.But, as per different surveys, 54% of web-based students’ inquiries did not get a response! Due to the high number of unanswered student enquiries, one could assume that many first year students will begin their term with a lack of clarity.

So, HEIs need to streamline operations, cut costs and improve management to enhance revenue generation activities.

Here are some key benefits of using CRM for education sector-

Create a complete holistic management system

A higher education CRM system is usuallyintended to serve three basic audiences:

1. Prospective students
2. Current students
3. Alumni/donors

Besides, it has a key role in employee management and workflow automation. So, it leverages the college/university management body with an all-inclusive system.

Design and empower student lifecycle

A student’s lifecycle begins once the student gets enrolled. Then comes the student retention phase, which revolves around monitoring students’ progress and monitor their needs. The entire cycle ends when a student gets the degree and becomes an alumnus.

 

Image Courtesy: Zenforce

The educational CRM fortifies the Student Lifecycle Management (SLM) with remarkable engagement across all touch points in the student experience.It enriches student interactions by setting up personalized communication channels that will instantly deliver assessable results. This allows you to be well-versedin decision making.

Simplify and manage the admission process

CRM software offers the opportunity to manage the complete student admission process from one single workstation. You can store all the information on your CRM dashboard, be it course and program name, admission data, complete details of student’s batch and roll number, previous academic records or parent’s contact detail – all you need to complete the admission process.

The education CRM lets you streamline the process of shortlisting candidates. It also allows them to engage on improving the enrollment results.

Discover potential students for future enrollement

An educational institution is only as good as its reputation. The reputation of an educational institution is determined by its students. In this situation, it becomes centrally important to attract and enroll the students of highest caliber.

Aided by the convenience and constant access of mobile devices, especially smartphones, 92% of teens report going online daily – counting 24% who say they go online ‘almost constantly’, according to the research conducted by Pew Research center.

 

Apparently, students are now relying more on online information and social media reviews. The CRM system for education comes with integrated tracking tools that allow you to track leads through multiple engagement platforms, including various social channels and Gmail.

[Know more about prospective student engagement here]

Deliver rapid responses to student enquiries

Integrating the social channels (like Facebook and Twitter), Gmail and Outlook with your system enables you to receive all the notification in a single platform. That is how, you can never miss out any students’ enquiry and provide rapid responses to resolve their issues.

This increases the chances of getting more potential students with excellent student communication system.

Focus on building a long-lasting alumni relationship

‘Alumnus’are assets to every education institution. They make the institution recoganizable across the society and nourish the aspirations of future students.

So, it’s crucial to keep in touch with your ex-students. With all the students’ contacts available on our CRM system, you can keep them informed of your achievements and make them part of your institution’s future, not just its past.

By having an automated system to manage your alumnus, you can directly find students who make a large difference in society. This allows you to invite them back or ask them to mentor selected students. This helps you build a future line of successful students.

This also help existing students define their career goals and deliver crucial networking support to transition from graduation to employment. They can also find future funds for your institution.

Conclusion

Internal engagement and empowerment is getting more and more significant due to the public facing nature of young students. Each member of your institution is a marketer for the university/college. So, it’s crucial to ensure that they are aligned with the values of your institution.

Institution-wide, completely integrated systems are still in the initial stages of adoption in India. However, there are major advantages of integrated CRM systems, which will undoubtedly encourage higher educational institutes to move in that direction, as they get more comfortable with technologies.

Want to get a collaborative workstation for your college? Visit Kapture CRM to know more about CRM for education business. You can ask for a CRM demo or try our 30-day free CRM trial to have an understanding about Kapture’s features and advantages. Call us on +91 7899887755 or send your enquiry to sales@kapturecrm.com.

 

Reference: http://www.kapturecrm.com/blog/

PSYCHOGRAPHIC SEGMENTATION IN B2B INDUSTRY. WHAT’S, HOW’S AND WHY’S?

Are you good at spotting the ideal customer for your business? Do you understand their actual needs or how your product/service would improve their businesses?

Well, let me explain why you need psychographic segmentation.

As you send an email or piece of collateral to a dozen of different prospects, the same sales pitch could appeal to each of your prospects in a different fashion.

You can attract maximum customer interest by understanding and satisfying your customer requirements. However, the client’s needs are different and constantly evolving. Therefore, you may need different approaches to satisfying them. In this situation, you need to take a decision that lets you intercept maximum leads in your sales funnel.

A good psychographic segmentation process lets your customers identify, understand and meet the different requirements.

Why segmentation is important for marketing?

 

 

 

The main reason marketing team segregates their customer base into identifiable segments is to create a custom marketing mix for the specific group.

For example – your company launched an expensive Aurvedic shampoo for hair loss prevention. Apparently, not everyone would purchase this expensive organic product. Hence, you need to identify your potential customers. And in marketing terminology, the process of identifying your target customers is called ‘customer segmentation’.

In a nutshell, customer segmentation helps you reach out to your target audience, thus effectively increasing the productivity of your marketing team. It also helps you communicate the right message to your customers.

Developing a customer segmentation strategy for B2B Industry

 

With the above example, it’s very easy to understand the importance of customer segmentation. The B2B market is characterized in a number of factors that sets it apart from the B2C market.

Let’s look into some of the segmentation challenges faced by B2B marketers-

• B2B buyers are more ‘rational’ than B2C buyers. B2C buyers tend to purchase what they want, whereas, B2B buyers generally purchase what they need. Logically, you can spend $3,000 on a stylish leather jacket that is less warm than a similar-looking $300 jacket next-door, but can never make a similar decision in your workplace.

• B2B products are often more complex. So, sometimes it’s difficult to figure out who needs the particular service or product.

• Personal relationships are more important in B2B organizations. As in B2B markets, customers’ loyalty is more important than any other things, marketers usually focus on making one-to-one conversation with clients, rather segregating them into different segments.

• Usually, B2B markets have long-term purchase periods. This means that the B2B vertical needs to focus more customer retention and relationship-building. Comparatively, the B2C marketers usually deal with shorter buying cycles and a frequently changing customer faces.

While considering these different aspects, you need to tailor a different customer segmentation strategy for B2B industry. This makes it really challenging.

On the positive side, it is challenging and it presents you with a genuine opportunity to convert customers. Instead of creating trivial customer segments, B2B businesses should focus on building customer-based segments.

How to create psychographic segmentation in your B2B customer base?

 

 

Most of the marketers use some degree of segmentation; at least they follow a mental model while creating a segmentation strategy. This could be easily a tangible and measurable strategy.

Demographic information can easily be acquired, as it includes numeric and comprehensive data like age, gender, income level, education level, occupation and so on.

But, sometimes psychographic segmentation works better than any other segmentation.

In Psychographic, you are identifying the passionate behavior that is associated with an individual customer. This helps you determine the reasons that led to a particular purchase.

Apparently, it’s more difficult to determine segmenting based on age or sex. However, it’s more relevant and provides more insights for B2B businesses.

In order to create psychographic segmentation you need to analyze the purchase history, personal and professional lives of your clients. Also, social media interaction is a valuable source to determine people’s likes and dislikes.

Once you get all the data related to your clients, you can arrange it with your marketing CRMsystem. The CRM dashboard can effectively showcase your data in a well-organized form.

With each purchase in a buyer’s journey, there is an emotional component. If you identify the factors, predominating your buyer’s decision, you can easily create a separate segment for it. The data insights will help you create these segmentations.

How to use psychographic segmentation at work?

 

With your B2B customer segments defined, you can send personalized emails that better speak to the reasons, why people need your product or service. With the integrated Gmail and Outlook, your marketing CRM software can effectively leverage your email automation system.

Combining the psychographic information with other variables such as behavioral information, demographic data, and geographical details would provide you with more powerful data points. It’s quite helpful in generating relevant content, targeting the right segment for your product or service.

Conclusion

It is apparently clear that the result of customer segmentation will effectively impact a company’s ROI. With increasing competition in the B2B market, the demand for integrated marketing software is rising gradually.

If you are not sure which marketing CRM software will be best for your business, don’t worry. VisitKapture CRM to find out all the advantages of an integrated marketing CRM system. Contact Kapture team for a CRM demo or 30-day free CRM trial at +91 7899887755 orsales@kapturecrm.com.

 

Reference: http://www.kapturecrm.com/blog/

WHY YOUR COLLEGE/UNIVERSITY NEEDS AN EDUCATION CRM SOFTWARE

The field of education has frequently come under the impression that it hasn’t changed in the last 400 years. In the sametime period, even the flimisiest human activity has undergone unrecoganizable changes. But as critical as it, the educational system has the same desk-table protocols that have been established centuries ago…

Very well, the situation is now rapidly changing and evolving!

Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) are now experiencing drastic changes. Students are now more demanding than ever.They demand complete authorities and teachers on request. As a result, educational institutes are turning to advanced technologies, so that they can cater to this increasing demand in an efficient way.

Exactly so, HEIs are now developing a “student-as-customer” standpoint to provide the best educational experiences. Hence, they are now moving forward to adopt Customer Relationship Management softwares for their organizations.

An educational CRM system helps institutions to have an all-inclusive perspective on students´ needs, collecting customer knowledge from the student interaction phases (admission, registration, fee payment, and course conclusion).

 Facts that explain present educational system

Today’s educational trends are amplified with a number of factors:

– Increasing Tutions and consequently increased expectations

– A multi billion demand for schooling and higher education

– Growing usage of online education and educational technology

– New business models of education emerging from Asia

Nowadays, students are getting accustomed with online information, reviews and enquiries.But, as per different surveys, 54% of web-based students’ inquiries did not get a response! Due to the high number of unanswered student enquiries, one could assume that many first year students will begin their term with a lack of clarity.

So, HEIs need to streamline operations, cut costs and improve management to enhance revenue generation activities.

Here are some key benefits of using CRM for education sector-

Create a complete holistic management system

A higher education CRM system is usuallyintended to serve three basic audiences:

1. Prospective students
2. Current students
3. Alumni/donors

Besides, it has a key role in employee management and workflow automation. So, it leverages the college/university management body with an all-inclusive system.

Design and empower student lifecycle

A student’s lifecycle begins once the student gets enrolled. Then comes the student retention phase, which revolves around monitoring students’ progress and monitor their needs. The entire cycle ends when a student gets the degree and becomes an alumnus.

 

Image Courtesy: Zenforce

The educational CRM fortifies the Student Lifecycle Management (SLM) with remarkable engagement across all touch points in the student experience.It enriches student interactions by setting up personalized communication channels that will instantly deliver assessable results. This allows you to be well-versedin decision making.

Simplify and manage the admission process

CRM software offers the opportunity to manage the complete student admission process from one single workstation. You can store all the information on your CRM dashboard, be it course and program name, admission data, complete details of student’s batch and roll number, previous academic records or parent’s contact detail – all you need to complete the admission process.

The education CRM lets you streamline the process of shortlisting candidates. It also allows them to engage on improving the enrollment results.

Discover potential students for future enrollement

An educational institution is only as good as its reputation. The reputation of an educational institution is determined by its students. In this situation, it becomes centrally important to attract and enroll the students of highest caliber.

Aided by the convenience and constant access of mobile devices, especially smartphones, 92% of teens report going online daily – counting 24% who say they go online ‘almost constantly’, according to the research conducted by Pew Research center.

 

Apparently, students are now relying more on online information and social media reviews. The CRM system for education comes with integrated tracking tools that allow you to track leads through multiple engagement platforms, including various social channels and Gmail.

[Know more about prospective student engagement here]

Deliver rapid responses to student enquiries

Integrating the social channels (like Facebook and Twitter), Gmail and Outlook with your system enables you to receive all the notification in a single platform. That is how, you can never miss out any students’ enquiry and provide rapid responses to resolve their issues.

This increases the chances of getting more potential students with excellent student communication system.

Focus on building a long-lasting alumni relationship

‘Alumnus’are assetstoevery education institution. They make the institution recoganizable across the society and nourish the aspirations of future students.

So, it’s crucial to keep in touch with your ex-students. With all the students’ contacts available on our CRM system, you can keep them informed of your achievements and make them part of your institution’s future, not just its past.

By having an automated system to manage your alumnus, you can directly find students who make a large difference in society. This allows you to invite them back or ask them to mentor selected students. This helps you build a future line of successful students.

This also help existing students define their career goals and deliver crucial networking support to transition from graduation to employment. They can also find future funds for your institution.

Conclusion

Internal engagement and empowerment is getting more and more significant due to the public facing nature of young students. Each member of your institution is a marketer for the university/college. So, it’s crucial to ensure that they are aligned with the values of your institution.

Institution-wide, completely integrated systems are still in the initial stages of adoption in India. However, there are major advantages of integrated CRM systems, which will undoubtedly encourage higher educational institutes to move in that direction, as they get more comfortable with technologies.

Want to get a collaborative workstation for your college? Visit Kapture CRM to know more about CRM for education business. You can ask for a CRM demo or try our 30-day free CRM trial to have an understanding about Kapture’s features and advantages. Call us on +91 7899887755 or send your enquiry to sales@kapturecrm.com.

Reference: http://www.kapturecrm.com/blog/

FIX YOUR SALES PIPELINE LEAKAGE: 3 SIMPLE STEPS OF SALES PIPELINE MANAGEMENT

Your sales team is getting enough leads every day and giving enormous effort to convert them. But unfortunately most of the leads are slipping out of your hands, restricting you from getting right ROI.

Investing in marketing channels such as SEO, inbound, PPC, trade shows is effective enough for increasing the lead generation rate. However, some extra tricks are needed for a successful sales pipeline management.

A leaky pipeline is an adversity for a company. Though you need to know–

• Only 25% of leads are truly legitimate (Source: Gleanster Research) and if the other 75% are leaking out, nothing is lost precisely.
• 79% of marketing leads never convert into sales, mostly due to lack of lead nurturing. (Source: MarketingSherpa)
• A study with more than 62 B2B organizations shows 44% of executives think that their companies are ineffective at managing sales pipeline properly. (Source: Vantage Point Performance and the Sales Management Association)

But, if you are losing the most qualified leads, then it’s the right time to change the gear and try out new sales pipeline management software, for the perfect nourishment of your leads.

• Companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50% more sales ready leads at 33% lower cost. (Source: Forrester Research)
• Nurtured leads make 47% larger purchases than non-nurtured leads. (Source: The Annuitas Group)

A sales pipeline management is an easy way to observe the process behind a sale.

[Know more about – is sales pipeline management really important for sales growth?]

If you are not getting proper results out of it, then at first you need to identify the exact problem. Why are most of your leads leaking out? What are the exact leakage points in your sales pipeline?

1. Process of identifying the problem and leakage point

Identifying the leakage points involves in-depth observation into your sales pipeline. For this you need your sales CRM to showcase all the information related to your existing and potential clients.

Leaks tend to appear, when your company’s sales cycles don’t fit with the prospects’ buying cycles.

For an example, your company sells cricket accessories. For you, a prospective lead should be willing to buy cricket accessories, however, people who are interested in football accessories are not considered to be qualified.

Furthermore, if your sales funnel is filled with leads that are interested in sports accessories in general, then you need to segregate your qualified leads (people who want to buy cricket accessories) from the others.

Your CRM dashboard is the exact place, from where you can get significant insights forsegregating your qualified leads from un-qualified leads.

Once you are able to identify the legitimate and qualified leads, you will gradually stop wasting time on ‘poor leads’, since they won’t be ready for a sales call.

2. Know the sales pipeline position of each lead

After segregating the qualified leads, you need to know their positions in your sales pipeline.

Though, the number of stages of your sales pipeline depends entirely on the length of the sales cycle. According to Donal Daly, “Having too many stages in the sales pipeline is counterproductive. Six or seven steps are the optimum number of stages in the pipeline”, since too many steps will be time consuming.

Generally, every business has five common stages of sales pipeline-

• Initial contact
• Qualification
• Meeting
• Proposal
• Close

All five stages have different weighted value within them; hence, they can include multiple sub-stages.With your sales pipeline management software you can identify exactly what is the position of your lead.

 

3. Improve sales conversion rate by following-up

Identification of leads’ positions enables you to recognize what makes you fall behind from getting sales opportunities. You can plug those leaks with perfect follow-ups.

Following-up a prospect is the crucial part of lead nurturing. Follow-up calls and emails help you to seal more deals within the agreed time period.

46% of marketers with mature lead management processes have sales teams that follow up on more than 75% of marketing-generated leads (Source: Forrester Research).

Further, a CRM software can help you get maximum ROI with automated lead management process, by reminding you about meetings and follow-up calls. You can even set a daily task list to organize your day-to-day work that simplifies the selling process.

 

Companies that automate lead management, see a 10% (or greater) increased sales revenue in 6-9 months (Source: Gartner Research).

Efficient follow-up shortens the sales cycle and helps getting valuable opportunities to maintain long-term relationships with customers.

Conclusion

Pipeline management incorporates the issue of how the sales pipeline is structured, how it is measured and how it is utilized. Sales teams that invest the right amount of time in defining a structured and manageablesales process are the most proficient at managing their sales pipelines.

With these three simple steps you can remarkably cut down your leakage rate and additionally acquire accurate sales forecast. So it has a direct role in increasing sales revenue.

Now you know how CRM software helps you to fix your sales pipeline leakage.

Do you want to know more about sales CRM?

Try Kapture demo or 30 days free CRM trial to know more about the benefitsof sales CRM tools. For more information, call +91 7899887755 or send your inquiry at sales@kapturecrm.com.

Reference: http://www.kapturecrm.com/blog/

HOW MOBILE CRM CAN BENEFIT YOUR STARTUP BUSINESS

India’s startup ecosystem continues to increase at a rapid pace. Now we have nearly 19,000 technology-enabled startup companies, according to Economic-survey 2015-2016. However, despite the innovative ideas and groundbreaking projects, many businesses struggle to survive the competition, and many are eventually forced to shut down.

Accepting the challenges, many companies are now using Customer Relationship Management software and getting wonderful benefits out of it.

As per the latest survey by Trackvia, successful implementation of CRM software can boost sales revenue by 41% for per salesperson and can enhance customer retention by up to 27%.

Office-based CRM systems are powerful tools for small businesses, but once you get outside the office, you will be completely disconnected from the affluence of your CRM tools.

That is the way sales-based startups face maximum problems regarding information management, client communication and team collaboration. Opening up your laptop to log in to a casual chat with your client is not a convenient option all the time, especially when you are out for a meeting.

Having your sales team equipped with a mobile CRM can benefit you to a large extent.

Quick facts about mobile CRM

• Not only is the CRM industry growing at a rapid pace, but Mobile CRM is expected to grow by 500%, with more than 50% of business rolling out or piloting mobile CRM. (Source- Gartner)

• Mobile access to a CRM increases sales force productivity by an average of 14.6% with a further 3 in 10 mobile CRM users reporting productivity improvement of more than 20%. (Source- Nucleus Research)

• Companies that have mobile CRM enabled had a much higher percentage of reps achieving their sales quotes. (Source: Super Office)

   

 

Selling on-the-go

CRM software is nothing but the backbone of a sales team. They need to access different marketing and sales tools, even if they are outside the office. Without a mobile CRM this could not have been possible at all.

Going out for a meeting with a mini-office in your pocket will surely give a higher level of confidence. You can carry out the selling process any time, no matter where you are.

All time access to updated information

Imagine the common scenario of a company with a decentralized sales force – while attending a meeting you suddenly need some information to show your client. You called your team members, and asked them to send a mail attached with the documents, and waited a long time expecting to receive the mail from the office.

Logically, you simply can’t waste your time like that. It certainly leaves a bad impression on your client and for this you may not get your expected closure.

With a mobile-enabled CRM system you can access updated client information, product information, brochure and everything in just a click.

Besides, the information comes with an organized form, making things easy to figure out. And the best part is that its limited access completely confirms the information security.

Real-time reporting

If you or one of your sales team members completes a transaction on the meeting site with a client, you may need to return to the office to update the MOM or transaction details into the system later on. This type of delay slows down the process.

While running a startup company, you need a superfast selling process. With a mobile-enabled CRM, you can simply update all records from your smartphone or tablet while you’re there with the customer. These real-time updates will show up on the dashboard, so that your co-salespersons and the executives can instantly know about the work progress.

Shorter sales cycle

From the previous points, by all means a CRM can successfully cut down the sales cycle, rescuing you from the exertion of long sales cycle. It streamlines your team efforts with technological tools to prevent you from unnecessary delay.

Collaboration on the peak

A startup company always needs a fully organized and coherent sales team. They need a platform, where they can chat, share, report and make big decisions instantly.

CRM gives you the right opportunity to enhance your team collaboration. With its inbuilt chat facility, you can share anything with your team, be it an image, video, audio or a document. Form a group or go for one-to-one interaction – with your CRM you can resolve any team or client related issues immediately. You do not need to call for a meeting or individually call people and ask their problems. You can interact with multiple employees directly through your mobile CRM app.
[Find more on team collaboration, with mobile CRM – 5 Applications of Mobile CRM to Achieve 5x Sales Results]

Also, it gives you the opportunity to maintain and track the performance and work progress of your employees.
Most importantly, your CRM tools will always take care of your data privacy.

Ultimate customer engagement

With your CRM in your pocket, you can contact your client whenever you want. The integrated social networks and other systems will help you to answer the customer queries, mails, social media comments and feedback.

By giving prompt response to customers’ inquiries and feedback, you can achieve remarkable customer engagement and brand loyalty.

Conclusion

With the upswing of mobile computing, cloud-based data networks and smart devices, companies now understand that anything that can be done digitally in office can also be accomplished effortlessly on the go. So, why not with your CRM?

Having a Mobile CRM is no longer optional.

Utilizing mobile CRM you can manage a prospective business in your sales funnel. You can make opportunities to define the prospect of your business, manage pipelines and related activity circles, and make certain the accuracy of sales forecast.

For more information on mobile CRM visit Kapture CRM. We provide CRM demo and you can get30 days CRM free trial for your company. Contact Kapture team at +91 7899887755 or send your inquiry at sales@kapturecrm.com.

Reference: http://www.kapturecrm.com/blog/

CREATE A BETTER KPI TRACKING SYSTEM WITH YOUR SALES CRM SOFTWARE

One of the major challenges for sales leadership in all businesses is accurately tracking the sales KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). Reviewing the “right” sales performance metrics lets sales managers determine which reps are struggling and in which domains they need training and help.

For sales executives, the stress to bring in the revenue is much harder than what it was in the past.

Most organizations have some type of KPI tracking process, even if it’s as informal as writing down performance ratings on a sheet of paper. However, without a proper system in place, KPI tracking is usually nothing but a hazard.

Lack of regular physical presence in the field makes it difficult to keep tabs on the sales team and business operations. The sales CRM is a useful tool for helping salespeople organize their selling process and make regular, consistent outreach to the field sales team.

However, it can also help you drill down to a true and accurate forecast by daily sales reporting. Here are a few of the ways in which a sales CRM system can make KPIs tracking easier:

1. Track lead generation rate

This is the metric that sales managers frequently want to monitor, since it’s crucial to measure who’s reaching their quota and who’s just missing out the opportunities.

Measuring lead generation rate includes plenty of complex factors. You need to track new contacts rate, how many enquiries are coming per day, how many leads are qualified, and so on and so forth.

Having a lead management software integrated with your system helps you to receive automated reports on leads. With a structured report you can track and measure the performance of your sales reps accurately.

2. Monitor lead response time

Now, interest has a short life span. Keeping response time to a minimum considers being a reasonable business strategy.

According to a Harvard Business Review, businesses who contact online leads within an hour of receiving a request are seven times more likely to convert the lead.

Are you confident that your organization is effectively handling potential customers’ online queries?

With sales CRM tools you can have the opportunity to monitor every possible aspect that can hold up your lead conversion process.

Selecting the lead escalation option in your CRM system, you can get crucial notification about the lead response timing of your salespeople. With this system, unanswered queries will directly transfer to the higher management over a certain time period. Hence, you can secure customer satisfaction and monitor one of most important KPIs at the same time.

3. Study sales volume per location

Let us suppose, you are selling winter wears. You need to know in which location you can make maximum profit.

With a sharp analysis of sales volumes across locations, counting physical stores and online transactions, you can see where your product demand is highest and lowest. Assume that you find out that hill stations have the highest product demand.

Once you get the report, you can increase or decrease your sales force, according to the market demand, or plan a new/ separate marketing strategy for this particular region.

The Sales CRM report engine helps to get an accurate metric, so that you can figure out your maximum profit zone and motivate your sales team to focus more on that area.

4. Understand existing client engagement

There is no reason to explain the importance of customer engagement, as it’s a main key indicator of your sales prospects. But, evaluation of client engagement is far more difficult.

First of all, there is no definite parameter to measure client engagement; you can only monitor the interaction with your client. Secondly, monitoring the client interaction is not an easy task, because it requires meticulous observation and analysis.

For this, you need a tool, where you can record, track and manage client interaction over phone, email and social networks.

Your CRM dashboard gives you the option to update your customer interaction history, so that you can get a well-arranged view of it. Thus, the dashboard provides you valuable insights about customer engagement. You can even understand the highest source of your marketing ROI from the data.

Besides, it enables you to receive all the notification from different social channels, hence, you can monitor social media engagement of your clients as well.

5. Automated daily sales report

The only way to improve is to see where you are week-to-week. In order to monitor every dimension of your business, you need DSR (Daily Sales Report).

But, is it possible to accurately prepare sales reports, on a daily basis, without any help of report generating tools? Apparently not!

Sales CRM platform endows you with automated daily, weekly and monthly reports, integrating all the facts and figures related to leads, sales pipeline, and sales revenue. That makes it easy to track your sales KPIs and make an accurate sales forecast.

Conclusion

Once you have data on your KPIs, evaluate the information to know how you got such outcomes. Then, determine how you can develop performance and increase your sales team productivity.

Irrespective of businesses, the main key performance indicator is the company’s ROI. And in order to increase your ROI you need to take care of above five KPIs for your business.

KPI is a great technique to measure and progress, but it is only helpful if it’s paid attention to. Get to know your sales KPIs and review your data daily. Visit Kapture CRM to know how CRM can help you to get a higher ROI.

You can even try our free CRM demo or the 30-day free CRM trial. For more information, contact us at +91 7899887755 or sales@kapturecrm.com.

Reference: http://www.kapturecrm.com/blog/

STARTING A COMPANY? HERE’S HOW TO GET FUNDING

This is a guest post written by Damien Justus. He is a freelance writer with a passion for business and technology. He writes primarily about technology trends in business, and anything else related.

 

After you’ve had your business idea and ironed out a solid business plan, you need to figure out how you’re going to fund your company. The funding method you choose can have significant effects on both your own financial future and that of your company, so it’s important to think it through and find the best option for your situation.

Angel Investors

An angel investor invests a certain amount in your company and gets an equity ownership interest in return. While the investment amount can vary depending on your company and the angel investor, a standard amount ranges from $25,000 to $100,000.

Several successful companies got their start through angel investors, including Uber and WhatsApp. Angel investors are looking for companies that they believe have potential, so a major factor in whether you can secure funding this way is the quality of your business plan, along with your passion for the idea and its viability.

The best thing about getting your funding through an angel investor is that you don’t need to put in any of your own money, so there’s less risk involved. It comes at a price, though, as you’ll be giving away a piece of your company.

 Business Credit Cards

If you have a good credit score, a business credit card is an excellent way to fund your business. You apply for a card, and if the card issuer approves you, you’ll have a revolving line of credit that you can use for all your business expenses up to your limit.

One of the perks of business credit cards is their convenience, particularly when it comes to the application process. Loans, especially business loans, can be difficult to get (many banks won’t even issue you a business loan if you haven’t been in business and earning a profit for two years). With business credit cards, as long as you have steady income and a high enough credit score, you should have no problem getting approved.

Business credit cards also allow you to earn a return on the money you spend through reward points or cash back offers. Not only will you earn points or cashback on every dollar you spend, but most cards also have introductory offers, such as $300 cash back for spending $3,000 in the first 3 months of opening a Chase Ink Business Cash Credit Card. If you want to avoid paying interest, there are business credit cards with 0% APR for the first year.

Lending instead of going to a bank for a business loan, you could try peer-to-peer lending. On these sites, you post an ad stating the amount that you want to borrow and how you intend to use the money. The site also includes your credit score with your ad. People who want to make money on interest look through the ads and can choose to lend you your desired amount.

Peer loans typically have moderate interest rates, with the national average coming in at 13%. If your credit is high enough, you may be able to score a loan at a 7% interest rate. Terms are either of three or five years in duration, and you repay the loan on a monthly basis.

These type of loans strike a balance between affordable interest rates and high potential loan amounts. Personal loans range from $1,000 to $35,000, while small business loans range from $15,000 to $100,000. You’ll have the best chance at obtaining a peer loan at a low interest rate if you have a high credit score and you can impress potential lenders with your ad.

There are plenty of ways for you to fund your business, it’s all just a matter of choosing the one that fits your needs. An angel investor is great if you can find one and don’t mind giving up some of your company, while business credit cards and peer loans are both fairly affordable options if you want to keep full control of your company.

EXCEEDING EXPECTATIONS: CREATE CUSTOMER DELIGHT WITH CUSTOMER SERVICE CRM

Are you familiar with inbound marketing? If yes, then you must know the popular phrase – “attract, convert, close, delight.”

All these four phases dictate the ability of the business or brand to go beyond set expectations. If you fail to do that, your voice will be swallowed-up by zillions of similar voices, all scrambling for a little bit of attention.

Exceeding expectations through Inbound Marketing

In Inbound marketing, you are basically trying to drive customer interactions based on different forms of content – blogs, articles, videos etc. This helps you to convert them into opportunities. The “attract” and “convert” parts could be the responsibility of your marketing teams, while your salespeople are accountable to “close” the deal.

Then comes the ‘delight’ part. Typically the customer service representatives take charge of this particular part. But if you think from a greater perspective, customer “delight” is everyone’s responsibility in an effective inbound marketing strategy. Hence, the entire system is geared towards achieving customer delight.

The above process can only be possibly accomplished with a holistic and organized approach towards customer service.

However, before going forward, let’s explain why customer delight is so critically important.

Significance of customer delight in your business

Now we are living in a customer-centric era, where everything depends on customers’ demands.

Here are some quick statistics that show you the importance of a happy customer in determining your company’s fate:

• 78% of customers have bailed on a transaction or not made an intended purchase because of a poor service experience. [Source: American Express Survey]
• 70% of buying experience is based on how the customers feel they are being treated. [Source: McKinsey]
• The average annual value of each customer relationship lost to a competitor or abandoned – $289. [Source: Genesys Report]

At present, it’s pretty easy to share customer experiences among thousands of similar platforms. At any moment, an unhappy customer can share their one bad review on social media that could spark a viral movement.

Any of these online platforms may significantly affect your business. Remember, the news of bad customer service reaches more than twice as many ears as a praise for good service experience [Source: White House Office of Customer Affairs].

That’s why it’s even more essential than ever to create an excellent experience, exceeding customers’ expectations to create the ‘delight’.

But the fact is only 37% of brands received good or excellent customer experience index scores, whereas, 64% of brands got a rating of ‘ok’, ‘poor’ or ‘very poor’ from their existing customers [Source: Forrester Research].

Apparently, most of the companies are not getting expected results from their customer service. In order to identify the ‘black spot’ behind the poor performance, you need to rethink about your customer service strategy once again.

Provide personalized service: Make them feel special

Customer service is no more restricted inside the four walls of the call center room. Now you can deploy customer service as a marketing team strategy.

While contacting your clients, make sure to remember their names, personal details and your previous conversation history with them – refer to their last purchase and ask about the feedback. All these small factors will help them feel more ‘at home’ with your business.

However, it requires thorough research on customer background and a systematic track of the customers’ behavior and purchase history. With a customer service CRM system, you can showcase the full customer details, making it easily accessible and comprehensible to your employees.

The marketing team can start utilizing the CRM dashboard and get useful data from it. Gathering valuable insights from the data, they can offer their customers personalized service to make them feel even more special.

For example, you can deliver automated mail offering special discounts on female products to your female customers on International Women’s Day.

Likewise, you can send seasonal greetings and messages on special occasion. This could help you leverage higher levels of engagement with prospective customers.

After building your customer database, you can automate the follow up interactions with the service CRM platform.

Aim for a long-term relationship: Follow up even after closure

 

The B2B organizations have to face a slightly different scenario. Dealing with a logically-driven client is even more difficult than approaching a community or a market segment.

It is apparently clear from the first chart (that shows the process of inbound marketing) that the course of ‘customer delight’ starts right after the ‘close’. So, you need to be more efficient about your after sales follow-ups.

Following up during the sales process is quite different from following up after the close. Whereas giving a phone call or a reminder mail to complete the purchase process shows your level of efficiency, similarly, keeping in touch with your client even after the purchase ensures long-term relationships.

By remaining consistent in your messaging, phone call and email, your clients will learn what they should expect from your company in the future. That is how you can generate a strong base of loyalty among your customers.

CRM system gives you the opportunity to set up reminders for pre and post sales follow-up calls/emails/meetings. Apparently, that makes the entire marketing process easier and smoother.

Conclusion

Sales revenue is the motivating factor for many small, medium and big businesses. Delighted customers will deliver higher lifetime values that bring a big difference to your sales turnovers.

While planning an inbound marketing strategy, keep in mind that the customer delight is definitely different, rather higher than customer satisfaction. If you want to achieve it, you need advanced tools and technologies that support your entire team.

Visit Kapture CRM to know more about how to improve your customer service. Contact Kapture team for CRM demo or 30 days free CRM trial at +91 7899887755 or sales@kapturecrm.com.

Reference: http://www.kapturecrm.com/blog/