Keepin’ it Simple

The best CRMs are often the simplest. Where a complex CRM is confusing, the simple CRM is intuitive. Where a complex CRM is hard to change, the simple CRM is agile. Where complex systems drown users in oceans of data, the simple CRM empowers users with insights. Complexity is to be avoided — as it only slows the business, frustrates employees, and makes your technology stack more brittle. You’re not succeeding because of the complexity, you’re succeeding in spite of it.

In today’s world of hyper-flexible platforms, constantly changing business priorities, and data-driven decision making, it’s natural for business leaders to want to make changes to their CRMs. But, if not managed properly, one well-intended band-aid on top of another quickly becomes a tangled mess that impacts system adoption, employee performance, and ultimately your bottom line. So how do you keep your CRM simple? The first step in “keeping it simple” is changing your mentality on the very definition of what a CRM is.

Let me be clear, your CRM is not your database. Your CRM is the layer between your database and your employees. A good CRM ingests data and spits out insights. CRM should not just be a window dressing around your database. Where a complex CRM provides an overabundance of detail, a simple CRM provides answers. For example, don’t show your reps every invoice related to a customer account, instead simply show a Status Indicator based on whether or not the last invoice is paid. Next time you’re in your CRM, take a quick look around. Is your CRM serving up data, or insights?

Every role in your company presumably exists for a reason. They all have their own priorities, their own processes, and their own questions. So, why give them all the same experience in your CRM? Undoubtedly, the information that is relevant to one team isn’t going to be relevant to another. Employees are going to scroll past the “junk” to get to “the good stuff”. Little by little the “junk” start to build up, until certain teams don’t see the value in the app any more. The app stops being “theirs”, it stops providing them value. As the changes continue to accumulate, more and more teams will be alienated until the system that is intended for everyone is used by no one. This problem will continue to grow, at a faster pace, until adoption is terrible and the data quality is poor.

So how do you keep your CRM Simple? It’s never going to get easier, so start now!

Here are some specific recommendations that can help:

  • Field Trip AppExchange app — It will help you identify fields that are not commonly used so you can trim the fat.
  • Salesforce Adoption Dashboards — Which teams already aren’t seeing the value in using your CRM?
  • Use a Salesforce Accelerator to help form a Center of Excellence within your company or get help redesigning your page layouts.
  • Salesforce Success community — If you’ve got questions about how to set something up, or how to solve a problem. Chances are it’s already been asked and answered here.
  • Use multiple Page Layouts to custom tailor your employees experience.

Before you make another change in your CRM, ask yourself these questions:

  • What is the business value this change should bring?
  • What insights am I trying to provide?
  • Which specific groups does this change apply to?
  • How do we measure the success of this change?
  • When do we revisit this change, and determine if it needs to be tweaked?