Add CRM To Your Marketing Strategy For Greater Impact
It can be difficult as a small business owner to know how to interact with customers effectively without spending a fortune. In order to interact with both potential customers and existing customers, you need to develop an effective marketing strategy. You have to understand each customer, what they need from you, and how to market to their wants and needs most effectively.
One way that small businesses can market effectively to potential and existing customers is through the use of CRM (customer relationship management) tools. With CRM tools, businesses can find ways to keep track of customer interactions and data, as well as providing hints for improving customer interactions. Not sure how CRM tools can help your business effectively market to customers? Keep reading for some reasons why CRM software is an effective strategy for business growth.
CRM Can Help Drive Purchases
First, CRM can compile data for you on all of your customers, such as their demographics, buying patterns, their purchase history (which could date back years), and how they use keywords on your website to find what they need. This is important, because while customers do a lot of their buying online, and many companies use digital marketing techniques in order to market their products for e-commerce sales, many Americans who buy online only buy after they have thoroughly researched the product and price point. The more the product costs, the more a customer will research it and price compare. In addition, even if the customer puts the product in the cart, there’s still a large chance the purchase won’t make it out of the cart.
This research-before-buying of your customers means that you need to market to your clients differently. CRM tools allow you to see those customers that have researched a product you sell, which means you can target them with social media ads and offers to peak their interest and perhaps create a sale. While it is difficult to keep a customer’s attention on the internet, because there’s so much content to look at or watch, a few CRM well-placed ads help to remind your potential customer they were looking at and thinking of buying one of your products. In many cases, a reminder is all your customer needs in order to be able to make the transition between potential customer to customer.
CRM Helps You Tailor Your Strategy
While CRM software with G-Suite integration allows you to specifically target your customers with advertising, it also allows you to tailor your techniques to drive more business to your company. It is possible with CRM software to use lots of different forms of marketing to reach customers.
For example, you may be able to reach several customers through social media campaigns that have marketing content. Other customers may enjoy an emailed newsletter that allows them to look at new products or services you have or offers and features they didn’t know about. As discussed above, in some cases the first time a customer encounters your business may be when they do searches online for products. If your business uses CRM software, you are able to tailor your marketing — not towards a marketing demographic, or a group of people, which was the norm in the past — but towards each individual customer, reaching them where they are. This type of targeted marketing helps to retain customer loyalty and repeat business.
Examples of the Uses of CRM
There are many examples of the uses of CRM. First, CRM software allows you to keep track of customer interactions across all of your communication platforms, including social media. You will be able to see all of your social notifications in one place, which means you can interact with your potential customers quickly and respond to opportunities for customer engagement.
With CRM software, you can also see all of your marketing contacts live in real time, which means that customers are able to ask questions and receive feedback more quickly. In addition, customer interactions and relationships can be shared across the platform with other members of your team. If your customer has a question about a product, why not put him or her in touch with those people who are best able to interact with a customer and answer questions?
While you may want to share as many customer messages as possible with your employees, some things need to stay private. Your CRM tool should allow you to decide which customer service messages are shared with your team, and which ones aren’t.
CRM software also helps you engage with potential customers through leads generated by the software itself, as well as suggestions on how to make connections with customers you already have. These opportunities to engage with customers may be as simple as wishing the customer a happy birthday or anniversary, or to wish them well when they have a new job or a job change. Every opportunity to re-engage or connect with your customers means that you may be able to drive a future sale.
Adding CRM to your toolkit means that the CRM can sync contacts through your sales and marketing department, which could increase the information you know about a client, as well as point you in the direction of possible new avenues for customer engagement. Nowhere does this make more sense than via social networks. By allowing social CRM to drive your marketing and sales and keep on top of contacts, you can really move your business forward.
CRM and Cost Reduction
One of the best things about CRM software is that it is cost effective. If you are able to market to your customers, using your CRM tools, you boost sales. While that is an obvious benefit, there are other benefits of the software. It reduces marketing expenses by reducing the number of time employees have to take to simply manage customer data, and the paperwork that comes with it, which leaves them free to concentrate on interacting with customers.
An effective use of CRM tools for marketing means that you will be able to push your business forward, while marketing and interacting with your customers in real time. If you streamline your workload — not just for you but for your employees as well — you give everyone time to concentrate on what matters most…the customer.
