The 5 Most Persistent CRM Lies and Rumors

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Here we present you the 5 most persistent lies about customer relationship management and clarify how much truth is really in them.

CRM only needs global corporations, only the customers benefit and additional IT is needed for hosting – in recent years, the CRM industry has experienced incredible growth. This is despite the fact that CRM systems are already an integral part of many companies.

Even from professional circles you can hear CRM lies and rumours about CRM again and again. To counteract this, here are the 5 most persistent CRM lies about customer relationship management and how much truth they really have.

1. With the purchase of a CRM system enough is provided for the customers

A classic CRM lie

If you have purchased CRM software, it doesn’t do all the work on its own. Careful planning, integration of all affected areas and the continuous and precise maintenance of customer data after CRM adoption are necessary to generate optimum benefit from the system.

It is also recommended to designate a CRM manager (What does a CRM-Manger?) do, which acts similarly to Aunt Emma in her store. Customer loyalty and acquisition, but also the identification of customer relationship goals with all departments of the company involved in the measures, as well as the analysis of purchasing behavior, customer development or the current market situation are part of his duties.

A professionally competent CRM manager in the areas of marketing and sales with a certain understanding of software and figures, who acts as a link in customer relationship management and thus a central contact for different business areas, is an important support for the introduction of a CRM system and the successful use of CRM software.

It is also the CRM manager who actively tackles CRM lies in the company and convinces employees.

2. CRM only supports sales

This is often claimed because sales have direct contact with the customer. However, this assumption is wrong.

In addition to sales, areas such as service or marketing also benefit from CRM programs: The marketing department of a company uses CRM to keep track of its activities, gets deep insights into customer requirements and needs through access to customer communication and offers, and can seamlessly collaborate with sales through integrated campaigns.

Thanks to CRM, customer service also has all the important data at its disposal in order to provide the customer with the best possible support. With CRM for Service & IT, all customer communication of the service area, tickets, reusable solutions for customer problems, related contracts or inventory objects are integrated directly into the CRM. Sales, on the other hand, benefits from direct insights into the service activities of its customers and can identify cross-selling potential.

Other departments can also be successfully connected to the CRM system – many examples of our customers refute CRM lies.

Tools such as workflow also control business processes across the board, taking collaboration in an organization to a new, cross-departmental and cross-site level. Thus, not only sales, as many claim, is supported, but the entire company is supported and formed into one unit.

For example, you can get an overview of the CRM software function overview with meaningful videos. They are arguably the most effective refutation to the CRM lies.

3. CRM only needs global corporations

When a company decides whether to buy and use customer relationship systems, the size of the company is often seen as a decisive factor. A fist-thick CRM lie, because size is irrelevant when it comes to the relationship with customers: Even with only 10 customers, a CRM system helps to easily manage customer data, record important requirements, agreements, offers and contracts.

In the meantime, it has even been determined that 91 of the companies with more than 11 employees use CRM. These small and medium-sizedenterprises are also formulating their CRM strategy in order to be able to continue to compete successfully on the market.

One possible criterion when deciding on or against a CRM system is the effort required for the introduction of CRM – but if it is well prepared and supported by experienced CRM experts, this is manageable and companies benefit immediately after introduction by the CRM system.

You really have to ask why these CRM lies still don’t disappear from the screen.

Refute CRM lies and live CRM in the company

However, the success of the CRM system also depends decisively on the maintenance of the data, because only if the customer data is maintained continuously and accurately can a benefit be taken from the CRM system.

Small and medium-sized enterprises in particular should weigh up what functions of a CRM system they really need, because – unlike a global corporation – fewer options are certainly needed. The CRM requirements overview checklist can provide very good services.

4. CRM systems only benefit customers

On the basis of the translation of CRM into German (customer loyalty management), people are constantly leading the way that CRM only helps customers and strengthens their connection to the company.

However, this assumption is also a misconception: of course, customers benefit from CRM, but this is because the work of the divisions that are in contact with them optimizes their work through CRM.

For example, by using CRM in sales, he always gets an all-round overview of his customer’s situation. Sales can create simple or complex offers faster than the competitor, track them in a targeted manner and thus significantly improve their opportunities.

Other areas such as marketing also benefit from CRM: for example, the marketing team with a CRM in marketing keeps an overview of the various marketing campaigns and activities. The software helps with the planning, execution, control, documentation and evaluation of the campaigns and thus provides an efficient support for the optimization of the work steps.

5. Additional IT is always required for the use of CRM programs

This thesis is not a real CRM lie, but it does not correspond to the truth.

CRM systems, as for all computer-powered programs, require IT resources such as servers, operating systems, and administrators. The cost of these depends on the individual requirements of the software.

However, GEDYS IntraWare offers a cloud CRM solution to companies that do not want to acquire additional IT resources: CRM2Host is a good example of cloud-based CRM software. The company does not need to invest heavily in new servers, licenses, or IT administrators. Thanks to cloud CRM, your own IT resources are not absolutely necessary when purchasing a CRM system.