Few professionals have more open projects and contact management to complete than a sales professional. Tracking prospects and following a sale through to a successful conclusion requires juggling large quantities of customer and product data. Customized sales software, called customer relationship management software, can be a crucial aid.
CRM Software Defined
CRM software is a genre of software designed for individuals and sales teams to follow sales initiatives to prospects and existing clients. It's available from many different vendors with a variety of features, but usually includes these components: a contacts database to associate notes and other background information with sales prospects, calendaring to track meetings and phone calls, and task and project management. This combination of data allows you to set up each sale as a project, and track project management by the sale, the customer or prospect, or due date.
Sales Pipelining
A sales pipeline consists of a series of actions that take place with every attempted sale. For example, a sales pipeline may start with meeting a prospect at a networking meeting then follow with the actions of sending a sales proposal and making a phone call to the prospect. At this point, the pipeline may branch into separate sets of actions depending on how much interest is shown by the prospect. Sales pipelines do two crucial things: they keep you from missing crucial steps, and they allow measurement of aggregate sales across prospects to determine how much revenue can be expected, and when.
Centralized Project Management
When properly utilized, CRM software serves as the single central storehouse of information and required future activities. In this capacity, CRM software reduces an overwhelming quantity of data in a series of linear activities that are mug easier to follow, or to use for planning proactive additional activities.
Invoicing and Payment Tracking
Most CRM software will also handle automated invoicing and revenue tracking, both for the sales handled within the system, as well as commissions due to the salesperson. This makes CRM software particularly valuable both to internal staffers as well as external contractors.
Software Examples
CRM software is available from various vendors, depending upon which computer platform you use, or whether you want to use a Web-based alternative. Microsoft offers Dynamics CRM for Windows computers, which features integration with its Office software. MarketCircle's Daylite is an alternative for the Mac, which connects to stored information in Macintosh address book, calendar, and email software. Alternately, for cloud-based CRM with Web access from any device or computer, Salesforce.com offers a range of highly customizable products at a variety of pricing points.
Tags: available from, project management, sales pipeline