CRM stands for customer relationship management software. But really, it helps keep track of all your relationships — customers, potential customers, vendors, partners, and more. It’s essential to just about any business, but it’s especially important to anyone who touts relationships, such as real estate agents, financial consultants and advisors, insurance agents, college coaches, and college advisors.
And that goes into the why do you need one. Here are just a few reasons why you need a CRM.
1. Keep track of contacts
Keeping tracking of contacts is important — whether they’re a potential customer, customer, partner, supplier, etc. But, it’s more than that. You need to understand and document when they talked with you, and what your next follow-up with them — an email, a phone call, a meeting, etc.
In fact, this rhythm is the lifeblood of your business. It can mean the difference between closing a sale and losing a customer.
You should be able to:
- Add an email, phone number, address, and other basic information
- Take notes about what you last discussed and when you want to call them again
- Assign follow-up items, including to people on your team
2. Categorize contacts
Is your contact a customer? Vendor? Partner? Potential customer? You also want to capture more information about their background or interests — such as whether they need financial assistance or a two bedroom, two bathroom house in Scottsdale?
Knowing this context helps you understand what offers and emails to send to them and what to discuss with them. Categorizing them, including using tags, improves the relevancy of your emails and offers increases the likelihood they’ll close business with you.
You’ll also be able to know who are current customers to ask for referrals. Referrals, also known as word of mouth, is the fastest way to grow your business.
3. View opportunities and know potential revenue, including when sales may close
When you keep track of contacts, you know where there are in your sales pipeline, including when they’re opportunities. (Opportunities are people who need your services, and therefore, potential sales.)
Good CRMs will let you easily understand:
- Projected revenue from the service
- How likely you are to close that sale
- Which type of service they need
- When the sale is likely to close
- Who’s connected to the sale
- Move opportunities through your pipeline.
It’s all about growing your business
Knowing when deals may close, understanding your pipeline, asking for referrals, and improving relationships. All of these make it easier to continue to expand your business and close sales. It’s why the top agents use a CRM, according to Hubspot.
Use an easy CRM that has custom content for your audience. SwiftAgent even comes with a free trial.