COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGES IN SALES USING CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT

Competitive Advantages in Sales using Customer Relationship Management

Competitive Advantages in Sales using Customer Relationship Management

Introduction

Stating the vision of a customer relationship management system to a sales team that is not automated and your proposal may not be greeted with excitement. In fact, several sales representatives consider that the primary purpose of customer relationship management is to enhance sales management purpose such as performance reporting and forecasting, and that it does little to make the day-to-day actions of the sales and marketing force easier and more efficient. Others may distinguish customer relationship management to be too complex, and fear that the system will add a new layer of difficulty to their jobs. Or they could fear that the tracking of their activities will reveal insufficiency. But, for numerous businesses, customer relationship management has clearly confirmed its ability to provide immediate worth to the sales and marketing force by improving their aptitude to sell, and significantly raising their success rates. In fact, a recent review conducted by research firm CSO Insights found that almost 72% of firms surveyed showed that customer relationship management was having a helpful affect on sales and marketing force performance. (Rigby, Darrell, Frederick, Reichheld and Schefter 2002, 66-89)

Explanation

Customer relationship management can benefit the members of your sales and marketing force in five key ways:

1. Increased Sales Team Productivity

Approximately every sales and marketing force is burdened with many routine, cumbersome, manual procedures that can disturb sales cycles and interfere with actual selling time. A customer relationship management solution can streamline and computerize pricing, order processing, and other managerial tasks, so reps can focus their efforts on those activities that directly impact revenues and profits, and spend more time working with probable customers.

2. Stronger Customer Relationships

Customer relationship management solutions give highly-interactive logical tools that empower a sales and marketing force with valuable, fitting, and precise insight into buyer interests and needs. These permit reps to have better, more productive chats with their forecast so they can build stronger, more personalized relationships with buyers - which can help shorten sales cycles, augment the number of deals closed, and boost revenue-per-sale. (Rigby, Darrell, Frederick, Reichheld and Schefter 2002, 66-89)

3. Access to Best Practices

With a customer relationship management solution, a corporation can recognize the activities that are most likely to result in sales achievement, and use that knowledge to implement and share ...