In this technology-infused world, growing your business without using the latest and trending technologies may not be a good idea. Similarly, a good CRM system is vital for growing your business. This is due to the increased complexities associated with e-commerce businesses and the constant pressure of increasing profits.
So, what is CRM and how is beneficial for eCommerce businesses?
CRM is a customer relationship management tool that helps companies to manage their interactions with the past, current, and potential customers. E-commerce businesses are highly customer-focused. They place their efforts toward learning about customers’ preferences, needs, and behavior.
Therefore, a CRM solution is essential for every business. It helps businesses with customer-related information such as their interests, shopping habits, shipping preferences, etc. In short, a CRM tool helps e-commerce businesses to collect, organize, analyze, and store this information on their customers.
Businesses these days are looking for CRM which is built on Blockchain technology. You can even hire a Blockchain application development company which can build a perfect CRM for your business.
Selecting the best CRM for your e-commerce startup from a pool of software can be overwhelming and confusing. Some of the best CRM software for e-commerce businesses are:
- Salesforce
- Zoho
- HubSpot
- Freshsales
- SAP
- Pipedrive
- amoCRM
- Act
Factors to consider while selecting the best CRM for your e-commerce startup
To select the best CRM for your startup, you have to consider certain points as mentioned below:
- Identify your needs
Choosing the right CRM depends on what you want to achieve and the problem you want to solve with the CRM software. Therefore, while selecting the CRM tool, you should consider the following goals. Based on these goals, you can choose the CRM software that provides solutions for them.
- Tracking customer base
- Traffic conversion
- Tracking leads and their activity
- Managing relationships
- Increasing profitability and productivity
- Organizing business operations
- Connecting different teams
- Tracking closing rates and opportunities
- Generating customized reports
- Key features
The best CRM solution should provide you with customer behavioral data to identify their needs, purchasing habits, and social activities. Data on these points helps your business improve and customize its offerings as per customer demand and increase sales. The CRM you are considering should offer these important features for your e-commerce startup:
- Instant access to customer information: The CRM should be able to quickly scrap customer data from your website and mobile app and provide you with important information related to each customer.
- Marketing tools: Your CRM should provide marketing tools to engage your customers based on the stage of their purchase cycle. The CRM tools should provide the email marketing tool or plugin preferred by you.
- Marketing automation: The software should enable you to easily bring all the data in the system, integrate social media, and connect with your customers through a contextual message.
- Plan a budget
The best CRM is the one that offers you what you need at a minimal cost. You shouldn’t have to spend a significant amount to manage the database of your customers. For instance, to manage a database of 10,000 customers, Salesforce charges $1000 per month.
So, if your active customers per month are less and your products are not very high in value, it doesn’t make sense to select Salesforce as your e-commerce CRM. Therefore, you need to select your CRM accordingly as per your budget and the charges.
- CRM should integrate with other applications
While selecting a CRM for your startup, you should choose the one that can easily integrate with other applications. The CRM system is not a mere plugin but is going to streamline business operations for you.
Apart from Google -Suite and Office 365, it should be able to also integrate with an ERP, your website, your HR software, web forms, marketing solutions, the billing platforms, and the e-commerce platforms for registering transactions.
- View a demo or a free trial
Ensure you have tested the CRM after viewing a demo and testing it with a free trial. Through a demo, the salesperson would walk you through the steps of using the CRM software and answer your queries related to its use for your business. A free trial will give deeper insights into the weaknesses and strengths of the system and how the system is going to work for you. Do consider the features and functionality, ease of use, and the scalability of the software. Also, don’t just finalize your CRM after trying and testing only one option.
- Check for customization and training
It is an added advantage if the CRM solution can be customized and your staff can be trained to use its features. Therefore, while discussing the cost of the CRM software, ask for the cost to configure it as per your needs and the cost for training sessions. The training will aid in a smooth adoption of the CRM system into your business.
- Consider the user experience
Lastly, while selecting the best CRM for your e-commerce startup, experience it from a user’s perspective. Find out how helpful it is and if there is something that is slow or annoying. Ask questions such as, in how many clicks does it take to get to the desired outcome, or are the important buttons placed and labeled clearly, how effective is the UI? These points will help you select a user-friendly CRM.
Conclusion
CRM plays a vital role in the success of any business, irrespective of the company size. Therefore, it’s always best to plan in advance and map your needs and requirements from the CRM system. As a startup, you may have very little to no experience in selecting the right CRM for your e-commerce business. These points will help you evaluate and consider each shortlisted CRM software and select the best one out of all. Try to keep it simple while selecting a CRM and scale up gradually with the growth of your business.
