In today’s day and age, when you are running a business, you would have to invest in a number of tools, technologies and trends in order to make a real impression and turn that into a real conversion. When we think about running a business, the first thing we think about is marketing. Marketing would be the function that helps us reach people. But what makes those people your customers? The word is sales. Hence, sales and marketing are two sides of the same coin, that every business aspires to earn. This is what we term as revenue. One of the main revenue driving forces in the world today would be the CRM software that you use. Let us understand how and why, before we understand on premise and cloud based CRM as well.
A CRM software or system can be defined as Customer Relationship Management system. It helps you maintain information about your customers and prospects. Let us step back and take a look at why this is crucial for the scaling up of any kind of business. This would also be one of the benefits of cloud based CRM systems. Among its many benefits, CRM helps you bring marketing and sales together in a seamless system. Let us understand how.
Businesses the world over are turning to CRM systems to ensure that their business runs smoothly. The sales pipeline is one of the main things that is taken care of when you turn to a CRM software – whether it is an on premise software or a cloud based platform. The CRM system is something that can help you reach out to customer and keep their crucial information handy for further use in specific functions as well as targeted campaigns. There are many ways in which a CRM can help you, especially when you integrate it with marketing automation. This brings us back to the point we made in the first paragraph – with CRM, you can actually keep sales and marketing together in one neat system that helps you up your revenue by leaps and bounds.
So let us look at a few ways to implement and execute a CRM system. You can have an on premise system that would have to be installed and managed from your own bandwidth and on your own time. You can also have a cloud based CRMsystem which can be hosted from a cloud so that you can get a host of other benefits. So what are the benefits of cloud based CRM systems? Here’s a quick look at the top 8:
- Take Your Business Global: One of the best things about using a cloud based CRM system is that you can use it from anywhere and at any time. This means that you can have a remote team from various parts of the country, the region or even the world – and the use of the CRM software would not be difficult since it can be accessed from anywhere considering it would be hosted from a cloud. This helps you take your business and scale up as well.
- Scale up Faster: You can scale up the business faster with a cloud based CRM software since you would not need to bring in a huge team. This would also mean that you have the resources to actually pump finances into other marketing activities to make your brand more known. At the same time, you can tap into any number of clients from any part of the world which can help you grow a lot and even faster.
- Reliable: When you have a cloud based CRM system, you will be able to access it from anywhere. At the same time, it is not dependent on a particular serve that can give way at any time. With a cloud based system, you can be sure that it will always work well and will not have all the technical glitches that you would otherwise experience when you have to host and execute from your own location premise. This makes a cloud based CRM software much more reliable than an on premise one and it also helps you service your customers from anywhere.
- Easy to Integrate: One of the many benefits of cloud based CRM systems is that it gives you the leeway to integrate with all your other systems like marketing automation as well. It is easier to integrate here than it would be an on premise system since the CRM softwareon a cloud helps you with less complications and more features.
- Affordable: A cloud based CRM would be much more affordable as compared to an on premise CRM software, which can cost you quite a heavy dime! An on premise CRM software will come with the cost of setup and hosting as well as the cost of maintaining the same. Yet, with a cloud based CRM, you get a number of economic benefits that far outweighs those you would get in an on premise CRM software. For starters, it would be much more affordable since you would not have the foot the bill for setup, hosting and various other elements. The upgrades are also easier and much more affordable with a cloud based CRM.
- Secure: One of the benefits of cloud based CRM is the fact that you would also be investing in a system that is much more secure. It is much easier to protect a cloud based system since it is much more secure. The access is also easy, at the same time, for someone who is actually operating the system.
- Installation: You can install the cloud based CRM with much ease since the functions will already be integrated and no technical expertise would be required as such.
- Seamless Integration: You can also integrate your marketing and social media functions with the cloud based CRM with much ease. This will help you manage everything from a single platform, which would be very convenient for you and your team.