Written by Lestraundra Alfred @writerlest
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As
a sales professional, you’re no stranger to the sales process. Chances
are, you spend your days engaging with leads and facilitating them through
their buyer’s journey step-by-step. In addition to an operational sales
process, your team likely has a CRM in place as well.
However,
if you’re only using your CRM as a virtual Rolodex, you probably aren’t using
the tool to its full potential.
By
integrating your CRM into each step of the sales process, you can expedite the
buyer journey from lead to customer. CRM processes are actions aligned with the
sales process to help you build stronger relationships with your customers
faster, helping you close more deals, keeping your customers coming back for
more.
What is the primary objective
of a CRM process?
A CRM process aims to improve the relationship between a company
and its customers, resulting in automated business processes that help sales teams
spend less time performing administrative duties and closing more deals faster.
Let’s
review the common CRM processes you and your team need to know to work more
efficiently and land more sales.
CRM Processes
1.
Capture leads
2.
Create and maintain contact records
3.
Connect with leads
4.
Qualify leads
5.
Document objections
6.
Issue proposals
7.
Log deals
8.
Upsell/cross-sell
1. Capture leads
First
and foremost, your CRM should be a repository for capturing leads across all
channels. Whether your organization collects leads through website traffic,
freemium sign-ups, or referrals from previous customers, using your CRM instead
of a messy spreadsheet to capture basic information about your leads such as
name their name sets you up for more efficient workflows throughout the sales
process.
2. Create and maintain contact records
As
you continue through the prospecting process, you can use your CRM to create
and maintain contact records to house the information you learn about your
leads.
For
example, if you work for a company that sells innovative HVAC (heating,
ventilation, and air conditioning) products and a new lead gets saved as a
contact in your CRM because they opted in for a free guide on your website
called “Five Signs It’s Time to Replace Your AC Unit,” your CRM can log their
contact record as someone who may be interested in new air conditioning
equipment as opposed to being interested in a new heating system.
3. Connect with leads
Once
you have a contact record saved with basic information about your lead — with
details such as their name, email address, geographic location, and potential
product they are interested in — you can then use your CRM to contact them and
learn more about their situation.
Ideally,
your CRM should integrate directly with your email and call system, so whether
you are corresponding by email or hop on the phone you should be able to log your
correspondence with the lead directly into your CRM.
4. Qualify leads
When
initially connecting with your leads, your goal is to determine if they are sales qualified.
Essentially, you want to make sure they are a good fit for your product or
service at this time.
As
you go through the lead qualification stage, you want to compare the lead’s
needs and information to your ideal customer profile. A helpful way to
determine if a lead is sales qualified is to ask them open-ended questions, allowing
them to provide more context about their situation. Here are some sales
qualifying questions you can consider:
·
What problem are you looking to fix?
·
Have you tried to solve the problem previously? What has or hasn’t
worked?
·
Do you have a budget allocated for this?
·
How does the decision-making process work for implementing these
kinds of solutions?
·
What other offerings are you considering?
Although
there is no clear "yes" or "no" involved with any of these
questions, the answers can help you determine if the lead is ready to be sold
to. If you believe the lead is qualified, you can log this information in their
contact record and move them to the next stage in the sales process in your
CRM.
5. Document objections
As
you move through the sales process, you will naturally hear objections as you
try to make the sale. If a contact provides pushback during your pitch or
raises a flag about your product the rest of your team should be aware of, your
CRM is the ideal place to document these objections.
Doing
so in your CRM gives your team access to information that can provide valuable
training or shape updated strategies. Additionally, if your lead gets passed to
another rep, having their reservations or objections documented in your CRM
helps your colleague know where you left off and creates a smooth transition,
which creates a better experience for the rep and the customer.
6. Issue proposals
Proposal software can be
a helpful tool. As you share proposals, you can integrate your proposal
software with your CRM to quickly create and share proposal documents directly
through your CRM.
Using
your CRM to issue and track proposals can give you insight into whether your
document has been viewed or opened, and allows you to link your prospect’s
contact records to specific deals all within your CRM.
7. Log deals
When
your customer accepts your proposal and the deal has been closed, you can log
the deal in your CRM for accurate reporting. This will provide valuable
information for reporting and forecasting purposes.
If
the deal was closed-lost, you’ll want to make sure you log that as well.
Tracking deals that didn’t result in a sale can provide context if that lead
moves through the sales process for a different offering, or if the initial
conversation reopens with them at a later date.
8. Upsell/cross-sell
Last
but certainly not least, you can use your CRM to assist with an upsell or
cross-sell after landing a deal. Because you should have all of your
communications with your customer tracked in their CRM record and you have
built a relationship with them, you can offer additional products or services
that can complement their initial purchase or provide a solution to another
problem they are looking to solve.
What is the last step in the
CRM process?
Once a deal has been closed, log the deal in your CRM to maintain
accurate records and include any final notes or details that were pertinent to
the sale. You can use this information at a later date to upsell or cross-sell
to your customer if and when it makes sense to do so.
Proper
use of your CRM can improve efficiency for you and your sales team during each
step of the sales process. To take your processes to the next level, check out
these must-have CRM integrations
to automate your entire business.
Originally
published Nov 19, 2019 7:30:00 AM, updated November 19 2019
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