Salesforce is a very effective tool for customer relationship management – and one that provides a broad spectrum of options when it comes to maximising ROI. All the strategies and techniques that you need to improve the way your business interacts with current, and future, customers are bundled up into this CRM software with a simple interface that draws in data from all key touchpoints. It will give your business oversight on customer interactions – and the resources to make a difference to how you optimise customer data going forward.

Salesforce, the basics

Salesforce is an integrated CRM platform that provides a 360-degree view of customers and a wealth of opportunities to personalise the journey that customers have with your business. It pulls together a variety of different sources of valuable customer data, from contact history to preferences, social media presence and past sales interactions. One of the major advantages of Salesforce is that it also applies analysis to this data, providing automated customer reports – and even invaluable predictions of future customer behaviour.

Using CRM to maximise ROI

• Start with an effective CRM strategy. If you’re looking to get the most out of any investment then it pays to have a defined strategy in place to approach it. A robust CRM strategy will ensure that you can optimise the investment in customer relationship management to maximise ROI. Your strategy should include a clear action-driven vision, your business objectives for working with the system, key metrics and priorities, as well as executive level sponsorship (a lack of executive sponsorship is often why CRM integration fails).
• Opt for a cloud-based CRM. This is more preferable than an on-premise CRM solution, which can generate a whole range of issues for your business to deal with, from server problems to handling upgrades.
• Ensure that the CRM will integrate with value-adding applications. Those might be business applications or social applications – one of the major advantages of Salesforce is how easy integration is.
• Mobile is also going to be a major factor. If you want to ensure that you’re getting the maximum benefits from your CRM then mobile integration will be key. This will open up the possibilities for your CRM to be used on a much broader basis than purely for sales.
• Stay on top of relationship building with customers. There is no doubt that a CRM system like Salesforce provides exceptional tools for connecting with customers and laying firm foundations for ongoing relationships. However, those relationships aren’t going to stay static but will inevitably grow and change over time. It will be key to ensure that, as your customer relationships change, your business does too – and using a CRM like Salesforce will give you everything that you need to do that effortlessly.

Salesforce is a vital tool when it comes to connecting with customers and managing relationships – and maximising ROI isn’t rocket science. If you’re looking for support with your Salesforce roll out to scale your business we can help.