Building CRM Technology for a Real-World Sales and Service Operation
By Larry Caretsky, CEO of Commence Corporation
One of the great things about managing a call center-based sales and service organization is the endless diversity of the team. Unlike professional groups such as accountants and attorneys, who tend to be more homogenous, salespeople come from all walks of life, employment backgrounds and education levels. Most sales professionals are outgoing, but their personalities vary a great deal, and the same organization can encompass stellar performers who are PhDs and high school dropouts. The same is true on the service side.
The sheer human variety found within the sales and service organization is the source of the company’s strength, with diverse individuals relating in their unique way to customers and prospects. But it can also magnify management challenges since each individual tends to perceive opportunity and service needs in a different way and evaluate prospects according to unique personal metrics in the absence of consistent guidance.
Providing that consistent guidance is where a call center sales and service manager armed with the right technology tools comes into the picture: No one can spot a quality opportunity like an informed sales and service manager, and with an advanced CRM program that is built for a diverse workforce, you can manage your team more effectively.
CRM for Sales Professionals
So what does the technology look like? Ideally, a CRM solution built for a modern salesforce would provide a way for professionals to qualify leads according to the same criteria. That means use of customizable program documents the sales manager can create to capture the pertinent information, such as:
- Budget parameters
- Prospective client need for the product / service
- Key decision-makers involved in the sale
- Customer engagement level
- Timing
Once this information is processed, the system can assign a color-coded status to the opportunity, qualifying the lead on the basis of an apples-to-apples comparison so that sales professionals focus on the best opportunities.
CRM for Service Professionals
When a lead is converted into a sale, the same CRM system can be used to rationalize the service delivery process. Service managers can capture information such as the following:
- Company size
- Annual revenue
- Profitability
- Service Level Agreements (SLAs)
- Growth rate
- Long-term viability of the relationship
As with the sales-focused CRM toolset, an effective service component could incorporate color-coding to signal customer status to service professionals, allowing them to prioritize service delivery to ensure customer satisfaction – particularly for the most profitable relationships. The system can also enhance cross-selling efforts and help professionals identify new opportunities.
With this type of CRM system, both the sales and service components have one thing in common: There’s no guesswork about priorities. When sales professionals use an effective CRM system, they can be sure they are pursuing the most promising opportunities. Service professionals can focus their efforts squarely on the most profitable customer relationships. By providing a framework based on relevant data, sales and service organization managers can give their team tools that work in the real world.