We all need to keep track of the various conversations we’re having with the people in our lives, be it for business or personal reasons. There are significant bits of information that we’re given by others or we say to others that we need to easily be able to retrieve, reply to, follow up and so on. The need is there, so how do people solve this problem?
Well, most of them just store everything in their inbox and then whenever they need the information they do a search. Some use tags to classify the information. Email providers like gmail make it really easy to run a business or your personal life without the need of any additional tools. The only problem is when you have a lot of information, searching can be difficult, as you have to go through a lot of information. In addition, sometimes, the information you want is not in the email system you need, but rather on your facebook, linkedin, twitter or other social media account.
There is a case for a central repository of your information, communications and business intelligence on your customers. You can keep only the relevant information that you come across over multiple channels, you can rate your customers according to how likely you are to make a sale to them, you can keep track of your sales opportunities, quotes, proposals that you send out and so on.
Storing it on the web means you can access it from anywhere and your employees can easily work from home, access the information remotely from the field and all this without you having to run any complex IT infrastructure with all the associated cost.
Is this for me, you might be asking yourself?
While various salesmen will try to answer this question for you, it’s a question only you and the people in your organization can answer. It does require a kind of discipline in the way you approach and structure your communication with your leads and customers.
But this structure it’s an inevitable sign of growth and success and as your business grows, you should review your business processes to make it more efficient.