Boost your success in eCommerce with a working CRM
Customers are the basis of success in eCommerce. If you don't have any customers, you won't sell any products and, conversely, you'll quickly realize that your business idea only looked good on paper. On the other hand, it is not that easy to generate success with existing customers, because if you don't keep an eye on your customers, you will quickly lose track of them.
Together with our partner weclapp, we provide you with our 8 best tips for a functioning customer management thanks to efficient customer relationship management tools.
What is a CRM?
Customer Relationship Management, or “CRM” in short, refers to the technology and processes a company uses to manage its contacts and relationships, both external and internal.
However, don’t let the word “customers” fool you: although the goal of a successful CRM is to use customer data to build and strengthen relationships, a CRM can also be used to strengthen relationships with individuals at all touch points.
A CRM includes not only guidelines on how direct interactions can take place, but also tools to organize and track all the relevant information you need to find prospects, nurture leads, close deals, retain customers, build stronger relationships, increase sales, create more personalized customer services, and overall, to make processes more efficient.
But as an online retailer, how can you implement a successful CRM in your business? Below, we’d like to share a few ideas and tips that will help you push the best foundations for sustainable growth in eCommerce thanks to a working CRM software.
1. Define your CRM strategy from the beginning
A CRM strategy includes processes that companies put in place to standardize and optimize the use of CRM technology. To make the most of your CRM technology, you need a customer-centric strategy. However, this strategy should be enabled by the technology, not the other way around. So first define a strategy that fits your business before deciding on the appropriate CRM tools.
2. Find the right CRM technology for your business
A CRM technology serves as a central platform where primarily customer information can be organized, used, securely shared and captured. It provides pipeline management and reporting capabilities, as well as the ability to communicate and track all touchpoints with your contacts.
3. Define the individual CRM measures
Successful customer management can be achieved at different levels and through different means. For example, you can offer incentives, set up sophisticated email marketing, or create opportunities in your online store itself that will keep your customers buying – and more importantly, coming back.
However, it is important that you define which measures you want to use from the very beginning. It doesn’t make sense to implement quite a few measures at the same time, but rather to focus on a few aspects. CRM is about quality, not quantity.
4. Use CRM platforms for your measures
Now, before you start picking out a suitable newsletter provider, looking for incentive funds online or even setting up various Excel spreadsheets with customer contacts, better find the right CRM platform for your business directly.
Instead of performing tasks like outreach, follow-ups, and qualifications manually, CRM platforms can help you automate tedious but important tasks. This allows sales reps to focus on the exact activities that are most important to them.
This level of automation can also benefit other areas of the business. For example, marketing can help qualify through lead scoring. Each time a lead interacts with your brand, their score increases. Once a certain threshold is reached, that lead moves from a “Marketing Qualified Lead” (MQL) to a “Sales Qualified Lead” (SQL).
5. Know your customers – over and over again
Of course, you can maintain your customer management with a well-equipped CRM platform and, above all, keep the perfect overview. Nevertheless, this still doesn’t give you the perfect foresight for what your customers really want. Our tip? Talk to your customers. Ask them what they found most valuable during their communication with you and find out what they didn’t find valuable.
Customer interviews and surveys can shed light on the processes that are particularly important. These are the areas that should be automated and optimized. These insights can then help improve the customer experience by highlighting gaps in your support communications.
6. Keep track of your data
A CRM platform does a very important job for you as it organizes your customer data. Without a CRM platform, you probably have multiple Excel spreadsheets set up for customer communications, sales figures, and potential business leads.
It’s good to keep track of these things, of course, but having everything in silos can lead to misunderstandings between team members. Also, it’s much harder to receive useful insights from these numbers.
With a CRM platform, all of your sales, marketing campaigns, and communication data is in one place. This allows you to create more accurate sales forecasts and create a sales process that is built on a predictable revenue model.
7. Guarantee certainty: from start to finish
How many times have you abandoned a purchase on a website because the checkout process didn’t seem quite right? Certainly not just once. In order to bind existing and new customers to your product and, thus, to your store, it is important that you guarantee absolute security. Take care of your customers’ data and show this to your customers.
Security is not only guaranteed by a GDPR-compliant and PSD2-secured online store, but also by the internal organization of data in your company. If you back up a lot of data in a lot of documents, you will sooner or later reach an internal security limit. By bringing the entire organization onto a single platform, there is a consistent approach and a home for the same data. The marketing team can see which channels are generating leads, while the sales team can access that historical data to support their sales communications.
8. Value your customer service
Returns, damages, or simply products that don’t meet expectations. These are all things you need to handle quickly and effectively as an online retailer. The best way to do that is with a functioning customer service that is not only always available, but more importantly, acts quickly.
All the benefits we’ve touched on in the previous points are aimed at the interaction between you and your customers. These interactions are especially strengthened when customer data can be clearly viewed and tracked. Nothing is more annoying then a customer calling a company for the second time and having to tell the same story again.
Keep track of your customers or use a CRM platform that stores all data well and securely for you. Because all interactions are recorded in the same place with a CRM platform, customer service teams can see a historical view of a customer’s relationship with your brand. This insight allows customer service representatives to personalize their interactions. For example, let’s say a person is more likely to talk to the sales team on the phone. When a customer service rep sees this in the CRM, they know they should schedule a call instead of trying to chat via email.
Optimize your CRM for more eCommerce success
Our partner weclapp offers a cloud-based ERP platform that aims to simplify the day-to-day work of small and medium-sized businesses in particular through modern software. Whether CRM, merchandise management or accounting – with weclapp, teams can intelligently manage all important business processes in an all-in-one software. From customer management and order processing to invoicing and financial accounting, weclapp has received several awards and has already been voted “ERP System of the Year” four times.
As a user of our Boost Kit you benefit now from 30 days free use of the services of weclapp. Sign up now directly to bring more order into your business and improve your customer management sustainably.