Email compliance and the legalities that come along with it are becoming a really big deal for companies. We recently hosted a podcast on CRM Radio (http://crmradio.today) with two leading experts, Steven Pearl of IntelliClick and Derek Lackey of Newport Thomson. Their insights into GDPR, CASL and CCPA can help executives navigate these tricky regulations.

Listen to our podcast with Derek Lackey:
https://crmradio.today/e/jan-2020-ca-consumer-protection-act-you-can-t-do-whatever-you-want-to-the-customer-derek-lackey/

What is the spirit of these email compliance regulations?

Maybe you haven’t heard but there are a host of new regulations that dictate how you store and manage customer data. This has a great effect on day to day operations for anyone in marketing, customer service and Information technology roles. At the heart of these regulations there are a host of things you now have to consider:

• How you collect customer data
• How long you store data
• How you delete data
• How you use cookies on your website
• How you use forms on your website
• How you handle customer requests for data and its deletion
• Etc

Adhering to these new regulations is very burdensome and failing to do so could result in significant fines. This is why it’s so important to develop an iron clad privacy policy, cookie policy and terms and conditions – then making them easily available. One of the things that makes these data protection acts even more complicated is that they are regionally focused, varying in requirements and now we have even seen individual states (in the USA) writing their own legislation; potentially making this a very hazardous minefield of regulations.

What does GDPR stand for?
It’s the General Data Protection Regulation, and it covers the European Union.
Learn More Here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Data_Protection_Regulation

What does CASL stand for?
This is the Canadian Anti-Spam Legislation and it covers Canada.
Learn More:
https://www.priv.gc.ca/en/privacy-topics/privacy-laws-in-canada/the-personal-information-protection-and-electronic-documents-act-pipeda/r_o_p/canadas-anti-spam-legislation/

What does CCPA stand for?
California Consumer Privacy Act, covers California.
Learn More:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Consumer_Privacy_Act

Here are some of the main takeaways we gathered from our recent podcast with Derek Lackey:

First, make sure you are paying attention to these regulations as they are very different. While GDPR is Europe and CCPA is California, the laws apply to anyone who markets into the territory – and some companies can be responsible for big fines as a result of not being in compliance.

Second, GDPR is very detailed and broad on defining what constitutes “personal information” and how it can be used, stored, and accessed or deleted. As with GDPR, you need a detailed and documented process as to how you respond to an individual’s request for their information, and allow them to edit it and or have it removed completely from your system. Make sure you know how to track, document and respond to these requests across your entire organization. GDPR also requires express consent from individuals regarding their data and how its being used by you, the company. According to these regulations, consent to data is no longer “implied”, as it has been in the past. Even if the individual reaches out to you seeking to established a business relationship or Legitimate Interest in your products or services.

Third, the new California law (CCPA) s mostly addressing the resale or use of email addresses by other parties. You must disclose this if you do intend to share it or resell it to third parties. You will be required to get express permission from the individual.

Fourth, while there have been penalties, Derek also shared that many companies have seen open rates improve – why? Because they are now using a qualified list of opt-ins who want to hear from you. As you can imagine, these regulations are causing chaos in marketing departments. Some marketers are seeing their lead lists cut in half or more. It’s also dramatically increasing the stress on internal IT departments to create new processes and re-classify previously existing data. This can be time consuming and expensive to reorganize legacy systems and bring them into compliance.

Here is our short list of key recommendations we discussed:

• Offer unsubscribe capability and honor it. You can’t sell to people who don’t want to hear from you anyway.
• Make your privacy policy and terms very easy to find.
• Institute a cookie policy and have individuals who visit your website accept it.
• Connect your CRM to an email management tool to track opt-outs. More importantly the opt-ins, as to build and maintain your marketing lists.
• Don’t default to implied “opt-in” on your web forms. The individual has to manually select the option to opt-in to future communications.
• Be careful when buying email lists. Make sure your list vendor can certify and prove they have permission from the individuals on each list you buy.
• Regine your GDPR process and ensure your employees are trained when they need to respond and provide an individual with their specific information or delete it upon their request. Keep in mind, any of these requests apply to all data across each of your systems: CRM, orders, accounting, customer service, marketing lists etc.
• Try to segment your emails by developing shorter content for specific segments. A basic one for Customers and perhaps another one only for prospects. It takes a bit extra, but can increase your effectiveness and lower your liability.
• And keep up to date on the changing legal environment surrounding these regulations. More and more are being created every day and some might contradict each other.

Derek had one last thought for all of us.  Preference centers will be the way to manage content and give the individual their choice of content and delivery. And most importantly, rather than wait for each new regulation to come out, get ahead of these trends by implementing good data practices to reduce your risk.

About GoldMine:

GoldMine has been around for more than 25 years. When you have been doing this as long as we have, you learn a thing or two. With millions of users all around the world our CRM system is the by-product of listening to our customers longer than anyone else.

Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

The post What is GDPR, CASL and CCPA? appeared first on GoldMine.

The only thing more difficult that purchasing a CRM system is switching one, say from Act to Goldmine. If you find yourself in that position, then this article will help you learn how to switch your CRM system. Companies often go through very lengthy processes to select a CRM and they involved a great many people in doing so. With this being said, however, sometimes companies find themselves in a situation where they have to make a change.

This is such an important topic because 90% of companies with 11 or more employees already have a CRM system. This means it’s already an important part of their daily business operations, and like most businesses the more you use it the deeper its tentacles go into everything. Businesses are very dependent on their CRM system and year over year, businesses continue to increase spending on this very important technology. After all, it’s the center of their universe.

Typical reasons for making changes to a CRM system might be:

• Cost (it’s too expensive)
• Poor Support
• Too difficult or complex to use
• Missing features or lack of features
• Too many features (Feature Overload)
• Lack of integration into other software
• The system has become too cluttered with bad data
• A requirement forced upon companies via a merger
• A vendor going out of business
• Need More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Demo

Or you might have specific comparison needs such as: 

• GoldMine offers a one time purchase alternative to subscription based solutions like ACT! That means NO MONTLY FEES!
• GoldMine offers enhanced features that ACT does not have ie., project management, customer service, fully customizable trigger based workflows

Before We Go Too Deep, Let’s Define What a CRM Is.

If you are thinking about switching your CRM system, then it’s pretty safe to say that you already know what a CRM system is. For some of you, however, who don’t this is a quick primer. CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management. These CRM systems provide companies with a centralized data system that manages the entirety of a company’s records. It can also play a very important role in customer service, marketing, sales, sales management, vendor management etc..

So if CRM is so important, why do 50% of these efforts fail?

Many recent studies point to a higher than 50% rate of fail when installing a CRM system. That number is shocking. If this technology is so important and so vital to a company’s success, how do these efforts go sideways?

Pre-Purchase Folly

Failure to Plan is perhaps the biggest reason for implementation failure. During the scope of the system requirements companies often skip steps in order to speed things up or are often too bewitched by the bells and whistles of the new shiny object. Companies who fail to involve all of the relevant stakeholders or take into consideration how it is actually going to be used in the daily operations are the same companies who experience the highest failure rates.

Pre-Purchase Planning Steps To Consider:

• Talk to all stakeholders and get their input
• Talk to users and get their input
• Develop a feature list of Must Haves
• Understand and build requirements for integration with other software within your company that you want to connect
• Determine if the CRM will fit with your operations in the future – will it be adaptable
• Determine how easy it is to import and export data
• Address the human side of things / training / requirements / protocols
• Need More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Demo

Reasons for Switching CRM systems (in detail)

There are a number of legitimate reasons a company would have to go through the painful process of switching their CRM. Below, we will give the most common reasons.

1. Cost (Too Expensive) – Typical CRMs charge per seat / license. So as you grow your staff you have to continually add licenses. There is also a little industry trickery happening that makes things worse as well. They display prices in monthly dollar amounts but actually charge on an annual basis, which often confuses and angers buyers. These fees are also often subject to annual increases that were not advertised; only further angering customers. Even worse, every feature can also come with an add-on price which when combined all together can create a very large surprise bill. A bill that gets bigger and bigger every year.
2. Poor Support – Many times what happens is during the sales process, the CRM vendor will pull out all of the stops. They will give you the “A” team experience but then after you are on board will begin to deliver “Less than A Team” service. As the complexity of the product begins to set in, the customer realizes that they need a lot more support. Then the CRM vendor will often try to upsell that customer on extra support at an extra price. When you have all of your important data in once place and you need support and then can’t get it … that tends to anger a lot of customers.
3. Too Difficult or Complex – Early on in the sales process, CRM vendors will often trot out their latest and greatest features under the guise of “look what you are getting for your money”. What ends up happening is buyers go with the absolute most complex CRM product thinking that they are getting increased value but in reality 43% of CRM buyers use less than half of the features. Even worse, 83% of senior executives complain that their employees don’t properly use the CRM.
4. Missing Features or Lack of Integration Capabilities – This one typically comes back to planning failures. If you have a CRM system and lets say you realize it doesn’t integrate with your financial system or your marketing automation platform, you might quickly realize your CRM system no longer fits your needs. It’s also important to note that some software applications do not integrate with other software unless there is custom programming (if even possible). This can drastically increase costs  and time if you purchased the wrong CRM initially.
5. A Forced Requirement (ie. Merger) – Changing a CRM system is difficult and its usually something you don’t want to do unless you have to. As we stated above there are a number of reasons that might cause a switch. One of the reasons, however, doesn’t even have to do with a shortcoming. Sometimes through merger and acquisitions, parent companies demand that the smaller company switch over to the other CRM platform.
6. Vendor Going Out of Business – With so many new CRM vendors coming into the industry every month, its not uncommon to see half of these companies fail or go out of business in their first five years. If you have all of your data with a vendor and they go under, you can often find yourself shut off without notice or have very little time to find a new provider and move everything over.

How To Switch Your CRM System

In general developing a plan to swtich your CRM system will pay great dividends and how well you planned it will determine how easy it is. Here are some things to consider:

1. Clearly spec out what you need in the new CRM
2. Get buy in from all stakeholders
3. Map your existing data for export / import
4. Define the vendor selection process / requirements
5. Determine what you need customized
6. Determine your integrations
7. Build a test environment (first)
8. Conduct training and deal with the human side of technology
9. Port over data
10. Create a rapid response team for quick updates, changes and fixes
11. Measure and enhance
12. Need More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Demo

Pros & Cons

If you are a smaller business its going to be far easier to switch your CRM system. You simply have less data, less people and less integrations. All of these factors will make it far easier for you to switch then say a large enterprise company that’s been around for 30 years. For a company like that to switch would often cause a lot of disruption and they will need to have a really good reason for switching. Afterall, that’s the really big question – is switching the CRM system going to be worth it?

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The post Act vs GoldMine CRM appeared first on GoldMine.

GoldMine is about to conduct our 2020 CRM Report. If you participate you will be able to get access to this report for Free. Just prior to the end of the year we are planning on releasing our latest report taken across multiple industries, across multiple functions (job roles) and across multiple geographies. If you are willing to provide your insights, please follow the link below. When the study becomes available, you will receive an email with instructions on how to take this brief survey. Any information you provide to us will be anonymous and we will only be analyzing the bulk data aspects of our findings.

Sign Up – Be Alerted When The Survey Is Ready

Because CRM software is fundamental to the growth of the software industry as a whole and one of the most ubiquitous types of business software, it’s important to understand how businesses actually use this technology, and where CRMs could stand to improve in the coming years.

That’s why GoldMine will survey hundreds of CRM users, to get an overview of exactly how businesses find, buy, and use their CRM Software. Whether you’re a current CRM user, considering a CRM for your company, or a seller of CRM technology, you will find very valuable information in the conclusions of this report.

The post 2020 CRM Report appeared first on GoldMine.

The only thing more difficult that purchasing a CRM system is switching one. If you find yourself in that position, then this article will help you learn how to switch your CRM system. Companies often go through very lengthy processes to select a CRM and they involved a great many people in doing so. With this being said, however, sometimes companies find themselves in a situation where they have to make a change.

Typical reasons for making changes to a CRM system might be:

• Cost (it’s too expensive)
• Poor Support
• Too difficult or complex to use
• Missing features or lack of features
• Too many features (Feature Overload)
• Lack of integration into other software
• The system has become too cluttered with bad data
• A requirement forced upon companies via a merger
• A vendor going out of business
• Need More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Demo

This is such an important topic because 90% of companies with 11 or more employees already have a CRM system. This means it’s already an important part of their daily business operations, and like most businesses the more you use it the deeper its tentacles go into everything. Businesses are very dependent on their CRM system and year over year, businesses continue to increase spending on this very important technology. After all, it’s the center of their universe.

Before We Go Too Deep, Let’s Define What a CRM Is.

If you are thinking about switching your CRM system, then it’s pretty safe to say that you already know what a CRM system is. For some of you, however, who don’t this is a quick primer. CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management. These CRM systems provide companies with a centralized data system that manages the entirety of a company’s records. It can also play a very important role in customer service, marketing, sales, sales management, vendor management etc..

So if CRM is so important, why do 50% of these efforts fail?

Many recent studies point to a higher than 50% rate of fail when installing a CRM system. That number is shocking. If this technology is so important and so vital to a company’s success, how do these efforts go sideways?

Pre-Purchase Folly

Failure to Plan is perhaps the biggest reason for implementation failure. During the scope of the system requirements companies often skip steps in order to speed things up or are often too bewitched by the bells and whistles of the new shiny object. Companies who fail to involve all of the relevant stakeholders or take into consideration how it is actually going to be used in the daily operations are the same companies who experience the highest failure rates.

Pre-Purchase Planning Steps To Consider:

• Talk to all stakeholders and get their input
• Talk to users and get their input
• Develop a feature list of Must Haves
• Understand and build requirements for integration with other software within your company that you want to connect
• Determine if the CRM will fit with your operations in the future – will it be adaptable
• Determine how easy it is to import and export data
• Address the human side of things / training / requirements / protocols
• Need More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Demo

Reasons for Switching CRM systems (in detail)

There are a number of legitimate reasons a company would have to go through the painful process of switching their CRM. Below, we will give the most common reasons.

1. Cost (Too Expensive) – Typical CRMs charge per seat / license. So as you grow your staff you have to continually add licenses. There is also a little industry trickery happening that makes things worse as well. They display prices in monthly dollar amounts but actually charge on an annual basis, which often confuses and angers buyers. These fees are also often subject to annual increases that were not advertised; only further angering customers. Even worse, every feature can also come with an add-on price which when combined all together can create a very large surprise bill. A bill that gets bigger and bigger every year.
2. Poor Support – Many times what happens is during the sales process, the CRM vendor will pull out all of the stops. They will give you the “A” team experience but then after you are on board will begin to deliver “Less than A Team” service. As the complexity of the product begins to set in, the customer realizes that they need a lot more support. Then the CRM vendor will often try to upsell that customer on extra support at an extra price. When you have all of your important data in once place and you need support and then can’t get it … that tends to anger a lot of customers.
3. Too Difficult or Complex – Early on in the sales process, CRM vendors will often trot out their latest and greatest features under the guise of “look what you are getting for your money”. What ends up happening is buyers go with the absolute most complex CRM product thinking that they are getting increased value but in reality 43% of CRM buyers use less than half of the features. Even worse, 83% of senior executives complain that their employees don’t properly use the CRM.
4. Missing Features or Lack of Integration Capabilities – This one typically comes back to planning failures. If you have a CRM system and lets say you realize it doesn’t integrate with your financial system or your marketing automation platform, you might quickly realize your CRM system no longer fits your needs. It’s also important to note that some software applications do not integrate with other software unless there is custom programming (if even possible). This can drastically increase costs  and time if you purchased the wrong CRM initially.
5. A Forced Requirement (ie. Merger) – Changing a CRM system is difficult and its usually something you don’t want to do unless you have to. As we stated above there are a number of reasons that might cause a switch. One of the reasons, however, doesn’t even have to do with a shortcoming. Sometimes through merger and acquisitions, parent companies demand that the smaller company switch over to the other CRM platform.
6. Vendor Going Out of Business – With so many new CRM vendors coming into the industry every month, its not uncommon to see half of these companies fail or go out of business in their first five years. If you have all of your data with a vendor and they go under, you can often find yourself shut off without notice or have very little time to find a new provider and move everything over.

How To Switch Your CRM System

In general developing a plan to swtich your CRM system will pay great dividends and how well you planned it will determine how easy it is. Here are some things to consider:

1. Clearly spec out what you need in the new CRM
2. Get buy in from all stakeholders
3. Map your existing data for export / import
4. Define the vendor selection process / requirements
5. Determine what you need customized
6. Determine your integrations
7. Build a test environment (first)
8. Conduct training and deal with the human side of technology
9. Port over data
10. Create a rapid response team for quick updates, changes and fixes
11. Measure and enhance
12. Need More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Demo

Pros & Cons

If you are a smaller business its going to be far easier to switch your CRM system. You simply have less data, less people and less integrations. All of these factors will make it far easier for you to switch then say a large enterprise company that’s been around for 30 years. For a company like that to switch would often cause a lot of disruption and they will need to have a really good reason for switching. Afterall, that’s the really big question – is switching the CRM system going to be worth it?

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Ask Us A Question

The post How To Switch Your CRM appeared first on GoldMine.

Buying a CRM system isn’t easy. CRM Systems are one of the most important pieces of technology in any business. We hope that this Buyers Guide will help you choose whatever platform is best for you. Getting it right is critical, but too many companies rush into selecting the wrong CRM system and then they find themselves with features they can’t use, features they don’t use, paying too much or all of the above. Don’t let this happen to you.

Considering a recent study pointed to more than a 50% failure rate of CRM implementations, there is a significant need for more research prior to jumping into choosing the right Customer Relationship Management system.

Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

We pioneered the CRM industry

GoldMine has been around for more than 25 years. When you have been doing this as long as we have, you learn a thing or two. With millions of users all around the world our CRM system is the by-product of listening to our customers longer than anyone else.

Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

Powerful CRM At a Price You Can Afford

GoldMine CRM is one of the only CRM systems you can actually own. With one up-front payment, you can buy licenses. These licenses can be used concurrently, which means you can share seats within your company, thereby cutting down on how many seats you usually have to lease. The net effect of this is that in year 2 your cost is dramatically lower. That’s far different than the popular SaaS model used by most CRM companies today where you pay monthly per seat and if you stop paying, they shut you off.

• Our perpetual licensing means you own the software with a one-time fee – each year afterwards our cost is over 70% less than subscriptions.
• Shared licensing – You can add all your employees and just manage the number of simultaneous users.
• The average 5 user subscription can save over $10,000 over 5 years compared to competitor subscription packages.
• Try Our Cost Comparison Tool – See How Much You Could Save!
• Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

Easy to Use and Quick Ramp Up Time

We have a core belief that CRM should be Simple, Affordable and Proven. Our entire product suite is built around that model. Our easy to use interface means faster ramp-up time, less training and a faster realization of the benefits from having a leading CRM.

GoldMine integrates with other products you own, including:

• Constant Contact for email marketing
• Office 365
• Quickbooks
• And Many Others (See Our Popular AddOns Section)
• Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

Feature Rich Not Feature Overload

There are a lot of CRMs out there that have hundreds and hundreds of features. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, unless you are being forced to pay for things you aren’t using or can’t use. Because we have been around for so long, we know what features are important and which ones aren’t. We have solutions for servers on-premise, in the cloud and even mobile.

In addition, GoldMine’s CRM system integrates with many popular add-ons like Constant Contact, QuickBooks, Outlook, phone dialers and many others, giving GoldMine a strong foundation in which you can add outside functionality.

• Relationships tab makes it easier to manage and see account/contact relationships
• Real-time graphical dashboards
• Universal search to find key words anywhere in the database including notes, emails, attachments
• Cases module to track and manage your customer service inquiries with integrated knowledgebase, document templates, and use all of the Activity management features of GoldMine in your Customer Service department
• Outlook client for auto linking of email, synching of calendars, and display of important GoldMine contact information in Outlook along with auto launch from the inbox
• Expanded Opportunity Management
• New Calendar views
• Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

And We Offer Full Mobility (Multi-Access)

• iPhone, iPad and Android: key contact management with a touch screen interface for real time access – great for users in the field
• Browser access with iGoldMine: thin client access in a browser to the full features and function of GoldMine – great for remote users and PCs with wireless connections in hotels and airports
• GoldMine Premium: The on Premise solution
• GoldMine Web: Access on the go
• GoldMine Cloud: Flexible sign up options for BYOL hosting or subscription with monthly or annual terms
• Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

You will have Access to Our World-Wide Partner Network

We have a network of over 75 trained and certified consultants who can help you install your data, customize, and train and then help you add new capabilities as your program matures.

Complete customer support includes:

• Telephone support
• Online self-service
• Email support
• Online resources
• Knowledgebase
• Software updates
• GoldMine community
• Our Popular CRM Radio Podcast
• Explore Our Partner Network

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The post CRM Buyers Guide appeared first on GoldMine.

The modern business is a complex operation with a lot of moving parts. You have employees, customers, partners and critical business information that you need to access at a moment’s notice. In short, a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system helps you centralize your most important data in one place. Through a single computer interface you can retrieve, create and edit every vital piece of information you need and everyone in your company can see these records in real time. That’s the power of CRM.

With the advent of technology, your employees can access information at any time from any device. Whether they are sitting at their office desk or on the road, your CRM data can be accessed by a PC, a mobile phone, a tablet or any device that has connection to the cloud. Most CRM systems offer your team instant and immediate access to vital contact information that makes it easier to close deals, service customers and keep things organized. Usually coming in an On-Premise or Cloud solution, CRM can be accessed from anywhere.

Integrating CRM systems can range from the easy to the complex, and there is no shortage of platforms to pick from, with a dizzying array of features. It is also important to mention that no two businesses are alike and therefore, every company will have a very unique set of needs to consider before jumping into or switching CRM systems.

Unlike a lot of other technology platforms, CRM touches every business unit and can make a significant impact on areas like Sales, Marketing, Human Resources, Customer Service and even the Financial / Operational teams. All business segments benefit from CRM.

Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

Making The Case for CRM

• Look up any contact
• CRM can improve forecasting
• It’s not just for Sales Teams
• Track Customer Life-cycle
• Identify marketing leads
• Access data from anywhere
• Integrate with other systems
• Manage employee data
• Manage vendor contacts
• Store notes and documents

5 Common Mistakes, And How To Avoid Them

With a dizzying array of options, prices and features, the technology behind CRM can be a difficult minefield to navigate. More often than not, however, the major issues with CRM are on the human part of the equation.

We helped pioneer the CRM space and over the years, we have helped a great number of people in every imaginable situation. Below are the top five mistakes we see people making with their CRM systems and how you can avoid repeating them.

Chances are if you are reading this whitepaper, you are either looking to install your first CRM platform or switch from one to the other. Both of those scenarios have their own unique set of challenges. What’s important is that on one level or another, you have determined that there is a need for change and improving your CRM is at the heart of that decision.

If you are a small company with a fresh install, you are probably looking for something to get in with as little cost and headaches as possible. Bigger more established companies who have existing systems, are looking for a way to move everything over from one system to the other with as little disruption as possible. In many ways, starting from scratch is much easier than migrating but make no mistake; things can go sideways.

Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

1. Jumping in Without A Plan

There is an old saying, “if you don’t know where you are going, every road will take you there”. That saying applies directly to CRM installs. The single biggest mistake most companies make is they fail to create a clear business case for what they are trying to accomplish.

If you start with the end in mind, you will find yourself in a much better position for success. Lay out your reasoning and priorities beforehand, so you can set the system up to accomplish those goals. Typically, companies are looking for their CRM to provide better sales productivity, make marketing more effective or improve customer service. Most of these goals can be easily quantified with some industry rule of thumb or metric. If you want to get “Z” out of the system, what are the “X +Y” inputs you need? Defining these priorities will help you manage your work effort and budgets so you can realize your results faster.

Without a plan, you are at risk of either moving too quickly to get something in place, or you might move too slowly and never finish.

A clearly defined roadmap will be your best friend. All too often, people start with one item and then get busy with it or bogged down in one particular issue. They never go back and revisit the list of priorities; essentially they get caught up in the whirlwind. What happens then is they blame the software or the technology saying that “it didn’t work”. Without a plan, you are at risk of either moving too quickly to get something in place, or you might move too slowly and never finish.

Action Steps

• Clearly define outcomes and goals
• Identify priorities based on outcome, time and budgets
• Be realistic but stick to the plan
• Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

2. Trying To Do Everything (Feature Overload)

Sometimes, just because you “can” do something doesn’t mean you “should”. Doing more things often means more time, more costs, more headaches and more points of failure. Don’t make CRM harder than it needs to be.

Sales people sell features. Admit it; you have been there, sitting in on a demo of some whiz-bang software program, just drooling at all of the features, promises and lures of the next shiny thing. It’s easy to get sucked-in. CRM systems, more than perhaps any other software program can easily take a buyer down this path. One of the main reasons this happens is because it’s the big promise of CRM – to be the center of your universe. Your system not only manages all of your contact records but it can integrate with your ERP, accounting, your VMS, your marketing automation platform, your social media etc… There are hundreds of buttons, gadgets, levers and connectors to everything … including your toaster. It all looks wonderful in the demo.

The problem is demos are conducted in controlled environments that don’t reflect the realities of your business. Sometimes, just because you “can” do something doesn’t mean you “should”. Doing more things often means more time, more costs, more headaches and more points of failure. Don’t make CRM harder than it needs to be.

In reality most companies are really only using about 20% of the average features in a CRM platform.

This becomes a particular with “Pet Features”, that one shiny thing you really are drawn to that might not be all that important. A good example of this is we had customer once who really wanted an instant messaging feature because it was all the rage. They thought email was too disruptive and because of the time savings they decided it was worth it to switch CRM providers and pay an extra 75%. What they found out was that instant messaging was far more disruptive than email. Essentially, they spent 75% more for a platform and ran straight into their number one complaint.

Action Steps

• Rank the features based on value, complexity and cost
• If it seems like an extra feature you won’t use – skip it
• Streamline your CRM to “essentials”
• Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

3. Installing CRM Without Training Your People

Current CRM adoption rates are below 50%. That means less than half of people inside most companies didn’t buy into the features, its value or take it seriously.

Selecting a CRM platform can sometimes take up to 6 months. After you sign on the dotted line with your new partner, it might take another 6 months to get it up and running. Decision making time and specific variables put aside, CRM takes an investment of time and money to put in place. At the end of that process it is understandable to wipe the sweat off the brow and take a breather.

Training is the number one forgotten part of the process. Most companies have a very small selection team and their installation teams aren’t much bigger. In reality, about 95% of the people who will be using the CRM system were not involved in the purchasing decision or its installation. To be honest, most people are naturally resistant to change of any kind.

Let’s frame this problem with a couple important statistics. Current CRM adoption rates are below 50%. That means less than half of people inside most companies didn’t buy into the features, its value or really take it seriously. The number one reason for this is because they weren’t trained how to use the CRM or why it was important for the business.

Another study found that less than 33% of people manually take the time to update information in the system after having a customer interaction. That’s a pretty big disconnect. As we discussed earlier, CRM systems take time and money to implement. These systems are vital to every department within the company. To go through everything it takes to put these systems in place, why let everything fall apart in the last 10 feet?

Training is an important factor for success in any CRM installation.

Two very important things to consider: 1)  How can you increase user adoption 2)  How can you ensure they use the CRM system to get the results you are looking for.

Action Steps

• Schedule training
• Training should be integrated into the culture
• Prepare cheat-sheets and quick reference cards
• Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

4. Not Asking Your Vendor For Assistance

The more time and effort you take in customizing settings, reports and fields, the better off you will be … especially if you want to hit your goals.

We live in an on-demand world. We expect immediate gratification and instant plug and play features. The reality of this, however, is that things don’t often go as planned. When companies try to avoid additional costs by taking the Do-It-Yourself route, they put themselves are greater risk.

There are some great advantages to having the insights and experience of the vendor who provides your CRM platform. First off, they know the product inside and out. No matter how easy something seems, there are always little tips and tricks that make installation and use a little more pleasant.  Secondly, given the large volume of installs that vendors help their clients through, there is very little they haven’t already encountered. Your vendor will have already gone through developing best practices; they know where the bumps are in the road you aren’t seeing yet. While there will no doubt be additional costs to have this kind of expertise on hand, it will also potentially save you time and money in the long haul.

Try working with your CRM vendor to understand the set-up tasks. Obviously if you are a new CRM customer with no database things will go far easier, but if you are moving from a legacy system to a completely new CRM with lots of data and customization, extra resources may be just what the doctor ordered.

As with most things, a blended strategy is always going to work best. If the vendor can do something faster or has an expertise in something you don’t, you should leverage them. If there is ever any doubt or question, simply pick up the phone and ask. It’s usually when you don’t ask questions that problems arise.

One thing is for certain. If you are planning on getting the most out of your CRM, you are going to have to customize it. CRM systems set to default on everything out of the box are most certainly not going to match with your needs.

Action Steps

• Identify what your capabilities are and where your vendor is faster or more skilled
• Prepare for customization
• When in doubt, pick up the phone
• Want More Information: Ask Us A Question or Take A Free Demo

5. Lack Of End User Value

The best thing you can do is involve your people and help them understand how their involvement with the CRM system can help the company achieve its goals.

Everyone who purchases a CRM system does so because they really believe that installing it will somehow benefit the business. Given the power of most CRM systems this is true but at the end of the day, it’s the blocking and tackling that show up on the scoreboard.

Imagine you select the perfect CRM provider and your install goes off without a hitch. Everything is perfect; the new CRM is highly customized, all of your data went in like grease lightening and its unicorns and butterflies as far as the eye can see. Now imagine Jerry in sales doesn’t like the new system. He doesn’t enter in any of his information and all day long he is talking to all of the other salespeople about everything wrong with the CRM. Pretty soon, they are all agreeing with Jerry and they aren’t putting in their information either. Not because there isn’t any sales information in your new

CRM, the sales managers can’t project their pipeline. To make matters worse, Jerry didn’t update a customer issue and now that customer has left for good. Jerry also didn’t enter in a new customer so accounting didn’t know they had to invoice this new customer and now they are getting free service which is costing the company money. Sounds bad right?

A good CRM install can go bad in a hurry if end users don’t see the value in keeping it updated. We all live in our own little worlds and if we don’t see the value in things, we simply ignore them. These little problems fester into larger problems and before you know it, problems are out of control.

The best thing you can do is to involve your people and help them understand how their involvement with the CRM system can help the company achieve its goals. People will often respect what mangers inspect and therefore, so long as expectations are properly being managed, and processes are being adhered to, you can create a culture that is CRM positive. If they see the value in what they are doing they will take ownership in ensuring the CRM has an impact.

Action Steps

• Create ownership in the CRM’s data
• Manage to expectations
• Make CRM part of the culture

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For many in sales today, they never got to experience face to face sales – they never got the experience of “pressing the flesh”. Back then, you had to be able to read a human being. You had to read their smile, how they shrugged their shoulders, engaged in eye contact or heard the subtle tones in their voice. All clues that gave you a sense of how the deal was going to turn out. In short, we could read a prospect’s “body language”. These clues helped us to figure out what to say or what next steps we needed to take in order to close the business.

The opportunity to establish a warm and trusting relationship with our prospects and customers was ever present. Those who succeeded were often times the ones most tapped into this “body language”. It gave them an unfair advantage. Believe it or not, in today’s crazy world of sales and marketing, we can still read those signs; they are digital in nature but still there, and you can still use them as an unfair advantage. If you know what to look for.

Capturing virtual prospects gestures, behaviors, and interests — their digital footprints — allows us to identify good opportunities, understand needs, respond in meaningful ways, build trust and comfort, and close more business faster. Making this happen is simple; but you need the right tools. That’s where GoldMine CRM and IntelliClick come in. Together, they offer an effective solution to capture, track and act on digital body language. Join us for a complimentary webinar on October 24th at 2pm Eastern to learn how you can take advantage of digital body language. REGISTER HERE

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