5 Things CRM Software Should Help You Do

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CRM software was created in order to help sales teams close deals and keep customers happy. Why, then, has CRM become more work for the salespeople and not the software that’s supposed to be assisting them?

This is the question Jeroen Corthout was asking when he found himself paying for Salesforce, but using Outlook and WunderList to manage his follow-ups. His answer was to create his own CRM software, Salesflare.

In this episode, Jeroen and I discuss…

• Common frustrations with current CRM software
• How CRM software affects sales and revenue leaders
• What sales reps should be doing to get a founder’s attention

What Your CRM Software Should Help You Do

In a nutshell, Jeroen shared 5 objectives your CRM software should be helping you meet. (Ask yourself, is my CRM system enabling me to do these things?)

1. Keeping the CRM platform up-to-date.
   
2. First off, your CRM software is probably causing you and your sales team too much work to keep it updated on customers and prospects. The thing is, the data already exists and it’s mostly digital. So shouldn’t your system be able to enter the data itself?
3. Jeroen feels like technology is evolved enough to perform simple data entry. I would have to agree.

“Most salespeople hate CRM because you need to do a whole lot of work and it doesn’t give you much in return.”

Jeroen Corthout of Salesflare

This is the main reason why Salesflare built an intelligence serum on top of existing data that actually organizes the data automatically. And, as a matter of fact, they were able to reduce manual input by 70%.

Imagine if your sales team had 70% of their time back to focus on customers and leads.

2. Effectively following up with leads.

In the same vein, your CRM software should be enabling more effective follow-ups.

If the platform you’re using is curating and organizing data points on all of your prospects, you can guess how much better your follow-ups are going to be. Jeroen even says that one of the best ways for reps to get a founder’s attention is hyper-targeting.

Moreover, there should be intelligent automation built into your CRM that sends out those hyper-targeted messages to priority leads.

Basically, when you have software doing the grunt work (that it should already be doing), you have all the insight and time you need to get super targeted.

That leads us to the next thing your CRM platform should be doing…

3. Growing your business.

This is where current CRM platforms tend to frustrate sales managers and organizational leadership.

When your system isn’t collecting and organizing data, it’s up to the sales team. But that’s not what salespeople want to be doing. So, oftentimes, insights are lacking.

“Collect as much data as you can to understand which prospects are the best to focus on.”

Jeroen Corthout of Salesflare

Fewer insights mean less reliable reporting means uninformed business decisions. And, in the end, it stunts your business’ growth.

It’s an ugly cycle that could be resolved if your CRM software, you know, did its job.

4. Saving money.

When your CRM system is doing what it’s supposed to do, it can save you some serious money.

For example, a Salesflare customer had $1m of savings in a year, spending $105/month on the software. Not to mention, there were only 3 people using the software.

Imagine what a huge sales organization could save.

5. Helping salespeople do what they’re actually good at and enjoy doing.

This is a big one. What if your CRM software saved your sales team enough time for them to do what they were hired to do?

Your company would save time, money, target prospects more effectively, have happier employees, close more deals, retain more customers…

The list goes on.

It’s Not Complicated

CRM is probably the #1 thing that salespeople complain about — for good reason, too.

Popular CRM platforms like Salesforce aren’t…

• Automatically collecting and organizing essential data
• Automating follow-up sequences
• Helping sales reps be hyper-targeted
• Saving sales teams time

That’s why Salesflare was created. We can only hope that CRM systems in the future take these crucial objectives into account.

Then, maybe sales teams and leaders can do the work that actually requires a human being.

This post includes highlights from our podcast interview with Jeroen Corthout from Salesflare.

Subscribe to hear this episode and many more like it. For the entire interview, you can listen to The B2B Revenue Executive Experience. If you don’t use Apple Podcasts, we suggest this link.

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