5 Important Hacks for Better CRM Sales Management

When it comes to managing your CRM sales pipeline and other aspects of your customer relationships, there’s always room for improvement. A solid CRM platform and management strategy can help you track and nurture leads, customers, and other relationships as they make their way through the sales pipeline. Of course, it doesn’t work on its own. You have to know how to make your CRM work for you to maximize your efforts. 

Running a business is no easy task. Today’s collection of tools and resources makes it easier, but they come with their own to-do lists, as well. By knowing how to hack the system and create more efficient solutions, you’ll be able to improve your CRM sales management and other aspects of your operations. In this guide, we’ll take a look at five hacks that can help you make big improvements without a huge investment. 

The benefits of effective CRM sales management 

When you have a solid strategy for managing your CRM and the sales pipeline, you’ll be able to deliver a better customer experience from start to finish. That also means you can enjoy several perks:

• Get to know customers better. When you maximize your CRM’s capabilities, you capture a lot of valuable data that can help you learn about prospects, customers, and more. You can even personalize communications and deliver a more connected experience. 

• Anticipate customer needs. All this data can help you understand customer purchase history, intent, and other elements of the buying journey. This will help you anticipate future needs and demands. 

• Target outreach and sales efforts. When you have all this information, you can use it to segment your leads and existing customers into different groups. This can make it easier to target your marketing efforts. 

And of course, the ultimate perk that comes from all of this: increased customer loyalty. Are you ready? Let’s dive in. 

Hack #1 – Take advantage of workflows 

Automation is one of the most powerful benefits of using a modern CRM platform. Automating repetitive tasks will free up time so that you can take care of other things that require your attention. When shopping for your CRM, choose one that includes a workflow feature (not all do). 

Consider automating things like:

• Scheduling
• Emails and follow-up
• Marketing outreach
• Self-service customer support 

Think about the tasks that eat up the most time in your day. Then, narrow down the ones that don’t require human interaction. Look at whether you can automate these things to save time and improve efficiency, and then do so. 

Hack #2 – Track your leads from first contact

Too often, businesses just getting to know their CRM will let leads work their way through the pipeline without paying a whole lot of attention to tracking them at the beginning. This not only ensures that you are organized, but it helps you identify which types of lead generation efforts are working best.

Your CRM is a great resource for tracking leads in a single place. You can even customize your dashboard to follow certain campaigns or monitor leads as they go through the different stages of the sales pipeline. This will tell you a lot about your campaigns, lead behavior, and other details you can use to your advantage. 

Hack #3 – Choose a CRM that integrates easily 

The last thing you want is to have to migrate data back and forth or work in two different systems simultaneously. Fortunately, modern CRM platforms come with several different integration options. When choosing yours, make sure that you check what integrations it offers. Compare that to your existing tech stack to determine the best platform. 

And of course, once you have the CRM, you should go through with the integration. This will allow you to streamline and automate even more tasks, manage data easier, and deliver a better sales experience for every single customer. It will also make managing the entire sales process simpler and easier. 

Hack #4 – Customize reporting for better customer insights 

Most CRMs come with standard and advanced reporting features. The average business owner or sales manager might stick with the standard analytics, assuming they’ll cover everything. The better option to improve your sales management is to customize all of your reporting. This will grant you valuable insights specific to your audience and business. 

That leads to better targeting in your outreach efforts, follow-up, and other communications. It also helps you learn to anticipate customer needs and build loyalty because you’re always one step ahead of them. The kind of reports and metrics you’ll want to watch include:

• Lead source analysis 
• Sales pipeline analysis 
• Lead status reports
• Forecasting reports and metrics
• Sales conversion analysis 
• Campaign performance analytics 

There is a lot more that you can follow, but these will get you started. If you’ve chosen a high-quality CRM, you’ve likely got a robust tool for analytics and reporting. It’s time to take advantage of that. 

Hack #5 – Outsource and partner up for even more efficiency 

You’re not an expert in CRMs or sales platforms. Even if you’ve been in business for a while now, there’s always more to learn. One of the best ways that you can improve your CRM sales management is to work with people who are experts in that field. Outsourcing and working with third-party services can help you make improvements at a fractional cost. 

What should you outsource? That depends on your business, but there are some tasks that can help every business run better. For example, when you partner with the virtual receptionists at Smith.ai, you can rely on us for appointment scheduling, lead intake, and a 24/7 answering service so that you never miss a lead. 

That’s not all, though. We can also provide support for your outreach campaigns to help you generate the leads in the first place. And we’re debuting our new AI voice assistant, which can help you deliver a better self-service experience in the customer support realm. 

To learn more and get help hacking the system, schedule a consultation or reach out to hello@smith.ai. 

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