San Mateo, California – CRM (Customer Relationship Management) software is taking a large leap into the small business sector, thanks to another venture from the visionary Indian American serial entrepreneur Vinod (Vin) Gupta, a 1967 graduate of Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur.
Gone are the days of enterprise CRM applications and for the small business owner, this can be great and also a little daunting. With hundreds of CRM applications out there for the small business owner, how can you find the right CRM for you, your employees and your business?
As every small business owner knows, it is important to start with the basics. Here are the cornerstones of every effective CRM application, cornerstones to look for before you commit to a CRM.
1. Simplicity- When adopting any new software for your business it is important to manage the learning curve. Consider how long it will take you or your team to learn the software and begin to implement it. If the CRM application isn’t intuitive and user friendly at first glance, it’s not the CRM for you.
2. Time management- The perk of any good CRM software isn’t only the ability to track customer and lead activity, but to also track your activities too. An application that will allow you to create tasks, appointments and notes easily will keep you organized far more efficiently than any calendar app or notebook planner. The bonus of CRM applications is that many are cloud-based. So if you forget your phone or lose your planner, your important notes and appointments are still accessible from any device at any location.
3. Customer Focused-At the end of the day, it’s the customer that matters to you and it should be the customer that matters to your CRM. A good CRM will make tracking individual customer behavior easy while giving you more visibility into your client base as a whole. Lead management is also a crucial part to any CRM, after all the real beauty of CRM applications is tracking leads as they turn into customers and watching the growth of your sales.
At the end of the day, these three elements are crucial for any CRM geared toward small business owners. “The easier the application is the better it facilitates sales and growth for my company,” says Jason Bradley, of Haleakala Solar in Hawaii. “I’ve used lots of different CRM products over the years and have had the most success with a new one, CRM101, through my subscription with Infofree.com.”
Bradley is one of many users that applaud user-friendly applications like infofree.com’s CRM101. This software pairs well with the company’s overall service, which is lead generation. “I find my leads on Infofree.com and save them to CRM101. From there I track leads and can manage their status until they convert to customers. It syncs well with my sales strategy; I can see which leads are ready to buy and still focus on my current customer’s activity. It’s really an all in one service.”
Based out of San Mateo, California, Infofree.com is one company that is following the model of simplicity that small businesses need in a CRM application. The founder of infofree.com, Vin Gupta, believed it was time for his lead generation company to participate in cloud-based CRM software.
“Our focus is the same as it has always been and that’s helping small businesses and sales people find new prospects. We want to help them grown their sales at a very low price,” said Gupta.
On providing a simple CRM software with unlimited sales leads Gupta, a graduate of the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, recognizes how innovative Infofree.com’s approach is, “Again, I feel we’re unique in what we’re doing; making our products better along with easier software with which to use it,” stressed Gupta.
For more information about Infofree.com and CRM101, visit http://www.infofree.com