CRM (Customer Relationship Management) adaptation is essential for companies wanting to improve customer relations and generate increased sales. Take a look at these stats for instance:

• For every dollar spent on CRM implementation, it produced an ROI of $8.71.
• 82% of the best performing salespersons cited CRM tools as being “critical” to their success.
• Nearly half of all CRM users reported that their CRM had a significant impact on customer retention and satisfaction.

However, despite the advantages, around 63% of all CRM implementations fail. Many of these failures are due are unsuccessful as a result of poor adoption strategies. In this article, we discuss a few helpful tips for so you can have a successful CRM implementation.

1. Get the Top Management’s Support

One of the biggest reasons a CRM implementation fails in an organization is because of the lack of support from the most senior management. Ensure the adoption is successful, by obtaining the involvement of top executives so they become active players in its implementation, inspiring others and building confidence in the use of CRM technology.

2. Appoint a CRM Champion

Your CRM Champion must have in-depth knowledge of the CRM software being implemented and understands the interdependencies of business units and processes across the organisation. The CRM Champion is always looking to find opportunities to help employees utilize the CRM so they will be more efficient and effective.

Your Champion have will have excellent project management and interpersonal skills and able to facilitate a collaborative approach to the CRM project and build a team spirit. They are someone who others can approach for any queries, help or issues related to CRM usage.

3. Your Project Manager is Important

The project manager in not always the CRM Champion.  Your Project  Manager is responsible for the running of the CRM implementation project and obviously one of the most critical people for its success. Ensure that the project manager you engage is nothing less than stellar at their job so that all the needed steps are taken on time and the your CRM project and goals are achieve on time and within budget.

The project manager will work closely with the CRM Champion to ensure the CRM successfully integrates with the different business units and their business processes and other apps.

4. Provide Adequate Training

The successful implementation of any CRM system requires that the staff is properly trained in its usage. The time and money spent on training are well-worth it as it allows the staff to quickly migrate to the system. Training will minimize the risk of costly mistakes in migrating and importing data as well as ensuring everyone knows the basics of using your ne CRM.

A key to adoption of a CRM is showing employees how they will benefit from using the CRM. How will it:

• help them achieve their goals and targets?
• make their jobs easier?
• help them benefit from sharing information with other team members?

5. Define a CRM Strategy

If you fail to plan, you plan to fail. To successfully implement a CRM system you need to define such area as:

• what are the goals and objectives you want to achieve from the CRM implementation?
• what are your measures of success or KPIs?
• how will the CRM affect your existing work processes? What will need to be changed? How?
• what are the steps for each stage of the implementation process?

All of these and more need to be taken into account for your CRM system and strategy to be successful.

Conclusion

A CRM implementation is complex requiring the commitment of all members of your organization including senior executives. However, as the statistics clearly illustrate, the end result is well worth it. A CRM will help your business generate more sales and enhance your customers’ experience.

If you would like to chat about how to make your business’ CRM implementation a success click here to arrange a time with our specialist.