CRM for manufacturers – user's Blog!

April 10, 2017

Turning Your Contact Management System Into A True CRM System

There’s a difference between high school and college, just like there’s a difference between the minor leagues and major leagues in baseball. Both represent a whole other level of performance. A high school diploma is good, but a college degree opens many more doors. Playing in the minor leagues is an accomplishment, but being a major league baseball player is a truly remarkable. The same goes for your CRM system.

Most of our clients own CRM systems, but they’re not truly using them as CRM systems. They’re basically just advanced contact managers. They’re databases – glorified roledexes, that in the best cases have not only demographic information about customers and prospects but also track some activities, notes and emails. A few, however, use their CRM applications like a true CRM system. One of these companies is called Smith Supply (I’m changing their name for the purposes of this piece, but they are real).

Smith Supply distributes parts to industrial equipment users and manufacturers and also provides maintenance and repair services. They have taken their CRM application from one that is used by just a few people to a mission-critical system that is relied on by their entire fifty-person company. How did they make the leap from contact management to true CRM? They did these three things.

They use CRM for both sales and service.

Many people think that CRM systems are just sales and marketing tools. They are right – a good one gives a sales team the ability to track contacts, accounts, opportunities, quotes and forecasts. But smart companies, like Smith Supply, know that only using a CRM system as a sales tool is just like using half the system. CRM is customer relationship, not prospect relationship. Of course, Smith has prospects in their database. But they also have customers, active or inactive, there as well. At smith, every interaction by anyone in the company is recorded. Customer issues, complaints and questions are logged into the database with worfklows designed for follow-up and resolution. The system is used for maintenance and service calls. Alerts have been configured if customers have certain problems or there are delays. Reports are generated daily that show management customer calls and resolutions.

A great CRM system is used by the entire workgroup to provide a 360 degree level of communication and service to the customer, from the time of first contact to the time of last thing done. Nothing falls through the cracks. Everyone in the organization has access to every customers’ interactions.

They have a quarterly plan for their CRM system.

The executives at Smith know that their system is constantly evolving. To that end, they’ve assigned a CRM “owner” and a three-person team representing sales, service and administration to work with that leader. They meet twice a quarter to evaluate how the system is going and to set objectives for things they want to do with the system in the next quarter. They look to expand the use of CRM for sales, service and marketing. They review how users are doing and focus on those that need more support and training. Throughout the quarter they query users about their use of the system and how it can be improved. They attend conferences and stay current on what other companies are doing with their CRM system. They bring in their CRM vendor and outside consultants once a year to review changes in the product and solicit advice for making the system better.

CRM systems aren’t static. The more people that work with the system the more issues, suggestions, improvements, problems and opportunities will be created. Smart companies know that their systems will evolve and put in infrastructure to support those changes.

Finally, they invest in the system.

A college degree is expensive. A major league career requires a lifetime of investment. A true CRM system requires resources to make it valuable for a company. Smith Supply knows this. They spent money to get their system up and running. And they have an annual CRM budget, shared by their sales, service and marketing departments, to ensure that the system not only continues to run but grows and evolves with the company. They’re paying for the time incurred by their CRM administrator and team. They’re paying for continuous training and consulting. They’re paying to integrate their CRM systems with other systems. They pay to send their CRM team to conferences and to subscribe to materials. They understand that for a workgroup system to properly serve the team, they must provide the resources and time needed.

Like anything good in life, CRM systems require investment.

Do you use a customer relationship management system or is it just for contact management? In either case, as long as you’re getting value and you’re satisfied, you’re fine. But if you want your team to be using your CRM system at a major league level like Smith Supply, you’ll have to make sure you’re using it in all aspects of your business – sales, marketing, service – and that your investing and evolving the system throughout the year. Just remember – a college degree is expensive and takes a lot of work, but the long term benefits significantly outweigh a high school diploma.

At Insightly, we offer a CRM used by small and mid-sized businesses from a variety of verticals. Learn about all of Insightly’s features and plans on our pricing page or sign up for a free trial.

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About the Author: About the Author: Gene Marks is a small business owner, technology expert, author and columnist. He writes regularly for leading US media outlets such as The Washington Post, Forbes, Inc. Magazine and Entrepreneur. He has authored five books on business management and appears regularly on Fox News, Fox Business, MSNBC and CNBC. Gene runs a ten-person CRM and technology consulting firm outside of Philadelphia. Learn more at genemarks.com

March 16, 2017

How Manufacturing Business Owners Can Succeed at Digital Marketing

Why does a manufacturing business need digital marketing? Five years ago, that may have been a valid question, but today, the verdict is in. B2B buyers are human beings and they make decisions in the same way any shopper will. They research the product, the company reputation and reliability, and pricing before you ever get a crack at selling them. If you don’t have the content they are searching for, you’ll never get a chance to close. What’s more, you can lose previous customers lured to another site when they go searching for answers.

What is Digital Marketing?

At its core, digital marketing is content-based. You lure potential buyers to your site, woo them with content, and sell them with your knowledge and reputation. Then you keep them coming back with the answers they need and the customer service they want.

Your job is not to produce a steady stream of words to fill up your website, your emails, and your blog. Random content is not effective. Your job is to know your customers so well that you can anticipate what they will ask, and have the answers ready and waiting for them. It’s not hard, because you have history. While new questions will certainly pop up from time to time, most will be asked again and again as customers come on board.

If your reps are well trained, the answers to “what do my customers want to know?” are in your CRM. Use your data to find the questions most asked by customers, and be sure to answer the follow-up questions. Consider your content a knowledge base; a first-stop resource to give customers the fast, in-depth information they are looking for. Comprehensive informational content can save them time and cut down on your customer service hours, all while being a great selling point.

What Digital Marketing Does

Digital marketing is an inexpensive (by comparison) method of reaching a highly targeted audience with offers they are most likely to be interested in. You’ll take your business to the next level by:

Increase Brand Awareness. Customers are more likely to do business with your company if they recognize your name. Digital marketing gets your brand in front of a larger audience.
Build Your Mailing List. Your most valuable asset is your mailing list, and getting people to sign up isn’t always easy. Digital marketing strategy might include contests, valuable content to download, or other incentives in exchange for information.
Encourage Customer Loyalty. Digital marketing campaigns tempt your existing customers with offers and content tailored to their needs. Your digital strategy should include social media, and give you constant opportunities to engage and respond to customers. Customers and their onlookers will see the way you respond to your customers. It’s a very public way to build a reputation for stellar customer service.
Show Your Expertise. Your content and the answers you give demonstrate your knowledge and authority to readers, who may recommend you to their followers, organically increasing your reach.

Building a Digital Marketing Strategy

An effective digital marketing strategy starts with knowledge: understanding your customers, your industry, and your goods or services.

Manufacturing companies are often faced with having to explain technical topics such as engineering specs to a non-technical audience. One of the biggest challenges is often speaking your customer’s language. You may have to create content that explains what you do without going over readers’ heads…or dumbing it down.

Your content should strike a balance by avoiding industry terms. To understand the concept better, think about talking to your doctor. If you were told you were a victim of synchronous diaphragmatic flutter, would you be more nervous than if your doctor said “you have the hiccups”? Save industry terms for meetings and talk to the public in plain English.

Get the topics and the language right, then forge ahead with a strategy that includes social media, email campaigns, and a wide wealth of informative content. Blow your competitors out of the water by becoming the go-to resource in your industry.

At Insightly, we offer a CRM used by small and mid-sized businesses from a variety of verticals. Learn about all of Insightly’s features and plans on our pricing page or sign up for a free trial.

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January 26, 2017

Are You Ready to Take Your Manufacturing into the Digital Age?

The manufacturing industry generates more data than any other sector in the economy, but they’re lagging behind when it comes to making the transition to digital. Going to an all-digital management system can be a major undertaking, but it comes with a number of benefits. With the data manufacturers already have at hand, costs can be decreased, production time can speed up, and profits, along with customer satisfaction can increase.

German auto manufacturers are at the forefront of an industrial revolution. They have worked to digitize processes that helped bring ideas to production, as well as sales and delivery, and factory maintenance. By 2030, there is an estimated $1.4 trillion dollar gain by following their lead. The majority of the gains come as a result of better managing processes before and after production while the rest will come from the actual manufacturing process.

Digitizing Pre-Production Stages

Before a product can ever start running on the production line, a lot of work must be completed including research and development, testing, and product launch. Going digital allows the R&D team make better-informed decisions faster. Data integration and analysis makes it easier for everyone involved to work together with partners and stakeholders.

Digitizing the Supply Chain

With supply chain management software, you can get a clearer overview of the raw materials and any manufactured parts that come through the plant, allowing you to better spot potential quality control issues, saving time and money.

A CRM can help in your supply chain management. Keep track of relationships you’ve built with suppliers, distributors, and customers. If and when communication between your staff and any members of the supply chain is strained or challenged, then the supply chain is going to suffer. Use your CRM to keep track of all your contacts, and keep everyone on your team up to date with the status of each contact, allowing you to stay on top of any issues that may arise.

For instance, if a distributor calls upset that their order didn’t make it there on time, your customer service team can make a note of it in the account, so you can discount a future order. Then, you can make a note in the contact with the shipper that details how the situation was handled with them to make it right.

The integrations with other programs you’re already using, such as your accounting software, can help you with sales forecasting.

Using Smart Equipment

Connected equipment can help you keep an eye on maintenance issues, keeping the equipment running smoothly all the time, to make production go faster and produce more. Data analytics can also help you optimize factory operations to make sure you’re using equipment and staff in the best ways possible in terms of scheduling and product delivery. You’ll be able to send customer experience data directly to your product management team to forecast demand, and assist in the design and development of better products.

Though there’s a long way to go before we see industry-wide digital technology adoption, we’re now in the middle of Industry 4.0, or what many are calling the 4th industrial revolution.

At Insightly, we offer a CRM used by small and mid-sized businesses from a huge variety of verticals. Learn about all of Insightly’s features and plans on our pricing page or sign up for a free trial.

September 13, 2016

Customer Q&A: Manufacturing a Better Business with Insightly

Take a look around your office: chances are manufacturing professionals created most of the items you see. These professionals harbor a wide range of talents; they are artists, scientists, engineers, and craftsman. Yet, when faced with the challenge of managing their production time and the business side of things, many small- and mid-sized manufacturing companies admit that they could use a little help.

Insightly surveyed 465 manufacturing professionals worldwide through a third-party vendor to identify their top project management and sales challenges. One of those customers, Lorin Zavik, who oversees the sales and marketing department for Mid Atlantic Manufacturing, discusses how Insightly changed the way her team runs their business.

Insightly: In your own words, what does an ideal customer look like for Mid Atlantic Manufacturing?

Zavik: An ideal customer for us is one who comes to us with a concrete vision that we help them further ideate and create. We manufacture solid surface and laminate countertops. But as you can imagine, no two customers are the same. Being that we are located right outside of Washington D.C., we’ve had the chance to manufacture countertops for military bases, apartment buildings, schools, hospitals, restaurants, and corporate headquarters. The needs of a school differ greatly from that of a military base. But at the end of the day, we love working with such a variety of industries because it makes every day different.

Insightly: Wow! Impressive roster of clients. We imagine that some clients like to know what “the norm” is for their industry before they place an order. How do you keep track of all that variety?

Zavik: Honestly, that’s part of the reason we started using Insightly a year ago. Our business was expanding and we needed a platform to keep track of all of our work. Our CEO Laurent Claudel was also traveling more and networking with various potential customers and he needed a way to keep track of all those prospects while on the road. In the past, we kept track of all this information in paper files but Laurent is extremely environmentally aware. He wanted to go paperless and Insightly gave us a way to better track our current project and leads, while also helping us to reduce our carbon footprint.

Insightly: That’s great to hear you’re so environmentally aware and we are happy to hear Insightly helped your team go greener. How are you using Insightly on a day-to-day basis?

Zavik: We use Insightly to track opportunities on a daily basis. Once a customer requests a project, we enter the customer information into Insightly and use it to track the project from start to finish. We track our KPIs on a monthly basis; once a month, our team gathers to examine all of the current projects in Insightly, analyzing what we have won and what we have lost. Insightly allows us to set goals for the future and improve on existing processes. I also love that it is integrated with Google Apps so it can sync with my email and calendar for project management purposes.

Insightly: That’s great! What about hurdles and challenges? We saw in our survey that 62 percent of respondents cited organizing information as their top challenge. Is this something your team faces?

Zavik: We are a small business so being able to have one source of information is crucial for our team. But it’s more than that; Insightly’s mobile platform allows our team to work and stay connected from anywhere in the country, which is a challenge we previously had as a company. If a family issue comes up, I can work from home and I don’t have to come to the office and file my information for the team to see my project status. We also have an outside sales consultant who logs all of her meet-and-greets into Insightly from home. The ability to incorporate remote work capabilities into our office culture is definitely a cultural change, but an extremely positive one.

Insightly: Customer service is crucial in any industry, but I’m sure it’s especially important in the manufacturing space. Has Insightly helped in that aspect?

Zavik: Insightly is key to delivering the level of excellence we strive for when it comes to customer service. We are big on transparency, and Insightly’s reporting feature allows us to deliver a factual document that we can present to customers. It also allows the entire team to have a historical record of our customer. In other words, it is an educational gold mine of contact information for us. Not only that, the Insightly training webinars also offer some great insights and tips so I can expand my knowledge of customer service.