Customer relationship management systems are incredibly important for the functioning of any customer-facing business. But such systems can be expensive to implement, and getting as much worth out of them as possible is an understandable goal. That being said, CRM systems can be tweaked and used for tasks that have nothing to do with strictly sales management tasks. Any job role that involves working with a large number of people could actually benefit from using CRM capabilities – and we’ll explore this notion below!
Contact Optimization in Event Management
While CRM is traditionally used for customer relations, it also has its uses in a B2B environment. For instance, someone who goes to a lot of different trade shows can tell you just how difficult it is to keep track of the myriad different business contacts and potential clients that you encounter. And sure, you’ve got many ways of collecting contact information these days.
But whether it’s a sheet in Excel, a phone entry, or a plain old business card — information can get lost.
On the other hand, if you’ve got a CRM system that’s phone-friendly, this could be one of the many uses of CRM; just put your contacts into a CRM form. And if you’re going to a trade show, you can make a custom Event tag and just use it to mark any potential contacts from this particular event. That way, not only will you have a backup of all the different people you’ve encountered and their contact information; but you’ll also be able to categorize them by the event.
Lead Management
Regardless of whether we’re talking about B2C or B2B, managing marketing relations is one of the many creative uses of CRM. For example, you can use the system to remind you to contact a lead at an appropriate time. There are many situations where you make progress with a lead, but they tell you that they won’t be available for a specific discussion for a couple of months.
If you’re managing a lot of relationships simultaneously, it can get pretty tricky keeping track of them all. That’s why you should set a long-term reminder in your CRM system for the future. Plus, you can store information there and simply go back to the topic at hand without any gaps in knowledge.
Sales Boosting
Were you aware of the fact that CRM systems are fully capable of helping you increase the efficiency of your marketing efforts, as well as your volume of sales? You can use the system to track the relevant data on your customers, and then come up with extremely precise and personalized campaigns that will perfectly target your audience of choice. In other words, you can use CRM to make large-scale campaigns for your customers’ birthdays, and send them all electronic greeting cards when appropriate. There’s nothing better than feeling that a company has a personal connection with you, and remembers the important dates in your life like your birthday. You can also send automated reminders to people who frequently purchase tickets in the case of event marketing. Or, you can pinpoint which of your customers is the most susceptible to purchasing from an upsell page, and guide them down the right sales funnel.
Educational Management
As you can see, the creative uses of CRM vary from industry to industry, and from sector to sector.
But these systems aren’t just useful for product-oriented companies that build customer relations and marketing strategies. Plenty of educational systems use adapted CRM products to manage their internal processes.
For example, universities face tough management situations in terms of student applications — thousands of them arrive each year, along with bundles of secondary information like recommendation letters, test scores, SAT results, and school transcripts. While most of these applications arrive online these days, managing them can still present difficulties.
That’s why CRM can be the digital filing system you require for the organization of student records. There are plenty of robust CRM platforms out there, perfectly capable of processing large amounts of data without clutter or deletion of old information. One of the smarter uses of CRM in this situation is making a student classification system via tags, and then further dividing them into subcategories by enrollment status, programs, etc.
Performance Tracking
There are uses of CRM that not only help with bureaucratic management but with student relations as well. After all, students are individuals with varying careers, interests, and personal goals. However, with a campus filled with students, showing each one of them enough personal attention is nigh impossible. That’s why CRM systems can be used to highlight the students who currently need the most management.
For instance, you can set your CRM to alert you once any student’s grades go below a specific threshold. And it doesn’t have to be just about grades; you can set alerts related to enrollment issues, missing a lot of consecutive classes, or other performance metrics you want to be tracked. All of this will allow you to deal with potentially dangerous issues before they become too big.
Targeted Campaigns
CRM has its uses in creating campaigns that will be the most impactful for your students. Using a well-constructed system of tags, you can automatically reach out to students with programs or extracurricular events that are specifically tied to their majors or their personal interests. It’s even a great way to maintain relations with your alumni or any other student organization.
