Multichannel Sales CRM To Win More Deals

A multichannel sales CRM is a dynamic platform that streamlines customer interactions across various channels. The value driven by such CRMs is multifold; from having seamless engagement to driving remarkable sales growth. 

In this module, we’ll explore the significance of multichannel CRM in modern sales, highlighting its role in enhancing customer engagement, optimizing outreach efforts, and driving sales growth. 

In addition, we shall also discuss the difference between a marketing and sales CRM and best practices for maximizing a sales CRM potential in reaching and converting prospects effectively.

What is a CRM in sales?

Multichannel sales CRM systems provide a centralized hub for sales teams to store and manage customer data, track interactions, and streamline communication across different channels. They often include features such as lead management, contact management, pipeline tracking, task automation, and reporting tools tailored specifically for sales activities.

It’s difficult to maintain reliable information on sales, business objectives, and profitability amid data that comes in from various sources. 

A sales CRM system provides a comprehensive overview of customers across multiple communication channels, consolidating data into a customizable dashboard. 

Your sales teams can use multichannel CRM to manage and optimize outreach campaigns, understand sales pipelines, and improve forecasting accuracy.

A CRM platform enables seamless management of customer inquiries across multiple channels, providing sales, service, and marketing teams with a unified view for delivering connected experiences.

Things businesses struggle without multichannel sales CRM?

Sales teams gather tons of valuable info, but it often ends up scattered. Without a sales CRM, details slip through the cracks, follow-ups get delayed, and deciding who to prioritize becomes merely guesswork.

Businesses without a multichannel CRM system often struggle to maintain consistency and efficiency in managing customer interactions across various touchpoints. 

Without a centralized platform to track and integrate data from different channels, such as email, social media, and phone calls, businesses face challenges in providing personalized and timely responses to customer inquiries and requests. 

Imagine a SAAS start-up that runs multichannel outreach campaigns and receives sales inquiries via email, social media messages, and phone calls. 

Without a sales CRM system, reps may have to manually switch between different platforms to retrieve relevant information, leading to delays in response times and potential errors in communication. As a result, customers may experience frustration and dissatisfaction, leading to lost sales and damaged brand reputation. 

Additionally, without comprehensive data insights from multichannel CRM integration, businesses may struggle to identify trends, preferences, and opportunities for improvement, hindering their ability to make informed business decisions and drive growth.

Integrating CRM into your multichannel strategy

Integrating CRM into the multichannel strategy allows you to leverage customer data from different channels to create a unified view of each customer, enabling seamless coordination and personalized experiences across channels.

Enhance customer insights

A multichannel sales CRM empowers businesses with valuable customer insights by consolidating data from multiple channels into a single platform. 

By analyzing customer interactions and behavior patterns, businesses gain a deeper understanding of their customers’ preferences, needs, and buying behaviors. 

This enhanced understanding enables businesses to tailor their outreach efforts and offers to meet individual customer needs effectively.

Utilizing multichannel CRM for personalized outreach

CRM enables businesses to personalize their outreach efforts by leveraging customer data to tailor communications and offers based on individual preferences and behaviors. 

You can enhance engagement, build stronger relationships, and drive better results in your multichannel outreach campaigns by segmenting customers and delivering targeted messages through various channels.

Marketing CRM Vs. Sales CRM

While both sales CRM and marketing CRM focus on managing customer interactions, they differ in their objectives, features, activities reported, integration capabilities, and user roles, reflecting their respective roles in the overall customer relationship management process.

These differences are discussed below in detail.

	Marketing CRM	Sales CRM
Focus	Marketing CRM focuses on managing customer interactions related to marketing activities, such as lead generation, campaign management, and customer engagement.	Sales CRM focuses primarily on managing customer interactions related to the sales process, such as lead management, pipeline tracking, and deal closure.
Objectives	The main objective of marketing CRM is to generate leads, nurture them through targeted marketing campaigns, and facilitate customer engagement to drive sales	The main objective of sales CRM is to streamline the sales process, improve sales efficiency, and increase revenue by effectively managing leads, opportunities, and customer relationships
Features	Marketing CRM features typically include lead generation, campaign management, email marketing, social media integration, customer segmentation, and analytics.	Sales CRM features typically include lead management, opportunity tracking, contact management, sales forecasting, and activity tracking
Activities reported	Activities reported in marketing CRM include lead generation activities, campaign performance metrics (such as open rates, click-through rates), customer segmentation, lead nurturing activities, social media activities and marketing ROI.	Activities reported in sales CRM include lead and account management, sales engagement activities via channels like emails, calls, LinkedIn, pipeline managementmeetings with prospects, opportunity updates, deal closures, and revenue generated.
Integration with other systems	Marketing CRM systems often integrate with email marketing platforms, social media management tools, advertising platforms, and analytics tools to streamline marketing campaigns and track their effectiveness.	Sales CRM systems often integrate with customer support systems, sales intelligence systems, ERP systems, and other sales tools to provide a comprehensive view of customer interactions across the sales cycle.
User roles	Marketing managers, digital marketers, and marketing executives primarily use marketing CRM to plan, execute, and analyze marketing campaigns and initiatives	Sales representatives, sales managers, and executives primarily use sales CRM to track and manage sales activities and performance.

Leveraging CRM features for multichannel outreach

Using CRM capabilities to engage customers across various channels efficiently, you can have better contact management, automated streamlined communication, and easier tracking of multichannel interaction. 

By leveraging these CRM features, you can personalize outreach efforts, maintain consistency in messaging, automate communication workflows, and gain insights into customer behavior across different channels.

Contact management and segmentation

Contact management involves organizing and maintaining customer information such as contact names, emails, phone numbers, and interactions in a centralized database within a CRM system. 

Segmentation refers to dividing contacts into specific groups based on criteria like demographics, behavior, or preferences. 

By effectively managing contacts and segmenting them, businesses can personalize interactions and tailor marketing efforts to specific audience segments, improving engagement and conversion rates.

Automation for streamlined communication

Automation in CRM refers to the use of technology to automate repetitive tasks and streamline communication processes. This includes automated email responses, drip campaigns, scheduling follow-up tasks, and triggering notifications based on predefined actions. 

By automating communication workflows, businesses can save time, improve efficiency, maintain consistency in messaging, and ensure timely follow-ups with prospects and customers, ultimately enhancing the overall customer experience.

Tracking and analyzing multichannel interactions

Tracking and analyzing multichannel interactions involves monitoring and analyzing customer interactions across various channels, including email, social media, phone calls, and website visits. 

CRM systems enable businesses to capture data on customer interactions in real-time, track your engagement across different channels, and analyze the effectiveness of each interaction. 

By gaining insights into multichannel interactions, you can better understand customer behavior, preferences, and needs, allowing them to optimize your marketing and sales strategies for improved customer engagement and conversion rates.

Best practices for multichannel outreach using CRM

By following best practices such as establishing clear objectives, maintaining consistent messaging, and continuous monitoring, businesses can optimize their multichannel outreach efforts and achieve greater success in reaching and converting prospects.

Establishing clear objectives and goals

Define specific objectives and goals for your multichannel outreach campaigns, such as increasing lead generation, improving customer engagement, or driving sales conversions. Clearly outline the desired outcomes to align your efforts and measure success effectively.

Creating consistent messaging across channels

Maintain consistent messaging and branding across all communication channels to ensure a cohesive and seamless customer experience. Align your messaging with your brand voice and values while tailoring it to suit each channel’s unique characteristics.

Continuous monitoring and optimization

Regularly monitor the performance of your multichannel outreach campaigns using CRM analytics and reporting tools. Analyze key metrics such as engagement rates, conversion rates, and ROI to identify areas for improvement. Continuously optimize your campaigns based on data insights to enhance effectiveness and achieve better results over time.

Final takeaways

Multichannel sales CRM is essential for new age sales teams, providing a comprehensive view of customer interactions across channels. 

Without it, businesses face challenges in managing data and miss out on opportunities. 

Integrating CRM into multichannel strategies enables personalized outreach and enhances customer insights. 

Businesses can improve engagement, increase sales efficiency, and make better decisions by leveraging CRM features like streamlined communication and contact segmentation. Following best practices ensures optimized multichannel outreach for reaching and converting prospects effectively.

If you have scrolled so far, it means you will love to roll on to our last module on multichannel analytics.