Although most people think that customer relationship management programs are only for organizing contacts and emails, this isn’t entirely true. In fact, there is so much more to CRM systems including features that could assist you with improving your sales, track leads, and as the name implies, maintain your relationship with your customers.But, there are so many options on the market, which is why you may have a hard time choosing one for your business. To opt for the best one that suits your needs, you have to know what features any reliable CRM system has, which is exactly what we’ll discuss in the list below. So, without further ado, let’s look at some features the best CRM systems have:
1. Tracking Different Interactions is Important
These programs are heavily used for managing an organization’s contacts – which we’ll be mentioning later on in the list – which is why it’s important that it enables you to add entries and track the history of all the interactions your organization had with particular contacts.
While you’re looking at all the options you can choose from, it’s important to consider how many times a customer will interact with different people in your company as they’re moving through the sales department. After all, you’ll want to opt for a program that’ll allow all the departments and parties to cooperate.
With a CRM system, you can manage all real estate business operations from one centralized database and capture potential clients, connect them to properties, store listing details, and manage agent workloads. You can access one here.
2. Organizing Leads Will Help With Gaining Clients
You must also guarantee that you could manage the entire process of transforming prospects you have into potential clients, which is something that you can easily do by recognizing, recording, as well as moving the prospects through the sales funnel- which is a method similar to managing your contacts.
Now, almost all options out there will have this important feature, however, you must ensure that it’ll allow you to operate efficiently and without any hindrances, which means that you must guarantee that it suits your business and, of course, your employees. This is why you should consult your sales department before making a decision.
3. Managing All Your Contact Lists Will Save Time
Any reputable and suitable CRM system must be capable of storing contacts – which includes things such as names, emails, addresses, as well as accounts from different social media platforms – in large databases that you could easily access and that’ll allow you to search for what you’re looking for.
Though most programs that you’ll find out there offer this incredible and important feature, you must look for two things, the layout and usability. Programs such as IXACT Contact will allow you to easily use and organize everything that you need, which is something that could save you a lot of time.
4. Email Implementation Will Allow Communication
No matter if you utilize Outlook, Yahoo, or Gmail, the CRM program you opt for must allow you to manage and categorize all of the contact lists you possess, and it also needs to feature a centralized hub that’ll allow you and your employees to internally collaborate on different things and processes.
Hence, when you’re looking for a suitable option for your business, you must consider how the departments usually communicate. If they aren’t used to communicating and collaborating within specific applications, you might want to use a CRM program with email implementation features.
5. Categorizing Documents Will Allow You to Easily Access Them
You must guarantee that the CRM program has the capacity to receive, upload, store, as well as share all the reports in a centralized area, which means that you and the departments in your organization can easily access and use the information they require.
If you have a lot of departments or a huge crew involved in advertising and commerce, the CRM program must feature document categorization and management, especially since this will ensure that your employees are aware of certain things, meaning that your customers will have a smooth experience.
6. Proposal Management Will Help With Your Sales
Proposal administration is a key feature that’ll allow you to generate and send different offers and estimates to your clients. Now, you should know, whether or not you’ll need this will completely rely on the nature of your business, as well as the tasks you most commonly do.
So, if the services and/or goods you offer require you to constantly go back and forth over the records and offers you have, then this incredible feature is a necessity in the CRM software you opt for in the end. Keep in mind, it’ll make things easier for your team, which is exactly why you should ensure that the software has this incredible characteristic.
7. Sales Funnel Management Will Boost Your Revenue
This useful characteristic will enable you to see and monitor an overview of the entire sales department, but more importantly, it’ll also enable you to see the progress and status of every single stage in the sales funnel, meaning that you’ll know exactly what’s going on with your sales.
For instance, if you have a bigger sales funnel, it’s probably a great idea if you prioritize this trait as you’re searching for a suitable CRM program. After all, it’ll enable you to view the entire funnel, which implies that you’ll be fitted of transforming potential clients into paying ones.
8. Automation is The Key
If there is one thing that you must take away from this article, it’s the fact that automating different tasks by generating workflows will help your entire organization. After all, it’ll prompt different actions or it’ll be able to send follow-up notifications, meaning that your teams will be ready for the next tasks they need to complete.
You should know, this important feature is usually available only as an upgrade, which means that you might not get it right away when you purchase the software. Hence, when looking for one for your company, consider whether or not you’ll need to automate the workflows within your company. Keep in mind, it’ll save you a lot of time, so, you should strongly consider getting this feature.
Conclusion
There are hundreds, if not thousands of CRM programs out there. If you want to ensure that you choose a suitable one for your organization, you must ensure that it has the features we mentioned above, especially since some of the best CRM programs have these important characteristics.
So, now that you’re aware of what you’ll have to look for, you really shouldn’t waste any more of your time. Instead, you should choose the features that are suitable for your business, and then start looking for the best CRM system that’ll suit all of your needs and requirements.
Kim Marks 
Nicola Holder