When it comes to business software like a CRM, your goal is to help organize your business and make complex tasks easier for you and your team to accomplish. CRM processes can help you organize data, improve sales performance, and boost customer retention. However, as your business grows and your contact list expands, the more complicated tracking data and staying connected with your customers can become. The good news is the right CRM allows for the automation of many important functions, allowing you to improve efficiency while still staying connected to your customers.
What is CRM automation?
CRM automation is the ability of your CRM program to automate repetitive and manual tasks in order to help improve the productivity of your team. This automation can cover areas ranging from marketing to sales and service and paves the way for your team to focus more on direct customer contact and relationship building, as well as growing your business.
Benefits of automating CRM tasks
How much time would it take for you to manually create and send out hundreds or thousands of emails a week? Obviously, this would take a lot of time that could be better spent on other aspects of your business. Automating tasks through your CRM, such as email campaigns, allows you to create the email content, as well as specific triggers, that when activated, automatically send out an email to your clients.
Benefits of CRM automation include:
- Streamline tasks and make your workday more efficient
- Generate more leads with faster follow-up
- Increase sales conversion
- Execute multiple campaigns at the same time
- Improve your customer satisfaction
CRM and marketing automation
CRM and marketing automation are technically two different systems, but they integrate well together. Marketing automation systems typically focus on the top and middle of your funnel, or from the time they first come into your system to the time they become a customer. Once they become a customer, they transfer into your CRM, which focuses more on customer management and retention. In other words, marketing automation focuses on lead generation while CRM focuses more on contact management and sales. When these two systems are integrated together, they help to maximize the efficiency of both your marketing and sales teams.
19 tasks you can automate using CRM
So how exactly can your business use CRM and marketing automation to boost your business sales and customer relationships? Here we offer just some of the possible automation that are available in a quality CRM.
1) Boost new lead follow-up
When a new lead shows interest, it is essential to reach out and follow up quickly before the lead moves on to one of your competitors. With CRM automation, you can create a welcome email that can be automatically sent out when a potential lead fills out an interest form. This initial email can include your latest promotional material as well as a link for them to schedule an appointment right away.
2) Appointment scheduling
When that new lead receives your automated follow-up email, it can include a link to an automated scheduling page where they can create an immediate appointment based on your schedule. Here they can set the appointment, and even cancel or reschedule as needed.
3) Newsletter sign-up follow-up
When a new contact fills in your newsletter sign-up, you can set automation to immediately send out a welcome letter, as well as place them into the newsletter queue automatically.
4) Event registration follow-up
If you are planning an event that requires registration, automating a response email after registration allows you to introduce your business, confirm the time and date of the event, and let the customer know you look forward to connecting with them.
5) Assigning new contacts to owners
Assigning new contacts to your marketing or sales reps can be time consuming. With lead automation, you can set specific factors, such as product line, geographical area, etc., that will automatically transfer new contacts to specific sales or marketing reps.
6) Thank you messages
After a customer purchases a product or service, that purchase automatically triggers an email message to thank them for their purchase. This immediate response is a great way to connect with your customers.
7) Lead scoring
Using your CRM automation can help you target those leads that are most likely to buy. Data within your CRM can divide leads into specific groups based on their likelihood to purchase. Based on these scores, automated campaigns can be initiated.
8) Ask for referrals
When a client purchases a new policy or buys a product, this new sale can automatically trigger a thank you email that also asks for referrals. If you have a referral program where they earn a discount for each referral, this is a great time to introduce that policy and explain how it works.
9) Ask for Google reviews
When your client completes a purchase or signs on a new policy, automation can send out an email asking for a Google review. The email can include a link to Google Reviews, making it easier for them to complete.
10) Payments
Tracking down outstanding invoices or sending out payment reminders for monthly payments can be time-consuming. Using CRM automation allows you to set up automatic email reminders that can include a “Pay Now” button for your client to easily make a payment.
11) Abandoned cart
How many ties have your put items in a cart, but never completed the purchase? Whether you got distracted or decided to wait, abandoned carts happen all the time. With automation, that abandoned cart can trigger an email reminding the customer of items still in their cart or even send out a promotional offer to help them make the decision to continue with their purchase.
12) Product reviews
Product reviews help to build trust and increase sales conversions with potential customers. With automation, the purchase of a specific product can trigger an automatic email asking if your customer would be willing to write a product review. This email can be scheduled for a few days after the product is set to be delivered to your customer.
13) Recommend related products
Automation can help boost your cross-selling efforts. When a customer purchases a specific product, automation can trigger an immediate email recommending similar or related products that the customer may be interested in.
14) Email drip campaigns
Automating your email campaigns is a great way to save time. With automation, you can set specific criteria for each email campaign and when a contact meets those specific criteria, the email campaign is automatically sent.
15) KPI tracking
With a CRM, you can automate your dashboard to measure your KPIs and automatically display the specific information that you want to keep track of.
16) Task assignments
Your CRM tracks your client’s movement through different stages in your sales pipeline. As they enter a new stage, they trigger specific tasks that are automatically sent to team members to perform.
17) Moving leads to pipeline
Using pipeline automation allows you to automate some key steps in your sales pipeline process. As a lead enters a new stage in the process, automation triggers specific actions based on the new level.
18) Connect with your clients
Birthdays and anniversaries are a great time to connect with your clients. With automation, you can set up automatic email cards wishing your client a very happy birthday or anniversary. You may even decide to include a coupon or special offer as a small gift.
19) Reports
With automation, you no longer must manually enter numbers and create reports. With a quality CRM, you can quickly pull the metric you need and create a report that can even be emailed to everyone that needs access to the report.
Are you an insurance agent? Let CRM help automate your business.
A quality CRM offers so much more to your business than simple customer relationship management. By automating so many of your daily tasks, you are essentially gaining a new employee for free.
To learn more about how CRM automation can truly make a difference for your insurance business, schedule a call with Better Agency today.
