CRMs have an amazing ability to take relationships to the next level. They equip companies and teams with the tools needed to attract, retain, and nurture clients. Tap into your CRM and you also tap into the insights needed to personalize quickly and efficiently for your audience.
Curious how to use what’s already at your fingertips to drive your personalization efforts? Read on to learn about the power of a CRM in getting personal.
Build Relationships
You’re already using your CRM to save everything from phone calls to social media correspondence to reviews. Tracking customer interactions isn’t just a matter of recordkeeping. This is vital information that can determine future interactions. Learning how to integrate them into your customer or prospect’s digital experience will bring it to the next level.
How many times have you called customer service for a problem only to be walked through the exact same questions each time? It gets frustrating when you’re constantly repeating information. Properly utilizing your CRM prevents these negative experiences from occurring. Rather than gathering basics on the issue a fifth time, a representative can get a clear summary of past interactions from the CRM and pick up right where the last correspondence left off.
The same goes for positive interactions. Let’s say your customer tags your restaurant in their latest foodstagram picture of a burger they ordered. You like their post, leave a comment—“Love seeing the picture! Camera eats first 😉” and your CRM keeps track of this action. A few days later the same person leaves you five stars and a rave review on Google. Because previous interactions were recorded you can thank them for the review, leave a comment referencing the social post, and continue the conversation. “Thanks for the stars! If you enjoyed the burger, you’ll love the pasta!”
This back and forth is what makes interactions feel genuine. It’s how you get your customers to know you care. We dove into getting personal on Social Media earlier this month.
Create Powerful Marketing and Sales Teams
Those working with your CRM are best positioned to achieve personalization. These are the ones with all the access to important customer information that can be translated into innovative strategies.
With CRM systems in place, the possibilities are literally endless for your teams. It is one of the best ways to organize and manage interactions and data points that can be built into effective ways of personalizing customer experiences.
This information can be used by teams to generate product recommendations, unique loyalty profiles, or custom-made banners, pop-ups, and shopping interfaces. Have you ever received a special offer sent to you on your birthday or a notice that your rewards points are close to expiring? These are all effective ways marketing and sales teams have used a CRM to engage audiences that feels personal.
Leverage Data for Personalized Communication
We have all tapped into personalized communication to some extent whether we’re using names in emails or curating full on year-in-review content for individuals.
Your CRM’s analytics can help you identify your customer’s digital steps. This gives you insight on exactly what they are doing, when they are doing it, and what they are doing it on. You have the capability to cater to the preferences of each individual from promotions to the best times to reach out.
Teams will use this to their advantage and start categorizing data, organizing by who likes what and discovering exactly how to speak to specific audiences. An example of this is a car dealership trying to garner interest for their brands. They take the data in the CRM and segment based on age, choosing different communication strategies for young, first-time drivers. Their tactics center around introducing their brand and capturing loyalty from drivers who haven’t committed to specific makes. Strategies like these bring a whole new light to what your CRM can help you achieve.
Understand Behaviors & Backgrounds
Everyone talks about creating unique customer journeys. Well, your CRM can get you there.
Even the smallest details can help you paint a better picture of your customer. You understand their shopping habits, tastes in content, and preferences for communication. For example, one customer may be prompted to buy something after reading your blog post. You can continue nurturing this relationship by including blog content with product references in emails.
Another customer may only be a purchaser of one type of product, which means you should focus on that category and not try to sell unrelated products. It’d be like pet stores sending cat owners emails about dog food that is on sale. Kind of irrelevant, right?
Understanding backgrounds also plays a big role in in customizing experiences for the future. One useful way to utilize your CRM is by documenting pain points that your customer has. Maybe they’re really struggling with internal communication or have horrible account organization. Figure this out early and keep track of it in your CRM. When you know their biggest problems, you know how you can add value to their experience whether that means delivering educational content or recommending products and services.
Use your CRM to soak up all the details of your customers’ likes and dislikes, daily friends and enemies, and then respectfully play to their preferences.
The Takeaway
Your CRM is one of your best friends when it comes to personalizing for your customers. It makes it easy to store everything in one place and even easier for anyone to reference and use to get up to speed on each customer.
This may seem like a database of details that speak to isolated events. Let’s just throw this one name data point into our emails and call it good? No way! Piece all the information together and you have a comprehensive look at the person on the receiving end. Now you can design exactly what your customers and prospects need from your brand and facilitate a seamless and authentic experience. Thank you, CRM!
