Getting the most from your CRM system

Part 3: Achieving results

Step 1: Keep the project team in place

It's a good idea not to disband your project team as soon as your CRM deployment is complete. It will provide the expertise you need to develop your use of the system, especially as you look at ways in which you CRM can take the strain of new pressures on your business. Continuous improvement should be the name of the game and will help you integrate CRM constructively into your business so it consistently delivers the benefits you've been anticipating.

Step 2: Manage company data

Be watchful for the sudden appearance of silos of new data that may pop up across your business. Staff may be slow to adopt a company-wide perspective and, instead, create new islands of information in ways they've been used to, rather than incorporate them into your CRM database. It's important to keep the implementation momentum going so that everyone becomes attuned to using the CRM, and to appreciate fully what it can do.

Step 3: Keep staff up to speed

Be sure to include your CRM in staff training programmes. Your staff will inevitably change and if new members are not properly inducted in your CRM's use then you will undo much of the progress gained during the initial project phase.

Worse, your CRM system could quickly become a relic with newer staff working around it in all manner of inefficient ways because they don't know how to use the system or are unaware of its capabilities.

Should new staff be left in ignorance of the tools they have available, your CRM will be undermined and your investment in it potentially wasted.

Missed previous parts of the guide? Catch up with:

Part 1: Securing success

Part 2: Insisting on adoption

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