For those who use a CRM platform, it’s hard to imagine conducting business without it. CRM helps you manage all your company’s relationships and interactions with customers and prospects, streamline processes, identify new sales opportunities, automate marketing campaigns, and many more. But best of all, CRM implementation brings real results from the get-go.
Stats show that Salesforce — the world’s #1 CRM platform — helps companies gain an average revenue increase of 20% and an average ROI of 50% within just over a year. Guided by these mission-critical benefits, more than 150k organizations — such juggernauts as Spotify, AWS, Toyota, etc. — worldwide already use Salesforce to scale operations and keep customers happy. If all this feels like your goals, this guide is for you.
Note that building a successful CRM system isn’t just about choosing the right technology; you also need the right project plan in place that considers the team, solution, and budget factors to avoid unpleasant surprises halfway to the fully deployed CRM.
With this idea in mind, we’ve put together all the tips and tricks that will help you mitigate any CRM risks and maximize the value of its implementation while optimizing Salesforce implementation costs — so your project can stay on scope, on time, and on budget.
If you want to foolproof your CRM implementation process, it would be wise to reach out to certified consultants. However, keep in mind that your success depends directly on the vendor’s expertise.
When choosing a consultant, pay attention to domain awareness, similar-scale projects in the portfolio, and a number of relevant certifications. What’s more, if your potential partner is experienced in multiple Salesforce products (Sales Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Service Cloud, Community Cloud, Health Cloud, Pardot, and more), it would be much easier for them to adjust the platform to your unique goals and roadmap.
Of course, in the case of established consulting vendors, you pay more for the proven experience, but at the same time you get a higher-quality implementation process if compared with freelancers — so why take the risk?
Though your Salesforce implementation partner is an essential part of the team, they are mainly responsible for the tech side of the project. Since you better understand your company’s values, you should also build your own squad comprising a project owner, project manager, system administrator, etc., demonstrating a clear, action-oriented vision that they all can rally around.
Role-wise, the project owner defines the scope of the project based on your company’s business needs. The project manager keeps the project on track by checking in with different teams for status updates and acts as a negotiator between all stakeholders. The system administrators will manage the system operations and will be responsible for rolling out new functionalities.
Seamless communication between managers, clients, and the team is essential for the success and growth of every new venture. Accordingly, before the very start of CRM implementation, define the best-fit communication channels that will serve as a record of all conversations, interactions, needs, and notes, while allowing everyone to work together effectively instead of worrying about siloed information. This is particularly important if the team is spread all over the world.
An all-around project plan is what makes your goals achievable. Keep your team going in line with the requirements established at the planning stage and decide what’s most important to deliver first in order to minimize business disruptions and foresee all possible loopholes in the process.
Since you can’t manage what you can’t measure, defining goals and metrics gives you a clear understanding of the overall success of your CRM implementation. Any project should have precise goals, for instance, to increase lead flow by 20 percent or improve customer churn rate by 10 percent.
The final project success depends on the thorough understanding of customized configurations or changes Salesforce brings to your company. Discuss and analyze any feature you’re going to implement with the consultants and implementation team to stay on the same page and give everyone 360-degree visibility into all new developments.
Within aggressive deadlines, try to search for some ready-made solutions in the AppExchange ecosystem, as any app there has been approved by experienced Salesforce specialists and can cater to your specific needs.
Continuous testing within the implementation process can help you detect any risks in its infancy stage — meaning you’ll definitely save the costs. Moreover, It’s easier to fix the bugs early; otherwise, you will need to return to the very beginning to find the issue hindering the entire CRM implementation project.
To maximize the value of the new business solution it’s important for all users to master its functionality in full; that’s why user training and proper documentation are an essential part of any successful Salesforce implementation. It results in company-wide user adoption and successful digital transformation with Salesforce.
CloudMasonry is a leading provider of Salesforce consulting services for large and small organizations across the US. We leverage our experience with cloud-based systems to help companies discover more significant value in their digital investments. With experience that spans across all major industries, CloudMasonry combines deep enterprise consulting experience with a collaborative approach to project delivery.
iTechArt Group has more than ten years of experience in delivering customer-centric and next-gen Salesforce solutions. Their team comprises 80+ certified Salesforce Consultants, Architects, and Developers who have the necessary skills to dive into your Salesforce implementation needs. They provide a full range of Salesforce consulting services from consulting on implementation, migrating the existing solution to Salesforce or integration with third-party tools, configuration and customization, audit services, custom development, staff augmentation, full support, and managed services.
TechForce Services is an Australian-based Salesforce consulting company with quality Salesforce services from migrations, integrations, analytics, and staff augmentation. They combine their cross-cloud consulting experience and industry-specific solutions and offer end-to-end digital transformation strategy, consulting, interactive, technology, and operations services across the core verticals of Education, Financial Services, and Government sectors.
Manras is a Summit (Platinum) partner, who has won the APAC Partner of the Year award for 2021. We have diverse experience in multiple industries like Real Estate, Hi-Tech, Manufacturing, Insurance, non-profits, logistics, travel, Healthcare, etc.
Stratiform is here to show you there’s a better way. Personal, face-to-face long-term partners that speak your language. They align your business with Salesforce, allowing for growth and the change the future will bring.
CloudKettle is a Salesforce Gold Partner, Google Premier Partner, and Marketo Silver Partner. We have a decade of experience improving clients’ ROI from Salesforce and tools like Google Analytics, Marketo, Marketing Cloud, Eloqua, and LeanData. The brains behind BANT+C and CloudKettle SafeGuard.
Ready to take your business to the next level? The above-mentioned hacks will limit the overall complexity of the Salesforce implementation process, helping you move faster and be more productive. By following this guide, you’ll also be able to increase the number of deals, grow revenue, and provide superior customer service.
If you’ve decided to start your digital transformation with Salesforce CRM and want to mitigate all possible risks — reach out to our consultants! We’ll help you define your winning project plan and roadmap and seize every single growth opportunity for your business.
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