Custom CRM development trends

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No present-day business company can grow and scale without a customer relationship management solution (CRM). Custom CRM software can provide a great package of benefits for your business operations compared to ready-made solutions.CRM solution`s goal is to boost the general company’s productivity and increase the outcomes.

In this post, we are going to prove to you that custom CRM development is affordable for any business company and it is really worth investment. 

What is a CRM solution?

CRM or customer relationship management system is a business management tool that is tasked to optimize the business company workflows by automating and better management of sales and marketing operations in order to provide an improved customer experience and eventually outcomes. Additionally, CRM solutions provide the ability to monitor the performance of all automated operations, track their efficacy to know what changes marketing and sales strategies require.

Core features of custom CRM system

The range of CRM options varies depending on the specific company requirements. Hence, here is a list of core features that are common for CRM solutions:

Report generation and data analytics

Based on analyzed business data, you can monitor the sales operations for a particular period of time, track their effectiveness and build new strategies to make them more productive. 

Contact management

Automation of gathering information about potential clients and structuring all this data within a single database.

Interaction tracking

This feature is responsible for recording any interactions with potential clients like mails, calls, documents, notes, etc. 

Lead management

Monitoring the process of researching, scoring, and further movements through the sales flow of each potential client.

Document management

All vital company documents can be added and saved in one system providing access for all employees in real-time.

Forecasting

Based on analyzed business data, CRM provides predictions for future sales and marketing strategies for the purpose of improving company services.

Types of CRM solutions

CRM solutions differ by their objectives and range of functionality that suit particular business industries. Here are three main types of CRM systems:

• operational – automation of sales, marketing, and service workflows;
• analytical – analysis of customer data and generation custom reports in order to provide a forecast on customers behavior and help to build marketing strategies to improve customer experience;
• collaborative – management of communication with the customer in order to choose the most appropriate channel of interaction.

Why do you need a custom CRM?

It is high time to describe the main benefits options that a custom CRM solution aims to bring into your company workflows. 

Designed to your particular requirements

You may know that the choice of ready-made CRM solutions is extremely large as this type of software is in demand for businesses in diverse industries. However, there are no guarantees that a chosen ready-made solution will bring the highest productivity and workflows efficacy that you could ever have. Ready CRM can not cover your specific workflows as it is designed considering general requirements. 

Talking about custom CRM, it will be specifically developed based on your company goals and demands. It is vital to define what problems CRM should resolve within your business to build an appropriate custom solution.

Cost-effectiveness 

Speaking of ready-made CRM solutions, you might know that these systems are not free and require at least $12 per employee monthly. It is okay when your company is small but would it be possible to scale? And then the development of custom CRM doesn’t seem to be so expensive. Custom software is always a great investment in the future development of your company. Despite it being designed according to your company requirements, it can also be scalable and upgraded due to the changing of tech trends and the introduction of innovative technologies. 

Simple integration

Far not all generic CRM solutions are convenient and logical in actions. You may need plenty of time to learn your staff to use this solution effectively. Custom CRM software will be built with the surely simple and suitable user interface where your employees will manage the processes they used to before.

Development of custom CRM

So how and where to start the development of a custom CRM solution? The key to successfully implementing custom software into a company’s workflows lies in the right choice of the development team. 

The development lifecycle is commonly divided into several parts each of those is under the responsibility of a particular specialist:

• Discovery stage – defining the project specifications based on research in your industry and company peculiarities, Business Analyst is tasked to highlight the main problems that should be solved with a Custom CRM and objectives of this solution for your business;
• Planning – an appropriate plan is half of the success of future solution so it is important to build a consistent strategy of how the development process will flow and split it into several sprints;
• Design – the beneficial side of custom CRM is the ability to design it up to your demands;
• Writing code – this is the responsibility of front-end and back-end developers;
• Integration – this process will flow easily as this CRM is built according to your company peculiarities;
• Maintenance – not all development teams offer these services, however, you should pay attention to it when choosing a software development company as your custom CRM will require updates up to the changes in tech trends.

Taking everything into account, custom CRM is full of benefits and values for your company compared to ready-made solutions. Your main responsibility is to find and hire a reliable software development company that has experience in developing custom business software and has mostly positive reviews from their previous clients.