Today the use of a CRM for the commercial team is basic and fundamental. More and more companies handle a large amount of information that revolves around their customers, with the aim of increasing their knowledge and trying to personalize products or services for each one.
This makes its management more complex, for this there are different methods that facilitate the processing of this data and its subsequent analysis.
These data are mainly used to get new customers, try to get to know customers more and seek to retain them, meeting the needs of each one individually.
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What Is CRM?
The acronym stands for Customer Relationship Management , a term used in the field of marketing with the ultimate goal of customer loyalty.
The CRM concept can also be applied to those software with which to manage the relationships of the company with its customers. With this tool you can collect a database with sales management information, all conversations with customers, whether through emails, meetings or calls, will be stored on the same platform and in this way better manage the information .
Companies use CRM programs to:
- Understand the needs of potential clients and clients.
- Anticipate and respond to these needs.
- Improve the relationship with your target audience.
- Organize, automate and synchronize business processes that are related to customer service.
- And finally, close a higher volume of sales.
Types of CRM
There are different types of CRM, each one used according to the different objectives or uses that each company wants to give it.
Operational CRM
It refers to the business process of the company , as it carries out the management of marketing, sales and customer services. These processes are called “front office”, which is considered a set of technological elements that revolve around the customer interacting with him.
Analytical CRM
It is a more specific CRM focused on helping to make decisions related to the company’s products and services, as well as evaluating data. It collects information related to customers, so it is linked to a data or information repository called Data Warehouse.
Collaborative CRM
It allows interaction with the client through different communication channels, such as e-mail, telephone or chat.
What To Choose A CRM On Premise Or CRM On Demand?
Now that we know it is a CRM and what it does, we propose that solution to choose, and what is that we will best suit for our company, if a type on premise or else hire a demand on (hosted service in cloud).
CRM On Premise
We are facing a CRM created, personalized and managed by the company. The use of these types of on-premise CRM is for large companies that have the capacity and need to carry out the creation of these platforms and their management (high cost), due to the need to manage large lists of information.
It is an in-house application hosted for the client and managed by the employees themselves. The company itself acquires the right to use the licenses, installs the software on its servers or computers and is responsible for its operation, updating, data security and in general, all activities as the owner of the operation of the software.
This type of choice, as we have said, is usually more oriented to large companies since the configuration is personalized, being able to extract the data they want and orient themselves to the search for professional results, avoiding taking risks with overloaded servers or internal data disclosure of the company.
Some of these CRM programs that SAP has, a computer system that includes many integrated modules , all of them related to the administration of the company.
It is fed by the data that is loaded and processed within an environment, and the system will be in charge (according to the configuration made by it) to produce with that data useful information for decision-making and the exposure of this data in such a way. so that they can be interpreted by the interested parties.
There are many benefits that SAP offers us for the management of our company, but we must bear in mind that an investment must be made in servers, licenses and maintenance.
CRM On Demand in the cloud (SaaS subscription model)
Due to the high cost of an On Premise CRM, many companies could not make use of it. From there came CRM On Demand, aimed at smaller companies.
In it, you can benefit from the use of a CRM at a lower cost, without all the benefits of a CRM On Demand such as the customization capacity or its power.
If you prefer to hire a service with these peculiarities hosted in the cloud, this option offers a customization of the application and maintenance of the privacy of the data with which it works. The user pays for the use, for the necessary infrastructure (storage, security, etc.) for the correct operation of the application and for the maintenance (new versions, correction of bugs, etc.).
Salesforce
The best- known CRM based on Saas-type subscription is Salesforce : it is intended to establish more meaningful and lasting relationships with customers, better understanding their needs and identifying new opportunities when it comes to providing help and solving any problem that may arise with fluent communication.