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- SalesForce is an example of a CRM, but doesn’t necessarily make sense for small businesses. SalesForce can cost too much and also has a learning curve. [01:10]
- Smaller companies can use a system like High Rise from Base Camp to organize your communications, tag people by category, assign tasks to sales team, all communication will be in one place if you BCC the information to high rise. [1:56]
- High Rise can be economical for small businesses. When we used it, we only paid $49/month to get the job done for a year or more. [2:32]
- Unlike SalesForce, High Rise is simple to set up, intuitive, ready to move on to a more robust system can export all contact info to dump into a more robust system when you’re ready. [2:52]
- We combined High Rise with one of my favorite tools, Zapier, to help our web applications talk to each other. For example, High Rise automatically tagged people via Zapier if a person came from a specific lead [3:18]
- Before you get started, talk to SalesForce representative. chances are you’ll screw it up in beginning. Our rep recommended a local consultant. $1,500 to set it all up a call and set it up. [4:23]
- Hold your team accountable to using your CRM. If someone’s slacking, you won’t get the same effectiveness out of it. [5:35]
- Remember a CRM is only as good as the data you’re putting into it. [6:05]
- We used High Rise in combination with Tout to maximize our CRM’s effectiveness. We could schedule appointments, send emails through SalesForce and access analytics. [6:20]
- Hold weekly meetings to go over how your CRM is working, what leads are coming in and how you’re using it. It’s especially important if you’re transitioning from an intuitive system like High Rise and transitioning to something like SalesForce. [7:35]
- Set expectations or create a wiki in addition to the screencast a consultant set up for you. [8:00]
- Ask for a screencast during the kick off call so you don’t have to go over the process over and over. [8:19]
Selected Links from this Episode:
Former Salesforce Director of Sales Shares How He Helped Grow Revenues To Over $100 Million
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