xRM – Anything Relationship Management

xRM is anything relationship management which works through CRM.  Ultimately xRM is anything relationship management as opposed to customer relationship management which is rather limiting.

For many years CRM has been managing xRM effectively, across many teams and many industries.

xRM basically talks more around how CRM has gone far beyond the traditional 1980’s type system that literally focused on managing customers.  Today, CRM is much more a strategic tool that manages projects, products, clients, students and much more… 

xRM is the development of CRM that has evolved over time allowing anything relationship management.

To find out more about xRM join us at the Caltech Forum 2010 or email George@caltech.co.uk

GoldMine best practise – Sales

Every customer commences its life as a lead – Marketing being the first phase getting them ready to speak with Sales.

Organisations that get leads to that next qualifying stage use GoldMine to:

Define the customer and the lead – whats the profile for a customer?  What is a good lead?

Establish a clear process for handling and distributing your leads

Get a centralized database to enable you to arrange leads by type, readiness to purchase etc.

Build a relationship by valuing them and engaging in a dialogue

Collaborative team working using a central system internally

Lead nurture through clever marketing and groups on GoldMine

Close the loop refers to knowing what is working and what is not and focus on the best activities

Market to existing customers

Ensure that reporting can be generated easily

Track and ensure that you are refining all the time.

To find out more about how GoldMine can do more for your sales team contact George@caltech.co.uk or call Jonathan 01924507280

GoldMine Best Practise – Customer Service

GoldMine moves customer service from a cost burden to a strategic asset…

Those that fail to take customer service seriously really do suffer – with poor customer retention – which in turn affects the bottom line.

So if you are not locked in with your customers – who is…?

Companies that maximise the customer experience are those that follow these pointers:

They make support a top priority

They personalize their service

They integrate all systems and have a holistic approach

They are accessible…

They are fast and intelligent and know what they are talking about

Repetitive processes are automated and onerous tasks eliminated

Reporting is taken seriously and analysis giving a big picture is involved

This is where GoldMine can help. 

GoldMine is pivotal and at the heart of many customer service strategies and with 1.75m users worldwide…

To find out more about GoldMine CRM and what it can do for you contact George@caltech.co.uk or call Jonathan 01924507280

GoldMine Essential to Customer Experience

Using GoldMine database CRM can really aid customer experience – and here is how it can enable your organisation to guide you to customer experience success:

1. GoldMine CRM will manage cases for you  from initial contact through to sale and account management
2. Route cases successfully using GoldMine
3. GoldMine can aid resolution of support calls with a quick search and automated tracking
4. GoldMine will manage your contracts and support (expedite or automate) how you want your contracts managed
5. GoldMine can work in holding essential information and collateral – its all at hand
6. Schedule appointments and manage staff easily
7. Using GoldMine will aid your staff to turn data into knowledge that they can use

BUT don’t take our word for it…

To find out more about GoldMine contact george@caltech.co.uk or call Jonathan 01924507280

Alternatively come along to our GoldMine CRM Forum on 9th March in Yorkshire and meet FrontRange.

Extend Microsoft CRM Functionality

FREE ACCELERATORS EXIST and are readily available..

CRM accelerators are add on solutions that enable more functionality from Microsoft CRM.  Some add ons give a more focused view of a certain topic such as the social media accelerators which focused on twitter and the full view of clients, suppliers or whomever you are using CRM to work with, or the event manager which will help your marketing team automate much of the delegate pain in organising events and the administration that goes into that task.

Each accelerators is free of charge and will accelerate certain pain points to meet your specific needs.

to find out more about Microsoft CRM or the accelerators, contact George@caltech.co.uk or call Jonathan 01924507280

If you would like a free demo or would like to see the accelerators in action, please join us at our free Forum 9th March 2010.

Hosted CRM or On Premise CRM????

The choice is yours… but we can help.  Caltech have been supplying CRM solutions for over a decade and hosted for many years now.

Basically the choice of hosted or on premise is based on if your organisation wants to rent their CRM infrastructure or if they would like to purchase CRM.  There are pros and cons for each option but often budgets are a factor when making this choice.

Hosted CRM

The biggest benefit by far of hosted CRM is it is quick to have it up and running.  The client isn’t reliant on an in house IT team to use Hosted CRM and there is no investment in hardware, software or upgrades for either…  Licensing fees are paid per user per month and are generally less costly than an on premise solution.  The biggest drawback of Hosted CRM is that you are renting the server space; the data is your organisations data but the infrastructure that CRM is working through / on is not owned by your organisation.  For organisations requiring customisations, on premise may be the only option.

On Premise CRM

On Premise CRM systems work best for enhance customizations and integrations.  On Premise CRM solutions allows organisations to have full control over its data.  On premise solutions have up front investment costs rather than paid monthly bills. 

So the choice is yours…  It will ultimately come down to what do you want to use CRM for and what will work best for your organisation.  Think about the level of customization you may require, do you have the hardware required in place or will you need to purchase new services etc… 

To find out more contact George@caltech.co.uk or call Jonathan 01924507280

Alternatively join us at the Caltech Forum 2010 in Leeds City Centre.  7Global will be speaking about Hosted solutions and there will be an opportunity to meet both FrontRange Solutions and Microsoft.

GoldMine Implementation

During the late 1980’s customer relationship systems were borne and GoldMine was developed by FrontRange Solutions late 80’s.  Since then GoldMine has gone from strength to strength, being refined, programmed and manipulated it has won awards and is still a favourite CRM solution of choice for many industries, worldwide.

Many clients Caltech has spoken to may have had a poor experience with CRM implementation, here Phil Callaghan gives his top tips of avoiding those pitfalls and getting more from GoldMine.

The first point to mention when installing GoldMine is to keep it small and simple – don’t try to boil the ocean as these projects will fail.

Think about how things are done as this is the biggest mindset leap – not GoldMine CRM itself.  Ensure that stakeholders, senior managers and end users are engaged to why you would want to bring on GoldMine CRM and how effective it can make the processes.  Think about how GoldMine can work for you in each team, department and transaction.

Your organisational processes are pivotal to the success of GoldMine CRM so ensure that you have firm ideas about how you work or want to work and how GoldMine CRM can assist you.

End user engagement to CRM is a major change and a major factor to the success of your GoldMine CRM implementation and use going forward.  Constant communication to the user community is essential and will really help you reap the benefits of GoldMine CRM.

Caltech CRM has a process to ensure that every implementation works and is maximised so that it works!!!  During Caltech’s initial phase one of our Project Managers and Caltech’s CRM specialist, meets with the clients implementation team to plan the implementation and ensure that there is clear communication and understanding of the GoldMine CRM Project and goals.  This initial stage of implementation is vital to the success of the project.

For more information about GoldMine please contact George@caltech.co.uk or call Jonathan 01924507280.

Meet FrontRange at the Caltech Forum 9th March 2010.

Hosted Microsoft CRM

Caltech have been offering Hosted Microsoft CRM for over 3 years together with leaders 7Global.

Hosted solutions have become more popular over the last few years as organisations can get all the benefits of Microsoft CRM without the upfront investment in installation charges and ongoing maintenance costs.

The prices of hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM are paid monthly and Caltech offer a competitive pricing model.

Users of Hosted Microsoft CRM through Caltech enjoy the benefit of 7 globals secure data centre. 

Hosted Microsoft CRM is viewed as an extension of Outlook; so it has a user friendly look and feel and uptake of the system is usually high with little training.

Hosted Microsoft CRM gives you benefits the same as having Microsoft CRM on premise.  Hosted Microsoft CRM will give the ability to view and manage your sales pipeline or funnel, and manage leads, customers, sales, marketing and customer service.  Reports can be generated to give you a wealth of knowledge about your organisation and you will have a visible pipeline. 

Hosted Microsoft CRM work well with Outlook, Word, Excel etc…

Hosted Microsoft CRM is available for those workers who are office based and also those that are out on the road or working remotely, as hosted Microsoft CRM is available through an internet connected computer.

Hosted Microsoft CRM provides a central repository for all your information, customers, suppliers, clients, students so on and so forth.

Set up of Microsoft CRM hosted is easy and you could be up and running in as little as a few days.  Microsoft CRM is a great solution that will grow as your organisation does.

To find out more about hosted CRM come and join us at our forum where 7Global will be speaking about the myths of the cloud!

10 Top Reasons to Choose Microsoft CRM

As more and more organisations in all industries and teams start to look at CRM – they ask us more and more – why Microsoft CRM…  Well, here are 10 reasons why Caltech would recommend Microsoft Dynamics CRM as its CRM offering of choice:

1. It works with Microsoft Office Outlook – literally in one place…  Microsoft CRM gives extra capability to Microsoft Office Outlook putting leads, marketing and sales information in one place for all teams to use…
2. Microsoft CRM works exactly the way that your processes, strategies and vision do – it is easily tailored and is the heart of these functions driving them forward.
3. The Right Communications to the Right People at the Right Time : Microsoft Dynamics CRM allows users to easily segment the data and group contacts (customers, clients, partners, suppliers, students…) allowing employees to give the right information to the right people at the right time empowering employees and engaging with the target audience.
4. Microsoft CRM works seamlessly with Microsoft Excel – so that data can easily be pulled out of your system and most importantly if it is stored as dynamic data then it can be updated regularly with the click of a button.
5. Microsoft CRM improves efficiency – it is not another thing to do – it really works and there are many advocates to prove it.  Not only does it improve efficiency of employees but also takes the organisation into the realms of higher levels of customer experience and satisfaction and competitive advantage.
6. Marketing and Lead Nurturing is a walk in the park – using Microsoft CRM really does allow marketeers to have the data they need to lead nuture or send information that is relevant at the right time. 
7. Micros0ft CRM can empower employees and allows them to work as a team in a unified manner – both in and away from the office…
8. Microsoft CRM eliminates the silo workings…  and using service effectively keeps customers satisfied
9. Microsoft CRM can be easily integrated – ask us what you want to integrate it with…
10. Reporting giving strategic real time view – is easily accessible from Microsoft CRM which can really get into what works and what doesn’t for your organisation, empowering management, refining processes and giving focus where it is required most.

For a free CRM demonstration, please contact George@caltech.co.uk or call Jonathan on 01924507280..

Register for Caltech’s free forum 9th March Leeds City Centre – click here to find out why you should attend…

CRM users

Implementing a CRM strategy does not affect just the customer facing employees.  Because of the need to transmit information from within the organisation and externally to customers, suppliers, donors, etc.   Every function is likely to be affected by a CRM project.

This means that every department should have a representative involved in planning and if required, rolling out CRM.

The introduction of CRM systems is likely to have some degree of impact on every job in an organisation.  At an individual level the aim is to provide each person with better information, allowing him /her to operate more effectively.  At a departmental level, by monitoring the effectiveness of different activities, organisations can better achieve their strategic goals.

Caltech has published its top 10 tips of successful CRM implementation – avoid the common mistakes.  To receive a copy please email George@caltech.co.uk

If you would like to find out more about CRM, GoldMine or Microsoft CRM, why not join us at the Caltech Forum 2010?