Why don’t your commercials use CRM?

You’re an entrepreneur, your business is not going badly, but you think it lacks some kind of value that just gives it a little boost.

You hear the word CRM and you know that implementing it in your company is the decisive step to get that little boost. To be able to detect faults, improve the quality of customer service, have a solid and accessible database…

But… What’s the problem? Your commercials are reluctant to use it. Do you want to know why?

“Commercials are a strange breed of workers who go a little to ours and do what we want”… Or so they have made us believe incessantly. But it really isn’t always like that.

First of all you must ask yourself what was your intention when implementing a CRM in your company. Collect information? Have a solid, complete and accessible database? Control your sales team?

Your team may not perceive the implementation of the tool the same way you do. Don’t even notice how good the use of a CRM can be.

In my experience, these may be the main reasons why a user (commercial or not) is wary of using the tool.

If you set the tool as a duty: “You have to enter all the data there”, have the complete and absolute security that it will not work. It’s a matter of perception.

Entering the data for you is valuable information. Every Lead and every little piece of data about it you enter into the tool is a note, an indication or inquiry that can help you in future interactions by being recorded and stored. It is very clear… Or not?

Do you think the salesperson might perceive something else? For example, he may feel that if he doesn’t fill out a 100% report with all the data you ask him for, you think he’s doing a bad job.

Simply you can see things differently. Although the reason for filling out a report is to be designed to extract all the information from the client, the salesperson may perceive that your intention is to monitor their activity.

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Obviously the intention that many companies have is to control their commercials. And they may have several reasons for doing so. Generally, the reasons for this type of control are due to mistrust, because something is not working well or other causes.

My advice is not to use a tool CRM to do this. Why? A CRM, as its name suggests, is a Customer Relationship Management, and therefore, it is designed to manage and add value to the relationship with your customers. The reason for hiring a CRM must always be (the main reason, go) to have a tool that monitors and facilitates the work of interacting with your customers.

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This is the main reason for not using the tool. The salesperson does not appreciate or perceive the value that a CRM can bring to his or her day-to-day life.

Y, this motif may be the result of a mixture of the above. So it’s not uncommon to hear comments like these from the sales team:

• – A CRM only gives me work.
• – It’s a waste of time to put there all the information: “If I have it in my head!!”
• – It is very cumbersome to be reporting ALL my activity in the tool.
• – I don’t know what to do with the information. What good is it to know what Fulanito in November 2015?

Y, as a commercial, I can agree with them on some points. For this reason, I propose you some possibilities to solve them.

Don’t despair. There is a solution for your commercials to use the tool. It will not be easy and requires commitment from both parties.

Let’s rule out, a priori, that the CRM you have hired is not the right one. This is unlikely since 99% of these tools have a trial period to use and avoid such situations. That is why we must know what we need before hiring a CRM and also the figure of a CRM Manager is so fundamental so that the implantation of a CRM is a success.

Then, what can be done? In a previous article we explained how uSell CRM can help you to design some useful reports to extract the necessary information

Do not pretend to monitor everything. It is true that there is a minimum amount of information that must appear in the client’s file: visits made, quotes submitted, orders accepted… However, it will not be necessary to interrogate each interaction carried out. So if you ask your sales representative to answer a sales report with 40 “key” and mandatory questions it is likely that he won’t even bother to answer 3.

In this article we explained how to design uSell CRM reports. It may be helpful to design the right questions in a business report.

Y, if you want it to be completed, you should reward rather than punish. In addition to making them see the value of having that information accessible to them. Not only for the company.

Furthermore, my recommendation is that you do not include questions in the report that are direct about the seller’s work or that might make the seller believe that you are controlling it.

Finally, do not penalize anyone who does not use it. Ask why. You may not know how to use it and need training. In contrast to this, my advice is to motivate the team to strive to make good use of CRM with incentives that can be salaries or even prizes or rewards. These can be: free time, training you want, gifts or even a bonus for a Spa.

They will not be able to resist!