Make the CRM part of the job

This article was included in the January 3rd, 2017 issue of the LACRM Newsletter.

A good, up-to-date CRM is integral to any business which is why it is important for every employee, even the newly hired ones, to remember to keep using it. A CRM is only as useful as the data stored within, so if you or your team stop using the system and start letting it fall behind, you end up leaving money on the table. For Mario Raia, President of Combined IQ, the CRM plays a key role in his team’s day-to-day, so he ensures that every new hire understands that making use of it is part of their job as well:

“If I’m not available and a client calls in, I need to still be able to know what’s going on, and if a member of my team is assigned a client, they will want to understand what is going on as well. This is because I may have written a note on the contact record, or set a task for them, and the CRM is the central repository for all of this information.

That’s why the expectation is for all of my employees to use the CRM. If they don’t use the CRM, that is a real issue for me because if they can’t adjust their behavior, it means that they are not a good fit for my company.”

-Mario Raia, President of Combined IQ

Tips to try: Learning a whole new system may be overwhelming for a new hire, especially if they have never used a CRM before, so it’s important to make sure that everyone gets onboarded properly. You can slowly get your new hire used to going into the CRM daily by scheduling events and tasks for them. This ensures that they get an agenda email at the start of each day that reminds them to log in to the CRM. You can also assign them a small batch of leads at the start so that they can test out how to enter data into the system. Once they’re comfortable with the CRM, they can start adding their own contacts, or you can assign them a longer list of leads! Click here for more things you can do during the onboarding process to get your new hire up to speed.

We’re here to help your team out, so if your new employee can benefit from a quick demo with one of our CRM Coaches, or has any questions at all, feel free to contact us!