Businesses that deal with customers know that there are many factors to consider to do it well. A relationship with a customer consists of multiple types of communication and meeting their needs in the best possible way to nurture the relationship. For this reason, businesses can benefit from customer relationship management (CRM) software. This software can help them with:
- Managing contacts
- Managing calendars
- Managing a sales pipeline
- Responding to customer inquiries
- Accessing a complete communication history with a customer
- Assigning and managing tasks
Yet, with so many options out there, it can be tough to decide which one will be the best for your business. What tools and features do you need? Do you need a high-level platform? Fortunately, there are some great options out there, and two of the best are Nimble and Zoho.
What to consider when choosing a CRM
When choosing a CRM platform, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Each business needs to determine what features and functionalities they need to get the most out of their CRM. That means they have to dig deep to determine what they need from their system. For example, large businesses may need more features than small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs).
To be fully aware of your CRM business needs, you need to be mindful of:
- Your business goals – what you want the CRM for
- Preparations ahead of time to ensure your team is ready to adopt the software
- The processes you need the CRM to handle
When looking for the right CRM for your business, there are areas you will automatically consider. The cost is generally at the top of the list. However, there are many other factors to take into account. For this reason, it is important to ask these questions:
- Is it easy to use?
- Is it easy to implement?
- Is it compatible with your current software and systems?
- Does it integrate well with social media, email, and contact data?
- Does it have mobile capability?
- Is it web-based, cloud-based, on-premise, or a hybrid?
- Can you meet the hardware needs of the CRM system?
- Is it secure?
- Is it scalable as your business grows?
- What is the level of automation?
- Do they offer good customer support?
To help you decide, separate answers to these questions into a pro and con list for each solution. Let’s take a look at these in detail.
Pros and cons of Nimble
Nimble was designed specifically to meet the needs of the SMB. It offers them the same quality of features that are typically provided to large businesses and enterprises, and these features can benefit smaller businesses. With SMBs forming the backbone of the economy in many countries, it makes sense to ensure they have access to a CRM platform specifically designed to suit their needs. Nimble does that, while still being compatible with the needs of the large business. With this in mind, here are the pros and cons of Nimble.
Pros
Nimble is ideal for many businesses, especially those that aren’t big enough to have their own IT department. The pros include:
- User-friendly interface
- Excellent customer service
- Excellent integration with social media, helping professionals build and nurture relationships across multiple channels
- Great integration with Microsoft 365
- Robust contact management, including the ability to:
- Import contacts from a variety of channels, like Gmail, Outlook, and LinkedIn
- Segment contacts by assigning them tags that represent specific data
- Export contacts
- Easy to keep track of when and how you interact with each lead
- The “Today” dashboard provides an overview of your activities, engagement opportunities, and deals
- The “Prospector” app mines websites for the contact information of potential prospects
- Inexpensive
Cons
As with any piece of software, there will be some drawbacks. When it comes to Nimble, here are the cons:
- Tags used to segment contact data is unusable outside of Nimble
- No autoresponders
- Integrations require the use of a tool to sync the app to Nimble
- Limited data and analytics customization capabilities
Pros and cons of Zoho
Zoho is a popular choice for many businesses, and there is a good reason for that. They consistently improve their product and introduce new features and applications regularly. There is much to appreciate about Zoho, including these pros:
Pros
- Simple setup and easy to use
- Loads of features
- Versions for SMBs and large enterprises
- Easy customization
- Strong automation and process management
- Easy customer account management
- Pay for only the features and applications you need with various pricing plans available
- Free for up to ten users
Cons
Again, as with any piece of software, Zoho is far from perfect. Here are some challenges and cons:
- Navigation of the user interface is not intuitive
- Features are not very robust
- Tutorials need improvement
- Integration can be difficult
- Inability to import contacts
- Not ideal for complex processes
- Slow customer service
The bottom line
Zoho is a cost-effective solution for businesses that are small and have ten or fewer users. However, you will find that Nimble is an apt name to describe this CRM software. It offers the best bang for your buck for many SMBs, with innovative contact management and the ability to truly connect with customers on their terms.
Contact Sherweb today for more information on how Nimble can work for your business.
