Initially, Excel may seem capable of managing your customer relationships. But as your business grows, you’ll need more scalable tools. You may be familiar with this expression: “It’s not what you got here that will make you succeed later. Initially, Excel does the trick. You will lose money just as quickly through inefficiency and waste of time.
While an Excel file can be handy, Excel is all too often used for applications such as customer management, invoicing, and creating item lists. But in this regard, the most famous spreadsheet in the world is not comparable to specialized CRM software. And as your business begins to grow, your need for more scalable tools will also increase.
Excel is sometimes contemptuously called the world’s worst CRM tool simply because it wasn’t designed for it. You can quickly enter customer data or contact details into Excel, but that’s about it. Who are your clients? What do you know of them? How important are they to your business? Knowing this information will allow you to meet your customers’ needs better and obtain better sales results. Of course, Excel also offers several advantages :
- It is easy to use
- most people know him
- all data is in one file
Excel is not a crucial part of MS Office by chance. But it will be soon that you run into its limits.
Manual Data Entry
You can use Excel for a wide range of applications, but you have to do things manually: you or one of your co-workers must enter all the data you want to store into a file. Simply entering and updating customer data becomes incredibly tedious. And that opens the door to human error.
Collaborating in Excel is also particularly limited. Of course, you can share your Excel files, but what about real-time collaboration? Impossible: Excel only allows one user to work simultaneously in the same table. So if you need to access some data immediately, but your colleague has opened the table, you will have to wait your turn. Or make an umpteenth copy, which you must remember to merge afterward. It works, but it’s anything but quick and convenient.
Waste Of Time
Managing your contacts in Excel is one of many time-consuming things. If you want to visualize your sales results in valuable statistics, you better get to work: select the correct data, create rows and columns, insert a chart, and choose a format – Do you prefer a bar chart or a nice Camembert? If you create invoices in Excel, you already know you’ll have to do it manually – with no way to automate the process. And remember: what is not done automatically is sometimes incorrectly or forgotten.
No Real-Time Collaboration
The ability to collaborate in Excel is also relatively limited. Sure, you can share Excel files, but what about real-time collaboration? It is impossible:
- The standalone version of Excel does not allow multiple users to work on the same file simultaneously.
- Microsoft Excel Online could be more practical at best.
- Google Sheets also has its limitations (fewer features, less loading faster, more difficult formatting and printing).
In other words, if you urgently need access to a file that one of your colleagues is working on, you must sit back and wait your turn. Or create another copy now, but then remember to merge them later. It works, but fast and well aren’t exactly the words that immediately come to mind.
Little Scalable
According to Forrester Research, the Age of the Customer started in 2010, which means that all your business strategies and operations should be carefully designed with customer satisfaction in mind. An Excel file quickly becomes insufficient as your business grows and your customer relationships evolve. For example, Excel won’t tell you about up-sell opportunities for a particular customer or when you should give them a follow-up call. In the age of customer relationships, you must take advantage of significant opportunities.
Additional Benefits Of CRM Software
Personal Communication
CRM software serves as a central customer database and is the ideal source for various uses in communication and marketing. Additionally, a CRM allows you to keep track of all interactions between your business and its customers in a single database. As an organization, you can collect data for each customer and better meet their needs. In return, you can craft a more personal approach based on the wishes of that particular client.
Access To Real-Time Data
A CRM allows you to manage your prospects more efficiently and track your sales quickly, easily, and profitably. Anytime, anywhere, you have the correct data at your fingertips to make well-considered strategic decisions. And yes, you can easily import your Excel files.
Why Choose CRM?
Are you going to keep doing something because that’s what you’ve always done so far? Change is never easy, but it is the key to growth, success, and progress. Choosing a CRM tool can be a giant leap forward in this growth process. With CRM software, you get valuable information about your customers’ wishes and preferences because all customer data and communications are stored in one database.
This lets you focus on customer satisfaction, collaborate more effectively, regularly track recurring issues, and conduct global analytics. If a CRM tool automates your administrative tasks, your team will save valuable time that can then be used for more meaningful and profitable tasks.
Read Also: How To Improve Your Sales Management?
