Customer relationship management (CRM) is the blanket term for a group of tools and techniques that help businesses understand the needs and desires of their customer base to optimize sales and marketing. By collecting and understanding essential information about your customers such as purchase records, buying habits, demographic information, and cross-channel messaging, a CRM can help you provide a better customer experience.
Besides providing this information to anyone in your organization who needs it — from salesmen on the dealership floor to finance managers and parts personnel — a CRM can streamline business processes and increase performance by automating key tasks and providing analysis for sales data. These analytics can contextualize pieces of data to make them easier to understand and convert into actionable tasks. Metrics can also help you understand the power and value of marketing campaigns so you can better optimize your advertising and outreach efforts.
The Advantages of Cloud Based CRMs for Auto Dealers
Auto dealers have been using customer relationship tools to help build and maintain strong bonds with customers that support repeat business. Cloud-based CRMs offer a number of advantages for auto dealerships, including:
Centralized Information
A cloud-based CRM corrals all pertinent customer data into one secure, easily accessible database, making it simple for any authorized employee to find the information they need. With a click, your sales force can access all previous customer interaction, including sales efforts and follow-ups, allowing them to more fully meet the needs of individual customers.
Smooth Integration with Current Systems
Using a cloud-based CRM provides dealers with a smart way to integrate with systems, even across dealerships. Cloud-based products are designed to integrate with a variety of applications, and CRMs are no exception. For example, if your customer takes a test drive at one location, but later turns up at a second location for financing information, your CRM will allow that second location to pick up the sales thread in a seamless manner, providing a fast and efficient process for both your customer and your sales personnel.
Targeted Follow Ups
CRM platforms can help your sales personnel provide more targeted customer service that can build trust and lasting relationships. Because a CRM tracks all customer interactions, your sales force can create targeted automated messages that remind customers about important scheduling matters such as routine maintenance appointments.
Smarter Reporting
Cloud-based CRM tools can help auto dealers better understand the customer buying process through in-depth reporting. You can easily discover how customers are finding your dealership — through online channels, word-of-mouth referrals, or even direct mail campaigns — to fine-tune marketing efforts. You can also better understand how customers are responding to dealership policies and changes and support sales staff in better managing the customer journey.
Get in the Cloud with Blue Technologies
Whether you already have a CRM application that you are using, or your dealership is ready to take customer service — and revenue — to the next level, you may want to consider a cloud-based CRM. Moving data into the cloud in a secure manner requires a high level of expertise — and one that may be out of reach for your in-house IT personnel.
That’s where Blue Technologies can help. Our Managed IT services team can expertly analyze your current infrastructure and CRM applications if you have them and design a cloud-based system around the specific needs and challenges of your dealership. Not only can we provide the appropriate infrastructure and support, but we can also keep your data secure. As a dealership, you handle large amounts of critical and sensitive data, from personal customer information to financial data — all of which is enticing to cybercriminals. Our team are experts are cybersecurity and compliance in a cloud environment and can also create a backup and disaster recovery plan that will keep your dealership operating in the event of unexpected data loss or theft.
Create better customer relationships with cloud computing technology. Contact a Blue Technologies consultant and learn how our team of cloud experts can help.
