Every business has turning points at some point of its lifecycle - it could range from creating a new product, going through a brand refresh, hiring a new CEO or even adopting a new game-changing CRM software.

In our previous blog article, we provided a quick 5-step guide to get started with CRM. In this post, we’ll uncover the 16 Biggest Secrets that will help you make better decisions to choose the best B2B CRM software for your company.

It’s about time you got the help you needed to identify and settle with the best B2B CRM platform the market has to offer.

1. Identify the Problem you're trying to Solve:

Every business is different in some way or the other. It’s the differences that make it unique. Your business might have its own reasons to need a CRM software - you just need to identify those reasons in order to extract the exact benefit from the CRM platform.
Note down the challenges your business faces, and have a detailed understanding of what solutions would be required to face them.

2. Find a Solution that Addresses the Identified Problem:

During your market research and software evaluation phase, always keep your business’ problems in mind before making the purchase decisions. After all, it’s not always about how cheap the software is, but about how well it can serve the purpose and solve your firm’s problems.

3. Create a Checklist of the Ideal CRM Features:

Identify and document all the important features that would be major players in solving the problem. This is very important because without a “wishlist” of the most desirable features, it can be a daunting task to go out looking for the best CRM. For instance, if you are looking to enhance your marketing efforts, the ideal features in a CRM would be to improve lead generation and help you initiate a better communication pattern with your potential clients.

4. Opt for the Software that Enables Customized Communication:

There are 3 broad stages every prospect passes through before becoming your customer. Those stages are - Awareness of the need, Consideration of the available solutions, and Decision to choose the vendor and purchase the solution. This is also known as the “Buyer’s Journey”.
Keeping this in mind, the ideal CRM should help you create customized communication strategies and patterns for leads at each stage of the buyer’s journey. This will enable you to address the needs of each prospect in the most effective manner by providing tailor-made content to them.

5. Find a Feature that helps you in Categorizing leads:

Leads need to be identified, categorized and nurtured based on what stage of the buyer’s journey they’re in. To do this, look for a CRM feature that enables you to segregate leads and customers into the right categories in order to avoid confusion and generic, irrelevant solutions. While checking out CRM softwares, review categorisation abilities and whether it suits your contact base.

6. Choose a time-saving program:

A great CRM should help you save time (including initial set-up and daily use) . Enough said.

7. Ability to Automate: 

Automation not only saves time, but also reduces margin for errors and prevents forgetfulness in completion of tasks. This is, therefore, one of the most important features you should look for in a CRM. For example, Hubspot CRM works in collaboration with their marketing automation tool, Workflows to create an expert assessment of a prospect to work in delivering hyper-specific messages that would be tough to target based off behavioral data alone.

8. Conversion Enhancement:

Let’s be very honest to ourselves - money doesn’t just flow out of nowhere. Your business needs sales to survive, so get a CRM that contains sales-friendly features and also nurtures leads better leading them to convert faster for a successful sale.

9. Analytics Matter:

Most CRMs have the ability to generate detailed reports on all aspects of the business. Use those insights to make your operations smarter to improve overall business performance.

10. Ease of Use:

Just because CRMs are sophisticated and multi-functional business development tools, they don’t have to be difficult to use. Search for softwares that are user-friendly with clear navigation menus inside-out, so that your team doesn’t have to keep spending time finding ways of getting simple tasks done.

11. Interdepartmental Coordination:

Some customer issues cannot be dealt by a single team member - there can be times where grievances need to be addressed to various teams to find an amicable solution. To facilitate this interdepartmental collaboration, look for a CRM that provides such a feature. Happy customers are after all, a great & free sales tool.

12. Connected Softwares and Apps:

Isn’t it satisfyingly convenient when your CRM platform smoothly works with other softwares and apps like an integrated tool rather than you having to manually add elements from other third-party softwares, everytime? Many leading software providers in the market have a multitude of partner apps to make your operations seamless, smooth and efficient.
For example, Hubspot has more than 50 partner softwares to make life easier for you.

13. Never Forget your Business Growth Objectives:

Remember - You’re not just installing it for the present situation to monitor day-to-day activities and achieve the current year’s targets. You should always keep your business growth goals and long-term objectives in mind while choosing a software so that it stays with you for as long as your business exists.

14. Choose the one that grows with you:

You need a tool that can handle the volume of your business operations and grows along with it over time. As mentioned earlier, it’s not just a one-time setup. It’s an organisational asset, so choose the right one wisely based on its credibility, versatility, and robustness.

15. Customer Service

You’re the customer here, so choose a vendor that ensures that your consumer rights are valued. The ideal vendor will provide excellent customer service to answer your questions, and troubleshoot any issues that may arise.

Lastly, don’t ever forget to -

16. Study and Uncover Hidden Costs

If it’s too good to be true, it probably is. Some vendors tend to offer lucrative deals while shadowing hidden costs with product attractiveness. So, before you sign along the dotted line or authorise a wire transfer, ensure that you’re not being duped in any way, by having to pay for costs you are unaware of.

With experience and expertise in this field, we whole-heartedly vouch for Hubspot CRM which dominates the entire CRM landscape with unparalleled functionality, integration options and user-friendliness.

It’s also FREE. Forever.

Good luck in finding the best B2B CRM software for your business!