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There’s a lot to consider when you get a new customer relationship management (CRM) platform. Among other things, you must consider price, automation features, and analytics capabilities. But one of the most important things to think about is CRM implementation.
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Setting up and implementing a CRM system is a major part of the process, so you want to get a CRM that you know will make things easy for you in that regard. You don’t want a CRM that’s so complicated that you wish you hadn’t gotten it.
On this page, we’ll cover the most essential steps for CRM setup and implementation and four factors to consider when planning your CRM implementation.
Here are seven of the most important steps for CRM setup and implementation.
Having a CRM implementation plan in place is essential for a smooth CRM adoption process.
A CRM implementation plan is a strategy and roadmap that outlines the process and timeline for implementation, designates roles and responsibilities, and estimates costs.
A well-thought-out CRM implementation plan:
Learn more about planning and preparing for CRM implementation:
It’s important to find a CRM solution that can meet your business goals and satisfy the needs of your team. But how can you choose the right CRM?
There are three main factors to consider when choosing a CRM:
By assessing each of your CRM options based on the above factors, you can find the one that’s best suited to your unique needs.
Learn more about choosing the right CRM:
To use your CRM efficiently, you’ll need to develop a workflow for operating it. Most CRMs allow you to automate various tasks, which can be helpful when creating your workflow. To that end, you can:
Taking these steps will help you streamline the process of using your CRM so you can drive results far more easily.
Learn more about setting up your CRM:
Now that your CRM is ready, it’s time to prepare the team that will be using it. The way to do that is through training and onboarding. To effectively train and onboard your team, there are four main steps to follow.
Throughout the training and onboarding process, be sure to distribute training materials, follow a training schedule, and encourage questions from your team. Doing each of these things will help your team more quickly pick up on the ins and outs of your CRM, letting them use it to drive better results in less time.
Learn more about training and onboarding for CRMs:
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Your CRM data won’t benefit you unless you can verify that it’s accurate and well-organized. So, be sure to make that a part of your CRM process. Take the following steps:
Be sure to choose a CRM for your business that makes this process simple. If you do, you’ll be able to easily ensure the accuracy of your data.
Learn more about data management for CRMs:
If you want to efficiently use your CRM, you’re going to need to develop a workflow for operating it. Most CRMs allow you to automate various tasks, which can be helpful when developing your workflow. To that end, you can:
Taking these steps will help you streamline the process of using your CRM, helping you drive results far more easily through it.
Learn more about setting up CRM workflow automation:
To make the most of your CRM system, it’s essential to continue monitoring and improving its performance over time. Doing so enables you to improve your ROI and adjust to changes in customer behavior, the market, technology, and more.
To monitor your system, you’ll want to:
Then, you can use this information to improve your system and processes.
Learn more about monitoring and improving your CRM system:
Many different factors affect CRM setup and implementation, so it’s essential to consider your business’s needs and the capabilities of your CRM during the process.
Here are four of the most important factors to keep in mind.
The first CRM setup factor to consider is scalability—how flexible and adaptable your CRM is.
Over time, your business will likely change. Maybe you’ll grow your team, switch to new tools for generating data, or decide to upgrade to a premium CRM plan. Whatever it is, you want your CRM to be able to handle those changes.
Unfortunately, many CRMs out there aren’t so flexible. Those CRMs are built for a particular business size and designed to work with specific tools, and any change to those things will be hard to implement.
When searching for a CRM, make sure you find one that offers scalability. You don’t want a CRM that makes you jump through a million hoops to add more seats or upgrade to a premium plan. Instead, seek out one that allows for easy upgrades and changes over time.
Another important consideration of setting up and implementing a CRM system is the system’s integration capabilities.
To make the most of your CRM, you need it to work with your other tools so that you can share data across all of your technology. This helps you keep your data current and reduces the need for manual data input.
Not every CRM integrates smoothly with every tool, though. Many CRMs are limited in which tools they can connect with. More than that, many tools aren’t good at integrating specific data types or formats.
That can mean you have to do tons of extra work to rework your data into a format your CRM can handle, and you have to compromise on which tools you use.
Whichever CRM you get, take the time to ensure that it offers plenty of integration options for data formats and external tools. Your CRM should be able to share data from a wide variety of tools and accommodate various types of data. Ideally, your CRM will require minimal data preparation on your part.
Learn more about CRM integration:
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The third consideration when setting up a CRM is user-friendliness.
A CRM can help you streamline your sales and marketing, but it, of course, doesn’t automate everything on its own. Your team still needs to be able to use your CRM to assist their efforts. So, if your team has trouble using the CRM, your results won’t be as good. Unfortunately, though, there are many CRMs out there that aren’t easy to use.
Sometimes, it’s a layout issue—the interface is simply too confusing. Other times, the interface is simple enough, but the tool just doesn’t respond the way it’s supposed to. Whatever it is, a CRM that isn’t easy to use will cause huge slowdowns for your CRM implementation.
You want to ensure you choose a CRM that your team can easily learn, understand, and use. That means finding an option with a simple, intuitive interface. It also means finding one where all the features work the way they’re supposed to, rather than promising one thing but then behaving differently.
It’s also worth seeking out a CRM with a top-tier customer service team. That way, even when you do run into issues or questions with your CRM, you can simply contact customer service and they’ll walk you through the solution.
Finally, it’s important to consider your customization options in preparation for setting up a CRM.
Every business works differently. So, when you get your CRM, you’ll probably want to set things up differently from many other companies. The question is, can your CRM accommodate that?
Not every CRM offers the same options when customizing the platform for your unique needs. Whether configuring software settings, creating specific types of data fields, or setting up user permissions, you need to be able to set things up how you want them.
A CRM that doesn’t give you the freedom to do those things, however, will inherently be a problem.
When choosing a CRM, investigate the customization options it offers. You want a CRM that gives you a relative degree of freedom in terms of how your platform is set up and how it runs. Otherwise, you’ll be stuck with a cookie-cutter tool.
Also, don’t just choose a CRM that lets you customize things—find one that lets you customize things easily. A CRM that makes you jump through hoops to change a single setting is almost as bad as one that doesn’t let you change those settings at all.
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