It's been said quite a few times that the only difference between a great salesperson and an average on is the attention to prospect follow-up. We've all seen the stats and we know the numbers, the average sale takes 6 contacts but the average salesperson stops at 2. How could this be? It seems pretty obvious that if you keep in touch with prospects that it will result in more business for you and your company. But why isn't it that easy? If the average salesperson knows that contact is the key, then why do so many of them stop short of success. One of the reasons might just be a lack of organization and that's where a good crm software program can make all the difference in the world.

CRM Solutions are programs that allow sales staff the ability to keep in contact easier with exisiting cliens and prospective clients. There are many options available for contact management software. You can buy the software for install on your own server, use a web based hosted crm solution, or you could even try one of the many open source crm software options. Each one of these has it's advantages and disadvantages, but the important thing is that salespeople are using a solution that will get them on the track of having a system for following up on their leads and prioritizing them.

One of the more popular solutions in recent years has been a hosted CRM solution. This is popular for many different reasons. As we all know, the salesman's job is to be on the road and visiting customers as much as possible so it's vital that they have access to all their records. Hosted CRM solutions let them do that. As working from home becomes more popular, more are opting to do as much work as possible from the comfort of their own home. The advantages are great for both the salesman and the sales manager. Being in sales means that salesperson needs to be on the road most of the day. Being on the road means that they need to stick around the office to fill out their call notes when they would much rather go home to their family and complete their notes from their home on their time. For managers that are concerned about the cost, it can easiliy be justified by the fact that a salesman can be more productive while at home, whether it's with a sick child or if he's just staying in touch with contacts when he's on vacation.

Small businesses are also discovering that CRM is not only for big companies. Business owners are investing more heavily into small business crm software to help aide in the growth of their business. More software companies are coming on board to meet the demand for small business CRM by giving affordable solutions tailored to small business owners. The hope is that they will grow and more users means more revenue, so they do have a vested interest to see these companies succeed. To be able to followup with key contacts is so important to the growth of many of these small businesses.

So, there are many reasons to have a business contact manager in place. You might be in the middle of trying to justify the cost to yourself. A good way to look at it is by thinking about what 1 additional customer per year would mean to your business. Contact managers give management and sales one spot where their information is kept so it allows everyone to accomplish more as they are now better organized. It also allows managers and owners to plan their pipeline as they can see new opportunities coming from salespeople everyday. Besides the obvious benefits, sales contact management programs are great for even the little things, like remembering an important customers birthday. What a great way to let your customer or prospect know that you are thinking about them It's those little things, that are made possible by a good contact management program.