What are The Benefits of Integrating Email Marketing and CRM?
You’ve got a CRM system up and running. You’re successfully exporting records and importing them into your email service provider’s database. It works well. So, why integrate CRM with email marketing? Here are a few of the reasons.
Real-Time Connection – Instead of exporting lists from CRM and importing them into an email marketing tool, the email marketing tool can be used to query the database directly. This is more efficient and saves staff time. Also, lists are generated in real-time rather than being hours or days old.
Greater Segmentation – Dynamic content can be based on CRM data (such as products purchased or contact demographics), as well as on click-through data from previous emails. More relevant content means more effective emails and fewer unsubscribes.
More Visibility by Sales – Your sales reps can view customer and prospect click-throughs right in the CRM database — in near real-time. This means that your reps are armed with more intelligence when they make calls.
Improved List Maintenance – Your sales reps can see bounces and unsubscribes right in the database. Does a bounce mean that a key contact has left the customer or prospect organization? Or does it just mean that the address was mis-typed into the CRM system? The sales department can queue up a calling campaign to acquire valid email addresses based on bounced email information that can be viewed in CRM.
Centralized Subscription Management – You’ll now have a single point of subscription management. All subscribes and unsubscribes are right on the CRM contact screen. You’ll never miss emailing a new prospect that’s in CRM but not in the email marketing database. Manage a contact’s preferences for various types of Communications ( i.e newsletters, tech updates).
Better Reporting – Closed-loop reporting is available within the CRM application. For example you will be able to see opportunity closes or orders by campaign.
Transactional Sends – Allow reps to send one-off emails from a CRM contact record and track back recipient actions into the contact record.
For more information about selecting the right CRM or email marketing solution for your company, please call us at (800) 799-4539 or email us at info[at]lexnetcg[dot]com
Related Posts
Steve Chipman is the founder and president of Lexnet Consulting Group, based in San Francisco. Lexnet is a leading value added reseller for CRM (customer relationship management) solutions.
with RSS Reader
Very solid article. CRM and e-mail are inexorably linked.
I totally agree with you.
Why don’t all CRM systems have good email integration? Most don’t! Many have limited email sending capabilities, but not unsubscribe, web-sign up forms, forward to a friend features, or click-thru rates. What are the systems you rcommend for small businesses, medium-sized businesses, and large businesses who want email and CRM to be fully integrated? (I’m assuming it would be three different systems.)
Adrianne Machina’s last blog post..What did you think of the Superbowl ads
I think classic CRM systems still silo email as their “marketing automation” tool and don’t yet understand that email is people, and integration is key.
Jason