The above saying by Ken Blanchard holds true even in today’s digital world. Customers are the core aspects of any business irrespective of its niche. Managing efficient customer relationships is much needed in today’s competitive world, not only to enhance the sales, but also to increase the brand value of the organization. And in doing so, Customer Relationship Management Software holds a crucial place. Customer Relationship Management or CRM is a robust tool for the enterprises that helps them to enhance their customer service and in boosting their sales.

Although you may not feel its crucialness during your initial days. Google botes, Excel, or sticky notes may be sufficient for you to manage your customers. However, as your business grows with time it becomes difficult to manage several customers at the same time. That’s where CRM software comes into play! According to sources, CRM software generated a market revenue of almost $19.35 bn in the year 2019. Moreover, this growth is expected to reach $40.26 bn by the end of 2021. That’s great!

Hence, if you are aiming to become a part of this trending community and planning to develop a custom CRM software for your enterprise, then we have got you covered! In this article, we will discuss everything you need to know for developing a powerful and feature-rich CRM software.

So, let’s get started!

Why Custom CRM Development?

Probably the first question that you might think is why to opt for a custom CRM software? And trust me, you are not the only person who is thinking like that! So, let’s clear that doubt first.

We all are well aware that every company has different needs and wants. And satisfying all those needs and customer’s wants is vital for your organization to grow in the global market. That’s why enterprises go for custom software development because in general, the readymade solutions are not that effective in solving each and every need of the organization. They are designed to solve the common problems of a wide range of audience. The personalization, and flexibility that is needed to build success for your business only comes with custom software solutions.

With custom CRM software, you can seamlessly choose what all features you want to include in your and what technology to use. Furthermore, you can even secure the crucial data of your Crm by implementing a robust security system during the development phase. All in all, a custom software development is scalable and efficiently helps you to grow your business in the global market.

Benefits of Custom CRM Development

To give a more clear idea about the benefits of developing a custom CRM software, we have listed the top reasons that most of the companies consider while investing in the custom software services.

1. A Perfect Versatile Solution

The first and foremost benefit of a custom Crm software is its scalability and flexibility. As discussed earlier in this article, a custom CRM is perfectly built keeping in mind all your business needs and wants. You can include any features or functionalities and can leverage any technological platform to build your CRM software. Moreover, if you develop your software with an experienced software engineering firm like Matellio, then the developers also provide you out-of-the box ideas that can help you outgrow your competitors.

2. Improves Business Processes

Besides providing a flexible approach, custom CRM software also helps to enhance your business operations. With a custom CRM software, you can integrate all your departments into one centralized platform. That makes it easy for you to get vital information on the performance of every department of your organization. Moreover, you can also include different features for each department in the custom CRm software, which is not possible in turnkey CRM.

3. Industry-specific Tailored Solution

Pre-built CRM software is created for all the businesses alike. But we all know that all the organizations are different from each other in functionality as well as in the way of their working. That’s why a custom CRM software offers much more than that of ready-made CRM. you can integrate any third-party software and can enhance your working operations. Moreover, you can even take care of the security features and can include all the security tools that help to keep your customer’s information safe and secure. Because, at last, a happy customer means more business and more sales!

Read More: How to Develop Solar CRM Software: Top Features, Development Process, and Cost

4. Seamless Integration with Business Operations

As discussed in the point mentioned above, a perk of developing a custom Crm software is seamless integrations. Meaning, you can integrate several third-party software and robust systems into your CRM software to make it more effective and efficient. Software solutions like payroll management system, employee management system, communication tools, and much more could seamlessly help you to grow your business efficiently in the global market. These tools and platforms ensure that you work efficiently while solving every problem of your client and business.

5. Saves a lot of Money

Last but not least, with custom CRM software, you can save a lot of crucial resources including the financial resources as well. It is often seen that most of the ready-made CRM solutions are a bit overpriced. The vendors firstly introduced a lot of features and then charged a hefty price for all of them. That’s where the custom CRM comes to play. In custom software development, you are the sole incharge of your software. Meaning, it is you who decide what feature to keep and what to omit. That way, you not only build a perfect solution for your organization, but also save a lot of money and other useful resources.

So, these were some of the benefits of developing a custom CRM for your organization. Now that you are convinced over investing in custom CRM development, let’s take a look at the different types of CRM available in the global market.

What are the Types of CRM?

While discussing the types of CRM, there are majorly three types of CRM software that are available in the global market. Let’s take a close look at them.

1. Operational CRM

Operational CRM focuses on streamlining the operations of sales, marketing, and customer service departments of your organization. It includes functionalities like lead management, contact management, sales pipeline, and helpdesk. Operational CRM could be your first choice, if you are aiming to only leverage it for solving your clients and sales-related aspects of your enterprise.

2. Analytical CRM

Next type is the analytical CRM that generates vital information from all the available touchpoints and then processes it efficiently to make it effective for you. This type of CRM provides you vital insights over market trends and over your critical business operations. You can leverage it to obtain real-time information and in effectively planning your workflow operations.

3. Collaborative CRM

Last comes the collaborative CRM. This type of CRM is specifically designed to improve and enhance the communication and teamwork of different departments of your organization. The collaborative CRM generally includes features like collective discussions, group chat, intuitive dashboard, and so on. You can leverage it to share files seamlessly across different platforms and to enhance your communications.

Together all these types make a perfect solution for any organization irrespective of its niche.

What Industries Use CRM?

There is no denying that nearly all the industries that deal with the customers need a custom CRM to enhance their workflow and to optimize their profits. However, to make you more informed, here we have listed some of the industries that utilize CRM the most.

1. Healthcare Industry

The top most industry that utilizes the CRM software at its fullest is the healthcare industry. We all know that hospitals and clinics have to deal with hundreds of patients on a daily basis. That means, mainitiang and storing all the critical information of the patients becomes somewhat difficult for them. That’s why healthcare CRM software is being used to store all the vital information of the user like past medical records, prescriptions, medical history, and so on. Moreover, it also helps the healthcare experts to enhance their services and to provide personalized care to the patients.

2. Banking and Finance

Another powerful industry that utilizes the CRm software is the banking and finance industry. A custom banking CRM enables the banks and other financial institutions to track and manage customer’s various activities and act as a decision support system for them. The banks can  leverage its robust tools to deliver the right kind of banking services to the right people at the right time. Moreover, the banking CRM also optimizes the profits and helps them forge strong relationships with their valuable customers.

3. Real Estate Industry

Well, it may surprise you, but the real estate industry is also one of the top sectors that are leveraging the powerful custom CRM software to satisfy its industrial needs. The real estate CRM helps the realtors and managers to close more deals, and to accelerate their sales process in an efficient manner. A real estate CRM is a complete package for all types of real estate businesses irrespective of its size. Tracking KPIs, monitoring team’s performance, generating leads, migrating data, and providing real-time updates are some of the robust features of the real estate CRM.

4. Retail and eCommerce

Last but not least, is the retail and ecommerce sector. Retail sector is also leveraging the CRM software for quite some time now. The increased customer demands and changing needs of the people made it difficult for the retailers and people involved in the e-commerce industry to satisfy the needs of their customers. That’s where the retail CRM comes to play. It efficiently caters to every changing need of the user and helps the retailer to deliver a personalized experience to the user for enhanced customer service.

What Things to Consider Before Developing a CRM Software?

Now that you are well convinced to develop a custom CRM software for enhancing your business operations and customer experience, here are a few things you need to consider.

1. Analyze your Development Goals

First and foremost, you need to clearly understand the underlying goal of the CRM development. Meaning, you should very well know what is the need to develop a custom CRM for your organization, what all problems will it solve, and how it will enhance your business operations. That’s because, understanding your business goals will help you design and develop a perfect CRM that satisfies all the needs of your business in an efficient manner. Also, these goals will further help you to utilize the CRm in a more effective way while serving your customers and clients.

2. Be Clear on Access Levels and Roles

Apart from understanding your development goals, you also need to ensure what all people will access the CRm and what roles they will be given. Meaning, you are likely to have several employees in your organization, but not all of them would be given access to operate the CRM software. Hence, you must decide the roles like C-level executive, marketing representative, sales representative, customer representative, etc. and should grant access accordingly.

3. Identify the Necessary Features

Identifying the relevant features is one of the most crucial aspects that you need to consider before developing a custom CRM software. Features play a very crucial role, especially in a software that deals with customers. Hence, to simplify your work, we have listed some crucial features that you can include in your CRM software.

• Lead Management

Automate the lead capturing process and generate and nurture more leads efficiently to get better and faster conversions and improved results.

• Marketing Automation

Efficiently creates email templates, and automates your marketing campaigns to engage your market and derive repeat business.

• Data Management

Centralize the vital data of your organization and provide you updates over all the crucial activities like payments, custom issues, and so on.

• Appointment Scheduling

You can seamlessly schedule and manage your appointments with the clients, vendors, and marketers using this robust software.

• Recruiting Management

This feature, in combination with outreach campaigns, makes it simpler for organizations and HR experts to manage recruitment processes efficiently.

• Referral Management

Referral management features can help you deliver your services across different platforms seamlessly and improves the coordination with your clients.

• Sales Tracking

Automates your sales process and efficiently tracks your leads during the entire sales cycle to win against the competition.

• Fraud Protection

Seamlessly identify the unreliable customers with high-risk behaviors by looking at trends like low-credit score, late payments, and much more.

• Quotation Management

Quickly generates quotes for your valuable customers by automating and streamlining the quotation process and manages unlimited quotes seamlessly.

• Reports and Analytics

Efficient reporting and analysis to enable users find the required data and anytime they need. The reports help you strategize better and make informed decisions.

Advanced Features

Besides all those basic features, you can also include some advanced functionality to stand out from the competitive world.

• Mobile Access

You can offer mobile access functionality to your valuable customers and office employees so that they can operate the CRm whenever they want.

• Intuitive Dashboard

An intuitive dashboard that stores and manages all the critical information of your organization and offers you custom reports displaying the performance of your business operations.

• Pipeline View

To better understand your sales process and to view the stage at which all your leads are, you can include the pipeline view feature in your CRM software.

• Invoicing

Invoicing functionality seamlessly generates all the bills and invoices for your vendors and customers and simplifies your working operations.

• Referral Tracking

Referral tracking functionality enables you to track all the referred leads that gradually turned into reliable customers.

• Social Media Integration

You can seamlessly enhance your marketing efforts by linking your marketing campaigns with your social media channels.

So, these were some of the features that you could include in your custom CRM software. However, it is always wise to go for basic features during the initial phase and then include advanced functionalities gradually with time. That way you can also reduce the costs of CRM development.

4. Decide the Type of CRM

Last but not the least, you have to decide whether you are going to develop the CRM for your internal purpose or you want to transform it into an Saas app later on. That’s because, the type of software you want will then decide the features, technology, and platform to be used while developing the app. So, decide it prior to the development phase and save your time and money.

How to Develop a Custom CRM Software?

Now we are at the most awaited section of our article. After knowing all the benefits, types, and features of the custom CRM software, you might be thinking of developing a feature-rich CRM software. So, to help you further, we have listed all the points that will help you develop an error-free and feature-rich CRM software for your organization. Let’s dive in!

1. Analyze your Financial Goals

Firstly, you need to be specific about the commercial goals of your organization. You need to look for ways that your company is going to generate revenues after the implementation of the CRM software. Remember that every software helps to generate revenues in different forms. For instance, some of them can help in reducing the overall costs, while others can help you in forming new business strategies by providing vital analytics.

2. Pay Heed to Legal Restrictions

Keeping up with all the legal compliances is also one of the crucial aspects that you need to take care of while developing the custom CRM software. It is to be noted that sometimes, various privacy policies will not let you collect all the vital customer information. Hence, if you work in a strictly regulated environment, then it is better reflected in your project requirements document.

3. List the Quality Requirements

That’s another vital aspect you need to pay heed to while developing a feature-rich CRM software. You need to list all the vital features and functionalities you want prior to the development process in your project requirements document. Also, if you want your CRM software to meet the industry standards, and compliances like ISO, FDA, ASTM, etc. then it is better to write that down.

4. Define CRM Type

After noting down all the vital functionalities of your CRM, you need to define the type of CRM that you need. In general, there are majorly three types of CRM that are available in the global market, viz. collaborative, analytical, and operational. Each of them have different features and uses. So, select the one that best fits your company needs. We have already discussed the different types of CRm above in this article.

5. Have a Development Team

Having a perfect development team prior to the development phase is much needed to help you simplify your development process. You need to have all the vital aspects of the development team like a project manager, front-end developers, back-end developers, testers, etc, in your team to efficiently develop a feature-rich CRM software. Now, for that you have two options, either go for an in-house development team, or outsource the developers from an experienced software engineering firm. Although both have their specific benefits, outsourcing the development team is always considered the best and wise decision. That’s because, an experienced firm will have all the knowledge of the issues that may come during the development process along with their solutions. Also, the programmers there would be well experienced that can provide you out-of-the-box ideas to help you stand out from the competitive world. You can refer to our article to know more about the benefits of outsourcing the software engineering firm.

6. Run Quality Analysis

Lastly, you need to run various tests and quality analysis to ensure that your custom software solution runs efficiently across all your desired platforms. In this case too, you can either run the quality tests by yourself, or can know whether your strategic development partner provides the quality analysis facility or not. Running the quality test ensures that your product is ready for all the functions and fits perfectly in your organization.

What is the Cost of Developing a Custom CRM Software?

Now we are in the last section of the article, where we will be discussing the cost of developing a custom CRM Software. So, like other on-demand applications, the development cost of a CRM software will depend on the team structure, features opted, platform selected, and so on. To give you a clear idea, we have listed various factors associated with the cost of development.

1. Team Structure

The team that will be required to develop a smooth and feature-rich custom CRM software will mainly comprise of a Project Manager, mobile app developers, UI/UX Engineers, testers, and so on.

2. Technology Opted

Apart from the development team, the choice of technological platform will also impact the cost of development. For instance, if you choose trending and disruptive technologies like AI and ML, then the cost of development will automatically increase.

3. Features Opted

Another crucial aspect is the features opted. If you opt for all the basic and advanced features, then it will surely impact the cost of your development. Hence, it is advisable to opt for basic features in the initial phase and then add the functionalities gradually.

4. Technical Customization

Last but not least, if you have opted for any complex customizations, then it will also add on in your development cost.

Build a Custom CRM Software with Matellio!

To conclude, we can say that CRM software is a much needed platform in today’s digital world to deliver a perfect custom service and to enhance the business operations. With feature-rich CRM software, you can not only improve your customer services, but can also leverage a vast amount of valuable customer data that is available in the global market. With that in hands, you can seamlessly capture more leads and can also deliver a more personalized experience to your customers.

Hence, if you are planning to develop a feature-rich and error-free CRM software for your organization, then we are always there to help you. We, at Matellio, have experienced and certified developers and programmers that assure you of a smooth and efficient development process. Our certified software engineers and trusted testers ensures that nothing hinders your business growth and your product runs smoothly across all the desired platforms. Still have questions? Don’t worry, we have got you covered! You can seamlessly reach us to get answers to all your questions and to get more details over custom CRM software. Visit www.matellio.com today!