According to the World Economic Forum and Forbes, 90% of the startups and small businesses fail within the first 5 years of their inception. Why? In a bird’s eye view, the reasons range from compromised marketing strategy, financial constraints, technical limitations, and unavailing management techniques.
In the classic research on Small Businesses by Harvard Business Review, the authors identify 5 stages of small business development. They identified that almost all startups face the same complications in their initial development phases.
The following paragraphs will aim at providing the readers with information regarding how SugarCRM can help small business development in every stage.
Stage 1 – Existence: Finding New Customers with the Help of CRM
In this stage, the main source of concern and headaches for many emerging businesses is obtaining customers and delivering their products. Remember, Microsoft did not have 1.5 billion active users on the day that Bill Gates registered his company?
The process of finding new customers seems interminable to many. The primary endeavor of every new company should be to showcase the world that they ‘exist’.
Can SugarCRM help me in this stage? Yes, of course, it can. Sugar will help you in finding new customers and engaging with them. The most productive path would be to integrate SugarCRM with social media. Everybody uses social media. Reaching out to potential customers can really provide a boost for your infant business. Once customers are found, BOOM, you’ve finally got someone to show your skills.
Stage 2 – Survival: CRM helps Ward-off Competition
Congratulations! If you’re in stage 2, you’re a workable business with plenty of potential to metamorphose into a corporation. Now, the primary goal in this stage is to fight off those competitors. Remember, you’re not a monopoly. Other companies will be fighting to take away your contracts and offering similar services. Excelling in competition requires strategic planning.
Will a SugarCRM help overcome this stage? Yes, it will. As your customers hold the key to your success, SugarCRM can provide valuable insights about the inclinations and preferences of your potential customer base. This will enable emerging ventures to have an operational and managerial edge in paramount functional areas of sales, marketing, and support.
This would, of course, lead to a much more fortifying customer experience and eventually translate into a competitive edge for you. You’ll be able to manage all those competitors much more effectively.
Stage 3 – Growth: CRM becomes a robust Growth Tool
Finally, all those times when you choose work over pleasure are finally paying off. You’re now a company with a moderate clientele base and operating in the profitable zone. But remember, the passion and desire to supplement is what separates the phenomenal from the ordinary. What do you need now? The answer is resources and a managerial skill set. Resources will pave the way for more growth opportunities and managerial skills will succor the existing and potential clients.
SugarCRM in this stage will open up vast new customer touchpoints. The SugarCRM integration with telephonic features, email and Google Maps will offer new ways to interact with customers and capture more prospects.
It will also allow you to run massive email campaigns for measuring success with the clients you need to retain. SugarCRM will increase productivity, ensure every opportunity and prospective customer is pursued with the right offer at the right time, and of course, it also improves customer service and satisfaction. Not only will you firmly hold on to your existing customers because of optimal management, but also effectively generate new contacts and resources to keep your business expanding in the right direction.
Moreover, Mobile capability in Sugar will give your project managers and sales reps the power to engage with their customers while they are on the move, dealing with other business opportunities
Stage 4 – Take-off: Manage Funding the Right Way with CRM
You’re in the big game now. Welcome to the high growth stage. This is a pivotal period in a company’s life. The owner has risen to the challenges of a growing company, both in a financial and managerial capacity. Have you ever noticed that successful entrepreneurs are often portrayed as being displeased and resentful all the time? Why do you think that happens?
It’s because their project managers, salespeople, and technical staff are not optimizing his/her beloved venture. Overhead costs are humongous and profits do not seem to match the monetary value of the projects.
Using SugarCRM in this stage becomes almost critical. Businesses often have to be involved in complex cycles of funding. For the venture to continue operating, they need to manage their funds in the most optimal way possible. SugarCRM system will be formulated to keep a track of all the opportunities related to funds coming in and going out the door.
In addition to this, CRM has the capability to integrate with the best third-party platforms including QuickBooks and DocuSign. Thus, reducing the sales time and increasing the workflow productivity of the company. Therefore, with so many plug-in solutions available for SugarCRM, it will set you free from the financial quicksand and in driving your beloved business towards glory.
Stage 5- Resource Maturity: CRM becomes a complete business management system
Like every systematic event in life, the final stage is always the most strenuous. In this stage, you would have to cement all financial gains brought on by expeditious growth and retain positive aspects like adaptability to customer response and keeping the entrepreneurial spirit of your organization alive. The corporation must expand the management and managerial workforce fast enough to eliminate the inefficiencies that growth can produce and professionalize the company by use of such tools such as effective resource allocation, strategic planning, management by objectives, and standard cost systems—and do this without stifling its entrepreneurial qualities.
A full-blown SugarCRM takes the shape of an ERP at this stage. Customer and client records are now integrated with your SugarCRM. Now you need complete access being provided to your project managers, sales staff and technical units to make them autonomous and give you enterprise a decentralized structure.
Even the SugarCRM has to adopt a hierarchical order with access to certain records being available to only concerned staff members. Various financial and managerial integrations are a must as well. Data Intelligence Tools in SugarCRM will aid and abet the firm in this stage. These tools will eliminate data errors and remove the need for manual account creation and maintenance. It will significantly shorten the sales cycle and optimize the “Lead to Cash” workflow.
It will also minimize one of the biggest costs in business – poor data quality. When a large amount of data flows through your SugarCRM, you gain the ability to predict how customers will respond in the future based on their behavioral history. This is called Predictive Analysis. This converts your Big Data into Useful Data as it will eventually lead you to useful information that can potentially invigorate your business to the optimum.
If you think you’ve reached this stage, it may also be a good idea to make the jump to mobile CRM so your business can move to your pocket, and work can be done any time, anywhere with no hassle!
Conclusion:
It doesn’t matter if you’re a budding business or an established one. SugarCRM can help you in every stage of the small business development cycle. So which stage do you think your business is in? Not sure? Let Rolustech help you. If you have any questions, leave them in the comments section below, our Certified SugarCRM Developers would be delighted to get back to you to answer your queries.
Rolustech is a Certified SugarCRM and Salesforce Partner firm. Get in touch for a Free Business Analysis and get your Small Business on to the Sugar platform.
