Last Updated on September 4, 2024
Clients are at the center of every business. From startups with a limited market size to multinationals with a global reach, the core objective of every business is to address its clients’ pain points. Even non-profit organizations (NGOs) wouldn’t exist without some form of clientele.
Since clients drive the primary agenda of every business or organization, it’s imperative that their interests are properly taken care of through efficient management systems. And that’s where client management software come in.
In this article, we delve deeper into what client management software constitute, their benefits, and how to select them. We’ll then crown it all by suggesting some top recommendations for your business.
What Are Client Management Software
Client management software, also known as client management tools or customer relationship management (CRM) software, are pretty much what the name implies. These are essentially tools or systems designed to track specific interactions between a company and its clients.
Although commonly associated with nurturing existing clients, client management tools are also useful in managing relationships with future customers. These systems can also be invaluable in revenue prediction.
How Do Client Management Software Work?
Client management software ideally collect data relating to specific clients. Common types of information gathered by CRM systems include contact name, contact history, email address, social media profiles, personality attributes, lead scoring, order history, and recent news.
Of all the different types of data a client management tool may collect, lead scoring and order history are arguably the most crucial. Lead scoring basically refers to data that provides an in-depth analysis of the worthiness of potential customers (leads). In other words, client management software can analyze the spending habits of a potential lead and help you determine whether they could be an asset to your business or not.
Once CRM systems have collected useful information pertaining to a potential or current client, a company’s sales and marketing department takes it up from there. This department liaises with the support team to create and foster meaningful relationships with two primary objectives – convert any leads into sales and maintain the existing clientele.
How Popular Are Client Management Software?
Findings by Grand View Research indicate that worldwide client relationship management software revenue may hit $80 billion by 2025.
The implication here is that businesses are increasingly appreciating the significance of CRM systems. Therefore, one way to get ahead of the competition is to integrate client management tools into your business operations.
Benefits of Client Management Software
1. Customer Acquisition
The data collected by client management software can be useful in providing personalized marketing services to your leads. This can consequently boost your chances of converting those leads into your sales funnel.
For instance, a CRM system will let you know if a potential customer is frequently ordering certain goods online. If your business happens to offer these products, the information could help you design targeted ads with the aim of nurturing those leads into actual customers.
2. Customer Retention
Nurturing leads into actual buyers is half the job. The other half entails converting them into loyal customers. And if research is anything to go by, then retaining clients is way more important than acquiring them.
Some studies have shown that a paltry 5% increase in customer retention could translate into a 25% increase in profit. Research further indicates that 93% of customers are more likely to buy from companies that maintain excellent customer service.
Client management systems provide useful information on the products and services your current clients are regularly shopping for. Therefore, having an efficient CRM tool in place can go a long way in helping you build a loyal clientele.
3. Process Automation
Keeping tabs on client spending behavior can prove too tedious and costly. That’s especially true for large corporations with hundreds of locations spread worldwide.
A client management tool takes away these hassles by automating the whole process. All you need to have is a competent sales & marketing team as well as a responsive customer support system. These departments can work seamlessly to harness all data collected by a CRM system for the benefit of your business.
4. Improved Efficacy
Not only is it costly and tedious to track your clients’ behavior. The process can also prove very ineffective, particularly for small businesses whose proprietors may not be well-versed in the intricacies of client tracking and management. This is another area where client management systems can come in quite handy.
By automating the processes, CRM systems can significantly improve your company’s efficiency while also helping you stay organized. The time you’d have otherwise expended manually tracking your customers’ activities can now be invested in other equally important aspects of your business for optimized productivity.
5. Streamlining Customer Engagement
As already indicated, client management software gather data on individual customers. If you run, say, a boutique, a client management tool will collect information on who’s buying suits, casual wear, or other fashion accessories like shoes and jewelry.
Such information prevents you from bombarding all your customers with spammy ads. Instead, you can create ads that target your customers based on their specific areas of interest. This can help you cultivate stronger client relationships and ultimately boost your revenues.
Factors to Consider While Shopping For Client Management Systems
1. Tracking Capabilities
What type of activity does a client relationship management system tracks?
This is arguably the most important question to settle while choosing client management software.
Many CRM systems will only collect basic customer data, such as what clients are frequently shopping for. However, certain tools may also clue you in on other pertinent information, including the frequency with which a customer requests support.
2. Multi-user Access
Unless you’re a sole proprietor operating your business as a one-man’s show, you’ll need client management software with team support capabilities. In fact, nearly all CRM systems offer some degree of multi-user access.
3. Ease of Use
A client relationship management system needs to be easy to use even for beginners with ZERO software knowledge. All of a CRM tool’s collaborators – particularly sales representatives and support staff – should find the tool fairly easy to get the hang of.
Ideally, a client management system’s user-friendliness can be gauged by the simplicity of its dashboard. Besides being incredibly navigable, the dashboard should also offer a platform where your sales team can quickly view all metrics about clients.
4. Mobile-friendliness
The accessibility of a client management tool doesn’t only pertain to its ease of use. It also relates to its mobile-friendliness.
The best client management system should support mobile applications. This makes it easier for your sales teams to instantly access the platform and secure important deals on the go.
5. Workflow Automation
A client management system should preferably come with workflow automation features. All data collected needs to be automatically analyzed to save your team’s time and effort.
For instance, these tools should be able to send automatic welcome emails with every new lead converted.
6. Efficient Communication Channels
Communication channels can make or break your lead generation efforts. That’s why you need a client management tool that can send direct and customized messages to your customers.
Most importantly, the software should maintain relevant automatic replies and templates that you can deploy for different marketing methods, including email marketing and social media marketing.
7. Integration
The best client management software should integrate with other productivity applications that your business already uses.
Seamless integration can help you automatically sync your data, thereby saving you time and money. You won’t need to allocate extra hours and expenditure training your sales team on new platforms each time.
10 Best Client Management Software
1. Salesforce
Pricing: Plans start from $27/month; a 30-day free trial available
Salesforce ranks among the most reliable client relationship management software out there. That’s if the thousands of reviews (some of which are from reputable brands like Spotify and Amazon Web Services) are anything to go by.
A cloud-based CRM, Salesforce provides a truckload of benefits for businesses. Among those include data security, ease of installation, flexibility, and around-the-clock access to information.
This customer management software also comes with a suite of features that help with both lead generation and customer retention. Notable benefits you’ll enjoy by installing the CRM include sales & marketing, data & analytics, customer support, and seamless integrations.
2. ProofHub
Pricing: Plans start from $45/month; a 14-day free trial available
ProofHub is the go-to client management software if you’re looking for the ultimate scheduling solution. The tool will help you plan your work schedules effectively by automating the whole process of client data collection and analysis.
As of the time of writing, ProofHub serves over 85,000 teams and businesses worldwide. The service enjoys over 98% customer approval, which speaks to its credibility as a CRM software.
You can avail several customer relationship management services from as low as $45. These include data & analytics, IP restrictions, API access, and white labeling.
3. Zoho CRM
Pricing: Paid plans start from $14/user/month; a free plan also available
Zoho CRM enjoys impressive customer reviews (as high as 4.8 stars on some legitimate review websites). And it’s easy to see why.
For starters, this tool offers robust customer management services, such as automated workflows and trend predictions. It provides an omnichannel communication platform where you can instantly reach your clients via several avenues, including email, social media, and live chat.
Zoho CRM also comes with a powerful AI sales assistant known as Zia that provides intelligent alerts, including pointing out data anomalies and giving useful suggestions based on your completed tasks. You’ll also love Zoho CRM for its multiple integrations. The tool integrates with over 300 popular business and productivity applications.
4. HubSpot
Pricing: Free
HubSpot is a free customer relationship management tool that was crafted by an in-house software development team with small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in mind. However, this software provides customer management solutions that any business can enjoy, regardless of its scale or location.
HubSpot’s most noteworthy CRM features include prospect tracking and customer retention. The tool’s email marketing is one of the most efficient. It tracks your clients’ behavior and then reports on the same via instant notifications.
HubSpot also provides meeting scheduling and live chat. The two features can be highly useful in helping you maintain consistent engagement with your clients.
5. Insightly
Pricing: Paid plans start from $29/user/month; a free plan also available
The name pretty much sums up the core objective of this customer relationship manager – providing insightful client data to help spur the growth of your business.
Insightly is equally ideal for all types of businesses. However, freelancers and small businesses will especially find the tool’s freemium plan more effective.
Although it limits the number of users and records, Insightly’s freemium package comes with many CRM features that freelancers and SMEs can take advantage of. These include relationship linking, lead routing, custom apps builder, mobile friendliness, and custom apps builder, among other key functions.
6. Zendesk
Pricing: Plans start from $19/user/month; a free trial available
Flexible pricing is Zendesk’s most standout feature. But it’s by no means the only one.
This customer relationship management tool is also famous for its robust client tracking and recording capabilities. It tracks client data using several channels, such as calls, text messages, and emails. The tracking processes are highly advanced and the reporting happens in real time.
Zendesk also integrates with multiple business and productivity apps. Plus, it supports offline access via mobile devices. There’s also a document storage capacity of up to 10GB per user, depending on the plan you subscribe to.
7. Bitrix24
Pricing: Paid plans start from 49/month; a free plan also available
Much like Zendesk, Bitrix24 has flexible pricing as its main selling point. But unlike Zendesk which only comes with a free trial version, Bitrix24 has a 100% freemium plan.
The client relationship management services you can avail using Bitrix24 will depend on the specific plan you subscribe to. However, common features include multi-user access, customer contacts database, and custom applications.
Bitrix24 supports both cloud and on-premise usage. The software is compatible with various devices and operating systems too, including Windows and macOS. No wonder it enjoys the confidence of Forbes, TechRadar, and many other popular brands.
8. Monday CRM
Pricing: Paid plans start from $10/month; a free plan also available
Monday CRM prides itself on offering “a CRM pricing plan that works for everyone.” That makes it another top customer relationship manager on this list in terms of affordability.
Monday CRM provides a comprehensive customer review through its sales pipeline management feature. This feature lets you analyze your clients across several metrics, such as deal size, priority, and expected closing date.
There’s also a centralized data review function that helps you manage useful information pertaining to your clients and prospects. Besides, you can take advantage of numerous sales and CRM templates to draft quick welcome emails and replies.
9. HoneyBook
Pricing: Plans start from $1/month; a free trial available
The name may sound overly enticing. But it largely reflects the cool services you stand to enjoy by installing this customer relationship management software.
HoneyBook is an excellent recommendation for small-time entrepreneurs who usually work on a per-project basis. The tool’s dashboard is incredibly intuitive and doesn’t require tech-savvy sales reps to get the hang of.
Invoicing & payments, efficient communication, compatibility with Android & iOS devices, and contract management are some of the core features of HoneyBook as a client management tool. And although the software is a premium CRM, plans start from as low as $1/month.
10. PipeDrive
Pricing: Plans start from $9.90/user/month; a free trial available
The last client management software on this list is among the top in terms of integration and automation.
PipeDrive integrates with over 300 popular applications. These include apps that can complement your client management systems, such as financial management and communication tools.
Another noteworthy feature of PipeDrive is its AI sales assistant which provides reliable CRM information, including performance improvement and risk mitigation tips. This software also lets you track client activity across several key performance indicators (KPIs) on a centralized data base for ease of access.
Conclusion
It’s not always enough to engage competent customer support personnel. Without the right client management software, you could easily lose crucial information about your current and prospective clients.
Feel free to bookmark this post for quick reference whenever you’ll be looking for efficient customer management tools for your business.