Invest in your sales team with CRM automation and let them do what they do best.

This is not a nerdy article on the intricacies of CRMs. Instead I will cover the importance of integrating a powerful CRM so sales are made faster and at a lower cost.

Your salespeople are your most expensive employees and they should focus as much time as possible on productive conversations with their most interested leads.

 

The problem is that most salespeople don’t know who their most interested leads are! 

 

But with some CRM tweaking we can fix this.

I just had the opportunity to dive deep into Salesforce.com’s Lightning CRM and it’s cleaner, easier and simply better for real estate development sales teams than the older Classic version.

Yes, Lightning can still do literally anything you would ever need, but that’s the beauty of it. It’s more powerful than Classic and more user friendly.

So we can use it to speed the sales process and reduce the time to sell out a real estate development.

 

A Special “Thanks” to Oil Nut Bay in Virgin Gorda!

Like most CRM nerds I was quite comfortable with “the way it’s always been”, and completely reluctant to change. After all, I had mastered everything I needed to know in the old Salesforce Classic, what’s the point of changing it all around?

The answer is simple, we brought on a new client, Oil Nut Bay on Virgin Gorda in the BVI’s, and they were transitioning to Lightning.

The property location is absolutely incredible, amenities over the top, the homesites are second to none and there was no way some new CRM system was going to stop me from helping that development sell out!

So I adapted. I buried myself in Lightning for a week and – with five o’clock shadow and coffee stains in tow – came out on the other side thoroughly impressed.

I was able to set up the system so the sales team could easily see everything important to them in one screen… imagine that!

Bye bye endless scrolling and 10 clicks to find something.

Now each sales executive can see:

• which leads are most actively reading the sales information
• when they will arrive for a preview visit
• which properties they have the most interest in and
• what their probability is to purchase… all in one page.

 

A CRM should be more than just data storage

Data storage is easy. You can do that in any CRM. But how does that help sales teams know which leads are most interested? How does a storage system help sales teams interact with the right leads at precisely the right time?

Lightning, with the Clearview Elite plugin, automates all of this:

• Lead capture – from multiple websites and landing pages
• Lead assignment – round robin and based on reason for inquiry
• Lead response – ownership information leads really want is instantly delivered from their newly assigned salesperson
• Real time alerts – notifications to salespeople: “Bobby Buyer is reading your information right now!”
• Viewing analytics – salespeople know what information their leads are reading and how often
• Categorizing and reporting – lead status and stage fields are updated automatically (see The Elite Sales Process custom built for real estate)

There are many benefits:

• No chance of accidentally forgetting to enter or reply to leads
• No more spending time crafting the same email over and over again
• Leads get a professional response instantly – when they want it
• The sales process moves faster because leads remain engaged
• The sales team is more productive, they know which leads to follow up with and exactly when so they can focus on the most important tasks rather than dialing for dollars, hoping to find a lead with a pulse

You see, it’s not all about lead generation. Yes, lead generation is a big deal, but it’s not everything. You can generate 1,000 leads, but with an inefficient sales program the result is fewer sales that take longer to close which brings a much higher cost.

 

There are many 3rd party solutions for marketing automation but to spend thousands each month is a lot to ask for a small sales team.

This isn’t Glengarry Glen Ross

If you’re one of those that still thinks the best response is to personally reach out on the phone to each and every inquiry to find those golden “Glengarry Leads” then I beg you to reconsider. While it may work some of the time, you’re making things much harder on yourself.

You can still build the personal relationship and connect directly, it will just happen easier because you’re using a system that tells you which leads to reach out to and when.

I bit the bullet and embraced the change to Lightning. I challenge you to do the same and upgrade your sales process to free your sales team to do what it does best.

If you found this article useful, there’s a lot more information to help you set up your professional sales process in my ebook, The Elite Sales Machine.