CRM UK - the official blog of the CRM specialists at TSG

Concentrix Whitepaper – Security for your Finance and CRM system!

As a result of the technical revolution, the use of email and internet has become part of the daily routine. In actual fact, some organisations have based their business model on the internet. Both email and internet have changed the business world for good. They provide organisations with beter communication, instant access to information and an enhanced business opportunity – with the ability to compete in global markets. However as a result of the technological phenomenon a whole new world of threats has emerged and organisations need to be aware of these in order to protect themselves against them.

For the majority of companies, data is their most important asset. If you take the data held in your CRM system for example, this tells you everything you need to know about your customers and enables you to deliver an exceptional level of customer service. As a result, securing the data in your CRM, Accounts or Business Management Solution is one of the biggest challenges you will face. What’s more, it is important to be aware of both the internal and external threats.

The Concentrix whitepaper: Security for your Finance and CRM system provides an insight into the security threats businesses face. This whitepaper discusses the importance of protecting your organisation from both internal and external security threats. It also provides suggestions as to how you can ensure that your organisation’s hardware, software and network are protected as well as providing information about the different types of security products available.

For more information about the security solutions provided by Concentrix, contact us on 01509 4105500 or email [email protected].

Bar Coding Software Specifically for Sage 200

For many businesses manually booking stock in and out is part of the daily routine. However, this is a time consuming process and can become a thing of the past with Datalinx Bar Coding Software, enabling you to concentrate on more business critical activities.

Datalinx Bar Coding Software has been specifically developed in to work with Sage 200 and Sage MMS. The Software automates the process of booking stock in and out, enabling staff to focus on other business critical activities.

Datalinx will deliver a number of key benefits to your business including:

- Improved Productivity

- Increased accuracy in terms of stock levels

- Enhanced Customer Service

- Improved internal processes

- Easy to use

- Increased speed and accuracy of stock taking

For more information about Datalinx, Sage 200 or the Datalinx and Sage integration, please contact Concentrix on 01509 410500 or email [email protected]

Stand out from the crowd with Sage Stationery!

In a business world where there is ever increasing competition it is essential to differentiate yourself from the competition. However, with tightening company budgets, this can be a difficult task. But it’s important to remember that the thing which differentiates you from your competition doesn’t have to be a company jet or the bottle of champagne you send every customer – in actual fact it is the smallest things which will often make the biggest difference and this is where Concentrix can help!

Concentrix is now providing the following Sage Stationery:

- Branded Accounting Stationery

- Branded Payroll Stationery

- Sage Cheques

What’s more

- All Stationery is 100% compatible with Sage software

- If ordered before 12pm, you will get next day delivery

- Personalised stationery is available.

For more information about Sage Stationery or to place an order, please contact Concentrix on 01509 410500 or email [email protected]

Vizola E-marketing

Communication is essential for developing relationships with customers. However, we are increasingly living in a digital world and as a result there has been a move away from the traditional methods of communication in terms of a phone calls and letters. Technology now touches everything we do, including the way we communicate. As a result, most businesses now rely on email as the main form of communication. However, with every other company doing the same thing how do you know if your email has been delivered and if it was read? The reality is that you don’t, unless you have a piece of software which can tell you all of this information.

Vizola is an e-marketing add-on for Microsoft Dynamics CRM.  Vizola is an innovative solution which improves the output of information from email campaigns delivered through Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

Although there are a number of e-marketing software solutions available, some can prove expensive, as you pay for the number of emails you send. With Vizola E-Marketing, this doesn’t happen and what’s more, there won’t be any problems importing data.

Vizola email marketing software for Microsoft Dynamics CRM utilises industry-standard techniques to provide instant feedback on recipient behaviour - it can tell you if an email has been opened or read and it provides you with analytics so you can make more informed decisions about campaigns and who you send communications to.

Features of Vizola E-Marketing Software for Microsoft Dynamics CRM

Usability – No configuration is required – start your campaign email activity and add monitored links and new templates as you go

Multi-lingual support – It supports six European languages on install

Monitors emails which have been read – The software lets you know if any when your emails are being read

Monitors Click-Throughs– Vizola lets you know when embedded links have been visited, and who has visited them

Benefits of Vizola E-Marketing software for Microsoft Dynamics CRM

- Provides comprehensive integration with Microsoft Dynamics CRM

- Provides multi-lingual support

- Tells you if and when individual emails were opened (pictures downloaded) and tells you if and when any recipient clicked through a monitored hyperlink in the email

- Increases effectiveness –equips you with all the facilities to make better use of email communications

- Improves Customer Service – allows you to be more responsive and in-touch with your customers needs

- Gives you a greater understanding of your target –and help you to understand your customers needs and wants.

- Enables you to make better decisions – and help you to analyse the results of your campaigns and see what works and what doesn’t

- Offers bounce-handling to improve your lists

- Allows you to use standard email templates

- Integrates with workflow to improve processes

For more information about Vizola, please contact Concentrix on 01509 410500 or email [email protected].

Email Marketing and CRM Software

Communication is the key to success within every business, after all it is through communicating that relationships with customers, prospects and suppliers develop.  This is why CRM software has become so critical for businesses as they provide one place to store all information relating to customers, suppliers and prospects alike.

Although CRM provides a place to store all information, communication methods have changed significantly over recent years. There has been a move away from the traditional methods of including telephone and letters, and a rise in the popularity of email.

Email delivers a number of benefits in terms of speed of delivery and the ability to get around gatekeepers. However, it also presents a whole host of new issues, including security breaches, and  spam – unsolicited mail.  Because of the problems caused by spam, more and more organisations are investing in solutions to protect them from the risks surrounding email and ensure that their organisation is safe. It is therefore more important than ever to get the message for you email right to ensure that it actually gets delivered to the recipient, rather than it getting caught in the spam filters.

Once you have got around the problem of spam filters the next issue is making sure your email gets read. To have the best chance of this, it is essential to know who you are targeting and to target the right people. The closer you can match a message to the preference of your target market in terms of its content and delivery mechanism, the higher the probability of its success.

Many CRM systems have an email marketing functionality, but organisations are increasingly using add-on applications which fully integrate with their CRM system. The benefits of these solutions include:

- Providing clear campaign analysis which shows open and click through rates

- Enabling you to manage your bounce backs and keep your data up-to-date

- Managing unsubscribes and updates the contact record in CRM

- Allowing creation of predetermined campaigns collating an audience at a specified time or triggered event for example every Wednesday morning.

- Enabling you to create both HTML and Text emails for greater delivery rates and to avoid the SPAM filters

- Allowing you to see the likelihood of emails being rejected by SPAM filters, due to unsuitable choice of words or content

- Providing you with the ability to personalise through fields in your CRM system to increase open rates

Email Marketing Solutions provided by Concentrix include:

CommunniGator - Email Marketing software which integrates with most CRM systems including Sage CRM, Microsoft Dynamics CRM and FrontRange’s GoldMine.

Vizola – An innovative solution which improves the output of information from email campaigns delivered through Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

SwiftPage – An email marketing solution which integrates with a number of databases including Sage CRM, Sage Sales Logix, Sage Act! and Microsoft Excel.

For more information about any of the email marking solutions provided by Concentrix, please contact us on 01509 410500 or email [email protected]

Swiftpage is added to Concentrix Product Portfolio!

Independent UK Business Management and CRM software specialist Concentrix has added Swiftpage email marketing software to its product portfolio!

Over recent years there has been a considerable change in the way we communicate both socially and in business. Businesses have become increasingly reliant on email as the main form of communication. Many now use email to contact suppliers, customers and prospects alike, the number of emails one person receives a day is significant. But email has bought a fair number of problems including spam and more and more companies are investing in software to protect their organisation from this. What’s more, many individuals are selective about the emails that they actually open and read. Often an email will only get opened if the recipient recognises the sender or if they believe the content might be relevant to them!

But with such a heavy reliance on email for marketing, it has become difficult to gauge the success of campaigns, especially when your email may not arrive in the intended inbox and this is where Swiftpage comes in!

Swiftpage is a piece of email marketing software which integrates with your Sage CRM software, spreadsheets or databases to help you achieve real results from your marketing campaigns.

Swiftpage has a wide variety of powerful features including:

Simple Template Editor – Enabling you to create your own email templates

High Deliverability – Swiftpage uses the latest technology to ensure that the email gets through the spam filters

Personalisation with Mail Merge – Swiftpage has a mail merge feature which enables you to personalise each email

Import your own template -    If you have created an email in HTML you can simply import it into the Swiftpage online editor.

For more information about Swiftpage, contact Concentrix on 01509 410500 or email [email protected].

Introducing Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011

As more and more businesses realise that Customer Relationship Management (CRM) solutions are essential to ensure business success, Microsoft Dynamics CRM has become increasingly popular. This is for a number of reasons including its reliability, flexibility and familiarity.

No matter which industry sector you operate in Microsoft Dynamics CRM will deliver benefits as it will enable you to:

- Have one central location to store all information relating to customers. This will improve employee knowledge and ultimately the level of customer service delivered.

- Improve efficiency and effectiveness by reducing duplication of effort

- Promote the sharing of information across the organisation

The latest release of Microsoft Dynamics CRM is due to be released in September. Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 promises to build on the success of previous versions of the software by enhancing the functionality of the solution and has many new features including:

Dashboards - Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 includes extremely impressive dashboards which will provide a visual representation of the information stored in the CRM system

Enhanced Familiarity – The familiarity of Microsoft Dynamics CRM is one of its key benefits as this is what promotes the high user uptake. Microsoft Dynamics CRM looks and feels like any other Microsoft application and in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 the familiarity has been taken a step further.

Role Tailored Client – This is something which has come from Microsoft Dynamics NAV and significantly improves employee efficiency as it removes 90% of the applications on a users workstation which they don’t use and highlights those which they do.

SharePoint Integration - Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 has out of the box integration with SharePoint, making it even easier to share information with employees and customers alike.

Microsoft dynamics CRM is available as either a hosted solution (Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online) or as an On-Premise solution. The Online version is ideal for companies who want to get up and running with CRM quickly, with minimal set up costs. With the online solution you will pay a monthly fee for the solution and typically won’t have any significant expenditure on hardware.

The On Premise version of Microsoft Dynamics CRM will provide greater control of the system and although typically it is associated with a large initial cost you will have an unlimited customisation potential. What’s more, there will be no monthly fees and you will own the solution. But it isn’t a case of On-Premise CRM being better than CRM Online, or vice versa, its more down to implementing the solution which matches the requirements of the business.  

It’s worth knowing that if initially you select the Online version of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011, and then decide you want to go On Premise, it can easily be switched to an On Premise version.

For more information about the new features of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011, Microsoft Dynamics Online or, to arrange a free demonstration, contact Concentrix on 01509 410500 or email [email protected].