CRM Design: Why It’s Important That Users Like It

Customer Relationship Management system or CRM is a tool every business needs. This technology enables gathering all customer data in one place, allowing its users to process that data efficiently. The statistics show that 92% of businesses claim to boost their revenue using CRM systems. Designing easy-to-use and intuitive software is essential to smooth and seamless processes. Go on and you will uncover the CRM design best practices to implement in your existing CRM or during its development stage.

What is a CRM system and why is it crucial for every business?

A customer relationship management system is a platform that helps keep track of the company’s interactions with customers, turn potential customers into clients, and organize all the processes that stay behind the scene of a sales funnel.

The instruments CRM software offers will provide you with control over everything that happens in the firm. It can serve for storing data from calls, emails, and other channels of communication with the users. You can also see a clear picture of who your customers are and what they need. And with that data, the CRM system will provide an analysis and you will see what aspects need improvement.

Businesses of any size can benefit from implementing a CRM system into their working environment. Let’s see what the benefits are:

• Managing the user journey. For startups, CRM can solve many tasks. No notebooks, calendars, or pens are needed. Every detail about a customer or the route your company goes can be displayed in CRM technology.
• Improving communication between teams. Given the fact that every company consists of different teams, clear and efficient communication is the key. In the CRM system, you can set up real-time messaging, employee managing tools, a file sharing and storing place, and other instruments that can connect multiple workers within one platform.
• Speeding up sales processes. The CRM system can paint a clear picture for salesmen with its sales forecasting function. This technology allows seeing the targets and pipelines, nurturing leads, and gathering analytical data.

What is CRM design that users love and why should they like it?

CRM user experience (UX) is highly important since if this technology doesn’t provide modern solutions for the issues but instead creates the last ones, then it is not functional. When users on the other side of the screen can’t track their order or don’t see the details in their personal account, it will increase dissatisfaction. The same goes for your team managing customer interactions within the CRM software. If its UX design is not intuitive and the employees can’t see the most important things first due to poor user interface design (UI), this technology will not serve its beneficial functions.

A CRM design that every category of its users will like can be described as follows:

• Simple and visually comprehensible interface. The CRM system indeed has multiple functions. But its design should not be overloaded with buttons, various colors, and elements that will only confuse a user. Good CRM UI design perfectly matched color schemes, a special style, and intuitive icons.
• Important things come first. Any page you open in the CRM system contains a lot of data and information. But designed in a proper way, a significant amount of info can be perceived in a simple way. The technique to make more important objects brighter and less important ones blurry can be of help.
• With step-by-step onboarding. The best way to avoid misconceptions about the features of the CRM system is to teach users how to use it. Designing an onboarding can help customers and employees get a smooth experience in exploring this tool.

CRM design process: step-by-step guide

Creating a top-notch CRM design requires going through multiple steps. Let’s take a look at what your actions should be to get the best design solutions.

User analysis: who is your target audience and what does it need?

A CRM system’s target audience is marketers, salesmen, and clients. While creating CRM UX design, the needs of every category should be taken into account. For marketers, the essential function a CRM software should provide is storing detailed customer information. When the marketing team has access to what the target audience’s interests are, their purchasing history, and what they prefer, marketers can build a custom marketing strategy. Lack of visibility of what the whole purchasing process looks like is pain marketers share.

CRM in the sales team should be a tool where salesmen can find all the essential information about the leads. With the analyzing tools that prioritize the most important clients, sales managers can quickly reach the targets. Dealing with too many administrative tasks can be a pain for a sales team.

Clients who reach out to your company via the CRM system, expect from it an individual approach, consistent communication, and a single access point from where they can get all the needed info. CRM customer pain may relate to a lack of proper communication, unorganized data, and a lack of personalization.

How to design a CRM so it meets all users’ needs?

A CRM that can efficiently serve all categories of its target audience should have the following features:

• Contact management. The key function of a CRM system is to store the details about customers. It should have a function to add contacts and fill in the information about them. Collecting clients’ data can help marketers as well as sales managers.
• Automation. A CRM that can automate your workflows will save you tons of time and effort. By setting up specific rules, they will trigger the actions, and the system will do the necessary. For example, you can choose to send a follow-up message if the client doesn’t respond within 48 hours or transfer a request directly to sales if the customer fills out a form on the website.
• Lead management. Along with contact management, lead management gives a lot of info about customers. This function is highly important for sales reps. Within the lead management feature, they will be able to get essential users’ details according to GDPR, set nurturing campaigns, and see the actions of customers throughout the sales funnel.
• Live chat. For customers, direct communication with the firm is a synonym for transparency and trustworthiness. Being able to ask questions in real-time will attract more clients who have doubts about purchasing your services. And you will reduce the load on a customer support team.
• Analytics. With all the data about customers, a CRM system should show you a picture of what your business needs to improve. Marketers and salesmen will focus on the most fitting clients, analyze high-ticket buyers, and get to the customers that are considering other options.

Why visual side of the CRM system matters?

CRM application functionality in most cases prevails over its user interface design. But the usability depends on the visual side of the platform. When creating a UI for your CRM software analyze the look of the navigation menu, workspace, fields and forms, buttons and actions, and color combination. Clean design solutions help organize workflows faster and more efficiently. For example, if you are a sales rep and need to call a customer to confirm the purchase and offer add-ons, the button to call a client should stand out from other functions. Adhering to a technique of highlighting important elements can solve that issue.

Usability and accessibility: how to stick to those terms?

Usability and accessibility in design allow users of the CRM system to be simple in utilization and accessible for people with different needs. Usability stands for ease of use. CRM software with great usability is one that allows users to easily understand its functionality, intuitively follow its features, and understand the platform’s logic at first glance. If it takes too much time to cope with all the buttons and sections CRM offers, you need to improve its usability.

Accessibility makes a program available to use for people with disabilities. It refers to making adjustments to the design so users with visual, motor, auditory, and other types of incapacity could utilize the program. To increase the accessibility of the CRM system, consider using color contrast, large font size, dynamic layouts, or standard UI components.

What benefits does a great performance in the CRM system bring?

A well-built UI/UX design of CRM software boosts its productivity and thus its users can make the most of it.An easy-to-use CRM platform simplifies and automates all the processes every team of the company performs. Quick access to the functionality reduces the time and thereby enables rapid processing of the client’s queries. Straightforward and consistent onboarding ensures every system user is aware of its functionality and can get right to the needed information.

Security in the CRM design and why it is important

CRM systems hold sensitive data about customers. Ensuring it is protected from data leaks and fraud attacks is the main task to consider in designing a customer relationships management platform. Implement these measures of precaution to be on the safe side.

Firstly, enable role-based access control (RBAC). This data protection method relates to providing access to highly important customer information only to dedicated people. For example, managers don’t need to be granted access to conduct refunds. And on the contrary, support agents can perform their tasks without entering the lead management section.

Secondly, make it obligatory to have two-factor authentication turned on for every account employees enter. A one-time digit code sent by SMS or a verification message sent to an email provides an extra layer of security.

Thirdly, integrate data loss prevention (DLP) technology into your CRM system. This method controls the traffic by compliance with the security rules. Sensitive data becomes protected from leaks as the DPL will not allow it to cross certain borders. Even though CRM system doesn’t possess this function, they can be integrated by third-party vendors.

Scalability in the CRM application design

CRM system is a solution for the long run. As you grow, your company’s needs extend but that doesn’t mean you have to design a new platform every time. A scalable CRM design allows making adjustments as businesses develop. Today you might be a 10-men startup company having a need for a contact and lead management. But in a month, you can grow into a 100-employee firm that can’t progress without AI implementation or automation tools. That is why designing a scalable CRM technology can save you a lot in the future.

What are the common mistakes CRM designers might face?

The CRM designing process is a long and multi-stage journey. Sometimes designers might work on a project for a long and invest in their best solutions. But these factors don’t ensure the CRM system will meet your target audience’s needs. Find out what mistakes often happen in the design of CRM software.

Not having a clear vision of what your company needs. Defining the goal of CRM technology for your business is crucial before the development process starts. This step should not be neglected. Without a vivid vision of what functions and design your CRM system should have designers and programmers can spend weeks creating a product that will not be used in the future.

Making a complex design. A good design is one that will not force users to think. This principle is not always taken into consideration. If your design includes advanced features and tools, you can enable filters that will show employees only the functionality they need. Also, most data can be visualized in graphics and charts so UI will help you in that.

Not including the onboarding or training stage. Even if you are 100% sure about the usability of your CRM system, people who look at it for the first time might need help to catch the logic of all functions. Providing a tutorial or onboarding to the CRM design will solve this issue.

Conclusion

A well-built CRM system with improved usability can help businesses of any size. Allowing employees to store customers’ data, analyze it, and receive solutions are far from all the benefits the CRM software can grant you. Designing it according to the latest UI/UX design trends can make you sure that the technology will be useful for your employees as well as your customers.

Are you searching for professional CRM system designers?

If you want to enforce your customer relationships and improve the overall performance of your business, we can provide you with custom CRM design solutions. We create designs for any niche you are in or any goal you have. Contact us to get modern UI/UX design ideas for your CRM system.