When comparing Microsoft Dynamics vs Salesforce, we found both to be robust, but expensive, CRMs with functionality benefiting larger organizations. Microsoft costs between $65 – $135 and can manage sales as well as general operations like accounting and inventory. Salesforce costs $25 – $300 and offers an extensive AppExchange network with functionality that’s great for…
6 Best Email Tracking Software for 2018
Email tracking software tracks email open rates, link clicks and message delivery of sent email. However, they’re also used for other things like managing email campaigns or as a customer relationship management (CRM) tool. We evaluated more than 25 different email trackers and narrowed them down to the six best, comparing them on ease of…
6 Best Business Phone Systems in 2018
Business phone systems allow you to set up a communications system for your business quickly. We looked at the major players and compared the overall pricing and features of each, narrowing it down to six. From there, we looked at things like subscriptions, number of lines, virtual answering, call forwarding and more, arriving at the…
6 Best Salesforce Alternatives for 2018
Salesforce is one of the best-known customer relationship management (CRM) programs out in the field today. However, it is expensive and isn’t designed for flexible sales processes. When looking for Salesforce alternatives, we compared 20 programs in terms of contact and deal management, customization, technical support and user reviews as well as their overall affordability in…
6 Best Contact Management Software for 2018
Contact management software organizes and manages contacts as well as manages sales pipelines and sends automated emails. We looked at the top software programs and narrowed it down to the six best for small businesses. We compared those six on contact searchability, activity tracking, overall accessibility, analytics, and added features to find the best overall….
3 Best Appointment Scheduling Software Systems for 2018
Appointment scheduling software lets clients schedule and pay for appointments and related services online. We researched the top-rated appointment scheduling software options and decided to review Square Appointments, Acuity Scheduling, and Bookeo Appointments. These three services deliver a full range of features at small business-friendly costs. Read on for our review and top recommendations. Best…
27 Effective Sales Strategies and Tips
According to a report from the Brevet Group, only 13 percent of customers believe that the salesperson attending to them actually understands their needs. Developing an effective sales strategy involves not only equipping your team with the tools they need to succeed but also actively engaging with your customers to better understand them. We asked…
How to Set a Sales Quota in 6 Steps [+ Examples]
![How to Set a Sales Quota in 6 Steps [+ Examples]](https://fitsmallbusiness.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/How-to-Set-a-Sales-Quota-in-6-Steps-Examples-300x200.png)
Sales quotas are sales performance targets that incentivize salespeople and work to increase company revenue and profitability or maximize a specific activity. Sales quotas are typically tied to sales volume, costs, profit, or specific business function. Effective quotas are ones in which 80 percent of your sales staff—on average—should be able to meet. One of…
23 Creative Sales Promotion Ideas to Drive More Business
In 2017, sales promotion spending grew by 2.6 percent and is expected to keep growing by 3.5 percent by the end of this year. But even if you, as a business owner, invest more on your promotional strategies — not having a well thought out plan can backfire. You might even find them cutting into…
Free Sales Call Reporting Template: PDF, DOCX & Auto CRM Reports
A sales call reporting template is used to track key details about one’s customers and calling activity. When organized properly, call reports help you measure the productivity of your sales team, the health of your pipeline and allow salespeople to pick up on past conversations quickly by reviewing their notes. In this article, we provide…
Lead Scoring: Simple Steps to Identify the Strongest Leads
Lead scoring is a way to identify your sales prospects that are most likely to buy. Using a combination of factors that measure level of interest and quality of fit, a lead scoring system automatically sorts your leads from hottest to coldest. For example, if you use email marketing, you can score leads based on…
7 Ways Live Chat Can Help You Achieve First Contact Resolution
First contact resolution (FCR) measures the ability of customer service teams to address a customer’s issue at the first point of contact. It is a key performance indicator as FCR usually contributes to other indicators, such as customer satisfaction (CSAT) and operation costs. In fact, a study revealed that a one percent FCR improvement may…
