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A Guide On Integrating VoIP with CRM
Here’s all you need to know about VoIP integration with CRM — what it is, the advantages, and what you should look out for.
Reading time: 6 minutes
Teams use multiple tools and apps for internal and external communication, which creates confusion in an otherwise straightforward process.
Next thing you know, the overlap of these tools costs you even more money, compounding the initial problem of ineffective communication.
All you may need is your VoIP and CRM — an essential integration to boost business efficiency. In this article, we’ll share how you can get the most out of those tools by integrating them to create a more streamlined process and workflow.
Contents
What is a VoIP CRM integration?
A VoIP CRM integration refers to combining these two software together to facilitate better communication, data collection, and information sharing between your business and customers.
This ultimately results in an increase in sales, better customer satisfaction, shorter lead response times, and many more.
Let’s take Novocall as an example. Novocall is a business phone system that allows you to integrate inbound and outbound calls into your website. You can embed a click-to-call widget on your site so visitors can book a call at their earliest convenience. From here, you can organize the calls at appropriate times and dedicate all your resources to bringing your callers down into your sales funnel.
At this point, you’d need a CRM tool to help you manage and nurture these leads until they become clients or customers.
Novocall integrates with Salesforce and HubSpot to eliminate manual data entry by automatically syncing your calls. Then, using the information gathered from the calls, you can provide your leads with a personalized outreach experience that will most likely close them into clients.
Advantages of integrating CRM with your VoIP software
1. Effectively collects real-time customer data
When you integrate a CRM software into your VoIP system, you can skip the manual entering of contact information as customer data is updated in real-time.
As mentioned in the scenario above, some VoIP systems like Novocall capture lead information and store them in your CRMs. This allows you to have all their information at hand during the call, such as their name and the purpose of the call.
Below are examples of information that your CRM should collect and ways they can help you manage highly qualified leads and successfully close them into clients:
- Contact details: Name, phone number, and email address are the essential information you must get from leads so you can get back to them very soon.
- Customer feedback: Whether it’s a suggestion or a genuine complaint, you must collect this information to help improve your business and use it as a touchpoint when reaching back to the same customers.
- Behavior data: Using any CRM tools on the market, you should be able to track how they interact with your website, call widget, and other calls-to-action that play a critical role in your sales funnel. For example, knowing whether or not they clicked on the button or filled out a form on your site provides insights on how to improve the performance of your website elements.
- Demographics: Some CRM tools allow you to search for your contact’s social media profile to extract more information. Knowing their current jobs, projects, interests, and others according to their LinkedIn profile and Twitter tweets helps you understand who they are as people. You can then finetune your sales approach to tap into their demographics and make a more compelling case about your business.
2. Reduces lead response times
Statistics show that about 62% of customers prefer phone calls over other communication methods because they can help to solve their issues quickly.
That said, it’s a common occurrence for customers to call your business more than once whenever they need a solution to their problem.
Having the customer’s data on hand can certainly help you better manage lead response times as you have all the information about them that you need, including past interactions with your business. You don’t have to transfer the call to the rep who handled their call previously or put them on hold while you dig for the necessary information.
3. Improves customer satisfaction and experience
As you know, the data collected in your CRM gives you all the information you need about a customer. This makes it easier to provide better customer service and support because your reps are already well-equipped and aware of the customer on the line. They can also easily route these calls to the most qualified rep to handle the conversation.
Furthermore, knowing a customer’s information at your fingertips gives your reps the opportunity to personalize the conversation. Because you’re already aware of their name and past interactions, you can easily tailor the communication based on their needs.
This can help you easily deepen the relationship with your customers and lead to better experiences.
4. Increases the productivity of your reps
Taking down notes on an excel spreadsheet every time a customer calls doesn’t sound productive at all. It also creates more room for human errors, which just leads to more work to be done.
Integrating your VoIP with CRM software means your reps can easily update and find customer data without having to toggle between multiple platforms. This saves a considerable amount of time and effort, and allows reps to work more productively.
Furthermore, if you have remote teams, integrating your CRM system means that it can be accessed by all reps across the world — as long as they have a stable internet connection. This allows all your reps to still have access to the necessary customer information that can help solve customer issues.
5. Aligns the marketing, support, and sales teams
This happens more often than we’d like to admit, but marketing, support, and sales teams aren’t aligned. When multiple people from different departments (or even the same team) are communicating to the same customer, this can create confusion and disconnection.
This communication gap can result in angry callers, a loss of opportunities, and poor customer satisfaction.
But by integrating your VoIP and CRM software together, you’re working on a unified platform that provides you with all the data you need. This eliminates any mistakes and inconsistencies from having different people communicating with a customer.
6. Decreases operating costs
VoIP CRM integrations help businesses save a great deal of time. And as we know, time is money.
Because you now have a more efficient way of handling resources and data, this allows you to better manage customer communication.
While both software do require initial start-up costs, there are several affordable VoIP systems and CRM software that give you a bang for your buck.
With more time and money on your hands, you can focus on other business activities to help achieve your company goal.
7. Scales phone call capacity
Ideally, you want to attract a steady stream of scheduled calls from your VoIP system.
After the call, the data is transferred to your CRM tools. Then, the sales team will break down the information into an outbound call in the hopes of turning leads into customers, thus resulting in more sales.
Gathering information about the number of calls your business receives provides you with actionable insights to help you manage these calls.
For example, if you’re not getting enough calls from your audience, refine your outbound lead generation strategy or website traffic strategy to attract highly qualified leads. If you’re getting too many calls, consider hiring more customer support agents to help you handle these calls.
Choosing a VoIP system to integrate with your CRM
Now that you’re aware of the benefits of a VoIP CRM integration, the next step is to decide software that are compatible with each other. You wouldn’t want to be spending too much time switching your current business phone system or CRM provider.
CRM integration options
This is the most important thing to consider — does your VoIP software integrate with the CRM software and vice versa?
As mentioned above, if neither of these software are compatible with each other, there’s no point trying to force them to work. This will just result in you having to switch either system that you’re already comfortable using, having to re-train your reps, and wasting too much time doing all these.
So, before you decide to invest, check if your VoIP system integrates with your CRM.
Ability to make calls directly from your CRM
To facilitate business processes, you’d want to keep all calling activities on one platform. This helps you better consolidate all the data and work more efficiently.
That said, it’s a major plus point if you’re able to make calls through your VoIP provider directly from your CRM. This means your reps don’t have to toggle between multiple tabs just to have the data they need and make calls.
With a VoIP software like Novocall, your contacts are automatically created and synced with your CRM. You can make calls directly from within your CRM, as well as store and access call recordings.
Other VoIP features
When choosing the right VoIP system to use, you should also consider the other business phone features available. These features should enhance customer communication as well as streamline the general workflow. These features include:
- Call recording
- Call routing
- Outbound autodialer
- IVR
- Business hours
- Call analytics and metrics
- Call tracking
Conclusion
When used correctly, your VoIP system integration with your CRM software will be a godsend to your business. Together, they can reveal meaningful information about your sales funnel, from the number of leads you’re collecting to the number you’re converting into and keeping as customers.
Using the data gathered by both tools, you can make informed decisions about how to improve processes to help increase your revenue.
Hopefully, this post has enlightened you on the benefits of integrating your VoIP and CRM systems. For more of such tips and advice, check out our blog!
Christopher Jan Benitez
Christopher is a freelance writer for hire who specializes in the digital marketing field. His work has been published on SEO and affiliate marketing-specific niches.
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