Why do you need a 360 view of your customer in your CRM

A comprehensive customer profile provides the context and information needed to deliver the right products and services - the hallmarks of all high-performing businesses today.

All high-performing businesses today understand one thing: the more you understand the customer, the better you can offer to that customer what they need and close deals. That's why companies in every industry, including retail, travel and hospitality, automotive, healthcare, and financial services, are leaning heavily on their CRMs to manage customer data. Business-to-business services should be no exception. Data helps sales teams piece together a 360 customer view for focused selling strategies — everything from identifying new leads to finding the right time to approach a customer with an offer relies on data.

But what is a Customer 360 view?

A 360-degree view of your customer is exactly what it sounds like. It is a single source of truth for your customer information, providing a comprehensive picture of each customer. With a robust view of the customer in your CRM, you get real-time access to insights that empower your sales and customer service teams to proactively engage customers instead of being reactive. Furthermore that centralized data helps create proactive insights. For example,  your sales team can get notified based on specific customer activity or purchase history to engage with your customer at the right time or if they usually make certain purchases but then stop.

How to get a 360 view of your customer in your CRM

To get that 360 view of your customer in your CRM is hard work that pays off however numerous times, the steps, however, can look like this:

• Identify sources and types of data relevant to your sales team: 

• Estimations/Quotes (if external to your CRM)
• Order information and production status.
• Quality or auditing information. 
• Billing and accounting information.
• Marketing and other communication methods.

• Set up data pipelines to import your customer data into your CRM from those sources: manufacturing, order processing, and project management tools or from your accounting and ERP system. You should also include your marketing automation tools and email management apps. You'll want to do this because the more you know about a customer, the better you can serve them with relevant information about products and services.
• Integrate your customer data with other systems and third-party solutions to understand who they are as customers. For example, if one of your customers calls Customer Support with a question about their order status, then that should be logged somewhere within the CRM so everyone knows what's going on at every step along their journey.

Why do you need a customer 360 view in your CRM?

A CRM is what your sales team uses to understand the customer. A customer 360 view is important because it provides a single source of truth for your customer information, which means you can answer questions about individual customer behavior immediately and cater to their needs. It also allows you to see what's working and what's not with your sales strategies.

A single source of truth for your customer information means everyone knows who you're talking to and what that person wants.

Picture this: you're a sales rep, and you pick up the phone to call a customer. Before you dial, you pull up your CRM system and see your customer's most recent activity. You can see their sales order history patterns, whether or not your company can service the client in time, their payment history, and any conversations or notes left by others on your team about your client. You know exactly who you're talking to and what that person wants. Wouldn't it be great if everyone else in your company knew that too? With a single source of truth for all customer information, everyone knows who you're talking to and what that person wants.

Having all your customer data in one place lets you answer questions about customer behavior immediately.

Having all of your customer data in one place makes it easier for teams across the organization to access relevant information at any time; this means that they can work more efficiently and ultimately provide better service to customers. With such a wide range of insights available at their fingertips, teams will have a better understanding of customer preferences, which allows them to increase sales by offering more reasonable recommendations and increasing customer retention rates because they understand what their customers want.

A comprehensive customer profile provides the context and information needed to offer the right products and services - the hallmarks of all high-performing businesses today.

And all high-performing businesses today understand one thing: the more personal and targeted your sales, service, and marketing are, the greater your customer loyalty. That's why companies in every industry, including retail, travel and hospitality, automotive, healthcare, and financial services, are leaning heavily on their CRMs to manage customer data. This data helps them create personalized experiences — everything from driving performance to identifying new leads to finding the right time to approach a customer with an offer.

Businesses with a 360-degree customer view outperform competitors.

At Capella, we have the data integration team and the platform to help you pull together 360 view of your customer into your CRM.  If you’re interested in learning more about how this could work for your business, feel free to get in touch with our team. We’d love to help!

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