The Key to More Sales? Centralize Your Customer Information

In sales, there is data, and then there is knowledge. Without proper consolidation of your customer information, your sales team can lack access to crucial insight that could help them win deals instead of losing them.

From personal data to behavioral activity and direct interactions, many types of information come into play when building customer knowledge.

Consolto’s all-in-one communication solution can help you bring your customer information to a single place so you can act on accurate insight and increase your sales success.

Continue reading to learn how.

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The different types of customer data used in sales

Over the past decade, the speed at which data collection grew substantially transformed business processes and made data central to many sales and marketing organizations.

The major change this has brought is that these advanced capabilities for segmentation and analysis put sales teams in a position to make decisions better and faster than before.

In practice however, the more data a company collects, the more difficult it can be for sales (or other departments) to use it. There are several reasons for this.

First, there is such a thing as having too much data.

For sales as well as marketing teams, gathering large amounts of data can easily become counter-productive, because: not all data is equally relevant and hence necessary; data analysis can be time-consuming; and probably most important - data needs to be structured in a way that is easy to read and understand.

In teams that focus on customer acquisition, retention, and satisfaction – being strategic about which data to leverage is essential.

Secondly, in most companies, customer information is usually spread across systems and teams, which makes it difficult to access and sometimes even acknowledge.  

Lastly, certain types of data (think, for example, feedback from customers) can be difficult to collect, organize, and analyze at a glance. In such cases, what can be goldmine information may not even make it into the decision process.

So let’s look at the most common types of customer data used by sales teams today.

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Personal data

Identification and demographic data are foundational for both marketing and sales teams.

It includes basic information about a prospect or lead, such as their name, age, contact details, location, job title, and company size, among others. 

Behavioral data

This is a more complex type of data that can include information regarding a prospect’s activity on your website, engagement through contact forms or email campaigns, downloads of resources, social interactions, purchase history in the case of existing clients, and more.

Behavioral information is extremely valuable as it indicates with a certain degree of precision where prospects are in their buying journey.

Technographic data

Technographic data refers to the technologies used by a customer (whether an individual or a business), including their technology usage patterns. 

Understanding this allows companies to align their offering with their customers' expectations or restrictions, in either case increasing the chances of adoption for their product or service.

Interaction data

Direct engagement and interaction data contains any kind of insight that can be gathered from direct customer communications.

This can be feedback collected through surveys and questionnaires, reviews left on third-party websites, information shared during sales calls, customer satisfaction reflected in net promoter scores (NPS), and so on.

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The dangers of scattered customer information 

For most if not all companies, different data lives in different spaces.

Personal and technographic data is typically stored in a customer relationship management (CRM) system.

Behavioral data, which is more complex, can be shared between a CRM, a ticketing system like Zendesk, and an email marketing tool.

Engagement and interaction information is, among all types of data, the most difficult one to gather, structure, and access.

Often, it is collected using a combination of messaging software (email, chat), third-party software for surveys and reviews, appointment scheduling software, video conferencing tools, and possibly more.

Such fragmentation is problematic beyond any doubt. According to research, 63% of organizations use ten or more tools to support their sales activities, and 45% of sales reps feel overwhelmed by this number of tools.

But beyond the frustration of having to deal with too many tools, scattered data can have more damaging consequences, such as:

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Data loss

The more systems you use, the higher the chances of a data breach or loss.

Reports show 48% of organizations experienced a data breach incident (such as loss or theft) in the previous year, involving information about customers, prospects, or employees.

Not only is some data irretrievable but the company is at a high risk of reputational damage and costly system recovery.

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Lack of access to information

When data is saved in too many places, it can be difficult for teams to access important information.

Sales, marketing, and support departments are concerned with different aspects of the customer relationship but rely on common pools of data.

Lacking proper access to this data, they can easily duplicate work or miss out on opportunities.

Sales inefficiency

Sales reps reportedly spend just 28% of their week engaging in active selling. Incomplete, inaccurate, and ‘hidden’ data still pose a challenge to most sales teams today. 

Additionally, the quality of your sales process can also be affected when sales reps rely on incomplete or inaccurate data during sales calls.

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Bring customer data in one place with Consolto

If you think there is a better way than this to keep customer details, activity, files, and conversations in one place, you’re right.

At Consolto we provide a single solution that allows you to communicate, collect, view, analyze, and search customer information with more ease.

Our platform seamlessly plugs into any website, allowing you to schedule calls, conduct sales meetings, chat with prospects, qualify leads, and collect payments, all in one place.

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Here is how to use Consolto to unify customer information in one platform and increase your sales efficiency. 

Video conferencing

Consolto replaces third-party conferencing software (like Zoom or Microsoft Teams) with live video calling and scheduling integrated into your website. 

This eliminates the need for separate solutions for booking appointments and conducting calls.

It also enables customers to connect with you at a time when they are most engaged with your product or service: when visiting your website.

Chat

Use Consolto to enable customers to talk to you straight from your website. Customer chats, browsing history, and files shared during the conversation become available to you in one place, helping you stay on top of customer questions, requests, and feedback.

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Manage your pipeline

With Consolto, customer data from conversations or website activity is updated in real-time so you can qualify leads faster and speed up your pipeline.

One customer, one timeline

Consolto’s rich communication center centralizes all the data and information you collect when your prospects or clients interact with you on your website. 

This includes files, images, audio and video recordings, text messages, meeting notes, form submissions, appointments, profile insights, and payments - all organized so you can quickly search and find information whenever you need. 

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The benefits of centralizing your customer information

Unifying customer information in one place can be achieved with the simple change of adding Consolto to your website, and brings a number of benefits.

Sell more and better

When all customer information is available in one place, sales reps will spend less time searching data between systems and more time actively selling. They will also make decisions using complete, accurate insight.

Build a better customer experience

Combining data from marketing, support, and sales can help build that 360-degree view of a customer that you need to personalize future interactions and increase customer satisfaction.

Achieve team alignment (finally)

With fewer systems to search, teams in your organization will be able to access and update information more easily.

Working with the same data across all teams can improve customer support and marketing activities and will ensure a consistent approach to customer relationships.

Keep costs under control

Less tools, less spending. Reducing your technology stack can help you lower business costs associated with yearly subscriptions and maintenance time.

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Summary

As discussed above, a good sales strategy should rely on consolidated customer data that takes the guesswork out of selling and empowers sales reps to make better-informed decisions.

In addition, data centralization brings several other benefits to your business such as better team alignment and cost savings.

If you want to give Consolto a try, get started with a free trial here or reach out to us to learn more.