When I started my business five years ago, I made a promise to myself that the only housework I would do is clean my data. Now five years down the track, I don’t even have to do this housework because a member of my team looks after it. I still have the occasional peek to make sure the data is consistent and there are minimal duplicates. I admit it, I can’t help it, it’s something that makes me feel good having come from the IT industry where I have witnessed the terrible effect on business when their data gets left and ignored.
As a business owner, you have a lot of competing priorities and often the fact that your data might not be as clean or accurate as you would like it to be can get left to that day when you have time to think about it! Yes, you have guessed it – it never comes.
Even though you know that it makes sense to have all of your leads, client information, opportunity details, correspondence and activity entered into a reliable database – or Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platform, the fact is that this data can quickly become outdated if you are not on top of it. It can get lost in all the activity around your business. This article is just a reminder for all of us who are running a business and juggling all that we need to do to become and stay successful. Your CRM should be considered the central information point for every activity with a client or lead that your business is involved with. You need to enforce the use of the CRM – regularly, run reports on the data collected in the CRM – regularly, and train your staff to use the CRM to ensure the data within it is clean and consistent – regularly!
So what is clean data?
Put simply, clean data is current, complete and accurate data (information). It means that your sales staff are in touch with their accounts, they know who is doing what, and they are recording it within the CRM.
Why should you care if the information in your CRM is up to date?
You should care because people move on. They move on from your team or your business, they move on from your client’s business. You and your future team need to rely on the CRM to ensure you have the correct information, regardless of who is dealing with the client from your team. You invest a lot of time and money in obtaining those precious leads so it makes a lot of sense to invest a little bit more to ensure that the information is kept up to date, entered in a consistent manner and is not duplicated.
You should care because unreliable information in your CRM will:
- Cause confusion
- Lead users to refrain from using the CRM
- Prevent you from forward planning
- Prevent you from analysing
- Send a message to your clients that your business doesn’t care what they have to say to you
- Give you worthless reports
The benefits of having clean data are that it gives clarity to your users, allows for accurate reporting and provides the ability to plan for future business growth and achievable targets. That is why I love clean data and so should you. If you haven’t the time or skills to do the housework on your CRM, consider hiring someone skilled in this area. It takes my VA very little time to run the reports on a regular basis and correct anything before it becomes too big to manage. Liz Parker manages a team of experienced VA’s through her company VA Placements. Contact her CRM specialist Kerryn Sonnet from Virtually There for help with maintaining the integrity of your data and CRM.
