An integral part of a company’s customer relationship management (CRM) program is now typically Sales Force Automation (SFA) with full sales lead tracking integration. Other elements that may be included are order management, product information and even sales forecasting. An important part of a well designed system is company wide integration among all departments assuring that customer contact will be consistent and not duplicated.

The integration of sales force automation tools creates the following benefits for the marketing and sales departments, as well as management:

Advantages for Sales People

- Sales people can fill-in prepared e-forms and transmit information over the intranet saving a great deal of time and reducing the amount of record keeping.

- When answering customer questions and objections sales people have greater access to important customer information and better communication and co-operation between departments.

- Because of better follow-up and better customer information the rate of closed sales is increased.

- A well designed system can be used as an effective training device providing sales staff with product information and training in sales techniques.

- Using preset campaigns sales leads can be automatically generated increasing the sales person’s available selling time.

Advantages for the Sales Manager

- Sales results and other reports are automatically produced eliminating the need to gather and tabulate data. This means that activity reports, productivity tracking and other sales information can be provided more frequently giving more hands-on control to the manager.

- Providing sales support materials for the sales staff is made easier.

- Marketing research, such as demographic, psychographic, behavioral data and detecting trends is greatly simplified.

- Coordinating with other departments is easier for the manager.

- The manager's ability to identify the most profitable customers, as well as problem customers is increased.

Advantages for the Marketing Manager

- It is easier to identify target markets and segments within your market developing profiles of your core customers.

- With better customer feedback and departmental input developing new products is easier, as well as developing marketing strategies for each product.

- It is easier to identify company strengths and weaknesses.

- Improved coordination between sales and marketing, providing input to help you monitor and adjust the sales process.

Their are also many strategic advantages to full integration, including increased productivity, reduced costs, increased sales revenue and market share, more current information management, increased customer satisfaction and loyalty, reduced customer acquisition costs and increased profit margins.