CRM Internal messaging versus integrated email solutions

October 17, 2020
Bill Southerland
success@hotprospects.com

Immediately what comes to mind is integrating smtp and pop servers with customized email solutions so everyone can login to one place for everything. Well the truth, is that some things are left better alone. Email is nowhere near reliable when compared to the success rate of an internal database.

Emails constantly are getting stuck in queues, lost in a network routing accident, deleted by “mistake”, and filtered to hell and back again. Not that email should be ruled out, but it certainly shouldn’t be weighted as heavily for a solution as we’ve seen in terms of reliability and usefulness over time. There was a time when we were trying to minimize the number of interfaces we log into through-out the day.

When we look at internal messaging to notify other users on the same system, the message delivery system is measured in milliseconds, not minutes. And although users can still attach the message to an email, the storage and delivery of the message internally is much faster and much more reliable.

The technology for importing and managing emails from within a CRM is still too slow and cumbersome resulting in a much more involved build out in order to accommodate most user’s needs. However, pushing CRM data out to these systems (emails, SMS, iCal etc) should be utilized and leveraged. The time, energy, and money it costs to integrate other software into your CRM process can be far more detrimental than it is helpful in the long run.

A simplified but effective approach on CRM communication is usually the winning solution.

  • Internal messaging with the ability to send copies as outbound emails.
  • Send messages to internal groups, individual employees, and additional emails not within the system.
  • Tie in a tracking system with the ability to see who has opened the message.
  • Allow others to see who else was on the list and who else has seen the message.
  • Allow the receiver of the message the ability to convert the message into a lead.
  • Keep a running history of the previous messages sent out and allow them to be reused.

 

It’s important to weigh the cost and effort to implement these types of solutions vs. how the solutions are going to be utilized. It may make perfect sense to integrate a third-party email system into the platform, but many cases, that can be far less effective and far more costly in the long term. The question to really consider is. What does the user gain by having this integration? and Is the cost and maintenance worth that gain?

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