Manufacturers improve operations & grow annual revenues 18%

Company News

by   Val Riley

No matter the product type, all manufacturers and manufacturing companies share a common set of operational needs that have to be met for them to reach their business goals, stay competitive, and build long-lasting customer relationships. Platforms for customer relationship management (CRM) play a key role in addressing these needs.

With this in mind, Insightly polled manufacturing customers to learn about their experience and changes observed as a result of implementing Insightly CRM. Questions covered common operational and business areas in manufacturing, from planning and forecasting through production, inventory management, sales, distribution, and customer service.

Below are the key takeaways from 115 manufacturers who completed our anonymous email survey. These insights can help decision-makers and CRM administrators in manufacturing companies to evaluate their own CRM needs and select the right solution.

Questions fell into the following categories:

  • User adoption
  • Productivity
  • Customer insights
  • Return on investment (ROI) and revenue growth

CRM adoption for manufacturers

User adoption, or a process of adopting and using a new CRM by its intended users, is one of the top concerns of any company that’s introducing a CRM to the team for the first time or is switching to a new one. After all, it doesn’t matter how sophisticated and powerful a CRM is if your team finds it hard to adopt and incorporate in their daily work.

Not surprisingly, when asked why they chose Insightly CRM, 57% of survey respondents cited “adoption and ease of use” as one of the most important factors in their decision-making.

But adoption is only the first step in ensuring ROI in any new technology —consistent, frequent, and as-intended usage is what determines its long-term benefits. To that end, 77% of manufacturers reported using Insightly CRM on a daily basis.

CRM productivity for manufacturers

Automating repeatable processes to minimize human error and save time across different workflows and departments is critical to increasing productivity.

In the survey, 42% of respondents reported improvement in “implementing repeatable business processes” and 39% reported overall improvement in employee productivity as a result of using Insightly CRM. 

This is a reflection of workflow automation capabilities of Insightly. It’s how manufacturers can automate complex, multi-step business processes. For example, if you have a standard practice to send email alerts or create/update records once a trigger event happens, Insightly can automate that. It can also generate tasks for others when opportunities are won, and even execute custom business logic to sync external systems from SAP, Oracle, and others.

With this in mind, it’s no wonder why users also reported slashing weekly hours spent on administrative and routine tasks. 

Customer insights from CRM

Since implementing Insightly, 44% of manufacturers surveyed reported having deeper customer insight. The soundness of your business decisions depends on the accuracy, relevance, and timeliness of your customer data analytics. With Insightly CRM, manufacturers have access to a ‘single source of truth’ of all customer data and can see a 360-degree view of each relationship. This results in deeper insights that allow your team to make improvements in customer experience and make solid business decisions.

In the survey, 69% of respondents reported having a more accurate source of information on their customers, sales, and projects as a result of implementing Insightly CRM and 47% reported improvements in both understanding and reporting sales performance. 

CRM ROI and revenue growth for manufacturers

Many organizations fear that a CRM is too expensive and won’t pay for itself over time. If you choose a legacy CRM platform like Salesforce and then need mountains of customizations that require a full-time consultant, that may be true. 

However, Insightly is built to be flexible and is easy to customize and integrate. Manufacturers are typically up and running in just a few weeks. Hear from the team at Sigma about how quickly they got started with Insightly.

Survey respondents also reported 18% annual revenue growth as a result of using Insightly CRM.

The degree to which manufacturers are able to streamline their operations and improve productivity has a direct impact on the quality of their customer and business relationships, ability to scale and, ultimately, grow business.

For more insights and data charts from this survey, download the ebook.

Try Insightly CRM today

If your manufacturing business is growing and spreadsheets are no longer cutting it, it’s a great time to check out Insightly. Start a free trial. Then, choose a plan as you grow. Want a guided tour? Request a personalized demo today.

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