Microsoft Dynamics 365 for SMB Manufacturers

Manufacturers are always on the lookout for ways to improve their products and supply chains. However, efficiently building quality goods isn’t enough to drive business. If buyers don’t know about your products, how will they be purchased? No matter how well your merchandise is made, it won’t attract customers without an in-depth understanding of consumer demand, quality customer service and smart sales and marketing strategies.

Simply put, CRM is the key to gaining the crucial insight required to get your products sold. But small to mid-size manufacturers remain skeptical. Unsure of whether it’s worth the price tag and hassle of implementation, too many manufacturers do without CRM and its necessary tools. Fortunately, CRM and other enterprise software platforms have become increasingly available to the midmarket.

Case in point: Microsoft Dynamics 365. At a competitive price, Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM delivers everything you need to know about clients and leads via a functional interface, making it a must for small to mid-size manufacturers. Below, we’ll explain how an investment in CRM will boost your profits and provide a sizable return on your investment.

Analyze Data

In the ongoing customer revolution, consumers have more power than ever to influence the market. The Internet Age has overwhelmed buyers with choices—choices in products, brands, shopping experiences and more. For manufacturers to capitalize on their products within a competitive marketplace and meet growing consumer demands, they need the best tools and data at their disposal. 

Enter CRM, the software that provides a comprehensive view of customer data. Leveraging historical data, Microsoft Dynamics 365’s predictive analytics features anticipate future customer needs, allowing marketing and sales teams to strategize for a more profitable tomorrow. Your business can provide the personalized interactions that customers have come to expect by using your CRM instance to generate quality insights from immense datasets.

Additionally, real-time information enables marketing and sales departments to join forces to identify new clients and improve marketing performance. With process automation and up-to-date data, your business gains an in-depth view of customer needs, empowering you to develop smart approaches to closing deals.

Connect Microsoft Products

As we have said on this blog time and time again, data is useless if it isn’t displayed, analyzed and organized in meaningful ways. For that reason, CRM powerhouses have gone to great lengths to create functional dashboards and offer the capacity for easy customization. Microsoft Dynamics 365’s flexible architecture empowers users to modify the system to align with their specific needs. Plus, the dominance of Microsoft products makes the CRM solution a familiar platform for many users, enabling faster adoption.

However, the area in which Microsoft Dynamics 365 is head and shoulders above competing CRM vendors is in its connectivity with other Microsoft products.  Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft Office 365, Skype for Business, Power BI—all this and more can be integrated with your CRM to streamline processes. Such easy connectivity consolidates your most crucial data at your fingertips.

With the 2016 purchase of LinkedIn, Microsoft can also sync information from LinkedIn profiles into Microsoft Dynamics 365. This saves employees time as they view a prospect’s activity right from their CRM instance and even save leads from LinkedIn into their records. If your business already depends on a number of Microsoft platforms, Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM is the missing piece you need to efficiently drive sales.

Wrap Up

There’s still one major concern about CRM that we haven’t covered: the implementation process. Many manufacturers fear that implementation projects will take up considerable time and require a massive amount of coding and software expertise. Fortunately, experienced consultants eradicate a lot of that hassle, providing implementations without any coding or stress on your end.

As a certified partner of not only Microsoft Dynamics 365 but also Salesforce, Datix possesses rare insight into both top CRM vendors. We can help you decide which CRM is right for your unique business needs and offer the expertise to implement enterprise software on your schedule and on your budget. Furthermore, using our Unity integration solution, we can seamlessly connect your CRM and ERP software to form a single source of truth. 

Ready to deliver optimal customer service and win more leads? Reach out to Datix’s premier CRM consultants to learn more about the exciting advantages of CRM for small to mid-size manufacturers!

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