College catalogs offer a wide variety of courses that employ web conferencing, whether for weekly lecture or for Q & A. Companies that don't want expense of sending employees on airplanes and having them stay at hotels in order to receive training on new software, techniques or simply just receive necessary information, can eliminate it with web conferences that will connect their employees to trainers in other cities or states.

Conferences of this type can even unite families who are separated by geography. Students away at colleges, grandparents and parents can meet daily or weekly or just on special occasions.

Communication tools are only as effective as their usage, web conferences bring people closer together, forges stronger business ties and effectively serves as a tool for businesses by lowering entry cost of arranging and attending meetings, making more effective use of time, and being flexible enough to take last-minute changes to agenda in their stride. =========================================================== Find out why web conferencing can slash your companies travel and communication costs. Discover all you need to know about voip, and how to use this breakthro technology. http://www.web-conferencing-101.com/

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• Promised return phone calls not made, and information not sent • Not being informed of possible delays or problems • That call to tell you when your order is ready – promised but not made. • One department in company having no idea what another department said to you in last call or letter. • No one bothering to call to make sure goods arrived, or are satisfactory. Probably no calls at all – until of course they want to sell you something else • No one knowing what they last sold to you – or when • No one knowing enough about you to offer you items or services that would enhance or compliment your purchase. Frequently only one person in company seems to know anything about you! And if they’re not available…?

Overcoming all this takes more than just contact management software.

The Answer What is needed is a change in attitude that extends from shop floor to boardroom. Not easy! It takes something special to initiate such a major change, but once up and running change will feed on its own success.

The CRM solution provides a sophisticated but (and this is important) ‘easy to use’ computer system which monitors all activity with customers, current or potential. Phone, mail, e-mail and fax all link in. Give everyone in your company who deals with your customers access to that system. Link it to word processors, accounts systems, stock control and manufacturing Now you’re starting down right road to achieving your ultimate goal - customers who become Raving Fans.

Your Information Bonus The additional benefit to a company implementing CRM, is far superior tracking of sales and marketing activities. Suddenly it becomes easier to identify most effective sources of business. i.e. • which Mailshots worked best • which sector provides your best business • how many leads turn into actual sales

All this information makes running your company so much easier. Your Sales Manager will also benefit considerably from being able to see sales activity and ratios more clearly. He will probably produce most accurate sales forecast you have ever seen!

Conclusion So, should you try to implement CRM or just stick with contact management? That depends on what you want to achieve. If your aim is to look after your customers to best of your ability, keep those customers, and tower head and shoulders over your competitors, it has to be CRM.

The alternative is to stay with pack and lose, on average, 50% of your customers every 5 years. Can you afford to do that?

Roy Gough Alloy CRM

Helping you keep your customers away from competition

Roy Gough has run and managed businesses for over 30 years. He has experience in finance, automotive, retail, high tech and ecommerce. He uses this knowledge to help businesses to improve their sales and profitability. He currently also sells GoldMine business contact management software, QuoteWerks quotation management tool and Mind Manager the brainstorming and planning tool.

His web site can be found at http://www.alloycrm.com