When you take the time to survey your customers and really listen to what they have to say, you want to make that survey data work for you.

One way to do this is to integrate your survey with your CRM (Client Relationship Management) tool.

Why is this important? It helps you get your survey data into the right place while it’s at its most valuable. Survey integration with your CRM helps you improve your sales.

In this article, we look at how to integrate survey results into your CRM. First, let’s look more at the CRM.

The Customer Relationship Management Tool

Your CRM helps you build solid and successful relationships with your current customers as well as your potential ones.

You probably already know there are many ways to use your CRM software to your benefit. Yet, perhaps something is missing.

This is where the survey comes in. Your CRM is only as successful as the quality of information stored in its database.

You also know that one of the best ways to learn what your customers and your leads want and need is through a survey. Even more, you know that data isn’t worth much unless you first analyze it and then act on it.

When you import your survey data into the CRM, you add your valuable results, so you can use the information to further market to your customers and prospects in the most effective manner possible.

Your survey software and your CRM complement one another. This integration lets you combine multiple pieces of information about your customers into one system.

This in turn makes it easier for you to grow your business by managing the customer relationship in one place.

Now, lets look at the ways you can use the integration.

Work with Your Personas

Buyer personas are semi-fictional representations of what your ideal customer looks like based on market research and real-time data of your current customers.

Personas help you create and deliver a better marketing strategy. They provide you a clear picture of the type of person who would be interested in doing business with you. Creating buyer personas helps you target the right people at the right time.

Your surveys can help you uncover the following information to create better buyer personas:

• Demographic info
• Behavioral data and patterns
• Geographic information
• The purchasing process of certain groups of people
• Customer profiles

When you take this survey data and add it to your CRM, you have very specific buyer personas and can create marketing strategies to meet their needs.

In other words, you can execute marketing strategies based on the customer profiles or buyer personas that you create from your survey data.

You’ll also boost your sales in the process.

Improve Customer Service

One of the most important markers of your success as a business is your Net Promoter Score.

When you provide the best customer care, you encourage customer loyalty and retention. You also have brand ambassadors who’ll share their good dealings with your business to their family and friends.

Integrating your CRM with your survey results allows you to get better data on your Net Promoter Score in relation to your customer transactions and interactions.

When you integrate, you can use your Net Promoter Score (NPS) survey results in your CRM to:

• Trigger an automated response for follow-up with your customers
• Ask customers who gave you a favorable NPS to give you a Google review
• Reach out to customers who rated you negatively on the NPS survey immediately. This helps you preempt any negative online reviews they might have and turn the situation around.

Learn More About Current Customers

If you want to run a successful business, it pays to listen to your customers.

By sending a survey, you’ve already shown a willingness to do just that. You’ve given your customers a voice and invited them to share their experience with you.

They are able to respond positively or negatively. They can tell you more about what they want and need. They can tell you about their negative experiences in a non-threatening forum.

When you ask your customers what they think and integrate your survey data into your CRM, you learn the following information:

• What makes your customer stay with your business
• How to retain your customers
• What encourages their loyalty
• More about their needs and desires
• Description of your target market
• Minimize the chance of negative online feedback because you handle it as it comes in

With this integration, you can rest assured that your CRM has the most up-to-date information about your customers.

You can also learn more about the customer’s journey with your business and then create surveys to match the journey.

Maximize the Moment

Sometimes it can be hard to know the exact right time to make a customer contact to make the sale.

But, when you use your surveys to learn more about your customers, you can use the survey data and your CRM to get the right information in front of particular customers at just the right time.

For example, you send out a survey to your leads and ask them what products or services they want to learn more about.

Once the survey is returned, you can trigger just the right automated email string.

Final Thoughts

The best part of integrating your survey results into your CRM is the ability it gives you to attract new customers and retain current ones.

This integration helps you facilitate a long-term relationship with your customers by providing the data you need for personal marketing.

You’ll find that by integrating your survey results into your CRM, you have smart data to make even smarter decisions.

Your feedback and your marketing opportunities come full circle because you have all of your information in one system.

You know the value and potential value of a wide range of customer types based on their survey data.

Above all, survey and CRM integration help you connect the dots for the most informative picture of current and potential customers. (tweet this)

Surveys help you make the best decisions for your business. Are you ready to get started with your free Survey Town trial? Start with your free account today, and you can upgrade at any time.

Image:  Domenico Loia on Unsplash