Lead management: turn Google Gmail into CRM

Today’s internet is clear that Google plays a major role in developing some of the best software out there. Google continues to distinguish itself as a software innovator. If you’re looking to accomplish a personal productivity task, chances are Google has or is working on a solution. The growth of email over the years has brought out the good and bad of the features we like to see when we use our email. Google’s GMail is a great example of leading the way and being the best choice for many users today. Google’s GMail has taken a very mature technology in our email and made us look at how we process, manage and retrieve our electronic communications.

Taking a closer look at a key feature that GMail has potentially addressed is its versatility in creating custom management strategies or processing queries. This flexibility is what makes GMail an ideal platform to use as a personal contact management system or as a simple CRM.

GMail has a contact management?

Contact management is fundamentally a system that helps a salesperson quickly identify new leads, make contact, and manage follow-up.

You inherently get the communication tool, email. Leveraging the power of Google search, tagging, and filters, you gain management of those communications. It is very likely that you are using a CRM, such as ACT! or Goldmine, you are using a lot of email-like features, but you still need to leave that app to use email as well.

Time is money, so you don’t want to waste time bouncing between multiple apps. So why not stay in your email app?

Import and management of contacts

One of the fundamental roles of your CRM is to capture and manage your contacts. Your sales system needs to easily onboard your leads and customers into the system, reference them quickly, and manage updates efficiently.

GMail does each of these tasks exceptionally well. Whether you’re exporting contacts from Outlook, Apple Mail, or uploading a GMail contact spreadsheet, it makes it easy. If you already have your contacts in a web-based email or social networking system like Yahoo! Mail or LinkedIn is even easier just sign in and click.

Creation of a sales prospecting system

Now that you have all your contacts in GMail, Google search becomes a powerful prospecting tool. Are you looking for a person in a particular company? Do you need the entire SVP or senior marketing executives? Do you need everyone in the health sector? All of these types of prospecting questions are easily answered and your database is segmented with GMail.

Most importantly, using GMail as a contact management system puts all of these prospects at your fingertips and ready to contact.

Real-time internet lead generation management

GMail also has great features for managing internet lead generation in real time. By combining the power of filters, tags, and actions, you can immediately prioritize and queue leads however you see fit.

Filters allow you to create complex rule sets for specific types of emails. This can allow you to:

* Highlight (ie stand out) emails coming from potential customer sources
* Tag different lead sources
* Filter them into specific groups for tracking

You can take this contact prioritization and management system a step further by using GMail’s latest multi-inboxes to create sales lines and queues.

Prioritize with the new GMail task list

Of course, no sales management system would be complete without a to-do list. GMail has a simple yet elegant to-do list. Not only can you create your TODO schedule and you can turn emails and correspondence into follow-up tasks and reminders.

Also, don’t forget to use Google Calendar to schedule and keep track of appointments.

Integration of social media tools

Ultimately, sales is about engaging with people. Few technology concepts have helped sales engage customers as directly as social media.

With Google’s robust GoogleTalk, built into GMail, you can bring all your social media streams as well as your email conversations. Again, turning all this communication into a searchable prospecting database.

There is no doubt that the features of GMail to use as users are much more than just an email application. GMail can be your personal CRM or Google contact management software.